Birthdays, Races, and Marathons, OH MY!

Alot has happened since my last post...including a bandwagon fall-off. But let's start at the beginning.

March:

Logged some amazing milage each week (about 24 per week with a 9 and 11 mile run mixed in there). Also, found out that both Sandra and I got selected in the random drawing for the Nike Women's Marathon on October 16th in San Francisco!!! *insert training pressure here*

April:

Started out kind of slow, with Sandra's bday on Apr. 9th, a biscuits & friends visit the weekend after that, and my bday on Apr. 24th. Good food, good wine, paper writing, and little recorded milage, that is until the day before my birthday when I did my first half-marathon training run to finish out another year of life...and to prep for the Reno Rock-n-River halfsies!

May:

So I may just snag my post on daily mile for how I felt about running my first half marathon:

This race made me fall in love with races. Great stations, not too hilltastic, and a great PR time...(even though Nike+ screwed up leaving me music-less the last mile and Garmin didn't catch my 0.03mi sprint to the arch, but if you have any doubts, I have the medal to prove it ;D)

It got difficult around mile 7 and then around mile 12 to just keep going, but totally worth it. I sprinted my legs off beating this other girl down the homestretch.

The official half marathon results:

• Time: 2:10:06.4
• Rank (Overall): 604/1158
• Rank (Women Group): 341/795
• Age-Group Ranking (25-29): 68/139

I beat my goal of running it within 2:30 and the even more wishful goal of running it in 2:15 so overall not a bad first half-marathon at all! I'm super proud of myself for that one. Also, here's two photos I snapped, one prior to the race under the big arch and the other of Sandy sprinting towards the finish line with her helmet head of hair (lol).

On the Monday following the HM, I ran a mile just to keep my muscles warm.

Then I didn't run for two weeks. :*(

My excuses: final exams, papers, and a possible case of chronic appendicitis.

Which brings us to May 23 / almost June. Yesterday, I was a complete moron and decided to do lunges to warm up my legs before going for a run, leaving my left knee riddled with a deep, sharp pain that only got worse during the first 0.75 miles of the easy run. I pushed through it (not sure if that was a good or bad idea) and it eased slightly, only to re-intensify after the run and even more this morning. Could it be runner's knee or PFPS?? (amazing acronym btw). I've popped some advil and plan to ice it down if it gets too bad, maybe go for a treadmill run and get an IT band roller. But it has to get better, and soon. I've got several races lined up, including one in a little over two weeks:

• Lake Tahoe Relay: June 11th. I'll be running Leg 5 (below)

• Seattle Rock-N-Roll Half Marathon: June 25th.
• Virginia Beach Rock-N-Roll Half Marathon: Sept. 4
• Nike Women's Marathon: October 11
• Las Vegas Rock-N-Roll Half Marathon: Dec. 4 (running the strip...AT NIGHT!!)

I'll probably add in a few more as time goes on. The Rock-N-Roll series is awesome because they're doing this Heavy Medal Bling thing this year, so that you get additional medals if you run more than one (which clearly we are). Check it out! Super stoked.

That's all for now, off to treadmill it up!