Hey guys! I’m going to keep it short today. I basically have an endless amount of work, so there’s that.
So…my school is having a pretty big outbreak of Norovirus, related to certain dorms and/or dining halls. So I’m trying to stay away from dining halls as much as possible because getting sick right now (or at all!) would be really awful. Hence last night’s dinner.
Yogurt, applesauce, warm cinnamon apples, and sunflower seed butter.
In related news, anybody have any creative ideas of what I can do with apples, carrots, and eggs? Because that is pretty much the extent of my grocery supply at this moment.
I’d also like to share what a big nerd I am with you. In Bio, we’re doing my favorite thing in Biology-carbohydrate metabolism. And given I’m a Bio major, that means it’s basically my favorite thing ever. So I made a pretty little poster, and this piece of artwork is going on my wall. 
This morning, I made the trek to my school’s shiny new gym. It opened on Friday, and this was my first time going.
It looks pretty much exactly like the old one (but there’s a pool), and has pretty much exactly the same name.
I made the journey across campus at 6:30am in the frosty air (ok, this is California…so maybe not) for one reason.
SHINY NEW SPIN STUDIO.
Our old gym didn’t even have a spin studio. They just threw a bunch of crappy bikes into the corner of the weight room with some big speakers. The bikes didn’t even show speed! These bikes were a lot nicer, although they didn’t have as good a feel as the normal Spinning spin bikes. I put a class together for myself last night and went at it. There are no classes in this gym yet, which was nice because I can actually do my own workouts. The weight room seemed nice-everything is red (my school’s color), and our little logo is on all the weights. It was actually really empty! I’m not sure if it’s because this side of campus has fewer people or what, but it might be worth the extra long trip for an empty weight room!
I wasn’t sure how the class I made was, but it must have been pretty good because I had the biggest post-spin high. Plus the return bike ride is all down hill. I thought about cheating on my usual coffeeshop, as Starbucks was on the way back, but it clearly wasn’t meant to be as Starbucks had a huge line.
When I walked up to the register at my regular coffeeshop, the barista had already entered my order into the register. It was clearly meant to be.
A totally white top=the best kind of cappuccino.
Fast forward to lunch-it was a pizza lunch with my Biochem professor and about 10 other students. I was super excited for it because I’m kind of obsessed with Biochem, but it ended up being a bit of a disapointment. I could be totally off base, but I got the impression that a lot of the students were there to suck up to our professor.
In the afternoon, I went to do some work in a local cafe and picked up an oat bar.
Between this and pizza, I ended up totally crashing my blood sugar and had to go take a nap. I did this yesterday too! I don’t normally eat a ton of grains anymore, so this is a problem I haven’t thought about in a while, so I didn’t even think of the consequences. Soo now I’m more well rested but behind on homework and studying.
I don’t have a ton of food pictures today-sorry! So let’s stick to fitness. At Crossfit today, we were doing 2 rep max front squats. I’ve never actually done a maximum front squat. I was struggling at one weight, and then the owner of the box brought me weight lifting shoes to try. The next lift was 10 pounds heavier, and BAM-it felt light! I was shocked they made such a difference, especially given it’s not like I lift in running shoes. I ended up going up another 10 pounds, for a major PR (I know I said I’ve never done a maximum, but I’ve definitely never lifted anything close to this heavy.) I might have to get myself a pair of these now! In other Crossfit news, I did my first WOD with double unders today. Something kind of clicked a few weeks ago, and I’ve been able to string together quite a few of every other jump a double under. The workout didn’t call for hundreds of them, so it was the perfect time to test the waters. It went really well!
Aaaand I have one last thing to share with you guys. I am officially in 5k training mode. I found a cross country training plan to roughly follow, so here is what this week looks like. Days will vary based on my schedule and what else I’m doing that day.
Mon-Recover from 16 miler
Tues-Easy 30 min
Weds-10×400 repeats (Note-in the plan it calls for 400m jog in between, but I’ll probably just rest because I don’t want to do that much distance or spend that much time, at least this crazy week.)
Thurs- easy 30
Fri-30 mins fartlek
Sat or Sun- 60 minutes “long run” (Ohh how things have changed.)
The run I’m skipping this week is a tempo run. I wanted to extra time off to fully recover from the weekend’s super long run before I dive in. I’ve said this before, but I REALLY REALLY need to do a timed mile, but I really don’t want to. I do need to know if my 5k goals are realistic-as in, can I even run 1 mile at the pace I want to do my 5k at? I also want to sneak in some erging as cross training, because I felt that really helped me in my last 5k. But the first priority is making it through this week. Yeesh.
If you’re a runner, what is your favorite distance? Do you have specialty shoes for your workouts?
My closet is kind of embarrassing. I didn’t even bring the shoes I used to lift in. There are Crossfit shoes, spin shoes, general workout shoes, running shoes, old running shoes, running shoes that I never wear because they make my feet hurt….
I caught the norovirus one year when I was in school. It sucked!
Oh no! That must have been awful!