a marathon mom 2014

Since I've been laying around dying from the flu for the past week, I've had a lot of time to reflect on my 2014.  Yes a lot of it has been feeling sorry for myself that I haven't run this whole week and being jealous every time Emir laced up his running shoes but there were times I laid there thinking about how grateful I am that most of the time I am able to do what I love, run.  And in 2014 I was able to do that ALOT.  I ran 2360 miles which is by far the most I've ever done in a year. 

Aside from just the sheer number of miles, 2014 was in general a special year for Emir, myself and the kids.  Not only did we celebrate our 10 year wedding anniversary but we were able to take the kids to Key West to the exact spot where we were married.  Of course running was apart of these celebrations.  I ran the Key West Half, Emir and I crossed the finish line of the Blue Ridge Double Marathon holding hands just two days after our actual anniversary day and we had an amazing anniversary trip to California and Arizona where we ran our first 100K. 

key west trip

Finishing double blue ridge

After finishing Born to Run 100K

As I just mentioned, we ran our first 100K in 2014.  This was pretty surreal for us as the furthest we ran prior was a 50K.  We ran 52.4 at the Double Blue Ridge Marathon in April and less than a month later were able to complete the Born To Run 100K.  Running those distances really sparked something inside me.  So in September I ran my first 12 hour and was able to make it 52.4 miles. 

Finishing the Sloppy Cuckoo 12 hour

Despite my intense love for these newly accomplished long distances, I still can't let go of my love for a fast road marathon.  There's just something about getting out there and trying to run 26.2 as fast as I can to see how much I've improved.  And there's also my desire to run Boston as it was this spring that I realized, it was actually possible.  I'm very proud of everything I accomplished on the road this year.  I PR'd in the 5K, 10K, half and in the full twice.  The first time in the spring by 6 minutes and the second time at Philly by 10 minutes giving me my BQ. 

PR at the Ocean Drive Marathon

PR & BQ at Philly Marathon

I can't talk about what a great year of running 2014 was without mentioning the AMAZING running community that I have become a part of.  Last year Emir and I became very active on twitter and involved with our friends at Trail and Ultra and #ultrachat. Now in 2014 I joined  #teamwickedbonkproof as a result of Emir signing me up to train with Coach Caleb Masland as my Christmas present.  Obviously the coaching has been outstanding (hello all the new PRs !) but being a part of the team has been AWESOME.  I am constantly in conversations with my teammates on our team FB page and outside of it.  Every single one of them is so supportive and I even have been able to meet a few in person. 

I've also added tons of new running companions in the #bibchat community.  #bibchat happens every Tuesday and is hosted by BibRave, a great tool when you are deciding which races to run.  And you can review all your races on there to help other runners.  I loved it so much that I became a Bibravepro over the summer.  It's been a great experience so far meeting new people and having new resources in the running community and the chat on Tuesdays is ALWAYS a good time. 

Just that little peek into 2014 lets you know that I've been lucky to have such a great, injury free year.  So what am I going to do next?

After a 50K next week "just for fun"  ;-)  I am going to dedicate 3 months to specific training for the OD marathon at the end of March.  I know that my BQ is not by enough to actually get to run Boston and I'm right there so I want to do it now.  So I will go for it again and try to take a minute or two off my Philly time so I can be sure I'll actually get to run.  The rest of 2015 will be dedicated to preparing to run my first 100 miler.  I'm planning on running Double Blue Ridge again, a local 50 miler here in Philly and a extremely mountainous 50 miler in Croatia as part of my prep.  Of course Emir will be tackling his first 100 miler as well so if all goes as planned, his will be before mine.  So I will actually get to pace for him and use that as a preparation as well. 

I plan on staying with Coach Caleb for 2015 and the team as it's been such a great, successful experience so far.  I've been accepted back as a Bibravepro for 2015 (yay!) so look for tons of orange #orangeisthenewfast.  New for 2015 I will be a Nuun Ambassador.  I'm looking forward to being part of that team.  And I've also been invited back to Blue Ridge as an official blogger and so has Emir!  We are so excited as we LOVE Blue Ridge.  And we have a code that all of you can use for 10% off of any of the Blue Ridge races: RUTOUGH   I want to see you all there! 

Lastly, I want to continue in 2015 to include the kids as much as we can.  I feel that we were very successful in 2014 with balancing the enormous amount of running, our work and our family.   Even though we do all this running we still spent TONS of time with the kids and we did many things together as a family including some races and our summer Sunday training runs and of course many non-running things.  Nothing brings a bigger smile on my face than Niko asking "when are you going to do your run?" or "how was your run?  how far did you go?  how do you feel?  Can I run today?"  And Una saying "mommy you no run downstairs on treadmill today, I go with you outside in stroller!"