I’ve Discovered Podcasts!

I think I am late to the podcast game…but better late than never!

What lead me to check out podcasts was Julie Foucher.  She is a CrossFit Games athlete who was injured during this year’s regionals (tore her Achilles) and ended her professional CrossFit career.  This was going to be her final year competing at the CrossFit Games anyways, since she is going to Med School to become a Family Physician.  Her injury put her into retirement a little earlier than planned.  I would imagine she had already planned on doing her podcast, but the injury might have made it go live sooner rather than later.  He podcast is called “Pursuing Health with Julie Foucher“.

Julie believes that “every person has the right to basic knowledge of how to optimize their mind, body, and spirit”.  So far there have been 6 episodes (well, 7 since #2 was a 2 part episode), with most of them being with CrossFit people and she also spoke to her surgeon who fixed her Archilles.  I’ve enjoyed it so far.  She has great conversations with her guests, and always asks these 3 things:

1. what 3 things they do on a regular basis that have the biggest impact on their health
2. 1 thing they struggle to implement that could have an impact on their health
3. what a healthy lifestyle looks like to them.

It’s been pretty interesting hearing what everyone says and i look forward to new episodes being added every few weeks.

The second podcast that I’ve been listening to is Harder To Kill Radio hosted by Steph Gaudreau of Stupid Easy Paleo.  .

On Harder to Kill Radio, Steph is talking to the best experts in fitness, nutrition, sleep, and mindset so you can apply their lessons to optimizing your own health and wellness.  Steph wants to give us info to make us harder to kill and be unbreakable humans.  In each episode, she asks her guests what they think is the #1 ingredient for building an unbreakable human.  The answers so far have all be different, yet all amazing.

One episode of Harder To Kill Radio, I can’t remember exactly which one, Steph’s guest mentioned a book they found helpful – The Happiness Project, by Gretchen Rubin.  I have this book on my iPad but haven’t read it yet, but listening to whoever it was talk about it got me curious and I discovered that Gretchen Rubin actually has a podcast!  So…

The third podcast I’m listening to is Happier by Getchen Rubin.

Gretchen took a year and dedicated it to becoming “happier”.  Her book – The Happiness Project – documents how she went about becoming happier.  On the podcast, she and her sister Elizabeth discuss things and habits that can make us happier.  Each week, they give a “Try This At Home” task.  I’m enjoying this podcast and plan on implementing the “try at home” tasks very soon.  (more on that in a future post)

I’m sure there are a ton of other great podcasts out there that I would enjoy and hopefully as I get more into this whole medium I will find more to add to my listening lists.

If you haven’t listened to these podcasts yet, give them a try.

Do you have any podcasts you like that I should give a listen to?

Making Changes

Well, it’s been 2 months since I posted a blog.  I am really not doing well with posting at all this year.  That needs to change.  I need to find someway to fit blogging into my life again.  I really enjoy it, but it seems to be the one thing that gets bumped in my hectic life.  I am going to set a goal of 2 posts a week for July, and if I post more than that, then it’s a bonus.

So, let’s get to it!  🙂

One thing that should help me get some time to blog is that I am officially caught up on Game of Thrones.  Why did I wait so long to watch this show?  I friggin’ LOVED it!  I did not love that they are killing off all my favourite people, but other than that, what a great show!  Anyways, now that I’m not watching GOT on my lunch hour, I can use that time to blog… at least I hope that will be the case!

I think I mentioned before I disappeared for 2 months, that I was doing the Whole Life Challenge again.  This time, along with following the challenge rules, I also followed a macro plan given to me by one of the coaches at the gym.  The challenge is now over (thank god!) and I finished with some slight improvements.  I lost a few pounds, lost a few inches from my waist and hips, and improved my workout score.  All in all, it was okay, and although I didn’t lose as much weight or inches as I did on my very first challenge, at least I lost and didn’t gain, which tends to happen to me as we get into the summer months as BBQ’s and beers become more frequent.

Towards the end of the challenge my coach changed my macro plan.  The first set of macro targets they gave me was based on the Eat to Perform calculator.  It gave me a lot of calories each day (2136), and I actually had a hard time eating enough to meet my targets ( 215g carbs on workout days, 105 on rest days, 150g protein, 75g fat).  Probably with about 2 weeks left in the challenge, I was given new targets based on the If It Fits Your Macros calculator.  My coach says this one is better for women, and it gives me quite a few less calories, mainly from a much lower fat target (1606 cals, 201g carb, 110g protein, 40g fat).

Even though the challenge is over, I am continuing to eat to my new macro targets.  It’s actually easier to do now that I’m not restricted by any WLC rules.  I can pretty much eat whatever I want, as long as it fits my macros!  I’ve been much more successful with these new targets, and with a little planning, and some creative snacking, I’m coming pretty close to all goals most days.

I have had to make a few changes to reduce my fat consumption.  Breakfast used to look like this:

Baked sweet potato topped with taco meat, veggies and 2 fried eggs.

and now it looks like this:

Toasted whole wheat English muffin topped with light herb cream cheese, sliced ham and 1/2 cup of fried egg whites.

And at the end of the day, when you have a bunch of macros left to eat, you get pretty creative with your snacks:

10 jalapeno stuffed olives, 4 slices ham, and a Skinny Cow chocolate and vanilla drumstick!

All in all, at the end of the day yesterday, I was right on with my carb target, and just under my fat and protein, but I’ll take that!
I’m sure there will be a few more changes that I need to make along the way, but so far, they have all been worth it!

Have you made any changes lately?  

Motivational Monday–Tuesday Edition

Hi folks! Sorry for being late with my Motivational Monday post, but things were a bit hectic in my world yesterday, and I never quite got to my blog post.  Oh well…better late than never, right!

if you’ve been following along, you know that I LOVE CrossFit.  It’s different every day, it’s challenging, it’s hard work, and it involves lifting heavy shit.  The lifting sometimes scares me and I am definitely not the strongest person at my Box, but I do my best and I see results.  This morning I say this awesome infographic from Health Central about why weightlifting and strength training are good for you.  I know first hand that all 10 of these are true!

So, what are you waiting for.  Go pick something heavy up, put it down, and pick it up again.

It will do your body good!

Do you currently include weight training in your workout routine?

March Blogging Challenge #2

Happy Hump Day!  Once I make it through today, I only have one more day of work before I am on vacation!!!

But, before vacation time, I have a few things to do…one of them being write this post for the 2nd topic in Fitness Cheerleader’s March Healthy Living/Fitness Blogger Challenge.  Today’s topic:

Share 5 tips to fit fitness into your life.

I’m no expert about this topic, but here’s what has worked for me:

1.  Schedule it:  Put your workout into your calendar and treat it like an appointment or meeting.  I am able to book my CrossFit classes up to one week in advance.  Based on my family’s schedule and other things I have going on, my CrossFit routine has been 8:30pm Monday &, Wednesday, and 5:30pm Friday evening for quite some time. It’s in my calendar and I know not to book other things at those times if I can avoid it.  My family also knows that at those times, I’ll be at the Box.

 

2.  It doesn’t have to be a long workout, just get moving:  One thing I’ve learned doing the Whole Life Challenge, is it’s okay if your workout is quick, or even if it doesn’t feel like a workout.  The challenge had us to do at least 10 minutes of activity every day.  This can be anything that gets you moving.  On days when I don’t have CrossFit I try to walk for at least 10 minutes, or do 10 minutes of light exercise – things like squats, hip bridges, sit-ups, push-ups or anything else that gets me moving.  Other things you can do could be: go for a walk at lunch, park farther away from mall or store entrances so you have to walk further to get to the door, take the stairs instead of the elevator.  These are all little things, but if you do enough of them in a day, they all add up.

3.  Get friendly with a foam roller.  This was another thing with the Whole Life Challenge.  They wanted us to do 10 minutes of stretching a day.  I got into the habit of foam rolling for 10 minutes before I went to bed.  This was one of the things that I actually kept doing after my first WLC ended.  Every night, before I climb into bed, I roll around on the floor with my foam roller.  It hurts, I creek and crack, but it feels awesome.  I think the fact that I do foam roll every day help my muscles recover from my insane CrossFit workouts so I am ready to go next time I’m at the gym.  Check out this link or click on the image to be taken to the full infographic for how to foam roll like a pro from Greatist:

4.  Find something you love.  If you find a workout that you love, you will be more likely to do it.  I used to run…quite a bit actually.  But I never really liked it and every training run felt like a chore.   As soon as the race I was training for was over, I would stop running, because I didn’t like it and it was so hard for me.  Then, when I was time to train for another race, I would have to start from ground zero again, and that made it even harder.  It really wasn’t fun ever.  Eventually I decided that life was too short to spend that much time doing something I didn’t like.  Thankfully, that was right about that time that I discovered CrossFit…and I’ve never looked back!  I absolutely LOVE CrossFit and I look forward to every class.  I’m actually sad and miss it on days when I don’t go to the Box.

5.  Do it with a friend.  If you know you have to meet someone, you are less likely to skip out.  Or, if it is something you really don’t like all that much, having someone to do it with will make it better.  When I did run, the best part of it was the training runs that I did with my sister.  We are both busy with work and families, but we generally ran together twice a week – once for hills and once for our long run.  Hills suck…plain and simple. But, knowing when I got to the top of the hill, I got to run casually back down and chat with my sister, made them suck not quite so badly.  Long runs were just that…LONG!  We would regularly run for 2+hours.  They were hard, but we made the time pass by talking non-stop for the whole time. So, find a pal and get out there and do it!

Hopefully these tips will help you fit fitness into your busy schedules.

Do you have any tips on fitting fitness into your life?

Back To It

After a much needed day off yesterday, I headed back to the box today.  I was a bit worried about whether I could actually do a WOD today.  I am sore everywhere.  My abs hurt when I laugh or cough.  My arms hurt to reach for things or turn the steering wheel.  My legs hurt getting out of a chair, climbing stairs and even just walking.  I hurt, and it’s awesome!

Tonight’s WOD was:

When I saw this I was a bit worried.  My arms are still sore from the pull-ups and push-ups and I wasn’t sure I could swing a 1 pood kettlebell.  Plus, my hand tear is still tender and 50 swings wouldn’t be making them any better. At least the lifts didn’t have any squatting in them.

This was the first time I had done good mornings.  I had done them only with a PVC in a warm up once before.  Today was the first time I did them with a bar and weight.  I did 55#, 65# and the last set with 75#.  They were okay.  I think they are a bit weird. 

After the Good Mornings we warmed up our cleans.  I like cleans.  Tonight we learned a bit of a different technique..not so much of a jump, shrug, high pull, but more pulling the bar into our hips and using our hips to lift the bar up.  It took a few tries to get this motion as it’s a bit different than what I’m used to, but once I figured it out, I really liked this new way.  The bar just seems to fly up to the rack position.  Anything to make these lifts easier is alright by me!

The Sumo Deadlift High Pulls were next.  I had only done these once before.  They are okay, a bit weird with the grip so close together.  I need to remember to use my “jump” to get the bar up on the high pull. 

After warming up the individual moves, it was onto the WOD.  I did the WOD Rx!  1 pood kettlebell and 65# for the hang cleans and SDHP.  I was worried about the kettlebell swings but they were actually okay.  I think I even may have done 5 extra swings because when I got to 50 I was done and no one else was, so I figured I must have counted wrong and did another 5 just to be sure!  I’m never the first one finished anything at CrossFit!  I managed to get through the 50 swings and 3 rounds +8 in the 9 minutes.  Then we had to take the weight off the bar and do as many push presses as we could do in a minute, with stripping the bar taking up some of the time.  I was able to get 17 push presses done, so a total score of 55 for the WOD.  Not great, but it is what it is.  I was just happy I could do the WOD given how sore I still was from Barbara on Monday.

Tomorrow I have hockey and then I’m back to CrossFit on Friday.  I’ll find out what the WOD is tomorrow.  Hopefully it’s a good one and I can work hard.

Since the end of the Whole Life Challenge back on November 7, I haven’t been the greatest with my eating.  I enjoyed a few treats the first week after and then really wanted to stick to my new way of eating.  I felt good, had more energy and the scale was moving in the right direction. Last week was good since I had planned and shopped to eat clean/paleo, but this week I didn’t get to planning and didn’t shop to a menu and my week has been crap.  I’m eating too much of the wrong things…and feeling it.  I’m tired, hungry all the time, and my stomach has been a bit upset for the last 3 days.  I am definitely going to plan my menu and do a good grocery shop this weekend so next week I can be prepared for success. 

Happy Hump Day!
How has your week been so far?  Are you on track with your workouts and meals?

The Sunday Six

NOTE:  I am quite aware that it is Monday today, but I started this post yesterday and I’m too lazy to make up a new graphic, so I am just going to stick with the Sunday Six as the theme!  That being said, I did get to item number 1 and part way through item number 2 before I got derailed by a car ride and the premiere of the new season of The Newsroom! 

My life seems to be a tad on the crazy busy side of things these days….and my blog has taken a bit of a backseat.  I missed this week’s Friday Five, so I’m going to make up for it with a Sunday Six!

1.  I had a couple of good workouts this week!  I wore my heart rate monitor to my ball hockey game on Wednesday.  Here’s how that looked: 

I also wore my heart rate monitor to CrossFit on Thursday night.  I know I’m getting a good workout because I leave the Box a sweaty, exhausted mess.  Here’s how that looked:

Seems like both of these activities are a pretty good workout.  The ball hockey is impressive because in that total 57 minutes, I’m only playing about half of that time, since we take shifts.  We play two 20 minute running time periods, so that hour is really probably closer to 15 minutes of game time for me.  Not a bad caloric burn for 15 active minutes!

I was surprised by how many calories I burned at CrossFit.  I usually count a WOD as about 300 calories when I put it into MyFitnessPal.  Seems like I might have been a bit on the low side with that.  The WOD was 2 parts..the WOD itself (5 rounds for time of 400m run and 50 squats) and then a circuit of different moves.  The hour broke down like this:  10 minutes for warm up, a few minutes for station set up for the ring dips and Pendlay rows, 18:26 for the WOD, and the rest of the hour working through the 3 stations 3 times each.

At some point I am going to need to figure out what the fat burn and fitness numbers really mean.  I know what they mean in general, but I’d like to know how it calculates what is a fat burn minute versus what is a fitness minute.  Both workouts show close to the same % fat burn, but very different fat burn minutes???  Anyone know what this is or means?

2.  We had a fantastic weekend at the cottage.  We decided late in the week since the weather was supposed to be so good that we would head up to the cottage for the weekend.  This was a fantastic decision on our part!  The weather was perfect.  We had two good nights of bonfires:

On Saturday we took a day trip to Burleigh Falls.  It’s only about 45 minutes from our cottage but I’d never been there before.  The rest of my family had been there a couple of years ago when I was at a golf event.  Anyways, Burleigh Falls is a small waterfall and rapids and you can jump off a small cliff into the bottom of the rapids.  For some reason I was a giant chicken and just couldn’t get myself to jump into the rapids.  Finally, at the end of the day I did it and it was awesome.  I just wish I could have done it sooner in the day.  Oh well, I got some good sun and I had a good vantage point to keep doing a head count as we had 10 kids with us between the 3 families that went on the day trip.

It was another fantastic sunset on Saturday night.  I never get tired of this view:

Sunday was spent following the sun around the yard, trying to even out my burn!  My back got pretty toasty at Burleigh Falls, so Sunday I tried to face the sun to give my back a break.  The kids went tubing and kayaking and just enjoyed a fun-filled day on the water.  And as seems to be a bit of a pattern, the kids have managed a few extra days at the cottage with the cousins down the road.  They are getting dropped off at home on Tuesday sometime.  I sure wish I could get a few extra days up there, but I will have to wait until my week of holidays the first week of August.  The countdown is on!

3.  Since we had no kids at home last night we went for a moonlit cruise in the Miata!  We got home from the cottage a bit late, grabbed a pizza for dinner, and watched Big Brother.  Then, since it was still so nice out, I got hubs to take me out for a little cruise.  We had a nice drive, saw some amazing houses, and had some nice chats about nothing in particular.  I was a great little date night.  Hopefully this can become a regular thing.  Lord knows with the amount that we are paying to insure the thing we might as well drive it as much as we can!

4.  I have another crazy week of workouts and sports ahead of me.  Here’s how this week looks:

Monday:  CrossFit 8:30
Tuesday:  Golf 4:50, Ball hockey 10pm
Wednesday: CrossFit 5:30, Jacko Ball hockey 8pm, my ball hockey 10pm
Thursday:  either shopping for a golf outfit with my scramble team or CrossFit at 8:30
Friday:  either CrossFit at 1pm, or a rest day – depends what happens on Thursday…and then drive to the cottage
Saturday/Sunday:  COTTAGE and relaxing!

I’ve only got a few more weeks of ball hockey left and I’m looking forward to it being over and dropping back to only 1 thing a night and maybe getting an extra “day off” in my schedule.  Of course, on those days off I really should be doing my pull up program and my double under practicing as I haven’t been doing those at all and if I don’t get my butt in gear soon, I won’t make my goal of an unassisted pull up and 20 consecutive double unders by the end of the summer.

5.  I can’t wait to go to CrossFit tonight.  I missed my Friday class last week as a little family emergency came up and I needed to go help my son babysit my niece as she really wasn’t feeling very well and he just needed a little moral support.  So my Friday afternoon was spent rocking a sweet little girl and trying to get her to stop crying instead of going and lifting heavy things. So, I’m looking forward to getting back to the Box and getting a good sweat on.  That shouldn’t be a problem tonight, since it’s about 33 degrees out and feeling like 40 with the humidity (that’s about 91 and 104F)..so pretty friggin’ hot!

Tonight’s WOD is:

I’m not sure I will be able to do the squat cleans at 95lbs…I don’t remember what my weight for the squat clean is…I will have to check my WOD book when I get to the Box.  And it looks like the last time they did this WOD was back in July of last year.  That is before my CrossFit time, so this will be my benchmark for this WOD.  I’m guessing it will be tough…all the 21-15-9 WODs that I’ve done so far have been killer!  I can’t wait!

6.  We are loving the Harvest Share boxes we are getting!  Last week was week 3 of the program for us and we got another amazing basket of goodies.

We got:  strawberries, lettuce, Swiss chard, orange peppers, red and white baby potatoes, onions, celery, cucumber, beets, and 2 baskets of the biggest peas in the pod I have ever seen.  I think there was something else buried under there too, but I can’t remember what it was!  In typical fashion, the strawberries didn’t make it to the fridge – we ate those in about 1 minute flat.  The peas also did not make it to the fridge.  The kids and I tried one and then before we knew it, they were gone.  Holy deliciousness! That’s a pea pod graveyard on the right side of the photo!

We are already looking forward to seeing what sort of goodies arrive this week.

Now, I’ve got just enough time to run the spell check, get this published, and go get ready for CrossFit.

Hope you all had a great weekend and are ready for a great week.

How is your week ahead looking?  As crazy busy as mine seems to be?
Only 4 more days until the weekend

A Super Short Week Ahead

Another weekend is over , but I’m looking forward to the week ahead.  For me, this is a super short week.  I’m only working 3 days and then taking Thursday and Friday as vacation days.  It’s time again for The Birdie Open!    I will be heading down to Niagara Falls to meet my girlfriends for our annual golf weekend.  I can’t wait!  More on Birdie in the days to come…for now, let’s recap my weekend.

I enjoyed an awesome massage Friday night after work.  As always, it was relaxing and soothing as my muscles always seem to be a little sore these days – thanks CrossFit !  One extra nice part of this massage was when my therapist asked if I had lost weight!  I was very happy to say yes.  It’s nice that other people are noticing the change.

The rest of my weekend was rather uneventful.

Saturday I spend most of the day down at my son’s school, helping with SpringFest.  Saturday night, Rory, Jack and I went to a Japanese restaurant and enjoyed a delicious and entertaining dinner at the teppanyaki table.  I didn’t get many good photos before my phone died, but did get just a few.

The shrimp in the pic are Jacko’s dinner.  He didn’t want a full meal, so instead he polished off an order of edamame and then the shrimp.  He did get a little bit of everything else, though, as the chef made sure he got a taste of just about everything he cooked on the table – some chicken, some steak, veggies and rice.  It was a fantastic meal and we left happy and not too full.  The meal took over 2 hours, so we had lots of time to digest each course before the next one came.  It wasn’t a cheap meal, but we will definitely be going back so Nick can come with us next time. 

Today was a quiet day with laundry, menu planning, groceries, and watching some Arrested Development.  I only had a few days of food to worry about since I’ll be heading out on Thursday and Rory and the boys will be fending for themselves. 

Tonight we had Flank steak and grilled veggies…so good.

After I prepped tonight’s dinner, I also prepped tomorrow night’s dinner, which is just waiting in the fridge to be grilled up for a quick, tasty dinner tomorrow after work.

I actually made a double batch of burgers so I will have leftovers for some clean eating lunches this week at work.  Seriously, I leftovers!

Today, I also enjoyed few indulgent treats! 

Yep..that’s a mini pretzel dipped in Nutella…directly from the jar.  Not the healthiest snack, but I just needed a little chocolate hit..so good, but I really need to try to make sure this doesn’t become a habit!

I also enjoyed this…

This is the cutest little container of ice cream I have ever seen!  Despite being tiny, it sure packs in the calories, at a whopping 280 for the 118ml container.  I knew this was going to be a calorie packed treat, so after dinner I went for a 5k walk to be sure I got some exercise in today and not have to feel too guilty about enjoying my treat.

I enjoyed my walk.  I listened to my tunes and felt good moving, knowing I was going to be enjoying my Haagen-Dazs soon! 

I’ve got another busy week ahead:

Monday:   CrossFit 8:30pm
Tuesday:  Golf at 4:30, Ball Hockey at 8pm
Wednesday:  Ball hockey 7pm, CrossFit 8:30pm (need to be sure I have a good lunch and snacks today, since I probably won’t have time for much dinner before I need to go to ball hockey…and then CrossFit after…wish me luck!)
Thursday:  CrossFit 9:30am before I head down to Niagara Falls for my girls golf weekend
Friday:   18 holes of Golf at Peninsula Lakes Golf Course
Saturday:   18 holes of Golf at Thundering Waters – a John Daly course (I’m pretty sure this is where we will be playing our second round…should be fun)
Sunday:  Winding up the Birdie Open and then staying in Niagara Falls for a conference until Wednesday morning.  Looking forward to it.  Hopefully I will see a few interesting presentations and have a chance to network with fellow market researchers.

Now, as is all too common, it is late and I need to get to bed.  When will I learn!

How was your weekend?
What’s in store for the week ahead?

Rise and Shine…More like Rise and Sweat!

I was up at 6am today to head to CrossFit for the 6:30 class.  I will admit, I was not crazy about having to get up so early, but this was the only time that would work for me today to get my WOD in.

It was a great WOD:

Part 1 was actually FUN!  I really like snatches!  There is a lot going on in the lift, but I love it.  I’m still not lifting very heavy, but my form is really coming along.  My overhead squats were much better today too.  I focused on keeping my arms pushing “up” and also on squeezing my shoulder blades/upper back to give stability.  I have no idea what my max hang snatch is.  I just used 35lbs for part 1 and that was enough to be challenging, but not sloppy. 

Part 2 was tough.  There were just so many reps to get through – apparently they call this type of WOD a “Chipper”.  I used 10lb dumb bells for this part of the WOD.  The toughest part for me was the thrusters…those 10lb weights felt like 100lbs!  The rest was tough, but really not that horrible.  Well, burpees are always horrible, and doing them with an additional 20lbs is not much fun, but I just kept moving and chipping away at them.  There was a 15 minute time cap to Part 2 of the WOD, and I finished in 14:11.  At the end, I was dripping with sweat and between the burpees and the push-ups, I left a puddle on the floor.  That made me happy! 

Tonight was supposed to be my golf league, but the weather was a bit crazy with heavy downpours so we took the night off.

That just left ball hockey.  My team played at 8pm, which was why I needed to go to CrossFit this morning since ball hockey conflicted with my usual 8:30pm class time.

Ball hockey was good.  The arena was much warmer this week, which made for another good sweat!  Plus we won, which is always good! 

Now I’m home, tired, a bit sore from the WOD this morning, and also sore from running on a concrete floor (I feel it in my hips) and I took a ball in the shoulder, which left a nice mark and is achy.  All these aches and pains should make for a fun WOD tomorrow….which looks killer.  Seems like the theme of the week is 2 part WODs!

This should be another fun WOD.  Lots of different moves, some which I can do, some that I can’t, so it will be hard….but that’s why I go! 

Okay, now I need to take my tired ass and sore body to bed.  I’ve got a busy day at work and a killer WOD, so I need my rest!

Hope your Tuesday was a good one!
What’s your favourite CrossFit move?

What a Week!

Wow, this week has just flown by…and I’ve been super busy.

Here’s what’s been going on in my world.

Monday:  CrossFit WOD…the Filthy Fifty.  Wow, what a WOD.  You can read all about the torture here

Tuesday: Golf! This was my second league night of the year, and despite being a bit on the cool side temperature-wise, I had a great night out on the course.  My driver was working, I had decent second shots (which often give me a bit of trouble), and I felt confident when I stepped up to the ball to make each shot.  I only had one really bad hole (an 8 on a par 4 –ugh!), but other than that, I played a decent round…for me at least! Here’s how my scorecard looked:

Hole	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	OUT
Par	4	3	4	4	4	5	5	3	4	36
Me	6	4	6	6	8	6	7	3	6	52

While some people would not be pleased with a 52, I am thrilled.  This was my second best night on the course ever…and only 2 shots away from my goal of shooting a 50 this season.  Hopefully I keep it up for the rest of the season.  I’m confident that 50 is within my sights this year…I will get it, I know I will!

I was supposed to play ball hockey Tuesday night, after golf, but my stomach was a bit off and it didn’t seem like a great idea to go run around when things were so unsettled!

Wednesday:    Both Jack and I had ball hockey Wednesday night.  He played at 8 at one rink and I played at 9 at a rink across town.  Before we all headed out (Nick was going out as well to babysit for my sister so she could go teach her body attack class), I whipped up a quick clean eating dinner of Spinach and Spiced Chick Peas.  Yum!

After dinner, we all headed out the door.  Hubs dropped Nick off to babysit and Jack and I headed to the rink for his game.  He really loves it, and I love watching him play.  He runs his little heart out there and gives all he’s got every shift.  He usually plays defense in his regular hockey, but in ball hockey, he gets a chance to play all positions and is really enjoying playing forward.  He seems to like taking shots!  I they were tied when I left, but in the end, Jacko’s team lost.  He was a bit disappointed but said he still had fun.

I was able to watch most of his game, but missed the last 5 minutes or so as I had to leave to drive across town for my own game.  I was glad to be feeling better and able to go run around, sweat like crazy and have fun!  We tied our game 1-1.  I got our team’s goal! 

Thursday: Tonight I was back to the Box.  Here’s what the WOD:

This was another night with a new movement.  I hadn’t done a rope climb yet.  Seems like I wasn’t alone in that, as when Andrew (our coach) asked who had done it before, the gym went silent!  He gave us a few very quick tips about how to wrap the rope around our leg, trap the rope between our feet, stand up tall, and pull up our legs and do it all again….and then we were off.

I was the first one in my pair to try.  I probably got about half way up the rope and then I got a bit freaked out about the height and came back down.  I tried a couple more times, but didn’t make it to the top of the rope   Once I felt pretty good and had a good rhythm going, but just couldn’t get up there.  I kept trying to tell my legs to move up the rope, but they just wouldn’t move.  Oh well, I will get it next time.  And, hopefully by the time we do rope climbs again, the rope burn on my leg heals up!  It is a bit shredded.  I’ve dosed it with antibiotic ointment, so hopefully it heals up quickly.

Once we finished the rope climb, it was right into the WOD…a long one, at 20 minutes.  For the pull-ups, I used a purple and black band for part but added a red as well for most of the WOD…I just can’t do pull-ups yet.  Although I did do a bit better tonight, and seemed to get a little kip into the pull-up, which made them easier.  I used a 25lb KB and did the 20 inch box jump.  The pull-ups really slowed me down.  In the end, I finished 6 full rounds, plus the pull-ups, swings and 8 box jumps, for 206 total reps.  Not sure if that is good or bad, but it sure made me tired!  I have to say, I like box jumps.  I’m pretty good at them and was able to crank through 12 in a row each round.  I’m not able to do the jump up, jump down, spring back up motion yet, but I jump up and step down and jump right back up.  One day I will try the jump up, jump down, spring back up and see how it goes….one day!

My class wasn’t until 8:30 tonight, so I had lots of time to make a good, clean eating dinner.  I wasn’t too sure what dinner would be when I left for work this morning.  On our drive to school/work Nick asked what dinner was going to be.  I told him I wasn’t sure and he asked if I could make the “pasta with the white beans and feta”.  I knew exactly the dish he meant, and thought it was a fantastic choice.  It is quick and absolutely delicious!  The official recipe is called Mediterranean Vegetable, White Bean & Feta Penne.  See here for recipe….and give it a try.  It really is good!

I gotta say, the fact that my kid requests a clean eating dinner makes me quite happy.

Tomorrow:   is Friday!  Wohoo!  I’m hoping for a quiet day at work and a quick drive home when I pick the kids up from school right at 3:30.  It’s the May 24 long weekend, so traffic will likely be heavier than usual as everyone skips town early and heads north to cottage country.  We will be heading to the cottage as well, but before we go, I’ve got a 5pm CrossFit class to do.  The WOD tomorrow is a lot of overhead work:

I wasn’t doing CrossFit yet back in January when they did the WOD before, so I don’t have a base score to compare to.  I’ve got my wrist wraps now, so hopefully I will be able to add some pounds to my overhead squat.  I’m not sure I will be able to Rx the Met Con WOD, but I will see…I will give it my best shot.

While writing this post, I got caught up on all of my recorded TV.  I watched How I Met Your Mother from Monday night, Grey’s Anatomy from tonight, and The Big Bang Theory from tonight too.  Now, it’s late…really late (12:30) and I need to go to bed.  I need a good sleep so I’ve got enough energy to make it though CrossFit tomorrow!

Have you done a rope climb?  Did it shred your leg?  I may need to get myself a pair of kick ass socks from TheSoxBox so I can save my legs from any more CrossFit abuse! 

Goodnight!

It’s A Beautiful Day To Go GOLFING!

I am very excited.  Today is the first night of my EWGA York-Simcoe golf league.  Once again, we are playing out of Cardinal Golf Club’s RedCrest course.

It’s a tough course, so it is always a challenge, but still lots of fun.  We have got 64 ladies coming out for our opening night event.  It should be a good time.

Since tonight is the start of my golf season, I thought it would be a good time to put my golf goals for the summer out there. So, here they are:

1. Shoot 50 or under on a league night.  This was one of my goals last year as well.  I came close, with a 51 one night, but never cracked the 50 mark. Hopefully this year will be my year.
2. Win Chapter Championships with my Scramble Team.  This one should be fairly achievable, since last year we were the only scramble team in our chapter, so we qualified for Sectionals just by finishing our round.  We may have some competition this year as our chapter is growing.  We will know in a few weeks.  My team has some issues to sort out with respect to membership since one of last year’s members knows she won’t be able to play in sectionals as she will be away on a course and can’t miss school or change the date. So, we are trying to find a replacement player.  We think we have one lined up, and hopefully we will get that all sorted out tonight when we all see each other.
3. Become more consistent with my driver.  I play golf left handed and have a fairly good slice a lot of the time when I strike the ball.  This means the ball goes out and then hangs a pretty good “left” and curves away.  This often puts me in trouble as I am not in the fairway. My goal for the year is to get rid of the slice.  I changed my grip a bit last year and that seemed to help.  This year I am also going to see if ball position in my stance makes a difference.  This one will be tough, but if I can figure it out, it will do nothing but good things for my game.

I could come up with a lot more golf related goals, since I’ve got many things that need improvement, but I don’t need to overwhelm myself.  If I cross these off early in the season, I can always add a few more things to my list later.

Last night I was back at the Box for another WOD.  My knees and ass had finally recovered from Friday’s killer WOD, and I was ready to get back at it!  The WOD last night was “Nancy” a benchmark WOD.  This was 400m run and 15 Overhead Squats, 5 rounds for time.  This workout actually wasn’t too bad.  The worst part of it was how much my wrists hurt during the OHS.  The squats weren’t bad at all, and I’m sure I could have lifted more weight as I seem to have the form down for this one, but my wrists absolutely kill. So, I only did 35 lbs again.  On my last set of OHS, I borrowed a set of wrist wraps from the guy behind me who had already finished.  When I came in from my last run I saw his wraps laying on the floor.  He wasn’t around to ask, but I grabbed them and threw them on anyways.  Man, what a difference.  I was able to plough through the 15 without much trouble at all.  Once my wrists didn’t kill, I was able to keep the bar nice and still and things felt great.  I finished in 22:19 (I think..or something around there).  I’m not breaking any speed records with my WOD times, but at least I’m getting them done!

After class I bought myself a set of wraps.  I think it’s $30 well spent.  Hopefully I get to use them on Thursday when I’m back at the box for my next WOD.

I tried another new clean eating recipe last night…this one from the June 2013 issue that I just came into my Zinio account over the weekend.

I made the Turkey Zucchini Burgers with Tahini sauce, salsa and feta…and they were AMAZING!
I did all the prep work Sunday night…made the turkey zucchini patties, prepared the tahini sauce, and got the salsa ready.  All that was left to do yesterday was grill the burgers and assemble into a pita pocket.
(the sauce doesn’t look that pretty, but it sure was tasty!)

The final product was absolutely delicious. The kids and hubby all gave two thumbs up for this meal.  I will definitely be making these again…soon!

Do you use wrist wraps when you lift?  Do you find they make a difference?
Have a great Tuesday!