Challenge Discount, Roth and Other Exciting Happenings

I am very lucky this year to be part of Team Challenge. I’ve had my best race experiences at Rev3 and the merge with Challenge is a perfect fit. If you have not done a Challenge race yet, I highly recommend it. They make you, the athlete, feel like a rock star while your family is thoroughly entertained. Family friendly locations, beautiful and challenging courses and a unique experience. Head on over to http://www.challenge-family.com/category/north-america/ to see the amazing race locations in the US, Mexico and Canada this year.
Register for any Challenge NA race with RGTRI15 (must be all caps) for a great registration discount.
In other news, a group of us are heading to…Challenge Roth!! I’m still trying to let it sink in as it was totally unexpected. Of course at Mt. Tremblant last year I said (like I do at every single IM) never again….but we all know that feeling quickly fades, doesn’t it 🙂 Or like my friend said, IM is like a siren song, every time you get to the beach all you find is pain and suffering. Ha! So…here we go again!
For the NE WI people, I’ll be speaking at the next Tri Foxes meeting, date TBD for February. I’ll be talking about Challenge, a unique coaching opportunity, and I’ll have fantastic products to share from PowerBar and SBR sports-including fantastic shampoo, lotion and body wash to get the chlorine smell out in a luxurious fashion and Foggies-hands down the best anti-fog for your swim goggles that I’ve used. Hope to see you there!

On the Horizon….

Exciting things coming in 2015!

Tick Tock

Whoa-you know it’s been a while since you updated your blog when you’ve forgotten you even have one and forgot how to log in…..
Lot’s of fun updates to come on IM and emegency appendectomy’s….in that order. 🙂

Wisconsin Travels

Enjoy these pictures from a perfect weekend in northern WI. This is from the “World Famous Waterfall Tour”.  Hey, that’s what the map said at least 🙂

Fun With Trees

 

Mr. T makes a rare appearance here!

Setting Sun

 

 

 

 

 

 

Taking My Medicine

After your last big race of the year, you know what’s coming….you try to hold on for dear life to all that hard-won fitness, but you know the email is coming from your coach. So, you cram in a few runs, enjoy those last really nice fall days on the bike and hit the pool. But you know it’s inevitable and the email comes…. “3 weeks off”. You’re like an addict going through withdrawal. Yet, you know deep down it’s necessary to lose it in order to get it back and then some. Logically, you know it’ll work, but the mind can play games! I’ll be slow, I’ll forget how to swim, I’ll lose my power on the bike. But, ask yourself this: what’s the worse thing that can happen? I bet there will be a little bit of silence after that question.

So, I will keep this short and sweet. Do what your coach says, that’s why you hired him/her. And, if you don’t trust them, and fight the plan, it’s time to move on. TRUST and submit to the plan. And STOP THINKING! Paralysis by analysis is rampant in this sport. We make it way more difficult than it is.

I recently met with someone who I will be starting to work with in December. He has a half marathon coming up in November and I said before I start working with you, I need you to take 2 weeks off after your last race. I noticed the panic in his face immediately. I get it!! But, as my friend Julia said “take the rest because once it’s on, it’s ON”.  And now I will use this to segue into my next favorite topic: Running Shoes!! 🙂  Most notably, ON Cloud Running Shoes!!

I had been running in the Puma Faas 300. Great shoe and it fit into what I liked. Very lightweight with no stability features. You have to understand that this is coming from someone who was told I had to be in an orthotic and stability shoe. I was always injured. I got rid of the shoes and the orthotics and turns out I am fine. In fact, better off for having ditched them. But, ONto this shoe. It is not a gimmick. Team TBB is sponsored by On and I think that says a lot. While I was looking into this shoe, I posted a quick question on the Team TBB forum about them and got a resounding positive response from Brett Sutton. Enough for me.

I can tell right away if I will like a shoe or not, basically from the second I put it on. And these were a winner right off the bat. The shoes’ construction is by far the most thoughtful I have seen. It is extremely well made. It has plenty of room in the forefoot without being sloppy and loose.

It has a low heel to toe drop and there is just enough cushioning without it feeling like too much. I believe highly cushioned shoes make your tendons and muscles work a bit harder. So you’re probably wondering about the “clouds” on the bottom. This is what I love. It feels as if you’re landing on a softer surface, yet pushing off of a racing flat. The cushioning is there when you need it and not there when you don’t. Ingenious!

I got mine, the Cloud Racer, a few months before IM and planned on slowly getting used to them. I chose the Racer because I had only been running 100% of my runs in very lightweight shoes and personally did not find any reason to go heavier.  I headed out for a long run and planned to do only a half hour and then go back to my old shoes. A half hour turned into an hour and hour turned into 2 and my legs and feet felt awesome. But, what really surprised me is how my legs felt the next day. They were not even remotely beat up after running 2.5 hours on contrete. My feet and calves felt great the next day. I was sold.

I usually go through a pair of shoes every 8-10 weeks depending on my mileage and I have not noticed any considerable wear yet on these. And, they are pretty much the first shoe I have not had to throw out after an Ironman. The upper and sole have held up beautifully. I can’t recommend this shoe enough. I hope to see more people wearing them and giving them a go. Well worth it and extremely well constructed.

Now….what to do with myself with 3 weeks off……..it’s only day 2, yikes! 🙂

www.on-running.com

Where do I Start?

The last few weeks have been crazy! Right after IM Louisville (more on that in a bit) my husband and I jumped a plane to Alaska. I like to do this after my last big race. When I check out, I really like to CHECK OUT. No better place to do this than Juneau, AK!

So, I drove home from Louisville on Monday, which I thought was going to be a terrible idea, (not bad, I was stiff but not sore thank goodness) packed on Tuesday and then my husband and I got up at 3am to catch our flight. We arrived in Juneau at 1:40 pm so we had some great flights and were able to enjoy what felt like an “extra” afternoon there. We were on a mission for Halibut! Yes, I’m surprised I like to fish too…..it surprises me every time I go there actually 🙂

We had some awesome weather days as you can see above. I’m not even  wearing a coat on the boat! However, by Tuesday, I was in full survival gear head to toe on the boat and freezing cold and wet. A marathon fishing day in 45 degrees and rain. We saw a ton of humpbacks this time, and some funny characters, sea lions, that liked to pop up next to the boat to see what we were up to.

I also had a new nephew to meet:

And check out this super cute duo:

It was the first time my husband was able to go with me and I was impressed with his single minded focus on HALIBUT. It’s a fun fish to catch actually.

So, let’s back up shall we and talk about the race. I loved it. Some background here. I have done 2 ironmans in the past. Hated them. Every.single.second. disastrous results and I just did not get what people saw in racing this distance. I also did races/locations that people just love and I did not see it. Did I say I hated every second of the entire day both times?  It took me about 5 years and a different coach to convince me to give it another try. Actually, the funny thing is, he did not at any point talk me into trying it again. I came around by myself after 2.5 years of working with him (Alun Woodward of Ironguides. He rocks, amazing coach).

I remember also when Louisville was announced as a venue. My words were (and my friend Cindy can vouch for this) “wow, who in their right mind would do a race in Louisville in AUGUST. Good luck with that!” But for some reason I got it in my mind last year that this is the one I HAD to do. I signed up fairly late in the year (May) and had no expectations. You know how you say that sometimes going into a race “no expectations, just going to work hard, blah blah blah” and you know darn well you pretty much have some splits worked out to the second and have some pretty clear expectations? FOR REAL this time, I fully expected to not do well and fall apart like I did in the past. No expectations whatsoever.

What did help going into this mentally though was: a wonderful homestay with my friend Julie and her husband. Talk about knowing how to treat a guest, wow! They were 10 minutes from downtown/transition and treated me like a million bucks. Having access to a nice bedroom, kitchen, etc helped tremendously. Thank you so much again!! Her husband also showed me an amazing park to bike in right down their street. It simulated the course quite well and was packed with other bikers, runners and walkers. Beautiful!

Second thing that happened was that I recently, just that week, was offered a job that I was extremely excited about. What a relief!! I went into this with no pressure, no expectations and knowing I was taking a nice little trip right after the race.

I wanted to go alone and did. I drove down by myself on Friday and drove straight to the hotel to check in, etc. As usual it was super efficient and I got in an out. One surreal experience was being tapped on the arm while standing in line to buy some extra EFS Liquid Shot (LOVE IT) turning around and having Nina Kraft ask me about it and if she should buy it. Very odd…..

As usual I  got out of the expo STAT, I do not like being around all the nervous athletes, etc and went back to Julie’s house and relaxed. Got my bike together, did a little ride and in general was feeling pretty tired. I was supposed to meet my friend Ben for a swim Saturday morning and 10 minutes before we were supposed to meet I texted him and said “I’m still in bed…..”  he said “so am I…” ha! So, that did not happen. I figured it was better to relax and rest. I also really took any emotion out of this race. Not in a bad way mind you. I just stuck to the plan. I did not pay any attention to what I “wanted” I just did what I had to do without letting a lot of emotion get in the way. Don’t feel like eating? Too bad, you have an IM to do. Don’t feel like resting? Too bad.

I also ate about 10x more than I thought I should figuring that would get me to where I should be. That also worked. I was excited for the race to start just so I could stop eating….I felt fat and slow so I was about where I should have been 🙂

I woke up early, had a silly huge breakfast and made my way down to transition alone making sure I double checked what parking garage I was in. I liked the quiet time to myself actually. The volunteers at Louisville were just amazing and I can’t say enough good things about them. Set my bike up with the nutrition for the day (EFS!!) stood around and then made the walk to the swim start. It was about a mile+ away and there was a huge stream of athletes making their way down there.

I took off my warm up clothes and stuffed them in my morning bag and handed that off to the volunteers and jumped in line relative to where I wanted to be. I did not go to the back of the line. No one seemed to mind and I would do this again. I thought we’d be waiting a while but man where they efficient. Once the line got rolling it was fast. You started to file down and then when you got on one dock, the line broke into 2 lines and 2 people jumped in every second. Before I knew it we were walking and I heard “goggles down now, get ready to jump”. And then of course I jumped in and got the requisite judo chop massive kick to the jaw which ended up hurting for a good 2 weeks. So much for the non mass start lack of melee. I really think I remember them saying we’d swim out about 1500 meters and then turn back towards transition, so kind of a point to point.

So, I saw a buoy after what felt like about 1500 meters and started to turn back. No one else was though! I jumped back in the crowd and I was really surprised at how much farther we had to go to make the turnaround. The way back seemed really fast, I sighted very well but I was making no time. But no one was passing me and I seemed to be around the same people. It was odd. I heard afterwards that it may very well have been measured long and some people from last year said the turnaround was quite far from where it was previously and the swim times were quite slow. I felt like I was swimming towards transition forever and could see it and hear it, it was just like I was on a treadmill at that point. But, being all business that day, I looked at my watch, said “oh well” and got on with the long day. After I got out of the water I never thought about it again.

T1 went well, I took in a massive shot of calories  while getting my shoes, etc and headed out. I was cramping a bit from the swim and felt kind of goofy but it passed quickly. It was scary easy to hold the pace I wanted but I was extremely patient and did not go any harder. I can’t tell you how conservative I was. I really don’t think I “raced” at any point on this day and just felt out if this was something I even wanted to do again. I was really afraid of a mile 18 run blow up. I  will say the majority of people that blew past me were crawling by mile 18 so the non-emotion do what you have to do, not what you want to do plan worked well.

I was chugging along up a hill (thank goodness it was UP HILL) and I heard a horrible “pop/explosion” and then an even more horrible metal on metal grinding noise. I then knew my tire was totally shot. How badly though I never could have guessed (I will say now they later arrested people for putting tacks all over the course and whether this was part of that I will never know). I pulled off and again, calmly, took in what I was looking at: a three inch nail that impaled my tire onto my rim and the nail went totally through the metal on my rim. I could not pull it out because it was like someone shot it with a nail gun it was in so perfectly.

I could not pull my tire up to loosen it since it would rip an even bigger hole through my tire that was already there. Sure I had a tube but not another tire!! I did not freak out but it did seem like the entire raced passed me by. I decided my day was done. There was no way to pull this out.

I then noticed a guy in his car waiting in a ditch (waiting for his wife to come around). I said “I think my day is done” he took one look at my tire and said “you may be right”. But then he said “hmmm, wait” and  went to his car and had a pliers. I could not believe it!! This was my lucky day!! It took some work to pull it out. I got a new tube in and he was great. He said “take a deep breath and just relax and let’s get this done”. I got out my CO2 and he said don’t waste it and pulled out a pump. Are you kidding me?? Again, this was my lucky break today big time. I really wish I knew his name. He gave me his business card and I tore a chunk off to patch the hole underneath and glanced at his name. It was Dave P something and I bet if I looked up the female results his wife’s last name would ring a bell. I wish I could thank him again.

Oddly enough sticking to the theme of the day I never got freaked out or pissed or emotional about it. Move on and ride steady. You never know what will happen or what’s happening up front. I would later see dozens of people pulled over changing tubes/tires. You could tell something was not right.

So,  I just kept going and kept with the salt plan and food plan. Don’t feel like eating or drinking? Too bad, you have a run to do yet. I never felt bad and the bike seemed to fly by. I prayed my tire held and it did. I will say though that I felt “goofy” the last 12 miles. I kept asking “what do you need? what do you need?” Salt? Calories? Water? Nothing seemed to do the trick and my held felt a little “swimmy”. Turns out I just needed to get off the bike!! The bad part of this part of race is that you can SEE downtown! It’s “right there!” but it’s not. The cool thing was though at mile 90 to 100 I repassed a lot of the girls I passed before the tire incident.

I started to get slightly concerned about running because like I said, I felt “goofy”. I got into T2 and of course had the most wonderful volunteer ever. I put on my On Cloud Racers (hello best shoe IN THE WORLD) and wouldn’t you know it, my legs felt GREAT. Wohoo! Rock solid and ready to go. Now, that is in relation to just having ridden 112 miles. They felt great for just having ridden 112 miles, let’s get that in perspective.

I picked a pace and said “how long can you hold this” if the answer was “all day” I just kept it there. I kept ticking off the miles and had a huge smile on my face the whole time. I walked the aid stations and had the same routine, salt tab, liquid shot, perform. REPEAT. Don’t feel like doing it anymore? TOO BAD, it’s working.

Funny thing, I never felt hot. I felt hot on the bike when I was working on my tire with that guy, but never felt hot on the run. I also only peed once, maybe twice all day. More on that later also….

I got to mile 18 and said holy crap I am still running!!! I tried to pick it up the best I could even. Kept doing the salt tab, liquid shot, REPEAT. About mile 15 though I switched to coke and it was perfect. Salt tab, liquid shot COKE, REPEAT. Tons of people were walking on the second loop. I got to mile 20 and it’s so far you know? But you have SO FAR to go. 6.2 miles if flippin’ far at that point! Just get to the next mile and the next.  I let myself walk for 5 seconds once and said get over it. Mile 25 to 26 was awesome. I felt so strong and was finally able to enjoy a finish line at an IM!! It was still light out!! I didn’t fall apart!! I enjoyed every single second of the day, amazing.

After I crossed the finish line, about 20 minutes later my body freaked out for about 90 seconds and I had to run to the bathroom ASAP. Then I felt fine. I was stiff but feeling pretty good. Total surprise.

And then…I did not pee for a very long time. Like a very very long time. I was pooped but went back to Julie’s house and ate a giant burger and shake AND fries-YUM!! and talked a while and then crawled up the stairs (literally, ha ha) and don’t even remember my head hitting the pillow. Woke up and… still have not peed people! But I remember my friend Cindy saying the same thing last time she did IM. So I was patient. Thankfully eventually it all worked out, whew! I guess I was slightly dehydrated.

So, will I do it again. Yup, and I will be back in Louisville. So, how did it turn out. 8th!!! Despite the tire issue, wow!!! I took hours off my previous times. Very thankful for the whole experience.

More to Come….

Wow, it’s been a LONG time since I’ve updated this! Too busy! A sneak peak: in the last two weeks I have….flown to Dallas, gotten a new job, home for a day,  drove to KY, did an IM, went home for a day and took off for Alaska and *just* got back, whew!! Lots of fun updates and pictures to come. Louisville was hands down my fav IM to date and I will be back there. Amazing race and venue.

The Best of Gluten Free

As some of you may know, I have to eat gluten free (GF) as does my brother. My neighbor was recently diagnosed and I would love to outline some of my fav, best tasting GF products since a conversation with him got me thinking of the great products that are available. Now, the best gluten free foods are the ones that are just naturally gluten free of course. I get a bit exasperated, but understand, if I have to explain to someone that I can’t eat wheat and they say “oh that’s terrible, you must not be able to eat anything”. I think the opposite and say if a diet is that heavily based on wheat and that’s the corner-stone to the diet, then that is a much bigger problem!

The problem is however, is that when you have to or choose to eat gluten free, it’s the gluten in all the insidious hidden places that continues to surprise me. Even in foods that should not have any gluten whatsoever in them. Examples are soy sauce, any boxed grain, even the rice “mixes” like Zateran’s,  (Rice in and of itself is the most hypo allergenic food in the world, able to be tolerated by the vast majority of people) some canned foods even, any bottled sauce and the one that confused me the most is I HOP putting pancake batter in their eggs/omlettes. Another one is “modified food starch” or “thickening agents” most likely wheat. You can never be too safe. First, while this list is by no means even remotely complete, here are some foods naturally gluten free. This list is more carb/grain heavy since it goes without saying that fruits, veggies, etc do not have gluten.

• Potatoes
• Rice
• Quinoa
• Millet
• Buckwheat (yes, despite the name, no wheat, no gluten. But, it is frequenty mixed with wheat flour)
• Corn
• Amaranth (cultivated for over 8000 years!)
• Teff
• Wild Rice
• Oats (however many are contaminated with gluten during processing so be careful)

Aside from just eating natural unprocessed foods, there is a time when you’d love a treat and quite frankly just want to eat a sandwich and have a piece of bread! Here are my top picks and brands that I highly recommend.

Top tasting breads:

The two brands I highly recommend are Udi’s and Rudi’s. Very good texture and very “realistic”. If you want a good old fashioned sandwich on white bread-Udi’s White Sandwich bread can’t be beat. However, I think the whole grain version is really tasty and has a bit more flavor/texture. Rudi’s whole grain bread is extremely good and toasts up amazingly well.

Udi’s has a wide product range of GF products including hamburger buns (big thumbs up) and pizza crusts. I can’t say enough about the texture and consistency of the products. All very good. The bagels are more like bagel shaped bread, but hey, beggers can’t be choosers 🙂

Pasta:

Tinkyada brand wins hands down. They have organic brown rice GF pasta or just regular non-organic. The only difference I could tell was in the price!

It has a great texture and is not mushy.

Wraps:

Food For Life brown rice wraps. Other wraps have not even remotely passed the test. These are excellent for quesidillas and I love to make breakfast burritos with them.

They have to be heated or steamed a bit before using. My husband, who does NOT eat gluten free, likes these over regular tortillas. So that means they are really good!

Desserts:

This is a local WI company and their products are downright tasty www.grandmaferdons.com  They are up in Hayward, WI and although all their products are great, they have these little lemon bars, pumpkin bars, etc that are simply amazing.

Pizza

I have to admit this was the one thing I missed the most. I am amazed now that what was such a treat in the past is now available at most local pizzerias here, a national franchise, and the freezer case at the grocery store. Top picks:

Locally: Christiano’s

Everything at Christianos is amazing (gelato!) and I was so happy they offered a GF crust. They bake it in their brick ovens and it is a true treat. Make sure they cook it long enough or it can by slightly doughy/mushy. But, when cooked right, the crust is crisp and very “real” tasting.

Dominos-the first national franchise to offer GF pizza.  The verdict? It was great! Very crisp crust and slightly sweet, which makes me think they use a rice flour based crust.

Amy’s Pizza: Found in the freezer case of the grocery store. Great flavors and again, the crust passes the test.

Eatons (local) this used to be my favorite take out. Eatons takes it a step further and puts the crust in a small aluminum pan to avoid any cross contamination. Not exactly the Eatons I loved, but very good. It will never be the same, but it can get pretty darn close! Thin, crisp crust.

Enjoy!

Magnesium? Yes! Magnesium!

Well it’s that time of year when the race reports start rolling in! Actually not much to report except a half marathon where some running miles paid off. I was pleased because I was not super rested and felt pretty darn good! So what in the world does this have to do with magnesium? Several weeks before the race, I had to start supplementing with Mg for a number of reasons and it really opened my eyes as to how many roles this mineral plays in the function of our bodies and how much better I felt.

Long story short, I started to get very odd and persistent calf pain, even while not running, basically all the time. I was beginning to think I was going to be the only person in the world that was going to tear a calf while just sitting in a chair or rolling over in bed. It was “odd” pain though, not normal stuff you’d expect from training. Very hard to describe, like my calves were very hard, swollen and sore to the touch. Turns out this is a big sign of a MG deficiency, which as much as 70% of Americans have. I also felt as if I could not take a deep breath along with other weird things I never linked together.  And here goes the standard disclaimer: I am not a nutritionist and you should not be looking for sound nutritional advice on a random blog. This is my personal experience only.

Magnesium, like iron, is one of those things that is very much depleted during running and is hard for the body to absorb through food sources, as is iron. Your body will absorb about 20 to 50% of the magnesium that you ingest. And it goes without saying that I am a ridiculously heavy sweater, I’ll pretty much pass out if I don’t get about 1000 mg/sodium/hour while training much less racing and we’re sweating out all electrolytes of course, not just sodium NA. You’ll absorb a small portion of magnesium compared to what you take in.  And like iron, it depends on the form of Mg and taking it with vitamin C helps it absorb more. More was going out than going in. There were also several other odd “symptoms” that I never would have linked together, much less linked to Mg. This is one interesting little mineral.

So, what does Mg do for your body? It’s responsible for more than 300 biochemical reactions in the body. It helps maintain normal muscle and nerve function, keeps heart rhythm steady (I was at the doc before finding this out with bad heart palpitations, but did not link the calf pain to this either) and it is extremely necessary for proper ATP synthesis (ATP often being called the “molecular unit of currency” of intracellular energy transfer). ATP transports chemical energy within cells for metabolism.  Only 1% of magnesium is found in the blood, but the body works extremely hard to keep blood levels of Mg constant. It also plays a role in blood pressure and blood sugar levels. It cannot be made by our body, so it has to be plentiful in the diet in order to get enough.

Where do you get Mg from?

First, another thing that Mg and iron have in common is that foods high in oxalates inhibit absorption. So, if you eat veggies high in oxalates, it inhibits both iron and mg from being absorbed well. Ironic, since we all hear to eat spinach for iron,( it’s also very high in Mg) . However, spinach, swiss chard, kale and beet greens are high in oxalates, actually inhibiting absorption.  So, it is better cooked than raw in this case. That being said, green leafy vegetables are a great source of Mg. Highest in Mg are: pumpkin seeds (I don’t know about you, but I rarely, if ever, sit around eating pumpkin seeds except around Halloween), spinach, swiss chard, soybeans, sesame seeds, Halibut, black beans, quinoa, sunflower seeds and cashews. Yes, it’s all a little confusing since some of these foods will also be on lists of what inhibits absorption.

Another benefit of taking Mg is that I feel like I can BREATH, wow!! Funny how things can slowly sneak up on you until it becomes normal. So after doing some research and taking a liquid Mg supplement which is not agree with my stomach, I am taking 2 Slo-Mag tablets, 2xday with vitamin C. Love it! Also, the First Endurance Multi V has 250 mg of a very highly absorbable Mg chelate. This is the only multi vitamin where I can feel a huge difference when taking it regularly. I have tried some really expensive vitamins like the Bionic Supermodel, which is outrageously expensive, and just could not justify it. The FE Multi Vs have some solid studies behind them. It’s entirely anecdotal, but a coworker of mine was still having heel pain after having a stress fracture there ages ago, she started taking the Slo-Mag and the pain totally went away, which was cool to hear (you can’t absorb calcium well if you don’t have enough Mg).   So, there ends my little speech on Mg. Hope it helps a few people out there!

In other news, I have a local race coming up and then will be back in KS since I just love the race but love the company at the race more. It will be a nice little reunion with my friend Julia and also Ben! Not to mention our very gracious homestay peeps that let us take over their upstairs with us turning it into an area where it looks like a transition area exploded. What did we do to the nice clean, very white sheets awaiting us in years past? Got body marked the day before and imprinted our numbers all over the bed while we were sleeping.

Kansas 70.3 involves a crazy amount of walking to pick up your packet and then set up. Seriously. Like so much you feel like you need to taper for the T1 and T2 set up. Julia and I cannot figure out a way to make this easier. I am pretty sure we took a nap last year after setting up. Otherwise, we have a few things down, like how to avoid the long lines into the park race morning and how to find our car afterwards. Trust me, things look totally different at 4am when you’re parking your car in a pitch black field. We have an alarm to get up, another goes off for when we should be eating, another for packing the car and one even goes off for when we should be pulling out. BUT THE WALKING!! We have not cracked the code yet on this part, but we’re going to try 🙂 We are not VIPs so we can’t roll on up to the main area, we’re stuck parking in a hot field on a 100 degree day humping all of our equipment up and down hills and fields of tall grass. This year we’re going to try to figure it out……

The Shoe Whore Chimes In

My friend Julia affectionately and appropriately calls me the shoe whore. I have a problem, and it’s a running shoe problem. I’m a little obsessed with them. I get some to try, I buy some to try, people give me some to try and some are worth writing about and some are not. I’m not the technical type that can go on and on about what foam and blown rubber is used and this and that. I just know what I like and what I don’t. There are a few rules. They have to be under a certain weight, and the ramp can’t be more than 9mm and NO stability features whatsoever. After being way over-corrected for years on end, I have found a super light neutral racing shoe works the best. That might not be the case for everyone of course.

Mind you, despite the moniker, I’m quite monogamous. I’ve been running in the Brooks Green Silence for 2 years straight. A record. Then, on the urging of my coach, I tried this:

It was love at first sight, or first run. The picture above is the Puma Faas 300. I also recently got a pair of the 400s which are equally amazing. I can tell within about 3 seconds of putting on a shoe if it’ll work or not. These were the most pleasantly surprising, underrated shoe I have ever worn. I immediately put on a ton of  miles in them in a couple weeks and could find nothing wrong. To be very objective, I like a wide toe box and these seem to be a nit narrow and this is standard for Puma and how their shoes fit. The suggestion to go a half size up was not necessary, they fit true to size. I can see though how some feet may need to size up by a bit. And the price tag? I scored a pair for $47. HA!!! RoadRunner tried charging me $80 but the Puma sight was almost half of that. I shake my head that I paid big bucks for Newtons for a bit. But, hey, I liked them quite a bit and they were the shoe that made me chuck my orthotics so they served their purpose. I hate the lugs now, if they made a shoe without those lugs I’d probably buy a pair.

It has a slight rocker shape and the sole is actually blown rubber. Very natural feel. If you’re running in Newtons and hate the price tag, these could be your perfect go to shoe.