Healthy Friday Finds and Weekend Plans!

Hello everyone!! Happy Friday! Anyone else super excited for the weekend? I am starting this Friday off with a Healthy Friday finds and then stick around for me to tell you all about my weekend plans (it involves a race… FINALLY). 1. One thing I need to really work on is fueling DURING a workout. It is so important to keep up with the calories you are burning and to make sure you don’t bonk midway through a workout or god forbid, a race. When I was training for marathons, I started to HATE all forms of fuel from GUs to Chomps to some flavors of workout energy bars. Then last weekend, one of my girlfriends and teammates SAVED me during a long workout by introducing me to the above Clif Bars: Berry Pomegranate Chia and the new Nut Filled Clif bars! Boy, are they both game changers!

The Berry Pomegranate Chia Clif bar is less sweet than their other flavors like Toffee, Chocolate Chip, etc. and is easy to take down during a run or a ride. Then the Nut Butter ones well… are just delicious. I’ve only tried the Coconut Almond Butter one so far, but reassured for those of you who do not like coconut: there are some that are filled with peanut butter and one that apparently has a filling that tastes like Nutella!!! I have to get my hands on one of those ASAP. 2. A positive attitude going into a hard workout. How is this a Healthy Friday Find? Because health isn’t just about your physical well being but your mental and emotional. I’ve realized that the more negatively I approach a workout or the more I dread something hard that’s on my training schedule, the worse the workout feels. The above photo was taken during one of our hardest team workouts, Black’s Beach Hill Repeats. 1500 feet of elevation gain while running is definitely no fun. But last weekend, I decided to change my outlook. I was excited to run with the two friends above, I was excited to get back into my training routine, and I was excited to challenge myself again. Was I nervous and scared? Yes, because God knows when the last time I ran 10 miles was before. That day, I ended up cranking out 11 miles, first double digit run since breaking my collarbone. It was so unbelievably hard but at the same time, easy. Weird, I know but I think I was just happy to be doing what I love and it made a world of difference. 3. Continuing the mental Healthy Friday Finds. Having workout buddies that are good for your soul. Besides my teammates, there are two coworkers and friends of mine that I absolutely love running and working out with. One of them is pictured above. We have the best conversations when we run during breaks at work and it makes the time fly by. It’s also perfect for recovery workouts because it reminds me to not overdo it and enjoy spending time with good for your soul people :) Yesterday, we were both changing at the same time to go to different workouts (Thursdays are BT track days) and when we walked out of the bathroom stall, we were accidentally matching. 4. Finding new places to run. There is a canyon near work that I wouldn’t normally run on my own just because I really don’t know what I would do if I came across a sketchy stranger or a sketchy snake… but my coworker and I went on a run there on Monday afternoon. I absolutely love the view from our turnaround point and love finding new places to run!  5. I’ve had some really great salads this week. Also, because it is summer, I’m on a huge salad kick, so expect a lot of leafy greens to end up on the blog. Anyway, back to the above salad. It is from a restaurant in San Diego called the Opera Cafe. Our team at work went there for lunch on Tuesday to say goodbye to one of our coworkers. She is retiring and we wanted to thank her for all she’s done for us and the organization. Salmon and shrimp were a great choice. 6. Told you there were a lot of salads in my life this week, not to mention the ones I’ve been making for lunch. Above salad really hit the spot after track practice last night. Also, if you haven’t tried mango and melons on your salad, you are missing out. Make them your next salad topping as soon as possible!

So my weekend plans. I’m actually extremely nervous. There are fun things planned like babysitting tonight, a bike ride tomorrow and dinner with my roommates, visit to the dog beach, and obviously plenty of quality time with Anthony and Elle. But… I have my first race since April on Sunday. I would feel fine if it was just running, but we are adding biking back into the mix. Thankfully, my coach and I have discussed this is a survival race. Hammer on the run portions of the duathlon and be comfortable on the bike. It will be interesting to see how the last couple months of forced off-season, poor nutrition choices (DONUTS AND ICE CREAM ARE GOOD FOR THE INJURED), and family visiting will play into Sunday. Regardless, I am going to stick to this positive attitude for hard workouts and let you know how it goes ;)

What are you doing this weekend?!

What do you do when you’re nervous for a race? 

Favorite foods now that it’s summer?: Salads and a ridiculous amount of fruit.

A Strong Weekend of Training and Elle’s 1/2 Birthday!

Hello friends! Happy Monday! I hope you all had a wonderful weekend and ready to tackle another new week! I had a great weekend of training and celebrating Elle’s 6 month birthday. Yes, I am that crazy dog mom ;) Saturday morning started off with a duathlon test run for my race this upcoming Sunday. My coach had a brick workout laid out for me that consisted of a run, bike, run. I headed over to Fiesta Island for some quality training time. Saw a couple of teammates who pulled me through the last couple of minutes on the bike and despite the rising heat, the workout went by pretty smoothly. Can you believe how fast this little nugget has grown up?!?! She went from 12 lbs at 11 weeks to almost 35 lbs at 6 months! This girl will be 50 lbs in no time, which makes us excited and a little nervous all at once :)

P.S. Puppy parents: any tips for picky eaters? Elle is a picky eater and while the vet says her growth and weight is normal, I would like to add a little more meat on her bones. She’s a little too lean! The first thing I did when I got home from my workout: cuddled with these two. Elle didn’t seem to mind how sweaty I was and gave me a bunch of kisses. We started off her six month birthday celebration with a lot of love, cuddles, and treats. After running the usual Saturday afternoon errands, Anthony, his best friend, and I headed up to the Encinitas Dog Park for Elle to get some quality time with some new puppy friends! We go to the dog park at least 4-5 times a week near our house, but going up to Encinitas is a real treat for us. The dog park is HUGE, completed paved with side walks and grass patches, and constantly has a bunch of dogs of all sizes playing. Since it generally takes us 20-25 minutes to get up there (even though I use to bike up to Encinitas every weekend), it was definitely a treat to take Elle to this specific dog park for a little birthday celebration. After about an hour and a half there (we could tell Elle was getting wiped out), we stopped by Solana Beach’s Culture Brewing brewery. Another one off the list in our craft beer tour. Also, this coffee IPA is out of this world. I love coffee. I love IPAs. This was the perfect combination, called the El Dorado. Get it on Nitro. You won’t regret it. I spent the rest of my Saturday night cuddling my little sidekick, foam rolling, and watching a bit of 30Rock. It was the perfect end to the day, especially because I had 10+ miles of hill repeats with the team the next morning! Elle got a couple of new toys for her 1/2 birthday and some things she is less excited about (like a new collar and harness)! She got a whale, a new tug of war robe with a chewy rubber center, and the moose from above she is snuggling with. I think she’s already decided which one is her favorite. The next morning started with some lovely hill repeats. Our team does this workout on a crazy mile hill (half a mile down, half a mile up) that has about 1500 feet of elevation gain from top to bottom. Probably one of the workouts you want to do the least, but you know it makes you the strongest. There is also a one mile loop we run a couple of times before doing the hill and depending on what’s on the coach’s schedule, we repeat it a couple of times. These two nuts above that I’m running with? Yeah they are racing IRONMAN BOULDER in two weeks!! I was with them for about 11 miles but they had a 20 miler for the day. After, you know, they already biked 6 hours the day before. So crazy inspirational. And also just crazy!! We had dinner at a friend’s house and they made us their version of thick crust pizza baked in a skillet! The one on the left was a sausage pizza and the one on the right was veggie. Both of them were so ridiculously good. Imagine 3 more plates like the one above and that was my dinner. For dessert, my friend made peach cobbler. Topped with vanilla bean ice cream and it was the best day to end the day. I couldn’t think of better company and food to refuel after a great training weekend!

 

Random Friday Ramblings and 5 Triathlon Training Mistakes I’ve Made

Hi everyone! Happy Friday! TGIF! Fri-Yay! I don’t know why but this has definitely been one of those weeks where I have been counting down to the weekend. It’s been so beautiful outside (although crazy hot) and I’m just ready to spend the weekend biking, running, and being by the pool to cool off. Can’t imagine a better way to spend these summer days :)

At the end of the post, I’m going to share with you all 5 Triathlon Training Mistakes I’ve made. Trust me, they are good and embarrassing, so you’ll want to stick around til the end of the ramblings to hear about them ;) My mom just sent me the photo from above when we all went to the Del Mar Dog Beach last week! This was the very beginning of us trying to get Elle into the water. As you can see, she is clearly NOT having it. Mid-day selfie. Sometimes I wonder what I’m suppose to share with you all after a long day of sitting in my cube. Also, I was having a good hair day. Ladies, you can relate, right? ;)  This salad from Stone Brewery was bomb dot com. A couple girlfriends, Elle, and I went out to the brewery last night for beers, pretzels, and a long overdue catch up session. We all ordered salads for dinner without realizing it. There is something about summers that just make me crave fresh produce.

Not pictured: Eggs that came with the salad that I ended up giving to Elle. I told Anthony he needs to get the back seat from now on. Elle is a much better copilot who doesn’t complain about how I drive at snails pace. Missing the family! It sure would be nice if my mom and sister lived a little closer or on the same coast. The traveling between California and Florida is getting old. Plus, who knew a three hour time difference could make such a difference in communication?!My boss at work as been having a rough couple of weeks. One of her dogs is really old and the vet just delivered some bad news to her and her husband yesterday. Our staff chipped in and created a little goody basket for them and their dogs. Target, you are the real MVP.

As many of you know, I started training for my first triathlon this year. A week before my first race, I decided to go and break my collarbone, which will be a part of the 5 training mistakes I have made. It made me realize the things I was doing wrong, despite having teammates, a coach, and a lot of friends in this sport. There were just trials and errors I had to make on my own to either 1) listen to the advice everyone gives me, specifically my coach, Felipe, and friend, Jason or 2) become a better athlete.

1. Being too competitive right from the start: I am pretty competitive by nature. In a lot of ways, it is good. But as I’ve learned in training and in real life, it can get me into a lot of trouble, like caring more about my times on the bike than safely getting comfortable riding, or how fast I can swim a lap even though I could have terrible form. As I am building up and growing in this sport, I need to put aside my competitiveness and just focus on improving as an athlete.
2. Comparing myself to others: This goes hand in hand with being too competitive. I love training with my team and I’ve made so many great friends through triathlon. But when your friends are Ironmans and Ironwomans or podiuming every weekend, it is pretty easy to get frustrated when you’re still struggling with shifting gears on a new bike. Or if you’re getting dropped on rides or lapped at track. I just have to tell myself everyone started from somewhere and 3-4 years ago, they were in my shoes as well!
3. Wondering why this isn’t coming as easily as running to me: I’m not the fastest runner by any means and it took me awhile to build up the endurance and pace I am able to run now. But something about running just came more easily and naturally to me. It just clicked and I keep thinking that triathlon is going to feel the same. However, even when you read stories of how Jesse Thomas got started in the sport or how Mirinda Carfrae’s swim coach really doubted her ability in the water, you realize that just because one of the three or two of the three sports in triathlon comes easily, doesn’t mean they all will. You have to put in time and hard work. Slowly but surely, the pieces will start to come together!
4. Doing things you aren’t comfortable doing just because everyone else is: Looking back, I really should have waited a little bit longer to get a tri bike and a little bit longer to get into aero bars. I didn’t understand my bike, I didn’t have the confidence or balance, and it really is no wonder that I broke my collarbone. Every ride and every race now will be a huge opportunity to get better at my bike handling skills until I am really ready to start upping the speed and getting faster on the course. Slow and steady wins the race!
5. Putting on your wetsuit inside out: To end on a funny note, I’m sure you all remember THAT debacle. PEOPLE. The really colorful side of your wetsuit: chances are, it is the inside lining and not what the actual color of the wetsuit should be! Also! Find up true to your size. It is suppose to be really, really tight, and suffocating. Otherwise, you’re not doing it right ;)

Any rookie mistakes from a sport you do?