Elizabeth Clor's Blog, page 24

Firecracker 5K: Testing My Limits

Ouch. That was definitely a humbling experience!

This morning I ran my 5th Firecracker 5K in Reston, VA. This race is always brutal with the heat, humidity, and hills. I missed running it last year because I had just come down with mono (or some mono-like virus), and this year I was thankful to be running it. I also missed this race in 2012 because of mono, and in 2013 because of injury, so the most important thing was that I was healthy enough to race. My time in 2014 was 22:54, and in 2...

Twilight Festival Four Miler Race Report

Last night I ran the =PR= Twilight Festival Four Miler. This was my 5th time running this race, I had run it before in 2007 (31:18), 2008 (time unknown), 2015 (30:08), and 2016 (28:36). This race is known for being very hot, and I like it because it's a good mental challenge.

I'd had two weeks of training since the Lawyers Have Heart 5K, with some pretty intense workouts in ridiculously warm weather. I ran a set of 8 x 200m sprint intervals, in which the recovery was long enough to go "all out...

Lawyers Revenge!

In June 2005, I ran my first "big" race: the Lawyers Have Heart 10K in Washington, DC. It was only the weekend before that I had discovered road racing when I participated in a two-mile race at my college reunion. One of my classmates told me about the Lawyers race, so I signed up.

Since then, I had run the race every year through 2012. That's eight consecutive years! But then in 2013, Greg and I went to the beach that week so the streak ended. And I realized I had no desire to start it back u...

5K Training with Geese

Success (or failure) in running is never based on one workout alone. Like notes played on a piano, you need all of them at different times and different intensities to make a rich song. A single note all on it's own does not make a song.
With that disclaimer, this focus of this blog is a single workout that I performed on Thursday. 
The track that Greg and I typically used has been closed for maintenance for over two weeks. They're installing what appears to be a new football field, and it...

Riding the PR Train, Eating PR Cake

I started racing almost exactly 12 years ago. I had been a treadmill runner for years, but I didn't discover racing until my 5-year college reunion in 2005, which had a two-mile race. I was the first female finisher and I had a blast. One of the other runners suggested I run a 10K the following weekend in DC, so I did it and once again loved it. I ran my first half marathon in September of 2005 and my first marathon in May of 2006.

I've been training consistently ever since, with my longest br...

20:17 in 2017

This morning I ran the Semper Fi 5K in Washington, DC.  Over the past six weeks, I've been focused on increasing my speed at shorter distances and this race was one in a series of several that I had signed up for.

I had run this race last year, and even though the weather was miserable, the course itself was flast: flat and fast! In terms of a time goal, I was hoping to shave about 10 seconds off of my 20:38 PR from the GW Parkway Classic three weeks ago. I thought it would be a nice mile...

Boston Bound's Birthday and the Story Behind the Story

Exactly one year ago, I published my first book, Boston Bound . I never expected it would sell so many copies; I simply thought it might be helpful for someone to read so I put it out there.

How It Started
I had wanted to write a book since the age of 10. I was actually quite serious about being the youngest novelist ever. I asked my parents to buy me the Writer's Market book so that I could send my
manuscript around to publishers. As I child, I was a prolific writer. I kept a diary, but I also w...

I Hit The Racing Weather Jackpot

That's right. This morning I, along with about 800 other people, were given the gift of perfect racing weather in Mid-May for the Mother's Day 4-Miler. It was unseasonably cool (50 degrees), there was no wind or rain, and it was mostly sunny with a few clouds.

Greg and I had run this race last year for the first time. We decided to return because the course offered a unique pacing challenge. The first mile features a net incline of 70 feet, and most of the rest of the race is downhill, with a...

Training Update: Springing Ahead

It's been awhile since I posted a training update. My current focus is building speed for shorter distance races. To recap, I set a PR in the 5K in mid-April (20:44), and then beat that PR a week later (20:38). Over the next two months, I plan to run three 5Ks and two 4-mile races. I really enjoy
training for speed, and in many ways it's more challenging than marathon training. The time commitment is less, but the effort level of the workouts is more intense. I'll write more on that idea in a...

GW Parkway Classic 5K: Slower, but "Faster"

This morning I ran the GW Parkway Classic 5K. I had only run this race once in the past back in 2008, when I ran a 23:58. This race also offers a 10-mile race (which is what the event is known for) and I had run that three times, although two of them had been marathon-pace training runs. The 5K is
GW Parkway Classicthe last 5K of the 10-mile course, which runs along the scenic Potomac River.

The GW Parkway Classic is a point-to-point course. Shuttle busses drop runners off at the start line an...