Happy Birthday to Me!

Today is my birthday.

So not a real post, just a quick comment, because I was way too busy eating cake and letting people sing to me and going out to dinner... :-)

This is my fifth birthday in the USA and the first year, I made the mistake that all the new peeps from Germany make. We bring our birthday goodies to work. In Germany, you as the birthday kid are supposed to provide your co-workers with food on your birthday. I have to say, I like the American way much better and that your co-workers make sure, that you have a birthday cake for your big day.

This is a picture from last year. I wasn't fast enough to get a pic from this year's cake.

2009 Race for the Cure Race Report

Results (based on Guntime)
29:00 mins (9:20 min per mile average)
Overall 293/620
Age Group 27/70
Overall Female 129/367


I know, this is a mighty long post for a 5K race report... If you want to read something more epic than a 5K race report, why don't you go back an re-read the report for the Blue Ridge Relay! :-)


Terry got up at 5AM for his long run. He is currently in marathon training and wanted to meet up with the 6AM group at Fleet Feet. Him getting ready woke me up, even though I could at least sleep until 6.30AM. At one point, I actually got back to sleep and when the alarm went off it was really time for me to get cracking. I prepared all my stuff the night before, so I just had to get dressed, throw the final items in the bag and head out of the door. I wanted to be at the venue early, so that I was able to park in the parking garage and I knew they are going to shut down the roads at 7.30AM. Well, either I was a couple of minutes too late or they never allowed parking directly at the ICAR building this time, so I ended up half a mile up the road on the Carolina First parking lot. Now I was WAY early (the race started at 9:20AM). I didn't have my BIB yet and was waiting for my team captain to get there for.... Breakfast time then... Had some sips from my water bottle and two small Luna bars... Checked Facebook and then started reading the magazine that I had the sense to bring along. When my team captain called me, I walked down to the Hubbell parking lot to meet up with him and get my BIB... By then the rain subsided to a drizzle... No complaints from me here... Made the final clothing decision and made my way to the start/ finish area.

The start/ finish was a sea of all shades of pink. There were tons and tons of sponsor booths that handed out goodies like capes, t-shirts, ribbons, cabs, bags and so on and so forth. I walked through the area looking around... Passed the information center and the area where they lined up the survivors separately by how long their cancer has been in remission. It was great to see that there were so many survivors out there, smiling, laughing, hugging their kids and husbands. Some of them later walking the 5K, some of them running it. Wearing their survivor t-shirts with pride. This was their day... They show us, that this disease can be beat. But even more important, that we have to find a cure, that people don't get sick in the first place. I would have liked to collect some of the goodies, but since the car was half a mile away and I didn't have a support crew with me to keep the stuff while I was running, I had to pass...


Of course I visited our good friend porta-john before jogging up and down the millenium ave a little to warm up. When the start was just a couple of minutes away, I walked to the start line and tried to position myself. As usual, I did a pretty crappy job with it and so I spend the first mile slaloming around people... On the other hand, I go out too fast on my races anyways and my first mile has been my fasted of the three this time again, so maybe it was better for me to start in the back.


The race course was a total of six rolling hills and the finish line is on a downhill, which is always nice. Throughout the race, people cheered each other on, the volunteers on the drink station did a great job too. Since the route is out and back, you were passing the people in front/ behind you on the other side of the road. Those races are always a little distracting for me, because I tend to scan the crowd for familiar faces instead of concentrating on my running. Just at the beginning of mile three, my left hamstring started to act up. It has been bothering me all week and all of a sudden it got really bad. Needle in cotton, needle in cotton (-> ChiRunning method) was my mantra over the next couple of minutes and things seem to improve. When I climbed the final hill, I looked at my watch at decided to go all out in order to make it under 29:00 mins. Shortly after I passed my chiropractor, that was walking the course, and she cheered me on, which really gave me another motivation boost. It is nice to hear your name in the crowd! :-) I crossed the finish line and was really pleased with the time that I had on the Garmin (28:21 mins, I said I lined up way in the back once again!)... Right after the finish line the hamstring got even worse, so I just grabbed a cup of water and then walked/ jogged back to the car and then stretched there.

Picture is from GreenvilleOnline.com


This was a good race for me personally and it was amazing to see, how many people do have the fight against cancer close to their hearts. This is good news for all of us, because it drastically increases the chances that there will be a cure soon.

Sunday Afternoon Hike

First things first. I had a good race yesterday, which really surprise me since running wasn't going too well lately. The official race results are not posted yet, but my time and distance according to the Garmin was 28:21 mins over 3.16 miles. That is an 8:58 per mile average and for me, it's pretty good. The race report will follow, when the official results have been published.

After the race I stopped by the Sunshine Cycle Shop to check out the Sale that they are having. Since my birthday is coming up and my parents always want me to get something for it (with their money), I ordered myself a trainer for the bike.... Off season can come now! :-)

Other than those two things, the whole Saturday pretty much was a blur. We have been so busy to get stuff done around the house and there was so much to do... I know, not very glamorous. When we finally headed out to dinner, I didn't even know where the day went. I was in bed sleeping by 9.30 PM last night... My party girl days are definitely over and I don't even miss them!

So today, we finally saw some sunshine after it had been raining for the last couple of days. That just felt great and we wanted to make good use of it. We decided to go for a hike and since we felt adventurous ;-) we didn't choose nearby Paris Mountain State Park, but headed to Jones Gap State Park. Neither Terry nor I have ever visited this park before and we certainly were impressed right away. The facilities from what we saw where in great shape and the trail are very good maintained. The only thing that I thought needed some improvement was the trail map they publish on their official website. That one is pretty much useless. But they had a big trail map right at the visitor center that resembled this one here.

While looking at the trail map, we decided to hike up to Rainbow Falls and if we still have time (shooting for 2 hours of hiking) and felt like it, we could even go to Jones Falls. When we looked at the map, we didn't pay attention to the mileage of the trails. We started out on the Jones Gap Trail and then turn on the Rainbow Falls Trail. It got steeper right away and we still followed that creek that we started out with. As already mentioned, the trails are super duper maintained. It got continuously steeper and we had to climb over boulders and little streams crossing the trails. Over bridges, stone and wood steps and up up up the mountain. After walking for an hour we started to wonder, if this trail is ever going to end anywhere and then we finally heard the water fall. Later we found out that the Rainbow Fall Trail is 1.6 miles one way in addition to the portion that we hiked on the Jones Gap Trail. Good that we are all in shape and had our hiking shoes on... Dinner was well deserved after that one! :-) And no, we went right back to the car after getting down the mountain. Jones Falls have to wait until our next visit.

Here are some pictures for your viewing pleasure! :-)


View from the first bridge we crossed at the beginning of the Jones Gap State Park trail system.


Steps carved out of the stone.


Steps out of stone between to big rocks... Terry and his favorite walking stick look like they are on a mission! :-)


The sprinkles of water felt good after the hike.


The top of Rainbow Falls... This view was worth the whole trip.

What's your Sport?

This week I tried out the Eastside YMCA. I took the cycle class on Monday, Intense Fitness on Tuesday and Body Pump yesterday. Looking at the schedules for the upstate Y's, the Eastside seemed to be the only place that offers early morning (6AM and 5.45AM) classes*. From what I saw this week, it's pretty much the same crowd no matter what class it is and that's nice and easy for the new kid. Almost everyone in yesterday's class was complaining about the same soreness due to the Tuesday class (too many hamstring exercises).... Shared pain is half the pain.

*Correction: Actually, the Caine Halter as well as the Travelers Rest Y do have early morning classes, I just plain oversaw this fact.

As said, it seemed to be pretty much the same folks in those classes, so the instructor welcomed me personally and asked for my name... The instructor on Tuesday introduced herself personally as well after the class... So much friendlyness is almost suspicious... JUST KIDDDING... It's really nice! :-) After yesterday's class, the instructor asked me, what my sport is and I just answered "triathlons", because that pretty much sums up my workout routine these days.

That got me thinking this morning on my way to work... Yes, I did one triathlon in my first season, but does that make it my sport???

I tried out a lot during my school days and was never a complete failure at anything. That even holds true to the time when I started gaining weight. I still was one of the first people to be picked in a school PE team sport setting and actually was sooooooo close to receive a prize at my graduation for my performance in PE, if there wouldn't have been this one semster that I "only" got a B+ instead of A- or better.* There was really not much I didn't at least try for one season. The sport, that I was dedicated to for the longest time was competitive gymnastics. On second place we have several years of handball (the European Handball, not the American handball) and dancing/ ballet. Throw in a season here and there of athletics and table tennis and you start to get the picture.

*Short explanation here: In Germany the last two years (12th and 13th grade) of high school determine your final graduation grades. Those two years are broken up in four semesters. In order to get the PE prize, you have to have an A- or better in each semester.

When I started getting back into shape, the triathlon thing really came very natural and completely unplanned. I always enjoyed to swim and actually swam before I learned how to ride a bike. Same thing when I finally started to bike. In rural Germany as a kid, having a bike was what you needed to get to the community pool, your friend's house, organ lessons etc. The running portion is Terry's "fault". He always told me to get into running, because it will make a huge difference in my weigh loss efforts... And he was right about that. All of a sudden, I had everything together that was needed to do a triathlon and it was the carrot, I was chasing until race day in May of this year. Even though I just ended up doing one tri this season, the tri sports just give me a lot of joy and a variety to my workouts that feels healthy and balanced.... So yes, I am a triathlete and a cyclist and a runner (I really want to love running again!) and a Salsa dancer... But how does all of that fit into a one minute conversation between the end of the early morning class and heading out to start the day? So as of now, I'll stick to triathlon as my sport!

On other news: I heard this morning, that the Gamecocks won a big game last night. I concluded that there will be plenty of donuts in the office and chose to skip breakfast in favor of the donuts. Well, our donuts supplier took the day off, so I didn't have breakfast and didn't have donuts... Fortunately, I always keep granola bars in my desk drawer and had the sense to at least pack some fruit.

Tomorrow is the Race for the Cure at the CU-ICAR campus in Greenville. Why don't you come out there and cheer for the people that will be walking and running the 5K course. Even better, just sign up for it and join the crowd! :-) The online registration is already closed, but you can still sign up in person before the race! Or if you won't be able to make it out there, please donate for this cause... As of now, they are at around 60% of their fundraising goal, every gift is appreciated, no matter how big or small.

Someone Please Explain This To Me!

Lately, I try to keep up with the news again. The Google Reader has been a valuable tool in these efforts. I have several subscriptions of US and German content providers that I can access from any computer with internet connection and my cell phone... Don't you love it?? :-)


Last week I came across a news report on Spiegel.de that said that the U.S. government want to start charging a fee of USD 10.- for tourists entering the U.S. I thought they were kidding at first, especially because this was the first thing, I ever heard about this. I guess, it's just not a topic of interest for U.S. citizens since they won't be charged. So earlier this week I did some research in the German (Spiegel/ Tagesschau) press and none of them sound very happy and I have to agree. This whole thing is a complete joke.


The official name for this joke is "Travel Promotion Act" and the goal is to set up funds in order to promote tourism in the USA. It applies to every tourist that doesn't need a visa for a short term visit which are most European and several other nations if they are participating in the "Visa Waiver Programme".


Can someone explain this logic to me please?? I want to get more tourists into my country, so I let them pay, in order to support the tourism industry in their advertising? ARE YOU KIDDING ME? I understand that the tourism industry suffered over the last year due to the economic downturn, but this is the wrong way to approach the problem. Especially since this fund (public sector) will be controlled by the leaders of the American tourism industry (private sector) and those leaders (e.g. Disney and Marriott) are still busy posting huge profits even in these rough times. You are supposed to make the country more attractive for visitors and not more frustrating. It's already bad enough as it is. Immigration is taking forever because every tourist gets asked the standard questionnaire, finger/ hand prints and photos are taken. I actually have friends and family that tell me, they don't want to be treated like criminals and therefore choose not to visit this country. Adding a fee to these procedures won't make things any better, because it will prompt more people to decide against a trip to the U.S. no matter how many Mickey Mouse commercials they are going to see on TV!


I read this article in the Washington Post by Jim DeMint and I think he nailed the topic as did Ambassador John Bruton from the Delegation of the European Commission to the USA in his statement. I don't have anything else to add. Hopefully some members of the house of representatives will read this and hopefully it's going to influence their decision to not vote for the Travel Promotion Act.


My blog isn't intented to be political, but reading about this just fires me up every time. The U.S. is still the most powerful country in the world, but even this country cannot survive on it's own. Our economy depends on other countries, just as much as they are interlinked with ours. The economic downturn showed that in a very scary way. The Travel Promotion Act gives the promise of supporting the tourism industry with good chances to make things even worse for it... Also, I think the world economy has bigger fish to fry right now and work together rather than to upset each other with ridiculous ideas such as these.

Fighting the Flab

Today is my Dad's birthday! Alles Gute zum Geburtstag, Papa!! :-) As usual over his birthday, he got a couple of his sailing buddies together and they charter a boat for a week in e.g. the Baltic Sea. I called him on the cell phone when it was already afternoon over there and he sounded like he had a good time sightseeing in Flensburg. According to him, the weather still leaves some room for improvement but overall it's okay. Safe sailing!

This is not only my Dad's birthday, but also the first full day of fall and in the Runner's World blog from today, you find tons of reasons, why this is good news for us runners! :-)

But this is not what I wanted to talk about today, because I want to talk about my FLAB!

Like I mentioned previously, I lost a lot of weight in 2008. I did this with a mix of change in nutrition and a lot of exercising... Cardio and strength. That combination is the oldest recipe in the world and I believe the only one that actually works in order to keep the weight off over time. The strength training helps with toning up the body which is especially interesting, if there is a lot of stuff on you that needs toning up and on top of that, added muscle mass means your body has a higher resting metabolic rate. My exercise routine included one hour of strength exercises specifically for sculpting. Of course, you use your muscles and build your muscles during running and cycling as well, but the strength training gives you the opportunity to balance out your muscle mass over the whole body, since you mostly use your lower body to do these sports (nice article on muscular imbalances here).

Over the summer I pretty much slacked off on the strength training and focused mostly on the tri sports and maybe some yoga. Yupp... And now I am paying for it big time! I am trying to re-vamp my exercise routine in order to adapt to the new living location as well as the fact that fall is here and long evening rides are pretty much out of the discussion... Sorry, call me a sissy, but I am just not feeling like riding my bike in the dark. I started out with the Boot Camp Class last Saturday and yesterday I tried out an "Intense Fitness" Class which is basically the same thing with a different name. Well, I wanted to join the early bird run at the Cleveland YMCA this morning, but every time I turned around in bed last night, I woke up, because something was hurting bad. So I reset my alarm to 6AM and slept in. Good choice. Today I don't walk, I waddle... Very attractive indeed. Neither the class on Saturday nor yesterday felt like a hard effort to me. I was able to keep up with the class no problem, but as it turns out, I lost a lot of my muscles and now they are screaming at me. Last year I started out working on 100 consecutive push ups... I never made it to the 100 as I gave up six or seven months into the whole deal, but at the very end of it, I was able to squeeze out over 80. In those classes they make you do push ups too and it's amazing how much I struggle with doing 20 now.... I can do them, but it's tough.

That reminded me of this month's motivational story in Runner's World about Dr. Ed Wolfgram. At 76, he is currently training for the Ironman World Championships in Kona next month. In the article, they quoted him saying:

"You can't put fitness in the bank. You have to maintain it."

Looking at my recent knee issues, I feel like there was an overuse thing going on while I was ramping up my mileage a tad too fast. But talking to my chiropractor, the possibility of muscular imbalance was mentioned over and over again. Seeing, how my body is reacting to strength training, makes me think that there is quite a possibility that exactly this is the case. Believe me, this would be the preferred diagnosis, because it would be a fairly easy fix. Also, I still have some flab to tighten up and therefore I would kill several birds with this stone.

Running feels like hard work for me these days. I hardly get any mileage in. Last week it was a whopping total of 3.79 miles only topped with the 3.88 miles run that I did tonight. The run was fairly good, speed-wise and also my knees held up pretty good, but it still feels like hard work at the moment. I know things come in seasons and right now, this is not the season for running for me... It will get better sooner or later... I will start to love running again... hopefully.

Welcoming Karma Into The Family

Karma (Sanskrit: कर्म kárma (help·info), kárman-

"act, action, performance"[1];

Pali: kamma) in Indian religions is the concept of "action" or "deed", understood as that which causes the entire cycle of cause and effect (i.e., the cycle called aṃsāra) originating in ancient India and treated in Hindu, Jain, Sikh and Buddhist philosophies.[2].

'Karma' is an Eastern religious concept in contradistinction to 'faith' espoused by Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam), which view all human dramas as the will of God as opposed to present - and past - life actions. In Eastern beliefs, the karmic effects of all deeds are viewed as actively shaping past, present, and future experiences. The results or 'fruits' of actions are called karma-phala.[3]

Above you can read the wikipedia definition for "Karma". In our case, Karma is the new dog. She came to our house maybe two months ago. I won't go into the details here, but Terry and I didn't have anything to do with the decision that there will be a dog in our house or the naming process. Despite the circumstances under which she made it in our lives, she is a good dog and whenever she finally gets the "Don't pee or poop in the house!"-rule, she will be a GREAT dog. Of course, she's a mutt... A mix between a lab retriever and a greyhound with the greyhound appearance pushing through mostly. But judge for yourself...

Don't get me wrong, Terry and I love dogs. We both had dogs in the past and know what kind of a responsibility they are. So, when we were presented with our new dog, we both were not happy. It had nothing to do with Karma, since she really is a sweet dog, but with the fact that we got this responsibility delivered without our agreement. If we wanted to have a dog, we would have gotten one... But we wanted to be flexible with our free time activities and be able to just go out of town over the weekend, without having to make arrangements all over the place. Because of that, we decided to try to find a new home for her. The thought of just taking her to the pound didn't sit well with both of us, therefore we asked around if someone wanted a puppy and also put and ad in craig's list.... And nothing happened. Weeks went by and none of our friends, family or co-workers wanting the dog, there was no response to the ad... Until last week.

Sometime last week, I sat in the office in front of the computer checking my e-mails, while Karma was sitting next to me on the floor to keep me company... Finally someone has seen the ad and responded to it, wanted to know, if we still had her. My heart dropped... I looked at the screen, then looked at her... She looked up to me, with her brown eyes, the long eye lashes, her big old floppy ears... Putting her head on my lap... Looking very similar to this:

"CRAP!!!" was my first thought. The ad has been online close to four weeks by then and I really didn't expect a response anymore. I told Terry about it and over the course of a long conversation, we decided to take the bullet and keep Karma along with all the responsibilities that come with a dog... Not looking back anymore at the circumstances under which we gotten here in the first place (this one is very tough for me... I am working on it). Even though she is already in the house for several weeks, I just consider us having a dog, since we made this decision last week. And if there was a piece in my heart left that she didn't win yet before last week, she has it by now... Of course it helps that she made incredible progress when it comes to her house training! :-)

Because we always felt like having her was a temporary situation, we held off on doggy purchases. So last weekend we finally got her a bed and retired the old yoga matt that she used until then. We also set out on a quest to find a used dog house, only to end up building one Sunday night... Well, Terry and kid did the building and I think they did a most fabulous job with it, even if it's not quite done yet. Have a look here...

And that's how Karma entered our family and may it be a good one! :-)