Dates are my new energy food

I’ve been reading a lot of Brendan Frazier’s books and after reading Thrive and Fitness last week I decided to give dates a try because he uses them quite often in his recipes.

Here are the nutritional data for a single date (from MyFItnessPal):

1. Servings:  1 date, pitted 100 g

Calories	66	Sodium	0 mg
Total Fat	0 g	Potassium	167 mg
Saturated	0 g	Total Carbs	18 g
Polyunsaturated	0 g	Dietary Fiber	2 g
Monounsaturated	0 g	Sugars	16 g
Trans	0 g	Protein	0 g
Cholesterol	0 mg
Vitamin A	1%	Calcium	2%
Vitamin C	0%	Iron	1%

That’s a huge pack of carbs for a single date!  I was pretty surprised and decided to give them a go for my early morning workouts.  I found it great that it was a no brainer, just roll out of bed, pop about 4 dates and head out the door type of food.  A lot of my runs and swims have really benefited from eating dates, I had no stomach problems, and I got the instant energy within minutes!  Normally my energy levels significantly drop if I were to use regular gels, but this little piece of fruit has surpassed what any prepacked energy gel can do.  One instance was when I did a 10km yesterday, my energy level felt increased midway through my run and I was ready to keep going!  That never happens!

There are a lot of energy gels, sports drinks, etc in the Thrive and Fitness book.  I’ll definitely give some of the energy gels a try.  I also picked up a food processor to start making them ;)

What are some of your favourite energy foods?

Post Race Week Recap

WARNING ALERT:  MY BORING POST

This past week was really difficult.  My energy levels crashed completely for 3 days following the race.  It was a complete surprise for me considering that all my races up to this point were completely normal.  It definitely meant that my body was completely stressed throughout the duration of the race.

I forced myself to go to the gym on Wednesday night as much as my body pleaded not to go.  I did a full body strength workout and it really helped!  I was also super sore the next day so I guess it shows how much strength training I have been doing this time around *facepalm*  I’ll definitely keep in mind that strength cannot be an after thought–it’s essential to training.  I also did a swim on Thursday morning to get routine going again.  I really missed the pool during taper week.  I slept in on Friday by accident and I had plans to workout, but I was falling asleep by 6pm.  I rode my bike on my trainer for about 2 hours while watching Archer yesterday.  I was surprised that I only had a banana and lasted pretty much the entire workout.  I was planning on going for a run this morning, but I strained my right calf during my sleep =/

Some of the tris that I was planning on racing early in the season will probably not be done…I am going to join a Triathlon Club here in town and get some guidance before I feel ready to race again.  Currently I don’t feel ready…which sucks, but I was never in a rush to race :)

How has your week been?

Changing the swing of things

I realized how poorly written my previous post was…sorry!  I am very used to writing technical documents, so it comes off as very factual.  It’ll take me a while to get back into my writing style.

After reflecting for the past few days on recent half-marathon I ran and some of the long term goals I have, I really need more help.  I really feel like I have plateau’d and tumbling downhill with my training regardless of what I do.  Although I have a lot of resources nutrition and running wise, I am still very lost.  I gained 12lbs (I would like to think muscle, but I don’t know for sure), my times are starting to get really slow, and regardless of what I eat, it hasn’t helped me improve: I would feel like fainting, tired, too hungry, or come up with a lot of stomach issues, there has never been a happy place with my eating/training.

For my last Tanita measurement, I had about 22-26% body fat at about 142lbs.  I am a girl all about efficiencies and carrying all this extra fat/unwanted fat is not helping me at all.  I think my goal for the summer is to fix my nutrition and lean out.  I’ll be measuring my progress by my athletic performance and how I feel rather than the number on the scale…it’s probably (mentally) healthier that way.  I try not to own a scale for that reason.

Having said all that, I am currently scoping trainers/coaches to help me out.  I am contacting people who are more runners/triathletes to get me started.  Thinking about the cost is pushing me away, but establishing a base again that I can always fall back to would be worth it.

I’ll update this blog regarding my quest to achieving my goals–who knows, maybe I can do it this time with a little guidance and coaching!

What changes are you making to better suit your goals?

Race Report: Toronto Marathon 2013

This is my first race in over a year (last year I did the marathon).  I had a lot of mixed feelings about the whole event.

Saturday (Race Kit Pick Up)
Going to the Direct Energy Centre, I was really pumped for a huge venue full of vendors and booths, but to my surprise, there was even less than last year!  I was pretty disappointed because seeing a small expo tones down my excitement for the race.  I think I might be used to the Waterfront marathon expo where it blows my mind.

I managed to grab some Moving Comfort bras from The Runners Shop for 30% off.  They felt wonderful and I will definitely do a review of them later.

Chris, Mark and I grabbed lunch at Kinton Ramen for the carb loading meal.  I got the Shoyu Ramen bowl:

(I had to mention it because I have pictures of it :)–isn’t your mouth watering?)

I met up with Kirsten, Jon, and Mike to chill out for the rest of the day and it really helped to calm my nerves (I was really stressed out the previous week about anything race related I could think of, so having familiar faces to talk to really helped.)

Sunday (Race day)
I woke up at 4:30am feeling really calm and not stressed at all.  Chris and I ate breakfast, got dressed and cabbed to the shuttle buses.  Still calm.  The long bus ride to the start was still calming for me and I was fine up until maybe 15 minutes before the gun went off.  I don’t know if it was the combination of my body just releasing all my fluids at once (from all the salt yesterday???) or my nerves, but I kinda felt like I needed to use the washroom.  I didn’t think much of it because I often feel like I had to pee when I start getting nervous–WRONG.  I really needed to go pee.

1-6km
Hong passed by me within the first km and he seems to do this to me every race–not sure how he always recognizes me from behind lol.

This length was probably the worst past of my race.  It was really hot.  There was no shade at all.  I was already dehydrated because every single fluid just rushed to my bladder.  My legs were not working properly.  They maintained a 5:20min/km pace but my legs were not feeling fresh at all, they were really weighted down, struggling to pull through.  After passing many porta potties, I decided it was time to use it, I really couldn’t hold it any longer….and I became dehydrated.  I also lost my salt sticks so any form of electrolytes were gone.

7-11km
I saw the 2:00 run/walk and 2:00 continuous bunnies next to me and I HAD to make sure they stayed behind.  I got a boost from my Vega Sport gels and picked up the pace a little, but it was still too hot.  I couldn’t do continuous anymore so back to 10:1 (even though I never trained with them this time).  My shoe laces also came undone–not having a good day because everything that happened never happened before.

I got a really good boost at 10km and was able to push for 5min/km.

12-15km
I was VERY scared at this point.  My body was suffering from heat exhaustion, I could barely move, I had to do more walk breaks and my pace went down to 7min/km.  I was really struggling and tried to keep my hopes up.  The 2:00 hour pacers passed me around 14km.

16-21.1km
It finally got cooler and I was able to pick up my pace back to 5min/km to try to make up for lost time.  The heat was still getting to me, so I had to take unscheduled walk breaks.  The shade really helped and boosted my morale a bit, but I lost my salt sticks and my CamelBak was dangerously low.  I sweated out everything and the pace band that I wore was completely soaked in my sweat that I took it off and tossed it aside around 16-17km.  By 20km, my CamelBak was completely empty, nothing left on me and the last station was at the finish line.  My asthma started to creep up on me too so while I was digging in my Camelbak for my puffer, I found an unopened e-load pack *BIGGEST FACE PALM EVER*  At this point it was no use to me, so I tried to go as quickly as I could, but I could only maintain around 5:20min/km.

Turning onto Lakeshore, I heard the crowd get much louder and I began sprinting towards the end (my legs had so much energy left–why didn’t they work earlier!?).

I made it in 2:05:41.  I’m not really upset, but I am glad I made it out ok.

A shot of everyone at the end with all big smiles :)

Everyone definitely came out a superstar!  I was proud of Chris because he finished in 2:23:00 (how often do you finish with an even number?) and he managed well even though his furthest distance was 12km!

Overall, the race was ok.  The race organization is not consistent.  Last year I had a blast, this year not so much.  I still recommend that everyone do this race (if you’re closeby).  It’s definitely something to do!

Time to Personalize!

So, hello.  I guess it goes to show that I am really bad at blogging (heh).  I have a feeling because I’m generally a really private person and I bottle a lot of my emotions and nothing ends up here.  I do feel bad because a lot of my posts are very dry in nature just giving facts and very little of how I feel about my training, eating, etc.  I’m also not an expert either, so I feel really bad for posting advice/facts on my blog for people to follow when I was never educated in this field.

I will definitely try to personalize my posts more because resources are all over the internet and it makes no sense for me to  repost everything here.  I do admit that I am really scared about posting ‘me’ on the internet.  For the most part I had a lot of issues in the past that I still can’t let go.  If I were to do that ‘Draw my Life’ video on Youtube that everyone is doing, I think I would cry through most of it.  I was bullied a lot, my parents didn’t know how to handle these situations other than to tell me to shrug it off (I guess I can’t really blame them since they lived much harder lives when they were young and my issues were probably just minuscule compared to theirs).  I thought that being in university would be much better, but not so much.  I made a friend in first year who eventually scarred me by the end and made me lose a lot of trust in everyone.  I wasn’t very good at being assertive back then and looking back, I would’ve given this friend a piece of my mind if I had the proper mindset like I do today.  I am not going to go into details because that’s just plain mean, but it still hurts me today.  Since I haven’t seen her/him, my life has gotten a tiny bit better, I still have a ton of trust issues in expressing how I feel giving myself a robotic, lone wolf presence.

I’ve tried to be the lone wolf for a long time, but I need my pack.  There are things I can’t do alone and it would be nice to trust in others again.  It would be nice to have companions that I can rely on and not have them outcast me…for being me.

…I felt really awkward about writing this, but I feel a bit better :)

Lessons Learned and still adapting

A while back I spoke to a trainer (who was in the business for 10 years) said it was best to build muscle during my off months and eventually ease up/do little strength training while I train cardio more.  I gave it a shot and I going into month 2, I really don’t like the results I am seeing at all.  I’ve put on some weight and I don’t feel any different cardio wise.  I will be getting back into strength training because one of my goals was have an efficient body–meaning that I carry as little as possible.

I know that I still have a month left before the half marathon in May, but I am fairly optimistic that things will be good on race day.  I am really excited because it kick starts my training season.  Regardless if I get a PB or not, I am super pumped to get behind a start line again–it’s so much fun!

I am still on the search for my bike.  I’ve been to some stores and currently they are waiting on 2013 models.  A lot of them are selling $5000 bikes in my size!  Soon…….I feel like I am searching for my better half.

Learning to cook and Taking it Easy

Currently my dinner consists of: two eggs and a sticky rice wrapped in bamboo leaves otherwise known as Zongzi.  I wasn’t planning on eating this, but there are many deadlines due this that I’ve been starting to stay at work late and very little time to cook.

Don’t let the title confuse you, I know how to cook, but not properly.  My eating is still not super great, it’s not easy to think of making delicious food after coming home around dinner time.  After browsing /r/askculinary, I decided to work on my cooking techniques, so I could whip up anything in a tight pinch without spending an hour sifting through recipes.  I got a library card and went all Hermione on some suggested books.  My goal is to eventually like to cook again, and to eat properly.

I really enjoy learning about techniques so far…it takes things and puts them at a scientific level so it’s easier to grasp!

My coworker will start teaching me new techniques to improve my swimming.

I’ve decided to take it a little easy this week.  My body was struggling a lot last week to run, so it needs to chillax for a week and I can get back into it properly.  I guess it works out since it’s crazy week.