Hey guys. Before I dive into this week’s fitness review, I wanted to share this post I read on Foodiecology, titled “An Open Letter to the Women Who Read Healthy Living Blogs.” The post discusses how reading about the wellness-inspired choices other people make can leave us feeling shitty or inadequate. I definitely related to the sentiment of unspoken competition with total web-strangers. It starts earnestly as piqued curiosity and is furthered by internet anonymity where we don’t see the full picture.
Part of the reason I started this blog is because I’m a regular person. Anyone who knows me IRL knows I’ve no natural gift toward athletics. (My high school friends still exclusively see me as a klutz. Whatever.) But what I do have going for me on this forum is that I’m not shy and I’m eager to share my failings along with my successes. (Honestly am a little more excited to share the fails because they make for way funnier blog posts.)
Earlier this week I shared a quote that read: “I will not compare myself to strangers on the internet.” When I read the Foodiecology post, I thought yes. This. Good reminder. So I wanted to share it with you.
But without further ado, every time I worked out last week. (And remember this is not my whole life. This is a mere hour of each day. The rest of the time I am at a desk binge eating PopChips.)
Monday: The Lincoln Square Lululemon offers a free run club every Monday night. I went once before but it fell off my radar and I hadn’t been back since. This Monday I jogged to the store and joined a group of the most positive people ever for a 1.5 mile run to Central Park, 30 minutes of sprints, push ups, planks, lunges, strides and more in front of the Bandshell and a 1.5 mile run home. This was a tough but incredibly uplifting workout.
Tuesday: Less than 12 hours later, Matt and I were up and out and headed downtown to Astor Place to take Flywheel Astor Place’s inaugural spin class. The new studio is gorgeous, with 5 showers and I think 70 bikes. The workout was tough, especially on tired legs. I love being downtown in the morning. After a shower, Matt rode downtown on a CitiBike (because 45 minutes of cycling wasn’t enough) and I headed uptown to work on foot stopping at City of Saints Coffee Roaster for an iced coffee. (Walking coffees are my absolute favorite, and they taste pretty great after a 7am spin class.) Also this class was free, not because I’m an awesome, desirable fitness influencer but because a friend who lives near by received a link to a free class and shared it with me. Just being uber transparent.
Wednesday: I woke up at 5:40am and ran somewhere between 7 and 8 miles because I went to November Project. November Project is a free, outdoor workout that’s pretty much the happiest place you could be at 6:28am on a work day. Matt and I had went once before over a year ago, when the group hosted a workout in Columbus Circle. This morning we ran to Carl Schulz park (86th/East River) for the Wednesday workout. It was awesome, silly and challenging. If you don’t know what November Project is, I encourage you to let Ali Feller and Kelly Roberts catch you up.
Me at November Project (the face of a true competitor)
Thursday: Rest day.
Friday: Unintentional rest day.
Saturday: I was in Austin for work and woke up in the early am (in advance of an all-day, all-weekend conference) for a 7-mile run along the Town Lake Trail/Lady Bird Lake Trail. I remembered this route from past visits to Austin, but I failed to remember that it’s made of dirt. It rained the night before, so I ran 7 miles in the heat, through mud. It was slow, but fine. I would’ve liked a running buddy, which I never say. Let’s mark the day of this personal transformation (3/12/2016).
Sunday: I did some very abbreviated stretching in my hotel room. Like for 5 minutes.
That’s all she wrote! How was your week? Tell me EVERYTHING!
Definitely do NOT stop sharing your successes and failures and PopChip stories (what flavor?) with us.
Here’s mine. This was the 2nd week with my new online running coach:
3/8: A little over 6 miles of easy running with a friend.
3/9: A prescribed core routine that takes me about 25 minutes, plus about 25 minutes on the elliptical. This routine is getting boring, except I am seeing general improvement.
3/10: Intervals! Hard! 10 minute jogging warm up, 12 x 1:45 minute intervals at ~7:00-7:10 pace with 1 min jog in between (ok, more like 1 min of staggering), 10 minute cool down. About 6 miles total.
3/11: Core + 25 minutes exercise bike.
3/12: 7 miles of very easy running with my club
3/13: Rest
3/14: 6 mile tempo run (sort of). Warm up and cool down as above, plus 3×6 minute intervals ranging from 7:23-7:54 pace. Felt a little too easy.
And that’s it! Other than lots of stretching, and foam rolling, and walking every day.
So far I think the coach is helping me. I’m mixing up my workouts far more than before, and actually taking 1 rest day a week. (Before it was just 1 a month. -Ish.) I’m being much more diligent about warming up properly (he has me doing dynamic stretches before every run) and a little more diligent about cooling down properly. And probably most importantly, I’m not beating myself about failing to meet my own unrealistic workout goals. The coach is — if anything — being kind of conservative with me, which oddly ends up boosting my confidence.
Ok, now back to work.
sorry for the delayed response, my favorite popchips flavor is definitely bbq