I'm back...

The last time I posted was July....REALLY?!?! Wow, I am pretty bad at keeping up with this blogging thing. Well here goes nothing again.

In the time between my last post and now I met someone that changed my life. No, not an amazing man that swept me away (unfortunately), but a FANTASTIC genius of a physical therapist who managed to get rid of my ITBand problem in three short weeks!!! She seriously changed my life. I went from being scared every time I went out for a long run to running 39.3 miles over two days a few weeks ago.

Since the beginning of October I have run The Diva's Half Marathon, 25 miles of the Chicago Marathon (and actually led a pace group for about 10 miles of the race--I was supposed to just be out there doing my 20 mile training run and supporting my friend Sean, but something didn't go as planned:)), The Nike Women's Half Marathon in San Francisco, The New York Marathon and most recently Goofy (a half marathon on Saturday followed by a full marathon on Sunday). Yes you read that right!!! Who would have thought I could manage all that mileage!!!

I finally know what it is like to run without a serious issue. While I will admit I had a handful of silly injuries in that time (a sprained ankle, some paroneal tendon pain and some back pain) none of it even compares to the fear of being fully disabled and unable to run for months because of an ITBand flare up.

And I am finally planning a schedule for the spring that is exciting and fun, rather than overcautious and scared. :) I go out for runs with spring in my step instead of scared. I am being smart and getting in my cross training and strength training and of course, my physical therapy.

Right now I have a bunch of great things on the schedule including The New York City Half, The Mardis Gras Half, The Sleepy Hollow Half, The New Jersey Full and a surprise that I am not quite ready to publicize yet :) I am still working on my summer schedule, which will include the NYC Triathlon and a few other triathlons and I am still trying to find a half ironman to do :).

Wow, that was one of the most self centered posts I have ever made, but there was a lot to say! Sorry if you are sick of hearing about my running, but I promise the new posts will be more about my perspective and what I learned rather than a rant about me :) But just to top it off, here are some of my favorite photos from the races:)

 Me with my medals after the full marathon day of Goofy!  I have never been so happy to be done with a race! 

Right at the finish line of the 2011 New York City Marathon! 

This was actually at the diner after Diva's! 

Sarah and I posing with the hot fireman (one in particular) after the San Francisco Half Marathon! 

I know I have been rather lax about posting, but there have been a few reasons. The first is that I have been working on a post for the last week, but can't quite figure out how to say all I want to say without really hurting someone. Ironically, I wouldn't be hurting the person I would need to say bad stuff about, but another person, so I scratched that post. I've also been hurt. My itb's acted up again, and when I tried to run to run a friend in for the last half a mile or so of his 100 mile race and an hour or so later I couldn't walk AGAIN.

So, the next week was spent with my physical therapist, orthopedist, the bike shop and with a new doctor. I switched from running and biking to underwater running, yoga, swimming, personal training and a tiny bit of cycling. It has made me cranky. It is hard to work through, it sucks.

I had to pull out of the NYC Triathlon, which might have been a blessing in disguise because there was a raw sewage leak from the 138th Street Riverbank sewage plant, which led to a bunch of warnings that people should stay out of the Hudson. Then there was a ton of rain this week, which brings up more of the sewage...so needless to say not doing the triathlon might be a blessing in disguise.

But the good news is I ran about 2 miles today at a pace faster than my normal pace and now I am pain free. It looks like something the new doctor did to change my biomechanics is working :).

That's it for now.

Oh, I also went to the beach today and got a very stern reminder of why I don't spend the day at the beach. Don't get me wrong I LOVE water, I love sun, but the always spend too much time in the water and even waterproof sunscreen doesn't stay on my skin. To quote my friend tonight "I didn't know it was possible for a person to get that red!" Here's hoping it just stays red and doesn't get painful, but quite frankly I doubt it.. .

Um so I've been terrible about posting!

So I have been super busy, work, fall season, winter season and the occassional social event has been taking up all my time.

This Sunday I did the 18 MILE tune-up in Central Park. That is 3 loops of Central Park, 3 Harlem Hills, 3 Cat Hills, 3 west sides, oh and those three half mile flat sections in the park. :) It was a killer. I was super lucky though. I started the race with my friend Kristin, and when she got in front of me, I saw Barb, who walked with me (faster than I run) for a good snipet, then met up with my friend Jeff, who hung out with me until he was kicking my butt, then I ran into Bo (who was awesome enough to come out and run 8-9 miles with me) and then Mike and Aleks joined Bo and I and continued with me to the finish. I have the best training buddies, friends, coaches and teammates around. So awesome to have all those people to distract me while I ran and ran and ran. Rumor has it that those 18 miles are harder than the marathon itself. Not sure if I believe that, but I do hope it is true.

As a little break from training I am taking part in Light the Night on october 1st (with the family) and October 14 (with TNT). Both events are a 2-3 mile walk to raise awareness and money for LLS. My uncle Paul is running the CT event!! How awesome is that. Aliza and her new little sister will be there too! My mom, dad and hopefully my Aunt Susan and cousin Sarah will be participating as well. I am not sure there have been that many Harinstein's in a small space in a long time :) The NY walk is over the Brooklyn Bridge, at sunset (yes awesome!) and Tiny Fey is the spokesperson, so who knows, she lives in NY, she may just show up!.
If anyone is interested in joining let me know!

Oops I fell off the wagon...

So many things have happened since the last time I posted. I had a little ankle issues, which you guys know about if you spend time with me regularly. ]

FIRST BIG NEWS TODAY: Aliza, my inspiration to do all this running...turned THREE today. What a great celebration, particularly becuase she gets to share her third birthday with her baby sister's three week birthday! Jason recently informed me she is getting her porto cath out on September 15th and is starting pre school very shortly.

AS TO MY TRAINING: I've have a number of hill workouts, swims, a few long runs (up to 15 miles now). But the most important new thing to report is that I agreed to be a mentor for Winter Season TNT. I am going to mentor the Disney Marathon and am back and forth about whether I want to run Phoenix or Disney (probably just a half, becuase another full would be THREE full marathons in just over sevens months, and well, that is a heck of a lock of marathoning!) As a mentor, I get assigned a group of participants and help them through the logistics of fundraising and training. Mentors are different than coaches in that I am not teaching them HOW TO RUN, but I am doing the other logistical stuff like making sure they are talking to coaches about their injuries or training problems and helping them come up with good ideas for fundraising!

FUNRAISING: Yes, I have started that again. I shot emails out to a lot of people that expressed interest in giving but never got around to it last cycle, plus someone my computer decided to send to OTHER people as well, but I am sure they will understand. So far we are seeing some great support from family in friends, both in donations and supportive emails!
I am going to hold a "Holy &^#$ I just ran my second marathon and survived!!" party on November 7th after the marathon to help fundraise, and if any of you guys out there have any donations as for as raffle prizes or anything, that would be AWESOME!! Please let me know.

I have to get to a total of $1750 for New York, and about $250 shy of that and then another $2155 for Disney/Phoenix, but it is doable I think. I just need to be creative!!

Bike ride/run/ow!

So today I was sort of lazy. I slept in and justified it becuase I was feeling some strange pain in my outside calf. I iced, stretched and then went out for a bike ride. I meant to ride about 10 miles, but due to the gorgeous day it turned in 25 miles, all of which were nail biting because I almost took out a good number of tourists and idiot in Central Park. Some pieces of advice to any of you visitng Central Park sometime soon...(1) If every other cyclist you see is riding counterclockwise...it might a good idea to do the same; (2) if you can't manage your child, it might not be the best idea to let him loose on West Drive where bikers are going 15-20 miles and hour; (3) DON'T STOP in the middle of the road in Central Park; (4)if you don't speak English, chances are if someone is screaming at you, you should get out of the way.

I really tried to be patient, and to be honest, the lower loop and Harlem Hill was no problem, it was just the mid 72nd to 102nd portion that was dangerous to be on.

Anyway I did my ride, was supposed to meet some people in Sheep's Meadow, that didn't work out so I went home on the ferry....and maybe took some time off...watched some tv, stretched and did soem laundry, and then got a three mile run in.

When I came home my leg started hurting more. I think it is just some mild perenoel tendonitis caused by a strange foot position due to those socks yesterday....figners crossed that I am right. I am taking it easy, skipped boot camp this morning and in lieu of yoga will have dinner with my dad tonight.

Summer Streets

So Saturday was supposed to be an eleven mile run down summer streets and into the park. Summer Streets is this fabulous thing NYC does the first three saturdays in August. They close down Park Avenue and a route into the park (and I think a route from the park to the west side highway) and open it to bikers, walkers, runners, rollerbladers, skateboarders, scooterers and some other contraptions I could not identify. I am pretty sure there was an ATV going along and some weird bike with really long handlbars and lots of random wheels.

We (meaning TNT) started at 52nd street went down to the Brooklyn Bridge (downhill) and back up to 52nd Street (uphill). Isn't it funny how downtown goes downhill !!! Seems appropriate to me. Then past 52nd Street, into the Park and back. I was supposed to do 11.25 miles, but due to an unfortunate sock situation (I bought new socks that didn't mesh well with my orthotics) my feet were slipping around in my shoes and I was getting cramping and doing weird things with my feet to run. I stopped after ten miles. It was a great and fun run though. NYC had water stations, rollerblade rentals, they were giving out free bike helmets and my personal favorite....the dumpster pools...I am seriously thinking about heading out there next Saturday to check one out. They had pools made out of what looked like dumpsters...so creative and fun!!!

After the run, and a shower, we had a Team In Training bonding event at the Boat Basin....great way to end your training day!

Tuesday Night GTS and the Secret Hill

Tonight we did hill repeats near the W 72nd Street Entramce. But after years of running in the park I learned that there was actually a road doing north and coming out on West Drive near 74th Street. How funny! It is one way and sort of hidden, but I have passed it at least twice a week for the last 7 months and never realized it was there. That is what I love about Central Park, no matter how much time I spend in it, I am always discovering new things!

The Mission Moment Tonight was a really terrific one. One of the women who is not only an honored teammate, but a participant in tons of Team in Training Events told us about her fight with Leukemia and three time relapse and how being part of the endurance team helped her fight as her fight got harder and harder, not only what she learned about enduring, but through the friends she made the support she recievd. How AMAZING! It's nice to be reminded why we run, especially before those grueling hill workouts! It definitely gave me goosebumps!