What I will miss from the Summer

First off I would like to say I am so grateful that Hurricane Irene turned into a tropical storm by the time she hit NYC.  There was definitely some damage but nothing too bad. Secondly I am feeling much more back into training this week.  Last week I was just feeling burnt out and ready for a break but am happy that this week is going so much better.

Monday Track workout
10 min warm up
6 x 800m @ 3:23 with 1:30 RI
How it went down
10 min warm up
3:19, 3:16, 3:18, 3:22, 3:21, 3:23
For my RI I just walked the 200m to my next starting point on the track.

This is what I have decided about the RI.  What they suggest in the Run Less Run Faster plan is just not happening.  I need more recovery time and I am ok with that.  I was tired by the end of these but glad I got them done.

I am also following the 3:40 speed work plan but then doing my long runs on the 3:30 plan.  I am doing this because I have strength in endurance not speed.  So I tweeked it a little to really push myself to the next level.  I know that is not how it is supposed to go down but I am really liking it this way so I am going to stick with it.  Hopefully I will come in between 3:30 and 3:40.


Rest of the Week-
Tuesday - I did P90X Back and Biceps (I don't have a pull up bar so I just lift more weights)
Today I am doing 8 miles with 6 at 8:05 pace
Thursday - Finally going to do Insanity!  I have been hesitant because there is a lot of jumping and I know my downstairs neighbor doesn't really love the noise I make :)
Friday-It's my birthday so I might do a little Tracy Anderson girly style!
Saturday- 13 miles @8:15 Boo-YA! A short long run!

The cooler weather is setting in and I love it!  It feels so nice to run outside when you don't break into a sweat after just one block.  But I will say I am going to miss a few things about summer and here they are....

16 Handles

Fruit/Veggie Smoothies (I don't crave them that much when it's cold)

Sparkling Water (ok I will prbly still keep drinking this one :))

Refreshing Summer Salads

The last two I will keep in my diet most likely but I probably won't have them as much.  When winter hits I turn into a hot and warm comfort foods kinda gal.

How about you??  What will you miss about summer?

XX
Sarah

My day

Since I have no training advice or insight to what I am training for these days ... since I have still not signed up for anything I will just let you know what I did yesterday.

Ran 4 miles

Sorted through school supplies

Took a little flight to check on the stuff I have in storage while we are living in the apartment.  I have the best co pilot

Only to find half of the stuff I had there with mold growing on it.  The day we moved it was raining and I am sure some of the stuff got damp.  Well I should have gone back and checked on it sooner... this is just some of the stuff that we can't save.  And the funny thing is that it is stored in the cleanest hanger I have ever seen.  I feel bad my stuff has now tainted it.

To end the day we went to the fair for family night.  The kids loves going and would go again if we would take them.  I made me a sandwich before we went so that I didn't over eat fried food.

But after we saw animals...went on rides... people watched I got one of these cones.  The thing I wait all year for.  A pineapple raspberry twist in a waffle cone.  Dole whip.  It was worth the wait.

We stayed until way past all of our bedtimes.  But is was fun and a nice cool night so it was so worth it.  The rest of my week is going to just be getting ready for school to start.  Need to pack up some of the summer clothes and get out the school clothes.  Go buy stuff for school lunches.  Anyone got any good school lunch ideas?  

-Heather

Monday FunDay

I returned from Minnesota last night exhausted and very full from all the eating. Came home, unpacked and went straight to bed. Who knew walking all over the fair eating all kinds of foods would be so exhausting.

This pic to the left is a piece of cheesecake dipped in chocolate. it was so good. I don't normally love cheesecake but for whatever reason this was delish.

I am now into workout week #3 of my FIRST training plan. Here is how it's gonna go down.

Monday: Total Conditioning

Tuesday: 1 Mile warmup followed by a downhill ladder...typically I am used to going "Up" a ladder. But hey, I am not going to discriminate and starting with the longest interval first sounds kind of nice =)

         1x1200, 1x1000, 1x800, 1x600, 1x400 and 1x200

Wednesday: Swim for 1 hr. I typically ride my bike this day but I have been feeling my IT band while biking and felt it a little on my run last Saturday so I am going to give the bike a rest.... I may need some kind of strange adjustment.

Thursday: 7 miles with 1 mile warmup 5 miles at 8:05 pace and 1 mile easy

Friday: Not sure yet... either total conditioning or another swim.  

Saturday: 17 Miles around a 9:00 minute mile. My 15 miler felt so good last week I am interested to see how this one feels. I hope all my long runs feel great but as most of us runners know some just feel like crap.

I am also going to be cooking a lot this week (now that I have a menu) so hopefully I cook up some good treats! For dinner tonight, it is Roman Style Chicken. I haven't made this recipe before so I'll let you know how it is. But I typically find Giada recipes delish.

Happy Running and may you Monday be a funday.  -Jen


What is everyone else cooking for dinner?

How did Hurricane/Tropical Storm Irene turn out for everyone?
-We are SO glad Sarah and Scott are A.O.K and the only damage they have are water bubbles in there wall.... which apparently have shown up during previous rain storms.... Sarah, maybe call your landlord? that doesn't sound too normal.  Check out the pic here.

Is everyone ready for Fall?
-I am, I am ready for cool crisp air and pretty leaves. I love fall

My Run Before Hurricane Irene

First and foremost I got insanity in the mail!!  I haven't tried it yet but I am going to start next week.  Anyone have any suggestions where to start?

Now to the matter at hand. Yes, hurricane Irene is headed this way.  No, I wasn't planning on going for my full 20 miles but I still wanted to get a run in before the rain.  I really wanted to go around the city and take picture of everything before she hits.  I didn't pay attention to time but I did stop my watch every time I took a picture.   This allowed me to keep a pretty good pace.  I came in at 12 miles at a 8:30 avg. pace.

 If you walk directly out of my apartment into the street and look down you can see this. Yes we are close to the water.  That cross street is considered Zone A then we are in Zone C, not sure where B went but I guess we should be ok because they only evacuated Zone A.

I have been wanted to take a picture of this forever! This is on the Williamsburg Bridge coming into the city.  See the rainbow tiles on each overhead bar.  So cool right?!  I love them!

I headed towns the World Trade Center building so I ran through Chinatown. All of these people are waiting for the Chinatown bus that will take them to D.C.

World Trade. The biggest concern here is the large cranes.  You can only see a couple here but there are a total of 13! The cranes are not meant for Hurricane winds.  For the past 2 days they have been securing them but we will see what happens there.

This is a picture from the pier right about Battery Park City which has been evacuated.  Mostly likely it will be underwater after this is over.  This is also the edge of the Hudson River that goes into the ocean.  If you look closely you will see the Statue of Liberty.  The waters were very calm and kind of creepy.  The city was very quite this morning.  People are not really sure what to expect.

More from Battery Park.

Good luck Lilac ship!

Good luck to these boats as well.  I mean I am not really sure why people did move them up river further but maybe they are out of town.  Think these ones might have a tough time.

Restaurants and Convient Stores are now all being boarded and taped up!

A lot of people who don't live here think that the people who are staying are nuts.  I can see why they would think that.  Just remember a lot of people here have no where to go.  This is all they have.  There are 8 million people in the city alone and I can tell you a lot of them are still here.  Keep us in your prayers!  It is foretasted to be sunny on Monday, I am looking forward to that.

Hope you all have a good weekend!

XX

Sarah

The winner is....

Congrats!!  Today is your lucky day.  Email me your info and we will get your goodies sent out to you!
Happy Friday everyone.  All of you on the east coast be safe this weekend!!  Watch out for Irene.
-Heather

Long Run and The Great Minnesota Get-Together

I am about to run out the door and do my 15 miler. I woke up at 4am today in order to blog, eat breakfast and be on the road running by 5:20. I have to be back no later then 8 and then I have to hurry up and shower and be ready to roll to the airport by 9. I am off to Minnesota to enjoy The Minnesota State Fair. It is definitely one of a kind. You can find pretty much any food on the planet deep fried and put on a stick. There is also your fair share of non-fried foods but alas I would not consider most of them "healthy choices". =) Realizing I was going to be totally overdoing it food wise this weekend I thought it would be a good idea to get my hard workouts done early in the week. That way I hopefully avoid making 20 bathroom stops while on my 15 miler.

Here is the low-down on my workouts so far:

Monday: Total Conditioning class
Tuesday: 12x400's with 1:30 recovery between each one. I averaged a 1:36 for all repeats with my fastest being last. (I always like the fastest to be last, so when it happens I am happy =))
Wednesday: 22 Mile bike ride with some pushups and pullups
Today: 15 miler @ around a 9:00 mile. I would like to run this a little faster, but we'll see how I feel. I am not too worried about it.

Then I leave for MN. Friday I'll be doing some cross training.
Saturday: 7 miles with 5@ 8:20

On a side note, food has been on my mind lately and I am happy because I finally created a menu for myself that is gonna last me through September. If I don't have a menu then all bets are off and for dinner it is cereal or PB&J. Here is some stuff I have made in the last few days.

I realize Sarahs Egg Sandwich looked delicious in the previous post but I would have to say.... this might be better.  Hickey smoked bacon and Buttermilk Pancakes smothered in peanut butter topped with maple syrup. Delish. (Heather is who taught me to put peanut butter on pancakes and waffles and if I haven't said so before, THANKYOU)

Crock pot roast beef sandwich. Along with fruit and a grilled asparagus and tomato salad sprinkled with rock salt and pepper. Oh, and some baked chips =) Delish #2.

Spinach salad with all the normal veggies, grilled chicken and to sweeten it a bit I grilled pears and apples with a little bit of rock salt and sprinkled with cinnamon. Delish #3. (I really like rock salt lately. I also have a weird infatuation with my grill....)

Now go enter the Giveaway if you haven't already and eat some treats. I surely will be doing plenty of that the next few days.

Happy Running -Jen

Does anyone else out there have an amazing state fair they attend?
They call this one, The Great Minnesota Get Together =)


Who else needs a menu in order to cook?
If I don't have one, I wait until 6 o'clock when my family is starving and wonder what to do...

I almost took a week off.... oh yeah and an EARTHQUAKE!

So Tuesday morning I woke at the crack of dawn to run my 20 miler. (normally I go on Saturdays but we are thinking about camping this weekend so I needed to get it done)After an hour of dilly dally I made up my mind that I wasn't going to do it.  Even though I would be back around 9-9:30 it would completely wear me out and ruin my whole day I just knew it (or at least this is what I kept telling myself).

I was dreading it so I crawled back in bed to hear my husband say that I should at least do something??  What!? Boy this upset me so I got up and did P90X back and biceps.  Then when he finally woke I told him that I was burnt out and really needed a week off from running.

It was settled... I was taking the week off and only doing workout videos.  As the day progressed I kept thinking about running.  It was interfering with my work thoughts.  It was driving me nuts!!  Needless to say by the time 6:30 rolled around I was out the door doing my tempo run.  It looks like the aftermath of Irene is going to hit this weekend so that means no camping.  Which means back to my 20 miler on Saturday.

So in the end I didn't end up taking the week off.  I guess as much as I would like to sometimes, when I am in training I just can't seem to relax.

This is the breakdown...
6 miles with 5 miles at 7:50
Mile 1 - 8:51
Mile 2 - 7:41
Mile 3 - 7:47
Mile 4 - 7:49
Mile 5 - 7:52
Mile 6 - 7:27

Done and Done!

I know I look super cool here with my socks and all but I had this set up going on for a shoot so I thought I would capture myself after my run.

Breakfast for dinner I say..

My version of a "healthy egg sandwich" although there is still bacon and cheese so I wouldn't say it is that healthy.  But I cook the bacon in the microwave on this tray that allows all the grease to drip off and makes it super crispy.  I love it.

Whole Wheat English Muffins
Crispy Bacon
Scrambled Eggs with Cheddar and Mozzerella mixed in.

Salt and Pepper and Done!
Simple, fast and delish!

These are my most favorite English Muffins EVER!

Please don't be grossed out!  I just wanted to show you how much grease comes off!

SO GOOD!

I did Tracy Anderson on Monday and will be doing something tomorrow I don't know what yet. Insanity was supposed to come today and it didn't.  Totally lame so I am not sure what I will do.  Thursday will be my track workout, Friday maybe Tracy again and Saturday will be the dreaded 20 miler at 8:45 pace.

In other crazy news an EARTHQUAKE was felt in NYC yesterday.  I was working in my studio when I realized things were shaking.  At first I was like.. "What are they doing to this building?" And then I realized no this was definitely something else.  It was small and thankfully everything was ok and no one was hurt but then it got me to thinking about what if.....  and I don't even want to go there because it just freaks me out!

Do you ever take a week off??

Don't forget to enter our awesome GIVEAWAY!!

XX
Sarah

Caffeine Cleanse

I am on a Caffeine Cleanse.  I love the stuff.  I love the little energy it gives you.  But I think that I was intaking more then I should and it wasn't then working that great when I really needed it to.  So I have cut it from my diet for a while.  I have not had any for two weeks tomorrow...well I must admit that I did have a little diet pepsi the other night at the movie.  My husband and I went and saw The Help... and I almost feel asleep twice so I had to drink a little.  But other then that I have been pretty good.  I am totally getting sick of drinking just water so I have been all about looking for other drinks to have that are not full of sugar and calories.  This is what I have found.

Anyone see a drink that I missing that I need to try?  Would love to hear what you guys are drinking!
-Heather

Run like a Girl and a Giveaway Basket... just another Monday =)

First and foremost, I can't wait to recommend this book. Run Like a Girl by Mina Samuels. Here are a few words that describe how I felt while reading it: Inspired, happy, captivated and peaceful. This book touches on some of the "hurdles" that we as women have had to overcome for equality in sports. It reminds you how the confidence you build in your sports can and most likely, (whether you realize it or not) play a role in your daily life. A few topics she covers within its pages are: the everlasting chore of finding balance, enjoying camaraderie, finding peace, everlasting friendships and as she calls it, "Chicking the Boys" =). There are numerous stories of women who have used their sports to motivate and challenge themselves to move out of there comfort zone. In the bottom of the first page of the Introduction she writes,

In the words of the French philosopher and writer, Adre Gide, "[Wo]man cannot discover new oceans unless [s]he has the courage to lose sight of the shore."

I really liked this book and I highly recommend it. I was given this book for free but I promise that this opinion is entirely my own. I am always hankering for a good inspiring book to read and I really feel like she nailed it. 

Now its time for the GIVEAWAY OF GIVEAWAYS!!!!! I apologize to any guys out there who read our blog because this giveaway is for the girls.  We wanted this giveaway to in some way represent all three of us individually.

1. A copy of the book Run Like A Girl by Mina Samuels

2. One 1lb Tub of Advocares Spark Energy Drink. Yum.

3. Five honey sticks in a variety of flavors =)

AND, thats right.... this is a giveaway basket.....

4. The Dixon dress from Edelweiss by Sarah. 

So enter this giveaway of giveaways and here is how you can get more then 1 entry.

-follow our blog

-mention and link this giveaway on your blog

please no more then 2 comments per person. The winner of this Giveaway will be chosen in random order on Friday august 26th.

Good luck! I'm jealous.

-Jen

Busy Summer...

This week has been a busy one and it is not over yet!  This afternoon we have to drive the 2-3 hours (depending on traffic) to CT for a friends wedding.  Because we have stuff to do on Sunday we have to drive back tonight!  Whoa! But anyways, I probably going to wear THIS.

 Sometimes I feel like summer can be misleading, it is supposed to be slow and relaxing and I feel like this summer has been nothing short of hectic.  So I have had to go into the city more often to get stuff from the garment district.  I met Scott for lunch one day while I was there, I am pretty sure it rained later that day.  How's the weather where you are?  It has been raining like crazy here.

Then I desperately needed some shelves for my work studio so I ran out to ikea (drove really, not ran :))  While I was there I always look at stuff I want but not really going to buy.  Like these new dressers.  I don't really love white furniture but I am really liking these.  What do you think?

Voila! Can you see the shelves behind my dress forms?  I finally put all the boxes together last night so I will be all set for the weeks to come.

Last night I had to go into the city once again and so I just met Scott in Union Square so we could eat dinner(whole foods salad) and have our usual 16 handles for dessert.  This time I decided enough with the fruit and tart stuff, I went straight for the unhealthy toppings.  I mean you really need to change it up once in a while, right?!

 

Confession, with Summer being so crazy I haven't been able to blog around that much.  But I am excited for fall.  With a new season comes a new routine.

I am about to head out this morning for my 18 miles at 8:45 pace.  I slept in a little but I think I needed the sleep so I am ok with that.   Getting so excited for the Giveaway on Monday!  I know you guys will love it!!
PS Don't forget to enter the Giveaway with Gourmet Runner! With training season in full swing you will not want to miss what she is giving away.

Hope you guys have a wonderful weekend!  Any fun plans besides the usual long run?

XX
Sarah

Salad for Breakfast

I am in a breakfast rut.  Getting sick of the same old eggs, bananas, protein shakes, toast and whatever else I usually manage to whip up.  The other week when my sisters and I were together we went to Whole Foods and got a salad for breakfast.  It was SO GOOD!   I was a little hesitant at first but wow... I wish I had one right now.  So nice and refreshing.   I could eat the entire thing and not feel guilty.  Love that about salads. If only I could have a Whole Food salad bar close to where I live.  I am sure that I would hit it up a lot.

We also ordered a green smoothie to share and to wash our salads down with.  It was pretty good.  I am not a huge smoothie person so sharing one is just enough for me.

Now on to today... Went to the gym for the 5:30 Burnout class.  It was hard like always.  Now I am just waiting for my sitter to get here so I can go for a run.  How I have been missing being able to go to the gym and run in the same day.  With the kids home for the summer those days have been few and far between.  But the air here is turning cooler in the mornings so I can't wait to get out and run when it isn't super hot.  And then the rest of the day is going to be spent at the pool.  There are not to many days left for the pool which is a little... ok a lot depressing.  

Happy Friday!!

-Heather