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That time I got hit by a cab…

May 5th, 2013 | Posted by Lindsay Runs in Uncategorized - (12 Comments)

When I last updated about 2 months ago (sorry!), I was pretty frustrated– I wasn’t able to run because of my knee/IT issues, and I wasn’t seeing much progress. I was throwing myself a bit of a pity party, probably from the lack of endorphins and withdrawal from the bridle path.

And maybe I should re-name this blog “Lindsay Never Runs” because 2 months later, I’m back in the same place. Let’s rewind…

In early March, I started seeing Dr. Levine, a pseudo celeb in NYC running-land, for ART and Graston that really helped my leg. After a few weeks of seeing him 2x/week, I was seeing awesome progress. I also stopped cross-training because I thought spinning might not be resting my IT enough, and I wanted to get back to running ASAP. I finally eased into running…with no pain! I gradually worked my way up from a mile a few times a week (so. out. of. shape.) It felt SO good to reunite with my friends on the bridle path, and kickstart my day with some fresh air and sweat.

In mid-April, I had worked my way up to a long run of 6 miles (!) pain-free. While I was huffing and puffing slowly through Central Park, at least I was out there and nothing hurt. Times were good, friends!

In mid-April, I also got a bike and started bike commuting to and from work.

It’s teal and it’s perfect.

If you’re a fellow resident of the Upper East Side, you can empathize with how terrible the 4/5/6 train is each morning. My commute to work down on Spring St is easily the most rage-inducing part of my day, as the subways can be so ridiculously slow and crowded. Including a 10 min walk to the subway, my commute can take anywhere from 30-50 minutes depending on the day. It shouldn’t. However, it takes ~30 minutes to bike door to door and is so much nicer (except the part of 2nd ave where the bike & car lane are one. eeee).

The night of my bike’s one week birthday, I was riding home from hanging with my sister who was in town from LA for work. It was around 10 p.m., but still plenty of cars/people outside. I was biking up 1st Avenue in the bike lane, and as I approached 79th street, the light turned from green to yellow. I went through the yellow since I had full momentum on the bike.

Well, the cab heading east on 79th street had a different idea as he went through his red light, likely in anticipation of the light turning green soon. In the process, he hit me and knocked me off my bike. Thankfully, I was wearing my helmet, didn’t lose consciousness, or visibly break any limbs or worse. I even tried to get up and insist I was fine, I was only 9 blocks from home after all, but felt shooting pains in my lower back and side when I tried to lift myself up.

And so, kind strangers helped get me to the sidewalk and called me an ambulance. They helped me call my friend Noelle who lives close by, who met me as I was in the ambulance and came to the hospital with me and called my sister.  Even though I knew I was okay physically for the most part, I couldn’t stop bawling. It was so scary, I don’t think I’ve ever been in an ambulance before?

I went to the ER (thanks, kind staff at NY Presbyterian Cornell!), bike and all, and got checked out. Thankfully, they thought it was just extreme muscle soreness and nothing was broken– I left close to 3am, prescription for pain meds in hand. It hurt to walk and bend, so I didn’t leave my apartment for 5 days. I half-worked from home on Thursday and Friday just to combat my boredom and feel productive.

Day 4. Still on the couch. BOO.

I can’t express how thankful I am for the support of friends and family who kept me company when I couldn’t get out of bed or move far from my couch and delivered delicious things like flowers, Pinkberry and cupcakes to my door. Who walked with me from the 24/7 pharmacy to my apartment at 3:30 am so I wouldn’t have to leave the next day to fill my prescription. Who put up with me when all I wanted was extra sauce on my chicken parm hero and Luigi’s forgot it. Who brought me bagels and coffee while we were glued to the couch watching Boston coverage. Who came with bottles of wine and food to have a girls night in and plot my return to Boston ’14 (more on that another day). Who delivered my laptop from the office and a 6-pack and pint of ice cream. (Guys, I’m literally not moving from my bed, I don’t need any more food. But I’ll eat every last bite, thanks.)

And everyone who sent amazing emails, texts and tweets wishing me well and offering to help in any way. That meant the world to me! There is no better feeling than to know you have a large support network in such a big city that often times still doesn’t feel like home. And the biggest shoutout to my mom, who spent all of Wednesday cleaning my apartment, doing my laundry, and making me food. She is the best and I’m thankful to have family so close.

I returned to work (slowly) on Monday, still a bit out of it thanks to the Percocet. I went to my primary care doctor to get a referral for x-rays, as the sides of my ribs were a bit tender and I hadn’t felt that immediate after the accident. We also did a saline injection on the primary spot of pain in my lower/mid back which seemed to help alleviate some discomfort. Which was good, because on Thursday night I had vacation plans to head to Iceland!

Reykjavik

Not gonna lie, the pain put a damper on the trip for me as the pain is pretty constant with every step, but I had a blast! Until one morning I was stretching out my back muscles and felt a ‘pop’ in the side of my rib cage followed by immediate shooting pain. I immediately thought I popped a rib out of place and panicked. There were tears and lots of ice packs, followed by slow movements the rest of the trip. I decided to wait it out until I returned home since I was scared to go to the ER in a foreign country and didn’t want to miss out on vacation.

Gullfoss Waterfall

 

Blue Lagoon + beers? Heaven.

We flew back to NYC on Monday night, and once I got back to my apartment, weirdly came down with a high fever and terrible aches/chills. Because I’m a symptom Google-r, I was immediately convinced my dislocated rib had led to an infection in my lung like pneumonia and I was dying. I tried to sleep it off but woke up at 3:30am and felt terrible. So, at 4 am I checked myself back into the hospital so they could take a look at my ribs and do an x-ray immediately. And because I’m a baby when I’m sick, I called my mom and she drove into the city to meet me as soon as I was done with x-rays. (I swear I’m an adult).

Thankfully, nothing is broken or fractured, though I’m still not sure what that ‘pop’ was in my ribs. Seems like I just severely tore/aggravated/inflammed the muscles around and in between my ribs after being weakened from the accident. It still really hurts, especially when moving from side to side when sleeping, and I can’t really cough or breathe deeply without feeling aggravation.

I’m no doctor, but this is where it hurts on my left side. Darn intercostals.

So, it’s been nearly 3 weeks since my accident, and thus, 3 weeks in which I haven’t done any type of exercise. Given that it still hurts to walk and breathe, I don’t think I’ll be returning to running anytime soon…

It’s also been 1 year since I last ran a race (Boston 2 Big Sur), which is probably the longest period since I started running 13 years ago. Depressing, to say the least. Due to crazy busyness/stress, I pulled out of Chicago ’12 in mid-August because I couldn’t handle high volume training at the time. I had to skip a few winter tune-up races and the NYC Half because of the stupid IT/knee issues, and I definitely won’t be able to run (even for fun!) the Brooklyn Half.

So many race fees down the drain, so many doctor’s co-pays, so many depressing thoughts and feelings of helplessness. It’s been a not-so-great year on the running front (and my bank account), to say the least.

At least I have a bit of time on my side, for now. While I’d like to be spending May building a semi-solid running base to kick off training for Chicago ’13 instead of on my couch, realistically I have until June to really start laying the foundation with 4 months out. I won’t attempt to run or exercise until the pain is fully gone. It’s also still too soon to tell if anything else is out of whack or misaligned from the accident that could pop up once I start running.

But I have my health, and I know that the accident could have been so much worse if the driver was going faster, he hit me at a different angle, I fell differently, etc. It also happened the day after the Boston Marathon, which really put everything in perspective. I will run again, it’s just a matter of when and how fast. ‘Till then, you can find me walking slowly, consuming mass amounts of froyo and margaritas, and watching terrible TV re-runs.

And yes, the bike came away entirely unscathed :)

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Adventures in cross-training

January 30th, 2013 | Posted by Lindsay Runs in Blog Posts - (6 Comments)

It was just about a month ago when my knee got so bad I decided to stop running on it. I figured I’d take a few days off to rest, and it’d go away. The few days of training lost wouldn’t be a huge setback and I’d be back on the roads in no time.

Welp, one month later I can see that I was entirely wrong. This stupid knee issue continues, but I’m happy to report I’m making progress and actually kinda enjoying cross-training.

Thanks to a few free class credits (lucky/weird), I totally drank the SoulCycle kool aid and love it. It’s like a sweaty, endorphin-filled dance party. Sorry haters, hate on. While I’ve been three times so far, including a class with Ali, I don’t understand how people pay that much to do it regularly (Though I’d probably pay to be in shirtless Bradley Cooper’s class). I think I might try it once a month because it makes me feel downright awesome. #treatyoself.

I’ve also been hitting up good ole New York Sports Club regularly for spinning classes with Kelly who has also been sidelined from the bridle path temporarily. Injuries make me glad I didn’t cancel my previously-rarely-used gym membership. I think we’ve tried and tested just about every 6:30 am spin instructor by now. After spinning, I’ve been spending about 30 minutes stretching and pretending to lift weights and do PT exercises before showering and going to work. I’m so over gym showers and their terrible blow dryers.

And I’ve also done a free class (and have another free class tomorrow– East Coast vs. West Coast hip hop rideeeee) at Revolve Fitness. It’s kinda like SoulCycle, but less dance-party-esque but still a good workout. I love these fancy spinning classes, but really only when I can do it for free and I can’t spend my energy running.

My training log is sad, and I still haven’t gotten around to re-adjusting my “Goal weekly mileage” totals. It’s safe to say at this rate, I’ll be able to run the NYC Half-Marathon on 3/17, but any PR attempt is out the window.

Yay for signing up for races I can’t do. I just took advantage of the unlimited beer at the finish.

When injured, some people turn to cross-training like crazy and hit the gym, bike, pool, elliptical, etc. for hours to make up for an equivalent effort not running. I am not one of those people. Kudos to you who are! Sure, I’ve been trying to get to the gym most days and have a newfound love for spinning, but I definitely think I could be doing more to maintain or gain fitness. That’s why I’ve been hitting up classes, because otherwise I’d never push myself on the bike or elliptical.

While cross-training certainly has its benefits, I believe that if you’re training for a running race, you should spend the majority of your time running. When you can’t run, cross-training is the next best thing by default. But I believe that a 45 minute spin class, no matter how sweaty, doesn’t deliver the same running fitness gains. Someone once told me that for every minute run, you should double that time to get the equivalent running effort. Whether or not that’s true, that’s a lot of time I don’t have…

Maybe I’m lazy. Maybe I’m unmotivated. Maybe I’m playing it safe. I know I’m not doing all I can to get back in shape by 3/17, but I really have no desire (or time) to spend like 2 hours at the gym daily to maintain or build my endurance right now. This stupid knee has really knocked out the positive mojo I had leading into 2013. I feel like I took two steps back during the month of January.

I can’t blame my loss of fitness entirely on my knee. I did aim to take responsibility for my actions this year. Remember?

I can’t change my knee pain (to an extent). I could cross-train more or harder. But honestly, I don’t feel like it. So I’m changing my attitude and not letting myself get down by it and being realistic about what I can accomplish. This race, though my favorite, is just one day. I’m going to set my sights on another half marathon in May (probably Brooklyn because it doesn’t involve travel) and work towards getting healthy and fit for that.

In good news, I AM slowly returning to running. About 2 weeks ago, I tried walking/running a few miles during the Run to the Brewery 10 miler in Long Island. The out and back course made it easy to do as much/little as I needed to, so I probably ended up covering around 7 miles total while running 4 of the miles on and off. I didn’t want to be too late to the beer at the finish. Priorities. Last week, I tried running 3 miles easily but the cold weather seemed to make my knee lock up a bit more and everything felt sore and tight afterwards.

And then I spent 27 hours in Orlando for work, 1 hour of which I got to spend outside. I also forgot to pack sneakers so there was no working out (darn.)

Yesterday, I decided to reunite with my running buds for our usual Tuesday morning runs. It had been nearly a month and I missed them! The roads were a bit slick due to the rain/slush that fell Monday night so we tried to take it easy before heading to the bridle for some intervals. I didn’t feel confident to test my knee with the uneven footing and mud/ice mixture, so I called it quits after two. Related: I am totally out of shape and wanted to die during the 1200 and 1000 intervals I did do. Nonetheless, my knee held up OK with some lingering soreness/tightness. Mostly, it felt good to be back for my first ‘real’ run and it’s a starting point.

I’ll probably stick to running once more this week, and spinning the rest of the days. Maybe next week I’ll work up to 3 days of running if it feels OK!

‘Till next time, when I can hopefully share a not-so-depressing update about how I’m back hitting the roads and rocking it.

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The Knee Update

January 13th, 2013 | Posted by Lindsay Runs in Blog Posts - (7 Comments)

It was bound to happen, sooner or later. After a history of being plagued with random running injuries through high school and college (2 stress fractures, rotated pelvis, tendinitis, low iron, IT issues…), it’s been generally smooth sailing the last 3 or 4 years. Little things here and there, but usually things I can train through.

Right before Christmas, I just finished an 11 mile run in Central Park, doing part of it with Nicole. We averaged around a 7:30 pace, which was quicker than I’d been used to but felt surprisingly fine! I brought my credit card to run errands at Duane Reade on my way home, and recall feeling a slight twinge in the back of my knee as I stood in line to pay. I didn’t think much of it and just tried to stretch, but it was a bit nagging.

The next few days, the pain moved from the back of my knee to the inside of my knee, but it was just annoying, not debilitating. I could tell it was throwing my gait slightly, but usually went away once I warmed up a bit. I ran 39 miles the week of Christmas, my highest so far, and I figured the weird twinges would work themselves out.

On New Year’s Eve day, I ran in the park with Terence and Noelle. The pain was much stronger and didn’t go away the entire run. I decided to take New Year’s Day off to rest (well planned…) and hit the roads on Weds the 2nd with Alex and Meredith. That was the last time I really ran. The pain had traveled to the front of my knee cap, and hurt when I walked and especially up and down stairs. Eeek. It even hurt when I was out at the bar dancing…that’s when you know it’s bad.

I took 5 days completely off exercise of any type. Considering it hurt to walk, I couldn’t exactly cross train! Annoying, but I kinda welcomed the laziness.

I finally saw a doctor on Monday the 7th, who didn’t really have a firm diagnosis for me but ruled out tendon/ligament damage and thought more rest and icing would help the inflammation. And it has, generally. Now that the pain has disappeared from my knee cap (but is still present on the inside of my knee), it doesn’t hurt to walk anymore. I’ve begun to cross-train, which I hate. If I can’t run, I am really lazy and can never motivate myself to get in an equivalent hard effort on the bike or elliptical or pool. Meh.

Pain=near the medial retinaculum

I saw a PT on Friday who cleared me to try running on a treadmill (because you use less effort to propel yourself forward) in quarter mile increments, alternating running and walking for 2-3 miles max. The weirdness is still there, but it is much milder and definitely dissipated once I got going. And it was really, really boring.

I think it’s always hard to tell what to do when faced with strange pain: is it the onset of an injury, or can I work through this? If I stopped running every time something hurt, I’d run a lot less miles. I’m really frustrated, because I felt like I was finally getting back into a groove of running regularly and working out. I purposefully ran semi-regularly most of the fall so that when I started to train for the NYC Half-Marathon, I’d have a decent base and prevent injury. Plus it’s been weirdly warm-ish lately and I can’t take advantage of it!

It’s also not the end of the world. Yeah, I’m losing the little fitness I did have, but I do have confidence I’ll be back (outside!) running soon. I just need to be patient and not stubborn. It also could be far worse. While I might not be in peak shape for the NYC Half, maybe I can set my sights on another half in April or May to use as a goal race instead.

So, there’s the update! Here’s to hoping the pain goes away soon…

Any advice? What do you do when you feel a potential injury coming on?

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Race Week & Piriformis Syndrome!

May 19th, 2011 | Posted by Lindsay Runs in Blog Posts - (0 Comments)

Thanks everyone for the congrats comments after Saturday’s Healthy Kidney 10K. In retrospect, I am mostly happy about this race effort and now know I can aim to break 40 at the Mini 10K in June! Also, Brightroom posted photos of the race. Oh, how flattering the camera is during a race…gets all my good angles.

Anyways, let’s recap this week!

On Monday, I didn’t really sleep well so I decided to skip the morning run and take a rest day. Since the booming thunder woke me up even before my alarm to sleep in, I decided this was a smart choice. I really want my legs to be fresh for the Brooklyn Half, and what better way to kick off the week than with glorious rest? Exactly.

On Tuesday, I decided I wanted to try to make it to the track to get in some light speed work before Saturday’s Half, just to get the blood flowing again. I talked with Megan who invited me to meet up with her and Jacqui in Central Park instead to do some 1000-meter repeats. Clearly Central Park > track, so I gladly met them at 6:45 and headed out for some intervals! I did 4x~1000 meters, though we found it was a tad short…it’s the effort that counts, right? In between, we had about 2 minutes rest which definitely helped.

  • 3:50? I was not thinking and hit the stop/start button instead of lap, so I didn’t get the split. Whoops!
  • 3:47
  • 3:44
  • 3:40

I actually felt really good during these! I was happy each one got a tad faster, and I wasn’t totally dying. If I didn’t have a race on Saturday, I probably would have done 1-2 more for a real solid workout, as we did 6x1000m workouts all the time in college, with 200m recovery. But I want my legs to be fresh and ready to go this weekend, so we just finished off the night with some lower loops and I ran back to my apartment for 10.75 miles for the day. Again, THANK YOU Megan and Jacqui for getting me out there, I’m so happy to start running with people again as part of a team and always enjoy talking all things running & racing.

Yesterday (Wednesday), was not so good. I had planned 6 miles, but had to cut it short after just 3 miles because my hip/piriformis really started hurting. Usually, it’s just an annoying dull pain but I found it was really altering my stride so I cut the route short and headed home. I am a stickler for sticking to my schedule but in these cases it’s so important to listen to your body to avoid injury. I am happy I used the extra morning time to foam roll and massage deep into breaking up the knots with my BFF, baseball.
 
 
This is the perfect at-home tool if you need to get in deep into any points that can’t really be reached via foam roller or stretching, like your piriformis:
 
I’ve always had weird right leg issues due to a leg length discrepancy which has been helped by custom orthotics, but I think my periodic flare ups are caused by running on hard surfaces and sitting at work all day which shortens/tightens the muscle. I also don’t do nearly enough flexibility and strengthening exercises as I should. Stretching and massaging with the baseball are usually quick fixes for me when the pain gets too much. For me, the pain feels really deep within my glute (butt) and outer hip, and often contributes to extreme hamstring tightness.
 
Today, I awoke with 4 miles on the schedule and I was a bit nervous I’d still be in pain. Luckily, all the digging/massaging I did with the baseball helped since I felt great. It was a tad humid this morning but happy it wasn’t raining. Fingers crossed for no rain and little humidity on race morning!
 
Speaking of which, I finally picked up my CPTC uniform last night and Saturday will mark my first official race for Central Park Track Club! I am excited as the Brooklyn Half is a team points race and there is a chance I’ll be able to score for the team. I am certainly not in top PR shape like I was in March, but still hope for a decent result and a fun race.
 
Still undecided which singlet I’ll wear. What do you think?
 
Tomorrow I’ll do my usual 20 minute pre-race shakeout run, and then I still need to figure out how I am going to get all the way to Prospect Park for a 7 am race start. WHY does it need to start so early?! I’ll also be checking a bag and will need porta potty time, so I will probably want to arrive by 6:30. Of course, they are doing subway construction so the train I’d take will be running local instead of express, meaning I will probably bite the bullet and take a cab that will probably end up being like $40. Awesome.
 
Any tips for easing stress before an early morning race start? What do you do when you feel a potential  injury coming on… take time off or push through it?

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It’s TAPER TIME!

October 20th, 2010 | Posted by Lindsay Runs in Blog Posts - (0 Comments)

Taper time? What’s that mean, exactly? Your guess is probably not much better than mine. I know tapering means reducing intensity/mileage to have your legs feel fresh on race day, but I have no idea what a three week-long taper looks like. In college, we tapered for the week before a race: less intense workout tuesday, then 20 minutes and strides Friday before a Saturday race.

Hence my problem figuring out how to gradually reduce over 3 weeks. When I hear “reduce mileage” it just makes me want to run like 2 miles a day for the next 3 weeks. I feel tricked when I still have to do 50 miles this week. Yes, a decrease from last week’s 67, but still substantial! When do I get to the easy 20 min run phase?!

Also, I think I finally just got the hang of eating properly for marathon training! I was enjoying massive amounts of delicious (AND HEALTHY, I swear) foods. I crave greek yogurt, oatmeal, avocado, fresh fruit, EVEN chickpeas. I used to DESPISE chickpeas, people. But now with reduced mileage means I need to eat less, or carry a little extra chub on race day. Or does it mean continue eating the same amount, to fuel muscles and store carbs? See- confusing! And to make it worse, I’ve actually gained weight marathon training. I know, I know, it’s muscle weight (my thighs and calves feel huge!) but shouldn’t I be a little leaner through all of this? I guess the massive amounts of healthy food may not be so great :)

Oh well. TRUST THE TAPER!
In any case, I’m getting a little nervous for the race. When I see we’re 18 days to go (AHH?!?!) I remember I actually have to do this, instead of talking about it. Half of me cannot wait for the thrill, and half of me wants to curl up and die.

I’m also a tad nervous because I experienced a strange twinge in my thigh on my run last Thursday. I was going to do 8 that morning, but did 7.5 since it just started coming on then and I was basically back at my apartment. Better to run a 1/2 mile less than to tear something. I felt it towards the end of my run Friday, and ooo boy did I feel it through all 21 miles on Saturday. Sunday was my planned day off and I continued to massage the crap out of it. I decided to take Monday off too, because I still felt it when walking, I had a massive head cold, and “Hey I’m tapering now I can totalllly take 2 days off in a row!”

Its starting to feel better, though I hope it doesn’t linger around for the Marathon. Its at a point where it isn’t painful, but I feel that its there. My body will get hit with enough problems over 26.2 miles, I don’t need to start the race with one. At least its beginning to disappear- hopefully.

Oh and did I mention that when I massage it, the quad muscle makes a sort of “crunching” noise? Not normal. The closest thing I could find to describe it is crepitus, which usually happens around joints/knee cartilage. This is my upper quad, not really sure. When I googled “crepitus” and “quad” the other day I got “bone cancer”. Well, so much for googling the cause….

This morning I decided to do a little tempo amidst my 8.5 mile run on the bridle path. Just two loops of the large bridle path reservoir, around 3.5? The first loop was 12:10, and the second was 11:35. Holy smokes! I didn’t realize I dropped it by 35 seconds. It was 6:47 pace overall- good for a nice quick tempo on dirt. Tempo miles are okay in the taper phase, right? And it was short!!

So, here’s to the beginning of a loooooong taper, less mileage, minimal weight gain, and weird quad pain disappearing! Though I have a feeling 11/7 will be here before I know it!

 

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Hump Day

August 25th, 2010 | Posted by Lindsay Runs in Blog Posts - (1 Comments)

I woke up at 6:45 to find it was rainy and gloomy this morning. Happy hump day! I set out to do an easy run, and found my legs were quite tired from the previous night’s track workout. Yes, I know a track interval workout of 400s and 800s is not exactly ‘marathon-speed’ training, but I need to start doing some sort of workouts (tempo, interval) and I need to start somewhere!

Given my dead legs, I only logged 5.7 in Central Park. Did I also mention it started to torrentially downpour for a good 15 min in the middle of it? I actually don’t mind running in the rain, I find it calming. I just hate when my shorts stick to me and my shirt gets all heavy! But it was tons of fun jumping through puddles and dodging the small streams forming in the dirt on the bridle path around the reservoir.

Afterwards, I tried to roll out my IT/hip on the foam roller. My glute has been pretty tight for a good month or two now, a self-diagnosed piriformis syndrome, and it’s making my right hamstring sore and my hip/back tight too. I went to my chiropractor, Dr. DeFabio, when I was home in NJ this past weekend and I got some scraping done with the Graston technique and it really loosened things up. But I guess I need another round, because 3 runs later, I’m all tight AGAIN! Have another appointment Saturday morning so hopefully one more round will kick it.

So, another thing I wanted to try to do in this blog is track my eating in hopes to find a more nutritionally-balanced and wholesome way of fueling my active self! As I’m sure any post-collegiate runner now bound to a desk for 45+ hours a week will find, it’s not as easy to eat whatever you want and get away with it! I’m carrying extra 5 to 8 pounds to prove it. I was so much more active in college, between walking to and from classes, events, and having well over 3 hours a day solely dedicated to exercise (run, stretch, core, lifting, icing, etc.) Now I squeeze in my run before work (or after, if I don’t have plans and think I can leave at a decent hour) and practically dash in and out of the shower, ignoring all the extra good stuff’ I used to do that make all the difference.

So, I’ve found that with this more sedentary lifestyle (despite still maintaining a good weekly mileage!) I need to be smarter about my food choices if I want to get leaner and stronger. I certainly don’t want to eat less, as I know I’ll need food to keep energized, but I want to eat better. I really enjoy cooking, preparing my own food, and bringing my lunch to work so this hasn’t been too much of a struggle so far. But, always room for improvement. Need to get better about portion control, mindless snacking, and trying new healthy foods.

For example, today I made a great big salad: mango, blackberries, cucumber, tomato, avocado, grilled chicken and feta over arugula. It was delicious and so filling! However, a bit more costly and time-consuming to prepare than your average sandwich. Have to keep reminding myself of the importance of filling up on good fruits, veggies and lean proteins. Which may call for more repeat trips to my favorite place…

Best grocery store EVER!

I won’t let the fact there aren’t any super-close locations stop me, I trek down to Union Square and now Chelsea (which is soooo much better than USQ!) I can’t wait till it finally opens on the UWS. I wonder when that is. On Monday, I ran to Trader Joes in Chelsea…hey, gotta get in that mileage and grocery shop, right?

Also need to keep remembering to take my iron supplements! During indoor track season my junior year, I found my race times getting slower and slower, and even easy runs were increasingly hard to recover from. I got my iron levels tested and my ferritin (measure of iron) was 8! It should be 30-40+ for athletes. I had to take off the rest of indoor and outdoor that year to recover by drinking lots of liquid ferrous sulfate. My levels are back up (or at least I think they are…) but I’m trying to practice preventative medicine and take iron. Right before I started this post, I drank some liquid iron mixed with V8 Splash…mmm.

Liquid Iron!

That’s about all from me right now. Getting up around 5;55am for a 14 mile long-run, so need my sleep!

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