A Tough 3-Miler

Yesterday I woke up and was a bit sour on my usual training schedule.  I mean, I’d just run FIVE MILES two days earlier…why should I have to run another three miles 48 hours later??  But, I’m one of those annoying people who feels the need to Stick To The Plan, so off I went on my three mile run at 7:30am.

I was excited, because the temps were pretty good compared to some of my past runs–only about 62 degrees. I’ll take that over 75 any day!  As I began to run, I was feeling really good…my pace was sub-10, and I didn’t feel at all like I was over-exerting myself.  This led me to decide that I was going to shoot to have all three of my splits (aka, miles) be sub-10.  As good as I felt, I thought, “That’ll be a breeze!”

Well, “breeze” was probably the key word, because when I turned around at mile 1.5 and headed back north, I was hit with said breeze full force. Holy crap!  I knew it wasn’t a very strong wind, but when you’re running straight into it, even a slight wind can make it feel like you’re running through a pool. I guess I’d figured out why the first mile and a half seemed so effortless. 😛

This turned out to be one of my hardest runs to date, believe it or not.  I really, really struggled toward the end, but of course, because I had set my goal to be sub-10 for all three splits, I couldn’t not try for it. Every step there at the end felt really hard, and when I finally got to the three-mile mark, I walked into the house, staggered through the kitchen and dining room, and collapsed on the coach while DS#1 brought me a glass of ice water.  (He was supposed to have it ready for me when I got home, but I guess I got home faster than he expected, lol!)

Here is how my splits ended up.

Look at that, sub-10 for all three miles!  I really worked for it, though.  Here’s is one of the wind gusts I saw when I got home.

I swear, it felt like it was 20 mph, but I guess it was only in the 10 mph range.  It got more windy as the day went on, so I was glad I’d done my run early.

I was not overly excited about my usual Monday weigh-in, since I had been travelling all weekend, and travel = bad food most of the time.  My menu for the weekend consisted of: breakfast at iHop with mom on Friday for 17 points; Mexican with my dad’s side of the family Friday night; party food on Saturday night, including…

I love lemon stuff, especially as a dessert.  I may or may not have had two of these on Saturday. (Though I did only have a bit of the frosting, since it had a lemon creme filling inside and that was more than enough lemon for me.) Sunday I had another point-heavy Starbucks biscotti, but I did take it easy with healthy Subway on the way home.  Sunday afternoon I took DS#1 to a hockey clinic (poor kid–he was exhausted after the busy weekend!), and I went easy for dinner Sunday night with chicken quesadillas on the grill.

After all that, I must admit I was surprised with the results of my weigh-in:

I lost sixth tenths of a pound! Not bad for a weekend where I had every manner of bad food imaginable.  😉  Last night, I decided to go healthy and also easy: I scoured the Internet until I found a quick, easy chicken pasta recipe that would incorporate the leftover grilled chicken from Sunday night’s quesadillas.  I modified a recipe I found at AllRecipes.com to make this:

My modifications included nixing the broccoli (which I’m not a huge fan of) and adding in diced green pepper and onion.  I also used fresh basil instead of dried, because that’s what I had, and I used red wine vinegar.  Mine has mostaccoli instead of spiral pasta as well.  I think my version is better than the one linked…plus, my picture is way prettier. 😉  It was a great summery kind of meal, cool and light and crunchy.  In fact, I had the leftovers for dinner again tonight!

The boys and I went for a 15-minute bike ride tonight.  Not the 45 minutes of cross-training I was supposed to do, but when you get home at 6:15 and still have to feed two kids and get to bed early, that’s what you get.  😛

Oh, and one final thought–the iPod mentioned last week is not responding well to treatment. 🙁  I feared that the rice bath would not be able to save it, since it went through an entire wash cycle.  I am not “pulling the plug” just yet, but it’s not looking good.   DS#1 already knows that he is not getting another one anytime soon, so I think he is resigned to the inevitable.  I hate disappointing him, but rules are rules!!

Thanks for reading!