Giving Thanks...

I really meant to post this before Thanksgiving, especially since I actually hand wrote out my post ahead of time, but time got the best of me (as well as the high school spam filter) as time always does so here I go.

Sometimes it is just so hard to see the positives when everything seems to be going wrong.  This month has had a whole lot of ups and downs, and I'm not so fond of the downs right before 26.2.  This is why I feel it is important to put it all in perspective and be Thankful
 
1. My Knee has had a major pain issue after my last awesome 20 miler, my training was going fantastic until this set back, but I am thankful for two legs to run on, and for being so healthy (first time I've managed to avoid illness during a training cycle, knock on wood)

2. I couldn't participate in track only a few weeks into having the guts to run my own track session.  Especially the big SWAG "bring a friend" week.
I am thankful for a tri/run club where people help motivate me to run faster and work harder.

3. My check engine light came on!
I am thankful for friends who care to help me fix my car (Meeney) and for having a car that runs and has been reliable for 8 years and then some

4. Progress grades were due in the midst of the other chaos.
I am thankful for a job I enjoy with students I love and even a few I don't.  (Unfortunately there are always a few jerks)

5. Poor Buttercup!  The kittens got spayed/neutered, but Buttercup managed to lick or tear some of her stitches.  The poor girl had to be re-stitched and put on antibiotics.
I am thankful for pets to come home to and that they are still healthy and safe.

Yes...some good came out of the week/month

-I enjoyed hot yoga (bikram) with Laney
I am thankful for therapy beyond running and such a great friend to enjoy it with

-I rode my bike with Nicki
I am thankful for friends to keep me company and safe while on the roads

-I get to/got to see my family for Thanksgiving
 I am always thankful for my fun filled family and food to eat

-I get to visit with old high school friends at my 10 year reunion
I am thankful for a fun filled evening to relax and have a good time with good people (Great job Lauren, Jen, and Matt!)

-I enjoyed some down time with Nick
I am thankful for having a great boyfriend to keep me company and put up with my running tears

I don't quite know what CIM has in store for me, or if I will even be able to run it, but I have a few ideas of what is the back up plan and what is in store for me.

I hope you all had a wonderful and fun filled holiday!

A world of things going on..

So usually I'm pretty good about posting at least once a week, but lately I've fallen off the wagon.  I've been overwhelmed with work, trying to get my miles in and staying in touch with everyone and everything.  I've missed trail running and I haven't been on the bicycle saddle in weeks which used to be unheard of for me.  I even ran a half marathon and never posted a race report, which I hopefully will get to this week.
I do have a lot of positive information to report since my last post:
1. I registered for my first half ironman: I will be doing Vineman this summer and although I am deathly afraid of this event I am also very excited.  My boyfriend, my good training partner and friend Laney, and many other friends will be partaking in this event so hopefully I'll be able to push through my training.  Not to mention Nicki is training for Cour d' Alene so I'll have company on the roads.

2. I've maintained my sanity: Usually at this time of  the year I'm ready to drop kick a 16 year old.  I actually love all my students and am having a great year so far.  I do have a few days I'm just drained, but who doesn't?  Although I'm still praying to the grading gods that my papers will grade themselves

3. I've made it through all my CIM training runs: Although I wanted to get in at least 1 run longer than 20 miles I just ran out of time and energy.  With the company of Laney, Amy, Nick and Gabby I pushed through two 20 milers and then other long runs along the way.  Although I wasn't sure if I would taper starting this week or not, I think a pain in my knee made the decision for me, so taper here I go.

4. I powered through 2 half marathons: I did pretty well at Nike for having 1,100 ft. of climbing.  I averaged 8:10 minute miles despite my walking a short bit and all the climbing.  At Healdsburg I pushed through approx. 400 ft. of climbing to finish with a 1:42:26, or 7:47 pace.  Not a PR (I wasn't really shooting for one), but hopefully I'll pull one off at Oakland half.

5. I've kept up with yoga: I have managed to get in at least 1 to 2 days of bikram yoga or pilates in weekly.  I don't think I was meant to put in some of the miles that marathoning friends of mine do, but this helps me control my piriformis.

LASTLY, I STARTED MY OWN TRACK SESSION!  I'm a HS teacher so I can't do morning track.    The wonderful activities director at a local HS gave me the go ahead for an afternoon track so I went for it.  So Thursday evenings at 5:30 I gear up for track no matter how exhausted I am

Now onward toward CIM...
How have things been going with everyone else the last few months?  Races? PRs?

I run to be...

...fit
...free
...chased
...trendy
...a triathlete
...seen
...a role model
...a rockstar!

There are many reasons why I run, but today I ran to be a finisher at the Nike Women's half marathon.  I've gone the last few years to cheer on my friend Charlene as she ran toward the finish, but I never really thought about running THIS race/run.  Last year I was already running a half marathon the same weekend so running Nike wasn't an option, but this year a friend kindly gave me an extra bib she had won.  Anyway, most women know this race as the one event where firefighters dressed in tuxedos hand you a tiffany's necklace at the finish line, and although I like the necklace, I honestly didn't even know what Tiffany's was until a few years ago, but I had quite a few friends planning on running the event so I was excited to join them.

The festivities started on Friday when Katie, Laney, and I headed to the city to pick up our bibs and check out the wall of names outside of Niketown.  Unfortunately, I registered later than I think they printed this because we failed to find my name, but it was still cool to see.  After we found Katie and Laney's names we headed for dinner and then out of the city anxious for sunday to come.
Now this race is HUGE, thousands of people come from all over the country to run this race, especially runners with Team in Training.  The race benefits leukemia and lymphoma cancer research and gets a great crowd of charitable women and men out.

We headed out at 5:15 in the morning, stopping to pick up one other runner along the way.  After parking, dropping our sweat bags and making a pitstop at the bathroom, where I ran into my friend Nicki (Yay!), I wished her luck and we were off to the insanity that is the start line.  Now Nike is not an easy course by any means there are many hills and many of them are steep (1, 070 ft. of elevation by my garmin), but it does start with a nice gradual downhill at the beginning as you race to dodge as many people as you can (reminds me almost of bay to breakers).

Mile 1: 8:05
I tried to hold back a little because I knew a fast start without a warm-up meant much pain to come.  We came out Union Square and headed down to the water.

Mile 2: 7:42
My legs felt like crap, they were heavy, but I tried to keep up with Laney and still give myself plenty of room to breath.

Mile 3: 7:44
The weather feels great as we cruz across the embarcadero with the first few hills quickly approaching.

Mile 4: 7:46
Made it over the first two bumps and they felt awful, which means the rest is going to be painful (I have trained for hills big time, I just had nothing in my legs)

Mile 5: 7:49
Decided it was time to see if a GU would do the trick, but all the people cheering kept me going and without any piriformis pain I was going try as hard as I could to keep going.

Mile 6: 7:58
GU still not kicking in and here is the big hill up to the bridge.  I'm usually pretty confident on hills, but not today.  Fortunately, I ran into a familiar face when I ran into Amy cruising alongside Crissy Field.

Mile 7: 9:06
Survived with no walking and tried to just get the hills to pull me down

Mile 8: 7:28
I was really feeling awful by now, because my stomach decided I needed a porta potty and my piriformis decided to get pissed off at me.

Mile 9: 9:47
There were walk breaks here, my stomach and legs were killing me, but as people started passing me I knew I needed to push through, all the great cheerleaders got me going again.

Mile 10: 7:47
We started heading toward the park and back downhill.  I'm going to label this mile the Tease mile, because you get to see all the finish line festivities and then you are rerouted back uphill through Golden Gate Park.

Mile 11: 8:28
I pushed through, no pain was going to hold me back I only had 2 more miles to go.  Here I saw Nicki which really pushed me to keep going and make it to the finish.

Mile 12: 8:13
Now a little bit of an up and then down, down, down to the finish line, but not before I grabbed my Ghirardelli Chocolate and headed toward the finish

Mile 13: 7:24
I tried to push hard to the finish giving the last bit of everything in my tank.

The last .14: 7:02
Necklace, banana, bag, protein shake (which I wish was chocolate milk, but I'll take what I can get), and prayers of no GI tract issues (success!)

Despite how awful my legs felt I really enjoyed my time on the course!  My finish came at 1:47:00 which is not my best, but not my worse, but pretty awesome considering the course.  Next, we headed to breakfast at Beach Chalet and finally home after a long traffic filled car ride.  Tonight, I have a date with my trigger point roller, ice, and a cupcake.  Great job all you ladies and gentlemen that were out there today!  Now what do you run to be....?

Happily Ever After...

Watching USA v. England

Training this time of the year has been a bit rough with milestone birthdays, visits to so cal, and enjoying visitors company I'm exhausted!  My last event of this exhausting party season was probably the most exciting and the BEST!  I had the opportunity to see my friend Mary marry her longtime boyfriend Tom.

Beautiful sunset of Greece

Wildflower Fun!

Enjoying company during Marathon training #1

    Although I've had many good times and great people in my life I will never forget my senior year in college when I enjoyed the company of Ms. Mary, Ashley, and Mel as roommates and longtime friends.  Between happy hour at the Cliffs, Mary's M birthday celebration, Wing wednesdays, and OC dates, we were always having a fantastic time!

Flutag

When we were in our early 20s

   Mary was not only a great friend in college, but she has accompanied on a great many adventures, including Greece, where she became an honorary member of my family.  Tommy and Mary joined me at my first olympic triathlon and has supported me through both the Long Beach and Huntington Beach half marathons.  We've had many other adventures and I only wish I lived closer to see the newlyweds more often.

Best wishes to the Bride and Congratulations to the Groom!  I would tell you all about the wedding, but I think the pictures tell the story much better!

Of Course an English teacher has to have Scrabble

On the Guest List

And of course Madlibs

Flower Girls 

Goodbye 27...on to my late 20s...greeting 28

After a bit of a rough week last week I wasn't quite sure how I was feeling about celebrating my birthday.  Fortunately, it ended up being a fantastic day!  I woke up at the crack of dawn to get a short 2 mile warm-up run followed by a weight session in.  I tried to slide by without my students noticing it was my birthday, but this was an epic fail.  I like celebrating birthdays, but with many people having milestone birthday parties and me never being really much into planning my own birthday I figured I woudl just lay low.  But apparently, September 20th is one of the most popular days to be born, and when you share a birthday with someone you always remember their birthday.  One of my ASB students for the class of 2013 shares my birthday with me so my morning was greeted with flowers, cupcakes, and a very cute and funny card.  Of course, they wouldn't leave without making their mark, and by mark I mean all over my boards, which read, "HAPPY BIRTHDAY MS.BYLER- Love class of 2013," and "Ms. Byler you have the best birthday ever- Chevy!"  So of course I was greeted every hour by 30-40 students pleasantly wishing me a very happy birthday and even some old friends stopping by to say "HELLO!"   Later on the Chess Club realized it was my birthday and felt they too needed to leave their signature on my boards.  After a much loved day of work I raced home for a birthday dinner with Nick.
       I was running a little late so luckily I had planned my outfit for the day appropriately for dinner at Prospect in San Francisco.  We headed to BART and eventually to the city to have a fantastic birthday dinner followed by a lazy evening at home so I wasn't too exhausted from work.  The day was filled with birthday text messages and phone calls from loved ones and even some great gifts, especially my "murder button" from Ms. Andie.  Thank you everyone for thinking of me and celebrating my existence.  I have to say 27 has been fun because...
I got my first 1st place medal
I did my first olympic distance triathlon+I survived wildflower
I PRed big time in my half marathon
I tested out new races including surf city, long beach, primos, and big sur
Nick and I won bragging rights over Amy and Ryan probably for the only time in my life during the couples relay
I got to celebrate Nick's 30th Birthday and see the gold cup finals
I became a Cal student and earned A's in both of my summer courses (this is a big deal because I always felt kinda dumb in college)
I made new friends like Nicki and Laney and had a blast hanging out with frequent friends like Mary, Ashley, Melissa, and Aron
I helped my sister buy a bike and nearly killed her on her first few rides
I survived year #4 of my teaching career and had the opportunity to read names at graduation
I started trail running with Kim around Mt. Diablo and then adventured with Amy to the Dirt Dogs

The year to come brings:
Seeing one of my best friends (Mary) say I DO!
My first NIKE half marathon
My second marathon at CIM, hoping to break 4 this time
My first run through wine country at Healdsburg
Hopefully many more training runs and rides with friends
Car shopping...unfortunately the truck is a little high on miles
I'm amped for year 5 in my classroom (although I'm not amped about the grading)
And....we'll see what this year has in store

A bit of a scare...

I've been trying hard not to overtrain and risk injury this marathon cycle.  The last time I tried to run a marathon I developed what is called piriformis syndrome (pain in the butt, literally).  Although I could have developed this issue doing many other things it was still a huge bummer that took me over a year to get under control.  Unfortunately, the issue hasn't completely gone away, but is manageable for the time being.
Anyway, this week I started feeling a pain in my big toe and with so many friends having stress fractures I began to freak out, and of course, instead of turning to the doctor I turn to the internet.  I figured the pain might just be tendinitis since I've had it before, plus many people said a stress fracture in your big toe is not likely.  Finally, 3 days later I gave in with the fear that I may be making matters worse and that I would have to contact a few race directors and increase my cycling miles if I did have one.
Today I walked into the Dr.'s office, and he didn't even ask for x-rays, he moved my toe around and said it seems like a joint or tendon issue.  I breathed a huge sigh of relief and felt so glad that I don't have to bail on the upcoming events I have planned.  I'm thinking next week might have more cycling days than running days just to be on the safe side, but I'm glad I'm in the clear so far.

Back to the Grind

I haven't really managed to write much because the school year has officially begun, heck, it is already 2 going on 3 weeks deep.  Transitioning to a new group of students is always difficult and often leaves me with nightmares.  However, after 6 years of in school experience (4 of them teaching in my own classroom) I actually transitioned fairly well into this school year and I don't recall the same night terrors of years past.  I'm onto my fifth year as a high school teacher and working my way through memorizing 180 names and praying that 39 students is going to be my largest class.  Although I'm never a fan of work in general I do enjoy my job, plus there is always something new and interesting happening, even if I'm not too happy with what qualifies as "interesting."

This is the first year I've really planned my training so that it starts around the beginning of the school year.  Usually, I plan races for a bit later because exhaustion overwhelms me the first couple weeks as I get back into the routine of talking and walking all day, which is probably why I've had a few more rest days lately than I would normally have.  I am 12 weeks away from CIM and right now I've been sticking around 30 miles a week, but I'll be growing my milege and hopefully increasing my crosstraining in the next couple of weeks as my energy returns.

Oh and one more thing has been taking up my time...2 new kittens!