Santa Scamper - Race Report

I'm going to keep this race report simple.  It's not going to be my usual race report with a bunch of headings.  Just a simple report of my most recent race completed.  Why, you ask?  Well, I really wouldn't consider this a "race" per se.  But, to my two oldest girls, it was one of the best "races" of their lives.  Every year the City of Appleton hosts their annual Christmas Parade the Tuesday before Thanksgiving.  Before the parade, a local running shoe company, Run Away Shoes, hosts a small 1 mile race/fun run before the start of the race.  I used to "run" this race with my cousins when I was much younger.  Then middle school sports set in and soon I was marching the parade as a trumpet player for the Appleton East High School band.  I honestly couldn't even tell you when the last time I ran in a Santa Scamper.  But, all would change this year.  Sarah and I try to make it to the Appleton Christmas Parade every year now that we have kids.  This year, though, we planned on having the girls run in the Santa Scamper before the parade.

After missing out on the Freaky 5k a couple weeks ago, the girls were eager to run in another race.  It was a late idea by Sarah to sign up for this race.  The race itself if a rather simple concept.  It runs straight down College Avenue (Downtown Appleton), and makes one turn and runs to a small downtown park.  The race is just one mile, which is a great race distance for families.  Along with your registration, you get a traditional Santa Scamper hat along with a Dairy Queen Dilly Bar and a coupon for a free Burger King Whopper....all for just $10.00.  By far the best part of the event is it promotes a healthy, active lifestyle along with spending time with family and friends.  All in all, its a great deal.

This year would not only be special to me and my girls, but special to me.  This year, not only would I be running with Maya and Delany, but my father would be running along with us.  On top of my dad running with us, one of my best friends from college, Erik, ran with us along with his oldest son.  Leading up to the race, I wanted to treat this run as a traditional race for me to keep my daughters excited for the run.  I really wanted to wear jeans and a winter coat and just treat it like a casual run, but I wanted my daughters to get excited and stay excited for the run.  I ended up wearing a pair of Nike track pants.  I still wore my running shoes along with my race bib belt and my Garmin GPS Watch.

We got to the parade early to make sure we got a spot on the parade route so the kids could have a front row seat.  That allowed us to be very early for the run as well.  The run started at 6:30 and the parade started at 7:00.  We got to Downtown Appleton around 5:15.  Around 6:00 we all started walking to the start line.

As I mentioned the race started at 6:30.  I wasn't quite sure what to expect with the girls.  I knew Maya would do fine, but Delaney, I wasn't sure at all.  It turns out Delaney ran with me, while Maya ran with my dad.  Delaney surprised the hell out of me and ran about 95% of the entire mile.  We even caught up with my dad and Maya, who evidently ran out a little too fast.  We ended up finishing the run along side Maya and my dad.  After the race we got out Dilly Bars and headed back to the parade.  The girls were both super pumped they ran the "WHOLE RACE!"  The whole night was a lot of fun with the family and some of our best friends.  We will definitely be back next year if my work schedule cooperates!

My favorite part of the parade!

Cheers!
Thanks for reading!

Best Summer Ever!

As many of you are already aware, I started a new career with the Kaukauna Police Department this past May.  The change has brought many changes to our family.  We have had to make adaptations to a temporary cut in pay.  I have had to make personally sacrifices in my career, such as giving up being a SWAT officer, suddenly going to the bottom of the totem pole in seniority, and have missed out on a lot of advanced training opportunities.  With all that being said, the benefits has truly outweighed the negatives.  First, I have been able to bike to work on about 90% of my work days, which oddly enough, has always been important to me (don't ask me why).  Secondly, I am now working for a city, which brings different challenges, tactics, and generally is just a different beast.  I felt that working for a city over a county was a better fit for me, personally, and I was correct.  In addition to both of those, I am so close to home, that I am able to quickly stop home during lunch breaks when time allows.  But, by far, the best change has been the schedule.  During my work week I work longer hours, but that affords me more time off to spend with my family.

With all the extra time off, Sarah and I truly took advantage of it by several family trips.  Some of them were just simple day trips, while others were 4-5 days "excursions" around the great state of Wisconsin.  Some of the trips included our annual trip to the Manawa Rodeo and a Brewers' game, where we saw a great game between the Brewers and White Sox (the Brewers won 7-10).  In addition to the Brewers', we went camping three times to three different state parks; Point Beach, Devil's Lake, and Governor Thompson.  We also took a couple weekend trips to La Crosse to visit our best friends in Minnesota and another to Wisconsin Dells.

Without question, this past summer was the best summer we have had as a family.  We really set the bar high for future summers!  Below is a video I put together from all our memories from these trips.  The video does not contain any pictures from simple events that took place over the summer that also made this past summer one of the best ever, but only pictures from our FAMILY adventures.  There are no pictures from the numerous trips to The Mulberry Lane Farm in Hilbert, WI.  Nor does it contain pictures to splash pads, local pools/swim lakes, or other short adventures done as a single parent family.  So I hope you enjoy the video!

As always, thanks for reading and following!
Cheers!

YMCA Freaky 5k - Race Report

This will now be my 3rd race report of the YMCA Freaky 5k and the 6th time I have ran this race. So, when I say that is one of my favorite races, I think it goes without saying. I enjoy this race for many reasons. First, the YMCA of the Fox Cities was my full time post college employer. Secondly, it always seems to fall perfectly into my race schedule. Thirdly, it's close to home, a great course, and a family friendly event. This year would be no different. I had Halloween weekend off from work and no other races scheduled in the vicinity of the Freaky 5k, so it was a natural decision. Plus, this was the first time for myself that this race actually fell on Halloween. This year, we registered our entire family, Sarah, Maya, Delaney, and myself were all registered for one of the two events offered. We signed Delaney up for the Mini Monster Dash, which was a quarter mile kids run. We also registered Maya as an individual for the 5k. This was going to be her first ever 5k as an official participant. She was so excited and nervous going into the day....as was I. We also signed up Sarah, who was going to push Harper in the stroller. My parents were also registered for the 5k in addition to our family. Going into the race, the weather outlook was not good. It was supposed to be cold, windy, and wet/rainy. Sarah and I both made the decision Friday night, that if it was actually raining Saturday morning, we would not bring the kids to the race and she would stay home with the kids and I would race with my dad, as my mom would also opt out of the race.

Well, as my alarm went off Saturday morning, I woke up to the sound of wind strongly blowing against our bedroom window. I looked at a current radar image and it was an easy decision, although a disappointing one. We opted to leave the kids at home due to poor weather. The entire state of Wisconsin along with Minnesota were covered in green on the radar signifying that there was no hope for a dry Halloween, let alone a dry Freaky 5k.

Training for This Race

I'll (again) keep this short and simple. I have not been following any specific training plan for this race or any race this year, for that matter. Although, I will note that October saw one of my highest running mileage totals of 2015...for whatever that's worth....

Prerace

As I mentioned in my open, I woke up and had to make a sad decision with Sarah and opted to leave the girls at home to avoid any possible (and highly likely) sour attitudes at the race due to them being wet and cold. But after waking up and getting dressed, I headed over to my parents house to pick up my dad. The race was scheduled to start at 8:30am, a half hour after the Mini Monster Dash kid's run. I was hoping to get there around 7am just to get a decent parking spot and hopefully some time to warm up. Unfortunately, after we got there, the weather was just miserable. It was cold (40's), windy, and rainy. I honestly just wanted to sit in my car with the heat on where it was nice and comfy. Eventually I had to get out and get ready to run, which I did around 7:30ish. I really wanted to stay as dry as possible before the start of the race, so I opted to forgo my traditional warmup and just did some dynamic stretching under the pavillion. This seemed to actually work pretty well, all things considered. Once 8:20ish rolled around, we started making our way to the start line. With the sun now fully risen, it was starting to warm up slightly, but the rain and the wind didn't really stop. It was a light drizzle, but enough to be uncomfortable. We planned it out damn near perfectly and got to the start line just before the National Anthem.

Nutrition Plan

K.I.S.S. - Keep It Simple Stupid. Its what I did. I didn't eat anything before the race and just drank my morning coffee on the way to the race. I did take two capsules of Hammer Nutrition's Anti-Fatigue Caps one hour before the start of the race. I chose not to take any Hammer Nutrition Energy Surge, just due to the wet and rainy race conditions.

 

Equipment

Nike Zoom Streak LT2

PRO Compression Socks

Hammer Cycling Jacket

Garmin 910XT

Road ID Elite

3.1 Mile Run (18:18)

 

This was the third year of the "new" race course (I guess that would mean that it's really no longer "new") and the second time I will have run it. Knowing that I really didn't get any true warmup in before the start of the race, along with the the hilly start to the race, I really wanted to take it relatively "easy" during the first 800-1200 meters. The race starts nearly immediately with a short and steep hill down to the river. The course then follows the river for about a half mile, or so, then goes up another short and steep hill. The majority of the course is a loop, which returns back down the same pair of hills back to the start line of the race. So, imagine a lollipop shape race course, where the stick has two steep hills that you need to climb twice for a total of 4 hills.


At the start of the race, I coasted down the first hill, allowing all the typical sprinters at the start of the race to over-exert themselves, and allowed myself to gradually warmup. After climbing back up the second hill at about the 0.75 mile mark, I tried to find my "sweet-spot" in reference to my pace. I wasn't ever truly able to find my comfort zone. I just never really felt "good." I felt like my breathing was out of synch with my cadence and my heart rate. It's a difficult thing to explain in writing and probably just as hard to explain in person. But, I guess if you are a runner, you probably know exactly what I am talking about.

By about mile 1, I was able to pass everyone who went out as fast as humanly possible and found myself in 3rd place. Shortly before mile 2, I passed the second place runner and was doing my best to stay within reach of the race leader. But, honestly, I had a pretty good feeling I wasn't going to be able to catch the leader by about mile 1....he was just that far ahead. I ended up finishing in 18:18, 2nd overall, with the winner finishing in 17:12, about a minute ahead of me. He was a 24 year old out of La Crosse, WI and he ran a hell of a race.

Post Race

About a week after I registered our family for this race, we were invited to my God Son's birthday party in Milton, WI, which was scheduled to start at noon on the 31st. Milton is about a 2 hour drive from our house, which meant that we needed to leave no later than 10am in order to hopefully make it on time. This basically meant that there was no sitting around after the race and waiting for the awards ceremony. After crossing the finish line, I congratulated the winner on a great run and then waited for my dad to come across. He ended up finishing in 22:09, first in his age group. After crossing the finish line, we quickly stopped in under the pavilion and grabbed some water and a snack and headed out. I honestly felt a little awkward leaving the race, while a lot of runners and walkers were still on the course but, I honestly had no other choice, shy of skipping out on the event.

What's on Tap

I now only have 2 more months to go in order to successfully participate in a race in each month throughout 2015. It's been an interesting goal to say the least, but as it comes closer to successfully accomplishing my goal, I get more and more proud of doing it. As of today, I am actually scheduled to run in 4 more races, 3 in November and 1 in December. Oddly enough, the 3 races in November are all within a span of 6 days and fall during the week of Thanksgiving. On the 24th, I will be running a 1 mile race with Maya, Delaney, and my dad before the Appleton Christmas Parade, called the Santa Scamper. It will be a fun and easy run with my kids and nothing more. Then on the 26th (Thanksgiving), I will be running in the Festival Foods Turkey Trot, in Appleton, which is a 5 mile very competitive race. Finally, on the 29th, I am running in the Noodleini 5k in De Pere to finish the month of November. My final race of 2015 falls on New Years Eve, with the Chilly Chili Run in Fond Du Lac, WI. It's been a long year with a lot of racing and not a lot of structured training. As I sit here writing this up, I have a lot of high hopes for 2016 and 2017 and some potentially very exicting news. But that will come out soon....


As always, thanks for reading!

Cheers!