No, I didn't fall off the face of the earth, I've just been running all over it!

Wow!  Where has the last 7 months gone!

Apparently life has completely gotten away from me and I have been neglecting my blog!  When I was just sitting here this morning reading back through a few of my posts, I realized how much I really have missed writing these updates!  That needs to change!  Writing these posts was a fabulous way for me to reflect back on adventures, keep a log of these adventures and keep in touch with all of you!

I know that there is no way that I will be able to completely recap everything from the last 7 months (I can't believe that the last post I did was from my Birthday Ragnar adventure last June!) s instead of tryign to go back and recreate posts for each adventure, here is a snapshot of the second half of 2015... a photo journey of the many adventures and a brief synopsis!  Over the next week I will then go back and get caught up on the adventures thus far in 2016.  My goal after that is to get out here and most at least once a week for you!  Whether it be a recipe, a recap on one of the crazy adventures planned for this year or who knows what else!

We spent A LOT of time at the ballpark!  Thanks to the Host Family program with the Green Bay Bullfrogs, we were able to host their Radio Broadcaster for the Summer.  Parker was with us from the end of May thru the middle of August.  Between his crazy schedule at the ballpark and traveling with the team, the only time we really saw him was at the ballpark, but it was still an awesome experience for all of us.  We watched more baseball in those few months than I think we ever have, but it was so worth it!  I am excited to say that we will be hosting again this year and, at this time, it sounds like it will be on of the summer interns.  

We headed north for a night to spent the night on a Bed & Breakfast train!  After a dinner on the moving train, we relaxed with a few drink and new friends on the train and then retreated to our own room in the sleeper car.  Of course, while the rest of the train slept in, I headed out for a morning run!  90% humidity, but I didn't care!  Afterwards, it was a warm breakfast before we headed off the train and had to drive home!

On one of our trips up north, I got to reconnect with a few friends from high school, take a hike up Silver Mountain and spent the evening catching up and laughing the day away!  Thanks for the memories ladies!  Until next summer when we can do it again!

Who says you have to do a virtual run solo?  Not with my awesome friends!  We ended up starting the morning later than planned because of a nasty storm that rolled through early in the morning.  In the end, our group was smaller than originally planned but we got in those 4 miles... and the best part?  Before this fun morning, every one of my friends that was there, met at least 1 new person that day!  I love when I can introduce my running friends to each other!

July meant the return of one of my favorite races of the summer!  The Cliffrunner 10k trail run.  6 miles of hills, rocks, dirt, cliffs and everything in between!  I was determined to beat my time from last year and thanks to my new friend Melissa that I met on the course, we pushed each other and ran an amazing race!  PR by almost 15 minutes over last year!  That's going to be tough to beat in 2016, but you know I'm going to try!

Meet Snickerdoodle!
In August we met this little sweetheart and a few weeks later she became part of the family!  Full of spunk and energy... and yes a lot of sass, the house is no longer quiet!

Over the summer, I rediscovered my love for yoga.  Last winter I took some Hot Yoga classes and realized that I did NOT like hot yoga... however, yoga outside on the city deck downtown?  That's a whole difference story!  Now I look forward to those days that I can squeeze in a yoga class into my schedule!

3 years on a row!  Warrior Dash WI!  John  went with me again this year, as did Darrin and my dear friend Lisa!  We spent the morning climbing, crawling and swimming through tunnels, mud, ponds and more!  I think we found mud in places that should never see mud but we didn't care!  After all that fun, we headed home, took showers, relaxed for a bit and headed to the next adventure of the day...

As if running warrior dash wasn't enough for one day, Lisa and I finished off our day by running the Packers Training Camp 5k in and around Lambeau Field!  While we were there we ran into Lori and a few other friends who all said we were completely nuts for running both race in one day, but that was part of the fun!  2 races + 240 miles =  lots of mud and laughs.  

Sound like a perfect day to me!

Over the summer, I also discovered this amazing pond, just a short run from my house!  How did I not even know this was here until now?  This quickly became one of my favorite places to run, especially in the early morning!  I would often leave the house before dawn, just so I could get here in time for sunrise over the water!

After running the Chicago Ragnar earlier in the year, I jumped at the chance to work the Great River Ragnar for Bondi Band.  Lots of driving, 2 long crazy days, scorching heat but loads of fun hanging out with some other awesome vendors and crazy runners!  Never again will I look at a frozen fruit bar the same again!  I gave up trying to keep track of how many I ate... it's a good thing Chris from FrioFrio was keeping track for me!

Finally the weekend that we were all waiting for arrived!  Girls Weekend 2015 brought us to Minneapolis for Women Rock!  Last year's girls weekend was 3 of us... this year it was 7!  Everyone seems to want to join us on our adventures, and I don't blame them!  With the exception of Lisa, our official cheerleader, the other 6 of us all met at the gym over the last 2 years and have continued to do things together now that several of us have switched gyms.  We will do what we can to find fun and laughs wherever we go!  The weekend was filled with running, laughs, hot guys, amazing food, lots of walking and everything in between.

A last minute add to my race calendar!  I scored a free race registration to the Lake Country Half Marathon in Oconomowoc (Near Milwaukee) Labor Day weekend!  The course was one of the prettiest courses I've run and I was completely enjoying the day... until the sun and humility took over!  When I started out the day, I was feeling good, had a great pace and was loving the day.  Unfortunately, at about the halfway point, Mother Nature decided that was enough.   I will say that this was the first race I've run in a LONG time that I actually felt like quitting.  I didn't.  I kept moving, even if it was just walking.  In the end I really didn't finish that far off my usual pace.  One of these years, I will go back and re-run this course so I can see what I can really do!  Besides, the scenery was amazing!

How to do pull off a PR for a 5k?  Find a run at an airport - on the runway!  No hills to worry about!  Oh yeah... and it helps when you have a friend running on your heels that you are determined to NOT let her beat you!  Lisa, Emily and I all set new 5k PR's on this warm afternoon and had fun doing it!  

For the 3rd year in a row, we got the crew from work together to run the Fox Cities Marathon Relay!  It's always a fun filled day, with no pressure of how fast you have to run.  It's about spending the day together, doing what we enjoy!  The highlight of this year's race for me?  By complete change, my dear friend Tracie passed through the exchange point just minutes before I started my leg, while she was running her Full Marathon!  I ran hard for that 1st mile to catch up to her and was able to run the rests of my 6.3 miles with her!  This girls is such an inspiration and one day, I will be able to keep up with her for more than 6 miles  :)

Last big race of the summer!  The Inaugural Bellin Women's Half Marathon right here in Green Bay!  We got the girls together for a fun weekend of shopping at the expo, dinner and the race!  The weather was perfect and the course was beautiful, and how many people can say they had their race bling handed to them by Katherine Switzer?!?!  Can't wait to run this one again net year! 

Hope you enjoyed this stroll through some of the highlights of 2015.  I know I missed a few, and will probably make mention of them over the next few weeks in follow up posts.  It was a fun filled year of adventures and 2016 is starting off to be more of the same!  Stick around and follow the adventures!  Or better yet, if you live in the area, come join me on some of my upcoming adventures!

2015 was awesome, lets make 2016 EPIC!

Fitness Follow-up Friday

Fitness Follow-up Friday is here! Well, it was here a few days ago but since we were out of town for the weekend, I didn't have a chance to post it until now!

Several people have asked what all is included in my weekly fitness.  So going forward, I am going to try and give you some idea of what my weeks consist of!  Each Friday will (hopefully) consist of a Fitness Follow-up!

Super Saturday Circuit

Super Saturday!

Last weekend started off this adventure with a Super Saturday Circuit at the gym!  30 Minutes, 9 exercises, as many rounds as possible.  The gym was packed and it was awesome to see everyone pushed it as hard as they could to get through this workout!  I managed to get through 4 1/2 rounds in my 30 minutes, using heavier weights on the OH lunges that I normally would, and modifying my plants to be one leg plants!  Then the circuit was followed by a 5 minute mini-mission consisting of sit-ups, squats and bicep curls!  I was definitely feeling that at the end!  After the workout, I spent some time in the other end of the gym hanging out with a foam roller and doing some other stretching.  Overall great way to start my weekend!

Sunday Funday in Bairds Creek

Sunday Funday with Friends!
Sunday afternoon we hit Bairds Creek and wandered the trails for just over 4.5 miles.  It was an awesome crisp afternoon spent enjoying the beautiful fall afternoon, watching ducks in the pond, sprinting up hills, and listening to the woodland creatures scurrying in the leaves.  I even got Colleens daughter to RUN up and down some of the hills with me!

Colleen - Next time I am climbing that tree when I see it, since we never made it back by it this time!!

Monday Morning Mini Rowing session

Manic Monday
Monday Morning wake up call!!  Last week I started meeting Tom at the gym for some mini rowing sessions before work.  We usually do a 5 minute warm up and then another 5 minutes of intervals.  Normally we do 1 minute on and then 30 second rest in between (5 total intervals),  but today we hanged it up and did 40 seconds on and 30 seconds off for 8 rounds (still 5 minutes total rowing time).  Those shorter intervals will catch up to you quick, however we both found that we actually rowed further in the same about of time!  Last weeks intervals gave me a total of about 1200m in the 5 minutes, today it was over 1300.

Remember, you need to change things up once in a while, otherwise your body becomes accustomed to the workouts and you may find yourself stuck on a plateau!  Keep your body guessing!

Afternoon Strength Adventures

Monday afternoon was Strength time at the gym!  Thanks Joe for  another great session! It was just one more day that I can say that I left the gym knowing that I pushed myself a little harder, stepped out of my comfort zone more, used heavier weights and still lived to tell about it!

Tuesday
Tuesday was "sleep in" in day... well not really. Instead of the alarm going off at 4:15 or 4:30, it went off at 4:45 so that I could get dinner in the crockpot before being at work for 6am.  After work it was time to hit the gym for another Strength class with Joe!  Forgot to take a picture of the board but it was a day full of Rowing, Clean's, KettleBells and Squats!  Between the KB work during the workout and then the mission at the end, I think I did  a zillion squats.  Ok maybe not a zillion, but it felt like it!  Then the Farmer Walks with 40lb KB's in each hand were epic!  Was fun to have Joe working out with us today as he was testing out the new MyZone units that they got in at the gym!  Thinking I might need to get one for myself to play with too!

Wacky Wednesday

Wacky Wednesday = Crazy sock day at the gym!

No rowing with Tom this morning since I have other things going on after work, needed to get my circuit in early!

5:15 Circuit class was THE way to wake up!  Was nice to see Lisa at the gym early today (I usually see her when she comes in for 6am, as I am jumping in the shower after the 5:15 class!) 3 stations, 9 exercises and burpees were not one of them!  4 minutes of wallballs, pushups and squats was tough but the 4 minutes of KB swings, pushpress and squats was enough to make my arms cry!  Then when you throw in some weighted crunches, Russian twists and flutter kicks, you get a morning workout that will definitely get you moving!

Tired Thursday
I am calling today Tired Thursday because I was too exhausted to get out of bed and get to the gym this morning.  My body said sleep, so I did  :)  I had to work at the bowling alley tonight for a few hours for a private party and the multiple trips up and down the stairs to the basement meeting room at least made me fee like I got in somewhat of a workout!

Finally Friday!
No work today since John and I were heading out of town for a long weekend, but I still was up early and got me workout in!  I also decided to splurge and get myself one of the new MYZONE monitors at the gym.  Charlene worked on getting it set up for me while I was doing a quick warm-up and then it was time to test it out!

MYZone  is a heart rate monitoring system that was recently installed at the gym to give us live feedback on how hard we are actually working out!  Anyone that is wearing a monitor has their live date displayed on the TV monitors that have been put up in each gym, to include current heart rate, calories burned, points earned (based on workout time, time in each heart rate zone and more!) and most importantly - your current max heart rate percentage! If you are not pushing hard enough, everyone will know - how's that for motivation to push your self that much harder?

This morning, started out with a rowing session with Tom, so my data was the only one on the screen (each gym has it's own screen showing data for those working out in that room).  I instantly found myself challenged by the numbers!  I was on a mission to keep that percentage as high as I could!   It was really cool to have a more accurate calorie burn too, since this takes into your age, heart rate etc.

After Tom and I finished rowing, I stuck around for the 6am Strength class.  There was one other person in class with a monitor too so it was interesting to see how our numbers compared during the 45 minute class!    At one point, we both we over 90%!    

After just one morning, I am easily able to see how this is going to help me get even more out of my workouts!  Results from this morning?  718 total calories burnt, peak heart rate 164, point earned 271.

What did you do to push yourself this week??  What are your goals for the next week?

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?