A Sad Goodbye...

i


... my track season ended last week with our banquet last Tuesday. Since the team is so big, we hold it in the school cafeteria. One of the other coaches works in food services (and has his catering license) so he is in charge of the food every year. This year he did an asian theme with cupcakes and ice cream for dessert. We hand out letters to the varsity letter winners, certificates for the JV kids, and trophies to the top senior, junior, sophomore, and freshmen athletes. We also recognize our seniors. This year we got our seniors a purple hooded North Canyon track & field sweatshirts (the coaches each got one too).

My girls' distance runners really surprised me this year with the gift. I am used to their funny cards and their homemade items but this year they went all out. Besides the usual flowers and cards, they got me a silver jewelry box engraved with "Coach Y" and "NCHS 2011". Inside the box was a silver chain link bracelet with a charm that says "NCHS 2011" on one side and "Girls Distance" on the other. I was floored. Even the boys team got me an "NCHS Distance" sticker for my car. My co-coach (whom I've coached with for 6 seasons of track/cross country) got me a purple long-sleeve nike "North Canyon Cross Country" running shirt and nike cold-weather running beanie.

I cannot begin to express how much I will miss my running "family". I never knew the hours I would spend training with these people and how much fun we would have. I was talking to some of the parents I've known for a few years now and I was overwhelmed with their compliments. I never actually thought I taught anyone about running. Running was always a hobby for me and I thought I was learning about the sport right along with my kids these past few years. One of the parents told me that their daughter said, "We have to get Coach Y something REALLY nice this year. She is like a 2nd mother to us." It is probably the highest compliment I've ever received. LOVE THOSE GIRLS!!! These are just a few pictures of me with my senior girls from the banquet.

I Still Don't Want No Scrubs...or I Get Scrubbed in Nice Connecticut Beach Towns too...

Yep, I do. I was running a 1.3-ish mile loop around my in-laws waterfront property in the lovely little "Woodmont on the Sound" community in Milford, CT when...yes a car honked at me (scared the sh*t out of me, too). And since I was doing multiple laps of this loop, I ended up passing several walkers a few times. The 2nd time I passed the same guy he said, "Hey, didn't I see you back there?" to which I replied "Yep! Running some laps!", the 3rd time he said , "Show-off!". Wow. Never been called a show-off before. Thanks, buddy.

I want to update but I have no pictures... I know, I know. More later...

I (really) Don't Want No Scrubs

My sisters and I refer to a "scrub" as someone who yells at you from a moving car. We define "getting scrubbed" as the act of being yelled at from a moving car. I can generally say that 99.99% of the time it is men "scrubbing" women. I can say that 100% of the time I have been "scrubbed" has been when I am running. I think horn-honking at a runner is only slightly less offensive than actually rolling down the window and yelling at the person. I only say this because sometimes people I know will see me running and honk the horn. Um...you a) just scared the sh*t out of me and b) made me want to flip you off because I thought you were a scrub so why don't you c) just skip the horn honking and the next time you see me in a normal situation you can say "hey! I saw you running the other day..."

Anyway, since I've started coaching my high school runners three years ago...I get scrubbed a LOT more. Probably because THEY'RE the ones getting the horn-honking and yelling...and the people in the car are thinking "who's that old lady trying to keep up with those hot, young girls?" We've had so many horn-honkings, so many inappropriate comments (really really DISGUSTING things), and even things thrown at us from moving cars. Gotta love running on the streets of a city. I try to teach my girls that it's inappropriate to give these people the finger (even though I really really want to) and that it's not really safe to gesture or yell back (what if they are REAL creepers and stop the car, turn around, and do something much worse???) I don't allow them to run with their shirts off unless we are alone, on a trail in the desert....NEVER along a road. So normally we'll make comments to each other....like "Oooh you're so cool" or "Yeah, right buddy", "you wish"....or last week I added "Grow one first" or "No thanks"... well yesterday I guess it was the last straw because one of my girls ( a calm, quiet, level-headed, intelligent girl) responded to a "scrubbing" with "F*ck you!" and then she realized she was running next to her ADULT coach said "Oh! Coach Y! I didn't mean it...I mean I did mean it but I didn't mean to swear in front of you. Sometimes I swear when I get angry and it just slipped. I am really really really sorry." She was so upset and I was not angry. Not one little bit. She just didn't want no scrub.

Looooong Overdue

Ok so....here is what's been happening since my last post in *gasp* January....

February: track season started and Keeper turned 30!! We spent the weekend celebrating with good friends in Tucson. We visited a brewery, went to an amazing restaurant for dinner, toured the gem show and had lunch at a fantastic Mexican place. I turned 31 a few weeks later and we celebrated by.... going to a spring training game and...starting a cleanse :( We were supposed to do the cleanse for 21 days...I made it 15 and Keeper made it 14... we thought that was pretty good. We gave up soy, wheat, dairy, processed sugar, caffeine, alcohol, and even MEAT the 2nd week. It was intense and I guess our livers thanked us. We were happy to be done with it. We had guests for President's Day weekend. Joy & Adam came out for a few days and we had so much fun. We did hiking, drinking, shopping....and Keeper and I celebrated our 6th anniversary with a great dinner at NOCA :)

March: More of the same...track, track, and more track. Keeper was very busy with his clinic shifts. Both of our schools had spring break...on separate weeks :( I spent mine coaching everyday, but did get to squeeze in some relaxation time and got some errands done that I'd been putting off.

Now April is 1/2 way done and... Keeper is in his LAST QUARTER OF MEDICAL SCHOOL!!! I have 6 weeks left of school for the year (4 of track). I have been running a LOT and am looking forward to some upcoming 5k's. We are trying to figure out our lives post-medical school. Everything's a bit scary as we are both job hunting and anticipating a summer move back east. We seriously cannot believe these four years are almost over!!

Marathon! and family visit too :)

2 weeks ago, I ran my 5th full marathon. Mom and Matthew made the trip out for the weekend to enjoy the beautiful AZ weather and see me run. They flew on Thursday night and on Friday, Matthew came to school with me to do a presentation on food chemistry to our honors chemistry classes at North Canyon. He did great and the kids loved him! We went out to lunch at America's Taco Shop, then headed to the race expo to pick up my goodie bags and race number. Friday night was the American Cancer Society team dinner in Tempe which was great. It really put into perspective why I ran the race and how many people will benefit from the money Team DetermiNation raised. Saturday, we drove out to Apache Junction and did some light hiking/sightseeing in Lost Dutchman State Park. We got some lunch at Dilly Deli and then came home to watch football. Keeper made me an awesome pasta dinner on Saturday night :)

The race went well overall. I raised $1,725.00 for the American Cancer Society as part of Team DetermiNation and I had a huge marathon PR of about 32 minutes. The last marathon I had run was in 2008 in San Diego, before I started coaching and running with high school kids...needless to say I guess all the training paid off. It was pretty to cool to be running my 5th marathon on the 5th anniversary of the first one I ran...and it was the same race! It feels like forever when I flew out here (in 2006) with Jen & Andrew and we stayed with the Bronders in Tempe for race weekend. The course was pretty much the same and it was neat to know exactly where I was at all times. Keeper got up early with me on race morning so we could head downtown for my charity team's pre-race "warm zone". A local Mexican restaurant had donated their "space" to us on race morning. It was awesome to have a meeting place, breakfast (NOT Mexican food, normal running food), and most importantly, CLEAN, FLUSHABLE TOILETS to use pre-race. No lines for port-a-potties that had run of toilet paper (and smelled)!!! At 7am, the marathon runners marched down to the start as a big group and I jumped in my corral. The first 6 miles were nice, I was just getting into the groove...I saw some coaches from my group a little after mile 5, and then I saw Mom, Matthew, and Keeper right around the 10k mark of the course. The race ran literally a half a block from our condo. The next few miles were nice as I ran through my "hood" and down through the Biltmore area and across Camelback Rd to Scottsdale. I saw another ACS coach around mile 14 and I was feeling great. I was doing pretty well until mile 20 ish. I saw my coach at mile 20.5 and I thought I could hang on to my pace for the rest of the race....but marathons are not exactly like that. After awhile, EVERYTHING starts to hurt and you just resort to putting one foot in front of the other and trying not to cramp up. You dump packets of salt on your tongue because you feel your calf muscles spasm-ing. You feet hurt and you feel a blister squish and pop around mile 23 (gross!). I did have to slow down the last 5 miles but nothing cramped up completely and I still finished at a decent time. I was SO GLAD to be done. After a painful walk back to the car and a shower at home, I happily consumed my favorite post-marathon meal: a giant burger, fries, and a beer. Mission accomplished.

December...in a nutshell

Sorry for not posting in...a month. Here goes...

In early December I ran my 8th half marathon as part of my marathon training. I ran the Fiesta Bowl 1/2 Marathon in Scottsdale and had a great race. I PR'd by about 7 minutes. I also did my 2nd 20 mile training run. Training was going so well that I did not take it easy after my hard race. I , instead, thought it would be good for my beat-up, 30-yr-old body to keep running (faster than I should have) the following week with my 16 & 17 yr old cross country runners. Needless to say, I was forced to take a few weeks easy and skip some long runs to nurse a sore hamstring. I think the rest was much needed, as the marathon training was, really, taking over my life. I got back in the yoga studio and have been adding more rest/cross training days...things I should have been doing all along. Oh well. Live & learn.

Our 4th East Coast Xmas Trip was a welcome distraction from intense marathon training. I flew into BWI on Monday, the 20th of December. My college friend was kind of enough to pick me up from the airport and drive me up to York. After a nap (that red-eye was rough), I drove up to the Tillinghammers' house to spend a few days with my nephews. The boys are doing great and are so much fun. We caravan-ed back to York on Wednesday night so that Mom and I could get up early on Thursday and drive back down to Baltimore to pick up Keeper. It was good to spend a few days at my parents' with everyone. Blake was especially into xmas lights this year and we had a fun car ride looking for blow-up Snoopy displays. Christmas Eve was spent doing the traditional "fancy" dinner with my parents, sisters & significant others, then church, then up to Grandma & Pap's for the late night feast with Aunts/Uncles/Cousins. It was really fun. On Xmas day everyone came to York to visit us and it was good seeing everyone.

Keeper and I woke up VERY early on the 26th to drive up to Connecticut. There was a blizzard on the way and we wanted to beat the storm (which we did). We saw the house in Milford, CT for the first time and it is beautiful. I loved being right across the street from the water.We also got to meet our nephew, Oscar, for the first time. What a cutie. The blizzard hit and we happily stayed inside to drink wine, play board games, and watch football. We didn't get hit that bad on the coast and were able to drive up to Boston on Tuesday, the 28th to visit our niece and nephews. On Wednesday, we drove around some surrounding towns and then headed down to Brooklyn. We were completely surprised at the lack of plowing 3 days after the snowstorm. Corbin's street (and several surrounding ones) hadn't been touched. We luckily found a street parking spot...right in front of the projects. We had fun seeing friends & family for dinner & drinks in Brooklyn.

By Thursday morning we were pretty exhausted from all the traveling so we decided to just head back to my parents'. We got there in late afternoon and spent a quiet evening playing Office Clue with Joy & Adam (VERY fun version of Clue--I highly recommend). New Year's Eve was spent at my parents' doing the now traditional Chinese take-out and steamed shrimp. We did make it past midnight this year and we did make up to Grandma & Pap's the next day for pork & sauerkrout. My flight left BWI on Saturday night and went back alone, as I had school on Monday and Keeper spent the week back in Connecticut visiting with doctors. He also got to go to the Jets-Bills game with his dad, which was really fun for him.

Although the weather was much milder this year compared to last year, I was still glad to back to Phoenix. Winter is the best here!

O Christmas Tree

On Sunday, Keeper and I got our Christmas tree and decorated it. Our place smells so lovely with the scent of fresh Oregon pine:) I was happy to pull out my NEW ornaments for this year: a sushi roll from Jen, a horsehair pottery ball with a Native American bear etched on it by a local artist, and a painted ceramic ball from the Painted Desert/Petrified Forest giftshop from our summer vacation. Yesterday, I had to stop at CVS on the way home from work and just HAD to buy a black lab ornament. It was on sale and it looks just like our Nene :)