2 month Check In, Y'all

Alright! No clue where to start, so I'm just going to dive right in. No time for smooth transitions here.. Let's start with the sad state of my current lack of tri training.. Not much to say about it. I guess the mild taste of moderate success at the last sprint tri was too much to take? My bike keeps looking longingly at me every time I pass it by on my way to hop in my car and head out to crossfit. My swim gear sits 'on deck' in my back seat.. you know.. just in case I should swing by a pool some time and want to swim.. Hasn't happened, but you always want to be prepared. Even my running has taken a nose dive these past couple of weeks. I was training my run pretty well there for a while as we worked up to our half marathon, which took place a couple weeks ago.. But now it's cold. And dark. And folks tend to frown upon pushing a baby in a jogging stroller when it's freezing out.. (I don't make the rules, friends, but I do occasionally try to abide by them) My plan is to start running a couple days a week by myself at night when Matt gets home.. So far? Let's just say I haven't been super successful in that plan. And by 'super successful' I mean 'giant failure'. Let me rewind a bit.. So things were plugging along.. Crossfit every morning, do about 2 or 3 short runs with Miles in the stroller during the week, Crossfit most saturday mornings, then long run on sunday to get ready for the half. The long runs were going great and holding 8-8:30's was feeling easier and easier.. Matt's running was going well, too, and he was claiming the same average paces for his runs, too.. So all was going as planned! Finally it was race day.. like I said.. couple weeks ago.. It went very well. Matt and I ran along, side by side, through the streets of Baltimore all morning (dreams do come true, folks.. yes, they do..). Matt seemed to be feeling just as good as I was feeling, so I just kept on pushing the pace Juuuuuust a bit. Up until we reached mile 10, which was the longest training run we had done, all was well. After mile 10? Well, we'll just say Matt wasn't quite feeling that 'adrenaline rush' that ol Hal Higdon promised him and he was a little peeved.. His/our goal was to come in under 2 hours, and that was clearly going to happen. I had, I guess, secretly planned to come in closer to an hour fifty.. or under.. And with the first 10mi going so well, I was trying to push Matt along those last 3 miles and get us to finish strong! Matt..was happy to just finish at that point, which is totally understandable, as this was his FIRST half marathon! So.. long story short.. We made it. 1:55-ish. I'm proud of Matt for making this goal for himself and making it happen. I'm even more excited that he really enjoyed it (maybe not those last 3 miles, but he's willing to move on from that..so I think we should, too) and is planning more half marathons in the future.. which is really what it's all about. So. That was that! After the race we had brief thoughts of hopping right back on the half mary train and doing the Monumental half here in Indy. But right around the time that we needed to make that decision, I was picked up by the struggle bus over at crossfit.. Just felt super tired, low energy, and weak.. Not a good combo when you're trying to pick up heavy things. I figured my body was trying to tell me to chill out and pick something to focus on for a bit. We are also starting a heavier cycle at crossfit and building up toward the 'open', so it's kind of time to work on my goals there and run (or tri train?) when it works, but cut out the extra things if they are wearing me down. So here we are. Successful couple sprint tri's this summer. Success on the fall half mary with my husband. Now ready to focus on making improvements in Crossfit. How's crossfit been going, you ask? How thoughtful of you! It's been great (aside from those few days.. it was 3.. 3 days. But who's counting..). Right before I picked up the sunday run mileage, I participated in a competition as a part of a 2 person team. I was paired up with a gal from another gym. My coach coaches her and thought we might make a good team.. so he set us up. I was nervous because she is quite a bit stronger than I am, but I guess that's what you want in a partner, yes? So that was the 'Fall Brawl' held at our gym back in.. August? No. September? Yes. That's right. So we had that competition and it was great. Lots of fun. Great workouts. We did well and wound up in second place.. First loser, you say? That's not very nice.. We gave it our best and I was happy with how it all went. Since then we kept on keepin on. Just finished up a 16wk cycle, so we had another 're-test' week. Started off with a 'plop', since that was one of those three days I mentioned before that we shall not mention again. Don't worry.. I figured out what was likely my problem (the extra long running, my lack of appetite and subsequent lack of eating, my missed nap times.. yes, nap time.. when I had some extra trainings and seminars to attend, the fact that everyone has bad days some times and I just need to get over it, already..), had a better rest of the week and then re-tried my monday's testing that sunday and improved. So no huge PR's this time.. Current maxes are: Clean and Jerk: 160#, Snatch: 130#, squat: 210#, Front squat: (a still wimpy) 175#. I reckon that's all I have to say about that. I did my 'Level 1 CrossFit Trainer' course, so am fit to train others. Hopefully I can pick up some hours at the gym, but we have to work it out with when I'm available. We're going to try a mid-day, bring Miles approach.. I'm not saying it's a fool-proof plan, but it's the best I have right now, so wish us luck! Speaking of Miles (how's that for transitions).. He's a walking, dancing, goofball of a boy these days. He started walking about a week or 2 after he turned one. After 13mo of super-crap sleeping and a whole heap of shenanigans that we employed to put him to sleep.. we finally stepped up and 'super-nannied' him and he's doing SO GREAT now! What's 'super-nannied' mean? If you have kids, you've probably watched the show.. And if you watch the show and pay attention to how she advises sucker parents like us on how to teach their kids to self soothe and go to bed like they should.. you know what I'm talking about. We should have done it a long time ago and everyone is better for it.. So that's been a good thing. Mason is still learning so much in school. I'm always amazed at how well he can read, write.. all those things you know they are going to learn in kindergarten, but it is so cool to see it happen.. and so quickly! He's doing 'Ninja Gym' now, which is at a gymnastics place, but more geared toward boys and obstacle coarse type things.. He loves it. He also enjoys doing CrossFit Kids. I know what you're thinking.. She's making her son work out! Not true.. I promise I don't make him go.. He only goes when he wants. Anyway. I think we're all caught up? Good Talk.

PR's all over the Place

So last week was 're-test' week at JoCo, meaning it's time to see how all of our work with the strength program is going. I'd say it's going well! I didn't get any huge new numbers, but after the snatch PR the previous week, I was able to squeak my numbers in everything else up just a little bit more, too! Again.. nothing huge, but I think after 8 weeks of work, we're on the right track. My 'high bar back squat' went from 185# to 195#, the clean moved a tiny bit from 150# to 155#.Jerk went from 150# to 160#. Snatch (previous week) went from 115# to 125# (this week I just matched that, couldn't quite get 130#, but it's SO close!). Front squat went from 160#-170#. I'll take it! It was actually nice to have this re-test week leading in to the 'Go Girl' Sprint Triathlon because it was a relatively light week and made for kind of a 'taper'. As I mentioned before, my goal for this month was to try to train to go 'faster' at the same distance/sprint triathlon that I did in July. What did I do to try to make this happen? Well.. I swam more..not that it helped much, but I tried! By the time the race came around, I was feeling more comfortable in the water and almost felt like my old self out there.. slower.. but at least I felt like my form was returning and I would be efficient and confident in the water. Well. Let's just get right to the race recap, shall we? My swim..was not good. I felt OK, but I just couldn't seem to get a free spot in the water to actually get into a groove with my swim. The whole thing felt like a battle and it's not usually like that for me. I'm not sure why this was, except that I was likely surrounded by a bunch of similarly abled female swimmers, so we were all just kind of bunching along together instead of breaking free of each other. Oh, well. I didn't compare the two races side by side (I should do that..hold on..). Here's my Go Girl results..:11:38( 61),1:11.3( 19),29:30.3 (20.3 mph/6),1:30.6 (71),:21:14.9 (07:05.0/4), 1:05:05.0. Here's my July results:11:24.1(154),1:26.9 (115),:29:29.3 (20.3 mph/ 80),1:53.0 (242),:22:57.8 (07:39.3/83), 1:07:11.1. So.. verdict? My swim was slower! Not much, but still.. I guess I knew that was coming. Darn it. 11:38 this time and 11:24 in July. Both, by the way, are laughably slow. I went a touch faster in transition from swim to bike, though not much. I had further to run out of the lake to my bike this time.. Not much change. My bike was identical! But felt harder this time.. I remember feeling like I was flying on the bike in July. This month I held the same average pace (20.3 mph), but man.. there were times I sure worked hard for that! At least my extra 'perceived' effort on the bike this race didn't effect my run.. That really was where I made up all my time and I have NO idea how that happened. Again, my transition from bike to run was a touch faster this month than in July, but not much.. 1:53 last time vs 1:30 this time. Move it, would ya? But my run went from 22:57 last month with a 7:40 min/mi avg to 21:14 this time with a 7:05 min/mi avg! Overall, my final times went from 1:07:11 to 1:05:05. A two minute improvement over a short time in a short race is OK by me. I didn't really improve where I thought I might, so there's that.. But I guess I can't complain. Over the past month, to train.. I mentioned getting in the pool more.. some good that did! I changed my wednesday ride to a spin and run.. I guess that probably helped with my run pace off the bike, so that was a good switch. I still did my usual crossfit every morning during the week and most saturdays. I continued with my sunday ride and runs, but we did a couple that were more 'speed' and 'interval' type workouts.. Again. Probably helped me with my run off the bike. Over all. It was fun to have a specific goal to train for and focus on in regards to triathlon training. As we come up on the closing of the outdoor pool.. I'm not sure where I will go with continuing to swim. I don't think completely stopping would be a good idea.. but it's so hard to want to get in a crowded, hot, indoor pool.. So we'll see. I was surprised by how hard the bike felt, but then how good I felt in the run. I have no idea why the bike felt hard. I guess that's to be expected, though, when you push hard for 10mi. My main goal, aside from beating my July time, was to 'make it hurt'.. Done and done, there! Compared to the run in July where I had to really talk myself in to pushing my pace and trying to pass people, this time I felt great, like I could keep the pace I was at for a while, and it was really fun to look up ahead to see a girl and to focus on reeling her in and, eventually, making the pass and feeling strong while I did it! Seeing as my next race on the agenda is a half marathon in October, I guess it's a good time to be doing well with running. So I'll be building my run distances on my sunday runs. This weekend is an exciting one.. First, saturday is a olympic lifting clinic with a hall of famer! I'm looking forward to having him break down my lifts and..just maybe I can improve a bit more! Good thing I got those new lifting shoes and knee sleeves.. looking pretty fierce these days. Sunday.. Miles turns ONE!! And is getting baptised! And my parents and Matt's mom and sister will be here to celebrate with us! And hopefully some friends, too!! So it should be fun. Lots of fun. Miles is really starting to look like he might want to walk soon. He actually took a step today (don't tell Matt.. he might be bummed to miss it..), but is looking more and more interested in the whole thing, so we'll see! Oh. I forgot to mention that I wound up 5th overall in the race and 1st in my age group.. So.. I don't know.. It was fun!

Southside Throwdown

Alright! So a little late, but wanted to recap the throwdown/friendly competition at our gym two weekends ago none-the-less.. So here goes. Our gym, JoCo CrossFit, came up with a plan to have a friendly competition with a local southside crossfit gym..southsiders stick together! Their gym, Sworn, opened up not too long ago and it's fairly close by, so I think our owner figured some friendly camraderie and competition to welcome them and get to know some of them would be a good thing.. and I agree! The whole day, all the workouts, the whole thing was a blast. I've only been to one other crossfit competition, which was Regionals, so I think the bar was set pretty high as far as my expectations go.. and they did NOT disappoint (not that I ever thought they might). All other competitions I might attend in the future have big shoes to fill, for sure. Kind of like with triathlon, once you've been to a high quality race put on by Ironman and now Rev 3, it's hard for the smaller races to live up to that. But anyway, the gym was cleaned and ready for some working out. So many fellow JoCo members opted to volunteer instead of compete which was really amazing of them.. to give up their day to help out..and they were awesome. Run like a tight ship, for sure. (wait.. is there such a thing as a 'tight ship'? did I mix euphomisms or something? Did I just make up the word 'euphomism'.. moving on). We started off with a fast and dirty 6 minute workout at the Farmer's Market.. and this would be my lowest ranking of the whole day.. I don't have any excuses, the other gals just moved quicker than I did. It was a triplet of ascending reps.. 3's the 1st round, 6's, 9's, etc.. with burpees jumping on to a weight (I think this is where I was slow), then kettle bell swings (relatively light at 36#), and abmats (sit-ups). I tried to move quickly.. but I must have looked slow because a fellow crossfitter reminded me "Sara, this is a sprint".. yes, yes.. this IS my sprint.. but, thanks. Anyway, I never looked at the rankings through the day..it WAS a friendly, fun competition, yes? But glancing through the list the following monday, I see I ranked 4th on this one. Well. Moving on. The next workout was one that folks seemed to think I might do alright at.. a run! a 2.5mi run. That may not seem like much to..well..anyone that runs.. But for crossfitters who prefer their run distances to be listed in meters or feet, 2.5mi was some folks' everest.. which is the great part about crossfit and competitions! Everyone has things they might be 'better' at, but everyone also will get a chance to test their limits on challenges that are a little less comfortable to them. I suppose I did my job on the run. Turns out I got 1st in that one! I even beat the boys, which never hurts. Maybe (spoiler alert) that run gave me the confidence to push my run in the upcoming sprint tri I had.. I don't know. But it was fun and went well. Next workout was a clean and jerk ladder and this was, by far, the most fun to compete in and to watch everyone else! You could really cheer everyone else on and it got exciting to see people push hard at the end of the ladder, whether it was a new PR (some got their first cleans and or jerks at a new weight during the competition!) or pushing hard to get the most lifts done at the heaviest weight (if you could clean and jerk the heaviest weight, you wanted to get as many reps as you could in that last minute..did that make any sense?)I wound up tied for 2nd in this one with a couple other gals. I got through the ladder and then managed 6 clean and jerks at 125# in the last minute.. I was aiming for 5 or more, so.. Done! The last workout was kind of Fran-esque with a twist.. It was 21,15,9 of wallballs and pull-ups, but the twist was you had to do 50 double unders after each round (so 21 wallballs, 21 pull-ups, 50 double unders.. then 15..etc.)All went OK for me, except I couldn't quite make it through the 50 double unders without getting tripped up a bit in each round.. Nothing too terrible, luckily, but not flawless.. So I came in 2nd in that one, too. The added bonus of placing in the top 2 females from our gym was that we were then going to have an extra, final workout with the top 2 males/2 females from each gym competing on a team in one last throwdown. It was a chipper with 50 calorie row, 40 overhead squats (65#), 30 toes to bar, 20 over the box jumps, then 10 wall climbs (start in a push up position with your feet touching the wall (chest to the ground), then push up and walk your feet up the wall until you are in a handstand against the wall, then walk back down.. repeat). Marcie (my partner) and I split the work 50/50 and got through it pretty quickly, passed it on to our guys and they did their work (I think also split 50/50). JoCo team wound up winning that contest, so we took home the prize for this throwdown.. but I don't think it was about that at all. It was a great day, lots of fun, really well put-together and executed by those working and volunteering, and a nice way to meet some more crossfitters in the area. So everybody wins! My favorite part was having my boys come cheer me on. Mason was mostly interested in playing with the other kids that were there, but Matt and Miles were there watching and Miles was clapping and smiling..especially through the clean/jerk ladder! It's always fun having them around and I think Matt got a little more of an idea of what it is I do at the gym all the time. He only got to see a little bit of regionals and he's always supportive, regardless of his understanding of what I do, but it's nice to get to show him what I enjoy. Good Stuff!

Compression socked my way to a PR!

This week has been pretty rough on the ol' legs. Lots of squats. Lots. I've stuck with my usual 'run it off' plan, and it hasn't gone super well. Let's recap a bit.. This week started off with the usual strength stuff at crossfit, but going ever so slightly heavier, which you start to feel after so many reps. But it was going well. I actually have felt really good about my lifts lately and feel like the 'program' is doing what it's designed to do.. so that's a good thing! The workout on monday was a nice little triplet of double unders (jump rope), GHD's (sit-ups bending way back off of a 'glute-hamstring developer' thing.. I think most often used for back extentions), and box jumps. It went well, though I messed up and used the wrong box height.. but oh, well. Tuesday's workout was the beginning of the end for my poor legs. We had lots and lots of squatting to do in the workout. I'll even write it out here, just for future reference.. The workout was: 30 squats (135#) 30 CTB (chest to bar) pullups 30 front squats (115#) 30 HSPU (handstand pushups) 30 overhead squats (95#..this was kind of big for me! these used to give me major issues, so I've come a long way with a lot of work) 30 ring dips After this day.. OUCH!!! from my entire legs and also from my triceps. I mean, my legs hurt to touch. I'd try to roll them out on the foam roller, but it would hurt SO bad. I ran later that day. Just a short run, but it was kind of a death march. I also swam that evening..the reason for the swim was a mixture of wanting to enjoy the outdoor pool a bit more before it's closed, another attempt to shake out the soreness in my legs, and needing to continue to swim to get ready for the next tri.. Again.. kind of a death march..but at least the pool was enjoyable! I also swam on monday and am planning to swim again after teaching gymnastics tonight (thurs), so 3 whole swims this week! Never mind that each swim is only about 30min long.. that used to be laughable, but now seems super adequate! Anyway, so my legs were pretty mad at me after tuesday and wednesday wasn't exactly going to provide me any relief. The lifting stuff on tap for tuesday was pretty tame, but the workout included Muscle Ups (MU's.. yay!) and weighted pistols (single leg squats holding a 35# kettle bell). It was 10,8,6,4,2 reps of each.. so 30 MU's in a workout again! No misses this time.. starting to feel fairly good about those, though they can always use work.. for example.. starting to string them together and/or using non-false-grip (that probably means nothing to most, but I can't think of a way to explain it, so I'll just let it be..). So. My point is.. my legs weren't going to get any less sore by doing weighted pistols. YIKES. And to add to the fun, I had a spin and run waiting for me that evening. I enjoy the spin and run, so wasn't going to bail, but I knew going in that it may not be a set up for the best workout ever..and I was right. I spun, but it didn't feel like I was working as hard as usual.. I think my body was involuntarily holding itself back.. somehow.. Same thing for the run. I think we held a fairly honest pace, but definitely couldn't push at. all. I rolled and stretched some more..and then I reached for the big guns.. my good ol' surgical compression thigh high tights.. And guess what.. I feel significantly better today! I mean a LOT better. Probably should have ice bathed and compression tighted tuesday night, but better late than never, I guess. So today, we had a relatively easy going strength session.. mostly power snatch and cleans (meaning no full squat needed.. legs likey!), though we did have some squats.. Then the workout was a mix of rowing and progressively heavier snatches. I asked coach what he wanted me to go for, as far as the weights for the workout, and he had a doozie for me.. How 'bout you build up to a PR at the end of the workout?! OooooKaaay.. Actually.. As I mentioned, I've been feeling pretty good with my lifts, so I felt pretty confident about the workout and was excited to take it on.. new PR's are always fun. So started off.. nice, smooth rowing; nice, easy lifts.. knocked out all the snatches at the 85/95/105 and 115# weights, which 115# was actually my previous PR.. But the 115# snatches went up nice and easy and I was feeling good! The workout was a little something like this: 500m row 5 snatches (85#) 400m row 4 snatches (95#) 300m row 3 snatches (105#..things are going well..) 200m row 2 snatches (115#..still nailing it.. don't get too excited..) 100m row 1 snatch (125#.. first attempt I only managed a 'high pull', which isn't even close. Next attempt I went for it, got under the bar, but not quite enough. Had a couple more of those.. getting closer.. With the help of coach Mike and encouragement from a few others in the gym.. up it went!! PR!! Felt good. Really good.. So, yay!) So that's where we are now. Basking in the glow of a new snatch PR.. which isn't so 'glowy' when you try to explain it to your 5 yr old.. "mommy picked up a heavier thing today at the gym!".. "oh..that's cool".. The words were right, but the enthusiasm was lacking. This may end up being an expensive PR because my 'purchase finger' has been hovering over the 'buy now' button on some spankin new lifting shoes for a few days now.. I don't know how much longer I can hold out and this excitement over the lift might be just the push I needed.. Tomorrow is a 'rest day' of sorts.. Might work on a skill or 2 at the gym, but no lifting session or workout planned. I'll probably get another easy stroller run in.. the weather has been so perfect for running this week.. gotta get out to enjoy! Hopefully it will feel a little better than the other 2 runs this week.. Saturday we have a friendly competition at our gym and I'm excited for it! A whole day of workouts..not much better than that! I'm still also attempting to get faster at biking and running.. I guess we'll see how that's been working out for me in about a week at the next sprint tri.. Ooof. Still looking forward to it. Just not sure how much faster I can go. In family stuff.. Mason is loving kindergarten and seems to be doing really well there. He mostly loves the bus. And lunch. And recess. But I can tell he's learning a lot already, too. And he's staying out of trouble.. at least while he's in school!.. Home is another story.. though I think it's getting a little better. He's just been exhausted and trying to adjust to the new schedule, which, lucky for us, tends to mean more fits at night.. But we're getting there. Miles.. is Miles.. Smiling. Crawling. He's been pushing his push toys around more and more.. some times on feet.. sometimes on knees. Just a few weeks from the big #1!! So that's about all that is happening around here! Good stuff.

Like falling in Love again..

I did a sprint tri today!! I don't know what it is about triathlon, but MAN did I have fun out there. It hurt. Oh, yes. It hurt. But I felt strong throughout the race and as soon as I made the turn to head down to the finish, I couldn't stop beaming! It was just so.. FUN. I hadn't pushed myself like that to try to go fast in soooooo long. After a couple years of being a 'distance snob', and then going straight into all easy workouts through pregnancy.. and then I got swept up by crossfit fun.. It had just been a long time since I had embraced the pain and joy of a short race. Well color me in love. I can't wait to do it again! As in.. I could go do another one right now.. or maybe tomorrow.. OK. Maybe I'll wait a month. But I definitely had fun and am looking forward to my next chance to push myself out there and to try to go a liiiiittle bit faster. In the sprints, it's tough to make up much ground. But I have some ideas on where I can improve. First and probably the easiest would be to remember how to not transition like a boob. I forgot to put 'zip' (or whatever they're called.. the bungie thingies) laces in my shoes, so I just loosely knotted them and crammed my foot in there.. not the most efficient way to put on a shoe. Other than that, I think just remembering what I'm doing, in general, and I could move a little faster in there. Also, I waited until race morning to sign up (turns out I'm a big baby these days and I didn't want to race in the rain.. All week they were calling for storms all through friday night and saturday, so I held out. Guess what? beautiful race day morning. Yay!), so I had a high start number. This race has you 'self seed' yourself based on your swim ability, as it is a 'time trial' type start (one at a time, leaving probably 2-5 seconds apart? spreads things out better than a mass start, but can get crazy if you mix slow swimmers in with faster swimmers). Luckily, I didn't have to start way back with my number because they actually prefer that you adjust your start place based on your ability, but I still had to rack my bike according to my number. 'Why is this a big deal?', you ask? Good question.. Didn't think it would be a big deal, myself.. until it came time for me to come in off the bike.. Everyone has to follow the same direction, so everyone ends up going the same distance.. BUT. If you have a rack far away from where you dismount.. let's just say it's the longest, goofiest run you'll ever take. Trying to guide your bike and clinking along on your bike shoes (I'm not cool enough to do the 'leave your bike shoes on the pedals when you dismount'. Even with as many races and as many years as I've been doing this thing, I still haven't mastered that skill. In fairness, I only tried once.. but that one attempt was traumatic enough, so I just keep doing what I do. It's just a few seconds I'm not willing to lose my life over!).. it felt like it took forever. So. For the next race, maybe I'll try to pre-register so I can have a lower number and not have to do that long, clinking, wobbling run of shame. Anyway. So there's lots of room for improvement in the transition (I actually haven't even looked at my splits, so I have no idea how long my transitions were.. maybe I should do that before I go on and on about my race). Just checked out the actual results.. ouch. Here goes: 11:24.1 (154), 01:26.9 (115), 0:29:29.3 (20.3 mph/ 80), 01:53.0 (242), 0:22:57.8 (07:39.3/ 83), 1:07:11.1. Translation? Slllllloooooowww swim. But I knew that was coming. Sighting back to the beach was pretty rough, and that time also includes a little bit of a run. Almost a minute and a half in transition? Good lord. That is ridiculous for a sprint. Maybe an IM, that would be great! But a sprint.. move it, lady?! Just under 30 minutes for the 10mi ride, so just over 20mph.. I'm pretty content with that. I pushed pretty hard for most of that ride and feel good about it. As I mentioned, I haven't done that for a long time, so room to improve, but I'm happy with how I did today. TWO MINUTES??!! Told ya it was a long, goofy run to my spot after the bike.. Well. Upside there, should be no problem to improve on that one?! then a 7:40 avg pace for the 3mi run. I told myself I'd be happy with anything close to or under an 8min/mi pace.. so there it is! I felt good. I noticed I did a lot of 'self motivating talk' on this run.. Very cheesy, but I guess it worked. I just kept telling myself not to let up, to hold the pace I was at and to stay strong. I even started some sort of chant.. something about 'light on your feet. fast turnover. lean forward. use your arms'. I don't even know what I was talking about, but I kept repeating that any time I felt myself start to let up or slow down. I also, and guys, I never do this.. I even started to strategize passing people?! I'm very much a 'race your race' kind of gal, so this was a new one. Maybe I just needed to divert my focus from the developing side stitch? But I actually, at one point as I was closing in on a gal, thought to myself.. should I pass now, or wait until later? She's probably going to chase you down if you pass now.. Who am I? Well, I just passed..and I'm pretty sure she didn't chase.. Oh, well. It was going to be very dramatic in my mind. I did, however, come up on another gal right toward the end and was able to out-kick her to the finish. She came in just a bit behind me and I offered up a friendly 'good job', to which she ignored and walked away.. Oh, well. It was fun. Honestly. I had a great time. I had no expectations coming in, which was nice. I even forgot to wear a watch, so I had NO clue how things were going, other than a vague idea that I was doing alright..based on what..I have no idea. But it seemed like things were going ok for me, so I just went with it. Overall, I wound up with a 2nd place in my age group..which means basicall nothing, but..hey! 2nd place! Woo! The boys all came out to cheer me on and Mason looked like he was having fun watching mama like the good ol days.. He's such a big boy now, though! As we speak, he is off on a 'man-date' with his daddy at the movies. We had a pep-talk about how 'they are just silly monsters, not scary' (they're at Monsters University, or whatever), but 'if you get scared, you can just close your eyes'. He hasn't ever made it through a movie at the theaters before.. We have only tried twice, but it hasn't gone well.. So here's hoping this one is successful! So that was my race. I'm planning to do the same race again in about a month.. maybe I'll work my speed a bit more on the bike and run.. I'm not sure how much I can improve my swim in such a short time, but I'm thinking actually getting in the pool a time or two between now and then might be a good place to start (I went to college.. I know smart things like that). Crossfit stuff has gone well this week. We went a bit lighter, since our fearless leader was on vacation. Still did all the lifts and about the same quantity, but just more focus on good form with lighter weights (60, 65, 70% of our 1 rep maxes.. not way off what we normally would do, but just a slight bit lighter.. probably so we don't do anything stupid while coach is away. He went to college, too..so smart). Probably the most notable workout, for me anyway, was doing the 30 muscle ups on one workout. That has always seemed like a 'something I can't do' kind of thing.. just so many, it seemed like I would lose my arms before I could get through all 30. But the workout broke it up.. 15 muscle ups (MU's), 1mi run, then 15 more MU's..and I did it! I actually only missed one MU attempt the whole time and that was because I was talking mid MU..not a good plan for success.. So I felt pretty good about that day. Of coarse there was plenty of 'knock you back down off your high horse' moments, too.. like the other MU workout of the week (I think I already wrote about that one), or that time I tried to do an L-sit.. Well, I think that about wraps it up. Tomorrow I plan to do an easy ride and run..and hopefully get in to the gym for some kind of fun. Matt and I are officially kicking off half marathon training??!! Matt has always said he has 'no interest' in longer races, but I guess he's caught the bug, so I'm going with it! We are planning to run the Baltimore half marathon together in October.. wish us luck!!

Back so soon??

Is it possible I have more to say already? Well. I'm trying to make this a regular thing.. Just humor me. So I know you're wondering..did you do your core exercises yesterday? Yes, I did! A 5 minute L-sit..because what better way to improve on your L-sit than to..L-sit!? Exactly. In other exciting news from yesterday, I broke out the ol bike trainer and hooked the boys up to the back of my mt bike! Last time I used that was last summer when I was pregnant and, somehow, riding that up to pick Mason up from school when it was too hot to think about walking made perfect sense. And by 'pregnant', I'm talking, like 9mo super pregnant.. Like, my son's teacher still talks about it.. "I couldn't believe you were out there pulling him around on your bike.." yeah, yeah.. We all know I'm a little nuts. It's ok. At least Mason thinks I'm cool..most of the time. Miles, on the other hand, does not seem to be so sure. He often looks at me with this mix of confusion and concern. Can't say that's the first time I've seen that look..probably won't be the last.. But anyway. It was fun. Miles was smiling and Mason was PSYCHED. I think it was his dream come true. He was jumping around, fist pumping..just beaming when he saw he was going to get to ride in the "chariot" with his baby bro. So. Go us! Good times. It was hot, though. I was dripping sweat just getting the tires all pumped and the thing hooked up. I'm sure I looked awesome picking Mason up. I don't think I'm ever going to be one of those moms you see all put together picking their kids up from where ever.. I'll probably always be sweaty and embarrassing. At least I'm getting them used to it from a young age, right? You're welcome, boys.. Alright, then. So my workout today.. Strength was a little lighter, as far as quantity, but a good time to think about good form. Went a little something like: power snatch: 3 at 75#, 3 at 80#, and 3 sets of 3 at 85#. Then power clean and jerk: 3 at 90#, 3 at 100#, and 3 sets of 3 at 105#. I did some weighted back extensions with a 25# wt, just for good measure.. Have I mentioned I have no core? A core is a good thing to have when picking up heavy things.. So I'm working on it! The workout was fast and furious.. 2 min max effort(ME) calorie row (it's a setting on the rowing machine..instead of distance, it tells you how many calories you 'burn'), I am not great on the rower, so I got 33 calories. Next I got a WHOLE minute to rest before starting a 4min AMRAP (as many reps/rounds as possible) of 24" box jumps(10), and toes to bar(TTB)(15). I got through 3 rounds + 5 box jumps. I was then supposed to rest another minute, but I sometimes miss these things when I read the workout, so I just went right in to my next 4min AMRAP, which was 10 Burpees and 15 wall balls with a 20# ball (women usually are given a 14# ball).. I only got through 2 rounds + 5 Burpees on that one. Then back to the rower for 2 more minutes..30 calories that time. Done with that! Last, but not least.. 50 handstand pushups (HSPU). That took me 5:15 to complete.. We had to alternate 'strict' and 'kipping'.. I won't bore any non- crossfitters that may ever stumble across this with the details of what that means. Overall. The workout went well. I didn't do any other workout today, other than my 6min of planking.. Usually I try to do something..either swim, bike, or run..but Mason didn't have swim lessons (which I usually swim laps during) today and it was super hot, so didn't want to take the boys out for anything..so we'll call it a taper for that sprint race I'm most likely doing this sat? Not much else for today.. Taught a gymnastics class..that's about it! AND. That's all I have to say about that.

Life..lately..

Oh, how I have let my reader down.. Well, I'm making another attempt at getting back to blogging. I really do like to write.. and since I'm terrible with taking pics and forget about any video documentation of anything.. so this is kind of my only shot at keeping any sort of track of things. So. I'll try to be succinct in recapping the last couple months.. maybe I'll do separate posts to catch up.. let's not get ahead of ourselves, though. First thing worth noting, I suppose.. Running! Or the lack thereof.. I still run. Yes, I do. I ran the Hospital Hill Half with my sister back on the 1st of June and it was actually much more successful in a 'that didn't feel like death' kind of way. I pretty much backed off my whole 'advanced running plan' thing, which included hills and speedwork and such, when training for CrossFit Regionals kicked off. It was just too much and, if I've learned anything over these past few years, if you really want to do well in something, you need to focus on it.. So since I wanted to do well at regionals and it was going to require a new level of commitment to picking up heavy things, I decided I couldn't also focus on getting faster. My new plan was to maintain distance to keep up endurance, but not really worry about improving speed right now. I've kept up running, but just short stroller runs during the week and then, while I was maintaining distance for the half, a long run sunday mornings. You know what only running slow does to your pace? You guessed it! But it was fun to run with Abby. I let her determine the pace and we chatted comfortably the whole time. It was a beautiful day and I still, for some reason, love that darn, hilly coarse and will most likely do it again next year. Abby wanted to start super slow and easy and aim to pick up the pace later and that's just what we did. We steadily picked up pace throughout the run, but kept feeling good. We finished just over 2 hours.. and that was that! It was nice to finish the distance feeling so good and left me feeling optimistic about my endurance life again.. though since then, I've been shorter and shorter on my endurance stuff.. Now I'm aiming for a sprint tri or two before summer is up. Actually the first one, if I bite the bullet and sign up, already!, is this saturday! I've been getting about 1-2 rides in a week and 1-2 swims, along with continuing the usual running, except subbing part of the 'long run sunday' for a brick (usually run 5-6mi, ride 20mi, then a short 1-2mi run). So I think that's all I have to say about my run and tri stuff. Hopefully I'll check in and let ya know how my illustrious sprint tri career goes! I can tell you this.. it is going. to. hurt. Of this, I am certain. BUT. I'm no stranger to a little discomfort.. hopefully I'll remember how to go hard out there! Now.. CrossFit stuff. So Regionals has come and gone. It was a lot of fun and a great experience, for sure. The training for it was fairly intense, as there was a lot to improve on in a short amount of time. I could go on and on about the training, because it is very fun and new and exciting to me, but perhaps another time. Basically, the Cliff's Notes goes a little something like.. squat, snatch, clean and jerk daily, then a workout that will push your limits daily.. repeat. I loved it!! I really love the olympic lifts and it is a lot of fun to increase my max lifts, usually simply by improving technique. The workouts that our coach came up with for us were often more like 'skill work for time' for me, especially when it would include several lifts all at what had recently been my 1 rep max (ie: 10+ hang cleans at 135#..which was my 1 rep max prior to that day.. Just FYI, now my 1 Rep Max for the Clean is 150#.. See what a little pushing the limits and regular training can do?..and still so much room for improvement..have I mentioned I enjoy this stuff?), but it was always fun and exciting for me to take on something that I maybe previously would have backed away from, but, with the 'if this is at Regionals, you can't scale it' mentality.. I just had to figure out a way to get it done. So we trained like that for the weeks leading up to the announcement of the workouts, then the real fun started! We tested some things out and then were assigned the workout that gave us the best chance for the best outcome.. and then we practiced those workouts like crazy until the big day! Again, that part was fun, too, because we had a specific goal in mind and knew exactly which skills we needed to work on. For example, there was a workout with rope climbs and squat cleans at 135#.. that 135# barbell became my best bud for the next couple weeks. My workout was deadlifts and box jumps.. so I picked up heavy things (AND put them down) and jumped on boxes many, many times. So how did it go? Well.. it went.. OK. Like I said, it was a great experience and I hope to go again next year.. I even hope to do some more competitions leading up to regionals this year.. But I had a few rookie mistakes, which, I suppose by nature of myself being a 'rookie', was bound to happen. Things started off strong and I hit a PR for my 3 rep max Overhead Squat.. so I had that going for me.. Then we did our 'burpee muscle up' workout and had no misses and everyone was feeling good! Then.. the next mornings' workout.. I don't even really want to talk about it. Silly mistakes that I have no excuse for, so there's not much to say.. I kept missing the wallball target. I have no idea why. Never had a problem with it before. Haven't had a problem with it since. Just an off day, I guess.. Everything else, for me, in that workout was fine, but the frustration of the wallball/target debacle kind of bummed me out. Later that day was my deadlift/box jump workout.. Again, another silly mistake. I had to switch out the weights after my partner went and, for some reason, the weights on one side were STUCK. So annoying. Finally got 'em off and did my workout just as planned.. almost caught a gal or two, but the damage had been done. On the plus side, we made the time cap, which when we first started practicing, was a concern.. All in all, aside from the sticky weights, that workout went as well as it could have. The last day started off kind of exciting when our team got first in their heat and, I think, 2nd overall for that workout. All we had left was one more with the whole team.. and it was one that we knew wasn't exactly our best.. the rope/cleans. I think we all did our parts as planned, so we were able to finish feeling good.. but also hungry to train hard and come back even stronger for next year! Which is where we are now.. I've decided to really dedicate this next year/season/whatever to CrossFit and really see where I can get with a full, solid years training. We've kicked off a 'competition' style training cycle.. whatever that means.. It's similar to what we did for regionals training (so see above Cliff's notes explaination), but a little less 'sped up', since we have more time to build.. The workouts and strength is still all very fun and exciting, so I'm having a good time with it! Maybe I'll start posting the workouts and results, since I don't keep a training notebook.. I don't know what it is with me, but I've never been good at keeping logs or calendars, etc.. So maybe I'll just document it here? It's my blog.. I guess I can write about whatever I want.. Kids, you ask? SUPER LOUD at the moment.. Mason is, at least.. He's "playing rock n' roll", you see.. He'll start kindergarten in just a couple weeks.. turned 5 a couple weeks ago.. His party was at the Indians game, which he was excited about. Then we finally took him to Chicago.. kid has been talking about Chicago for months now! So we went to the aquarium and then to the White Sox/Orioles game (yay!). We only made it to about the 3rd inning..it was cold?! He got to see warm-ups and got a ball and snacks.. all the important things. After the game, we set off to continue our journey out to vacation-land USA. Not sure where that is?? Iowa.. obviously! We went to Clear Lake, which is actually a nice, cute little Iowa town and had a lovely time visiting some family friends who were celebrating their wedding. So that was a nice little trip. Miles is 10 months and crawling around everywhere..of coarse. I've recently noticed how much more 'interactive' he is.. He'll crawl over to his highchair when he is hungry, or pull off his bib when he's done eating, things like that. He has FIVE whole teeth..and they are so darn cute. He is eating mostly finger foods, so chopped up versions of what we eat..and the kid loves, like LOVES black beans?? and cheese.. But then again, I guess, who doesn't, amiright?? So kids are good. Mason is obsessed with baseball..watches 'highlights' any chance he gets, looks up on the computer ALL the games and needs to know who is playing who, what the score is, etc. He always asks.. do you want the Padres to win? or the Blue Jays.. and, apparently "I don't care" isn't an acceptable answer, though it's the one I give him just about every time.. Anyway. Want to know what my workout was today? Here goes: 5:30am-enter JoCo CrossFit to finish my warm-up (which I start at home to help me get started faster so I can finish on time to get home and let my husband get out the door and off to work) Strength: Squats: 4x115#, 4x130#, 4 sets of 4x150# (off a 1 rep max of 185#) snatch with 3 sec pause below the knee: 4x75#, 4x80#, 3 sets of 4x85# (off a 1 rep max of 120#) Clean and Jerks with a 3 sec pause below the knee: (4+1) at 90#, (4+1) at 100#, 3 sets of (4+1) at 105# (1 RM of 150#) Snatch extension: 4 sets of 4x110# Jerks: 4x110#, 2 sets of 3x120#, 2x125# Whew! Now the workout..was supposed to be: Every Minute on the Minute (EMOTM) for 10min: 2 Muscle Ups (MU), 20 Double Unders (DU), then with rest of the minute, do clean and jerks at: 10x95#, 10x115#, 10x125#, 10x145# So that was the plan.. After the 1st minute, I realized that my connecting muscle ups weren't happening, which wasn't going to leave me enough time to complete everything and get any clean and jerks in, so I went to just 1 MU with the 20 DUs and the clean and jerks. At the end of the 10min, I only got through 10 at 95# and 5 at 115#. Just ran out of time. It took time to swithc the weights out. I was getting tired, so was more out of breath each round, making it tougher to get through the MU/DUs fast enough to get much more than 1 or 2 clean and jerks in the minute.. It was fast and furious and didn't quite go as I had planned or hoped, but it was a good workout and I gave it my all! After that we did 'Glute/Ham Raises', which we used to do back in the day in gymnastics.. always fun to kick it old school and remember the good ol' days! So that was crossfit for today. Usually I would have walked Mason to school and then run a short run with Miles in the stroller before we head in for naps, but since I didn't get my swim in yesterday, but DID do about 7-8mi run and 20mi bike.. I thought I should try to swim a bit. I didn't have much time, but got in the water and did a lil swimmin.. and that's it for today! Except I might do some sort of abs/core and some stretching later.. just because I'm on a personal hunt for my mid-section. I don't know how it's possible with all the strength training I've been up to lately, but my abs are purty weak.. on some things.. Basically on L-sits.. hanging L-sits and parallette L-sits to be exact.. I've gotten much better at seated L-sits on the floor and can plank like nobody's business.. but picking my feet up in mid-air? Not so much.. So feel compelled to work on that.. it's probably important, right? Maybe not. But I'll try to improve on it, none-the-less. Holy Moly, this is a lot of info.. I'm done. Plus I'm needed to "play a little game of basketball", despite the fact that it's dinner time.. And I need to make dinner.. Kids..

I Blame the IPad..and Dr. Oz..

So I've often thought about blog posts I wanted to write over the past couple months, but for some reason.. they just don't seem to happen. No excuse, really. I mean, yes, I'm 'busy' with the two boys and all.. but not THAT busy. But, I'm more likely to be surfin the interwebs these days on my ipad and typing blog posts on that is..not my favorite. I even got a keyboard thing that you can hook your ipad up to for Christmas! (my poor husband always gets me great gifts..that I then proceed to allow to collect dust because I'm too stubborn to learn new tricks) But that's an extra step and, again, just doesn't seem to happen. But since I don't journal or do any other cool method of tracking my kids lives along with my athletic endeavors, I'm going to make a solid effort to get back to keeping this bad boy running.. So here goes! I guess kind of a lot has gone on in the past 2+ months.. where to start.. We'll start with running. So I ran my first half a few weeks back. I guess that means this is my 'race report'? It was.. OK.. I think I maybe had some unrealistic expectations.. as usual. My training went fine. I followed Hal's plan and felt like I was set to go. My long runs felt good, but looking back, when your usual LSD pace is 9min/mi, does it really make sense that you'll all the sudden run over a minute/mi faster for the same or longer distance? I understand the concept of 'LSD' for building a base and for 'finishing' a race, but I'm thinking if I want to get faster at the half marathon distance, I'm going to need to run my longer runs faster..maybe long tempos, or long runs with a set amount of 'race pace' miles in there? I'm using the 'advanced' training for my next half, which is 2 months away, and it has some of those things in there, so we'll see. Though, I'll explain later why that is not going to be a PR kind of run. So anyway, back to my 'race report'.. I ran the Sam Costa 1/2 Marathon on March 23. It's a smaller race and early in the season, so I really liked the low stress smaller race and using this run as a 'starter' for the season (too bad I thought it was going to be an 'A' race? seriously.. hind sight really makes me look like an idiot). So I met up with my ol tri buddy, Ashley. It was great to get to catch up with her. After last season completely away from racing (growing a human, you may recall), we haven't seen a whole lot of each other. I knew we weren't going to run together.. she's been training her run a LOT and had a BQ last yr, so out of my league right now.. which is fine. At the start, I felt ready, but oddly nervous.. like I hadn't done this before? I think I'm just way out of practice. I started off fine. My plan was to hold 8min miles..the whole time.. So. Obviously, when you plan to hold 8's, you start out in the 7:40 range, yes? NO??! Hmmm. By a couple miles in, I started to get the feeling that I wasn't going to be able to hold my goal pace. By about 6 miles in I felt myself looking ahead for.. what, exactly? I was looking for some kind of 'break' point? Like a transition, or something? But then I remembered that I'm running a half marathon..ya dummy..and there's no stop until you're done. I kinda knew I was in for a rough one at that point, but I kept plugging along as my pace slowly, slowly...got slower. I was hanging in with the 8:30 crowd for a bit. Then for the last couple miles it was all I could do to keep below the 9min range. I felt bad.. usually in a race I'm the chipper, smiley lady congratulating people and offering ever-so-helpful "keep it up" and "looking good"'s, but not this time.. This time I felt like, instead of thanking all the volunteers (and there were a ton.. this was a turn-heavy coarse, so there were people at every corner telling us which way to go), I felt like my eyes were pleading with them to tell me how to make it stop. But I kept plugging away..until we finally did reach the end.. I crossed in something like 1:52/1:53.. I have no idea. I forgot to stop/check my watch and didn't really look at the clock, either. I'm sure the official results are somewhere on the world wide interwebs for all of posterity. So some have said: "that's a good time", or "that's not too far off from your goal" (which was 1:45, which is my previous PR..which I got under someone else's name and therefore is not really 'mine' yet)..and that's all true, but I think the bigger kicker for me wasn't that I didn't reach my goal, but how I felt in the run. The half felt long.. it used to feel like something you just do on a tuesday before breakfast just because.. so it was weird for it to feel so...loooong. And I was pretty wiped. Even my abs and where my c-section scar is (too much?) hurt. I wasn't prepared for a hurt like that, especially when I felt like I ran so slow.. but I guess my pace wasn't so much by choice, but by default. Maybe if I had set out at an 8:40 (or whatever a 1:52 half mary pace averages out to) pace and just held that, I would have felt better.. But since I, instead, went out fast and was forced to slow down.. it hurt. ANYWHO.. enough negativity. I did the run. I had fun catching up with a friend. It was a nice day for a run... Uh...that's all I have to say about that! I did learn that I have a long way to go, as far as improving my run..so that's always fun. And I decided to back off of my full marathon plans for this fall and will, instead, continue to work on the half distance and see if I can't somehow get faster there before I move on to the full. Biking and Swimming? Absolutely nothing to report there. My swim has gotten slower as I've been in the pool less and less regularly. I just can't seem to get excited about it.. maybe when the outdoor pool is open? As of now, I haven't signed up for any tri's, but I'm thinking mid-late summer sprints and maybe an oly will be the plan. Sometime before those dates, I will get back in the pool and make swimming a priority again. I did get out on my bike last sunday and it. was. awesome! I love riding outside so very much and, again, it was great to catch up with my good pal, Lara. Now that it's finally getting nice out (cue insane days and days of rain. You're welcome), I plan to get a good bike ride in on the weekends.. week days are pretty much out because of husband work schedules and kids stuff and sunlight.. Oh, well. Weekends will work. CrossFit has kind of taken center stage these days, so there's quite a bit going on there..and I'm having a lot of fun doing it. So I'm still going in to the gym in the early am before Matt heads to work, but my 3..or 4.. days a week has quickly turned in to 6.. or sometimes even 7, since they started having open gyms on sunday. We just wrapped up the 'Games Open'. "What the..??", you say? Right. Well, if you're not in to CrossFit, I'm not sure how exciting discussing the Open will be.. but I guess we'll find out! (in other news, I'm back after a few hours, baby played with, then fed and put down for a nap, kid fit dealt with, timeouts served, lunch made and eaten, dinner prepped, chutes and ladders played, kid down for nap.. and now I remember why I let myself slide with my blogging. Anyway. Where were we..) So the Open is the part of the CrossFit Games where everyone can play.. Everyone can sign up (and pay their $20, but whatever) and take part in the workouts that the 'HQ' (uh..headquarters) folks put out. After the workouts are announced on wednesday evenings, we watch two of the top crossfitters take on the workout, then we get a false sense of how to do the workout, only to be quickly humbled when we actually try them the next day.. Then.. if you're like me and are a part of a gym that wanted to make it to Regionals (the next step) as a team, you obsess over what strategy to employ as you take on the workout again (and again) before having to submit your final score on sunday. Fun, right?! It actually is, and maybe I'll blog another day on my thoughts about the Open.. But it does teach you how to be more 'strategical' in your workout to try for the best score possible. It also makes you push harder than you maybe would normally and can even force you to break through some perceived barriers in your training. ie: I thought my 1 rep max on the snatch was 95#.. I had tried 100# before and failed.. it was scary to me to even try throwing it over my head, for some reason. Well. Here comes the 1st workout and wouldn't you know it, there are snatches and if I want to get a decent score, I'd better throw that 100# over my head.. and I did! Boom. Barrier broken (and then I quickly got mad at myself for missing any and not getting MORE of my (new) 1 rep max at the end of a 17 minute workout.. ah, well.. I celebrated for a moment). I also did my first workout with muscle ups in it.. so that was fun. I got up on those darn rings a few weeks (months? I don't know) ago and have been working on it A LOT to try to get it consistent and where it would be 'no big thing' in a workout.. They still aren't perfect, but it's great to at least, finally, have that skill. So anyway, the Open is now over and guess what.. I did alright! After just 4-5 months of training post baby, I wasn't so sure how things would go and if my fitness would be up to par with where I needed to be.. But the Open tends to favor gymnastic-y folks like me.. so.. I don't know. I was happy with how I did, though I do know I still have lots of room for improvement (which is good, otherwise.. what am I doing??). So. Our team DID qualify for Regionals by placing in the top 30 in our region (Central East.. there's so many crossfit gyms that there's several regions just in the US). And to top it off, I ranked in the top 3 gals in our gym, so I get to compete at Regionals! I'm excited.. and nervous. It was the goal and something I worked hard for these months since I've been back in the gym and definitely focused hard on it through the 5 weeks of the open.. But now that it's REAL?! And we've started REAL training?! I'm even MORE excited.. but nervous, too. It should be an experience, to say the least. I'm going to really work hard over these next 2 months so I can do my part on the team and give it our best shot! So that's that.. Did I leave anything out? Ah, yes.. How does running fit in, if you're focusing on CrossFit? Well.. I plan to continue to run. I DO feel like the two can work together and even benefit each other.. So I'm still going to run my next half.. which happens to be the weekend before Regionals..which is why it won't be a 'PR kind of race'. But my sister and I have talked about running this half together for YEARS and she FINALLY agreed to it.. so I'm not backing out now. Plus, honestly, when I first looked at the timing of the two things I thought "perfect. The half will be a nice 'active recovery' from all the lifting stuff and it doesn't interfere with Regionals!". Of coarse, it might not be 'perfect', but it wouldn't be 'me' to back out of the run..and I gotta be 'me', right? That's what I thought.. I'm back to doing the tumbling teaching gig. I do all the classes two nights a week, which is up to 3 a night, depending on how many kids sign up. So far it seems to be working as far as kids, eating, sleeping (them, not me), etc.. So we'll stick with it as long as it continues to go well. Mason and Miles are great (well, aside from the crazy fits Mason likes to throw at times.. like today.. Miles crumpled up a picture..I mean 'map' that Mason drew and the kid. fell. apart.). Mason actually has kindergarten registration TONIGHT!! Ah. How did this happen? 'Big Boy School' has always been something we knew was coming..we talked about it.. But how is it actually HERE?! He's psyched, though. As much as he has liked the Goddard School, he's already talking about moving on..ready to get this 'big boy school' thing started. Miles is 7 Months now and 'busy'. That's what I like to call it.. I love looking over at him to see him sitting on the floor just 'busy'. Working on picking things up, turning it over, putting it in his mouth (of coarse), etc. And the boys, for the most part, are doing very well together. Mason loves making Miles laugh and Miles is quick to smile at pretty much anything he does.. so it works out well for both of them.. And me. I love to watch it all. I think that's all I have to say for now.. As for Dr. Oz.. I blame most things on him. I've long been meaning to blog a rant about him..particularly regarding his 'magic diets', and 'super foods' and 'tricks for wt loss' that he keeps insisting he knows all about, which often border, if not fully delve in to disordered eating.. but perhaps another time. For now, I bid you adieu and hope to check in here again sooner than later..

getting decent at the 5k...

..but I'm training for a half marathon, yes? Mr. Higdon? It's cool. I can definitely get on board and I understand the idea that I need to slowly build the miles that I can sustain a faster pace, as well as just building miles at the slower, easy pace. Actually, the 5k (or the 3mi time trials I was doing pre Higdon training plan) has kind of become my favorite love/hate run workout.. It's efficient and sufficient.. you know? I'm not out there for hours..but when you push hard on the pace, I feel sufficiently wiped out from the run. Today there was a 5k 'race' on the ol training dockett, so even though I did my last 3mi time trial just a couple weeks ago.. and last sunday I had a 3mi 'pace' run (meaning I needed to run just 3mi at the pace I'm hoping to run my half marathon), I decided to go for it again. I was really hoping to get under 22min and with my first mile coming in under 7min, I was hopeful.. But with the chilly air, a stop to prevent a dog from joining me for the rest of my run (side note.. get control of your dogs out there!? I've had more than my fair share of dog run-ins over the past few weeks.. some more amicable than others, but all need to be better wrangled in their yards, if you ask me..), a stiff head wind that some times made me feel like I was running backwards, and my sore legs from another great week of crossfit.. it wasn't meant to be. I did manage to eek out another very unofficial 5k PR of about 22:15. I pushed hard, but felt pretty good, overall. I had the distict pleasure of hearing each and every huff and puff and gasp for air as my ipod ran out of juice just as I finished my warm-up mile..so that was nice.. I cooled down with another couple miles and felt pretty good about the run. The rest of the week? As far as running..nothing too notable. I had my trail run last weekend and that went well. No clue about pace, but the weather and company was awesome and they tell me we did 7mi.. so that's good, I guess. My 'pace' run the next day felt great! What's my goal pace, you ask? Well.. I consulted Mr. McMillan to see what I should be aiming for in these training runs and such.. and turns out, he's quite the optimistic fella! Seems he felt that, according to my recent 5k times, I should be shooting for a goal pace of something in the mid 7:50 min/mi range.. Well, that seems ambitious, but I figure my goal pace will be 8 min/mi, but if I can hold 7:50's, that would be good, too.. So I aimed for my pace run to be 3mi at 8min/mi and I was surprised to find that holding under 7:50 felt pretty darn easy! I know it was only for 3mi, but it definitely gives me hope that I'm heading in the right direction with my training and can maybe pull out a decent half marathon or two this season.. and maybe even PR the full?! Let's not get ahead of ourselves, but it sure felt nice to push the pace a bit and have my body respond positively. During the week was business as usual with my early running on the treadmill before crossfit. I actually took saturday off from running, so today's 6mi with the 5k 'race' in the middle was my only run.. but another week of Higdon training in the books! Other stuff.. I biked twice and swam once.. I think I'll stick to that plan, at least for this month. I think I've mentioned before that, ideally, I'd like to swim or bike in the evenings on the nights that I teach gymnastics.. but I'm not ready for that just yet.. Maybe next month.. or the next.. Whenever. At the very least, when summer comes creeping up and I set my sights on some tri's, I'll up my swim and bike.. but until then, I'm just going to do whatever fits in to the week to allow me to cross-train and maintain at least a tiny bit of my swimming and cycling fitness. Crossfit continues to be a lot of fun for me. My hands are healing up nicely and I was even able to do a pull-up workout and bar muscle-ups this week without having to slather my hands in athletic tape..so I consider them pretty well healed. Of coarse, now I have some rips on my wrists from working on ring muscle-ups.. Darn it all if I'm not getting close to conquering that skill. I'm going to keep at it and I WILL get myself up on those rings. Nothing too exciting from this week, except that I was happy that I could pretty easily complete a hang clean and front squat workout with the 'prescribed' wt of 115#.. That's about 90% of my 125# max, but judging from how well I could handle that wt in the workout, I'm thinking I should go for a new 'clean' PR.. yes? Maybe next weekend.. Mason and Miles? All good things there.. Miles has conquered the 'front to back' roll. I'm pretty sure he views the 'back to front' as a 'why would I do that?' kind of thing. Mason started back at his 'gymnastics flips' class, which he actually asked me for for Christmas! He loves it.. not exactly a 'natural', but who cares if he's having fun. Teaching/child watch went better this week. Miles continues his 'anti-bottle' campaign, so we'll see how it goes this week when he stays a little longer.. I'm going to stay to teach both classes, so that means the boys wait for Matt to pick them up.. which is only a difference of 30 minutes, but man that can be a long time in baby world! So we'll see.. I'm sure it'll be great.. So that's about it for us!

Good News/Bad News..

I feel like this week has been full of good new things.. all with some sort of caveat.. Nothing huge, just a little bit of.. "you can have this good thing, but ya gotta give a little something back". For example, this morning, I'm up at 5am, been up since my 4am wake-up feeding with Miles..but I don't need to be up this time?! So, good news is I've adjusted to waking up at 4am for my workouts and other morning duties.. bad news is that even when I was going to 'sleep in', I'm up.. Not a huge down side, but still.. I was kind of excited about the idea that I was going to take it easier this weekend with my workouts and such and I'm just planning to meet some friends for a 6mi trail run later.. I guess the 'back up' side of it, though, is that I'm getting some writing in! Another 'good news/bad news'?..it's 50 degrees in Indiana in January.. Awesome! Buuuut.. it's going to rain every day until it gets cold again.. Oh, well. I'll take it. I'm taking advantage of a few dry, warm hours today and hitting the trails with my old trail running buddies. I've, for some reason, gotten away from running trails and I miss it! I know what's kept me from them.. it's just easier to run straight from my house and not waste the extra time driving and such.. But, since I'm not doing any of my other usual saturday am stuff (Crossfit.. it's closed today because there is a big competition in town and some folks from the gym are competing! I really, really want to go watch some of it.. but we'll see if I can make that happen) and it's going to be so crazy nice out, I figured today would be a good day to take a little extra time and get out to enjoy some wooded running. So. Let's review this week, shall we? My first official week of following a plan.. I'm realizing more and more that I need to really just focus on what I've determined as my goals for this year and just let go of my 'need to do all the things' ways.. Meaning.. I need to be OK with missing swimming and spins if time/ schedule/soreness/sleepiness/etc doesn't allow for it. I need to get my running in and do as much crossfit as time allows and just be good with that. Those are the goals that I set for myself, after all.. so now I just need to embrace it! So this week, so far, I have done all the running that Mr. Higdon advised. With today's 6 mi run in the woods, which I'm sure will be plenty slow, that covers my 'long' run for the week and leaves me with just a 3mi 'pace' run for tomorrow. I'm thinking, unless it's raining hard, I'll try to branch out of my 'hood a bit and hit some hills, but then that will be it for me for workouts tomorrow.. So just running this weekend! Doesn't exactly sound exciting or note worthy, but for someone who normally tries to cram all sorts of workouts in (ie: I just let go of the idea of doing my own triathlon of sorts today.. I thought, since I missed my swim yesterday..due to my crazy boys and their early am hijinks!.. I'll go swim early today, then, since I'm there, I might as well spin..and then I'll head out for the trail run!.. welcome to my world of crazy), I'm kind of strangely proud of myself for re-evaluating that plan and deciding what was best, not only for meeting my current goals, but also for what my family needs. Of coarse, my family would survive with me gone for the morning.. Matt can handle things just fine.. BUT.. would I feel good about it? That is the question, my friends. I have no problem at all taking time for myself to do the workouts that I enjoy and that get me closer to my own, personal physical goals, but when I start adding things in 'just 'cause'? I gotta draw the line there. More so these days, I'd say, with having the two boys and all. Re-learning the infant stage all while balancing time with Mason has had it's..well, to stick with my theme here.. 'good and bad'. I won't go in to great detail and we're certainly working things out, but it's hard to meet both boys' needs all the time..and with Matt's long work hours, a lot of the time I'm on my own.. it can get messy at times, but we're doing our best and figuring things out. Mason tries his best and is a huge help a lot of the time.. He is 4, though, so he has his moments. Anyway, I got off track a bit there.. Where was I.. The rest of this week was good.. Did just 1 swim, which was a bit of speed with 50's and then some other stroke/IM stuff. I squeezed in a spin yesterday during one of Miles' naps.. basically 10 min of steady/slightly fast spin increasing resistance every 2 minutes, then 15 minutes where I switched to the heavy ring and did 2 min steady climb and 1 min stand/sprint, repeat..then Miles was up, so my spin was done! I actually had a good sweat going and was pretty ready to get off the bike anyway, so it worked out well. Crossfit is still going well. Good news on monday was that I got my bar muscle ups and was able to do them in the workout.. Bad news was all that swinging on the bars gave me matching rips in the middle of both hands. Another good thing was that I started back with teaching gymnastics this week.. Bad news was that the child watch place is an overstimulation nightmare for a sleepy baby and by the time I came back (only an hour!..I'm just doing set up and 1 class for this week and next, then I'll start staying a bit longer to do both classes) he was all hot and bothered from crying and they had squeezed the poor thing into these newborn size shorts I happened to have in my bag.. Oh, those thigs were not meant to fit in there! They claim he was OK for a bit and was in the swing doing fine for a while, and he wasn't crying the whole time.. but that was the most upset I had seen him and it broke my heart to think of him crying up a sweat in there while I was teaching. He calmed down as soon as I held him and the rest of the night was fine.. but if it doesn't go better or we don't figure out a way to make things go smoothly for him while I teach, I just don't see how it makes sense for me to continue if it's going to make him so upset. I can always wait until he's a little older and can handle the child watch stuff a little better. It really isn't equipped to handle sleepy babies, nor do I expect them to be able to soothe him to sleep.. so we'll just see. Matt seems to think it will work out and be fine, but a lot of things have changed since I originally took on this job and it may not make sense for us at this time.. When I started, it was just taking Mason to child watch and he was old enough to actually play and enjoy that time.. But now, Matt's long hours and an infant with his schedule and needs in the mix.. Again. I keep saying it. But we'll just have to see. I'll give it a fair chance, but I'm not about to have my little guy in fits every tuesday and thursday night just so I can teach a couple tumbling classes.. you know?? Anyway. So that's that. Anything else? I think that covers it. Wish me luck in my first trail run in a while! I hope I don't fall down..and that the trails aren't so soggy that it's no fun.. But I know it will be nice to get out, enjoy the day and the company of my old running friends!

It's On..

..sort of.. So I took a look back at the last post there.. Not only was it jam packed with type-o's, it gave me a quick flash back to how much can change in just one little month! Anyway, I've made some decisions...sort of.. and am following a 'plan'...more or less.. My original idea, if you'll recall, was to wing it and do the gradual long run mile increase with the first of the month 3mi test run.. Well, I still am keeping that plan in mind, but it occured to me that just upping my long run distance and keeping it high for months and months might not be all that great. SO. Enter good ol Hal Higdon. He's an old pal of mine.. I used his plan back when I did my first half and full marathons.. so I figured I'd see what he thought about the whole training thing and I liked what he was throwing down. I've had a coach for training in the past and I definitely don't think I'm 'above' needing a coach.. Quite the opposite, actually.. I shall return to my trusty coach.. once I have a new goal to strive for. Right now, though, I'm just trying to get back a good, solid base and THEN I'll see where I'm at and what kinds of crazy plans I can make for myself.. For this season, though.. I still want to work on and improve my running.. which I suppose could be 'coach worthy'.. but I think maybe I don't want the extra pressure.. So a free plan from the world wide interwebs fits the bill. And just what, you ask, are these big plans you have?? Well, I've decided my first half marathon will be the Sam Costa Half Marathon, which is a small, local race that a friend of mine has tried to get me to run for years.. The timing was right, so I guess I'll finally see what all the fuss is about! So my plan for that started this week..which I didn't actually know until last night (saturday)..but it turns out I was pretty on track, so we're good! My weekly plan will look a little something like: Monday: short warm-up run and CrossFit Tuesday: swim and spin Wednesday: (will be kind of a doozy..so may need to adjust..) speed/hill run and CrossFit Thursday: short run and CrossFit Friday: EZ swim Saturday: pace run and CrossFit (it's a skills and 'active recovery' day) Sunday: LSD run or at least that's my plan for now. You may notice the lack of a full day of rest.. which I know is important.. but until I go back to 2-a-days..which I'm hoping to start that at some point soon when I start back teaching gymnastics.. But we'll see. I'm definitely aware of the problem. For now, though, I see friday 'EZ swim day' as rest.. I know.. This week followed that fairly well. There was a holiday in there, so a little different. But mostly we were on task. As for those 'changes' alluded to in the start of this entry? Well, today was my 3mi test run and I improved by 2 minutes again?! I really didn't think, after the last one and how much it hurt.. I didn't expect to go faster.. and my time keeping skills were 'unofficial' at best.. but I did my 3 miles, after a 1mi warm-up, in 22:18! Still not setting any land/speed records or anything, but I'm happy with the improvement. It still hurt, but I think it felt a little less like death than the last time..though if you judged it by my 1mi trudge home, you might beg to differ. So there's that. I topped my LSD runs last sunday with a lovely 9mi treadmill run. That was kinda tough. I need to get my treadmill calibrated, or something.. because the paces are definitely off.. But it was too cold and icy last week and I just didn't feel like spending 9mi looking for clear roads to run on.. so basement 'mill it was. It wasn't that bad.. but I definitely prefer the fresh air. I've come to realize I really look forward to and enjoy those sunday runs, so I must be doing something right as far as balancing how much running I'm doing. I actually enjoy all of my workouts right now, which is a really good thing...and is also why I can't seem to cut anything out to give myself a rest day.. I've started using actual workouts for swimming again..so I have that going for me. Nothing too crazy, but getting back in to the idea of having a plan when I hit the pool.. trying to work on some speed, watching the clock and such.. Hadn't done that in a long time! I toyed with the idea of going to do a modified version of 100 x 100 with Indy Aquatic masters on New Yrs day.. I would have done 75's because they were going on the 1:40, which I would not have been able to make.. and I was just going to do as many as I could.. So I did kind of a trial run on my own and did: 6 x 75 swim, 6 x 75 pull, 6 x 75 kick, 6 x 75 swim with fins, 6 x 75 pull with paddles, 6 x 75 back kick.. I think.. it was something like that.. darn it. I'd like to gradually add on to that, so next time I have a little more time to spend in the pool, I'll do 8 of each of those 75's.. then 10.. and so on.. (I stuck with the 1:40 interval). I also have enjoyed doing workouts with a lot of 'other' stroke work.. back, breast, and I even include a lil fly in there from time to time.. Stop laughing at me, lifeguards.. stand down.. I am not drowning, can't you see I'm a beautiful butterfly in here??!! Spin kind of is what it is right now. I'd say the bike is going to be the thing that takes a bit of a back seat this winter/right now. I kind of bounce around between my trainer, doing my own spin sessions on a spin bike at the Y, doing the ol' programs on an exercise bike, or going to spin class.. But until it warms up, I just have to try to keep myself entertained on the indoor cycle options.. CrossFit is coming along. I've been feeling like I'm making some improvements there and have decided to really focus on strength and olympic lifts and skills that I need. There is the 'Open' games stuff coming up in Feb or March, so I figure we'll see how things go with that and if I/our team makes regionals again, maybe I'll dabble in some crossfit competitions.. So we'll see what happens there. I did a couple of max effort olympic lift things this past saturday.. so as of now, my max for Power Snatch is 90# and max for Clean and Jerk is 125#..Plenty of room for improvement there, but a good start and definitely working on form. So that's that! Only thing left for me to figure out for this season is what to do as far as triathlons.. I had said earlier that I would just do some sprints and kind of lay low on the tri's this summer.. but I just can't seem to get excited about the short stuff! I don't know what it is.. maybe I'm actually just scared to try to push that hard in the short races.. I don't know.. Plus, if I'm focusing on running half and full marathons.. it just seems to make more sense to me to do a half IM or two.. No? Anybody else follow that logic? I'm tinkering with some ideas still, but I'd really like to do the KS 70.3, which would be 1 week after another half marathon that I plan to do..which is also in KC.. which would mean a week long stay with the folks! It's a plan I've had for a while now..to do the two races, stay with my parents, get a little extra visit time with them AND get to do two races.. everyone wins, right?! Then I'm still figuring out whether I'd do a second half IM or not.. Gotta make some decisions soon, though.. I already missed the first price increases and the next increases are looming.. So those are my loose plans for racing and my first part of training has begun! In other news.. The boys are great. Mason had a wonderful Christmas and is already planning out the return of his 'elf on the shelf' and what he will ask Santa for next year. Miles is.. still growing! He has rolled from tummy to back a couple times, though I'm not sure I'm ready to declare it as an official skill...mighta been a bit of a fluke, but I know it's all coming! He's had some teething pain lately, which has made lying on his back no fun for him.. good thing he's comfy in his car seat, though, so he's been sleeping there for a few days. Most of the time, though, he's a chill, smiley, fun guy that's getting interested in toys and LOVES to smile at his big brother! Mason loves it, too. He'll ask if he can go in to Miles' room when he's waking up from a nap so he can make him smile.. Very sweet. I think that's about it for now. Hopefully I'll make some more decisions and put some money where my mouth is! Race Plan for this season to be continued..but it's in the works and coming along!