January 2010

AFTER

July 2010

What a difference!

Whoa, this is looooooong overdue! Enjoy this recap of my first ever half marathon on 5/1/10!

I swear, I’ve never before said “winner, winner, chicken dinner” in my life, but I found reason to here. Look, I’m wearing a medal! I’m a winner! It’s a medal that is shaped like a chunk of Wisconsin cheese which is quite fitting since I received it for finishing the Wisconsin Half Marathon. My first half marathon, done. Finito. As in, I will never experience it again. Luckily it was awesome:)

The day was amazing as I predicted. I couldn’t sleep the night before because I was just so excited to get out there and run! And of course all the logistics of the day were running through my head on a reel. The 4:00 am alarm Saturday morning came too quickly, but how could I be upset about it? It was race day! I was going to run my first half marathon and my longest run to date.

After a bit of a SNAFU (again, who says that??) in meeting up with some of my other runner friends to carpool, we finally go to Kenosha, parked, and made our way to the race site.

Training for this race, I ran most of my long run with my running buddy Cheryl. She was such an important part of my training and mental preparation for this race that I had a mini breakdown when we started lining up for the start and Cheryl was no where in sight. Thank goodness we found her right before the gun! I would have been thisclose to quitting my first half marathon had I not found her.

The gun went off and we started running! The race itself was fairly uneventful. You can check out my dailymile race recap for more race-specific details. But here’s the exciting news…..I finished! I ran the whole 13.1 miles! And I ran it in 2 hours and 7 minutes!

My first half marathon? Check. An amazing race? Check. Awesome friends? Check.

It was so great sharing my achievement with so many friends, who all now share the same achievement. For some of my friends such as Cheryl, Lindsey, and Tony, this was their first half marathon. For others, Anne, Rochelle, Tracey, Krista, Joe, and Matt, this was another in a list of many. And for two, Mike and Marty, this was their first full marathon! Congrats to all!

Race Day Signs!

]]> http://mserita.wordpress.com/2010/09/08/winner-winner-chicken-dinner/feed/ 1 mserita 31638_779903634968_26700645_43118077_3764582_n Race Day Signs! http://mserita.wordpress.com/2010/04/30/im-actually-going-to-do-it/ http://mserita.wordpress.com/2010/04/30/im-actually-going-to-do-it/#comments Sat, 01 May 2010 02:36:20 +0000 mserita http://mserita.com/?p=175 ]]> That realization pretty much just hit me. I am actually going to run a half marathon tomorrow. Or to be more precise, in a little under 9.5 hours from now I will be crossing the start line of my very first half marathon. And hopefully about 2 hours and 5 minutes later, I will be crossing the finish line. Holy shit, I’m doing it. I’m actually doing it. Obviously I know that this is what I’ve been working so hard for over the past 4 months, but wow, it’s here. It is finally here. I have a feeling tomorrow is going to be an amazing day

And now that those few simple sentences have been written, I need to set my alarm for 4:00am and drift off to sleep and dream about running.

Anyway, back to why I did 75 push ups last night. I did 75 push ups because it was Pump Day Hump Day! That means that it was Wednesday and every Wednesday (until it gets annoying) I will match dollar to push up for all donations I receive for Team Challenge! I received $75 in donations yesterday, so I did 75 push ups. Hopefully, I’ll have even more push ups to do next Wednesday! I’m looking forward to having killer arms for the upcoming tank top season:)

Shout out to Scott Johannes, Bob Hartner, and Steve Sensenbrenner for the donations! Thanks for making my arms sore today guys!

Ok, I'll admit it, this was totally posed.

Blarney Run 5K with Cheryl, I'm in blue:)

So, I’m running my first half marathon on Saturday. You think I’d be nervous, right? Wrong. I’ve kind of taken to running like a fish to water, like a junkie to heroin, like a skier to a mountain. Get it? I love it and I’m actually pretty good at it.

My running story is pretty simple. I was inactive. I was active in high school, but that was (insert number here) years ago. Ok, alright, it was 12 years ago. I was shocked when I realized that I really hadn’t been active in 12 years. I guess I thought that I didn’t really need to be. I didn’t have a weight problem; I’ve always been on the slender side. When I told people that I was out of shape, they laughed because I just didn’t really look like I was. Regardless of what people thought, I was out of shape. How couldn’t I have been? I hadn’t done much in the form of exercise since I was 18.

I had stints of fitness throughout the years, but nothing that stuck. That was until the end of this past year. I decided, along with my good friend Lindsey, that I was going to start running. In October of 2009 we randomly decided to sign up for a half marathon. It’s the half marathon I am preparing to run on Saturday. 0 miles to 13.1 miles?? Yeah, that’s apparently how I roll. I ran for about 3 weeks prepping for a 5K on Halloween that I also signed up for (ya know, to keep me accountable and push me to train). I obviously wasn’t too dedicated because I went to a Halloween party the night before and didn’t get home until in the morning hours on race day. Oops. After missing the Halloween 5K I stopped running. You could say I gave up for a while. Then about a week before New Years Eve a bunch of my friends on Twitter were talking about a NYE 5K. So I decided that I could do the 3K and signed up! When I got there and realized that the other 12 or so people I was there with were all running the 5K I switched from the 3K to the 5K. Previous to this, my longest run was less than 2 miles. I ran this race in 34 minutes and something. I didn’t run the whole thing, but the feeling at the finish was amazing! The experience of this race changed my life. I’ve been running ever since that day, working towards my goal of becoming a runner. That was 4 months ago. I am now running the same distance (in non-race mode) in about 26 minutes. That’s approximately 8:40 minute miles. I’ve even ran farther, faster. I’m definitely not trying to brag, it just feels so good to quantify it and to be able to see my progress! To date, my longest run has been 12 miles in 1 hour 56 minutes. This Saturday’s half marathon, 13.1 miles, will be my new longest run ever. I. Can’t. Wait!

Shout Out! I am very fortunate to have a really great and supportive group of runner friends that are so impressive and motivating and inspiring. They keep me moving. They tell me I’m doing great when I’ve had a bad run. They remind me of how far I’ve come. They remind me that I’m speedy:) So this post, is dedicated to you! I don’t like listing people because I cringe at the thought of missing someone, but I also cringe at the idea of not naming you all who have been so important in my success. So, here I go….Lindsey, Anne, Rochelle, Tony, Tracey, Ginesa, Mike, Marty, Joe P., Amy, Alicia, Sara S., Krista. And a special shout out to my running partner, Cheryl! Thank you!!

Oh, and if you’re interested you can follow my running on Daily Mile. And if you’re an athlete yourself, be sure to sign up!

That’s how I feel about this blog at the moment. I am totally excited and psyched about it and also a bit leery. It’s a bit scary to put your thoughts down in a forum that shares it on the internet for possibly the whole world to see…not that I think the whole world is going to read my blog, I’m waaay too much of a realist to think that;) So, I’m just going to go with it. I’m not going to fret about it. I’m not going to agonize over what to say. I’m just going to say it. No rewriting. No planning. Just simply me. So there. Take that world!

I remember when I first joined Twitter. I was worried that I had nothing to say and that no one would find me entertaining. And now I have a blog. It’s funny how things evolve, huh?

Mserita is pronounced M-serita. It’s short for Miss Serita. Serita means little Sarah in Spanish. It is a nickname that a coworker gave me 10 years ago and it just kind of stuck. My first personal email address (yes, I’m dating myself here) was miss1serita. Over the years, I’ve shorten it simply to Mserita. This shorten name defines me in a way. Many people know me as Mserita. If you are Twitter folk, you understand. It becomes almost as important as, if not more important than, your “real” name. If you’ve ever been to a Tweet-Up you understand. Notice the theme? Twitter. I love Twitter. Twitter and the people I have met through it have changed my life.

But before I get into any of that, I simply wanted to introduce myself, Mserita, to the blog world. Hello! Hope you enjoy:)