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Ouachita Trail 50 race report--April 13, 2019

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Before I talk about Ouachita, let me give you a brief backstory of my running. I started running in the Summer of 2011. I started out as a road runner, tackled a few 5ks, a few half marathons, and in 2015, the Chicago Marathon. In 2014, I had started dabbling in trail running and by 2016 I was sticking mostly to trails and starting to form an interest in this thing called ‘ultra running’. I had read the book Born to Run (what runner hasn’t??) and the idea of running beyond a marathon distance was both scary and intriguing to me. I had also met my now husband, James, himself an ultra runner, and this further increased my interest in ultras. In 2017, I ran my first official ultra, Dogwood Canyon 50K and in 2018, my 2 nd , Psycho Psummer 50K. Once those were under my belt, I was ready to set my sights on a 50 miler. I decided on the Ouachita 50 for a few reasons. I knew several people who had run it and they spoke highly of the race course, the aid stations and the race directors. It
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2 months later...EEP!

Oh geez, has it really been 2 months since I posted? Obviously I am proving I'm not cut out for this blogging thing. I will not even attempt to catch up on the runs I've done in the past 2 months. However, I will state that my total mileage for the month of April exceeded 80 miles, which is more like my pre-injury days, so I was pretty pleased with that, and I would like to keep that up in the months ahead. Of course, once my half marathon training begins, that should be pretty easy. I will say that in general, I've been trying to keep my runs around 6 miles, which has been pretty good. That also is more like my pre-injury days. Of course, it's not even hot yet, so that will definitely be a factor soon. Last night, I did a 6.73 mile run pretty late in the evening. It was a route I've done before, which consists of this: I start up my street and then head down Lemay Ferry. I grab the River des Peres Greenway Trail and then cross over Germania under the I-55 overpass
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Warm weather, please show your face.

I'm behind again. Are you surprised? So I've been dating this guy, and he's been doing side jobs with a moving company. He's working weird hours. Wednesday, he worked til 3:30 a.m. and texted me to let me know he was done. I am a light sleeper and I don't silence my phone at night, so the text woke me up. Unfortunately, I couldn't go back to sleep. I tried. I laid there for over an hour, trying to will myself to go to sleep. It wasn't happening. I told myself the last time I woke up during the night that, if after an hour I couldn't go back to sleep, I would get up and run instead of just laying there. So, I did. At a little before 5 a.m., I got up and dressed and headed out for a run. The weather was chilly and I didn't want to risk messing up my throat again, so I threw on the Balaclava. Good choice. Running at this time of the morning is different. Traffic is minimal, which is nice. I passed a good number of people waiting at bus stops. Very earl
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Strep throat throws a wrench in my running routine

So last week, there was a break in the cold weather. Friday and Saturday had predicted highs in the low 60s. I was excited! A few nice days in a row of good running weather, to follow my last long run in the morning with great weather! I made plans to meet my friend Joe at Forest Park around 11:45 a.m. to do the circuit. Friday morning, I woke up and my throat was on fire. I could barely swallow. Dammit! I looked at it in the mirror and it had the tell-tale white back there that is typically an indication of strep. Seriously?? I haven't been around anyone (knowingly, anyway) with strep. I called my Dr. and luckily, they were able to get me in early that afternoon. I figured while I was there, I would let her check out my head, just to make sure nothing more serious was going on with the bump, as it was still tender back there. Until then, I had to cancel my run with Joe and spent the morning laying on the couch watching the final season of Dexter, which coincidentally, had arrived
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Bad blogger

I am seriously slacking at this blog. Many of my previous posts have been catching up on more than one run, and this one is the worst yet. I've had 6 runs since the one I last blogged about. I'm a terrible blogger. But I have much to tell! The weather lately has still been unpleasant, overall. Snow has been sticking around, temperatures have been cold, and it's not been very conducive to running. However, the past couple of days, as well as the next few, temps have been around 50 degrees, give or take. This is much more appealing for running. This morning when I woke up, it was already 40 something out. I could not pass up that weather. I went out and had one of those mornings where it felt like I could run for hours. In reality, I ran for a little over an hour continuously, which is officially the longest I have run solid since my injury back in the fall. It felt awesome, and was a great start to my day. I took a route I haven't done in a bit, which was to go out my d
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Cold Carondelet night

This weather is killing me. We get a bunch of snow, then it melts, then we have some random weird warm days, then below zero. I don't mind the cold. I used to hate it but now, eh. I don't like this back and forth shit though. I would rather it just stays one way or the other. And the snow definitely makes being consistent with running more difficult. So this week, once again, snow was in the forecast. This meant I wanted to try to get a run in before it was too messy. I didn't really want to do a night run, but it's pretty difficult to avoid in the winter like this. My friend Joe had volleyball Monday night, so we planned to meet at the Y after his game, putting the run at about 8:15. It was very cold, and the dark made it feel even colder. We headed out from the Y into Carondelet park and did a couple laps around the park. I had woken up Monday morning feeling the results of the fall on my stairs the day before, and I was a little skeptical about running that evening,
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Firetruck run

The weather since my last run has kind of sucked. Thursday would have been a good morning to get up and run, but I wasn't quite able to drag myself out of bed. Friday I hung out with my sister and nephews, so that was a bust. It was my intent to go out yesterday and run with Joe, but it rained ALL DAY, followed by ice, then snow last night. I was bummed yesterday about having to take 3 days in a row off, which rarely happens, so I got my trusty yoga DVD out, "Yoga for Runners". I burned this DVD from the library sometime during my first year of running. I was having some soreness issues, especially in the mornings, and my friend Amber suggested I start doing some yoga. I hadn't done it in quite some time, and it was obvious. All the moves felt almost like I was doing them for the first time. It felt good to do them, though, and I'd like to get back in the habit of doing yoga on the days I don't run. I don't have those soreness issues too often since cutti
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