Hope you had a lovely holiday, if you celebrate Christmas, and a lovely day off if you don't. I had a fantastic time relaxing at home in the Pacific Northwest with my family. If you follow me on Instagram, you might have noticed a few sunset and beach snapshots. I got really lucky and it only rained once during my time in WA, so my family took full advantage and got out every single day.
Unfortunately, I wasn't so good with the whole "taking pictures of people" thing. We were too busy eating, I guess...
My dad made a delicious paella for Christmas eve dinner, and Christmas day we had a Thanksgiving-style meal. Friday we had a big lunch with my old piano teacher and surrogate grandmother, and Saturday we feasted on tamales and homemade guacamole. Oh, right, and there was some great gift-giving, too! (Clearly we're a food-focused family.) I am now officially 100% stocked on running gear and have no excuse to buy anything in 2014, other than new shoes.
I flew back to NYC yesterday, and I'm back at work today. I have New Years off and am so excited to run the New York Road Runners 4 Mile New Year's Eve Midnight Run Race on Tuesday night! I'm not sure what this week will look like workout-wise, but starting next Monday, I'll be back in training mode. The NYC Half is only 10 weeks away!
Workout Recap
Monday: Rest day (travel).
Tuesday: 3.4 miles along my favorite running path at Semiahmoo Park.
We got out to the park around dusk after picking my mom up from work. It was pretty dark, but it wasn't too cold and I was so happy to be running on my favorite running path again that I kept a really fast pace (for me). The path is only a mile long, but it's one of the prettiest places in the county, so I never mind running back and forth along it.
Wednesday: 5 miles at Semiahmoo Park.
Christmas day miles, again at an extremely speedy (for me) sub-9:00 pace. It must have been the Christmas
Thursday: (1) 60 minute yoga class (2) 60 minute boot camp class.
In addition to a 2 mile walk, I took my dad's morning yoga class and accompanied my mom to her boot camp class. It's a program that meets every weekday from 7:30-8:30 PM. The boot camp seemed sort of like CrossFit, from what I've read (I've never actually been to a CrossFit "box").
The class first warmed up for about 5 minutes by running up and down stairs and doing inchworms across the floor, then did a roughly 40 minute workout of the day -- a 12 days of Christmas-style workout starting with one stretch, two flights of stairs, three lunge jumps, etc., all the way up to 12. We finished with 12 minutes of the Thursday workout: three rounds of four exercises, trying to see how many reps of each exercise we could do in a minute. I was sore the next day! I'd never done a "man maker" before, and we did about 50 altogether (slightly adapted from this guide -- no single arm row or second push-up).
Friday: (1) 2 mile run (2) 60 minute boot camp class.
It rained most of Friday, but the sun came out around 2:30 PM, and we decided we had to get out to Semiahmoo one more time. We got lucky and the sunset was stunning. I was sore from Thursday's workout but had promised my mom I'd also attend the Friday night boot camp, so I did two slow recovery miles to try to get my muscles moving.
The second boot camp class wasn't quite as intense, thank goodness, since I was extremely sore, but it still had me dripping sweat. These classes are no joke! (If you happen to live in the Bellingham area and are interested, the program is only $180 for 6 weeks, which averages out to $6/class. Kind of amazing! Here's the website.)
Saturday: (1) 75 minute yoga class (2) 4.4 mile walk.
It's incredible what yoga can do for sore, tired muscles. I have to remember this and make sure I get to yoga classes during half-marathon training!
My parents and I finished the day by taking a long walk along Bellingham Harbor and, once again, we saw a beautiful sunset.
Sunday: Rest day (travel).
How was your Christmas? Do you have a favorite running path near your parents' home?
Sorry I'm not sorry about "liking" basically every picture from Washington. ;) That's awesome you're doing the midnight run! A few coworkers have talked about doing it, but no one has signed up yet; I'll do my best to convince everyone it will be fun. :) Here we go, final week of 2013--it's almost time to train!
ReplyDeleteI have obviously been stalking your amazing pictures this whole time. That's awesome that you were able to join your mom for her workouts...they seem intense! Nice job!
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