5th Annual Packers Training Camp 5k

This past weekend marked the 5th annual Packers Training camp 5k.  Since I have run this event every year since it started, it was one that I didn't hesitate to sign up for when registration opened.  This is one of 2 times during the year that I know I will get inside Lambeau Field (the other time is each spring with the Cellcom (Half) Marathon or 5k).  This is always a fun race to run and it brings out so many people - why not, when you can run through Lambeau Field.  There have also been times when several of the Packers players were spotted running the course.  A few years ago, I actually ran with Mark Murphy, Packers President and CEO, for a while, but he quickly left me in the dust!

Each year this event has been slightly different... the first few years, it was at 10am.  Now, normally, I don't mind the 10am start, but when you are talking the end of July, by 10am it was always too warm.  I can understand why they went with a slightly later start time - they were looking to make it a family event and a 7am start time is not practical when you are looking to get families together to come out and run/walk.  During the second year, I think it was 85 degrees by the time we finished!  Then they changed the run to the evening.  Last year, this was awesome!  It was unseasonably cooler than the year before - low 60's and cloudy!  It it was not for the bottleneck getting into the stadium, this would have been the first time I broke the 30 minute 5k time.  My official time last year was 30:08.

This year was a little different for my family!  This was the first time that the entire family was participating in the event!  I had a bunch of friends that I was going to be running with, John decided to sign up to walk and Darrin was going to be running with myTEAM TRIUMPH.

Darci, Kim, John and Myself before the start

This year they once again went with the 6:30pm start time and the weather was not as mild as last year.  As it turned out, Matt and I were signed up for wave 2 (7-9 min mile pace) and then Darci & Kim were in wave 3 (9-11 min mile pace), so we headed to our respective corrals while John and Molly headed to their corral with the rest of the walkers.  Darrin was already hanging with the rest of the crew from mTT.  He was running with Captain Tristan and fellow Angel Adrianne this year.  At the time the start gun went off, it was 87 degrees and virtually not a cloud in the sky!  This was going to be brutal.  There was no way that I was going to attempt a 5k PR in these conditions.  Our goal for tonight - not to die!  Ok, and hopefully hit under 35 minutes.

Matt and I waiting at the start line

I would love to say that I had a fabulous race and that I was able to put the heat out of my mind and just run, but that was not the case.  Matt and I started out strong and made it through mile 1 in 9:30.  Unfortunately, that was the only mile that was under 10 minutes.  Shortly after the 1 mile marker, the course begins a long gradual uphill stretch.  I was determined to make it to the top of this hill before I had to walk, but the heat really started to get to me.  I had to stop to walk for a bit.  Thankfully this part of the hill was somewhat in the shade so that helped.  The entire second mile was a combination of walking and running, just trying to survive and not over heat.

The anxious crowd awaiting the start of the race

As we came around one of the last corners, and the stadium was back in front of us, I felt like I was running on near empty.  Matt was my godsend in this race.  He slowed and walked when I had to but yet pushed me to keep going.  He was determined to get me to the finish line, and I am truly grateful for that!  Just before we reached the parking lot back to the stadium, we passed the second water station.  Since I had my Nuun with my in my water bottles, I was ok yet on hydration that way, so I grabbed 2 cups of water and poured them over my head to try and cool of.

Feeling a little more refreshed, it was time for the motivation run through the tunnel and around the field in Lambeau Field.  I pushed that last mile for everything it was worth.  As we ran through the tunnel on the final approach to the parking lot - and the finish line, Matt turned and said "there's the finish - time to kick it in and finish strong"  Normally I would do just that, but today, there was nothing left in the tank.  I pushed with what I had left and we did finish side by side.

Matt and I crossing the turf at the finish line!

I honestly didn't even see the clock as we crossed the finish line.  I had one thing on my mind... I needed to find water and needed to cool off.  Around the corner from the finish, they were handing out medals!  I honestly had forgotten that they were giving out medals this year!  5 year anniversary of the event = medals for all finishers!  OK, that works for me... but I still need water!

Finally I got to the water and kept walking.  After a few minutes of standing in the shade of the food tent I could feel that I was finally cooling off a bit - plus I had dumped half my water on me, instead of drinking it.  That was by far one of the most brutal, warm runs that I have ever done... but I finished!

We may be warm, but we ROCKED that!

We slowly found everyone else in our party - Kim and Darci finished just a few minutes later.  Thankfully by the time we finished, the temps had started dropping so it was not as hot and sticky anymore.  Kim was extremely proud of her first official race medal - smile away Kim - you earned that one! My official time came in at 32:04 - much better than I thought it would have been with how I was feeling out of the course!  All in all, we all agreed that we were happy that we were done, we were happy with what we did and we all needed showers!

Darrin, Adrianne and Captain Tristan!

This race was definitely a challenge but we all kept each other going and got through to the finish!  I am very proud of all of us for encouraging each other to keep going, helping push each other to do our best and celebrate our success at the end!  You guys all rock (and this includes you Jeff for getting the awesome finish line photos!)  I am proud to call each of you my friends and family! Together we can accomplish anything!

What kind of extreme's have you dealt with during your outdoor fitness activities that have pushed you to your limits?  How did you deal with it?  Did it change anything about the way you train?

Super Sunday's Hill Challenge, Renegade Style!

Just one of the may quotes that gets us through our workouts at the gym took us outside from an insanely fun and challenging workout.  Colleen spread the word that she wanted to head out to Bairds Creek/Triangle hill for some hill climbs! She was even bringing some tires with her so that we could make the climbs back up the hill even more of a challenge!  What was I getting myself into?   Better yet, I dragged my son along for the fun! 

View from the top!  Doesn't look too bad...

We knew that we were in for a challenge as the temps we in the high 70's when we got to the part and there were not many clouds to be found to offer any reprieve from the sun.  However we were on a mission to get this workout in before the rain started... we figured that we had a few hours.

But from the bottom of the main hill, it's deadly!

We wasted no time in hitting the hill, letting the tires roll to the bottom on their own... wherever they stopped, that's where you had to pick them up from!  Carrying a tire up this hill was no easy task!  Not carrying a tire?  Ok, then bear crawl up the entire hill! Katelin actually bear crawled up that hill TWICE!

Colleen with 1 tire, Ty bear crawling up the beast of a hill

While the rest of the crew was having fun on this one hill, I decided to take this up a notch and run a few of the other hills in the facility.  Between the tubing hill, small ski/snowboard hills and tow hills, I had plenty of options in front of me!  This is the same park system that is the home of the Run for the Hill of it trail run - my  first 5k trail run that I ever did, (and am running again this fall) so I was anxious to get out and run a few more of the hills!

Ran up and down this beauty at least twice!

After my first loop out to the other hills, I came back to find that the rest of the crew had upped the ante a bit.  The challenges were flying!  they had moved on to hauling 2 tires at a time up the hill!  They were in beast mode!  Colleen was ready for any challenge that Ty threw at her!  If he did it, you bet she was going to give it a try too!

Two tires at a time!  We got this!

But if two tires wasn't bad enough, "how many tires could we carry up the hill?"  That challenge was on!  They started to really live on the wild side and go with 3 tires!  How do you get 3 tires up the hill?  One either around your waist or around your neck and on in each hand!  Colleen decided that she was thankful for hips today.  She was able to actually carry 2 tires around her waist/on her hips and only had to actually CARRY one in her hands.  

Colleen and her 3 tires, climbing the hill with style!

Of course since Colleen accepted and conquered Ty's challenge, he had to do it himself too!  Best part was that when Darrin was helping roll the tires down the hill, he made a point to make sure they were spread out across the bottom of the hill so Ty had to work that much harder to get all his tires in one place to start his climb.  :-)  Then to try and make him work harder, I made a few runs up and down the hill while he was climbing... yeah, I was able to move a little faster with no tires, but my personal rule - no tires, means I have to RUN up the hill.  No walking for this girl!

Ty and I heading up the hill - hurry up Ty!!

Of course, not to be left out of the fun, Jay hit the hill next with his 3 tires!  Spartan training at its best!  These guys are going to rock the Spartan if they keep up training like this!  Thankfully by this time in the afternoon, we started getting more of a breeze, ahead of the incoming rain!  

Jay's hill climb with 3 tires - showing those tires who's boss!

This was by far one of the most entertaining, grueling, challenging afternoons in a long time!  But don't let the tough workout fool you, we had a lot of fun too!  A quote from Colleen on FB "I can neither confirm nor deny but I may or may not have grabbed Ty's tires and tossed them further away from the hill so he had to go father away from the hill to get it back... might have happened once or twice"  All in all,  we had a great time, worked up a good sweat and finished as the dark clouds were rolling in.  In fact, just as we were getting ready to call it an afternoon, I used that cool breeze to my advantage and got a few more hill runs in before we finally finished!

Grab your tire and lets go! Its Beast Mode time!

In the end, between my climbs up and down the tubing hill as well as 2 loops around the rest of the hills, I put in 2.85 miles.  I had 8-9 miles on the training calendar, and this was a great change from the normal run I had planned.   My original plan was to see how many miles I put in during this hill workout and then get out and run the rest of those miles later, but after 15 hill climbs in that 2.85 miles, my legs had other plans for me!

The long run will have to wait!  My legs are done!

So what did you do to challenge yourself this weekend?  What will you try for the first time this week?

1st 10k trail run - Cliffrunner 10k race weekend recap!

Last summer I did my first ever trail run - a 5k just a few miles from home that ended by running up the tubing hill.  This year it was time to up the ante!  The Cliffrunner 10 trail run down at High Cliff State Park was the chosen target. Before this weekend, I had never even set foot in this park and my only views of this park were in pictures that I found online!  I had heard about the massive hill along the trails and I knew that this was going to be a tough course!

The first of our weekend adventures!

Saturday morning, after a tough 8am circuit workout at Fitness Renegades, Darci and I met up with Robin and we headed to the campground!  Some awesome friends of mine offered up their camper to me for the weekend so that we would not have to drive all the way from Green Bay on Sunday morning.  Just us girls, enjoying a quiet day/night at the camper!

Our day was not a quiet and relaxing as we originally thought it was going to be!  On Friday, we saw a post of Facebook from the race crew that they were planning a walk thru on Saturday evening to mark the trail and anyone who wanted to join them, could get a sneak peak at the course!  Since none of us had never even been to the park before, we figured it was a good idea!  Once we got settled in to the camper, we started our campfire, cooked some lunch and soon found ourselves mesmerized by the flames. Darci ended up having words with Alvin, the resident chipmunk that has created his home in the woodpile at the camper!   Apparently he was mad at us for tearing down his home to keep our fire going.  If looks could kill, Darci would probably not be here anymore!  However, instead of sitting around the campfire and just chilling all evening, we headed out to High Cliff for a nice hike before dinner!

After a few wrong turns, we found Patrick and Rob in the park.  Patrick was heading out to take care of a few last minute race details so we would be heading out on the trail with Rob.  We took off the from parking lot a little after 5 and headed out onto the course.  Right away, we knew that we were in for a tough course - the course wasted no time in throwing a challenging, long steep hill at us!

Once we hit the top of the hill and got onto the actual trail, we knew it was not going to just be an easy walk through!  Rob asked if we were up for a little running, and of course were were all "oh yeah sure!"...  that was the end of the easy walk through the course.  We spent the next hour and a half doing a walk/run through the course.  Most of the walking was UP the huge hills.  At one point Rob commented that he wanted to make sure to took it easy tonight... He wanted us to have fresh legs for tomorrow.  Less that a minute after he made this comment, he asked if we were ready to run.  So much for taking it easy! (JUST KIDDING ROB!)  We had a great time and when we finished, we felt confidant about our adventures for the morning. (thanks to Robin for the pics from Saturday night!)

By the time we got back to the campground it was after 7:30 and we were starving... but of course we had to get the fire going again so that we could actually cook our dinner!  Thankfully, Darcy knows how to start a HOT fire and a little paper added to the still warm embers and we had a roaring fire before long!  It was after 8 by the time we sat down to eat and we literally inhaled our dinner!  During dinner, we thought we spotted Alvin running through the campsite, but quickly discovered that it was actually Theodore... Alvin must have sent him in as the decoy because at about the same time, we heard Alvin and Simon running around behind us near the fire.  Sneaky little chipmunks!  By the time we got everything cleaned up from dinner, made sure Alvin and crew were not causing any more trouble, and sat down to relax by the fire, we realized that we were all exhausted!  I think we were all in bed before 10pm!

Team Renegade at the Start line!

Next think I knew, it was 7am and the alarm was going off!  Time to get the fire started to make breakfast before we headed out!  I know that my sweet potato hash only takes about 15 minutes to cook over the stove, but this morning I was cooking it over the fire!  Before long we had bacon, potatoes, mushrooms and spinach sizzling away, just waiting for the eggs to be added!  The perfect pre-race fuel for the tough course that we knew was ahead of us!  Over breakfast, Darci and Robin told me that Alvin and one of the other boys spent part of the early morning up on the camper room running around and voicing their disapproval that we were still there.  We were not going to let a few pesky chipmunks run us out of camp.  They were going to need to learn how to share.  I tried to get a photo of Alvin when he was having a staring contest with us, but he was a little to quick for me.


We were back at the park by a little after 9 and met up with Jay, relaxed a bit, grabbed a few photos, did a little stretching before long it was race time!  We tackled that first hill with vengeance and hit the trail hard.  Robin and Jay headed off ahead of us in the crowd and Darci and I kept strong together for the first 2 miles.  It was about this point, after we headed down the first big hill that Darci started getting further ahead of me.  After a bit I caught up to her, but lost her again on one of the long straight stretches.  When I made the climb up bear crawl hill (yes our name for the killer hill in the middle of the course) and climbed the stairs on the final decent, I found her waiting for me!  YAY!  I grabbed a cup of water, but instead of drinking it, I dumped it straight over me head!  The heat and humidity were quickly climbing and I was getting really warm.  I still had some Nuun left in my hydration belt so I knew I was good there!  I didn't waste any time and we were on out way again.

Before long I lost Darci again!  That girls legs don't quit when she gets out there on the course!  I found a few other ladies that I fell into pace with and we worked out way through the last few miles of the course together.  Once we made it back to the water station for the 3rd time (one water station, which we passed 3 times over the course of the 6+ miles) we knew that we were just over a mile from the finish... at it was virtually all downhill from there!

The four of us set a goal of under 1:30:00 for this tough course.  I knew that when I got my last update on my phone at the 5 mile marker I was on track to do that!  I was going to make sure that it happened!  That last downhill stretch was fast and before long I hit the bottom of the hill and the last turn.  I was on the home stretch!  I didn't even see the timing clock as I was approaching the finish line.  I was just focused on getting there!

I was done!  I was hot, I was exhausted but I finished!!!

Team Renegade celebrating an awesome finish!

This was definitely the toughest run I have EVER done, but by far one of the most rewarding! The course was a huge challenge but also very beautiful and peaceful to run through!  A huge shout out to the crew that puts this race together.  This year was only the second running of this tough course and you can be sure that I will be back again net year!  It's only going to get better!  If you ever have a chance to get out and run this course (of the Half Marathon that this same crew puts on in the fall) do it!  You won't be disappointed!

Thanks Rob and Patrick for an awesome race!

 Next on the race calendar - Packers Training Camp 5k next weekend!

Where is this summer going??

They say that time flies when you are having fun... this has been so true for this summer!

It seems like it was just a few weeks ago that I was putting in some freezing cold miles in the bitter cold of the "brisk" winter we had here in Wisconsin.  Now we are halfway through July, summer vacation is half over and we are already starting to think about fall and back to school.

I figured this was a good time to look back on some of the goals that I set for this year, things I wanted to do and see where I stand with those goals now.

1.  750in2014 - After running/walking 319.95 miles in 2013, I decided that I needed to raise the bar!  My goal is to hit 750 miles in 2014 (between running, walking and biking combined).  I know that there were a few more miles that I walked in 2013 that I did not log, but it was no where near another 400+ miles.  In order to hit 750 miles this year, I was going to need to log about 62 miles per month.  At the end of June, I was at 318 miles... quite a bit short of where I should be for the year.  I know that I have many more miles to come this year as I still have several Half Marathons in my future. Based on where I am now, I am going to need to kick into high gear and average 70 miles per month to hit my goal. Granted, I know that I can help these miles out my getting in some biking too (my bike has not been out on enough of the awesome country roads yet this year!) but these feet need to get moving!

2.  Run my first Full Marathon - Cellcom 2014 was on my radar as the first full marathon I was going to run.  Unfortunately, as you all know, that didn't happen.  My IT Bands had other plans for me.  I ended up having to back off my training miles and take a look getting myself back on track.  I ended up with an awesome Physical Therapist who not only got me back on track with no knee pain but also made sure that I started getting in the proper strength exercises to make sure that I didn't have to go back and see her again next year!  She officially broke off our relationship just after the 4th of July holiday.  She told me that she hopes that only time she sees me again is at a race!  I know that a Full Marathon is not going to happen this year, but I am not giving up this one.  We will table this one until a later date... I am not giving up on it, just postponing it until I know that my body is ready for the challenge.

3. Run a sub 2:15 half marathon.  Considering I have only run 1 Half this year and it was partway through my IT band rehab and I hit 2:33, I am calling this one a work still in progress.  If I was within 5 minutes of my Half PR while dealing with my IT band issues, I am not giving up on this one!  I still have several more Half Marathons in 2014 so I can guarantee that I am still working on this one!

(New goals since the beginning of 2014)
4.  Qualify for Half Fanatics (http://www.halffanatics.com/)  I recently discovered this group online and have realized that running these half marathons has gotten into my blood.  There are other people out there just as crazy as me - or even crazier!  So why not join the asylum and have some fun with it!  If I work it out that I am able to run the Marquette Half Marathon Labor Day weekend, I can qualify for the Saturn level - 4 half marathons in 37 days!

5.  Try things that I have never done before - time to step out of the comfort zone!  This of course is an one going adventure.  I started out the year running in some of the coldest conditions ever!  In years past, if the weather was too cold, I either skipped my run or hit the treadmill.  After doing way too many miles on the treadmill, it was time to suck it up and get outside!  With a few changes to my running gear, I ran through the coldest winter I think I have ever lived through, outside and survived!

I also had the chance to actually do some running/hiking in the beautiful Phoenix area this past spring!  Those amazing views could really convince me to move out there!

This weekend will mark my first 10k trail run.  Last year I ran the Bairds Creek trail 5k here in Green Bay. It is time to embark on a 10k extreme trail run, single track... we will get dirty and may even have to use our hands to climb through part of the course!  It will be a true adventure!

2014 may be half over already, but the adventure is no where close to being over! I have made some awesome new friends, found many more new challenges to consider and have some incredible adventures planned! With several more races left, miles to run, family and friends to enjoy time with, the second half of 2014 can only be better than the first half!

I know that I have a few race recaps to catch up on and other updates that I would like to get out here, but until then...

How are you doing on your goals for 2014?  If you are not on track to achieve them, what can you change now to ensure that you will be successful?