Fast Forward...

Somehow time has just escaped me, instead of any sort of detailed account of anything, I'm just going to do a quick run down of the highlights of the last 10 months and then try to keep up better from now on... I'm sure I am going to leave out some important things. November - Malta with Heather for Thanksgiving, we had a great time and the weather was nicer than I expected it to be. December - I went home for Christmas, which was awesome, as usual! January - Rome for a conference and then extended the weekend to hang out with Anika and her sister, we had a great time! February - A marathon in Germany, I can't even remember the name of the city with Steve and then to Seattle for February Break. March - Paris for my first ultra marathon, and an annoying injury I'll get to in a bit April - Rpad trip through Spain with Mel and Amy, and we also saw Heather in Barcelona. May - Last minute trip to Barcelona to visit Heather, long weekend in Nice with Mel and Cathy and an awesome weekend in Copenhagen with Anika, where we found her wedding dress! June - Zell am See to finalize some wedding details with Anika, spa weekend with my mom at Loisium Spa, a week in Nice with my Mom, Boun and Mia, Stacy, Claudia and Chelsea and Steph and Eddie's awesome wedding in Vail, CO with friends from Dubai and Vienna, such an awesome time! July - Home for the summer! I spent time at the beach house, up at my sister's and in Portland. I also did three races, an Olympic Distance Tri in Seattle, a 50 mile bike ride in Hood River and Cascade Lakes Relay with my new best friends. August - Back to Vienna... Sad. This last year was as crazy as any other year. I overplanned and ended up traveling way too much, but looking back I have no idea which trip I would have given up! I went to this small artsy town in the Czech Republic with Claudia one weekend too, but I'm not sure when that was... I also went on a day trip to green lake. I'm still training and "racing" or at least signing up for races. I started with a trainer this year, I thought she was crazy in the start, as the first thing she did was cut back my training, which made me insane. And forced me to lie to her. I decided to get a trainer because I had signed up for the Nice Ironman again and also wanted to do my first Ultra Marathon, the Eco Trail Race in Paris, which was an 80km race, with a friend Gail in March. When I tried to work out the training on my own, I realized I had no idea what I was doing. Long story short, she did an awesome job training me, I guess less is more. I was convinced she was crazy as she had me sign up for a training marathon in February, but my longest run before that was only 2 1/2 hours, I didn't think there was any way I would be able to do a marathon. Steve and I woke up the morning of the race and it was snowing and freezing, I was feeling far less than confident. I ended up finishing in 3:48, my second best marathon time. I decided she knew what she was talking about. Ha! I had a great time at home in February, I just spent the week in Seattle, it seemed to short to try to make it to Portland also. The race in March was awesome! I met up with Gail and some of her friends for dinner the night before and four of us set off the next morning to do the 80km and another two people were doing a different distance. The race itself was pretty awesome, it was a trail run that ended at the Eiffel Tower. You had to carry all your own things, so I was wearing a back pack and a lot of clothes, it was quite cold. There were some rolling hills, some flat sections and some steep sections that you had to walk up, single file, and at the end there was running through the city of Paris at night. Overall, I thought the race was pretty fun, easy to say when it's over! I took off at the start and ended up running by myself, the other people stuck together. I felt good throughout the race, but when I looked up at one point and saw the Eiffel Tower and knew that I still had 20 km left to go I was annoyed and just decided to run as hard as I could. I didn't even bother to stop and fill up my camel back, I couldn't be bothered, and ran out of water before the end. It also POURED down rain the last hour or two and was pitch dark. Fun. As I was running through the Paris streets I was looking at all the people dressed up and in fancy restaurants, drinking wine and wondering why that wasn't my idea of a vacation! During the race I felt fine, but after my leg started to hurt and by the time I got off the plane in Vienna the next day I was in excruciating pain and could hardly walk. Condensed version... it was a partially torn tendon, stress fracture and a torn muscle. It had me not running, on crutches and in PT. I was an absolute disaster physically and mentally for weeks. I didn't realize how much a part of me running was, take that away and I just went crazy! After a while I could bike and swim, but running took a while and the PT was incredibly frustrating. My foot just wouldn't do what it was supposed to do. It also made for a pretty difficult trip to Spain as I couldn't drive and had crutches. ANNOYING. Work was annoying, everything was frustrating for me. I was not able to do the Ironman in Nice, which was also frustrating. My mom was already coming over, and my friends were doing it, so I still went and cheered everyone on. That was hard! I think it has been just over a month that I have been allowed to run over an hour. Now it is "healed" but my foot still shoots out to the right and I sometimes walk funny, putting my toe down first. Whatever. I was able to comfortable complete all my races over the summer, so it must be ok. Summer at home was great. The wedding and Vail were awesome. I rented a car the whole time and will definitely do that again! I also signed up and did the three races and they were all good fun! The tri was especially fun because Gavin and Ella did the kids tri after, it was SO fun to watch them! The HR bike ride with Amy was great, and then I met two friends and we spent the weekend just hanging out and of course eating at 6th Street. I also met up with friends from Vienna that live in Trout Lake now, and also Lindsey and Simon, so great city and great people. The CLR was awesome. I only knew one person, but got to know everyone else and had a great time, the relay races are just awesome. Somehow, running three legs and not getting any sleep is fun. Who knows. Work was crazy as usual, I like what I do, but sometimes it just seems unreal. Steve and I are no longer together as of a couple days ago, so that should make this year in Vienna interesting, as I really don't like the city/people very much. I find it cold and lifeless. I'm really busy through October though, so that will help I think. Crazy schedule. Sept 1 is the Half Ironman in Zell am See, the next weekend is Loisium Spa for Anika's party, then meeting Heather and Gail in Brussels for another trail run, Steph gets in the next weekend, then it's Anika's wedding in Zell am See, then hopefully Whitefish, MO for a training for work, then the next weekend is the Amsterdam Marathon with Heather and I think I'll just stay the rest of the week as it is October Break. Need to stay busy to stay sane..! I'm sure I left out a number of really fun things I did, but... that's the way it goes. It is going to be a goal of mine to keep up with this better this year! Won't be a hard goal to meet seeing that I haven't written in nearly 10 months...