Tuesday's Shenanigans

Today was my daughter's first day of 1st grade. It was weird for me, but I survived ( so did she).

Miles asked about her just about every 10 minutes.

He and I headed ff to the gym for some playtime.

I made up a sort of cardio-weight circuit for myself. It went like this:

step mill intervals 20 mins

upper body circuit ( shoulder press/biceps curls/push ups) 3x10

Elliptical steady state 20 mins

upper body circuit ( upright rows/bent over rows/triceps ext.) 3x10

stair master 10 mins.

lame stretches for 2 minutes.

I decided to skip running club tonight. This seems to be a continuous theme for me lately!

It was really windy out and that would not be good for my allergies/breathing right!?!? I felt I was setting myself up for failure if I attempted to run in the Gail winds. They are bad. Really.

I headed off to spin class instead. It was awesome. The music and fore mat were great. It was a strength class that did not have any given recoveries for the most part. Nice.

My legs are pretty much toast already and it's only Tuesday. Oops.

Weekend Update + Monday.

Saturday~ perfect weather for running. I was able to wear carpi's and a long sleeve shirt. Already! I love that actually.
12 miles. Or 12 miles of torture. The first half mile was straight up- hill (true story). What a way to warm up! I was running with my middle of the pack friends that were going a bit faster than normal ( or was I slower??). It was kind of hard. One of my slower runner friends showed up and we ended up running together. Now that the run is over I wonder how I could have done/felt if I would have stayed with the fast chicks. Makes me upset at the moment, but those hills kind of took my confidence away- real fast. Too late to find out now. It won't help to dwell on that. Did I mention all the hills????
Sunday~ Road biking with my friend. She just got a sweeeeeet road bike for her birthday. I helped her husband conspire to make it a surprise. We went for a nice 12 + mile ride. She is a natural. I was pretty much eating her dust for most of the ride as I was "teaching" her how to shift and attack the hills. She was like a little kid. I think my legs were toast from the day before--although she was super fast regardless of my excuses!
Monday~ Met my friend again and 2 more for 16 miles on the bikes. Where did we ride you ask...well the same dumb hills that I ran on Saturday, of course! The hills were just as bad too. (probably worse! haha) Ugh. Those downhills scare me.....we were all squealing and breaking as we coasted down them too. It was fun to ride with a group. Sadly, the days of having a bike are getting less and less. The owner will probably want his bike back soon. Boooo! It was good while it lasted! I just need to come up with a plan so I can borrow someone elses bike next spring!

Wed-Friday! Spinning mostly- ( no running so far)

Wed-Spin today........26 mins worth of hill climbing.........that is all!
Thurs- Spin today! Ha....I took a class. I also went on the elliptical for about 15 minutes. Tonight was also the first class of an 8 week session of Cardio Sculpt I am teaching. Lots of lunges and other stuff to blast the butt.
Fri-Early morning spin class (repeat of the 6 mins. of hills--what was I thinking?!??!) It was good. I contemplated lifting weights, but was kind of feeling Thursday night's Cardio Sculpt, so I did the elliptical (very easy level intervals) for 30 minutes while I read the new issue of Runner's World. Sometimes my time at the gym is the only way I can read and actually comprehend what I just read.

Too bad I have not put any miles in on the road this week. I was not feeling it and my allergies were sky high and, and, and I suck! :-)
This weekends long run is 12 miles. The high is 63...I cannot wait! Love this weather!!!!!! I sure hope it proves that I was not a total slacker this runing season--and that it was in fact my allergies and the humidity (pleeeease!!!). Wish me luck tomorrow.

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!