A Journey to Fit & Fast

It's interesting looking back on 13.1 miles. It is a lengthy distance to have completed. And now, I have two under my belt. I repeated the IMT Des Moines Half Marathon again just yesterday. It had me thinking about how I measure success in this situation. I successfully ran the 13.1 miles, without walking or stopping. Success! I successfully trained harder, and in a more healthy fashion. Success! I did finish about 8 minutes slower this year. STILL Success, because I trained wiser and gained more mental fortitude in the training. I got progressively faster and finished the second half of the race 30 seconds per mile faster than the first half. Success!! This year, I had the immense pleasure of training with some amazing people, who quite literally (Travis) walked into my life randomly. Thankfully he did, because it has been a cascade of meeting amazing and inspiring people since then. Success!! :-) With their help, guidance and company on our long runs, I was able to train smarte...

This week (half marathon taper week) has been an interesting challenge to me. I am not running much, as I should appropriately not be, and yet my appetite has remained in hyper mode. Luckily I've maintained my weight, as I've followed this a little more closely on the scale to ensure I'm not going overboard. And because I'm not as active, I have more time to sit and contemplate. I come to realize the themes for this week are "just give it all you've got," followed closely by "do what you can." This works in lots of areas of life: careers, exercise (ie endurance sports), proper eating habits, and general life changes.  I've been trying to eat lunches that contain no meat and incorporate forms of protein of natural sources, such as black beans, quinoa, etc into my daily diet. I'm 'doing what I can' with my diet this week, and trying to 'give it all I've got,' while still remaining human. On Sunday, I will certainly giv...

I'm not sure if any of you are like me, but I struggle sometimes with getting in a 'breakfast slump.' I tend to have the same things A LOT, and that gets boring. And we all know that getting bored is the first step in making less healthy choices or 'falling off the wagon.' This week I have been having a sort of deconstructed omelette for breakfast, because I am trying to get more veggies into my morning routine. I have been taking about a half cup of spinach, putting an egg directly over it, putting a touch of salt and pepper and microwaving it for 1 minute. I put it on a piece of bread or a mini bagel with just a touch of cheese and it is so super delicious! And fast, which makes life easier for everyone. Try it out, I promise you won't be disappointed. Have a happy and healthy Friday everyone!

I know as well as anyone that time is a huge commodity in the society that we live in. I happen to be a mom, wife, and a full time nurse/sidekick to a doctor in a crazy busy orthopaedic surgeon practice. It is of course overwhelming considering the obligations of all of those individual roles, and it can certainly make my healthy living a challenge. I cannot speak enough though on how much being prepared has helped me along my journey (battle?) that is weight loss/maintenance. The preparation that I speak of is regarding meals, or having quick and easy options available at a moments notice throughout the week.  I have been much better about this lately, and it is paying off because I'm not jumping to unhealthy 'easy' choices because I am surrounded by healthy easy choices also. Of course this is not always easy to find time, but with a little time investment I find a HUGE payoff in my weekly eating. Here is what I did today in preparation for the week ahead (and the tim...

This week I have had time to think (the first week I've had any time to do so in a while), and it has made me think about how I am transitioning as a runner. Last year, I started running races (starting with 5k's) and decided to the IMT half marathon and train for that. Last year, my focus was about speed. It was getting through the miles, but also getting through them at a pace I found acceptable. My average pace for races last year was about 7:45-8:00 miles. This year, I've been slower. And just recently through thinking about it, I've discovered that this is ok in my mind's eye. I average a 8:15-8:45 minute mile race pace. It's ok because I am both a better runner, and a runner who has more attention on nutrition and hydration while I'm running this year, which I believe helps to keep me healthier outside of my races. So, I suppose the moral of the story is that life transitions, and changes-and those changes are ok. After all, life isn't a spri...