Back in action!

I have been MIA for a while! Still training and working and mothering and everything else I do but I just havent had a spare moment to get on the net and check out all my usual haunts. I've just dropped my daughter off at a birthday party and so finally I have a couple hours to myself. I just heard the dryer beep to tell me its finished but stuff it! It can wait!
Well, I finally had a chance to do my new Cathe DVDs. I tried the Imax one first - HUGE mistake! I knew it was gonna be hard but I didnt think it would be THAT hard! LizN tried to warn me but I didnt listen, did I? I had to stop several times - not only was the choreography different and more complex than what I'm used to (Body Step) but there were so many jumps and leaps and non stop drills that I was really struggling. And I thought I was fit - pfft! I guess its just something I'll get used to if I keep trying. I also did the Drill Max one which was a lot easier to get through and it was very enjoyable too. I havent tried the third one yet....
I'm going out for dinner tonight with some friends and they have chosen a pub - god I hope there's something healthy there. I dont usually go to pubs so I dont know the food but from what I've heard it can be pretty bad. I have had a couple blowouts this week which I'm blaming on TTOM so I cant afford to eat crap for a while.
A full week of work next week so wont get much time to surf the net so I best be off to check out everyone else's blogs. Byeeee!

Now, if only the postman would deliver my new hair straightener. Damn Ebay!!

Yay! I have just received my workout DVDs from LizN at http://www.thefitnesssolution.com.au/
Will let you all know how I go. She is so nice she even sent me a free protein bar (Slim Secrets) which she also sells through her website. I have to say it was DELICIOUS! Have a great weekend everyone!

Inside me lives a skinny woman crying to get out. But I can usually shut the bitch up with cookies.

Boohoo! I had a bit of an embarrassing accident. I was trying to get my oats out of the microwave this morning when the bowl slipped out of my hands and all over the floor. But on its way it burned my left hand, left breast (how embarrassing), lower stomach, left thigh and left foot. I feel like such a dill while I sit here typing with one hand and the other is sitting in a bowl of iced water. I've had to cancel today's and tomorrow's sessions at work because of the throbbing pain and blistering on my hand. There's no way I would be able to lift anything. Well, the good news is I can still use the treadmill at home and do bodyweight squats and other stuff. I'm glad my foot and leg are not as bad because then I wouldnt be able to wear runners. I'm too embarrassed to post any pictures of my injuries so instead I will post pics of my weekend. The first one is of me and hubby (poor bugger has lost most of his hair) at edding No. 1. The second is of my daughter and a friend's daughter at same wedding. The third is of a friend, me and my brother in law at wedding No. 2. The distraction of typing is not helping me so I'm off to find some painkillers. Should've just had toast!!!

Feeling good today, training's back on track. I have sore lats which is good and a sore bum too! Not sure what I did there?? Maybe it was the Body Attack class I did yesterday, it did have a few plyometric lunges in it. I also played two games of netball last night and went to work as well so I'm pretty buggered today. Even still, I did do Body Step today (i'm addicted). Oh, did I mention I bought a brand spankin new treadmill?? And a new spin bike as well??? Yay! I cant wait for the spin bike to arrive. We got the treadmill delivered yesterday and I spent what little time I had trying to set it up. Do you know some men are completely hopeless when it comes to these things and my husband is one of them. If it wasnt for me that treadmill would look like something from outer space right now. Yeah, so I cant wait to do some serious interval training on it.
I've had very little sleep in the past few days so I'm really looking forward to going to bed early tonight. The two weddings I went to were nice and we had a great time. The weekend went so fast and I barely had a minute to myself. Even in between wedding and reception on Sunday I went home to write a seven day food plan for my cousin. He saw me at the church and asked me to give him one because he wants to put on weight (he's a string bean) so I did it and gave it to him at the reception. Ahh, if only that was my dilemma! Speaking of food and eating, the food was lovely - I chose the fish on both nights which was very yummy and you could tell it was fresh right out of the sea! My cousin (who was the groom) has a seafood delivery business so he wasnt going to provide second grade stuff!! The other foods were nice too and I had a bit of everything. The down side is that I woke up two kilos heavier yesterday morning so here's hoping that its from all the extra carbs and that it will be gone by next weigh in. And now that I've stopped the long cardio sessions and I'm back into high intensity stuff all the fat should fall straight off. Providing I eat properly of course. Today I had a huge bowl of oats in the morning, I was really hungry - I think because netball finished at 11pm last night and I was a little peckish afterwards (had dinner early) but I decided to go straight to bed instead. Anyway, I was famished and I had a double serving of oats and an apple after step class. I will be having tuna salad for lunch and probably chicken and vegies for dinner.
Anyway, off to do some work and if I remember later I may post some photos from the weekend.

Had a great session today, upper body weights and 20 mins of HIIT on tready that went something like this:
1 min walking at 6.5km per hour
1 min jogging at 8.5km
1 min running at 9.5km
1 min running at 10.5km
1 min running at 12.5km
repeat four times, but the last sprint was at 14.1km.
I felt great afterwards and Mr Polar said HR was between 80% and 95%MHR the whole time which was good. My maximum was 182.
I will also have a slightly lower calorie day today as I have two weddings to go to on the weekend and I cant pass up sticky date pudding, can I? OK, maybe I can. We'll see.......

By the way, here are the finished products. I added a little flake chocolate to the top of each one.

HOW RUDE!!
I went to the supermarket as planned to buy the ingredients I previously mentioned. I went to the checkout with 2 blocks of dark chocolate, a tub of cream, 3 flake chocolate bars, 3 packets of butternut snap biscuits and a tub of cottage cheese. The cottage cheese was weight watchers brand and I got it because it was on special (not because I'm on weight watchers). Aaaaanyway, the checkout lady takes a look at my goods, then casts a disapproving eye over me and says: "Why do you even bother, weight watchers and all this chocolate?" I couldnt believe what I was hearing! She obviously thought I was some kind of binge eater! I politely explained that I was making dessert for someone and then I thought "Hang on! I dont have to explain my purchases to THIS woman!!" I mean, we all do it - check out the contents of people's trolleys and silently judge their eating habits, but I certainly dont confront someone about what is clearly their choice of lifestyle! I just thought this was outright rude and afterwards I felt like going back and slapping her!! Grrr!

YAY!
I'm back on track and DOMS is setting in from the lunges, squats and pushups I did! Food is on track too. I'll have to resist the mini chocolate tarts I'm making for tomorrow's parties though.
I did a 5km hills run from hell today. I have to honestly say that the 15km was a breeze compared to this. I really thought I would collapse but I pushed through the pain and kept the finish line in my head. Today's food has been (and will be):
*egg whites on oat bread toast
*oats with protein crunch
*vegie soup with lentils and chickpeas
*chicken with vegies
Well, off to the supermarket to buy some dark chocolate (mmm..) and cream (ugh!) for the tarts.

WEEK OFF = NOT GOOD

Well, that's it! There is no more chocolate or hot cross buns in the house and my "crap-free" zone is back to normal. Had a fair bit of chocolate and other sweets in the past three days but now its all gone so back to clean eating now. There is a reason why I dont keep any junk in the house and now I have been reminded - in a BIG way. I feel CRAP! How the hell did I used to consume these things in large quantities on a daily basis? Anyway, I've just cooked up my vegies and a big batch of soup for the week. I'm also defrosting some chicken to go with it so the week's meals are all in order.
I had planned to take it easy in the cardio department last week after having done the long run but I didnt plan on doing NO weights at all. Things just went crazy and I skipped all sessions. Woops! That's not the worst part - I only drank 1.5 litres of water a day instead of 2.5L. Its too late to change it now - I'll just have to live with my stupidity. I still did a Body Attack class this morning but not the weights. Back to normal as of tomorrow though and hopefully the lack of resistance work over the past week will give me a more severe case of DOMS for this week.
Most of my clients are away this week so I only have to work on Thursday at the studio. I still have to go to the other work though. Also, we have a barbecue on Thursday night to go to, a wedding on Saturday and another wedding on Sunday! It will be a good test of my willpower! Actually, I'm not too worried because BBQs are fairly easy to find something good to eat, and there will be too much running around for the weddings to have time to eat too much. My 4 year old will be going to her first hairdressing appointment on Saturday morning. I have never cut her hair so it hangs down around her bum. She wants her hair done "like Barbie" for the wedding. Its a close family member so she will be part of the bridal party. She is so excited - she has been taking the card that the hairdresser gave her with her name and appointment time on it everywhere, she wont let it go!
Anyway, better get off the puter now. I think its time to re-focus and write down some short term goals for the next few weeks.

Jay posted this on the Sportzblitz forum and I just had to steal it!! What a crack up!! Makes me want to eat some now - damn!! Nothing exciting planned for me. I'm sure trying to staying away from all that choccy will keep me busy enough. Some nice long walks should do it.
Gym is closed tomorrow - bugger! I didnt have time for a workout today so I was hoping for a hard one tomorrow. It'll have to wait I guess. I'll just do a huge spring clean instead - that should definately burn some calories. Better get back to work now and when I finish here I have to go straight to the other work. Its neverending!! Hope everyone has a great Easter!

OK, now for the rant. It took such a long time to start ( we only started WALKING about 30mins after the scheduled starting time) so by the time we got up to a run I had run out of breakfast energy. I had had my oats at about 6.30am and it was already past 9am. Lucky I had some GU Energy Gel on me in case of emergency and I felt I needed it at about the 6km mark. I think it really helped.
I've never been in a race before but I think if you're planning on walking the whole thing, the right thing to do is start at the back. It doesnt affect your time as its measured from when you cross the start line. It was a little annoying to see people walking together (arms linked, 5 0r 6 people across) and having to run around them and weave in and out of others who decided it was the perfect time to take photos (in the middle of the road!!) My second complaint was that there were only three drink stations (water only) and the first one was right near the start. I saw the queue for the first one and thought "I'll just go to the next one". Little did I know that the next one was what seemed like 10kms away!! Also, there wasnt even one at the end!! Talk about water restrictions!!
Anyway, back to HIIT for a while now. Gym sessions will be short and intense and I'm thinking of getting some Cathe DVD's for that extra push. She seems hard which I love! I'll have a fairly easy week this week though - I am a little stiff. Not too easy though as I'd love to have a bit of the "c" word on Easter Sunday!
Had a bit of a bad day the other day with nuts and dried fruit (I just couldnt stop picking) so I decided to offload them and packed them into hubby's work bag so his co-workers can put on weight instead of me!! Haha!

Forgot to post my HR stats - average for the whole 1h35m was 166 and max HR was 185 (that was at the end when I sprinted to the finish line! I cant wait til the Herald Sun website puts the finish line thingy up - I want to see how bad I looked at the end! Gotta go but I have heaps more to say on the subject later (mostly whinging).

I did it!!!
I completed the whole 15.2km run without stopping to walk! That was my goal, just to keep going. I knew I wouldnt get a good time because I am not a very fast runner but I just wanted to jog the whole thing. And I got my time today (from the paper) 1 hour, 35 mins and 42 seconds. I am really pleased with that. I remember not even being able to jog for 30 seconds on the treadmill. I thought that I would never be able to run, but the more you do it, the better you get at it. Anybody can do it! And when someone said to me today "I'd never be able to do that" I just said "I used to say that, and look where I am now". Its definately mind over matter, if you think you cant, then you wont! I felt such a rush of relief when I crossed the finsh line and I felt I could have kept going. It was a good day, for us and for the kids. Will post more later when I get time.