it's been a while

what up. looks as been it's been about a month since i last updated. god i'm terrible at this. 

yesterday i ran the brooklyn half marathon, which is a part of new york road runner's five borough marathon series. it was a good race, but probably not my favorite half ever. 

i picked up my bib on wednesday, which was awesome since they are usually only open on thursday and friday night's for pick up. it was easy peasy per usual. my main complaint would be the t-shirts. they are really cool, nice quality t-shirts. however, they are enormous. a men's small is still way too big for me. i can definitely sleep in it, but i'd kind of like to run it in, since it is a tech tee and all. had the same problem with the NYC half, and now that shirt is in the "random ass clothes" basket under my bed. 

the race was saturday morning, which i really prefer to a sunday morning race, since you don't have the the whole weekend preparing or stressing about it. i got out of work on the early side on friday evening, and laid out my stuff for the next day. 

essentials include: asics core shimmel (best running shir ever and it's like 25 bucks), new mizuno elixirs with new laces of course, lemon lime sports beans and pink lemonade honey singers, nike spandex shorts (BEST RUNNING SHORTS EVER!), features socks and LOTS o'  body glide. these are pretty much my go-to running products. i also used a fuel belt to carry my iPhone so i can listen to spottily. very important. 

the race started early (7AM), so i was up at 4:45 getting ready to go. i didn't have my usual bagel with PBJ but the most incredible toast instead that i had frozen from a farm back home. it was so filling i couldn't even eat all 4 pieces. 

                            

or maybe i'm a fat kid, because looking back on it, that is a lot of toast. anyway, i had my pre race eats while drinking coffee and reading blogs (my favorite way to prepare). i headed to pick up the 2 train at about 5:45. when i got to the train, i was greeting with an ABSOLUTELY PACKED train. but, it was completely filled with runners. i was weirdly obsessed with the experience. it felt so cool to know that everyone you were with shared an interest of yours. i almost said "twinsies" to a middle aged man who had the same watch as me..but i thought that might be taking it too far. as we got off the subway, it was so crowded we could barely get out of the station. but, i didn't mind at all. i still thought the fact that i was sharing the subway with 16,000 other runners was super amusing. probably the only time in my life i won't mind a crowded subway.

 

after shuffling off the subway, i was greeted by a gorgeous sunny morning at the brooklyn museum, which is wear the race started. i hit up the port potties (lines were short), walked around a bit and then headed to my corral. the race started on eastern parkway in the prospect heights section of BK, and it was gorgeous. given the beauty of the start, i had high hopes for the rest of the course. 

we started right on time, and i crossed the start at about 7:11. i wasn't putting any pressure on myself for this race, since i hadn't trained much at all. i was hoping to sub 2, but honestly i didn't really care. it was really humid from the beginning, and i felt dehydrated at mile 1, so i decided very early i just wanted to stay hydrated and not get heat exhaustion. mile 1 clocked in at about 9:53. 

miles 1-7 were lovely. we cruised down some shaded pretty streets of brooklyn and then headed into prospect park. i was maintaining about a 9:05 pace, which felt comfortable and fine. prospect park was lovely, not too hilly. it was starting to get hot though. i stopped at pretty much every water stop and had mostly water, and grabbed gatorade about twice.  while i was running the park, i was looking forward to getting to mile 7, where i knew we were gonna leave the park and head through parts of brooklyn that i'd never seen. i was excited. 

however, we were quickly corralled into a entrance onto a highway. ocean parkway, to be exact. this is when things got hairy. 

i was getting excited at this point (because i didn't know what was ahead of me). i couldn't wait to get to coney island! however, my excitement was premature. we ended up running on the highway from mile 7-mile 12.5. it SUCKED. i was SO bored. i had picked up my pace and was running around 8:30's at this point, but the sun was coming out, there was no shade, and zero scenery. i know NYRR works really had at creating great race routes, but this was pretty bad. i couldn't wait for the race to be over. i had hoped they would route  us through brooklyn neighborhoods, instead of the highway..but they did not. oh well. i have to say though, the course was REALLY flat and had i trained more, i think i could have run it a lot faster. 

by mile 12, i was just so ready for the race to be over. it wasn't that i was really hurting, but i just had no enthusiasm or energy any more, and just felt like stopping. the only thing encouraging me was knowing that coney island was at the end! i knew the race ended on the boardwalk, so i pushed through and we finally were funneled onto the boardwalk for the last 400 meters. normally i have enough in me to surge at the end, but that was not happening. i pushed as much as i could, and finally crossed the finish. i immediately got the chills and knew that if i didn't hydrate ASAP i was gonna get really sick. i grabbed a big cub of gatorade and 2 cups of water and went searching for t.  i didn't see t in the spectator area, but i knew he was there somewhere. after about 30 minutes of searching for each other (phones weren't working and i was basically trapped in a corral), we finally met on the boardwalk. i downed another bottle of gatorade while we enjoyed the view. 

coney island is really beautiful when it's not crowded! we hung for a while on the boardwalk and then headed for the car. of course, i had to make sure tim took a picture of me. 

i was pumped we got a medal too! overall, not my favorite or best race ever, but i was happy with it and glad i just got out there. bottom line, is i love running, and i'm thankful that i live in a city where i could pretty much run a race every weekend if i wanted. 

i finished in 1:57:51. now time to start training for the old port half marathon in maine, my favorite state ever. xoxo

thoughts on the slow carb diet: it's stupid

so..here i am, eating my words. obviously. it's been about 2.5 weeks on the slow carb diet, and i'm done. i'm off the bandwagon. that's not to say i'm abandoning healthy eating, but a girl can't live without manchego or raspberries forever. ultimately, this diet was incredibly restrictive and doesn't really work. i found myself eating way too much meat, feeling sad because the food i could eat was so restrictive and feeling sick after cheat days. all and all, i do not recommend it. i just weight myself, and i am at about 129.4, which is pretty darn close to where i started. it was an interesting practice, but more than anything it just made me angry and did not change my body at all. i'm a pretty healthy eater to begin with, and this just ended up making me mental about weight, food, etc. 

while i've done some interesting things in the kitchen (see above: cauliflower mash and almond/macadamia nut flour crusted shrimp), it just hasn't been worth it. i've been too focused on thinking about cupcakes. and cookies. and chocolate. and skinny vanilla lattes. maybe that's not healthy either, but it was making me sad. 

also, the amount of red meat i was eating CANNOT be good for me. i'm not a huge red meat eater and i'd been eating steak and bacon at least a few times a week. arteries, i'm sorry. 

so what's next, you ask? back to normal. while i realize i REALLY need to keep my paws out of the tortilla chip basket at mexican restaurants, and should probably learn to control my chocolate addiction, other than that, i think my diet is fairly clean. i don't eat many white carbs (except my love, again, tortilla chips..and again, that's only at restaurants) and i am very mindful of what i put into my mouth. i think if anything this diet has taught me how much added sugar is in food, and that's something i will continue to be more mindful about. did you know there are 18G of sugar in a SUGAR FREE LATTE? skim milk has about as much sugar in it as soy milk..who knew..

         any way, thanks for listening to my rant, and hopefully you've learned something. in other news, i'm going to make a green monster smoothie for breakfast with DAIRY in it :) and take the BEST soul cycle class ever. seriously, if you live in NYC, go to Danny Kopel's class, you'll die of happiness. he puts my high kicks to shame.

XX

SCD

t and i have decided to take on a little experiment. a while back, t purchased the book "the four hour body" by timothy ferriss. basically, this guy has made himself a guinea pig for 10 years and tested out about a bajillion theories on weight loss, muscle gain, exercise etc. and based on his findings, he wrote this book. in regards to food and diet, he has laid out a plan called the slow carb diet in the book. i really hate anything called a diet, but i was intrigued. after doing the cleanse, i really wanted to clean up my eating as best as possible. t and i decided to do an experiment and follow the slow carb diet for three weeks. although the benefits of the diet do include losing weight, i was more just curious to see if it actually worked. my weight has stayed pretty much the same for 4 years, and i wondered if this diet could make it move at all. so we'll see how it goes after 3 weeks. 
here are the main points:

Rule # 1: Avoid White Carbohydrates—i.e., bread, rice, cereal, potatoes, pasta, tortillas, fried food.

Rule # 2: Eat Meals every 4 hours or so.  Eat within 1 hour of waking.

Rule # 3: Don’t drink calories. LOTS of water. You can drink tea, coffee (but only use cream with it), up to 2 diet sodas a day. Up to 2 glasses RED wine per day as well if you want. 

Rule #4: Don’t eat fruit. Only exceptions are avocado and tomato. You can have no more than 1 cup or one meal per day.

Rule #5: Take one day off a week. “It is important to spike caloric intake once per week. This causes a host of hormonal changes that improve fat loss, from increasing cAMP and GMP to improving conversion of the T4 thyroid hormone to the more active T3.

Rule #6: You can use spices, herbs. Olive oil, vinegar, butter is also fine.  Salsa is fine too.

Rule#7:Avoid domino foods: almonds, nuts, chickpeas, peanuts, macadamias—you will ultimately end up over eating them. 

so, there it is. it really hasn't been so bad. i think bottom line is you need to prepare yourself at the beginning of every day and think about what you're going to eat. this week most days, i've woken up and  had some cottage cheese with cinnamon (and trivia, sorry timothy ferries, i can't live without some sort of sweetener), just to make sure i eat within an hour of waking up.  i'll then have coffee on my way to work, and grab a big omelette with tomato and turkey sausage when i get there. 

or i'll have eggs and sausage or turkey bacon

i forgot to take a picture of my lunch EVERY DAY dammit, but i just had a huge salad with tomato, cucumber, avocado, chicken sausage, walnuts with olive oil and vinegar. the idea is your supposed to eat so much at your meals that you don't feel hungry in between, but i can't stomach like 8 cups of beans, so at times i have needed a snack. i've tried beef jerky, cottage cheese (again) or a little peanut butter or nuts. it's been fiiiine. 

for dinners we've just done lots of meat and veggies. just try to make it as filling as possible so you don't feel inclined to snack. one of the winning parts of this diet is that you can eat PEAS with BUTTER. sign me up. that is a favorite food of mine any way. 

so, that is a snapshot of what i've eaten this week. tim ferriss recommends not too much exercise and doing a variety of short bursts of weight training (think kettle bells). I've been doing them some mornings just because i like them, but otherwise i've kept my exercise the same just because, as you know, i can't give up running or spinning because they are fun!

so..that leads us to today. the BEST part of the diet. CHEAT DAY. obviously this was a huge part of the draw to this experiment. i could be healthy during the weekend and still have one day a week where i could eat what i wanted and not feel bad about it. there is a great link here about things you should know about cheat day, and exactly how to complete one correctly. see here: cheat sheet

on your cheat day, ferriss recommends eating a slow carb breakfast, waiting a few hours, and then going from there. things i am craving today: dark chocolate M&MS, a latte, raspberries (OH HOW I MISS FRUIT) and maybe another type of easter candy ;). tonight t and i are going to GEMMA for a fabulous italian cheat day meal. i can't wait. 

in terms of progress, you're probably wondering where i'm at right now. while i am quite embarrassed to share my weight on the inter webs, it will probably be helpful for you to see. 

so far, the slow carb diet seems to be working. i started on monday at 130 pounds (i am 5'4) and this morning i was down to 127.4. that is pretty good if you ask me. we started on monday and it is saturday. so 2.6 pounds in 5 days isn't too shabby. i'm a little nervous about the cheat day because i don't want to undo everything, but timothy ferriss says that is normal and my weight should be back to normal by tuesday or so. we'll see. 

we got a new scale as well, the withings wi-fi scale, which wirelessly transmits your weight to your computer or iphone and keeps track of it. it's pretty awesome. i've been weighing myself every day, which i am going to try to stop doing, because it can be discouraging and i don't want to turn into a pyscho. 

isn't it pretty?and yes, i realize my toes are not. 

this is what it looks like on your phone, and you can also look at a graph of weight over time on your computer. 

okay. phew. that was a ridiculously long post. and i hope i haven't lost blog readers because y'all think i am crazy. again, this is just an experiment. i do not believe that the slow carb diet could be something you do forever (it is TOO restricting) and i would not WANT to do it forever, especially during marathon training or something like that. but it's a fun test. so we'll see. 

okay, off to get a latte!! :) 

i hate when the weekend's over

so..i'm really trying to keep consistent with blogging. my weekend was a good one. i don't tend to do a whole lot on the weekends. my idea of a great one is, cooking a good meal, going out to a good meal, taking a long run or a good spin class, blog reading, watching hgtv and drinking coffee. i also love just going for walks and exploring the city. call me boring, but that is pretty much perfection for me. 

this weekend was pretty much that. albeit, perhaps a tad quiet than my personal preference. it was great. on friday, i celebrated the weekend by wearing some new shoes. ballet flats from asos. very inexpensive, and make me feel a little more dressed up without wearing heels (i pretty much NEVER wear heels). red pants are also celebratory, right?

friday evening, i fled work as early as i possibly could and enjoyed the rest of the gorgeous afternoon. for dinner, t and i headed to our FAVORITE mexican place, mole in the west village. it's slightly higher end mexican (kind of dos caminos-esque) but not as fussy and not as expensive. it's in the west village and has a great atmosphere and even better guacamole. you can sit outside in the summer and it's gorgeous. after dinner we walked down to battery park city to go see (NOT HUNGER GAMES) 21 jump street. the walk down was gorgeous. based on the blooming trees, you can tell it's definitely spring time in new york. 

21 jump street was HIGH-larious. loved it. i'd say the last 20 minutes of the movie were kind of stupid and i was ready for it to be over. i think t felt the same way. i hope they make a sequel. and seriously, i absolutely love jonah hill and find channing tatum even more attractive now that i know he is funny. 

saturday was a SOUL CYCLE date which pretty much made my life. i met some girl friends for coffee followed by soul cycle. it was bliss. i also followed the class with louise with my favorite peanut butter split smoothie from juice generation. it's terrible for you, but so so good. that was lunch for me :)

on saturday night, i made dinner for t and i. meatballs and red sauce and baked tomatoes with whole wheat bread crumbs/garlic/evoo. very delish. 

sunday was even more relaxed. i woke up and after breakfast, headed to the gym for a work out. it didn't exactly turn out as i hoped. i hadn't run since the half, so i figured i would take it somewhat easy, but still try to get some speed work in. i warmed up with 1 mile at 9:30 pace. after that, i did 15 kettle bell swings and 15 plank pull ins (put feet on a exercise ball and get in plank position and pull in). the plan was to alternate these with 4, 400s at 8:00 pace. However, I only got through 2 before my knee literally almost gave out. i do not think those plank pull ins are a good idea for me. something about the movement kills my knees. i gave up running and did a bit more lifting and then called it a day. 

don't be jealous of my outfit. it's basically my favorite two things ever..orange and stripes. would you be weirded out if i told you i also was wearing a striped sports bra and underwear? oh you would be? sorry. 

so, in the interest in your time and sanity..i'll stop giving you a play by play of my life and leave you just a few more pics from the weekend. 

best salad from cowgirl seahorse

ootd

gratuitous cat photo

that is all. happy monday :) i'll be back tomorrow with some thoughts on the SCD (slow carb diet) and our newest gadget, the WIFI (we call it the wee fee) scale. xx

BPC review

so this past week, t and i decided to partake in a little experiment. we both hadn't been eating great and were looking to re-set our system a bit. we decided that we wanted to complete the blue print cleanse, which is a three day, all juice cleanse. i have actually done it before and didn't really like it all that much the first time but i decided to try it again.  t had never done it and i also thought it would be fun to try to do together. we ordered from their website (blueprint cleanse.com) and selected the 3 day cleanse. we had it delivered to our apartment (with no fee) on monday night. you can select a time frame you would like it delivered in (like furniture!) we selected 7:00-9:30 and it arrived at right about 7:30. each of us got a full box of juice and they included mini cooler packs to keep it cool during the drip. our fridge ended up looking like this

i think this was actually 1 day in, but you see what i mean. there are 6 juices per day, and three levels of the cleanse. we chose level one (renovation) which includes 2 green juices, 1 pineapple mint, 1 spicy lemonade, 1 beet juice and 1 cashew milk. 

each day you start with the green juice. on the first day, i didn't think it was that bad and actually thought it was much better than i had remembered. by day three though, it's really not something you want to have ever again. you need to make sure it is COLD too, otherwise, it's impossible to get down. 

the first day i felt AWFUL, but this is to be expected. i am a total caffeine lover, so it was really hard not to make my morning stop at starbucks, or make my coffee at home. i had a headache by around 9:30. i was kind of hungry throughout the day, but never unmanageable hunger. you are pretty much drinking a juice every 2 hours, so you are getting enough calories to feel decently. after the green juice you have a pineapple mint juice which is delicious and i would drink it on his own. you then go for another green, a spicy lemonade and then beet. the beet is pretty awful. it tastes like dirt. BLECH. 

after the beet comes the cashew milk. if you have done the cleanse before, you know that the cashew milk is amazing and it's something to look forward to. it's also calorie dense considering the other juices (about 300 calories) so it gives you enough at the end of the day to feel okay. i went to bed on the first day feeling okay, mostly just feeling overwhelmed that there were 2 days left. 

day 2 was MUCH better. i felt great. no headache, a lot of energy, really good. t on the other hand was DYING. i honestly think for him, it was far too few calories (he probably normally has 3,000 a day) to feel good. he was hungry all the time. i really never felt hungry, i just wanted to eat. i drank 2 cups of tea also (with no sweetener) in between teas on day 2, which is allowed. 

jasmine tea is my favorrritteee

i even had enough energy for soul cycle on the evening of day 2. day 2 was actually the best for me i'd say. i felt great, had a ton of energy and was fine to exercise. i headed to soul, had a great class, and came home afterwards bouncing around and i didn't even mind! (how!?!?) drinking the beet juice.  but it's hard to say whether i was pumped up because of soul or the cleanse..i am leaning towards soul ;)

day 3 was fine. i felt i had less energy, but still okay. the green juices were tough to get down, and i was just ready to be done. however, i have to say, i would drink the pineapple mint juice regularly and obviously same with the cashew milk. both are delicious, and are actually sold on their own at whole foods if you have any interest in trying any of them. at the end of day 3, i still wasn't hungry, but was ready to CHEW. they recommend chewing your juices..but umm..i don't know how to chew liquid? i also went to the dentist at the end of day 3, and maybe this is TMI, but when you do the cleanse your teeth start to feel dirty, even if they aren't. i think eating (duh) is a natural tooth brush! so i was kind of worried they were going to tell me my teeth were rotting or had turned green permanently. but they didn't. they did tell me i have to get my wisdom teeth out though. BOO. 

after i was done with the cleanse (on Friday). i felt good, i didn't wake up ravenously hungry..and i wasn't craving bad food or anything like that, just nutrients. more than anything, i just wanted coffee the entire time i was on the cleanse. that was the first thing that crossed my mind on friday morning. 

coffee is my boyfriend!

 t had joked that he was going to wake up at 12:01 on Friday morning and go find something to eat, but even he didn't do that. he tried to eat an omelette on Friday morning and could only eat half, which is shocking for him. i had an apple and some PB and then headed to soul cycle. i still wasn't really hungry and had a bit more fruit for breakfast. by lunch time i was starting to get reaaaalllly hungry. i had a salad with grilled chicken at lunch and amazingly, avoided the bread basket. however, this lunch did NOT sit well with me. BPC recommends you ease back into solid food to prevent this from happening..but..oops..i didn't listen. lesson learned. 

overall, i actually lost 5 lbs on the cleanse (which wasn't the goal, but it was interesting to see). however, i'm back 1.5 pounds this morning (saturday), so i'm sure it was all water weight. 

would i recommend this to other people? Definitely! more than anything, it is an interesting practice in self control and discipline. i do think you get a ton of nutrients and probably more than a normal day for some people in the juices. does it make you feel like a super star with clear, beautiful skin who could go out and run 18 miles no problem? no. but it does make you feel good, and i think it does re-set your system a lot. makes you crave healthy foods and sometimes, you just need that! 

let me know if you have any questions about BPC. sorry this is so long, but there is a lot to stay!