Chasing My Joy

My journey to becoming an Ultra Runner and Ironman

Green Monster

I love making green monsters, if you have never tried one I HIGHLY recommend them. My twist this morning induced instant coffee to give me extra an extra lift:
I make mine by adding:
2 tablespoons ground flax seed meal
1 cup vanilla soy milk
1 banana, the riper the better
1 packet cold brew VIA
2 cups spinach
a splash of vanilla extract

blend for about two minutes then add as much ice as you like I add a tall glass full.

It looks like baby poo but tastes great!

This mornings workout was 2000 yd swim, 200 warm up with 4 by 400 set and 200 cool down. Tonight I have RMTC track practice I think the workout is 8 by 400 sprints with a mile warm up and cool down.

What did you have for breakfast? Happy Tuesday!!!

Week 4 Goals

Week four goals and week three recap: ( I can’t believe it’s almost February!)

  1. try two new recipes this week, and share them
  2. Work on riding in aero position
  3. Make sure to get in all my vitamins everyday
  4. Make a doctors appointment to work on my asthma

Week 3 recap:

  1. Get back on track by following my training plan all week work derailed me for one day but it was an A for effort…..
  2. Really, actually do plank…..really. Some nights.
  3. Track my calories all week to get a baseline try to stay between 1600 and 1800 calories yup, even though it took a lot of time.
  4. Don’t stress at work too much, it’s going to be a draining week but it will pass. Still working on this one.

To start the week of right I tried a new recipe, I got it out of Matt Fitzgerald’s Racing Weight.

Tuna Mac n’ Cheese:


This meal was ok….it was a little bland. I did like that it had a lot of vegetables in it. Not every recipe will be a winner, but I will keep

A good weekend

I can’t believe the weekend is already over, but it was a good one!
On Friday we went to REI and came home with this haul:Love REI!!!

We started Saturday with a difficult 12 mile run over Green Mountain. I took all of this with me:**I didn’t end up eating the GU or LUNA bar but we did have Qudoba after, YUM!

Cory caught some great pictures of me warming up.

Thanks honey for always getting the weirdest pictures of me.

You should know that I take my warm-ups very seriously and I am NOT normal.

The run started out great it was windy and steep but beautiful.

It is a big climb but you are rewarded with great views of Denver and the Front Range at the top. We ran back down the other side with no issues. Soon we were headed back up to our car on a bike path when the wind picked up. It was not fun to spend the last 3 miles struggling up a hill feeling like you are being blown back down, but I was super happy to be done.

We spent the rest of the day eating, taking an ice bath and resting. This morning we headed out early for a 30 mile bike ride. I was so excited to actually be outside on my bike, although I was very cold. We then headed to a friends house to watch the Bears lose to the Packers. I am not really a fan of either team but our friends are from Chicago so we were sad to see them lose.

Now it’s just laundry and getting ready for tomorrow morning. What did you do this weekend?

Week 3 Goals

Week three goals and week two recap:

  1. Get back on track by following my training plan all week
  2. Really, actually do plank…..really.
  3. Track my calories all week to get a baseline try to stay between 1600 and 1800 calories
  4. Don’t stress at work too much, it’s going to be a draining week but it will pass.

Week 2:

  1. Enjoy NYC and try not to lose too much sleep. Check =)
  2. Plank every night (this one hasn’t been going so well so far) Not even once, with the flu it just wasn’t happening
  3. Be present while in all day meetings Yup, I really learned a lot
  4. Pace myself well on Saturday’s race so that I put up a good time (for me) and also not have an asthma attack. Didn’t race =( but Cory took third in his age group, way to go baby!

To work on my new years resolution to learn to cook healthy meals I wanted to share a Salmon cake recipe that Cory came up with. They are seriously good, especially with a big spinach salad.
These are simple, healthy and quick salmon cakes.
Prep Time: 20
Cook Time: 10
Ready In: 30
Yields: 4 servings

INGREDIENTS:
2 6-oz cans salmon, drained well
2 eggs
2 stalks celery (75g), chopped
1/2 small onion (75g), chopped
5g fresh minced garlic
10 drops Worcestershire sauce
2 tbl cold milled flax seed
1/4 tsp salt 1 tsp dried thyme
pepper
50g panko bread crumbs
extra virgin olive oil, divided

DIRECTIONS: In medium sized bowl combine all ingredients up to and including the salt. Mix panko bread crumbs, thyme and pepper in small bowl. Divide the wet mixture into 8 balls and coat with bread crumbs and set aside. Heat oil in non-stick skillet and cook until done, flipping halfway through.

Workout today was 50 minutes on the bike trainer:
No, I didn’t ride in my jeans, with my eyes closed. Cory was trying to position my tri bars, I seriously need a bike fit!

New Tri bars

Even though I am still sick I had a great morning. Cory and I had a leisurely morning, we took advantage of the fact that we didn’t get up early to bike or run and headed out to breakfast at the egg and I. We then headed over to bike village but we got there about a half an hour before they opened. So we had to go to Starbucks to kill time.
After we were done killing time we headed back to Bike Village and bought a pair of clip on aero bars for my bike.I know this isn’t the best solution but I am hoping that I can get through one more season on my road bike with clip-ons then invest in a true tt-bike.My bike on the trainer in my basement, where I hope to spend some time tomorrow. I really suck at using the trainer, it’s hard for me to keep my motivation and cadence up.

Do you use a bike trainer? How do you keep yourself going for hours?

Tomorrow is technically a holiday for me, I had planned on going in to try to catch up after being out last week but I think one more day of rest will make the rest of the week bearable.

Bad Couple of Days

First off thanks to all that wished me luck on today’s race, I am ashamed to say I did not race.

Here’s the story…..on Thursday my meeting in New York finished up with a nice lunch and some free time to walk through the American Museum of Natural History. Around 2pm we walked back to our hotel to grab our bags and meet our car to get to the airport. At the airport I decided to grab a sandwich and some pretzels to have on the flight as dinner. As I waited my stomach started to hurt and cramp a bit. I didn’t think much of it, I figured my body was just sick of being off schedule and not eating what I normally eat.

(Best Cupcake Ever)

As it got closer to boarding time I started to feel nauseous and I started to worry. I got to my window seat in the very back of the plane and thought I would be ok if I just drank my water and didn’t eat anything until I got home. As we were taking off I knew I was in trouble, I will spare you the details but it was the longest four and a half hours of my life. I have not been so happy to get off a plane in my life. I am still not sure if I had food poisoning or a stomach flu but I have no energy and still can’t eat normally.

I was so sad this morning not to be able to race, this is the second time I have had to stand on the sidelines to cheer Cory on at a race that I should have been running. In August I was injured and couldn’t run the Georgetown to Idaho Springs half marathon that both Cory and I had signed up for. It was fun to cheer Cory on but watching people race when I couldn’t just added salt to the wound. Cory encouraged me to stay home and rest but I didn’t want to pass up the chance to support him and see him put up an awesome time.

(35 minute clock time for 5 miles, I am sure that his chip time is even faster)

Hoping to get back to normal quickly!

Have you ever been sidelined from a race? Did you/would you go anyway?

Compression Gear???

Workout: 6 mile tempo run (2 miles at 11 mm, 2 miles at 9mm and 2 miles at 10.5 mm)

Not sure what pace I should run for my 5 mile race on Saturday. I ran a 5k in December in 26 something, first two miles around 8mm and the third mile at 10mm. I suffered an asthma attack in the last mile and really slowed down. For this race I would like to avoid that by not going out too fast. I think I would like to hit between 8:30 and 9mm splits.

As I am packing up to head back to CO tomorrow I laid out my travel clothes including my Zoot compressions socks.

My feet have a tendency to swell when I travel so I got these compression socks to help and they feel good to run in

Don’t ask me what I am doing in this picture, I’m not really sure.

I also have a pair of Smart Wool compression socks:

I like them booth and I am thinking about buying some compression tights.

Do you have compression gear and do you think it helps? Any recommendations for compression tights?

Week 2 goals

Week 2 goals (a day late) and week 1 follow-up:

  1. Enjoy NYC and try not to lose too much sleep.
  2. Plank every night (this one hasn’t been going so well so far)
  3. Be present while in all day meetings
  4. Pace myself well on Saturday’s race so that I put up a good time (for me) and also not have an asthma attack.

As for week one:

1. Start marathon training (YAY!) I am loosely following this plan from Runners world. I have to add in swimming and biking. If anyone knows of a training plan for someone running a marathon in 4 months and a half ironman 2 months after that let me know! Cory and I are finishing up our plan tonight so I will try to post it tomorrow. DONE =)

2. Put away all Christmas decorations and start thinking about how I would like to decorate for the winter (I am thinking warm oranges to combat the chilly winter) Christmas is away, but no other decorating has happened.

3. Catch up at work without freaking out. Didn’t freak out but still working on catching up, while out of the office :/

Overall not bad. What are your goals/focus for the week?

I am off to a fabulous dinner somewhere, not sure where yet. Happy Tuesday!

East Coast Time

Workout today: sitting on my but……all day

I didn’t get into my hotel until after midnight last night after many delays. Here is the room I am staying in:
I was exhausted and fell into bed but couldn’t sleep. So I am taking the day off and resting. Wishing I was still at home so I could read while watching the snow

Instead I will be watching it snow from this window: When I stayed here in September I made sure to run(and get lost) in Central Park. This time I didn’t even bring outdoor workout clothes, It’s just too cold!

Tonight I am off to Kefi, a Greek restaurant, should be good.

Do you like traveling to New York? If so what do you like to do here?

Good bye Colorado, hello New York City!

This morning started out nice a relaxing and spread up from there. I woke up to about three inches of fluffy white snow =)I took my coffee and Racing weight into our hearth room to read and watch the snow fall. Our 8 mile run had to be moved inside because of the snow so off the (VERY packed) gym we went for 82 minuets on the treadmill. We then hurried home for a quick shower and ice bath, helpful but so painful. I didn’t have much time so I raced around trying to pack and ended up with a 48 pound bag, yikes!

I am now sitting in Denver International airport waiting to fly to New York City for a meeting about evaluating Professional Development. This is my exciting reading for the plane:
I will also hopefully have time to read this book:

Hmmmm, do you think the gummy bears are helping me reach my race weight?

Off to the east coast, catch you all on the flip side.

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