Did you workout today? Good for you! That’s awesome, especially in these dark days filled with holiday anticipation (and maybe stress!)!
It took me a loooonnngg time to get geared up for my 5 mile run today. It was cold out there! Until today I had never run outside in under 30 degrees Fahrenheit. Today it was 26*. Thus the “gearing up” was both mental and physical. It was a double glove kinda day…
And as I ran I sang like nobody was listening (no, really, I did)! Oh wait, nobody was listening because it was just me and the mailman on the streets. Today was perhaps the first day in three months of running in Charlottesville where I didn’t see another single runner. I must say, it made me a little proud. I’ve never been exactly “hardcore”, more of a fair weather sports girl if you will. I was a whitewater raft guide for a few years after high school but I definitely preferred to work on sunny days with perfect water levels:).
I know I’ve said this already, but it’s coming as a surprise to myself so I keep repeating it; I don’t mind running in the cold. Even 26 degrees was manageable since the sun was shining. I don’t, however, like running in the wind. At times the wind literally choked me. Yuck.
After a slow first 30 minutes I finished off with 17 minutes of sprints. My pattern was 90 seconds run, 30 seconds sprint, 30 seconds walk. Lately my fitness philosophy has been “work out harder, not longer” and sprints fit in with this perfectly.
Sprinting bursts burn a ton of calories, increase your overall speed, speed up your metabolism, increase production of human growth hormone, and make you feel tough and strong. Sometimes I jog instead of walk for recovery after a sprint but walking is really better. When I recover at a jog pace I don’t reach that true anaerobic full-out sprint. If you are doing a real “sprint” you should want to walk afterward (or stop all together, although I wouldn’t recommend it).
“The difference between try and triumph is just a little umph!” – Marvin Phillips
The sprints definitely added some “umph” to my run!
Lunch was quick and simple. I picked this big boy up at the farmers market on Saturday and have been eating off it since then!
It must have weighed 5 pounds! (I was tempted to take it upstairs to my bathroom scale but I resisted…)
So I made sauerkraut. And soup. Lots of Cabbage and Butternut Soup.
This soup is super simple, shredded cabbage, diced butternut squash, onions, salt, and cayenne pepper and full of vitamins and minerals. Both cabbage and butternut are high in calcium, manganese, magnesium, potassium, B6, and C.
We have a fun and random outing tonight. Yesterday Tate got a call about one of the offices we have for listed on Craigslist for rent. He mentioned the name of the caller to me and I said, “oh, I know her, we were childhood friends!” Small world, small town! So we are going to meet her for a drink tonight, catch up and see if maybe she wants to rent from us.
Can’t wait to read about how your workouts went!
P.S Oh yeah! And I did about 10 minutes of power Pilates, my favorite 7 exercises without rest between exercises.
Gracefulfitness 