Race Day Spin......

Monday- Today was Race Day in Spin class. I always tell the participants to take it easy on Sunday and to give it their all on Monday race day. I never follow that advice myself. Until this time! What a difference! I usually workout on Sunday and possibly run a few miles before Spin on Monday. Well, this time I took Sunday off and slept in ( well 7:30 AM) on Monday morning. I did not plan either of those event, but it happens.
This may have been one of my best performances at a race day yet. Close to it. I was able to push myself to the brink and back! My heart rate was high and steady at times and I was able to take it even higher from there. That usually does not happen too often for me. My Garmin says that my avg. heart rate was 153-- that's included in the warm up and cool down AND the 7 minutes after class that I forgot to shut my watch off. So I wonder what it really was....most likely higher than 153 bpm.
Also different this time was the actual ride. I had more flats then hill climbs and I made a point to tell my class that. I think that mentally for non bikers ( not me anymore!!) it's hard to really push yourself on the flat road when you are used to recovering here. Not the case today. My class was rockin' it today!
Today started a new 8 week session for Totally Toned. I have a a bunch of new faces in class. I did the whole workout today too! haha..so there is 1 full body weight workout for me.
Let's see class consisted of the following exercises-- we did a lot of reps with light weights, pulses and so on.

Plie squats (and regular squats)
lat raises (and front raises)
lunges (and more lunges!)
Leg lift series ( lots)
Abs ( about 200 ish)
stretching

I hope I did not scare the new peeps away!

Grand Rapids Mud Run Race Recap

1.Running the course (I have pink on!)

2. After the race.

3- Losing my shoe!

Let me say that this was possible my toughest 5k ever. I would also like to say that is was by far the most FUN I have ever had in a race--any distance!

The turnout was HUGE!!! My bib number are 1416 and I saw a bib number in the 1900's...( I would check the web site but it has been down due to over capacity!)

Ok-- so the race was very organized. I was surprised. The Team racers started at 8:00 am, the competitive 5k was at 9:00 am and the "for fun" runners and walkers were at 10: am. The cool and smart thing ( besides the start times), was they let about 100 runners go at a time 1 minute apart. Very smart!

I was in the 9 am group and in wave 3. The first obstacle was a slide ( garbage bags with dish soap squirted all over it!) it was fast and kind of hard on the butt! Or was the huge dirt pile first?? I might have those flip flopped.

After that there were a few small mud patches that were not bad at all. This is where I forget what order the obstacles came in-- so these might be out of order, but that's ok.

Running though tires Army style baby! There were a lot of tires too!!

Big Mud Pit (aka Swamp Fever)-- deep, soft suction cup mud. I lost a shoe and sock. I found the shoe (whew) after a minute or 2 and was off and running with mud up to my knees. Next up were a few barriers to hop over-- not too taxing, but still- I had to hop over something during a 5k- NOT NORMAL!

Tall climbing structures to climb up x4! Ugh. (Jericho's Walls).

Tunnel to crawl through (cuts and bruises on my knees and elbows to prove it!) 3 slippery mud hills with a nice dirt bath at the bottom of each hill(lovely) My least favorite obstacle of the event was this dirty water trench that you had to crawl though while a net was over you. Claustrophobia at it's best! I ate lots of water here--kind of like swimming (which is why I just say NO to the triathlon!) I am sure I left out something ( Kristy?? ). But the most fun thing was that I just explained 1 lap! Yep, imagine repeating all of this again. That's exactly what I had to do!!!

It was so much fun though and I cannot wait to do it next year. My buddies and I are going to be on a team next year with costumes! haha! We saw lots of people decked out.

Wonder Woman in a full costume and make up and wig! A dude in a Snuggie. A team of men in short short short (yuck) jean cut offs and half shirts. We also saw 2 ladies with bike helmets with water proof cameras attached!

All in all, this was awesome and I am glad I was able to participate!

*Check out the Grand Rapids Mud Run FB page and take a look at all the pictures!

Spin class and a Mud Run ( It's Friday!!)

What a week this has been! It's not over yet!
Today I taught spin. I took it easy and pretty much warmed up for 15 minutes before I could give it some power. It ended up being a pretty decent workout for myself and the class too! I had a few new faces at 5:30 AM and they like it ( so they said).

Tomorrow is the Mud Run. I am kind of excited and kind of afraid. It's going to be hard that is for certain. A 5k is hard without the added mud and stuff. It's going to be hard! I am too competitive to take it easy on purpose. It's going to be interesting for sure. I picked up my race packet tonight and the line was wrapped around the building! There is a map and a legend included in the packet/ Some of the obstacle names are funny/scary/interesting to say the least. Just to name a few: Drum Line, Tube Top, Pre Lube, Swamp Fever ( my 6 yr. olds favorite) and Trursch's toilet.
Ummm. Yep.
I am hoping somebody will get pics, but no promises. I do promise my best to have fun though! It will be a riot!

10 mile and a spin class. I have had better ideas before.

Still sore. Even more so now.
I was up all ready to run today!! I set out at 5:45 AM with big goals. I met the biggest one. I got in 10 miles! Not at the paces that I wanted, but hey. Whatev.
My warm up was about 9:30 ish pace. Which I am OK with even though when I run the warm up with my friends at running group it's about an 8:30 pace. I have issues with pushing myself apparently. That's dumb.
So anyways. I was going to maybe do a 6 mile tempo. Although I am not certain what my actual tempo for a 1/2 marathon really is. I thought maybe I would do an 8:00 -8:15 pace. Not so much. I think I made it to 8:45 ish for the first 3 miles and then I stopped to drink. I ran close to home so I could stop by and drink up. My next 3 miles started out pretty good. 8:30 ish for a bit and then it went downhill. I was pooped. I finished my "tempo", and then started the cool down- yeah I made more of a walk/run! It was mostly a run, but whateva. I got my 10 in!

So then since I am super smart I decided to go to my friends spin class. Not because I thought I needed to go. My main reason was because I told her I would go and I want to support her-she's a newer instructor. Ugh. I basically used it as a recovery ride...I had to work way too hard to keep my heart rate up and I was not up for that..so I kept it low. What a waste! I could have been in yoga or home not sleeping on the couch! Oh well. Lesson learned??
That was my Thursday!

Wednesday--ouchie

Just as suspected I was pretty sore this morning. Must be from the over 200 squats I did yesterday. Yup.

Spin today. It was an interval class....first interval set was 9 minutes....set #2 was 6 minutes...set # was 3 minutes....set # 4 was 2:15 and the last set was about 6:30 seconds..I forget. There was a minute of recovery between sets though. It was a tough one today folks!

After that I had big plans of extra cardio ( not sure why) and some weights. I did the extra cardio for about 10 minutes. It was on the elliptical and I was talking the whole time to my friend-- very little resistance. I also talked to her as she lifted weights. I lifted nothing.
Nighty night.
**I have plans for 10 miles in the morning all by myself. Wish me luck.

Turbo Fire Giveaway-- worth $600!!

Head on over to Little Ya Ya's for the details. What an amazing prize!! Lots of stuff....check it out...CLICK HERE!!!

Tuesday- Excessive much???

I started my early morning with a nice speed workout on the track. I did a 2 mile warm up. It was literally dark thirty in the morning. I have a cool little red flashing light that I am diggin' these days.
After the warm up I headed to the track for my 200 meter sprints with a 200 meter jog between all 12 of em' Yikes. It was kind of hard to do by myself but I survived!
The time I was shooting for was 50 seconds, but after the first one I did in 40 seconds, I changed my time to 40-45 seconds! I am happy to say that 50 seconds was just too easy! Yay and finally! After that I did a 2 mile cool down. I am loving this weather--I have a suspicion that that is the reason that I felt so good. My breathing was not a problem at all today.

After that I taught Cardio Scuplt ( not until 4:15 PM). I recently won a DVD on Huff and Buff blog. I borrowed some of this DVD's exercises. It was crazy! Squats galore today. If I had to guess we did no less than 250 squats in class today. That's a lot.
Sooo, after that I had the bright idea of going to the gym and taking a Spin class, but spin does not start until 6:00 pm so I had to do something in the meantime. I got on the elliptical for 20 minutes and then to spin. It was a fun interval class that I gave all I had. Not much. I did leave a nice pool of sweat under my bike though ( don' worry, I cleaned it up). Gross.

It was about 1.5 hours after spin that my day started to catch up with me. I am not looking forward to how my butt and legs are going to feel tomorrow! ( well, kind of--it's a good hurt).
Today was rather excessive in terms of exercising and I do not do this that often--just when the feeling hits or time allows!