It is almost incredible to think about everything that has happened in the last month (ahem…plus) since I last found the time to write a blog post!  Here are just a few of the highlights:

Our Anniversary Cruise

I will have to write a full recap post but we had a fabulous time sailing aboard the Disney Fantasy!  We finally got some relaxation time in and truly enjoyed ourselves.

I was actually able to really maintain my mileage thanks to the treadmill on board.  While I think one long run ended up being sacrificed, I think I logged 5-6 miles all but one day of the trip.  This definitely helped to stave off a major weight gain because, believe me, I really ate on this vacation!  I also ran the Castaway Cay 5k again and had another great race!  I finished in 23:45 although I think the distance was just shy of 3.1 miles.  I finished as the first female and 2nd place overall.  Plus seriously, who doesn’t love running on Castaway Cay (minus the blistering heat).

After we got back, it was back to the real world for just a bit.

Bonnet Creek 5k

After getting back into serious training for a few weeks, it was time to try my hand at another 5k.  I was really unsure about how prepared I would be for this race and decided to treat it mentally as a “baseline” for the rest of the season – to see how much progress I made since last season.

After some pre-race jitters, it was time for the start:

You can see me in the middle of the frame in the lime green outfit.  I went out way too fast, maintaining a sub 7 minute pace for the first 3/4 of a mile.  I definitely let my nerves get the better of me and pacing will be a major focus for upcoming races.  Overall, I stayed strong and managed to bring home a PR of 23:17!  I also took 2nd female, 1st female 20-29, and 11th overall.  Here was my finish:

Here are a few photo highlights courtesy of the Give Kids the World Facebook Page (source):

And a post-race “selfie” with my age group award medal:

My Birthday!

So we ended up unexpectedly needing to shift our Disneyland trip by a couple of days (long story).  This meant I would be spending my birthday in Orlando instead!  We spent that Saturday and Sunday celebrating with my family between my mom’s house and the Magic Kingdom (where else would I go?).  Although I ended up going to work on my birthday, we celebrated with ‘Ohana for dinner so that was pretty much perfection!

Here are a few photo highlights:

Disneyland

So, I won’t even go into detail here yet (I have about a million pictures) but my mom and I had a BLAST at Disneyland!  I’ll have to write a follow up post about this trip.  We squeezed an almost unimaginable amount of fun into 4 days.

and finally…

The 2013 Tower of Terror 10 Miler

So, unfortunately moving our Disneyland trip meant taking the Friday nigh red eye flight that would get me back to Florida oh…at 5 am the morning of the Tower 10 Miler!  Walking around endlessly for 4 days at Disneyland plus barely sleeping the night before a race is not exactly ideal.  I couldn’t bear the thought of missing the race so I made it work!

Again, I’ll have to write a separate race recap but here are some pictures from last night:

Considering the circumstances, I actually had a pretty great race!  I finished in 1:28:05 (just shy of the 1:25 “A goal” I had set for myself).  This was an improvement over last year’s race by almost exactly 10 minutes (almost down to the second – last year’s time was 1:38:06).  Although the 10 mile distance is somewhat weird since I don’t race it often, I can still count this as a PR.

More to come on this race.

What’s Next?

Well, now that my furious schedule of travel has come to an end, I can settle back into normal life and focusing even more intently on running.  I have a few 5k races on the horizon and will be working hard to try to break into the 22’s soon!

With a slightly calmer schedule, I also hope to amp up my blogging volume.  Actually, Wine and Dine (just a month or so away) will mark the “birthday”of this blog so I look forward to running and blogging about that race again!

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Has your racing season gotten off to a strong start?  What are you doing to prepare for some new PRs?