Kelsey Creek Warm Up and Cornering Vid

Puppies, Pis and Pip

I enjoy teaching people to run. I love when there is enthusiasm after someone runs their first mile or being there with them when they complete their first 5k or PR a race. As a running coach these are exciting moments that, to me, are akin to being a mom and your child reaches a new milestone. Chest puffing pride abounds. So what happens when you are a mom and a running coach and you try to get your kids to love running too? There has only been a modicum amount of chest puffing in my house in this regard but I've found the secret.

Kids run. Sometimes they run a lot. Kids enjoy running most of the time when they don't realize they are running. Make kids run for any reason other than fun and you are asking to get an earful of whining. Maybe deservedly. I have tried to get my 2 kids, ages 5 and 9, involved in running. They have had some desire but I almost squashed it when I tried to make them do it,  even when I thought what we were doing was fun. So I eventually learned after some tears and a lot of "why are we doing this?" and I backed off. The kids seem to like that I run. They know I am a coach and often accompany me while I water stop my runners. They always seem to enjoy when I come home with a new medal and they have spent countless hours on the race course cheering mom on. I thought I could lure them into running races with the promise of a medal but it seems most kids races either don't give a medal (a big mistake in my mind) or they are clearly inferior. I know there are arguments to be made about the value of medals, who should get them and when but when talking about kids and racing, especially younger kids, I feel they are a great incentive to get them involved. Since they are hard to come by in regular races I have turned to virtual races.

 

Virtual races are great to do with kids because you can run them anywhere, at any time of day, you generally have a few days to complete them and you more often then not get a medal. Score, score, score and SCORE! The last virtual race I did with my kids was the Pi Day 5k created by Gametiime. Since I knew my kids could not run a 5k all in one shot my plan was to run one mile a day over 3 days with the last day adding a little extra 0.1. The kids were so excited to earn their Pi Day medals and schwings that they were rearing to get out there (our neighborhood) and run their distances. I let them run/walk when needed and the beauty of doing it anytime really helped them complete their goals. My daughter was able to finish up her last mile with me and my running group (they were running our planned Pi Day 5k group run) and eat pie! My son had a previous engagement so he ended up running his last mile, by himself, in the pouring rain. But he did it and he was very proud of himself. I was proud of him too with plenty of chest puffing that morning.

 

 

Now Gametiime has a new virtual race, The Puppy Run, and when I showed my daughter the awesome puppy medal her head nearly exploded. If you were to know my daughter (and Pip Running namesake) you would know that she loves dogs and cute, fluffy puppies are the bees knees. The Puppy Run medal with the dogs feet forming a heart was really too much for her and we were doing this race. The medal is to be hers. The bag and Frisbee are great too but the medal, and the race name of course, is what is getting her and my son excited to do this. Our 2 dogs are too old to run this with us but I'm sure the medals will be named Courage and Rocco and we'll notice lots of other cute dogs on our runs that remind of us Courage and Rocco. I am planning to have the kids run this race similarly to the Pi Day 5k. I'll have them break up their runs if they need to, run/walking is allowed and mom will give them subtle tips to help them run longer. The time doesn't matter at this point so much as completing their goal, earning their medals and participating in something as a family.

Virtual races are awesome.

Edumacation

I have had a pretty good couple of weeks lately. Well, couple of months really. I have been working with my coach on helping me get back my running mojo. We meet once a week and I have to say having someone force you to do things you should do but don't do is really helpful. I'm getting that left arm to cooperate and hills are still evil but I can tackle them now. I'm really trying to remember my stride and breathing to keep things coming together. That makes me feel good and feeling good about my running makes me feel confident as a coach.

Many things lately have been going on with my coaching. Not so much that I've picked up tons of new clients but I had 3 certification classes scheduled for this year that I've been pretty excited about. The first class was through Rocktape to become FMT Level 1 certified. I've been having a ball taping up my clients (and myself). So far, so good with the reviews of my tape jobs. I feel it's just something a little extra that I can give my clients. The taping this picture is for one of my clients Katey. She has problems with edema in her knee and calf after running. I was excited to learn about this edema taping in class because I immediately thought of her. After she was thoroughly examined by a couple of doctors she was given the all clear of any medical issues and the taping seems to help keep her swelling down. Now I am only taping her knee because the calf swelling seems to subsided after the 1st application.

The next certification class I just took over the Mother's Day weekend. I went through the Lydiard Foundation's Level I&II Certification Course. This was a really educational, interesting and fun course. I'm still waiting to do my final test to receive my official certification but I cannot wait to explore this method of coaching and hopefully start implementing it next year when I am done with my races. We got to meet Lorraine Moller who was the Bronze medalist in the 1992 Olympic Games. She and Nobby Hashizume were really fun and of course gave us a ton of information and Lorraine brought her bronze medal for us all to see. That is one heavy metal! I met many great people and I hope I get to work with many of them in the future.

The final certification course for the year should be Newton Level II Cert. I am taking a Healthy Running course this summer and after some procedure and video taping I can apply for my cert and pass muster. I am pretty excited about this course because there is a large section of form which has become very important to me as a coach. Also, there is a section regarding shoe wear (go figure) and I will get a new pair of Newton's out of the deal. Plus the kids are getting another trip to Portland and they have been dying to go back.

Finally, some of you may have noticed a couple of Learn to Run Clinics/Meet the Coach events. This is something I am trying to get going to help all those people that are on the fence about learning how to run.  Many of us have been that person that is interested but too scared to join because we think we are too slow, or to fat or are all Phoebe running through the park. The goal is that interested people can see that we are normal people in this group that look like them and have/had all the same concerns. Everyone is welcome to come to this event so even if you've been through one of my classes I would love for you to be there!

WTF just happened

The last month or so have really been a whirlwind full of ups and downs for me. I have had a lot going on with creating and launching my new website, Pip Running, setting up a Groupon campaign, setting up classes at Renton Community Center, reformulating my run schedule/pricing, launching my newsletter, scheduling coaching workshops for myself and starting my own marathon training! Phew! I'm tired.

The website is something I have thought about doing for awhile. I wasn't sure if I would try to hire someone to design it for me or just try to wing it myself. I have winged setting up sites before so I knew how daunting it could be especially with no actual coding knowledge. I was lucky enough to be listening to Mark Maron's WTF podcast when I heard the ad for Squarespace and remembered to check it out. I thought the websites looked nice and it seemed doable. I spent a week solid working on it and fixed bugs and stuff a long the way. It's not perfect and on the backside for setting up the calendar and store things could be easier but I'm pretty pleased with it especially with my limited website building capabilities. Check it out and let me know what you think.

The whole reason I really sat down and built the website was so that I could start doing Groupon or Groupon type campaigns. Obviously I wanted to attract more runners to Pip but I really want to start building up the trainings so that all the mid-week stuff could just be free, fun, maintenance runs. That is my plan and hopefully the little community will start to grow and Pip Running shirts will be seen all the local trails. After I complete some of these workshops that I have scheduled I think I would feel more confident exploring more online coaching as well. The Groupon campaign is launching in 10 days and fingers crossed it all goes well! There is a lot of satisfaction in getting people to run and having them fall in love with it. It won't be everyone but that handful that does it is really fun to watch and be apart of it.  Spread the word!

All of this was going on and when I would do my solo runs something was off. The runs seemed to be a lot harder than they should have been. Things weren't moving right and I was getting pretty down on myself. The coach needed a coach. I started working one on one with my Flash and Dash Speed/Form class coach Ben Rixe. Seems like I was running into a common problem (no pun intended) that my own workouts were suffering. Let me tell you seeing yourself on video can not only be very frightening but pretty eye opening! This is something I want to start doing more myself as a coach. No one wants to see themselves but after a few dozen times of watching yourself you will get desensitized to how your ass looks in those tights and will be able to focus on things such as arm swing, foot strike and forward lean.  I'm feeling better these days and started seeing improvement immediately.  Now about my ass in those tights...

Did I Really Just Agree To Do Another One?

 

When I finished the Portland Marathon in October I felt great. Other than my calves being ridiculously tight I had very little in the way of soreness. I never hit a wall when we were out running and it seemed the farther we went the more upbeat I felt. We were getting closer to the end and I was getting closer to accomplishing this goal. It was a pretty great high especially coming of a month of injury and another month of trying to build my miles back. So immediately I thought I will need to do this again, without injury, so I can experience a full marathon training and one where I aspire for more than just finishing. I've ridden that high and that thought for many months. Eventually I decided with another friend to try to run the Light at the End of the Tunnel Marathon. We have talked about it for months and any thoughts of my running Ragnar this year I put aside because this was the race. One problem. The race sells out every year, the number of runners is very limited and we had yet to sign up. It's hard to plan your training for a big race when you are not even sure if you would be able to run it. Not to be deterred we continued to plan as if we were in like Flynn.

March 2nd! March 2nd was the first day released for registration. Promptly at 7pm we could try to register online. Only 200 runners would gain entrance. By this point my first running partner had to drop out. She is on the indefinite injured list. While I was sad to hear she would not be able to run, and all our training prior to the race was out, I am happy to report that another was foolish enough to take her spot as my training partner. What are we getting ourselves into?

March 2nd has come. We ran Hot Chocolate this morning and I cannot tell you how tired I am. The last stupid hill in the 5k wiped me out! How am I going to run 23.1 more miles in July?!? Granted this lovely marathon is a gentle downhill for most of the way and I will go through 20 weeks of training from now until then but it freaks me out a little. I'm not too disappointed in my Hot Chocolate time either. Could have been a PR I think if not for that last long hill up Denny (or maybe it was another street they all have hills).  So 7pm had come and Emily and I were feverishly trying to register online. I was just checking out when I got a text from Emily that said she was in. Just as I got Emily's text something crashed on my end. I was out! I tried refreshing several times and opening another page. I was texting Emily that I had crashed! I had crashed! Time was slipping away and I had crashed and might not get registered. I was freaking out a little. Emily texted that she was still in and she would try to register me.

Just as Emily got me registered my page came back up. I would have had to go through all the steps again to register but I was already in. I decided to poke around a little at who got registered when I received notice that the race was sold out. Minutes is all it took. I was only of the lucky (that remains to be seen) few to make it into this race.
Now I've got to run it.

New Beginnings

What's been going on at Pip Running? Lots! In January I started a Slug to 5k Training Group. This was a small group of 4 ladies plus one current client who was rehabbing. By the 3rd week I lost 3 (one transferred to later class, one wasn't ready & one moved to the class below). The class was small but we were progressing.
 

A few weeks later I started another training group. This one was a Half Marathon Training Group with the goal race being BMO Vancouver on May 4th. I have 3 ladies in this group. They are a fun group of very motivated women. For reasons I'm still not sure of I decided to schedule these 2 groups on Saturday morning. For a few weeks there I was doing double duty. Eventually it just made sense to move everyone to the same flat, trail. Hello Ron Regis Park!
 

8 weeks later Shannon graduated from the Slug to 5k. The other lady never could make it to class but fortunately we've been able to keep in contact. I am always so proud when someone goes through the training and reaches their goal and I always especially enjoy being there for people when they do their 1st's. While all this was going on I was also working with the Renton Community Center to have a training group through there. The goal race for this group was the Seahawks 12k/GLOW 5k coming up in April. The Seahawks had just won the Super Bowl and I thought this training would be really popular. We missed being published in the RCC guide and the only offering I could do was a morning class and of course of those that inquired they wanted evening. Doh! Unfortunately while this was going on with the community center I did have my own Seahawks Slug to 5k evening training starting the same day but no one who inquired knew to look into Pip Running for evening classes and I didn't know who inquired. However I did speak to one lady and now the current Slug to 5k is made up of refugees from previous classes.
 

So now there are two classes going plus all the usual runs. Somewhere in all that running around I have been planning on running another marathon. I'm sure that's why I scheduled everything on a Saturday. There had to have been a good reason.
 

New Pip Running Merchandise!

I finally got the order placed today for the new Pip Running tech shirts. These are the shirts that are being given to the new Slug to 5k and Half Marathon Training clients. They are also available for sale. $20 per shirt/Unisex sizing. The quantities are very limited. You can use the PayPal button the the rights to order.