Weekly Goals and Workout Recap: Low-Key Weekends and Food Prep

Happy Monday! Hopefully you have today off (or don't have class until this evening, like me). 

It was another relatively low-key weekend, although Friday was pretty packed. After my two classes, I met Brittany for 3 chatty miles before I met Madison, a good friend from undergrad, for a Refine Method class. Madison loved the class, but we were both ready for some food after so we grabbed dinner at Josie's. Verdict = tasty and healthy, but pricey. After dinner, I stopped by home for a few minutes to clean up then headed to a friend's party for a few hours. 

Low-key weekends are fine by me right now, since I looked at my calendar and realized that the weekends throughout the next couple months are pretty packed. I'm going to take advantage of whatever down time I can get!

I think a lazy weekend is best captured with a picture of Mason. 

Besides, I end up being exhausted for the rest of the day after each week's long run lately. I think it's the cold that especially takes it out of me! Luckily, this week I had the wonderful company of Abby and Carrie. The 10 miles really seemed to fly by (and the early ones really did since those two are speedy!).

I ended the weekend watching the NBA All-Star Game after cooking up a bunch of food for the week (by the way, Shaq and Charles Barkley need to narrate my life). 

I was inspired to try food prep by Lindsay at The Lean Green Bean. We'll see how much easier this makes my life this week! Here's what I made:

• Quinoa (1 c. quinoa with 1.5 c. water, bring to a boil then turn to low and put a cover on for ~10 minutes)
• Healthy Cooking Camp's Special Sauce for quinoa salads
• Lean Green Bean's breakfast bars for Sourabh (they'll be "snack bars" for me)
• Chopped eggplant for easy Indian vegetables
• Chopped summer squash and zucchini for homemade pizza 
• Hardboiled eggs
• Homemade trail mix (almonds, peanuts, and raisins)

All of this took about 45 minutes and I now have snacks, easy lunches, and prep done for two dinners. I think I'm going to be a fan of this system.

Weekly Workout Recap

Last week was great on the cross-training front, less great on the running front (was 5 miles under goal mileage because of time constraints), and a fail AGAIN on the yoga front. However, I did get in lots of foam rolling and made a much greater effort to thoroughly stretch before runs, which I think helped recovery a lot.  

Monday: 45 minute spin class at Flywheel with Holly Rilinger. Terrific class, as usual, although I could really feel how tired my legs were on the hills. 

Tuesday: Rest day. Moved my rest day to Tuesday after seeing how tired my legs were in spin, but it meant that I had more running days in a row than I would have liked this week.

Wednesday: (1) Physical therapy at Finish Line. First worked on my feet for my plantar fasciitis, then was given exercises to loosen my extremely tight calves, as well as my tight IT bands and hamstrings. 

(2) Tempo-ish run. I say "ish" because after the first mile, my freaky fast friend Christine felt pain in her knee and achilles, so she needed to head out. Then my Garmin died midway through my second mile. I *think* I ran about 4 miles, all of them at a this-feels-very-hard pace. The first mile was definitely 8:05 and the second was at 7:30 until my Garmin died around .35 miles in.

(3) Uplifting - Cardio class at Uplift Studios. I wasn't sure if this would be enough of a strength workout, but I was wrong, and my sore muscles the next two days proved that to me.

Thursday: 3.2 easy miles in Central Park with Julianne at a 9:37 avg pace. Were supposed to be 4.5 miles but realized I only had time for 3 once we were in the park. First time meeting Julianne and she was great. Hoping for more early morning runs with her where we can discuss our dogs :)

Friday: (1) 3 miles in Central Park with Brittany at a 9:56 avg pace. Was supposed to be 4, but professor went over class time by 10 minutes making me late. (Sorry, Brittany!) Didn't want to push the pace at all since I had a Refine Method class I was running to! Gorgeous day for running.

(2) Refine Method class that was similar to Sunday's (AKA it kicked my ass). Only 6 people in the class so we were pushed hard and got lots of form corrections.

Saturday: Long run of 10 miles with Abby and Carrie, 9:41 avg. pace. The splits show that I was probably going a bit speedy in the early miles for a long run, but it didn't feel speedy. The biggest issue was that I should have fueled better. Lora recommended Generation UCAN, which she swears by, so I may try to pick some out and give that a try. 

Splits were: (1) 9:31, (2) 9:02, (3) 9:20, (4) 9:16, (5) 9:31, (6) 10:15 - Harlem Hill, (7) 10:04, (8) 9:51, (9) 10:03 - nasty headwind in Riverside Park for the rest of the run, (10) 10:14

Pre-fueled with a bagel and lox 1.5 hours before and Vega Sport Pre-Workout Energizer 15 minutes before, half a Gu gel and Nuun in my water bottle during the run, and post-fueled with a Picky Bar (LOVE these). Problem was, I couldn't get more than 1/4 of the Gu down because it was just tough to swallow and stomach. I'd prefer to find something that fuels me for the entire half-marathon, so that's what I'm on the lookout for.

Sunday: 2.71 miles on treadmill with 0.5% incline at 8:39 avg. pace. Postponed this run too long and the planned 5 miles at race pace became 2.71 miles at race pace. Still, felt very strong despite my tired legs and could have kept going.

Total Mileage = 22.9 miles

This Week's Goals

While I got in all the scheduled runs last week, I didn't budget enough time for two of them (and was made late by a professor for a third -- still holding a grudge). I need to make sure I budget enough time for each run this week. I have a yoga date for Sunday so I'll at least be getting one class in!

My goal workouts are:

• 1 long run (15k for time with Lulunatics AKA Lululemon Run Club)

• 2 easy runs (1 3-miler and 1 5-miler)

• 1 speed work session (9x400)

• 1 spin session

• 2 strength workouts

• 1 yoga class

• foam rolling and stretching consistently

What are your workout goals for this week? Have you ever tried prepping food for the week?