Endurance Nutrition Tips

Posted on May 12, 2013 by Colleen Lerro

Last month I went to a clinic on Endurance Nutrition Tips featuring sports nutritionist Rebecca Mohning, MS, RD, LD, put on by Team Z at Fast Track Physical Therapy. I’m always amazed how no matter how many of these things I go to or how much I read on the subject, there’s always something new to learn.

Rebecca talked about nutrition pre, during and post workout or race. She highlighted the usual important tips including eating the proper amount of calories, fat, carbs and protein for training; staying hydrated; not trying anything new on race day and choosing the appropriate calorie level for weight loss so it doesn’t impact training and performance.

Some new things I learned and interesting stats…

Be careful of sugar alcohols in bars or energy drinks. They can cause GI distress.
If you lose more than 3 percent of your body weight in a training workout, it’ll hurt your performance.
Just 4-6 ounces of OJ or 1/2 a banana will give you 30 percent more energy for a short morning workout. (The 1/2 banana thing actually drives me crazy. Does anyone ever actually just eat 1/2 a banana?!)
Women have an exaggerated increase in appetite hormones after exercise leading many to eat more calories than they’ve burned. (So not fair!)
Your weight in kg. times 1.2 is equal to the number of grams per day of protein you should eat.
Always take vitamins with food and not with teas, colas or coffees.
Women need 350 mg. of magnesium per day. Nuts and seeds are the best source, but need to supplement it as well.
Many people are Vitamin D deficient and should get a blood test to determine further supplementation needs.

I’ve tried over the years to take vitamins, or at the very least a daily vitamin, but never stick with it. What do you all think about taking vitamins or supplements? Any new nutrition tips you’ve learned recently?

Book Review: PRE The Story of America’s Greatest Running Legend, Steve Prefontaine

Posted on May 11, 2013 by Colleen Lerro

I cannot believe I have never read this book. If you’re a runner or a competitor, you will love it.

Tom Jordan tells the story of Pre’s life from his beginnings in Coos Bay, a mill town on the coast of Oregon through his brilliant, but short career. As a runner, I’ve always known who Pre was and obviously heard the stories about how great he was and how his life was tragically cut short in a car accident. I honestly didn’t know much more than that though and loved every page of this book.

Jordan details Pre’s career from high school through college at the University of Oregon to the Olympics, running overseas and his run-ins with the AAU. He talks about his training, his interaction with teammates and others, and his races. There are brief blurbs throughout from people whose lives Pre touched that give you a fuller picture of who Pre was. His work ethic, drive and intensity were unbelievable and unmatched. What really stood out for me was his connection to “his people” in Oregon.

A few of my favorite excerpts:

Bill Dellinger, University of Oregon assistant cross country and track coach at that time, remembers his first glimpse of Pre at that meet. ‘I was standing on a hill. I had my binoculars, and I was probably a good half-mile or 700 yards away from the start. And I saw this guy that had the start position, but it was the look in his eyes, from a half-mile distance, the intensity in his face as the gun went off. I thought That’s got to be Pre.'”

Training was not always all that much fun, as Pre himself admitted. ‘It really gets grim until the competition begins,’ he once said. ‘You have to wonder at times what you’re doing out there. Over the years, I’ve given myself a thousand reasons to keep running, but it always comes back to where it started. It comes down to self-satisfaction and a sense of achievement.'”

‘It seemed,’ said Rick Riley, ‘that those of us running in the meet were only minor performers and that any minute the Star would appear and the crowds would roar to life, athlete and spectator giving and taking whatever it I that each needs and wants. I stood there on the track near the finish but he did not appear. The magic was gone forever.'”

Seriously, read this book – you won’t regret it.

“To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the Gift.” -PRE

A Marathon View From the Sidelines

Posted on May 8, 2013 by Colleen Lerro

Last weekend I volunteered with the DC Capital Striders at the Potomac River Run Marathon along the C&O Canal Path. It’s not too often I’m up before 6 a.m. for any reason other than going running, but Sunday I would just be manning the sidelines. I met up with the rest of our group at Lock 7 and helped set up the aid station. The marathoners would go out and back twice along the path so we’d see them all four times along the course. We were stocked with water, Gatorade, bananas and power bars.

Lock 7

Volunteer Group at Lock 7 (stole this from the DC Cap Striders FB page)

The race had about 500 runners with a 7 a.m. non-competitive start and an 8 a.m. regular start. After we got things ready to go it wasn’t going to be too long before the first set of runners were coming through since the first time they’d pass us was just about 3.5 miles in. It was an overcast day and temps were in the high 40s at the start with a slight breeze – perfect for runners, but a bit chilly for us. I’m glad I packed some hand warmers that I still had on hand from when I used to teach outdoor boot camps during the winter!

I handled the water cups and doled out encouragement to as many runners going by as I could. I know how much it means to me to have some encouragement along the course, especially one without a lot of crowd support. I also knew a couple runners so it was fun getting to cheer them on as they passed by. Other than one botched water handoff to one of the faster runners during his first trip through our station, I managed not to drop or spill the water cups on anyone! Successful day if you ask me. Although if you ask the guy who I botched the handoff with, he might not agree! There was a somewhat steady stream of people after the 8 a.m. group got going and we had people coming from both sides, but it was never overwhelming. I can’t even imagine working a water stop at one of the mega races. I need to remember to say extra thank yous at the Marine Corps Marathon stops this year!

Runners on the C&O path

It was fun to be out there and it was really inspiring to see so many people of so many different abilities putting it all out there to finish their marathon. I love this sport!

Aid Station at Lock 7

Congrats to everyone who ran Sunday! Have you ever volunteered for a marathon? How’d it go?

Footprints: Monday Morning Recap

Posted on May 6, 2013 by Colleen Lerro

So this week’s Monday morning recap is brought to by Monday night. I’m running a bit behind this week! After last weekend’s half marathon I took this week as a recovery week, and I actually – gasp – did not run at all. It felt good to give myself a break and recharge, but now I’m itching to get out and run and am actually excited for my early alarm to go off tomorrow so I can lace up my running shoes and hit the streets.

Here’s the day by day breakdown…

Monday: Spin Class, Upper body strength

Tuesday: Rest Day

Wednesday: Rest Day

Thursday: Spin Class Body Ride and strength

Friday: Rest Day

Saturday: Spin Class Endurance Ride

Sunday: I might not have been running this week, but I did man an aid station at the Potomac River Run Marathon – fun way to spend the morning!

On Saturday, Revolve brought in some Cinco de Mayo enterainment to go along with the ride!

Resolution Check-In

Posted on May 1, 2013 by Colleen Lerro

I know I say this every month, but how is another done already?! With the beginning of the month here it’s time for me to check in on how I’m doing with my New Year’s Resolutions, and choose what my focus will be for this month.

Even with a lot of running so far this year I’ve been staying injury free. I’ve spent a lot more time stretching, foam rolling and icing than ever before, so I’m sure this is playing a major role. Building a stronger core was also a major part of this and I’ve been doing great with that. I’m on day 124 of my consecutive days streak doing my P90X ab ripper workout and also completed a 5-minute plank challenge last month. The craziest thing about the plank challenge was that I wasn’t sore the next day – so this core thing must be working!

Drinking less soda was April’s focus since I was reintroducing it to my diet after giving it up for Lent and didn’t want to overdo it. I had a few bad days with this when I was tired and traveling and craving caffeine, but overall I’m getting a lot better about not drinking too much soda. Definitely still something I need to work on though.

My last resolution for this year was more of a goal – Boston Qualifier. As I’m sure you can imagine and as many others feel, I want this more than ever now. My marathon isn’t until late October so I won’t be able to get in for 2014, but I hope to be there cheering on next year’s runners knowing I have my ticket punched for 2015. I just hired a running coach thanks to a Zozi deal, and am really excited to have someone to work with to help me navigate my training plan and hold me accountable. I think this will be a great step towards getting my BQ this year!

May’s focus is going to be all about strength. My goal is to do at least 3 strength workouts per week to work on toning and strengthening my upper and lower body, which will only help me become an even better runner.

What are your goals for this month? How do you plan to get to them?

Rough Day Running: Nike Women’s DC Half Marathon Race Recap

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Colleen Lerro

My race day started off with a 4:44 a.m. alarm, and unlike I usually do when early alarms go off, I popped right out of bed. Exhausted from a long week of travel for work I actually went to bed early Saturday night and didn’t feel like I needed the snooze button Sunday morning. All my race gear was laid out, so I was quickly ready to go.

The first sign of a bad day struck when I grabbed my Garmin. The display screen was blank. I had just charged it the night before, but I think it went into it’s protected mode which I’ve had trouble with before. I pulled up the email from Garmin support on how to bring it back to life, but after I did it beeped that the battery was low. NOOOOOO! I had a minor panic attack before Ian calmed me down and assured me this wasn’t the end of the world. I was going to have to wear a regular stopwatch for the race and not have instant feedback on my current pace or beeps with mile splits at all the markers. I haven’t done an outdoor run without my Garmin or before that my Nike Plus wrist band in years. I convinced myself not to worry about it and headed toward the metro.

I was really early, so there was barely a line for the porta potties. I was one of the first people in the 6:30-7:29 pace corral, which turned out to be pretty sparse. I had to go to the bathroom again, but stressed out about whether or not I’d have time so I decided not to go. I think I might drink too much water on race morning sometimes. This was a bad decision and would come back to haunt me as I really couldn’t hold it anymore and had to find a porta potty just past the 10k-mark wasting about 90 seconds.

Other than that little bit of TMI, everything seemed perfect for the start of the race. Temps were in the low 50s, so I wasn’t freezing like at the start of the Cherry Blossom, but it wasn’t going to be too warm to run in either. The Nike trainers kicked things off with some fun active stretches to get everyone warmed up and pumped up, and then to top things off they introduced Shalene Flanagan and Joanie Benoit Samuelson. The two both sporting Boston tees were going to “jog” the race with us.

At the start, ready to go.

With so few people in my corral and even fewer in the one ahead of us, I was very close to the start line. I didn’t have any issues with overcrowding or weaving in and out of people at the start, which was awesome. I’ve heard some rumblings on social media that this was a bit of an issue for others further back however. We headed out for the first mile that led us through a tunnel with drummers and strobe lights reverberating off the walls pumping up the energy. From there the course was very similar to the Cherry Blossom 10 Miler running along the Mall, out and back over the Memorial Bridge, past the Kennedy Center and through Hains Point.

Coming out of the tunnel at mile 1

Right from the start something didn’t feel right. It was hard to breathe even during mile 1 – like that out of shape, out of breath I’m running way too hard feeling. I wasn’t running way too hard though. I ran my first mile right on pace in 7:30 and my second at about 7:27. It felt hard though. Really hard. I desperately tried to stay positive though, and told myself it was good that I wasn’t going out too fast. I didn’t want to let my mind beat me when I’d trained so hard for this race.

My next two miles slowed to about a 7:50 pace even though I felt like I was pushing to keep at my 7:30 goal. Again I told myself to stay positive and that I still had energy in the tank to make up for it. This was not a fun way to run. I wasn’t taking in any of the sites or enjoying the bands and cheer sections along the course that were all really great.

I entered the long, lonely stretch that is Hains Point and told myself this was my spot to make up some time. I’ve been running these roads so much this year and there was actually no major headwind to deal with on Sunday…this never happens at Hains

Point! Instead I got even slower. Nike did a great job of filling this four-mile-stretch with motivational signs that I tried to use for motivation. By mile 9 though, when I realized I’d slipped well below an 8-minute pace and was only slowing more, I almost broke down and cried.

Leading from start to finish…wow!

Mile 10 brought the first real hill up an on ramp, but it wasn’t even that tough of a hill when you think about the course for the National Half Marathon also here in D.C. At this point I wanted to just run off the course and hide somewhere to stop the struggling. Mile 11 brought us back through the tunnel and into the final stretch down to the Capitol Building and back towards the finish on Pennsylvania Ave. I swear that loop around the front of the Capitol took days. I saw Ian just after the 20k mark and tried to smile as I ran by, but just wanted this race to be over.

Just get me to the finish line!

You can see the finish line of this race from a long ways away. The fact that I didn’t have any energy to even kick to the finish made it seem like I was never going to get there! I did finally cross the line though and got high fives from Shalene and Joan Benoit – the highlight of my day. I broke down a little when I saw my friend Lindsay who was handing out water at the finish and told her I felt awful and had a terrible run. Being a runner she just gave me an understanding hug and told me there’d be another chance for a PR.

Only highlight of the race…getting high fives from Shalene Flanagan and Joan Benoit Samuelson at the Finish!

I kept moving through the finish area collecting my Tiffany’s necklace from the ROTC guys in tuxedos and then grabbed my super cute finisher’s tee. Well done Nike. I met up with Ian and immediately lost it and started sobbing in his arms. I realize this is a ridiculous reaction to not getting the time I wanted, but I was exhausted emotionally and physically and it just came out. I’d trained so hard for this race and was really disappointed that I’d had such a bad day. It wasn’t just that I was mad about my time on a day and a course that were tailor made for a PR, but that I’d hurt for the whole race and hadn’t enjoyed any of it like I usually do on race day.

ROTC guys getting ready to hand out Tiffany’s necklaces to the finishers. Kudos to Ian for getting them to do the prom style picture!

Finishers Tee and Necklace

I had a goal of finishing in 1:38 and ended with a time of 1:47:48 putting me in 812 place overall and 236 out of 3,744 in my division. It’s funny how relative running can be. A few years ago I would have been over the moon with that time, but after the training I put in, I know I could have done much better. In the grand scheme of things it’s just a race time. Nobody other than me really cares what time I come in. Even my goal time wasn’t going to win me any awards. I finished another half marathon and that’s something to be proud of.

Also, one of the best things about running is that there’s always another chance. I’m thinking about adding in another half marathon to give it another shot, but am trying to give myself a few days to see how I feel before jumping into a new race. I’m looking at the half in Alexandria on Memorial Day weekend or the Zooma half in Annapolis on June 1. Has anyone done either of these? What are your thoughts? How do you deal with a tough race?

Footprints: Monday Morning Recap

Posted on April 29, 2013 by Colleen Lerro

I ran 20.6 total miles last week in my half marathon week. Everything about the Nike Women’s DC Half Marathon was great except for my performance, so I was a bit disappointed, but what can you do?!

Here’s the day by day breakdown…

Monday: 3 miles at my race pace on an indoor track at the Chicago Hilton where I was staying for a work trip. I didn’t look at my watch once the whole time and felt like I was keeping an easy pace – was actually surprised when I saw I’d hit my race pace for the run.

Tuesday: Rest Day

Wednesday: Interval workout on the treadmill back at the hotel gym (which was pretty awesome). One mile warm up followed by 6x400m repeats at a sub-7 minute pace for a total of 3 miles.

Thursday: Rest Day

Friday: Rest Day. I had the day off from work (just had to check emails) after traveling back from our Convention late the night before, but didn’t really spend my day relaxing. I was up early for a dentist appointment then had to get over to the other side of Arlington to have routine blood work done, and spent the afternoon/evening volunteering at the race expo.

Saturday: 1.5 mile easy shake out run at a 7:48 pace

Sunday: Race Day. Conditions were absolutely perfect for a PR and yet I struggled from start to finish and never felt good. It kept me from enjoying what should have been an awesome race. Full recap to come tomorrow, but I finished well off my goal of 1:38 in 1:47:48.

Only highlight of the race…getting high fives from Shalene Flanagan and Joan Benoit Samuelson at the Finish!

Nike D.C. Women’s Half Marathon Expo

Posted on April 27, 2013 by Colleen Lerro

I can’t even believe my half marathon is TOMORROW! It’s time to put so many weeks of training to the test. I’m not particularly thrilled with my last two weeks of training, but am hoping the foundation I built will be strong enough to still go for my goal. Yesterday I headed into Georgetown for packet pick-up and the expo, and thought it was a great experience!

Ian dropped me off around 3, and I headed straight to the packet pick-up tent since I’d volunteered to help out for a shift there.

Packet Pick-Up Tent

I was really impressed by how many volunteers they had an how organized it was. No matter how many people poured in, there never seemed to be much of a line if any at all. I got my volunteer shirt, went through a quick training session and sat down at a computer to check runners in and assign their bibs for the next three hours.

Bib Pick Up

The time flew by. It was really fun to see how excited everyone was for the race. Before leaving I picked out a bib for myself and saw that I may have been a bit ambitious when I registered placing myself in the 6:30-7:29 pace group. I’m hoping for a 7:30 pace so I’m debating whether it’s smarter to start near the back of this group or drop back and start at the front of the next group. It’ll likely be a game-time decision.

Bib and Pace Corral Bracelet

From there I headed to the Expotique on the Waterfront. I thought it was pretty cool. It was fun, loud, energetic and crowded once I entered the tent. I breezed through pretty quickly since I was starting to get hungry and had a dinner date with Ian planned at Pizzeria Paradiso coming up, but I did make time to stop and test out several of the Nuun Hydration flavors. They were all pretty awesome, but I especially liked the Cherry Limeaid and Fruit Punch varieties.

Expotique

You could also get a quick hair style from Paul Mitchell stylists and a free makeover with Bare Minerals make up – the only kind of make up I wear. I love the natural look it gives and the fact that it never feels caked on. I took my card from my packet that gave me three chances to win Nike shoes and gear and tried my code on all three walls with no luck…bummer! Then I took a quick look at the wall of sneaks, selection of sports bras and inspiration wall where everyone was free to write why they run on it.

Fun things to do at the Expo

There was still more to see at the Nike Store, so I made my way up Thomas Jefferson St. towards it with a stop at the We Run DC wall. This was so cool. It had the names of every participant on it.

We Run DC Wall

I even managed to spot mine!

Finding my name on the We Run DC wall!

The Nike Store in Georgetown is pretty great with three levels of awesomeness. They even had a DJ in the store. It was a mad house and they had tons of NWM DC specific gear. I found a black tank with the DC race logo on it. I actually have the same style tank in three different colors so I knew what size to get and knew I’d love it!

During my Sunday stop at Pacers to pick up my Gu and Body Glide for the race I asked about the special Tiffany Blue Nike Frees I’d heard had been designed for this race. They only had one pair of size 8’s left in stock…my size! I figured it was a sign I just had to get them.

Nike Frees – DC edition

Now it’s time for some spaghetti and meatballs and hopefully an early night! Good luck to everyone running tomorrow!! See you out there!

Taper & Travel

Posted on April 26, 2013 by Colleen Lerro

The Nike Women’s Half Marathon is this weekend! How did that happen?! The taper time is always an anxious time for runners. This race and my last big race – the Niagara Marathon – both had one thing in common for my taper period: each race happened directly after my company’s annual convention and at least a week on the road. Last year was worse as I flew out for a weekend of fun at a friend’s wedding in St. Louis, flew directly from there to a week in Boston for the convention and flew from there to Buffalo where my boyfriend picked me up and drove me to Canada for the marathon. This year I flew to Chicago for convention, but was home late Thursday night and being a local race, didn’t have to get myself anywhere else.

Traveling while on taper has some pros and cons. Being such a busy week, it would be hard to fit my regular duration and intensity of training runs in. On the negative side, one of the most difficult things about the taper for me is realizing you don’t need to eat as much as you did during your normal training weeks since you’re not burning nearly as many calories, and eating healthy on the road – especially during busy work trips – is not something I’m great at.

My meals usually consist of more beers than usual, comfort foods like the picture below from a diner that claimed to serve Chicago’s best mac ‘n cheese (it wasn’t) and one too many desserts.

Giant Miller Lite!

Decent Mac ‘n Cheese – but not the greatest as they claimed!

Delicious Strawberry Cheesecake

A big postitive for this trip though was the hotel gym at the Chicago Hilton. I’ve stayed at some hotels with really nice gyms lately, but this might be the best one yet. It even had an indoor track! Despite the fact that it took 18 trips around, I happily did my 3 miler on it instead of the treadmill on day one.

Indoor Track!

Every cardio machine also had its own individual TV built in, which I love. I took advantage of this for my interval workout.

Always love the indivdual TV screens on treadmills.

So many treadmills!

As soon as I saw the pool area I was really bummed I hadn’t brough my suit. It had a great lap pool and two hot tubs!

lap pool

two hot tubs!

It was really an impressive hotel gym. It made it a lot easier to get my workouts in this week since it was freezing here in Chicago. Still, I hope I’m not on the road for my next big race. It takes a lot out of you and I’m glad I’ll have a couple days off before the run on Sunday to hopefully recover from the week! I can’t wait! I’ll be volunteering at the expo from 3-7 on Friday, so stop by and say hi if you’re picking up your packet then.

I’ll leave you with a few more pics of the gym…

Weight Area

Tons of cardio machines for a hotel gym!

Pretty awesome view of the Chicago skyline through the floor-to-celing windows!

Giving Back

Posted on April 25, 2013 by Colleen Lerro

I love races. They’re what all the hard work and training are for. Volunteers are such an awesome part of races and I’m always sure to thank them no matter how tired I am. I decided I should probably give back after all the races I’ve done and over the last few years I’ve been trying to do a better job of volunteering at as many races as I run.

Turns out, volunteering at races is a ton of fun too. It’s great to see everyone out there going for PRs or just trying to finish. Other than a few bad apples who get really upset if you can’t give them a different size t-shirt than what they ordered, everyone is so incredibly nice and appreciative.

I’ve spent my last two Fridays volunteering at Pacers Crystal City 5k Fridays. I love these races, but since they didn’t fit into my race schedule this year I figured this was a good way to still be a part of them. My first volunteer shift was at the water stop. This might not seem like a big deal, but it’s actually something I’ve been terrified of doing. I’ve volunteered at a lot of races and I’ve always avoided doing this. Ridiculous, I know.

Still, I was worried I’d mess the hand offs up and leaving a runner without any water. I had no idea what to wear on my feet – flip flops in case I got splashed a lot or sneakers in case my toes got stepped on?? Admittedly I probably put too much thought into this for a 5k race where most of the runners don’t even take water anyways. It turned out to be pretty easy. I just held the cups out there and let the runners take them out of my hands. I didn’t even get splashed. Who knew?! I really enjoyed getting to interact with the racers mid-race and encourage them to keep going.

Last Friday I was back to packet pickup and pretty thankful for that since the skies opened up into a thunder and lightning storm shortly after the start and we had set up shop inside. As I mentioned in my last post it was also really great to be around so many supportive runners while everyone was still reeling from Boston.

I’m so glad I’ve found out how much fun it can be to participate in races in other ways than running over these last couple years…just gives me more of a chance to be part of this great community.

What races have you volunteered for? Have you done a water stop…and am I the only one who had an irrational fear about working at one?!