Focus on Running

I was in.

Knowing what was ahead of me gave me inspiration to train during the winter.  I am very much a fair weather work out type of gal.  After my second half ironman, I backed off training.  I did a couple half marathons and that was about it.  A guy I was dating challenged me to be a faster runner, more or less saying if I tried I could do it.  I'd been running for 5 years, I knew this was not possible. To prove him wrong, I tried.  Funny thing happened - when I went out for my "I'm going to run my fastest and I will show you there is no change" run, I was indeed faster.   That got me thinking.  Maybe, just maybe, I could improve my running.  So that became my focus.  If it was nice weather on a weekend, I'd join a friend or two for a 30ish mile bike ride, but my focus was on my run.  I started running sub 9-min. miles consistently on my morning 4 mile run, even getting down to 8:30 for a good number of them.The year before, I'd done the Swamp Rabbit Trail run at the end of an injury, so I walked the last 2 miles after pacing a friend to get her PR (personal record). I didn't want to walk, but I didn't want to get more injured, so I did what my PT told me to do.  Everyone I know who did that race got their PR.  So, my goal was to PR in that race.  My previous record was 2:03, I think, on a 13.7 mile course (that's a completely different story ending in a decision to never do the Greer Earth Day run again). I wanted to break 2 hours.

In January I signed up for the Greenville News 5k. In general, I'm not a fan of 5ks, but everyone seemed to want to do it, so why not.  One of my problems with 5ks is it takes me about 2 miles to warm up which leaves only 1 mile until it's done.  I decided to run from home to the start, giving me a 1.5mile warm up.  For giggles, I figured I'd go hard and see what happens.  I started where I usually start, in the middle, and found myself doing a LOT of weaving.  I  was able to break free probably half mile into it.  As I past the water stop (no time for that!) I saw that I was doing a 7:45 pace or something insane like that.  I ran into a guy from our run group who refused to let me beat him, which was fine.  It made me run harder to try to keep up.  In the end, my chip time was 24:15, gun time 24:58 - that's a 7:50 chip time pace!  I'd never run that fast for one mile EVER- and here I did it for 3.1!!!  Well, I couldn't stop there.  So I signed up for the Reedy River 10k and finished in 50:46 chip time, 8:06 pace! Again, faster than I'd ever done 4 miles never mind 6.  I was on a roll!  This was going to be my year for PRs.  I had a good feeling that I could, at the minimum, do a 9 min/mile for the half... that would bring me in at 1:58, hitting my sub-2hr goal.  Well, the gods were shining on me when it came to race day.. doing a 1 mile run, 1 min. walk, I finished in 1:47:58 chip time - 8:10 pace.  HOT DAMN! The beginning of my season was worth a few cartwheels (but I'd probably get injured, so I just did them in my head).

I was very excited about the progress I'd made on my run, but knew it was now time to start buckling down for the swim and the bike too.  I'd been swimming a few times - in the indoor pool because I hate the cold and would rather swim in 85deg water inside than 78 outside.  It was also time to start migrating my runs to Sundays and rides to Saturdays which meant I'd be saying goodbye to my Saturday morning run group for the next 6 months.  That's right, we were 6 months away from the biggest event I've ever trained for- it was time to buckle down.  Sharon and I signed up for the Knoxville Rev3 half ironman, and that became our new focus.

How it started

People ask how long I trained and I haven’t been able to give a specific date/time frame.  I often answer with “from May to August were the most intense parts of my training” but really it started much much earlier than that.

In October of 2005 I moved to FL.  I wasn’t excited about being there and thought I was going to leave within a year. Unfortunately when the opportunity for a new job came about, the housing market was such that I couldn’t move. By the summer of 2007, I knew I had to stay in FL for a while longer.  I decided that I needed to unpack and get used to the fact that I was going to be there.  I‘d met a few fun folks but I wanted to find more people with common interests. I’d heard about Team in Training (TNT) on the radio- one of the personalities had been training for the Chicago marathon.  It was a group that would train you to do a marathon while you fundraised for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.  I went to an info session because I figured the people there would likely be interested in one of two things that meant a lot to me – getting fit and/or giving back to the community.

I went to an info session and sat next to this woman named Jen.  As the people talked about how many full and half marathons they’d done I was very surprised to see they looked like me – some bigger, some smaller, but it wasn’t a bunch of Kenyans up there, they were regular ol’ everyday people.  Then they asked how many of us knew someone with cancer. My Aunt Mary was battling cancer at the time. Jen said she lost her husband to Lymphoma and asked if I was going to sign up. I told her I didn’t run.  She said she didn’t either and that she was going to sign up. So, I filled out a check for $100 and handed it in.  Then I called my parents to tell them.  Dad said “you don’t run.”  I said “I know”.   He said “it’s 26 miles” I said“26.2, I know, they told me”.  They thought I was nuts, not that that is anything new, but there began my journey.

Marathon training was hard.  I felt muscles I didn’t know existed.  I learned that sweat can come out of your calves. I learned what an ITBand was and had to come to terms with mine when it stopped me from running for 3 weeks and helped me to become familiar with physical therapy.  Jen got injured and dropped out.  I felt like everyone else had already paired off so I was on my own. When I finally came back for a long run (well, walk) I went with this amazing woman named Fran who was 30 years older than me, but became a very close friend because she is young at heart and has no end to her generosity.  My parents came down for the marathon and as I crossed the finish line I couldn’t believe I’d done it.  It wasn’t fast, and it hurt at the end, but I started something I thought could likely be impossible, I stuck to the plan they gave me – even when I was traveling, I survived an injury and didn’t give up and I raised $2500 in honor of my Aunt. It changed my life.

I went on to participate in 3 more marathon seasons, as both a mentor and assistant coach.  If you’ve ever gone to an endurance event with TNT folks, you know there are a lot of purple people cheering for you. The team gave a call out to ask for volunteers for a triathlon in Miami.  I was training for Alaska at the time and felt it’d be good to pay back all the cheers others have given me.  So I went down with a few other folks and we were told to stand on the bike course and cheer.  I had no idea what to expect.  When the triathletes started coming by, I was in awe!  So many of them had amazing arms!  I know, not the most inspirational thought.  I wanted their arms.  Of course, not everyone had them, but those who did? Wow, they were beautiful.  I started asking questions about triathlons.  That was when I first learned about the Ironman.  Someone rode by with a tattoo.  Someone told me what it meant.  I decided I wanted that.

The next season one of my teammates was training for her first marathon as she’d done a number of tris before.  I asked her all about it and by the time the season ended, I asked if she was going to sign up for that tri in Miami and she said yes.  So, I decided I would too.  I had a hybrid bike that I spent maybe$400 on- I thought I’d paid soooo much. When I arrived, I learned that my bike wasn’t really a common choice for people, but it worked.  I learned about bricks- where you run after riding your bike and you feel like you are running in place.  I learned to wear spandex while running – I always run in a skirt, running in tri shorts horrified me.  I then got a more appropriate bike and learned that $1000 is cheap and $2000 is “entry”.  I learned how to clip in and out of the pedals – I’d tell Heidi (who was riding behind me) “I’m clipping out!” as we’d approach a stop sign or light. Then I’d yell “I’m clipping in!” I don’t know if it was at the end of that ride or a later one, but she told me that she was able to actually see me clipping in and out and I didn’t, in fact, need to announce it.  HA!

This triathlon was a Olympic distance.  .9mile swim, 25mile bike and a 10k. Somewhere along the way I’d mentioned to Dad that I wanted to do and Ironman and I started getting articles about how people drown.  He was worried I’d sign up tomorrow.  I tried to assure him I’d be smart about it –but how do you believe that from a woman who signed up for a marathon having never run? 

I look back now and giggle, but I remember dreading the bridge that we were going to have to go over TWICE because it seemed like a mountain.  And to ride 25 miles? That might as well have been all day. The 10k at the end was in the Miami sun- no shade to be seen. It was tough, but I did it.  About a week later I went to Peru for vacation and upon returning I moved up to SC for a new job.

It took a bit to figure everything out when I got here.  I had to buy a car and my top qualification was could it fit my bike, because I knew if I couldn’t get it into my car easily, I’d be less likely to ride it.  And after spending so much money on it, I better ride it.  I trained for the Greece marathon – the first non-TNT marathon I’d done. More or less started a running group and met some amazing people.  The next summer (2011) I decided I wanted to brave a bike ride.  I went on the Swamp Rabbit Trail – a rails to trails trail that we run on – it’s mostly flat and has no vehicular traffic. I think my first ride was 10 miles, then 14… a few times.  There was an incline in the trail and I’d watch my speed go from 14mph down to 11 or 12.  It definitely wasn’t FL.  That summer a bunch of things went wrong at my job. I had been dating a guy who did an IM before (2 I think) and he said I could do one if I trained and he said I could definitely do a half.   He told me in order to ride with him I should be able to hold 17mph…. well, with the amount of hills around here, I didn’t think that would ever happen.  We stopped hanging out and I needed something to do. I asked around if anyone wanted to do a half ironman.  One of the women in my running group said yes, so we began training. Then, another woman who joined just happened to have signed up for the same one, so I found another training partner.  I went on a bike ride on the road for the first time (scared out of my mind) and with hills and 30 miles… that was all one ride!  Slowly I got better, though it felt like my first marathon where I always had new pains.

I learned a lot from that event – how important it is to gradually increase miles, fuel, change your seated position on the bike, how much extra you float in a wetsuit, how much more time it takes to get a wetsuit off, and that I am very bad at picking a run pace without using my garmin.  But I kind of liked it, so that summerI signed up for another.  A friend told me about how much fun the Rev3 events were and this one was only 45 min.away- so I was in.  After that I started to believe that I had what it took to do an Ironman.  I’d often told people I wouldn’t do one unless I knew I could finish, and they’d say “you never know what will happen”–true.  But what I meant was,barring anything crazy, I had the physical ability to finish, in time, because one second after midnight, and it won’t count.  That time cut off scared me.

My friend Sharon had done Louisville in 2010 and said she’d do one with me.  After great thought, I decided I wanted to do an Ironman brand event – you can do Ironman distance (140.6) with a variety of groups but only the Ironman brand events say “Kristin Meyer, you are an Ironman” and I kind of wanted that.  My rule was we had to be able to drive– which left FL and KY.  Her rule was no ocean, so KY it was!

On December 9, 2012, I signed up for the Louisville Ironman.