Tag Archives: Cross Country

Winter training

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I haven’t posted for quite some time since race season wrapped up. Over the last 4 months I have been working on rest, and rebuilding to gear up for 2013 race season. I have cut my mileage down and starting to build a solid base for my half ironman this summer!

My training schedule right now is….

Monday – Bike 30-60 minutes
Tuesday – Swim 2 or 2.5 km and Run 4-8Km
Wednesday – Bike 30-60 minutes
Thursday – Swim 2 or 2.5Km and Run 5-8Km
Friday – Bike 60 minutes and Run 5-6Km
Saturday – REST DAY!
Sunday – Bike 90 minutes and run 7-15Km

I have set some parameters around my run training the minimum I am running 4Km and maximum 15Km until march 1st. Then March 1st my heavy training schedule starts to start building for half iron and a few ultras I am doing this year.

Set 2013 race schedule

April

  • Wed night races

May

  • 5 Peaks terwillegar
  • Blackfoot Ultra
  • Wed night races

June

  • No races just traininggggggg

July

  • Sinister 7
  • Sylvan lake half ironman

August

  • 5 Peaks chickacoo
  • MAYBE Edmonton marathon

September

  • Coaching starts for OOKs
  • 5 peaks Devon

Well that’s it that’s all for now. It has been pretty chilly here and super slippery so lots of my longer runs have been moved on to the deadmill. Party rock. NAWT.

Little pups feet and mine going for a winter zoom

Mine and little pups feet going for a winter zoom

Just bike training away

Just bike training away – sweating bullets

2012 race season is a wrap

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Well it’s officially over; with one exception of a charity turkey trot at the end of October.
I haven’t posted for a long time; life just got so busy so fast. Last thing I posed about was Sinister 7 – an amazing race.

For the month of August I only raced 5 peaks Chickacoo. This is one of my favorite of the 5 peaks series; this year not so much because I had bronchitis. In pure Teagan style I told Jesse I wasn’t going to race and would just come support him; as we are driving down the little road in to the park I said fuck it. I can’t let you race and me sit there. SO I ate an Aleve, Tylenol day cold and sinus and used tigerbalm as Vicks on my neck to help me breathe. This concoction of drugs made my race a bit wonky noodles I thought my head was going to explode pounding down some of the hills but I finished dead lungs and all!

There I am dying at the top of the huge hill.

 

September started along with the Wednesday night series my personal fav. I couldn’t race the whole season this year due to a compressed disc in my back. Some days are good days and some are bad days so that went along with racing. My back acted up for all of September and in to October when I was supposed to run the Grizzly Ultra 50K. Looking back I shouldn’t have tried to race at all but I am stubborn and have a hard time taking no for an answer.

So October came and we headed down to Canmore to race; I was ready to go had a bunch of Aleve in my hydration pack and said its go time. Deep down I knew I wouldn’t be able to finish it my back just couldn’t take 50K of trail pounding. I started the race and felt good my first 10K were stellar I was right on pace for my projected 6 hour finish and things were good to go. Then at about 11k things started to fall apart I felt my low back start to swell and my knee seize from pinched nerves. I started to walk the hills and had an internal mind fight about if I should continue or not. I realized I just couldn’t put my body in the position of further pain. I decided to take it easy for the last 3K in and enjoy myself. I came through transition and went to our gear tent to grab some race food and my poles. I knew I shouldn’t keep going but I started to head out on leg two – as I started to head out I stopped and turned around and came back in. Probably one of the smartest and hardest decisions I have ever made I HATE to quit. I went to our gear tent dropped my pack, and poles and realized I had to turn over my timing chip and pull. That was hard to say out-loud that I couldn’t go any further because I was hurt. All in all it was a great experience and a well run race. It taught me a lesson or two also.

Grizzly Ultra 50K

After Grizzly I came back and finished off the Wednesday night races; I usually was in the top 10 in my age category which isn’t too bad for being hurt. Now racing season is over it is time to reset and ease off the distance for a while and keep up the solid and effective workouts. I am spending more time on my road bike and in the pool. Next year I will be doing Ironman Calgary 70.3 on top of my usual trail and ultra races! Pretty dang pumped.
Well that is all for now!

The summer post sin 7

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After Sinister 7 this year my body gave me a giant F you. My legs were tired and I felt completely depleted; the week post Sin I ran 40km when I should have been resting this also did not help my cause. So I decided not to sign up for Merriot Duathlon (where I wanted to get top 3 to apply for Tri Canada POO) and not to sign up for the St.Albert Tri and not to do the Edmonton half marathon. I really wanted to do the St.Albert Tri and the Merriot Duathlon this year because I have been putting lots of km on my road bike and in the pool since Sin ruined my legs and I mixed up my training. Two years ago when I did the St.Albert Tri-a-tri I got second so I really wanted to come back and push hard in the Sprint – however there is always next year and the year after that! Next year I will for sure I am going to race a Duathlon qualifier.

For the last few weeks I have been running 30km/week and a minimum of 30-50km on my bike! I even had a 35km road bike business meeting; it was awesome minus the fact I couldn’t clip out fast enough at one spot and ate poo during a meeting so embarrassing. On the long weekends Jesse and I always go to Jasper so of course we were there August long! We hiked/ran Whistlers with Chocolate his first big hike and did all the normal stuff. I got a few good runs in while we were there and our puppy thinks camping in the bomb diggity because the tent is a giant snooze pillow and he thinks deer should be his best friend.

Snoozing in the tent.

On our hike. Someone is more interested in the birds.

So pretty. Whistlers.

Things are finally back to normal this weekend we are going to the cabin, next weekend we race 5 Peaks Chickacoo one of our favorites minus Devon which is the BEST ONE EVER; and then we will be back in Jasper for September long with our best friends and their new puppy. Him and Chocolate are becoming the best of friends.

Then from there we are back to September, which for me is the busiest time of my life; because I work in a post secondary and I start coaching cross country again. I have tailored my training to cross country specific now, last week was my first week back training specific XC and it was awesome. My fastest 5km time was 24 minutes so I am very pleased and my 30×1 w/ 1 intervals went really well. I will be training XC specific with a mix of ultra training thrown in there (Sunday LONG runs) because on October long I will be soloing the Grizzly Ultra 50km with Jesse and our best friends will be there to cheer us on and help with our pup. Love them AND we get to have a big thanksgiving together.

Anyways back to zooming; MY FAVORITE race series of all time starts in a few weeks the Frank McNamara Wednesday night races – fall races are much harder than spring but they are awesome because all the post secondary teams run them so there its lots of people and I get to run with my team! This will be my 5th year of Franks races between all the members in my family including Josie we have a bizillon franks shirts!

I was looking in to doing Canada Pentiction Ironman next year but it is just too much money right now because we want to buy a house and on top of our normal warm holidays registration alone for the full iron = one week in Mexico; so I am thinking of doing Canada Calgary Half Ironman and my dad and I are doing the 175km Tour de’l Alberta 175km together because he road bikes also!

That is all for now and remember to eat healthy because;

hahahaha too funny I had too!

2011 Goodlife Fitness Victoria Marathon

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This thanksgiving Jesse and I spent the weekend in Victoria. For 2 reasons; 1) to visit my best friend and 2) run the Goodlife Fitness Victoria 1/2 marathon.

This was an amazing race and a good personal race for myself. The course was fast but not flat. There was enough elevation change to make it interesting for a road marathon. I decided to run this race by doing 10 and 1′s. This is running 10 minutes walking one and staying diligent to this regardless of feeling great or shitty. After the first 10 minutes it took all of my will power to stop and walk for a minute. My course goal was under 2 hours or 2 hours flat. I ended up running a 2:04, which was 4 minutes off my goal and finished in the top 50% of my age category.

None the less I was really happy with this time for a few reasons,

  • I have been having horrid stomach problems as of late
  • I have been training for XC and trail exclusively

In retrospect I could have run a 2 hour for sure.

The day before the race I did a 4 km prep run out onto the breakwater and along Dallas road; it was awesome and a good warm up to elevation change. But for some reason my Garmin decided not to record that run; it has been doing that every so often.

There were 6000 people in the half marathon it took me about 5 minutes to get over the mats to start the race and then I had to do some heavy recon to pass a crap load of people to get in good position. My first 10km was done in about 55 minutes so my split time was really off; this is what pisses me off because I didn’t push out the last half properly. I slowed down on 2- 10 minute sets, which I think cost me that extra time. However it was a great race environment and a well organized course. Aid stations were positioned perfectly and they had a TON of volunteers helping out. Kudos to them. The finish of the race was great the finish shoots were easy to get around and then the food was right there! Next year we will be going back to Victoria to run this again or might go to Kelowna to spice it up. This defiantly will not be the last time I run this marathon.

In other news – The Wednesday night races come to a finish next Wednesday. Always sucks because they are so fun. On Sunday I am running the 5 mile in the Mustard Seed Fall Classic. My legs have been like cement the last few days after the 1/2 and training runs have not been stellar to say the least. Hopefully they can pull it together for Sunday. Ooks race this weekend in Camrose so I will be out there coaching. It will be a bittersweet day because Camrose is my FAVORITE XC course of all time and I have run so well on it; but it is exciting to watch other people compete and enjoy it. I may or may not take them on a run through of the course before the race so I get to run a bit of it!

Photo from Victoria – The best suffer face ever! I am also too cheap to buy them so I take screen shots!

Franks Wednesday Night Races Fall 2011

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Yesterday the 2011 Wednesday night races kicked off again!

Fall 2011. The first race is at hawerluk park and is a 5km XC. This was honestly the worst race I have competed in all year time/running wise. Much worse than my previous years on this same track, same day. It was also 31 degrees outside because in our lovely city Edmonton summer falls in the first week of September when NO ONE has holidays.

Anyways long story short my ruined shoulder/ collar-bone started to act up and cramped up my neck my shoulder girdle and down my armpit at about 2.5km and my time plummeted.

I really found that LSD pavement training for the Edmonton marathon really hurt my XC pacing etc. Which, is to be expected but I have been clocking a ton of kms and hills but I need that short quick XC power back. I am back on a strict XC training schedule for the next few weeks here; still pumping in LSD runs once a week since it will be half-marathon time again in early October. I ran 4 km in 20 min flat today in the heat so I am moving back in the right direction.

The Ooks are up and kicking in full force now the first grand prix is this Saturday at Goldstick with the deadly Esso hill all Edmontonian runners love/dread.  I may even enter and run as an open. It will be the first time ever I race an ACAC grand prix as an open runner and not as a registered college athlete. OR the first race I don’t race at all and just coach. Exciting but kind of crazy!

Anyways next blog next Wednesday it’s the Emily Murphy 8km XC!

Why XC is awesome.

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The other day I was flipping through things on urbandictionary.com when I typed in cross country I got back some of the funniest and best definitions EVER. Below are some of my favorite definitions people posted!

“A sport which is superior to every other sport, because you need talent, and endurance to stand up to the challenge. AND you hafta be a crazy ass mofo to do it, like me.”

We are crazy people.

“Cross Country is thuggin. It requires long hours of training to be great but the cross country ladies are hot as hell so its worth it.”

Hell yes XC girls are babes.

“Cross country is a fucking hard core sport for real athletes who dont enjoy rolling around in the mud with other men (football). Often get shit from other pussy sports players like sprinters and football players. Have a lot of endurance and stamina and there are also girls involved. Cross Country runners also get called gay for wearing short shorts but they never participate in spirited games of grabass such as football players. Put simply, cross country is kick ass.”

The shorts are bad ass

“Cross country is a sport that is often disliked by individuals who dislike the fact that it requires more dedication and will than any other sport.”

Fact.

“Best sport ever, probably the only sport worth participating in because the players and coaches aren’t redneck douche bags.”

HAHAHA

“The most confusing sport in the whole world. You run four miles thinking you are going to die and hate every second of it, then as soon as you finish and catch your breath you think, ‘Damn that was fun! Can’t wait till next week’s race!”

True Fact.

I could actually put a million of these definitions in this post; every one of them makes me laugh. So the general consensus?

  1. Cross country girls are total babes
  2. It’s really hard
  3. Cross country folk are crazy
  4. Have to train a lot
  5. Cross country runners are totally GANNNGGSSTTAAAAA
Document definitions taken from: (2010). In Urban Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2010, from http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=cross%20country&defid=950899