Michael & Liz are Bloggable

Well we're only 6 days away from the marathon now and I must say that I'm no longer confident about the race. My 8 mile run yesterday and 5 mile run this morning felt like I hadn't been training at all. Granted it is crazy hot and I didn't run them as early in the morning as I should have, but it just felt uncomfortable and to be completely candid, my lower abdominal pain is not gone. In fact it's actually feeling worse now than it was during my 22 mile run 2 weeks ago. I'm never one to go to the doctor for anything, but Liz may convince me to go if it's not gone in a couple weeks.

I guess a consolation is the fact that Liz isn't feeling as confident about her race either. Her runs have gone just like mine, she destroyed her run 2 weeks ago but struggled last week and this week. So unfortunately we are both feeling nervous and anxious. I say that's a consolation because I have the utmost confidence in her ability to go out and destroy her race, so what makes me think I can't do the same? 

Regardless of how I'm feeling now, there's no turning back or improving at this point. I've done what I've done and I have to accept that. I don't expect fist pumping happiness at the end of this race, which is sad because I've trained harder this time than any other race. As of Saturday, I will have run over 660 miles in 2011, so you can see why I have unrealistically high expectations for this race considering how much effort I've put into it

Well with Saturday's race, one goal ends and another will begin. I started the year at 187 and now I'm down to about 176. I've decided no more races or training until I'm at my goal weight of 160,  because after all, that was my "Operation Reese Cup" New Year's Resolution.  I always try and use races and training as a means for weight loss, but this time I'm doing it the other way around. I so badly want to keep training and racing but it's difficult to lose weight that way.

My original goal for Operation Reese Cup was to lose the weight by May, well that didn't quite happen so the deadline has been extended.

To accomplish this goal I'm going to start back up with P90X. It really seemed to do the trick 2 years ago when I tried it the first time and I want to try it again. Last time I made it 11 weeks before stopping, so hopefully I can make it all 90 days.

Once I hit 160, I'll set a new marathon goal and start training again. I would love to make this race my next goal, but we've traveled too much in the last year and another trip may be too much. We'll see, there's plenty of local races to run as well.

On top of my 160lb. goal, Liz has created a challenge for me in July that will assist me in my goal. I will blog about that separately though because I don't feel like writing a novel here.

Well ever since we (more appropriately, I) ruined our cabinets, Liz and I have started a little game. It's called, "which cabinet did you ruin today?" Every time I'm in the kitchen now, I pull off a piece of laminate from the kitchen cabinets. The other day I came home from work and just cracked up laughing because Liz had pulled a major piece off of a lower cabinet. This slow-processed-renovation is turning out to be awesome. Check out Liz's handy work:

Now all those little pieces of laminate that used to annoy me, instead of avoiding them, when I pull out a drawer or cabinet door, I use a lot of force and hold on tight! This is a really fun game because the normal operating procedure is to be careful with delicate things like laminate cabinets pealing. That's not how it is anymore bub! Here's completed the work on these two cabinets.


This is actually super exciting because I really believe that after we get all the pealing laminate crap off the doors and drawers, we'll be able to paint these cabinets white and make them look very very nice. It's crazy how easy the laminate peals off. All you need is a putty knife and a few minutes of your time. Although all this destruction and renovation may motivate us to get new countertops. One step at a time though because like I said, I don't really care what things look like.

We've made it well known to many people that we hate our kitchen cabinets. They are an ugly color and even more frustrating is the fact that the laminate continues to chip away. Let me show you what I mean. Here are our ugly cabinets:

And here is a picture of the hideous chipping that goes on with them. Literally every single cabinet has chips just like these in them. I am not willing to touch-up or improve laminate cabinets that are already hideous in the first place. Let the chips fall where they may with these pieces of junk, I'm not going to improve them. 


So while making toast this morning, my frustration got the best of me and I decided to give the chipping cabinets a little assistance. This action took me about 3 seconds in one fell swoop. Needless to say, Liz was a little shocked when she came downstairs. To be honest, I think she had a burning excitement inside that was masked by her "I can't believe you did that" shock. She may hate the cabinets more than I do, so to see me give in to my spontaneity was exciting to her.  


Our plan has always been to strip the cabinets of the laminate, paint them white, and put some knobs and miscellaneous hardware on them. It's a pretty cheap way to renovate some terrible looking cabinets. But that plan was supposed to happen all at the same time.

I think what Liz wanted to avoid was months and months of the kitchen looking awful and completely destroyed when guests come over. My opinion is that I don't care what people think. It's not like we're living on straw beds with pigs in poop. We can do what we want with what we have and if people don't like it, then who cares. That's why we've gone 3 years with 3 holes in the carpet that the dogs dug up. The holes don't bother me and I am not going to spend a fortune on new carpet to avoid some sort of embarrassment from our carpets having holes. The conversations usually go like this "What's with the holes in your carpets?"... "Puppies, what are ya gonna do?!" In fact, I don't think I've ever posted their handiwork, each one is a little larger than a quarter:


So, this may have been a little spontaneous, and like the title states, a little impromptu, but soon we will be working to rectify the ridiculous chipping that continues to wreak havoc in our kitchen. We soon may have more cabinets that look just like the one I destroyed this morning, that is if my curiosity and proactiveness gets the best of me.

We didn't watch too many movies in May seeing as all our shows were wrapping up, but we managed 7 movies and 2 TV seasons. There are a couple movies below that I ruin in my reviews. More specificallly, "Fracture" and "Knowing". Lots of really good movies though, looks like only 1 below average one.

• The Switch (2010) - 4 stars - The plot of this movie is completely silly, but if you get past that, it was cute and enjoyable. 
• Fracture (2007) - 4 stars - This movie mad me very angry up until the last 2 minutes. I was waiting for redemption and justice. I started thinking it wouldn't come... but it did, as usual with most movies. 
• Parenthood: Season 1 (2010) - 5 stars - This show is freakin' awesome. I didn't think I'd enjoy it. I can't think of any other drama similar to it that I've enjoyed in the past. The characters are endearing, the comedy is subtle and sarcastic, and the story lines are realistic. I highly recommend it!! It's still currently airing on NBC, starting it's 3rd season this Fall. We can't wait until season 2 comes out on DVD. 
• The King's Speech (2010) - 4 stars - It's very clear why Colin Firth got an Oscar as the best actor. He did a phenomenal job for sure. I gave it 4 instead of 5 stars because it was kinda slow and boring at times. I don't think the movie was worthy of it's Oscar for Best Picture, but it was still good. 
• Knowing (2008) - 3 stars - This movie was really intriguing and great up until the last 10 minutes. I'm about to ruin the movie for you. It is a total cop out for a movie to be well constructed, intriguing, and mysterious, and then for aliens to be introduced as the explanation for everything. I mean SERIOUSLY!? That also happened in the last Indiana Jones movie, and it's just pathetic. Whoever wrote this movie needs to try a little harder. 
• The Sorcerer's Apprentice (2010) - 2 stars - Not a whole lot to say about this movie, I never bought into what the plot was dishing out. Just was silly and boring. 
• Salt (2010) - 4 stars - I'm not a huge Angelina Jolie fan, but she kicked major butt in this movie. There were also 4 or 5 complete plot shifts that made it difficult to figure out what was actually happening in the movie, which was really cool.
• Without Limits (1998) - 4 stars - I love me some sports movies. This was the second Prefontaine movie I have seen and I think it beats the other one (named "Prefontaine"). I just remember Prefontaine being somewhat depressing and not uplifting. I felt like this movie really did a better job of telling Pre's story (assuming historical accuracy). 
• Merlin: Season 2 (2008) - 5 stars - This show is very silly and predictable but I love it. The characters are just so likable and the story lines are intriguing. I also don't know what it is about movies about ancient Rome or English Kingdoms or medieval times, but I love them. 

Today was the first week of the step down towards the marathon which required a long run of 12 miles this weekend. I definitely didn't prepare for this 12 mile run the same way I did last week for the 20 mile run.

Last Friday I ate healthy and drank 200 ounces of water before the 20 mile run. Yesterday I did basically the opposite. I had some pretty unhealthy food, ate way too much, and drank only 20 ounces of water all day. In fact I had a couple beers last night which tends to dehydrate you. It might not have been the best idea considering it was high 70's and pretty humid this morning, which is much different from last weekend's cool temperature!

Today's terrible run reflected my terrible preparation. When I had 5 miles left, I felt like stopping and I had almost nothing left in the tank. I pushed through it and ended up finishing with a dreadful time (relatively) considering how much I had to stop and walk. To be honest, I didn't prepare well on purpose. I figured that it would verify that good preparation is the key to my success. I also felt like I needed to push myself and there's no better way than running when tired and dehydrated. I'm not disappointed at all by the bad run. I feel like last weekend reflects my true fitness level and I'm confident I'm going into the marathon in really good shape.

Next week I have my last long run of 8 miles. You better believe I'll be preparing like crazy for it to make sure I knock it out of the park.

Bear with me... this is a long post. If you want a synopsis, just read what's in bold.

This weekend is the biggest weekend in our race training schedule. It's the last and longest run before our races, 20 miles for me and 12 miles for Liz. I've had to run 20 miles twice before in the training, but obviously the last one is supposed to feel the best. The plan was to run early early Saturday morning so as to avoid the stupid 90+ degree heat and gross humidity that accompanies it.

If you asked me on Wednesday night if I would be running this weekend, I would have said definitively... no! Wednesday night I played an indoor soccer game and somehow strained my lower ab muscles, the part that's below the waistline. I don't know how it happened, but it hurt so bad that on Thursday I was struggling to walk. Thursday night I was supposed to run 5 miles and play two softball games. I skipped the running, sat out of the first game and played first base in the second so I wouldn't have to move much. I don't know what I did when I hit the ball but I sure wouldn't call it base-running.

So waking up Friday I felt a little better but just sitting up or jogging in place was painful. Needless to say I was nervous about having to run anytime soon. As Friday went on, it was loosening up and I was feeling better but it was clear that I wouldn't be running without pain. So my plan was basically to prepare as much as possible for the run and if I can do it, great, if I can't, then oh well. It's not like I've had great 20 mile runs in this training program so far, so what's another bad one?

Just to back it up a little, Thursday morning Liz went out for a 5 mile run at 6AM and came back absolutely drenched in sweat. Just because it's cooler in the early morning, doesn't mean it's nice out. When she walked in the house, I think her exact words were "it feels gross out there, we better run early Saturday".

That alone was alarming enough that on Friday I just chugged as much water as I could. If I'm going to be running with stomach pain, I need to do everything I can to set myself up for some level of success. I drank my 32 ounce bottle twice throughout the work day and then got cup after cup of water when I got home. For dinner Liz made a MASSIVE pasta meal with garlic bread and we filled ourselves sick. I continued my water drinking ways until I was peeing every 15 minutes the rest of the night. I would estimate I drank roughly 200 ounces of water on Friday.

The pain in my abs wasn't gone but regardless, Saturday morning we got to the trail at 6AM and went off on our routes as we always do. To our surprise, it wasn't hot or humid at all, in fact it was in the mid-50's and quite cold. My fear of the heat disappeared pretty quick. I started slow, although I didn't want to, because I was just trying to work around the pain and get into my stride. I was hitting a 8:30 to 9 minute mile. The run pretty much felt the same as all my other runs for the first 15 miles. My ab pain subsided to a tolerable level and of course I was tired while running but felt fine and had no problem with the pace.

With a little over 5 miles left, there was a turn around point where I head back to the car. I had already run 15 miles and had finished the most recent 5.5 miles in 47 minutes. This is where the run felt different than the rest. Usually at that point my mindset would be "how far can I make it before I have to start walking?" Swigging some water and chomping on my GU during a short break, I stood there realizing it wasn't a question of whether I could run back to our car, but how fast?

With only 2 miles to go, I was smoking it, running faster than I had been the previous 18. "Should I really stop at 20? I feel way too good to quit now." I sprinted the last couple hundred yards and finished that last 5.25 miles in 40 minutes. I got to where Liz was resting from her run and I was just pumping my fist with excitement. I turned a corner in my training and it felt fantastic. I dropped my belt of bottles and GU and went back out for 2 more miles. I figured, I need to rock a long run, but I also need to push myself and see if this good feeling is what I suspect it was. Although there's no reason to push it too far, so 22 was perfect.

The last 2 miles was exactly what I needed. No pain, no muscle cramps, no spasms, nothing happened except running fast and strong. I ran the last mile in 7 minutes flat and got my confidence back. Even better, I felt like 4 more miles would have been easily achievable. Now I can't wait until the marathon!!

What was different between Saturday and every other long run? I had never taken such a drastic hydration approach to any run before. I was worried about the heat so I drank as much water as possible to prepare. I was worried I overdid it because I actually had to use the bathroom twice on the run and twice in the middle of the night. But it didn't bother me if it helped accomplish my goal.

I must say, I have no worry whatsoever about the marathon anymore. I am going to take the same ridiculous hydration approach during the two days prior to our race and I feel comfortable that it will easily get me through the race. Liz also rocked her 12 mile run and she's going into the half marathon with just as much confidence. It's nice to know our race weekend will be filled with excitement and happiness rather than fear and anxiety.