Eco Trail Paris 50km

The Eiffel Tower at night... what could be more beautiful! This weekend was awesome! I met some friends in Paris to do the Eco Trail Paris again. Last year I did the 80km, which was awesome, but, I injured myself. Even though I felt totally trained for the race, I was really nervous about injuring myself again. But, fortunately I didn't! Instead it was an absolutely amazing run. We landed in Paris late on Friday night, met everyone else for dinner and sat around getting excited about the race and debating what to wear, as it was supposed to be WARM! Last year it absolutely poured down rain, which made for a muddy and miserable course.

Heather and I stopped for the perfect French pre-race breakfast, croissant and coffee. Delicious, but not quite enough to fuel up for a 50km trail run, I bought a ham and cheese crepe from a street stand... yep, my trainer would be proud! Ha!

This is our before pictures... we were ready to run!

The race was much harder than I remembered it being. I started off feeling pretty good, but after about an hour I just started thinking, wow, this is hard. My legs are tired. I don't remember feeling like this. Oh, it's getting hot. Oh no! I ran out of water. Are these really the same hills? They seem steeper... My legs were really just burning for much of the race. I really don't remember any other race that while I was racing, my body felt tired. Even the 80km last year. Weird. I laugh when I try to remember what I spent the time thinking about. For a while I was wishing I was Heather, since she started earlier and was doing 30km, then I started wondering where Sarah was on the 50km course, then a bit later, I started being SO thankful I was only doing 50km, then I was laughing because I was thinking, since when did 50km become an "only"?!

Snack time! I had run out of water at about 24km, so I was really happy when I arrived to the first rest stop. I was thirsty and who doesn't need dark chocolate and a handful of nuts in the middle of a run? Delicious.

The Eiffel Tower looks so far away... I knew that was were the race ended, and that it was mostly downhill from there, but at the same time, I also remembered how annoying the winding around the busy roads on this tiny gravel "sidewalk" was and how it seems like you are just running away from the tower, when all you want to do is GET THERE. This time though, I got to run it in the daylight and no rain and I had water too. Last year I was so mad the last 20km that I couldn't even be bothered to stop and fill up my camelbak, instead I just figured I would drink the rain water... Anyways, I felt great during the last part and was able to pass a lot of people who had stopped to walk. That always feels great! I felt like even though my legs were burning, I had done all of the necessary training if at the end I was still able to keep on going.

We did it! Heather met me at the end and then we just hung out and waited a bit for Sarah to finish. It was awesome! I was super happy with my time, 5:11, I got 8th in my division, 24th of all females and 344th overall. I finished faster than I thought I was going to, which always makes me happy. It was such a perfect day for running, gorgeous blue skies, perfect temperature and a cool breeze. The exact opposite from last year! I loved the race. After we finished, we met up with the Grewe clan for dinner and to cafe/bar hop until Gail and Theresa finished. We had a great French meal and lots of French wine and great conversation and lots of laughs. It was absolutely amazing to watch Gail and Theresa cross that 80km finish line. What an amazing accomplishment! I can't believe Gail did it again, well, actually, I can.

Celebration time! After the obligatory finish line photos, we all went back to one of the cafes we had been at earlier in the night and had more French wine, fries, beer and peanuts. I think we finally made it back to the hotel at 1:30 or 2:00, maybe even later, who knows! The next day was relaxing, I think I went to three or four different cafes, one was even Starbucks (free wifi), we wandered through the market, I found a place to get a massage and then ate a delicious lunch and read my book. A perfectly relaxing afternoon in Paris after a perfectly awesome trail run.

Spring in Paris... what's not to love?! Another think I love, is that next time I be here, it will be to enjoy Paris as a total tourist. My Mom, Aunt and I will be here the first weekend in June. FUN! I am hoping for a boat ride, cafe time and markets. I have a feeling there will be lots of walking and some wine too! In other news... I became an adult today. I finally have a refrigerator that is not "perfect for a college dorm room", yep, I'm growing up for sure!

Sunny Spring!

It's been a gorgeous end to winter and start of spring this year, and I am loving it. The first few pictures are ones that I took while trail running with the AIS group. They have been patient with me as it is possible that I have been complaining quite a bit lately. I love to run, really, I do. But... these trail runs are just plain brutal and they have not gotten one bit easier. It doesn't help that one of the guys is just amazing and makes it look effortless. His morning runs are more than what most runners do in a week. I also put in a photo of an oh so beautiful sweatshirt that was sent to me for writing up a little blurb for these women who want to write a book about women that have completed an Ironman. The idea is nice, but I find the size and shape of the sweatshirt about as useful as the dri fit polo shirts Ironman hands out for completing the race. When is the right time to wear that?! I presented at a conference for work and was completely over prepared, which I guess is better than not being ready. It went well and I was thrilled that it was over. Meg and I had no choice but to celebrate at Palmenhaus afterwards. I then led a group dinner of random conference people, I know, not my thing. It was actually good fun, a friend of mine from Dubai happened to be in my group and the rest of the people were also fun. It did make me laugh though, because after dinner they wanted to "go out". I had to apologize right away as I know NOTHING of what to do in this city at night. We ended up wandering around to different bars and had a lot of fun. We celebrated St. Patrick's Day the next night and if you were wondering, it's not my beer. I made some cookies, guess which ones had the American flour?! Wine tasting and a picnic was pretty much the perfect way to spend the first spring weekend. We went out to Neusiedlersee and had an amazing day! The directions at the winery were pretty simple. Please take a glass and help yourself. Well, that's easy enough! I met up with some girlfriends for a Sunday Brunch that ended up bringing us to a cute French place, Wein and Co. and ended 8 hours later at an Irish Bar. Ha! Not the day I had planned for. I was happy I had put lunch for the week in the Crock Pot before I went out that day. This week was busy at work and with a few dinners out, one with the GGI girls and the other for a friend's birthday. I thought I was going to become a real, live, grown up tonight, you know, life after a college size refrigerator, but it didn't happen. I bought a refrigerator from a friend and I had arranged for the movers to come tonight at 6:00, I had a funny feeling about it earlier today and I was right, they didn't show up, answer their phone, or respond to my texts. Grrrr. We were both late to dinner and now I have to figure out a way to get it all taken care of and I won't be here this weekend. I have no idea what I am going to do. Worry about it tomorrow I guess. This weekend is the Paris Eco Trail 50km run. I'm excited, it will be great to meet up with some friends, and I guess I'm ready for the race. I'm actually quite nervous. I know I did the training, and the weather is supposed to be great, but I really don't want to end up on crutches again! That was SO miserable. I wish I could fast forward to the start of the race!

Prost!

Cheers to a fun night out with the girls! I met some friends from GGI out for drinks on a Monday. I know, that is a BIG stretch for me. I rarely drink cocktails and certainly not on Monday nights, but it was a great time! We met at this great place that I wish I would have known about when Steph still lived here, as it was literally on her street. I guess it is probably better that we didn't know. Time is just flying by, it's hard to believe it is already a third of the way through March. I'm currently busy panicking about a conference I will be presenting at this week. I feel like I have never worked this hard on anything before, but it's just not exactly what I want it to be. I'm sure I am expecting too much and the presentation is probably fine, but I want it to be perfect. I will be super excited when it's over this Friday. The one great thing about the presentation is that it is the same time as my swimming class, so I will have to miss class again this week. So disappointing. Training has been super hard. I'm still frustrated that the trail runs aren't getting any easier, but I'm hoping that the hard trail running I have been doing will pay off at the end of the month in Paris. I was just looking over the course and it's a 50km trail run, but it is actually 54km. In some ways I just wish it were this weekend so I could get it over with! I am looking forward to seeing Heather and Gail in Paris. I'm sure we'll have fun! Apparently we are not having a real winter this year, which is great. We have continued to have sunny and almost warm weather. This weekend nine of us went out to Loisium Wine & Spa resort in Südsteiermark. It was amazing! My Mom and I went last summer, and it was great, and it was just as fun the second time around!

It was clearly an awesome weekend. When we booked this weekend back in November we had NO idea that we would literally be able to lay out in swimsuits in March. Honestly, it was shocking! Along with lounging around the pool, we did some wine tasting, spa treatments, trespassing/hiking, running and ate some delicious meals. All in all, could not have asked for a better weekend! Feeling pretty lucky about the life I have! But, today, also a bit sad that this week is my niece's birthday and I won't get to see her. I just wish Vienna and the U.S. of A. were a bit closer!

Vienna Staycation

Winter in Vienna. I would say this year = awesome. We had a week or two of absolutely FREEZING weather, but there has been sun and blue skies and next to NO snow this year and I love it! Today I ran in this race at the Prater, and it was gorgeous, people were wearing shorts and tank tops. I found that to be a bit ambitious, but not completely out of the range of normal. I was definitely too warm in my winter running clothes. Lots of fun things going on in the last few weeks. I've had a few Vienna surprises lately. As I'm sure I've made painfully obvious at times, this city is clean, safe, public transportation is supposedly awesome (except to get to work...) and always ranks high on the best places to live... but, the people, it kills me. They are often rude and I get SO frustrated with people saying things like, that's just how the Viennese are, or basically just excusing bad behavior and it's just not a friendly or nice, or exciting city. You pretty much walk with your head down and avoid eye contact, which is a big difference from my friendly, small town, U.S. of A. life. And, I miss it a lot. This city just seems dead and unfriendly and I have found the people to just be cold. At first, I thought it was because I didn't speak German, but at this point I have found that is not the case. The Austrians I have met and made friends with here, are all from outside of Vienna, and many of them also say that there is like a wall around the Viennese that you can't break through, even knowing the language. Well, anyways, enough about that, because I had a rush of pleasant surprises from this city. First, I finally found an awesome running group through Internations, there are a variety of levels of runners and they meet every Sunday; I ran a race with some of them this morning, and I love it. It only took five years, but so worth the wait! Next for randomness... on Valentine's Day, I was on my way to work, waiting for the third form of public transportation of the day and not necessarily in the best mood, and as I was standing there, this woman just walked up to me and gave me a flower. I looked up and sort of looked around, and her and another man, were just standing on the corner handing out flowers to everyone that walked by! You would not believe the look of shock on everyone's faces. Really, Viennese people smiling? Handing out flowers for no reason? Not normal at all, but super awesome! Last random act of kindness from the Viennese... Heather and I went on a walk up to Kahlenberg and long story short, we were sitting at this cute cafe in Grinzing and didn't have enough money to pay for our lunch and the cafe didn't take bankomat, and while there was a bank nearby, my card doesn't work to take out cash (and hasn't pretty much the entire time I have lived here, I have ordered new cards over 30 times and have decided to give up, and yes, I have tried everything to keep it from getting demagnetized)and the lady who was having lunch with friends at the table next to us, just offered to pay for us while we left to go find an open bank that I could go in and get money out. So nice! I couldn't believe it was happening, I mean, that is nice for any city anywhere, but just shocking for Vienna! I am just at the end of February Break, it was such a great week! Heather came to visit and we had a relaxing Staycation! We enjoyed some touristy things in Vienna, walk to Kahlenberg, Hunderwasser Museum, and the Julias Meinl Wine Bar. We also had time to do some long runs, sample some food and wine from my favorite places, the Naschmarkt, who doesn't love Dr. Falafel?!, Mini and Wein and Co. to name a few. We also made some great food at home, including chocolate chip cookies. Delicious! We went on a few day trips, a cold rainy day in Bratislava, Slovakia and a relaxing Beauty Care Day at Wabi in Sopron, Hungary. The week also involved darts and drinking games, yes I did say drinking games, who does that still?! Someone said the we did the adult version, and I will say, I am not sure there is any such thing as the adult version of drinking games! Vienna is being good to me these days. Training is going well, I feel like I am wiped out most of the time, as the training days are just plain hard. I was feeling pretty discouraged with my trail running as every Tuesday I pretty much feel like the trail run is torture and not getting any easier, but then today I did a flat race after already running 45 minutes, and did 14km in barely over an hour, which I was not expecting at all. So, I guess whatever she is doing is working. I sure would love to take a year off and just train. Maybe someday! Looking forward to more fun times coming up! I just signed up for a volunteer cooking activity, a few different GGI (Girl's Gone International) events, a spa weekend, and then a rush of traveling and visitors starts at the end of March and will go through to the end of the year. And, I'd love to make it out to Barcelona again for some beach fun... We'll see!