See Cara Run

I had the honor of participating in a relay with Mary Beth, her first relay. I was super excited to be doing this with MB, I love doing races with her, so this was the ultimate for us! 

The morning started out like any other pre-race morning, except on my way to the race I almost got into a life ending accident. Thankfully, the race gods were on my side, and I escaped with mine, and the Rabbit’s life. This just put me in this shaken mood for the rest of the drive, which quickly turned to crankiness. I found a rock star parking spot and heading to the tent to grab the team packets. I still had no idea what was going on for this race and tried to ask a few volunteers about the relay, to which they replied with a well informed “I don’t know”. 

Once Mary Beth showed up we decided to double team this and try and find out where the bus for the second leg relay was. Mary Beth was running the first leg, so she could cheer me on at the finish, with THE SIGN. 

By the start of the race, and countless volunteers later, I still had no idea where the bus was going to be. I asked a police officer who was certain it was going to be at the intersection he was standing at, so I kept an eye out. I saw Mary Beth start and then headed towards the intersection when I heard the announcer tell all second leg relay runners to head to his podium. 

Me and about 15 or so other runners headed up there, and he was chatting up another volunteer and then turns to us and goes “what are you doing here!? You’re supposed to be at the relay stop!”. But, but…. you told us. This is where it get interesting. 

We all look at each other in amazement, thinking to ourselves that there’s no way that this many people could screw up so bad! He instructs us to go to the finish line to wait for the bus, so we all make our way there. Guess what, no one knew a damn thing about it. We moved on to the next tent, no one knew then. Then we went back to the start and I chatted up a police officer and he said “yeah, it was here about 30 minutes ago, looks like that bus (gestures a block away).” I ask him to make sure they don’t leave without me and I sprint to this shuttle bus. I jump on and franticly ask her if she can take us to the stop. After confirming that she can, and that she’ll wait for us, I run back to where the rest of the runners were waiting. 

WHEW!! We made it! Not really. We get on the bus and she’s like “Um, yeah, I can’t take you.” Some random race director sees what’s happening and flags down a supply van and explains the situation and herds us into the back of the van. This van had no seats, and a bunch of random junk strewed about the back rolling around. We cram about 13 people in the back and hope to the unicorns we make it there alive.

We do, and just in time, because Mary Beth was running up to the relay stop just as I was getting off the bus. We exchange timing chips and I head out for my longer half of the relay. 

The miles ticked away quickly and I soon found myself at mile 6, that’s when I first started getting tired. The aid stations along the course were amazing, and the volunteers were very supportive. The course was also amazing, right along the river and through the woods. 

I came up on mile 7 and knew the end was near, so I just settled into a nice pace and finished strong. I came around the corner to the finish line and saw THE SIGN in all it’s glittery amazingness and Mary Beth there waving it around to cheer me on. It was a nice relief to see it at the end of such a long morning. I finished and grabbed our medals and promptly headed to breakfast, because that’s what we do. 

I finished with a time of 1:12:27, a pace of 9:55… I think. I have no idea how many miles I ran, but my watch said ~7.6 miles so we’re going to roll with that. 

I’m currently in the process of switching my site’s theme, and moving over to Wordpress. Don’t worry, stuff will still get posted here and you can still <3 things. Not that many of you do, just sayin’. 

I also bought a sweet domain too, www.seecararun.com :)

I have no idea where the start is, how this relay works, where to get my packet or anything else related to a race. So far this race is pretty unorganized. Let’s hope tomorrow shows more promise.

March… Medals… Madness! I completed four races this month, and things got a little crazy! First off, who completes four races in a month? Second, I survived to tell the tale with no injuries to report.

Since I’ve been so crazy busy running and switching jobs, this poor little blog of mine has become very neglected. I’m going to do a quick recap of all the madness that happened this month, which is going to account for a very long post.

Madness #1: New job

So I quit the ole DMP. Thank the unicorns for that. My time had come to leave the newspapers, and move on to bigger and better opportunities. I was fortunate enough to receive a great recommendation from a colleague of mine for a position at a startup called Are You a Human. Are You a Human creates a CAPTCHA (you know those annoying squiggly letters) alternative by replacing them with fun games! They needed a kick as user interface/experience guru that wasn’t afraid of Nerf darts and boys (I’m the first lady human to be working with them).

It’s a great place to work and I can’t be more excited to work with this great group of dudes.

Madness #2: Stair Climb

Remember a while ago when I mentioned that I was raising money for some crazy stair climb to the top of a very tall building? Well, that happened. My team, the Quadzillas, ended up raising an impressive amount of $1,660.51. Can you believe that!?

I had just gotten over a fierce case of the stomach flu right before the climb. Nothing like rapidly losing five pounds before exerting yourself for 70 flights of stairs. I toughed it out and finished in just over 14 minutes! Half of the team was waiting for me at the top and cheered me on as I crossed the threshold to the 70th floor. We waited around for the rest of our team and FOX 2 got a pretty sweet video of us cheering on our teammates!

After we all finished we headed on down to the first floor where a cheering crowd and shiny medals awaited! My awesome friend Heather came out to cheer us on and take photos, and it was nice to see a friendly face awaiting us at the bottom.

The Quadzillas, the medal, and the big ass building we climbed.

Madness #3: Corktown 5k

I have always heard this race was a ridiculous amount of fun, but I just didn’t feel it. I ran this race for fun with Heather and Mary Beth, and didn’t have any intention of exceeding an 11 minute mile. The whole thing was just a hot mess. The starting corrals were just…. a mob, there was a lack of post-race food, and the medals… don’t even get me started.

The course itself was just a simple 1.5 mile out and back along Michigan avenue in downtown Detroit. Michigan avenue is an ankle twist waiting to happen. Majority of the road is brick, and some of the bricks have come loose or just disappeared, causing 4”-5” deep ruts. I did enjoy the ‘running’ part of the race, I rocked a green feather boa and left a trail of feathers wherever I ran. I handed out so many high fives my hands were tingling, another benefit of out and back courses.

The first 7,000 runners were to receive commemorative medals, celebrating the 30th anniversary of the race. HOWEVER.. they gave away a bunch to the kids (whatever), and then because the start corral was a hot mess, we ended up being one of the first 7,000 finishers, but not the first 7,000 to cross the finish line.

I was bummed that I didn’t get a medal, but totally stoked to finish the race with two of my favorite ladies. No medal can replace that.

Heather, me, and Mary Beth

Madness #4: Al Kayner’s St Patrick’s Day 8k After running the previous weekend in a hot mess of a St. Patrick’s day race, this was a welcomed relief. This has got to be one of the most organized races I’ve ever attended. Here is a bulleted list of why it was so awesome:

• The course was well supported and stocked with fuel. The medal was superb! One of the best finisher’s medals I’ve received, second to my half marathon.
• There was no doubt where you had to be in the start corral, the wave start was incredible. 
• There was a mass amount of handsome volunteers. Seriously think there was a volunteer every 50 feet along the course

Downtown Bay City was really cool, I can’t say I’ve spent much time there, but I was really impressed with their collection of Antique stores. Me and Mary Beth did a quick warm up around downtown and then headed to our corrals. I started off with the intention of taking it easy, but once I got comfortable I just kept runnin’! I ended up finishing it with a 9:30 pace, which isn’t something I thought I could hold for longer then 3 miles. After the race me and Mary Beth met up at the Friendship Egg, snapped a few photos, destroyed some apples and then headed to breakfast at Denny’s. We had the most amazing egg white scramble with veggies and it was the perfect end to a perfect race. The only bad thing about this race is the fact that it was in Bay City. Bay City is about 2 hours north of Detroit, and we didn’t get back into town until mid afternoon, so the whole day was basically wasted. But I would do this race again in a heartbeat, and would recommend it to a friend!

Me and Mary Beth at the Friendship Egg

Madness #5: Rock CF Half Marathon Relay

My friend Heather came to me a few months ago with this great idea to do a half marathon relay. Since the DMP was going to cover the cost of the race, and I can never turn down a free entry, I said yes. My leg of the relay ended up being a whopping 7.6 miles, and Heather’s would be 5.5 miles.

This was my first relay, and I’m glad I picked a small race like the Rock CF to do it with. It was extremely organized, and the volunteers were on top of their game! We all met at the Grosse Ile High school and the leg 1 relay runners and half marathon runners had to walk to the start, about ¼ mile away, while the leg 2 runners were bussed out to the relay exchange.

I did a quick warm up around the startline to keep… warm, because the temp was a balmy 40 something degrees, and I was rocking shorts and a tank. Once I started running though, I was glad I opted for the shorts, everyone around me was shedding layers of clothing.

The miles kept ticking away, mile 1.5 I grabbed a water, which seemed early for a water stop. The view was gorgeous along the river, if I wasn’t so focused, I would have stopped to take photos. Mile 3 they had Gatorade and I took it willingly! I was cruising along, keeping my sub 10 pace I was secretly hoping I could achieve. Right before mile 4 they had a Gu stop, I decided to grab one, since I forgot my sport beans and I was gonna need it at mile 5. I carried that sucker for a whole mile.5 before deciding to opening is and consume it. Which was the best decision ever! I had so much energy to get me that last 2.6 miles. Finally I crossed the timing mat at the relay stop and saw Heather jumping around super excited!

Once Heather started her leg I was bussed back to the High School where my mother was waiting for me. I got some food and then we waited for Heather to finish. When she was close, I moved over to the entrance of the finish chute, so we could finish together. I started running with her and we completed the last .10 miles together! Then some handsome men gave us our medals and we were reunited with our families. It was quite the achievement for us, it was both of our longest runs to date!

Me and Heather with our relay bling

Some highlights from March Medal Madness:

• Amount of classy medals acquired: 3
• Most revolting thing witnessed: A intoxicated man vomiting all over his breakfast because he was still drunk from St. Patrick’s day.
• Best post race spread: Rock CF - they had thousands of cookies and bagels and other tasty treats waiting for us in the gym.
• Favorite Medal: The Bay City medal is almost as heavy and large as my half marathon medal
• Favorite Shirt: Corktown - I’ve needed a nice short sleeve tech shirt

It was a month full of Madness, but it was the best March I ever had.

Some of my sweet medals

You may remember last year, when me and Mary Beth ran the Sweetheart 5k/10k in Flushing, Michigan. Like last year the weather was horrid, with 20mph gusts and 9 degrees (felt like -6), yet sunny! I was not hoping for a 5k P.R. and after the fierce stomach issues in the morning, I wasn’t even hoping for a sup 30 5k. THEN after the nearly two hour drive to Flushing, I wasn’t even hoping to run the whole thing. 

Last night the Metro Detroit area got ‘dumped’ on with a fierce snow/wind event. I call this an event because it wasn’t really a storm, but rather snow and lots of blowing and really cold temps. It did make for a tricky driving situation heading north to Flushing. I think total I saw about 20 or so cars in the ditch scattered about the area. 

After trekking through the snow and getting to the race, I really just wanted to turn around and go back to bed. I had this kind of crappy week, and then this stupid snow, and then the stomach issues, and it was cold. Like, really cold. 

But once the race started I felt okay, despite the slipping and sliding at the start until I got my footing. That must be an awesome sight, seeing 200+ runners try and run on ice while not taking each other out. The start was fine - despite my mental cursing the whole time I did get into a groove. I think at some point during the beginning of therace my balaclava started to suffocate me and I felt like I was hyperventilating. Or it could have just been the excitement of seeing an adorable black lab running in the snow. 

There’s a hidden feature in this race. There’s this spot where you’re running uphill and into 20mph gusts of wind, and all you want to do is die. It’s such an added bonus that really makes the $8 registration fee worth it. I’m pretty sure that in the low spots of my music all I could hear were shoes crunching on snow and curse words. It was awesome. 

Anyways - mile 2 was when I was supposed to get my glitter powerup but someone forgot to leave it out for me. I decided that at that point my best bet was to just curl up into a ball, climb into a snow bank and cry myself to sleep and hope Mary Beth found me on her second loop during her 10k. 

But, whatever, I finished in 30:14 and didn’t P.R. I did get second place in my age group and got a sweet medal. It’s a heart with kitty eyes on it! Oh, another great thing about this race, there is an abundance of cat themed goodies at this race. I’m pretty sure one of the race organizers is an actual crazy cat lady. 

Mary Beth also got a sweet medal for 3rd place in her age group, as well as Bob and Jocelyn! After the race we met up for some delicious, yet expensive, post race noms at Bob Evans. 

Despite having a craptastic week, it did end on a pretty awesome note. I hope everyone is staying warm tonight! 

Last January I made a post about how I wanted 2011 to be a year full of badassery. I must say, I did pretty damn good considering the year I had. 

I’m just going to make a quick list of 11 things that made 2011 what it was. 

1. Completed a Half Marathon
   One of my goals for the year was to complete a half marathon. On October 16th, 2011 I did just that! I crossed the finish line of the Detroit Free Press Marathon with a time of 3:12:06. 
2. Lost a butt load of weight
   I started 2011 out weight nearly 160 pounds (158 to be exact). When I weighed myself at the beginning of the year I weighed in at a glorious 134 pounds. A difference of 24 pounds! Yeah! 
3. Got my first real runner’s injury
   In June my right leg started to hurt more then the usual shin splints that would pop up every so often when I got a little over active. I rested my legs for about a month and finally broke down and went to the doctor, only to find out I had a stress fracture! I was told to rest it for 4-6 weeks, test it, and if any pain was there, rest it again for 4-6 weeks. Lucky for me about two weeks before my half marathon my doctor gave me the go ahead to walk the race, and run 1 mile! I will now always listen to what my body is trying to tell me and never try to over train. Lesson learned.
4. Ran my first 10k 
   I ran my first 10k along side my friends Mary Beth and Sharon (also her first 10k). I’m going to run that same race again this year, only this time I get bling! They are handing out medals for all 10k finishers!
5. Ended one relationship - and started a new one
   I ended a 3 year long relationship with my boyfriend at the time, and started a new one with someone who truly does make me happy without hindering my hopes and dreams. It turned out to be the best decision I’ve ever made. I’ve never been happier! 
6. Moved to Detroit
   Because of the above relationship ending I had the chance to do something I always wanted to do, live in downtown Detroit. It’s actually been pretty awesome, despite people’s negative feelings towards the city, I love it here. 
7. Designed and Developed my first mobile app
   I designed and developed a mobile app for the Detroit Free Press Marathon! How perfect a scenario is that! It was a very successful project and I’m excited to have my name behind it.
8. Designed the Marathon site
   I was passionate about how horrible their old site was that I made it clear they needed a new site for the new year when registration opened. It’s one of the few projects I worked on this year that I’m very proud of.
9. Registered for 3 half marathons
   Well, I registered for two of them in 2011 and one of them at the stroke of midnight new years eve. Next year I’m set to run the Traverse City Bayshore half marathon, the Lake Tahoe Emerald Bay half marathon, and the Detroit Free Press international half marathon!
10. Ran my first destination race 
    While visiting Grant’s family for the new year, in Arizona, I had a chance to run a quickie 5k. It was awesome to run in a new state with different people.  
11. Said good bye to my Father
    In June my Father passed away and I miss him every day. 

I’ve run a handful of races outside the Metro Detroit area, but not too far. Places like Grand Rapids, Traverse City, and Marquette. For my last race of the year I had an opportunity to run a race in a whole new state: Arizona! I’ve never been to Arizona,  so when the chance for me to go there for a vacation came up - I had to find a race! 

I do like the idea of the end of the year ‘resolution’ races, even though I’m not a big new years resolution person. I found a race close to where I was staying, I’m not familiar with the area at all and found one about 5 miles away. It was the inaugural race, and I didn’t find that out until the day before, when we got the reminder e-mail.

I have a love hate relationship with inaugural events. I love the idea of being a participant in the first ever event, so when it gets big I can say “yeah I ran that when it was brand new”. On the other hand, I find them to be a little disorganized, like this one for example. They didn’t have a real web site, just an active.com page and facebook page, both which were sparse in information. We did receive one e-mail prior to the race for pre-registered participants letting us know when to pick up our shirts & bib. 

I showed up early to the race, about 7:15 (race started at 8:00), and made my way to the bib pickup table. First they couldn’t find me, and then when they did they couldn’t find my bib! So they assigned me a new one, and then told me to go grab my shirt - which I indicated at registration to be a small. I walk over to the table and the lady asks me what size, “small” I say and she responds with “we only have larges”. Why would you ask me what size then? Little things like that annoy me for some reason. But I got my obeastly sized shirt and headed back to the car and hung out with Grant’s family, who wanted to come see my run a race, and which I appreciate. They got some great photos of me running! 

The course was challenging enough and it was a change of scenery! It had a mix of grass, dirt, rocks, and hills! I was feeling really great in the beginning, and I think most of that was the fact that my boyfriend, Grant was there to cheer me on. I like seeing him there, it motivates me to be awesome. I finished it in just under 29 minutes, 28:49! Not a PR but, considering my persistent cough, I’ll take it.

The whole weekend was great though! I got to see the Grand Canyon, and climb a mountain! 

“Well Cara, what do you think? It’s a big hole eh?”

That I’ve registered for! 

Yesterday I registered for the Lake Tahoe Emerald Bay half marathon in September 2012.

Today I registered for the Traverse City Bayshore half marathon in May 2012. 

Because that’s what I do, and then I’ll have this bling around my neck: