stingers and a sneaky mama

Between the holiday festivities and the heat, this weekends long run never happened. Who in the world slacks off on only week #2 of marathon training ? Knowing that Monday was probably my last window of opportunity, I tricked Rich into bringing me to work an hour and a half early. Yes, that's right, I weaseled my way into a sans-babies and jog stroller 7 mile run. You see, Rich is NOT a morning person. In his perfect world, "morning" would begin about 2 p.m. and "bedtime" somewhere around 5 a.m. The complete opposite of me, but you know what they say, opposites attract! It doesn't help that he works the night shift at his job, sometimes not getting home till 2 am.

So anyway, while sweet, innocent Rich was sleeping, I ran upstairs and took advantage of his sleepiness. "Baby, wake up, it's time for me to go to work. I can't be late, I'll get a bad section. The boys are ready, let's go! I'll meet you in the car! GET UP!!" (we are currently sharing a car until this weekend when we finally get the second car). I snuck back downstairs, put the boys in their car seats, hopped into the driver's side, and waited. Rich eventually came stumbling out the back door and into the passengers side, where he proceeded to snooze the entire 10 minute drive to my workplace. Not once did he look at the clock to notice we were about an hour and a half ahead of schedule. Not once did he notice that I was in running clothes, and not work clothes.

We pulled into the parking lot and as he yawned, stretched, and got ready to take over the driving...he looked at the clock. "Uhhh baby, aren't you a bit early?"

BUSTED!!

I sheepishly said "umm I just wanted to squeeze in my long run before work". He just rolled his eyes and laughed at me. haha. I wonder if I should be ashamed of myself :) If I had simply said "Hey lets leave early so I can run" I probably would have been met with some "I'm really tired and need just one more hour of sleep" resistance. I didn't lie...I just, left out some details. All in the name of running, of course.

So, once at work, I dropped my stuff off inside and headed out for a run along ocean boulevard. It was an overcast day, low humidity and temps in the 80's. Such a cold front I almost wanted to break out my gloves, haha. Perfect morning for a 7 mile run. If you remember a few posts back I mentioned how I recently purchased a hand full of different nutrition options to experiment with to find the right product/solution for me and my belly. This morning I was going to give Honey Stinger organic energy chews a shot. The package says to take 5-10 for every hour of exercise, but knowing how my stomach can be, I started with 4, and left the rest behind. Since it was so cool out (haha) I decided NOT to run with the amphipod water bottle.

So first things first in my review of these things. They actually taste GOOD! Now, I'll admit, I often steal Rowen's fruit snacks. And one thing that always bothered me about Cliff Shot blocks are the consistency. They are incredibly chewy and kind of hard. Not the Stingers, they are soft and incredibly easy to chew, just like a fruit snack. And they didn't have the fake fruit flavored taste you find in most gels and chews. YUM!

The first half of the run went great, I felt very energized.
mile 1: 8:47
mile 2: 8:38
mile 3: 8:37

I saw SOO many runners, walkers, and cyclists. I passed many people and it made me feel strong. Always the silly competition , haha. At the turn around, I got a "zinger" in the belly. Uh oh, here we go. Stingers have you done me wrong? I walked for 2 minutes , felt better, and was on my way.

mile 4: 9:41 (includes the walking)

About this time, the overcast sky started looking stormy, and then came the headwinds. Ahh running on the coast, always an adventure. A pretty, scenic adventure. Headwinds + legs still working on getting back in shape = no negative splits today!!

mile 5: 9:33
mile 6: 9:19
mile 7: 9:19 (oooh how's that for consistency!)

total: 7.01 miles 1:03:57 9:08/mile average.

I got to work just in time to well, work. About 15 minutes into setting up for a wonderful day of waitressing, my stomach starting turning and lurching so hard it stopped me dead in my tracks. Grrrr. I'm beginning to wonder how much of my GI problems with running are NOT related to my nutrition, and are simply a side effect of running. From what I understand, when running (or any exercise really) one of the first places blood is diverted away from is the digestive system. So here's my theory, with nothing but a basic college anatomy class to back it up. I'm wondering, if once I stop exercising (running in my case), the blood returning to it's normal flow in my digestive system causes things to go into overdrive? Hence the crazy tummy? I dunno, am I making this up in my head, or is there some validity to it?

Fortunately, I just had a few "lurches" of the tummy, but that was it. I was fine the rest of the day. A bit, umm, gassy (sorry TMI...is there TMI in running?) but that's it. So I will give the the Stingers another try. Much easier for me to consume than those nasty gels. I'm still working on my gag reflex with those suckers!