Monthly Archives: October 2011

Halloween Joys

By Posted in Breakfast, Food, Pumpkin, Recipe Tagged , , , , 17 Comments

Happy Halloween! 

As some of you guys know-Halloween is my favourite Holiday because you can acceptably dress like a hooker and be crazy.  Just kidding, but it is certainly one of my favourites.

This year I was Nicki Minaj.  Oh glory days.  How in the world I was convinced to go out after being a bus for 8 hours is beyond me but I did and it was fun.  I chose to not to drink, and watch the drama unfold of parties.  It’s hilarious to watch you know.  Boys being sleezy, girls being grimey grimers, ya know.

This is what I assume Nicki looks like when rapping superbass

I stayed out until roughly 1 drove someone home on my way and slept until 9.  Why can’t I sleep in?

But that is enough of my Halloween adventures.  I’m not going out tonight again too-although I’m sure I’ll be getting up Tuesday at 5:30 and see a few stragglers getting home from their Halloween parties.

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As many of you know…I have a weird obsession with pumpkin.  It’s just so good.  I have to tell you my other favorite reason pumpkin is amazing.  It automatically makes anything you cook good.

For instance, take pumpkin pancakes:

You could overcook them and they could be hard and crusty.

But the middle will still be so moist because of the pumpkin.

You guys all know my pumpkin pancake recipe over here…

I’ve tweaked it a little bit actually to include:

2 tablespoons of brown sugar

No really it makes all the difference

½ cup flour

1 scoop protein powder

1 packet sweetener

2 tablespoons brown sugar

½ cup pumpkin

½ cup water

1 egg

Mix, pour and griddle it up.  ;)

Well-I’ve got a date with children and passing out candy. 

Question for you:

What are your plans for Halloween today?

What is the next festive pancake for the win? 

XC Championship Race 6k

By Posted in Food, Running Tagged , , , , , , 11 Comments

It didn’t make a public announcement but this weekend was my biggest cross country race of the season.  In fact, it was a 6k versus a 5k but anyways-it was also a lovely 7 hours away.  Good thing I don’t have class on Fridays and didn’t have to miss any of them.

Let me begin with saying, championship style races for cross country are no joke.  They are NEVER flat, and they are never easy.  Girls (like myself) that could run <20 5ks, are normally running 22 minute 5ks on these courses.  I’m not complaining because I enjoy the courses. It was a 6k on tap and my motto is awkward distances always make for a good PR.  (right…I know catchy) :)

So it started on Friday morning with a team shakeout run, followed a by a delicious bagel from the baglary.  I am in love with these guys and the fact that it is literally about a 5 minute walk from my house does not make it any easier.   But really smoked salmon + cream cheese+ bagel

Smoked salmon bagel.

Then add a 7 hour drive to New York City. 

Yes, New York State is that big and we were driving from one side to other.  (Don’t worry-I didn’t know either until I went to school up here lolz).

We have a team tradition where we decorate team sports bras for our big championship race.  Since I’m an art major after all, I drew my entire team on the back of my bra.  I also deemed it appropriate to give them all nicknames.  Right on.  My nicknames are pretty creative.  For instance my nickname for one of our girls on our team who has firey red hair was MS Fire  (MS being her initials…)

And onto to the morning.  It was cold.  It was snowing.  The course was frozen over and it was hilly.  All championesc qualities of racing.  We aren’t allowed to wear long sleeves or leggings or anything that ventured away from the uniform.  You could wear hats and gloves but that is about it.  Team uniforms are pretty strict and the weather gets really dicey at this time in the season.   We had really good luck last year with races and really poor luck this year.  Eh toss up.

A great quality photo from my phone...

The race started on an open field.  Decently flat.  Somewhat muddy.  My first mile was a 6:45.  I wasn’t sure how I felt about it, so I began to make my move.  (Who am I to even use these terms?).

Up and up and up and freaking up we climbed.  This was the steepest part of the course was between mile 1-2.  It was almost straight up uphill.  I wish I could tell you I didn’t enjoy it or it sucked but I run so far on my toes that uphills make me pretty happy.  My second split was a 7:30 when we were climbing the entire time and I passed about 10 girls.

At the top of the hill, almost like the heavens were singing to me…I saw her.

Incase you don’t know, I have a pretty nasty grudge against a girl that spiked me last season.  I also have a pretty nasty scar from it too.  It makes me look intense (or so I tell myself).  I don’t hold many life grudges but when you get spiked which causes you to trip, roll your ankle and bleed profusely, you get up and vow revenge on the girl.  I mean calm down and wait till next season.

You can better believe I pretty much believe I powered through that third mile and left my comfort zone and flew down the down hills.  These aren’t just easy inclines, these are more of-you may or may not trip and fall if you run like a chicken with it’s head cut off.

But I took that risk and I passed her.  My third mile split was 6:59. 

And then just powered through the nearly flat terrain that was the last .75.  My teammates were located around that point cheering like it was their job.  It was really is something else.  I love it.

My final time was 26:39 (which averages to 7:10 pace or so).  With the hills, frozen tundra, not tripping and dying, and blasting by m y grudge worthy opponent-I am happy.  Very happy.  I did exactly what I wanted to do with this race.  I took it out a manageable pace and didn’t let anything bother me.  I kept passing girls instead of dying and taking it out way to fast.

My goal for our championship race in 2 weeks is to break the 7:00 minute pace.  I think I can with another nice taper and a few speed workouts (also a more flat course).

And to end…I still love running. 

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Question for you:

  1. Where does your biggest source of motivation come from?

For me it comes from a lot of places, people and things  My family is very supportive, the drive to do better and the fact that I love running.  My teammates are so supportive and great as well.

  1. Are you one to hold grudges?

I don’t have grudges against very many people in life. It’s not really my jive.  I get over things pretty quickly.  I normally get along with 99% of people, but I have a couple people that I just don’t jive with.

College Swimming

By Posted in Reads, Swimming Tagged , , 17 Comments

Confession of the day: I typed this blog out quite some time ago and never actually posted it.  I didn’t want to post it until I was completely sure of one thing and one thing only.

That swimming and I were getting along. 

And we are becoming closer and closer.  Gone on a few dates and been okay so I figured it was acceptable to talk about more swimming on the blog.

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I know a lot of people know a decent amount of swimming (ie: survival skills) but I am forever getting questions (on and off the blog) about how swimmers actually compete and what that entails.  I don’t mind though because I actually like talking and teaching about swimming.  I am a certified instructor after all ;)

For my runners-think of a swim meet like a track meet.  You have the sprinters who run like the 100 meter and you have different people that run the 2 mile.  That is why the teams are so big, because not everyone can swim/run every single thing.  You also even more different people who are discus throwers (right?) and hurdlers…lots of different events and no one person is exceptional at every single thing.

It’s kind of like that for swimming (although I think there is more overlap).

To clarify-there are four competitive strokes.

Freestyle.

Backstroke.

Breastroke.

Butterfly.

In college we race anything from a 50-1650 (also known as the mile).

But you don’t race a mile of butterfly(dear god).

The freestylers race the following:

50

100

200

500

1000

1650

Generally there are three different sets of swimmers that belong to this group the class freestyle. 

You have the sprinters who only swim the 50 and 100.  They are fast and like little sparkplugs.  They could swim no yards and still whip out the same times.  (Why can’t distance swimmers be like that wahh).

You have the mid distance, who in my opinion deserve the most credit.  They have to remain fast but for longer distances and swim the 200 and 500. They do a mixture of sprint workouts and distance workouts.  Both of these events are my least favorite actually.

Then finally you have distance.  (That’s me!).  They swim either the 1000 or the mile because both are not offered every meet.  I mean who really wants to pay attention to 20 minutes of going from point A back to point A 30+ times.  That sort of race does not come down to the .001 (and yes that has happened countless times in sprint events).

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Next you have the stroke groups.

Butterfliers (100 and 200).  They normally get the pleasure of swimming both.

Backstrokers/whackstrokers/napstrokers…I have a lot of names for those guys.  But they also swim te 100 and 200.

Breastrokers (100 and 200).

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Then on top of all those events you have Individual Medleys (medliers…I don’t know).  Depending on the meet it can be either be a 200 medley or 400 medley.  400 IM=death.

They swim a 50 fly-50 back-50-breast-50 free.  All in a row, without stopping. 

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Plus relays (which build to the team aspect).  Relays are a team of four people that swim an equal amount.  For instance in a 400 relay, everyone swims a 100.  In a 200-eveyrone swims a 200. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

200/400/800 Freestyle

200 Medley Relay (Everyone swims a 50).  So for instance 1 person will swim 50 fly, 50 back, 50 breast ad 50 free.  The 400 Medley relay is the same but with 100s.

 

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I hope this helps one person.  I am the ultimate confuser if ya didn’t know.  :)

Questions for you:

Swimming.  What would you like to know?

If you are a swimmer, what was/is your favorite event? 

Cooking with Your Main Girl (Vlog)

By Posted in Breakfast, Food, Pumpkin Tagged , , , 18 Comments

Just so you aren’t shocked. I am super vulgar in real life. That is all.
I’m super upset that so many people didn’t know how to cook pancakes. I hope this is helpful (please know I’m not a foodie) lolz…as you can tell.

Question for you:
Are you a foodie? Where should cooking with your main bitch take her next broadcast?

Weekly Roundup and More Q&A

By Posted in Running, Swimming Tagged , , 19 Comments

Remember how we agreed that I would post more blogs on a better schedule?  Well that is all fine and dandy when I have things to say…but I haven’t had any thing of importance to say. 

I wake up.
Go swim.
Class.
Run.
Homework.
Sleep.

Always add harassing my friends too.  That goes there too.  I’m just not going to blog about boring stuff in my life unless it’s relevant. 

My weekend was decent I suppose.  I was convinced to go out last night to our neighboring schools swim house.  We are pretty close with them I guess…well some of the girls are.  I only roll out of bed at 9pm for themed parties or well no just that. 

Let’s rewind, yesterday I had the two hardest workouts of my life in both swimming and running.  Our hard set for swimming was 19X100s and then I had a tempo run 4 hours later.  Needless to say I laid in my bed for quite some time before the 10 text messages to come out actually motivated me.

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I’ve finally hit a 50 mile week this week for running.  The 50 mile week also included, 1 tempo run, 1 track workout and 1 treadmill run.  I think the dreadmill run was actually the most scary because well-that hard surface pounding (in my mind at least) leads to injuries.   Needless to say-every run had a purpose and I’m getting a lot better about recovery runs versus speed runs versus moderate runs.

Swimming-I went to all 6 practices.  Mentally I showed up to most of them.  I did well at time trials.  I think I’m improving lolz.  I swam roughly 24,000 yards this week. 

Weights-I went to the gym four times this week.  Who am I?  I did a lot of core, and upper body strength work.  Should I start posting those workouts too?  They are pretty swimming specific but I can.

This week followed by two weeks from now is certainly one of my hardest training weeks of the season.

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Next week I’ve got my first championship race on tap near NYC.  (That is roughly 7 hours or so).  So lighter week in running regards.  I don’t know the exact mileage but I’m guessing it will be between 40-45 miles.   I’m really trying to strictly follow the coaching plan and run fast when needed, run slow when I should.  It’s working pretty well right now.

Swimming-I’ll probably only be at 18,000 yards since I’ll be missing Friday practice for this race.  I’m not concerned and I would have probably not gone to begin with.

Weights-I think I’ll hit the gym 1-2 for strength training.

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Finally here are more Q/A questions I’ve been asked recently in video form.  You can see all the videos and ramblings on my youtube channel.

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Question for you:

1.       How was your weekend?

2.       Any good workouts this week?