The Hills and Victory

No, not the TV show... my Friday evening.

Hubs had a 4:15 colloquium yesterday (Really? Who schedules something for 4:15 on a Friday??) so yesterday evening was a perfect opportunity for me to squeeze in a run.

Due to the weather this week (here and here) I didn't run Wednesday night, and I didn't get to the gym for boot camp Thursday night.  So, I did a little schedule juggling and made Wednesday my rest day.

Thursday night instead of going to the gym for boot camp, I found Jillian Michaels' 6 Week 6 Pack, part 1 on Exercise TV On Demand.

Not saying it wasn't tough, but boot camp is longer, so after I finished the 40 min workout, I threw in some extras like 20 chest push ups (10 on knees, 10 on toes), and 20 tricep push ups (knees), plus a minute and 15 second plank.

Back to Friday-
Since I missed out on my Wednesday speed work, I did it Friday.  Except as per Mr. Higdon, I am subbing in hill workouts in place of some of my regularly scheduled speed work or tempo runs. (My April Half will have some hills).

It was 33 out and snowing, but it wasn't really sticking to the ground and it was kind of pretty.  However, they were HUGE snowflakes, and I took several flakes to the eyeball while running up hill. They were cold on my eye.

From the above-referenced link,

"Hills: Some hill training will help strengthen your quads and build speed. Look for a hill between 200 and 400 meters long. Jog or walk an equal distance between each repeat...You can substitute hill repeats for any of the interval workouts, or even in place of a Tempo Run or two if you want."

Here's what my workout looked like:

{click to enlarge}

As I've mentioned before, I live at the bottom of a hill.  The hill is about .20-.25 miles long (~320-400 meters) There are several parallel streets on the hill for me to choose from.  So I ran up and down the hill, six times.  I ran harder when going up, and took it easy while running back down, or running over to the next street.

I'm not sure if the elevation is that impressive or not, but it's what I've got, and it was way harder than running on a flat road!  I was pretty pleased with how quickly my heart rate recovered on the downhill too.


Saturday-
We were going to meet a friend at a favorite brewery halfway between us.  Turned out our friend wasn't going to be able to make it due to some car problems, but we were already in the car, so we went anyway.

I had the Turkey personal pizza; hubs had the Smoke House burger.  Both were delicious, as their food always is!  Here's the blurry other half of my pizza that I took home with me:

 They always have a fantastic selection of beer:

With our lunch we had the Schwarz Pils and the Dark Lager.

We filled our growlers with the Dark Lager and the Milltown Mild to bring home with us.

Heading North

The verdict from last night's On Demand videos?

Today I'm feeling the effect of Bootylicious Buns 2 the most.  Arms/shoulders a little less, and Abs the least.  I definitely could have done many more crunches in addition to the workout before feeling it.

Wednesday was another long nonstop kind of day at work.  I was all psyched to run once I got home, but while driving home I felt like someone hit me with a tired stick.  I felt like I had to work really really hard to keep my eyes open!  No idea what happened, but I relaxed on the couch a little bit, and ran later.

I had a good 3 mile run though.  I enjoyed checking out the Christmas lights in the neighborhoods behind us and smelling the smell of a fire in the fireplace or a wood-burning stove.  I tried really hard to keep the pace easy and to keep my heart rate down and I think I did a pretty good job, if I say so myself.  No walking needed to keep my HR lower, but I did have to stop a couple times for traffic (only for a few seconds) to cross the road.

Check it out! Avg HR of 158, max 171.  Or, on average 80% of my max HR.  Or based on "zones" an average of zone 3.2. I'm pretty happy with this since I went up and down hills (I would have posted the elevation map too, but it was too busy looking).

I may not be posting so much over the next week as we head further north for Christmas.  It is even colder up there than it is here.  I can say I have adapted to 25-35 degree running finally.  For example, during tonight's run it was 35, but 24 with windchill. Balmy.

NJ forecast:

Further North forecast:

Western NY, A.K.A. ...the North Pole.
Our rule of thumb is that it's typically 10 degrees colder up there than it is here.

Brrr... that paired with the many inches of snow already on the ground.  I am not going to be able to get away with wearing jeans and ballet flats sans socks, like I might here. I need to pull out the boots.  Speaking of that... I need to finish packing still.

We are bringing our skis with us hoping to make it out at least once!  There's a decent mountain nearby (well, small compared to many in the NE, but bigger than anything the Poconos offer).  It's about 45 minutes from where we'll be staying and it's the mountain I learned to ski on.

I'm also hoping I'll be able to get out and run a couple times...To equip me for colder runs, I will be bringing:

• my Nike Brushed Thermal Tights (that's what I am calling them)
• my Marmot Power Stretch half zip fleece

• my Smart Wool PhD running socks
• my Smart Wool glove liners
• Lululemon Brisk Ear warmer (last year's version)

Hopefully I stay warm enough and don't turn into an icicle.

In case I don't post again before this weekend... Merry Christmas!

BareMinerals & an On Demand workout

I like bareMinerals matte foundation and I ran out of the one I purchased nearly a year ago (yes, while it looks expensive it lasts that long! for me, anyway).  I re-ordered some from drugstore.com and with my order came a "10 day sample" of their regular foundation, as well as a travel brush.

This is what came:

I like the tiny container the sample foundation came in.  I think I may be able to refill it once it's empty though, and that would be great for travel! You know, save me 3/4 the space of the regular container.  Yeah, it sounded like a good idea at first, then I realized it doesn't actually save that much space.  It's  not like bringing the tiny foundation would allow me to pack an extra pair of shoes :)  BUT, it could be handy for throwing in a tiny bag/clutch when going out. 

And I didn't expect the travel brush to be so tiny! Not sure how well it will work.  It's kinda cute though.  I just wanted to share.

Today was a crazy, non-stop day at work.  I think I was at my desk for all of 10 minutes, and my back-to-back-nonstop-meetings, etc. resulted in my lunch being a 3pm bagel leftover from a staff breakfast this morning.  Then I ran errands after work and didn't get home until 7.  

So I didn't really feel like heading back outside once I did get home.  It was probably good to take a day off from higher intensity workouts anyway since yesterday was spinning and the day before was a 6.15 mile run.

Today's workout was courtesy of exercise TV OnDemand...

1. Rock Hard Abs? (~10  minutes)

2. Arms with Attitude (~13 minutes)

3. Bootylicious Buns 2 (~11 minutes)

4. a 1-minute plank

I realized during one of the ab moves that where my left leg connects to my hip makes a weird noise while sitting on the floor, sort of reclined, and attempting to raise my leg.  That can't be good... it's not painful, but maybe I need to stretch it or something.  Honestly, I expected more crunches from the Abs session, but maybe I will take that back come tomorrow morning.

Arms with Attitude - I have done before and mentioned it here and here.  I used my 3lb weights as I have no upper body strength.

And it was my first time with Bootylicious Buns.  Lots of squats and some kicks and some jumps that startled the pup who was, of course, napping - 2 feet away from this commotion, but not bothered enough to move.

Tomorrow, I will run.

Gym Membership & Acorn Squash

Monday night I decided I would re-join my gym.  We live pretty close to where I went to grad school, and as an alumnus I can use the gym there (for a fee, of course). It's by semester, and if you join mid-semester they pro-rate the cost.  So I paid $32 to use the gym, including classes, from Monday night through the end of December. 

I tried to hold off as long as possible, with just running outside, but it seems winter is getting close.  While we had crazy 60s temps yesterday, it quickly got cold last night, and now the forecast appears to be a high around 40 and lows at night in the mid 20s.  While I don't love running on the treadmill, I could use a little exercise-excitement in the way of group classes.

After renewing, I went to a one hour spinning class (maybe only about 50 minutes of actual spinning though).  It was my first time spinning since about mid-August, when my last round of gym membership expired.  I was able to keep up alright despite not riding a bike in the last 3 or so weeks either.  Luckily, my legs survived, and they weren't even a little bit sore the next day!


Monday night we finally used up the Acorn Squash that had been sitting on our counter for the last couple weeks.  When I bought it, it was mostly green with a little orange...now it was the other way around.

I preheated the oven to 350.  

Then I halved the squash with a giant knife.

And I scooped out the seeds.  

I put the squash face down on a baking sheet covered in foil (easy clean up).

I left the squash face down for about 30 min, then I carefully flipped them over to see how they were coming along.  The squash "meat" was still too hard when I poked it with a fork.  So it went back in for another 10-15 minutes face up.  I put a tiny bit of water in them so they didn't get too crispy.

When they were fork-tender, I took them out - put in a dollop of cottage cheese, and a handful of almonds (I couldn't decide between the slivered and the whole, so I used some of both).  Voila.

While the squash was in the oven for the half-hour period of time I tried some Yoga On-Demand.  I started off with some 21 Day Yoga Routine ("two dynamic yoga fitness workouts"), and tried to keep up, but stopped it half way through the 21 minute video.  The voice was describing the moves in a low and quiet voice, but speaking very quickly!  That's not good when you're re-introducing yourself to yoga and you can't SEE what's going on because you're looking at the ground.

It reminds me of how the Old Spice guy talks in commercials:

"Look down, back up, where are you? you're on a boat"  Yeah, that's how the first yoga video was, but a softer voice: "Now look down, put your hands on the mat, lift your left leg, look at the ground, bring your leg down, and bring your foot between your hands." Couldn't follow!

I instead found "Yoga for Beginners and Beyond, a 16-minute with a "basic flow sequence" and a "deeper lunar practice." The music was a little funky, but I was able to keep up much easier.

Then when the yoga was over, I tended to my squash, then ate it.

On-Demand Workouts and this week's Long Run

Gigi has posted on her blog how she uses Comcast's On Demand exercise videos.  I did not realize this existed! While I do not have Comcast, I do have Verizon Fios, and much to my excitement, Friday morning I learned Fios has On Demand exercise videos as well.

If you've got Verizon Fios, this is how you can find them: 

Push the OnDemand button--> Browse All--> Free--> Health & Home--> Exercise TV

All kinds of options to choose from-

Friday morning I tried my first On Demand Exercise Video.

I went with 10 minute workouts/AM Standing Abs.  I was a little skeptical of what a 10 minute workout video could do for you.

As you can see from the above description, no equipment was required for this.  I wondered how the heck I was going to work my abs while standing.  Here's a shot of the workout-- I like the countdown timer in the upper left corner.  There is an ad at the bottom of the screen for most of the workout, but what are ya gonna do, it's a free video.

So I did this 10 minute video before going to meet up with a friend for lunch.  After completing it, I felt ok.  But the next morning...Holy Obliques!!  I was sore on my sides from below my rib cage to my pelvic bone.  Clearly it did something!

I bumped up this week's Long Run from Sunday to Saturday.  Nice weather forecasted for both Saturday and Sunday, but I was hoping to maybe join a group run Monday evening - so I thought I'd move up the long run to give me a day off in between.  I left on my run at about 4:45, Temperature was 47-49F.

I wore my Lululemon Brisk LS in faded zap and Run: Zoom crops.

It's a VERY bright top, but I feel very visible in it!

I'm glad I went with the crops because it was cooler out with a little breeze, but I found that at about 2 miles in I had really warmed up and needed to push up my sleeves.  Happy to have that split neck on my top to cool me off too.

My 6 miler was supposed to be at a 12:47 pace.  My splits were as follows:

1: 11:05

2: 12:03 (stopped for traffic to cross the road)

3: 11:22

4: 11:09

5: 11:15

6: 11:19

.18: 13:08 (still running the first .1; walk the last .08)

Total Time: 1:10:38.  Avg Pace: 11:24/Avg Moving Pace: 11:12.  Avg HR: 172.

I brought my mp3 player along for some entertainment and listened the last disc of Chelsea Handler's Are you There Vodka? - the audio version of her book, read by Chelsea Handler herself.  I find that listening to fast music will make me run faster than I mean to.  I experience less of that effect if I'm listening to an audio book while running.  I don't usually bring my mp3 player with me so I can be aware of my surroundings, but I was feeling like a bum  yesterday and needed a little nudge to get out the door.

After my run, I wanted to try more of the 10 minute workouts.  First, I went with Arms with Attitude.  Required hand weights and a stability ball. 

I'm not going to lie.  I'm weak.  I used my 5 lb hand weights, and let's just say that half way through, I wished I had used my 3 lb weights instead... haha.

Next up was the Abs & Back Workout.  No equipment necessary.

This morning I'm feeling these workouts a little bit in my triceps, and a little bit in the muscles between my chest and shoulder, if that makes sense (not sure what those are called).  Some tightness in the stomach, more central/lower abs than obliques.

 [source]

This morning I watched the ING NYC Marathon live on NBC.  I tuned in around 10:45, so maybe half way through the elites.  I was so excited to see Shalane Flanagan do so well in her first marathon; she placed second (2:28:40).  Was hoping last year's winner,  Meb Keflezighi would medal too - he stayed with the pack up through mile 21, and ended up finishing 6th (2:11:30).  It's crazy how fast the elites can run!!

Also cool to see rescued Chilean Miner Edison Peña running the marathon!  He had not yet finished when I wrote this post.

You can check out Runner's World's live blog coverage of the event from this morning here.

Now I'm off to treat myself to a Starbucks Nonfat Cinnamon Dolce Latte with my coupon for a free drink that came int he mail the other day!  Then battle through the Sunday crowd at the grocery store...  Enjoy the rest of your Sunday!

What did you do this weekend?

Do you have any experience with On Demand workout videos?

Did you watch the NYC Marathon?