We Have a Winner + Self Hosting?

The winner of the Victoria’s Secret $10 gift certificate is…

Congrats Miss Erosion! If you could send me an email  snthierry [at] gmail [dot] com and I can email the gift certificate code!

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I’ve been extremely busy with work, running and SELF HOSTING.

Yes, that is right, the blog is growing up. I have been moving blogger to wordpress and got my own domain etc. I’m doing the whole process by myself and I am very happy to say in one day the majority is all day. I just have to work on making it pretty and transferring the pages. So keep a look out for the move. It should be by tomorrow night or Monday!

In the meantime I saw that Blue Bunny makes FROZEN YOGURT! And I of course had to buy some.

So yummy and you definitely need to give it a try.

I haven’t taken any running pictures but here’s a break down so far:

• Monday: off day
• Tuesday: 4 mile tempo run. 1 mile warmup, 1 mile cooldown.
  Ideal Splits: 7:31 - 7:21 - 7:21 - 7:11
  Splits for tempo: 7:25 - 7:22 - 7:06 - 6:47
• Wednesday: 3 mile run (was supposed to be 6 but I was ill)
• Thursday: 7 mile run
• Friday: 5.5 mile run
  

I’ll have more for you later!!

Q: Did you switch your blog over yourself or pay someone to do it?

Q: Have you tried Blue Bunny’s frozen yogurt?

Oh How I Love Big Brother

So funny story. I headed to the rec center straight from work and I was in the bathroom stall changing in the locker room. I go to pull my sports bra out of my bag and it flies and of course it lands in the toilet. I got upset but had a quick reaction and pulled it out. I also had brought a towel with me so I wrapped it up in there and squeezed it. The toilet was clean water so I wasn’t too worried about it and I put it on. There was no way I was going to go all the way back to the apartment to get a new sports bra.

Some may call it gross, but I call it “keepin’ cool” in this nasty weather we have been having.

6 Miles in 46:30 [7:45 per mile]

Lunch was O Charley’s on the house at work. We also celebrated a birthday and had ice cream cake! It was delicious. Oh how I love working at the job I work at.

I made spaghetti for dinner.

Now onto Wednesday. Tempo workout day.

I set my alarm for 6:30am and continued to press snooze up until 8:00am. I am awesome I know.

Thankfully it was raining and 72 degrees so I didn’t miss out on cool weather. The humidity was gross but hey, can’t complain since it wasn’t 104 degrees out .

Woke up with knee pain again, just walking around kind of hurt. So of course I took no risk and put on my knee strap. I also have been having tailbone pain which is awful.

These were my times for my tempo I was supposed to hit. 7:36 – 7:26 – 7:16

I thought they were a bit slow but I didn’t question it. I hit up the bike path as it is flat and decided to not even bother looking at my watch and just run what felt comfortable.

2 miles total for warm up and cool down together

3 Miles in 21:08 [7:02 per mile]

Splits went: 7:13 - 7:03 - 6:52

The last mile however I stopped with .5 left because I really had to go to the bathroom. So you can judge that one however you please.

I came home and started the recovery process.

Clif came out with new Clif Kid bars and they are like chewy granola bars. Of course I had to try them and I also had a $1.00 coupon which made 6 bars under 3 dollars. Score.

They are delicious and I recommend them if you are looking for something light to eat before or after a workout.

I then packed up my laundry and headed out the door to Jessica’s. She’s such a good friend and is saving me $2.00 a load and letting me do my laundry at her place. How generous.

Then of course it was grocery shopping.

I have three recipes I got ingredients for and then of course just extra items like pasta sauce to have on hand.

Recipes that will be made:

Zucchini and Squash Pasta
Pasta Con Broccoli
Orzo pasta with tomato and spinach

I spent a little under $18 for all this.

I honestly have just been buying what I need at the moment for recipes. I really need the basic staples such as flour, sugar, olive oil, and things like that. Feel free to send some my way if you are feeling generous  

Q: Do you enjoy grocery shopping? I do but I hate crowds and people who think it’s all about them and feel they can take up a whole aisle.

Q: What recipes are you making this week?

Q: Are you watching Big Brother this summer? Big Brother is pretty much my thing. I have watched the Australian Big Brother, the UK Big Brother and the US Big Brother. I would watch the others if they spoke english haha. I highly enjoyed the Australian and UK ones but they are not continuing anymore. So sad. Big Brother US always got their ideas from them and it was always entertaining to watch them mimic the other versions.

Great Comments Make My Day

So as I was looking through the pictures I took I found this one below. I was shocked by my leg muscle. Check it out.

How crazy does that look! We are not talking about my massive quadricep but my tibialis anterior. (This is me practicing my muscles and since my anatomy and physiology is a bit rough since I took that junior year of high school. Now junior year of college I will be in anatomy and physiology 2. Wonderful.)

Well my run was going to be 8 miles because I was planned to work Sunday which is today. It was insanely hot in the morning that I only got in 5 miles.

I hit the pool with my bff and teammate Jessica. She’s going to love me for posting this picture because she says that it looks like she is wearing a white sports bra underneath her swimsuit.

We hit up the pool at our apartment and it was pretty much awesome. We are trying to get rid of our running tan lines from our sports bras. I told Jessica she should probably give up because I don’t think she can get rid of hers haha. Especially when we run everyday in sports bras.

 

I received a wonderful comment a few minutes ago that made me smile!

Whoever you are, you brightened my day. I will be posting more pictures of what I eat! It will just take me a bit to start remembering to photograph before eating which is a hard task.  

But this brings up a really good blog post for me. I also can agree with this reader, that reading bloggers and seeing the food they eat, makes me extremely sad. I just feel bad for them because they think they are being healthy and so good but honestly I think some have more disordered eating than healthy eating. I’m sorry, but eating a big bowl of vegetables as a meal does not make you healthy. But I will talk more about that in an actual post related to that!

Hope all is well out there!!

Q: Do you ever question the food bloggers post?

Q: How hot is it where you are? Today it got to 103 degrees when I got done with work. Running was not in question for me today sadly. That is way too hot.

Q: Don’t you love wonderful comments on your blog? I seriously love every one of my readers! Well the majority. I know some people read my blog, especially visits from fb and then judge me, but that’s their time their wasting, not mine.

Can You See Me Now?

My dad says I need to stop hunching over in my pictures. Example:

So I tried and tried but for some reason I couldn’t position the camera right and this is what I continued to get:

Can you see me now?

So I gave up.

I’ll figure it out some time because I know I can fit, I just need to get the positioning and height of where I put the camera right I guess.

Run: 6 miles (whoops, only did 5) with 3x3xuphill strides (not included in the 6 miles)

We had speed development which was 3 x gradual hill strides at 87% race pace and 3 x steep hill strides at 97%

2.28 Miles in 17:38 [7:44 per mile]

7:26 - 7:42 - 2:29

3 x gradual hills

.10 @ 6:42 pace
.11 @ 7:21 pace
.11 @ 6:44 pace
my second one was slow because I stepped in a hole and hurt my ankle a little

1 Mile in 8:10 [8:10 per mile]

this was pity mileage between my gradual hills and steep hills.

1.8 Miles in 14:15 [7:55 per mile]

7:50 - 6:25

****As I am writing this, I just realized I only ran a little over 5 miles instead of 6. haha FAIL!

After my run I refreshed with a nice glass of chocolate milk.

I also decided to share with you what I wore to work on Thursday because it is a really cute shirt. However, I am sad to say the belt loop in it broke so I’m going to have to get all Martha Stewart up in here and sew it back up.

Also I drank out of my favorite mug ever.

“Tigger is that you?”

I have an obsession with Winnie the Pooh ever since I can remember. Anyway, I am totally seeing the new adventures of winnie the pooh in theatres. Start judging me now.  

Q: Do you enjoy your job? I absolutely LOVE my job and that is wonderful because it’s hard to find a job you really enjoy and don’t mind working 9 hours a day or more.

Q: Who is your favorite character from Winnie the Pooh? Or do you have a sour soul and think Winnie the Pooh is stupid? I love Winnie, he is just so cute. But once Roo came into the picture, Roo became one of my close favorites too. My mother enjoys eeyore, poor guy is always so depressed and just needs a hug. I dislike Rabbit though, seriously, such a downer.

[source]

Just a Little Bit of Race Fun

I have fallen off the face of the planet obviously.

The news:

1. I found a great job.
2. I have moved back to school to live in our apartment and work.
3. The apartment does not have internet.
4. Therefore Sam cannot blog.
5. Hopefully we can get internet set up within the next few days!

I’ll just break down my week’s training real quickly.

• Monday: off day
• Tuesday: 4.75 miles. (15 minute hill workout – 1.75 miles done)
• Wednesday: 6 mile mid week long run in 48:13 @ 8:02 pace
• Thursday: 5 mile run in 40:31 @ 8:06 pace
• Friday: 5 mile run in 40:00 @ 8:00 pace
• Saturday: unscheduled off day. Got home too late from helping clean up our house.
• Sunday: 7 mile long run in 55:30 @ 7:55 pace

 

Yesterday I ran the Macklind Mile for the 4th of July. I ran this race last year and you can see that recap here.

Going into the race, I didn’t even expect to PR since I have only been training for a few weeks and haven’t really done much speed work. But I love this race and it’s a fun time. I did have hopes to break 5:40 but would be content with breaking 5:50 to PR.

I am a long distance girl and only really know how to pace myself for long runs so the mile was a bit hard for me. I held back too much and had a lot left at the end but not another gear to switch to. My second quarter I held back too much thinking I didn’t want to die like last year. Well I’m in better shape than I think.

I ended up with a chip time of 5:41.0 so I was definitely content with that time at this point in the off season!

I finished 3rd in my age group of 20-24 and 11th woman overall out of 302.

After my race I had to do a workout because normally our workouts are tuesday and this week was a 3 mile progressive tempo. However since I raced on Monday, coach told me to just do a 15 minute fartlek after my race.

So after I watched the Elite Wave, Alex ran my fartlek with me. It was 2 minutes on, 1 minute off. So 2 minutes fast and 1 minute slower. If you’ve done a fartlek then you know that you keep this cycle until you’ve reached your time limit.

I was pretty shocked at how fast my on’s were. Especially after just racing. I hit 6:40 pace twice and a 6:45/6:50ish pace for a few others. The rest were at the beginning and around 7:15ish pace. My legs were still a bit jelly at the beginning.

Overall I had a great day! Pretty pumped for cross country, knowing that I am in shape for a 5:41 mile currently. That makes sub 6:30 pace for a 5k sound pretty obtainable. We’ll see though!

Not sure when I will be able to blog again, but I will once I get internet! Promise!

Q: Did you run a 4th of July Race?

Q: If not, what did you do on the 4th?

Raise Your Hand If You’re An Idiot

Let’s see, I am a complete idiot and didn’t put sunscreen on when I went to the pool. Here’s my logic:

1. I’m not sure if we will go to the pool because it’s 70 degrees and no sun.
2. However, if we do go, the sun can still get me through the clouds.
3. How bad could it be though?

4 hours later

This is what I looked like when I went for my run. If you want a better look at the sun burn, just look at my arm above my bracelets.

I was able to get a run in that night before the burn set in too much, but then I had to take 3 days off of running because my feet were completely toasted and swollen and I couldn’t wear shoes.

I feel like a complete idiot and a failure because I missed three days of training and I have a race that I kind of care about a week from today. Awesome.

But good news is that I should be for sure able to run tomorrow which is our first actual workout and it’s hills. I hate hills, but it won’t be too bad because it’s only 15 minutes!

So if you learn anything from me, it’s don’t be an idiot and put on SPF even if it isn’t hot out and sunny.

In case you were curious, the run went decent that night.

5 Miles in 38:29 [7:41 per mile]

7:47
7:34
7:46
7:52
7:29

We also moved stuff into our apartment! I will show you the slow progress hah

It’s all a work in progress and nothing is completely done yet. The kitchen is done for the most part but everything else is still being worked on. Plus we are in desperate need of decorations!

Q: How excited were you when you moved into your first place?

Q: How awful are sunburns? Seriously I used so much aloe vera and medicine and still hurt like no other. Today was the first day I stopped burning an insane amount and I went to the pool thursday.

I’ll Give You Some Tips

This is my “Hi, I think I’m too tall for the camera so I’m going to duck down and while I do that I will stretch out my leg.” pose.

5 Miles in 39:13 [7:50 per mile]

7:51
7:55
7:58
7:46
7:42

Thoughts on the run

1. This breeze is a bit nice.
2. Okay, it’s a bit strong. This is going to be a rough run.
3. It’s extremely humid out here. Of course it would be at 11:30am.
4. AH sorry lady! Didn’t know you were passing on your bike until you were RIGHT next to me. We could’ve both died! lol
5. Hi dogs! Nice to see you too!
6. Oh my goodness it is hard to breathe. I feel out of shape.
7. I have to sit down for a second. My head feels like it’s overheating and I am shaky.
8. SO HOT! This wind is taking every ounce of energy out of me.
9. Time to head back where the wind isn’t against me.
10. Too bad that means I’m going to suffocate with this heat.
11. Yeah, I need to stop and turn into the wind for a second.
12. Worst run ever.
13. I wish I had water.

Yeah, I was deceived by the wind and decided to go for my run at 11:30am. It felt nice with the breeze but it was just a cover. Totally humid and deathly out there.

For some fun, I found some unique ideas for keeping cool on your run! These tips were taken from the article “Stay Cool” by John Hanc on the Runner’s World Website.

Miami Ice: Steve Brookner of the Bikila Athletic Club in Miami came up with this idea while running the marathon leg of Ironman Arizona. "They had thin sponges at each aid station," he says. "So I took one and grabbed a couple of ice cubes." He put the cubes on top of the sponge, then put his hat on over both. As the ice melted into the sponge, it created a cool spot on his head and a nice trickle of water running down his neck.

The Tucson Cold Cap: Randy Accetta, president of the Southern Arizona Roadrunners and a 1996 Olympic Trials marathoner, keeps his head cool in the extreme heat of Tucson with his "cold cap." "I'll soak a baseball cap in water and put it in the fridge for at least 30 minutes or overnight before a morning run," he says. "An old baseball cap retains the moisture longer than the new technical hats."

The Badwater Bandanna: For years, Denise Jones puzzled over the best way to keep the competitors in the Badwater Ultramarathon cool. Finally, Jones--considered the "dean" of Badwater aid-station volunteers--came up with the answer: Lay a bandanna out in a diamond shape. Place a row of ice cubes in a horizontal line, just below one tip of the bandanna. Then roll it up "like a burrito," and tie it around your neck. "We've found that this is the best way to keep runners cool," she says. "It feels wonderful."

Out of all those tips, I would probably try the Badwater Bandana. Mainly because I have so much hair that the idea of wearing a hat in the summer makes me cringe. lol!

I think I might try and provide more tips on the blog than just the boring “this is what I ran and thought today.” Any ideas or things you would like to know?

Q: What do you do to stay cool in the summer?

Q: Have you had to stop during a run before in fear of dying? haha or maybe less dramatic reasons.

Ask me anything, let me know what you want to know more of on the blog! It can be about me, nutrition, running, etc! I’d love to provide more exciting posts for you all!

Time for Speed

5 Miles in 37:45 [7:33 per mile]

7:29
7:22
7:05
2:16 (.3)

speed development: 4 x ins&outs: 50m ascending, 50m at 90%, 50m at descending

cooldown/recovery
8:00
5:30 (.7)

I had a 5 mile run today but it was also the first day we start speed development. Which basically with about 10-15 minutes left of your run you do speed work and then finish your run after.

So I decided to wear my racing flats picture above and ended up owning my first part of my run. Then I hit up the track for my ins & outs and then did recovery.

Thoughts on the run

1. These shoes feel great
2. It’s not too bad outside. The weather is kind of nice.
3. This is my first time ever wearing two sports bras, how funny.
4. Holy cow that reeks. I can’t wait for the day this raccoon goes away.
5. Looks like it might storm.
6. Sprinkler!!
7. Time to head to the track
8. OH I hope the water fountain is on.
9. These ins & outs are fun
10. Guess I should take off my ipod since that thunderstorm is coming my way.
11. Rain would feel good.
12. Time to get another drink and finish up
13. YAY another sprinkler!!
14. Hi whoever is waving to me!
15. Dang my mileage is off, I have to keep running. Bye house, see you shortly.
16. Good timing. It’s getting ready to pour.

 

I probably won’t be blogging tomorrow. If all goes well I am heading to Cape unless this weather doesn’t get better.

Don’t forget to enter the RoadID giveaway!!

Q: Do you like speed training?

Q: What’s your favorite workout?

Q: Do you like running in the rain?