WazSUP?

Early morning golf, an awesome cruiser bike ride across the Sanibel causeway to Ft. Meyers (a hill!) then SUP tour through the mangroves. No running.  Happily.

Stand up paddle board

flat water, mangrove tunnels

fun fun core workout

Achtung! Alligatoren!

We drove a few miles out on the island to the Rabbit Road bike trail section to do our 1000s. Flat, straight, protected from the wind, but watch out for gators.

5x1000

on the Rabbit Trail bike path

Huffing and puffing

Cruise Day

Seven hours of easy, cruisey, island-wide biking. Lots of stops, a beer, a great day. 

Beach cruiser bike ride

Thirty-seven fun, slow miles

Island wandering

Sanibel 10

Sunday long run, 10@mp+45, done on Monday because yesterday's weather was nasty, and well, because.... I'm vacay!  Whatever works!  I love running a loop on vacation in a new place. We carefully mapped it, figured out where the water fountains were, then set out.  Running somewhere new is so liberating.  There aren't those associations of "this hill" or "this section" being where I usually feel awful or slow - just new territory to discover and see how it goes. Breezy and cool - a nice treat for  FL LR.

10 on the bike path

counting dogs, seeing new sights

Running somewhere new

Captiva Beach Wind

After a decent night's sleep, I feel much more ready to enjoy the week ahead.  Yesterday was soul sucking.  Today was crazy windy and not very nice out, but it was the first day of vacation, so I took the time to just breathe and relax and feel my way into the headspace.  Yesssss.  We biked north and walked on the beach at Captiva, with winds gusting up to 40mph.  The ocean was choppy and soupy as chowder; the wind was blowing like a bitch.  It was great. 

Blowing sand like salt

stinging, biting at my shins.

The wind is salty.

Long, long fly day

Today was a harder-than-it-should-have-been travel day.  I didn't weather it very well, not sure why, but most likely because I had to wake up at 3:15am and really didn't sleep well before that. Ugh.

Long, long travel day

that made me feel spent and old

and cranky and sad

Stupid Run

Why oh why do I always fuck up my tempo runs?  1/5/1, 5 at LT (8:18) but I started way too fast, plus I set up the run so that it was downhill for the the first half, so I just suckered myself into it.  Ugh.  I'm an idiot.  

Stupid tempo run.

Well, me, not the run, that is.

Need to pace better. 

Good Swim

A nice, solid-feeling, but not too hard swim this morning.  The pool was deliciously quiet and calm without the swim team. 

Smooth swimming, gliding

Back and forth, calm and steady

Quiet Thursday laps.

Steep Ladder

Whoa, that was a tough one.  Ladder intervals on the TM - 1200, 1000, 800, 600, 400, 7:13 down to 6:54.  Did it, though.  Plus I killed the killer squats afterwards - boom!

Hard treadmill ladder

Quick steps, breathing hard, go, go - 

pushing hard, yes - done!

Back in the pool

Finally - back in the pool! Felt strong and easy, but I only did 54 laps. I was worried about Mully being too cold in the car, the swim team invaded and made the water all splashy, so I just stopped at 3/4 mile.  The best part was the early drive into town, and the amazingly beautiful red-banded sunrise I got to see while I was walking Mully.

Red banded sunrise

Two wide, bright stripes of fire

slapped across the sky

Cold Wuss

Not too jazzed up about exercising at all today.  Took Mully on the snowshoe loop this morning - cold and breezy and raw.  Might whip up some motivation for an eazy spin later, might not.

Blue sky, sharp clear light

Cold wind whipping at my face

The couch is calling

The day after

So yesterday's run felt like no big deal, but apparently it was tougher on me than it felt at the time.  We did Body Shred/3 and a 45-minute yoga session this morning, and I was whupped.  Just blah.  Huh.

Body shred, yoga

Shouldn't have felt hard at all

but I was a blob!

Cold day, good LR

Long run today (Saturday) instead of Sunday, trying to beat out the forecast rain.  9@mp+45 was actual 9@ 8:56 (mp+16).  Ran mostly by effort, managed a negative split.  4 miles on Oblong, 5 miles on 43.  Cold and damp.

Post run hot tub soak

sipping on hot chocolate

feels pretty damn good

Virtual Sunny Bike Ride

About an hour of hardish spinning doing the Pensacola bike ride video.  First time back at it in about a year; I think I managed about 75-80% of it.  Legs started out a little dead, felt good by the end. 

Sunshiney bike ride

virtual reality

wishing I was there

Fine Form Five

Today's 1/5mp/1 felt solid and good; I really concentrated on my running form, working on glute activation by way of POSE method - focusing hard on pressing off and back after each landing, keeping the leg and glute activated both at the forward and backward arcs of each step.  It makes me run faster! I was well under mp, with 6@8:22.  Oops.  It also made my brain a little tired, which makes me realize that mindless running probably leads to bad form.  Need to remember that, especially with easy miles.  

5 miles at mp

concentrating on my form,

running POSE method

feeling uninspired

I could not find any mojo today.  Bleh.  I started, but total fail attitude-wise, so I just quit.

Reluctant spinning

not even 15 minutes

and then I just quit.

Jiggly Intervals

Beautiful, sunny day, but only 1* outside, so on the treadmill for 4x800s @ 6:58.  Theoretically.  I took the first one slowish, starting at 7:13 and speeding up, then made it to 6:58 average for the final 800.  Not great, but good enough for me, and felt like I did some good work thinking about form - specifically, thinking POSE method with glute activation.  I also thought about how much jiggly belly fat I could see and feel, rolling over the top of my lululemon shorts....

Do you want to lose 

Belly Fat? Click Here! Or just 

Run as fast as fuck

Recovery Monday

Just an easy recovery Monday, but the pool isn't open yet, so an easy spin and then Body Shred, plus some glute work.  Bitter cold outside, so just as well to be an indoor, easy day.

Easy spin inside

watching crappy On Demand

makes the time fly by

1 down, 15 to go

Today was my first official 'long run' of my 16-week Boston training program.  It's been a long time since I ran 8 road miles -  no mileage to speak of (except the Philly marathon) since 10/31. Given that, it could have been a lot worse. The run was actually more mentally than physically tiring.  My brain was annoyingly busy during those miles.  I need to learn to clear it and just be in the miles, in the moments.  Good goal for the next 15 weeks. 8 @ 8:45 (1:09:54)

The first long run done

Just 8 miles, but still seemed long

15 weeks to go

Nanospike Trail Run

Steve and Mully and I ran from the backyard onto South Loop, then Caves Loop and back home. Cold, clear morning with about an inch or two of hardpacked snow/ice on the trails, making the nanospikes essential - and awesome.  I felt more comfortable running down the back hill on Caves trail in the snow with the spikes than I do when the trail is clear.  They are good and grabby. I got my right foot a little wet at the first river crossing - it was cooooold by the time we got back home.  4.3, 52 mins.

Cold, crackling morning

Hard snow crunches underfoot

but the light is soft

136 Streak

The streak is broken.

Ten days missed but that's okay

I'll just start over.