Training and Food

Training:

Saturday’s was as usual Satan’s cross training.  Spin was a lot of climbing – i.e. high tension and staying in the saddle = burning quads and calves.  Cross training was 4 min wall squats (?!), lunges, pushups, abs etc… The bane of these classes (lately) are the low pushups or chatarunga:

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I suck at them and it pisses me off.  Sat, I was actually able to get into the pose but held it for approx 5 seconds.  Of course I kept trying and managing to tweak something in my shoulder…can you get a hernia in your shoulder cap?  ‘Cause that’s what is feels like…

This pain caused some discomfort on Sunday’s 24km run…nothing major but I could still feel it.  It was a sunny day and ONLY –17…like Spring after last week.  :0 

This week’s goals are to try to not beat the crap out of Mama Nature who is bringing more snow and brutal temps to us.  We are supposed to start hills on Thursday ….and I LIKE hill training so if she wrecks it for me…fear my wrath….

Food:

I made some wicked good eats this weekend…

The hubs is still sick so I made him some pho soup a la MamaPea:

I made some changes like grating the carrot, adding lemongrass and fresh chillis to get this sickness out of the hubs.

And last night was Yakisoba:

Both were awesome….as you can see, my preferred cuisine is Thai or Japanese…I love Italian as well but Thai/Japanese are my favs.

What is your fav cuisine?  Are you a pro at the low pushup?

Four for Friday – The Sad and bananas edition

1.  This was a rough week.  We had a close – and very young - family member pass away and the services were this week.  It was a beautiful remembrance of her life but the waves of sadness are overwhelming.  So live your life, hug the ones you love and be excellent to each other - Mkay?

2.  On top of this, the hubs has been sick and I have been valiantly trying to fight off whatever he has…cause I don’t want it.  If ColdFx is a food group, I am meeting my daily recommended quantities.

3.   I had a great run on Tuesday but bailed on last nights….it was a very conscious decision and I don’t feel bad about it.  The dull thud in my head that started at the funeral became a roar so Advill+water was the ticket.  I am looking forward to a nice long run tonight. 

4.  As I have said before, my run group is awesome.  They became even more awesome when our coach brought in the tons of frozen half bananas they had left over from past runs.  What to do with them?  Banana soft serve of course:

Bananas+cashews+a dollop of chocolate?  Perfect post run snack in my professional opinion.

Make it a good weekend my peeps.  You get one life, let’s LIVE it.

Wardrobe for a Long Run…in -28C

Before the fun of Sunday’s run, there was Satan’s Boot camp on Saturday.  It was actually kind of fun…though I did almost barf in spin class.  And after ladder drills mixed in with squats and lunges (and doing all these with your arms out to the side) and push ups and abs I was a quivering mess of muscles but you know..fun still.

On the way to our run clinic Sunday morning, the radio announcer said it was –18 Celsius (-.4F) or –28 Celsius (-18.4F) with the wind chill so in his words:  “It is a day to stay indoors and be careful about going outside”.  I looked at the hubs and said:  “Or go and run 22km!” Whateves……it was sunny out, the roads were relatively clear…so suck it up princess.

It was an ok run…I was dressed well, I had my water under my coat so it didn’t freeze for a changes and my gels didn’t freeze but were more popsicle like.  We have a great run support crew so I had a few people come check on my throughout the run to make sure I was ok….and not popsicle like myself.  There were no land speed records set..just a slow steady 22km run done.

I had great intentions of taking a pic of my chilly self but when I got back to the clinic, I just wanted out of the piles of clothes I had on so here is the (clean) recreation:

Bottom layer:

CEP socks, RoadID, Peak Performance tights, Winter running pants

Top Layer:

Gloves, Hat, neck warmer, Mittens, Pink Peak Performance base layer, Adidas run top with hood, Adidas running jacket…and Body Glide which I smeared all over my face.

All together:

Not pictured:  my water bottles, cell phone and poor salt covered shoes. 

While I was warm, I did feel like this dude the whole time:

Not gonna lie either…I am very excited to see temps like –1celcius for my run Tuesday night…downright balmy!

Four for Friday

1. Mother Nature continues her reign of terror on my running. :) Tuesday was a very weird 9km run – the temp was great out but instead of snow it rained…which meant the roads were snow+ice+rain+giant puddles = a bit scary footing wise. I ran, I walked, I sprinted, I jumped over puddles, I jumped INTO puddles and finally packed it in.

2. The nicer temp on Tuesday let me take these bad boys out for a spin:

Running skirt with sub zero tights – though not this cute skirt…the Canadian site seems to only have all black…still loved it though.

3. Last night’s tempo run was cold but not too bad from a footing perspective. I kept to the ‘main’ side streets and again did some loops in the subdivision near my place. They are seriously going to think I am some loon/stalker lady. I ended up doing 5 threshold repeats- new PB in this training. WooHoo!

4. Tomorrow, Satan’s Cross training is introducing something new apparently:

Oh my clutziness will be in full force tomorrow. I may have to take pics of this!

Happy Friday! Other than Saturday training and a 22km long run on Sunday, we don’t have much else on the go…except cleaning the house before the dust bunnies attack. I saw them gathering forces this morning….

7 things about my weekend

Sophia  was awesome enough to tag me with this:

Since I did something similar to this awhile ago (and apparently can’t think of anything more interesting to say…Here are 7 things from my weekend.

1.  More snow? – bite me already.   My biggest complaint is people who don’t clean all the snow off their cars.  Seriously…..you use more than just your windshield right??

2.  Our Coach Satan was back on Saturday to punish us.  55min unbelievable hard spin class followed by 45 min of boot camp torture made from me being in bed at 8:30 Sat night.  Living the high life my friends…

3.  Yesterday was a 20km long run.  It was a good 15km and a tough 5km.  For the most part, I was able to run on the road as I went out pretty early but the last 5km were on snow covered sidewalks and the kabillion minutes of wall squats and calf raises we did on Saturday turned my legs into concrete by the end. Here’s my new attitude to winter running…Put your hands up in the air and look like a dork:

4.  Having a post run brunch right at your clinic after a cold 20km run is like finding an oasis in the desert – there was coffee, bagels, fruit, cheese, muffins and …

5.  My cinnamon buns.  I was up at 5:30 to actually bake them so they were pretty much oven fresh when we got to enjoy them.    Apparently…everyone liked my buns.

6.  The hubs Patriots lost yesterday.  I could care less.  :)

7.  The more (and harder) I train of late, the more my sleep is wayyyyy off.  I am waking up every ‘morning’ around 1am or so and just toss and turn for at least 90 minutes and then fall back asleep.  When the alarm goes off at 5:30am, this is not a good thing.  I needs me some sleep!

How was your weekend?  Did snow factor into your run, driving or overall plans?

Four for Friday

1. This weekend post long run on Sunday is our clinic brunch. Cause I love my running friends so much, I am making Angela’s Cinnamon rolls…which will come to the clinic right out of the oven. That’s incentive right there to finish a run.

2. Have you ever had a TimTam? We became addicted introduced to them when we went to visit the hubs sister in Aussie-land. Last night, we received a belated Xmas gift from an Aussie friend….6 packs o’ cookies including:

Mint.crisp.timtam. There were 2 consumed (and tracked!)and I may have to had the hubs hide them…

3. Food tracking has continued well thus far - I am also saving a bunch of cashola as I have been bringing all snack/lunches etc. as it is easier to track what is actually going into my gob as well as how many calories I have left etc. I don’t necessarily feel any different but we will see if the scale says anything different when I weigh in tomorrow. One thing I was surprised to see is that I am eating the exact amount of protein I should be daily. I always thought I was way under but nope..who knew?

4. Though I am trying to lean out (as opposed to thinking in terms of losing weight) and am getting a bit frustrated with it, I often forget how far as I have come…I found this little gem from some old photos the hubs had scanned:

Forget couch potato… I look like I ate the couch.

~ this weekend is Satan’'s bootcamp tomorrow and a 20km run on Sunday. We are supposed to get another dumping of snow (!?!) so there may be some forced smiles yet again.

Are you embracing “Snow running?”

A day with a bunch of Ones

Today’s Date: 11/1/11 – the little things make me happy and distracted.

Saturday saw the return of Satan’s bootcamp. 50 spin class + 45 min of pushups, skipping, lunges, bicycle abs, reverse crunches, planks, fast feet and a million wall squats. This coupled with Friday’s sports massage made for a very rough 18km run on Sunday. Winter snow continued its buggering up of my runs by dumping a crap load of snow on us on Saturday. By the time I started running at 8am Sunday, there were some streets/sidewalks cleared off but it still made footing unpleasant. I oscillated between being on the road, on the sidewalk and then across the street on the other sidewalk…it was slippery and snowy. I did make a concerted effort to salvage the run – at around 10km I just said that I could be miserable or just put a smile on your stupid face and deal with it. So I did.

Mind you, it was a forced smile but whatever – no one is making me do this so suck it up, deal with the weather and put one foot in front of the other. Since quitting the gym last year, I don't have access to a treadmill so I just have to deal with the weather. I can't control it...though one day I will....

Since snow was threatening to interfere with today’s speed work, I did it this morning…..at 4:30am. It wasn’t bad actually though I am sure I scared the hell out of the lady walking her dog while I was in the middle of one of my repeats barrelling down the middle of the road..she either thought: “robber” or “Ninja”.

I hope it was Ninja.

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Four for Friday

1. The hubs and I never really got a great pic of us together from New Year’s…this is the best I could find:

…and I found this one. There was wine involved that night so leave me alone.

2. Winter running beat me up this week. Tuesday was a Zone5 run (2 min FAST pickups) but it was really slippery and tough to keep balance. Thursday night was a tempo run that was full of slipping and sliding from the snow. It was coming sideways at some point. The hubs took a pic of me when I got in. Notice the white/water on my face? That’s all snow…

This morning's run was no better. I finally found a condo subdivision where everything was plowed so did loops around it for another 4km. The people living there must have wondered what the F I was doing...

3. I followed through and tracked my food this week. It was actually easier than I thought and while my diet is pretty good…when you factor exercise in, I am averaging 300 calories less than what I should be having. I am just going to keep at this for awhile and see what happens. I feel good right now but know I will need those calories and marathon training ramps up.

4. My pain/issues with my upper back flared up again so I was back in for another sports massage this morning…it seriously kicked the crap out of me. I am exhausted from it and again realized that I need to do this once a month as there was soreness in a lot of places today.

Happy Friday and thus weekend!!

Bring it 2011….

I was hoping to start this latest training/racing session with a great race photo from the Boxing Day 10 miler – I knew where the camera guy was so I smiled by butt off….

…and got a pic of one arm and 1% of my torso and quad. Such is my life in run photos.

2010 went out with a bang and an awesome dinner with friends at our fav restaurant…and a ride home at 2am…and sleeping in on Jan 1.  But one day of rest/recovery was followed with a great 16km run on Sunday.  It was cold but not freezing and I truly enjoyed the entire run. 

I am officially registered for my 2011 Winter/Spring races and am very excited to really focus on training again.  The 2011 plan is:

Peak Performance Chilly 1/2 Marathon

NYC Half Marathon – wooHoo!  All 7 of us who entered got in and I am very excited for this race – I could care less about my time as this is all about the fun with friends and N.Y.C!

Around the Bay 30km

Pittsburgh Marathon

I am not a resolution maker – never have been.  I think if you are going to do something…do it.  Don’t wait until tomorrow or Monday..or Jan 1 to do it..just do it.  (yes Nike..I could be your poster girl)  I am going to focus this training session on getting leaner and the biggest part of this is going to do some serious tracking of food – specifically portions – over the next month to see if/what needs tweaking.

I hate tracking food….I’ll check in on Friday to see if I even made it through 4 days….