Thursday Thoughts and Fuel Belt Winner!

First of all, wow!! 96 followers?!  You guys ROCK!!  Hello and thank you to all of my new followers!  I love making new friends! :D

I had 131 entries into my giveaway!!  I plugged the numbers into random.org and this is what it came up with:

Congratulations Alanna!!  Please shoot me an email with your address sometime this weekend!  I hope to get your handheld and GU to you sometime in the next week Lord willing! :D   runners.luck@hotmail.com

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Now onto the “Thursday Thoughts” portion of this post!  I’ve been thinking about a lot of things lately and don’t really have time to write about all my thoughts.  Of course, a majority of my thoughts are about running and blogging and everything else life has been throwing at me!

1.  I have been working extra hours the past couple weeks… 15/week to be exact and it leaves me with no time to do anything unless I stay up late.  Which I did on Monday.  4am late to be exact and mostly because I was too lazy to get up out of the recliner from watching tv with my dad to walk back to my bedroom to go to bed.  I can’t be the only one that does this right?!

2.  I’ve been feeling crappy lately.  I do believe it has to do with a lot more than just the late bedtimes.  It took me a week to get back to running after my half marathon… A WEEK!!  And still… I can probably count on one hand how many times I’ve been running since then!  It’s pathetic really.  It’s not that I don’t want to.  I really don’t like getting up early.. I’ve never made it a habit to because I didn’t have to.  My work schedule allowed me to run in the afternoons or evenings most of the time and now since I’m working more, the only times I have to run are early morning or late night… ugh!  So, that has a lot to do with why I’ve been feeling crappy PLUS I’ve been eating crappy too!  You are what you eat right?!  Ok, so I did have an excuse for last weekend because of the fair… but seriously… I  haven’t been eating any veggies or fruits and I’ve been eating on the go … ie: fast food!  GASP!!!  so… lack of sleep, lack of running/exercise, more hours of work, and a crappy diet have all come colliding down on me this week and I’ve felt like a bad human being lol…

3.  It’s not like I don’t have any motivation… ok, I don’t have any lol.  I do have a race on OCT 30th and my goal time for 5k is sub 25 right now and I really want it in my head lol… but I still don’t have any motivation… and its probably because of #2!  So I have decided to stop wallowing in my self proclaimed laziness and business and make some changes!

4.  Not only am I making healthy living changes, but I have thought a lot about changing around my blog.  First of all  I don’t believe in LUCK… I never have.  I believe that everything happens for a reason because God has a plan.  So… I have no idea why my blog is named “Runner’s Luck” other than it sounded cool and I had ZERO creative juices flowing the day I created my blog.  Also… I ran my half marathon on September 25th!  I think my blog needs a new tagline!  I also want to give my blog a little makeover starting with a cool picture header… except I have no idea how to do that … help?!  And maybe a new background?!  What do you all think?!  I would appreciate any opinions you guys have about changing anything on my blog or any help you can give me on creating a photo header!

So those are just A FEW thoughts I’ve had… I’ll save some of the others maybe for greater in-depth posts…  As always I love advice/opinions/comments from  you all! :D  I know a lot of you feel somewhat like I have after running a big race… I think making healthier choices will make a HUGE difference in the way I’m feeling though!  So starting tonight… I’m going to bed before midnight!! :D 

Tempo Turned Fartlek & Sigvaris Review

Well I have a 5k race this Saturday so I was trying to figure out how to move my training schedule around so that I wasn't doing my long run on Friday! I decided I would just move everything up a day and move my long run to Wednesday... which meant I have to run on Monday which is usually a rest day because I am never very motivated on Mondays (surprise, surprise!)

Training Schedule as planned:
Monday: Rest
Tuesday: 7mi tempo run @9:42 (5mi w/ wu and cd)
Wednesday: 2mi easy run
Thursday: Rest
Friday: 9mi long run @11:08
Saturday: Rest
Sunday: 2mi easy run

New Revised Training Schedule:
Monday: 7mi tempo run @9:42 (5mi w/wu and cd)
Tuesday: 2mi easy run
Wednesday: 9mi long run@ 11:08
Thursday: Rest/XT
Friday: 2mi easy run
Saturday: 5k race

So, yesterday I was all excited and psyching myself up to get out and run my tempo run and was pretty excited til I remembered the stupid dogs that always run after me and try to bite me at the end of my road. I didn't let that get me down, I came up with a plan to drive my car down the road and park a little ways down the intersecting road (no big deal)... then I stepped outside!! WOW!! I had completely forgot to check the weather and did not think it would be 95 degrees especially since it had been so cool we had turned the AC off for an ENTIRE WEEK!! lol... I didn't let that get me down either... "I have plenty of water and I've ran in the heat before!!" So off I went for my 1 mile warmup, 5 mile tempo @9:42, and 1 mile cooldown.

I did the warmup up pretty good and 1 mile of the tempo run I was going faster than the 9:42 pace, not a lot faster... but there were times when I was in the 8's... I'm not a very good pacer i guess lol... but soon after the first mile of the tempo run, i definitely started feeling the heat!!
That's when I knew I wouldn't make the whole 7 miles and that I knew I had to slow down... I ended up walking then running fast to the next shade spot, then walking in the shade, and running to the next shade.... it was actually quite pathetic! I felt so ashamed of myself and disappointed! I turned around 2.5 miles in and kept running/walking the rest of the way home for a total of 5.05 miles, as you can see for yourself...

Runs like yesterdays are the times when I start doubting myself and that I can run a half marathon ... days like yesterday make me think "what are you doing?! You're not a runner!! You're just a wannabe!!" And this makes me sad because I am trying... I really am... just sometimes it seems like its not good enough! After especially hard training days like yesterday, I look forward to an ice bath and some chocolate milk!! In addition to those two treats, I also LOVE pulling on my Sigvaris Recovery Socks!

I have worn my Sigvaris Recovery Socks that I received from Erica (HERE) so many times that I have now lost count! My favorite thing to do is take a nice ice bath, shower, then pull on my Sigvaris recovery socks and lay on the couch after those tough runs because even though I'm feeling down on myself and have a negative attitude for a little while afterwards, the compression recovery socks ALWAYS make my legs feel great!! You can feel the sock actually squeezing (not too tightly) the calf muscles that always feel tired and sore on me, and it feels GREAT!

This is what the Sigvaris website says about their recovery socks:


Introducing the SIGVARIS Athletic Recovery Sock

SIGVARIS, the global leader in graduated compression garments, introduces the first product of the Active Therapy collection: The Athletic Recovery Sock. The Athletic Recovery sock helps to flush out the lactic acid built up in the leg during exercise, relieving tired, aching legs and exercise-induced muscle soreness.

Athletic Recovery Sock Benefits:

•Promotes lactic acid flush-out and relieves delayed onset muscle soreness!
•Superior Athletic Sizing Assortment and comfort & fit with 50+ years of graduated compression expertise!
•Patented Drirelease® and latex-free yarns with an embedded Freshguard® treatment that virtually eliminates odors!
•True Graduated Compression from the global leader of graduated compression socks!


I know that a lot of times, people say to not dry your compression socks, but I am a person who loves the convenience of the dryer and every time I wash my socks, I throw them into the dryer. They may have shrunk a little bit, but not enough to really notice, and definitely not enough to make them ineffective! Even after all the washing they've been through, they are not worn out in the least and are just as soft as they were when I first wore them! They always make my muscles feel better after a run! I have even worn them once during a run and they felt fabulous as well! So, either way you wear them, I definitely recommend Sigvaris Recovery Socks! I definitely love mine and will definitely be wearing them after my long run tomorrow!!

**Sigvaris in no way endorsed me for this review, I just wanted to share a product with the rest of you that I have really come to love and enjoy!

If you have a product you want me to review, or you want to host a giveaway on my blog, please feel free to email me. My email address is superwoman_4002@yahoo.com

Week in Review (8/23-8/29)

What my schedule said to do ----- What I actually did

Monday: Rext/XT -- Rest

Tuesday: 6 mi Tempo Run w/ 4mi @ 9:37 -- 5.37 miles @9:57 (inc warmup and cooldown)

Wednesday: 2mi easy run @11:08 -- 2.31 miles @10:57 LLL &hardCORE

Thursday: Rest/XT -- Rest (worked on my feet all day) hardCORE

Friday: 8 mi Long Run @ 11:08 -- 7.03 miles @9:48 and 2.26 miles @10:37=9.29 mi@ 10:01

Saturday: Rest/XT -- Rest, LLL &hardCORE

Sunday: 3mi easy run @11:08 -- Rest

Total: 19 miles ----- 16.97 miles (2.03 miles short)

I didn't have the best week of running, but my long run was fantastic!! I also got new running shirts in the mail from nike that I had ordered that were on sale!! I usually dont like pink, but I thought it was a pretty cool looking shirt! :)

I also won a giveaway for WIN laundry detergent from Jill over at Running to Sanity!! If you haven't already, go check out my sidebar and all the giveaways going on around the blogging universe right now! :D I hope everyone had a great weekend!! I know I did, had a much needed long talk with my best friend on Sunday (which is why I didn't really get anything done) Goodnight everyone!!