Staying Motivated

This is a common look for me. Cooking dinner in my workout gear.

It's tough to fit in a workout when you work 8-5 (and lately for me this has been 8- 6 or later). My workouts typically take place in the evenings after I get home and after I make dinner. It's very tough to stay motivated once dinner is done, so my go to trick is to put my workout gear on the second I get home and cook in my gear. It's a weird way to stay motivated but trust me, it works! It does feel weird to sit on the couch in workout gear.

Some other ways to stay motivated are to:

• Plan and schedule your workouts ahead of time
• Switch up your workout plan (weights, workout DVDs, yoga, etc.)
• Take it outside. This is especially good if you work inside all day.
• Use working out to accomplish daily tasks. For example, I bike to work because I have to get there anyway. You could also try walking to the grocery store or go for a run with a friend instead of going out for drinks (or go out for drinks afterwards anyway)

Any other ideas out there? Feel free to let me know.

Race Recap: Bowness Centennial 10KM

Last Sunday I ran the Bowness Centennial 10km! (and yes, it took me a week to write a recap). Here's a pre-race pic of me. Man I look nervous! I was kind of worried that my leg pain would flair up and I really wanted to beat 50 min.

Every time I race, I try to take a lesson out of it and this time the message was pace yourself! It took forever for the race to start once they got us organized at the start line. First they had a few speeches, then a blessing from an aboriginal, and just when you thought that was it, they sang the anthem! It was too much, especially when you have pre-race jitters. So once the race finally started, I was anxious and went out too fast. I was feeling great at that pace, so I decided to keep it up. If I wanted to beat 50 min, I figured I would have to push my comfort zone anyway. The problem was that at about 7km I realized my pace was maybe a bit ambitious and I totally ran out of gas. I thought I was either going to pass out or puke, and the last 3 km was killer. When I rounded the corner saw that I had about 500 meters to go, I have never been happier to see a finish line in my life. Usually I pick up the pace and finish strong but as soon as I saw the time was at 47 minutes, I slowed down, fixed my hair (I had to look good incase there was a photographer at the finish line), and finished in 48 minutes on the dot. (There was no photographer. Major boo) I was so happy that I beat my time but immediately felt like I was going to pass out. I made Bill raid the post-race snack goodies while I walked it out. Once the dizziness passed, I realized I had run my first sub-50 min 10km and was soooo happy. We peaced out on the post-race events and went out for Vietnamese Pho afterwards to celebrate. I'm guessing Pho is probably not the best post-race recovery food but I felt like I had earned it.

In other news, Bill ran his 10 km in 41-something minutes. He also had the same epic fail as me and went out too strong. So lesson learned, next time I'm pacing my self properly right out of the gates and then if I can pick it up around 5km I will do so.

Pre-Race Fuel

Today is race day and it's not snowing! I was a little worried yesterday when it was raining, but today we woke up to a tiny bit of blue sky and no moisture in the air. Fingers crossed it stays this way. You may think it's odd that I'm worried about snow, but since the two races I've completed this spring have been in snow, I think I'm justified.

We are running the 10km in this race, and my goal is to break 50 minutes. In order to fuel up for the race, I made my pre-race go-to meal: oatmeal. Every runner is different in how they fuel up, but we are all the same in that when we find something that works, we stick to it.

In the bowl:

1/2 cup Instant Oats

1 tbsp PB

1 scoop Vanilla Whey Protein Powder

1 tsp Maple Syrup

1/4 cup milk

1 apple on the side

On that note, I better go get ready so I'm not late for the race!

Grill It Up

Today's workout burned and I liked it! I was faced with a head wind on the bike ride home, which always makes for a fun ride. My legs were a burning by the time I got home! Once home, I popped in a workout DVD, Get Ripped and Chiseled, which has a ton of upper-body exercises. This helps to balance out those thunder-thighs that biking and hockey so conveniently give me.

Fitness: 60 min. workout DVD + 40 min. bike

It's no secret that I'm a little obsessed with workout DVDs. I particularly like Ripped & Chiseled because it focuses on one muscle at a time and I can overload on weights. I always feel like it's a solid workout when my muscles are shaking towards the last few reps.

Eats: Grilled Teriyaki Pork with Grilled Pineapple

After my workout I was f-hungry (as per usual). I needed something quick so the BBQ did the trick. We marinated some pork tenderloin all day in a teriyaki sauce, so we threw this onto the grill with some pineapple. Easy peasy.

Magazine Workout

Today was a busy day at work. I ended up working a bit late and had little motivation to workout when I got home. This is the downside to working out after work, but the upside of biking if I do skip the workout. I really didn't want to miss out on my first workout of the week so I decided to try a new routine to motivate me. I also wanted to watch the hockey game (go Bruins!) and I could do this while working out.

Workout: 40 min bike + Bootcamp routine from Women's Health Magazine

I'm generally not a fan of magazine workouts but when I saw the bootcamp workout in the June issue of Women's Health, I thought I'd give the magazine workout a try.

Overview:

The workout consisted of 2 circuits each with 4 exercises. You complete each circuit 4 times before moving on to the next. All you need is a medicine ball and resistance tubing.

Review:

This was definitely one of the tougher magazine workouts that I've tried and I'll probably keep it on hand. My arms and shoulders did get a good burn during the workout, but afterwards I didn't feel that continual burn which I really love and crave from doing weights. I ended up adding a few exercises with some heavier free weights to supplement the workout. It must have worked because now I can barely lift my arms to type.

Eats:

Post workout meal consisted of Chicken Asian Salad

(that bowl was refilled numerous times)

We have been making our own salad dressings lately, mostly because we are too lazy/keep forgetting to pick up some from the store. This one was a soy-ginger-garlic one that was fantastic!

Hooray for May

Goodbye May and hello June! The sun is starting to shine here (well sort of) and the grass is getting green (well ours needs a bit ofwork to get there), but it's starting to feel like summer! Since I nerd out on numbers, here is my recap of the month in numbers:

Running/fitness

- Races: 0
- Weeks off running: 2 (It was a looooong 2 weeks)
- Races signed up for: 3
- Pairs of running shoes bought: 1
- Weeks of cross-training: 4

Food

- Weird dishes made: 3 x 4 weeks= 12 (I made these items over and over and over...)
- Normal recipes made: 0 (it was a lazy month)
- BBQs bought: 1 (hence the lazy month. Pretty much everything was grilled)
- Cups of coffee per day: 2

Life

- Years married: 1 (yay for anniversary month)
- Vacation days taken to celebrate anniversary: 7
- Temperature of anniversary destination place: 90F (that's right, I finally found sun)
- Theme parks visited while on vacation: 5 (can you guess where we went?)
- Dollars spent on outlet mall shopping: $300
- Items bought at outlet mall: 15 (Shopping in the U.S. is seriously awesome)
- Number of times I have added color commentary in this post: 11 (Color commentary = anything in brackets)
- Disney pins collected: 4
- yes that's right we went to the happiest place on earth to celebrate 1 year

Hooray for May! It was a fun one.