Posts Tagged ‘Central Florida’
This coming Saturday is the 2010 Walt Disney World Half Marathon. The weather forecast is showing a low for Friday night of 33 °F with a RealFeel® of 21 °F and it’s supposed to be cloudy. Did I mention it will be COLD Saturday morning? While I understand that it’s preferable to have it be cool as opposed to warm when running a half marathon, a temperature that is considered the point at which water can freeze is a wee bit uncomfortable for me and most Central Floridians. Not to mention that I have no earthly idea of what to wear… well I do sort of, but I’m still constantly going over it in my mind and changing things.
Here’s my list of things [so far] I may or may not wear on Saturday for the race:
- 55 gallon trash bag — this will be discarded once we start moving.
- Survivor buff — this will cover my lower face, ears and neck and can be moved down to just around my neck.
- Arm warmers — I can remove these later and stuff them into my waist belt; probably won’t though.
- Running gloves — I probably will not remove these.
- Calf compression sleeves — these are for calf pain, but will help with needed warmth.
- Running cap — hopefully this will assist with keeping heat from escaping via my head.
- Technical running shirt; short sleeved
- Technical running shorts — 7 inches long
- Under Armor tank — this has the Run4Olivia.org logo on it and will be worn over my regular shirt.
- FuelBelt Helium 2 bottle with a medium storage pouch — I can put my phone, some gels, my mp3 player and my sunglasses [prescription] in this.
Whether all or any of the above will keep me warm enough to be comfortable, I have no idea. It’s difficult to imagine how cold it will be and since the sun still won’t be up for at least an hour or so after the start of the race, it’ll seem even colder. Hopefully, the adrenaline and excitement of the event will keep me from noticing. 
If any of you are running this weekend, either in the half mary on Saturday or the full on Sunday, are you going to take your cell phone with you? Head phones are discouraged, but not banned — so are you going to take your mp3 player along? What about hydration gear or gels — they have water and food stations along the course; will you take extra just in case?
Can you tell this is my first half marathon? ::freaks out::
Although I would have liked to have run in this weekend’s OUC 1/2 marathon [HA!] or preferably, the 5K, we had a few planned-in-advance events that demanded our attendance. The OUC races were this past Saturday, which turned out to be a really nasty, cold, wet day. I was recuperating from a party we went to the night before — this is an annual event that falls on the first Friday of every December at our friends’ house way out in Apopka, FL. We had a great time, ate entirely too much, drank wine and had some really super-minty cocktails. At least I smelled fresh when I burped…
So even though we got up pretty early Saturday morning, I was in no condition to run any races. Instead, I opted to put up our outdoor decorations! Normally, I would have done them the weekend right after Thanksgiving, but we were camping at the time so I had to wait until this weekend. I put on my sweat pants, a hoodie, and a hat and set out to battle the elements. Mom and Dad live in Colorado and for some reason, when he goes out to put up the outdoor decorations there, it’s always a balmy 70 degrees and sunny. Each year here in Central Florida when I go out to put up ours, it’s always 59 degrees and cloudy with a cold, drizzly rain. Still, I put on my decorating face and headed on out!
After six times climbing up and down the 10-foot pull-down attic ladder in the garage while carrying various bins full of decorations and lights, I decided it was actually warm enough to ditch the hoodie. Yeesh. While preparing to hang the icicle lights along the eaves of the house, I came to find that I had thrown all of our old lights out last year with the intention of buying new LED icicle lights this year. Of course, I probably should have left myself a note in one of the bins or something, because I’d totally forgotten. OK, nix the lights under the eaves — we’re going to my Mom and Dad’s in Colorado for Christmas this year, so I can hold off on that. I ended up just decorating the front porch and surrounding hedges — and it doesn’t look half bad! The picture doesn’t do it justice, but that’s what you get with a 5mp camera built into a phone! There’s a house in there somewhere…
We have a 7 foot reindeer named Dancer, a pair of lit-up deer munching over on the side [their heads move -- ooh!], three lit-up xmas trees of varying sizes and net lights on the hedges in white and blue. It’s kind of hodge-podge, but it works. The whole setup is on a timer that turns everything on when it gets dark. They’ll all stay on for around 8 hours. Each evening when it starts to get dark, I’ll run to the front window to see if I can catch when everything turns on. Each time I see that everything is lit up and Dancer has fully inflated, I yell, “Dancer’s Up!”. I know, I know — but you have to get your traditions created one way or another…
Later on that night, our community had it’s yearly holiday celebration which culminated in a fireworks show at 9:00pm. We bundled up and sat on our front porch and watched [one of the perks of living where we do]. I’ve posted just one of the photos I took with my phone.. it’s the only one that wasn’t so fuzzy and out-of-focus it would make you dizzy. But you can see how nice it is to be able to sit on the front porch and be entertained for free. We brought some eggnog martinis out and had a great time.
Sunday [yesterday], we went to our god son’s second birthday party. I was so hungry, I ate 3 hot dogs with ketchup — on buns. I also ate a piece of birthday cake [Sponge Bob-themed] WITH 2 scoops of vanilla ice cream. I think if I’d eaten one more bite of anything, I would have exploded. By the time we got home, I was miserable. My stomach made odd, rather disturbing noises all night. I even got nauseous around 1:00am. When the alarm went off at 5:00am this morning, I was already awake. Hot dogs do not like me. Blech.
Caitlin posted earlier today a great “unofficial” primer on how to run in the rain. In it, she suggested wearing a hat to keep the rain out of your eyes and to keep your head warm. It’s a great tip — however, [especially here in Florida and other sunny locations], I’ve found that a hat is an indispensable part of my every day gear. Trust me, although many runners out there may be in their 20s and 30s and aren’t thinking about the amount of sun they’re getting on their faces — the time you spend in the sun will catch up to you. Always remember: Time Marches On — Your Face. [I also always wear eye protection so I don't squint as much -- crow's feet aren't always caused by laughing...]
When I run, I always wear a hat. My hat, whether it’s a baseball style cap or a visor, will have a good brim that goes out far enough to protect most of my face from the sun. Granted, the angle of the sun will depend on how well this is pulled off; when it’s rising or setting, you’ll get it smack in the face no matter what if you’re running toward it. In the winter, I’ll wear a baseball style cap that is light weight and breathable. The reason being that your head is where you’ll lose most of your heat, so covering it in cold weather is the best way to stay warmer. My choice of cap is the Outdoor Research Sun Runner Cap. The bill is made of a pre-shaped plastic so it can’t be damaged by rain and it keeps its shape. The sun skirt is detachable, and I don’t use it when running. [But it's great for hiking and backpacking.]
In warm weather, I wear a visor made for runners. I wear one specifically made for women, so it’s smaller and doesn’t swallow my head. It’s made from technical, sweat wicking fabric, with a plastic insert in the bill and it also has reflective properties for nighttime running. Being a visor, it allows the heat to escape from my head to assist with keeping me cooler in warmer weather. When you run, no matter what the weather, your head and brow will sweat. Wearing a hat or visor helps so much with keeping a large majority of that salty stuff from getting into your eyes.
Do you wear a head cover and eye protection when you run? If not, why?
This past holiday weekend, we went camping up in New Smyrna, about an hour or so north of home. It was very cold, but very beautiful. It’s fun to be able to take out our gloves, sweaters, hats and scarves and actually USE them! We roasted hot dogs [Nathan's], made s’mores and drank mimosas [with acai-blueberry juice]. It wasn’t super-healthy, but at least it wasn’t unhealthy either. We snacked on carrots dipped in hummus along with some great-tasting jalapeno-stuffed olives. We walked the dogs all over and laughed a lot. It was a perfect Thanksgiving weekend spent with good friends.
Didn’t get any running in though, although I did do a 45 minute strength training session Sunday afternoon when we got home. I rode the recumbant bike, worked out my arms, shoulders, chest and back on the total gym, and did a slow endurance workout on the elliptical. It felt good to sweat after eating a lot heavier than we normally do since Thursday. We got caught up on General Hospital — we DVR it and watch it in our workout studio when we workout.
The workout studio is one of the best decisions we made in our house. We took 2 of the 4 bedrooms [they were next to each other], knocked down the wall between them [which removed the two closets as well] and made one big workout room. A little over 1/2 of the room has carpet tiles installed and all the heavy workout equipment. It also has a 32″ LCD were we can watch TV, DVDs or the DVR. The other half of the studio has laminate flooring, a nice area rug and a 42″ plasma TV. We do yoga, stretching and floor work on that side. It’s really an awesome setup and the energy in the room is at once both exhilarating and yet calming. We painted 2 of the walls a semi-gloss chocolate and the other 2 a semi-gloss cafe latte. There are two windows and of course, two doors.
The two doors to the workout studio both opened into the room and into each other, so I removed them and their hardware, filled the holes left behind and installed two barn door-type sliding doors. One door is mounted on the wall outside the room and the other is mounted on the wall inside the room. So no doors block any movement and yet we can still close the room up for privacy if necessary. I had seen this setup in one of my Dwell magazines and searched and researched until I found an affordable solution. I think the the total cost for the hardware and doors [Lauan doors - $28 from Lowe's] was right around $175. That was way better than the $1500 price tag for most of the featured setups in Dwell.
Anyway, so now when/if I mention the workout studio — you’ll know what I mean!
I hope everyone had a great holiday week/weekend — it’s time to get ready for Christmas! We’ll be putting up our outdoor decorations and lights this coming weekend.
Former Tropical Storm Ida has now strengthened into a Cat 1 hurricane in the Carribean. Depending on the direction of a high pressure system that’s over Florida right now, it’s possible this one could cross over Central Florida some time next week. If it does, that will put a damper on training next week. Actually, it’ll put a damper on everything. We’ve been lucky so far this hurricane season and haven’t had any storms come anywhere near us. The season ends November 30th, but I doubt the storms know or respect that.
A little piece of trivia: my maternal grandmother’s name is Ida. Not sure if that’s good, bad or even relevant.
