Sharing is Caring

When I was looking at apartments in the Chicago, one thing that I had thought about was, "What will it be like to run in the city?"  I figured that I might have to deal with more frequent stop lights.  Luckily, I am close enough to the lake that I can run on the lakefront trail and I don't have to worry about stop lights until I get to Navy Pier.
I also figured that I would have to share the sidewalk with fellow runners and other pedestrians.  This has been a big change for me.  My hometown is a suburb, but my high school was pretty much in the middle of a corn field, so there were few runners.  Even if I encountered one, we were usually running opposite ways.  In Chicago, especially on the lakefront, there are so many runners.  I want to high five all the runners going the opposite way as me, but I figured that might be weird.  Since it is summer, there are so many walkers that take up the entire path.  It is a struggle to try to weave through them.  One woman stepped out right in front of me and then gave me a dirty look as I swerved to avoid running directly in to her.  I also have to share the paths with bicyclists.  This generally isn't a problem because they ride around me, and I try to stay to the side of the path.  However, today there was a woman that was riding her bike slower than I was running.  I wish I could say I was running really fast, but I wasn't.  Why even ride a bike if you're going to go that slow?
One thing I never would have thought about sharing the path with: Segways.  Being on the lakefront, there are Segway tours all over.  Unfortunately, I found out the hard way that Segway tours go at the same speed I run.  This is frustrating as a runner.  When I come up behind you, I either want you to speed up away from me or I want to speed up and pass you (I am partial to passing people, but maybe I'm just too competitive).  To run behind these Segways and maintain my distance behind them for a mile was very difficult, but I got through it.
I am slowly learning how to be a runner in an area where there are a ton of people.  I have really been enjoying running on the lake, though, so I think it's worth it.

I haven't gotten all the songs you suggested onto a playlist yet, but I'm excited to start running to them soon!  (I'll still take running playlist suggestions!)



I also have to share my run with boats, which is really cool.  I'm also looking for boat friends because I want to be able to go out on the lake in a boat.  Maybe I'll introduce myself to someone on the docks and become their friend.

Day 1

As you can clearly see by a quick scroll through this blog, I am REALLY good at blogging.

I definitely fell off the blogging bus for the last race, but I have had a couple people ask me if I am going to keep updating it for the marathon and I thought I'd give it another try.

Quick update on the half marathon: Madeline and I did it.  We finished.  It was really rainy.  We had fun.  Madeline will probably never do it again.

But now, my friends, it is time to begin training for the Chicago Marathon this fall.  I am really excited to start training.  For anyone wondering, I am following the Hal Higdon Intermediate 2 Marathon schedule.  I have used his training schedules ever since my first marathon and I think they are really well put together (plus then I have less planning I need to do before each run).
This is my first training regimen that includes cross training, so this will be new and different.  For those that don't know, I am now living in Chicago and loving it.  My building has a pool, so I'd like to think that I might swim on my cross training days, but to be honest, I am a really bad swimmer and there are always people in the pool.  So, I think I will bike on my cross training days.

Today was Day 1 of training and it happened to be a cross training day.  I signed up for Divvy, which is a bike sharing service (if you don't know what I'm talking about, think of Zipcar, but for bikes).

I decided it would be nice grab a Divvy and bike along the lakefront.  It was so beautiful, but my legs definitely felt it.  I didn't realize how differently biking works your muscles.  I think I ended up biking about 8 miles and I got this great picture of the skyline from afar (see below).

I am looking forward to more running and biking on the lake and I promise to try to keep the blog more updated this time.

Also, let me know what your favorite workout tunes are!  I need to make a workout playlist.  Currently, I just throw my music on shuffle and, as much as I love "Hallelujah" by Rufus Wainwright, it really isn't conducive to working out.