the happiest 5k take 2!

Team Fit Britches 2014!

I have a turbulent history with 5ks - first I was all about them, then I decided I only liked silly themed races that didn't require me to just flat out run, then I realized they make me 400% miserable and swore them off in favor of exercise I actually enjoy, and now it seems like the tides are slowly turning. 

A few months ago a friend of mine and I decided we wanted to do a theme race & I suggested, based on my past experience last summer, The Color Run. (This may also have been influenced by the fact that doing the Toledo race meant we could go to the zoo & to Maumee Bay Brewery afterward.) We recruited some friends and ended up with a group of 6 & the team name "Fit Britches." (Thanks, autocorrect.)

Getting up at 4:30am to head down to Toledo made for an interesting drive...

At the starting line with my ladies, Alisha & Emily - shout to to Alisha for the super cute idea to amend her shirt to state "Fit" Britches, haha.

A pre-color shot of us with the classiest of all backgrounds...

It was a beautiful sunny day, but early enough that there was a touch of chill, so it was perfect running weather. I've been doing a lot of pacing work at the gym lately - I learned a huge part of my problem with running is my tendency to shoot out the gate way too hard and burn out before a mile is even up, so I've been doing a lot of steady paced runs at around 5.5-6 mph on the treadmill, and you guys, did it ever help.  I broke away from the group and ran a comfortable race in which I never thought I was going to die or hated my life, in about a half hour - despite stopping to get coated in paint every kilometer. And I felt GREAT. I couldn't believe how actually pleasant running 3.1 miles was!

An epic attempt to be coated in every color possible.

Of course the after party was phenomenal as usual - that's something the Color Run has always done right. Between the DJs and the dancing and the Zumba and the color packet throwing, it's by far the best post-race celebration I've been to yet (and that includes the ones with beer!).  It was also really lovely that the weather was a little cooler than my previous Color Run - the color looks much better when it's not caked all over your body with sweat ;)

Rest assured, Color Run, I will be back in 2015!

summer updates

I used to be a really good blogger. I mean a REALLY good blogger. As in, I use to update my livejournal three and four times a day with what I was doing/eating/reading/cooking, etc (okay that probably actually makes me a seriously horrible blogger - nobody wants to know all the details of my many popcorn binges and tv episodes watched.) Now I'm a lazy blogger in love with the self-indulgent idea of having a blog that tracks all the genuinely cool experiences I have on a regular basis, but apparently still poor at the execution of this.

So, it's summer, and these are the lovely things I've done that bear noting:

• Spent an entire weekend with my best friend forever doing nothing but lying on my couch marathoning every Marvel movie (none of which I had seen). 

The snuggles of both my best lady friend and my kitty; what could be better.

• Went to Ottawa again for just shy of a week of Canadian beer shenanigans - I have far too much to say about this trip not to give it its own post.

Ottawa beers with my best Canadian friends!

• Spent my pre-birthday weekend with my Kalamazoo loves Tom & Joe - including sparkler fights in my driveway on the 4th, after a fancy dinner of grilled salmon and scallops, Tigers game with all my favorite boys in the world followed by an incredible all you can eat meat dinner at Texas de Brazil on the 5th, and a day spent brewing a Belgian Dubbel on the 6th.

KalamaBFFs!

First Tigers game of the season!

These boys are my life <3 

Brazilian cheesecake - we literally had to pass this around the table about ten times before it was gone; we were all so stuffed full of meat.

Looking scrubby with some lovely ladies (they were heading out to a club; I had just come from a ball game...)

For as obnoxious as we were, Texas de Brazil treated us soooo well.

Ghetto-rigged brew-in-bag setup.

How many people does it take to transfer wort from an 18" kettle...?

• Finally figured out a temporary sparge solution for our brew-in-bag beers & created what will hopefully be a successful RyePA with honey & peppercorns - outcome to follow after bottling next weekend ;) 

Manual sparge - might not be the easiest way, but it worked!

• Saw Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds for the 3rd time at the Masonic Temple - not only was it an incredible show, but Nick pulled me up onto a seat so he could spit "From Her To Infirmity" right into my face. It was super special that they played Detroit at all (I had previously only seen then in Toronto), but the set list, Nick's energy and interacting with the crowd, and the giant piano interlude (a man on the keys is probably the most attractive thing I can think of - especially one crooning "Love Letter" & "The Ship Song") one of the greatest shows I've ever been to. My buddy and I kept turning to each other and just staring in shock - aka the "I KNOW, right!?" face.

This man completes me.

That would be the rail I was moments later pulled up & over.

• Made many many visits to Eastern Market....& gotten a little carried away every time. My most favorite vendors: DROUGHT raw juices (never stop putting cinnamon in watermelon juice) The Brinery (Kimchi! Kimchi with garlic scapes and ramps!), Corridor Sausage, The Granola Tree (The Almond Joy peanut butter is just killing me), and of course Germack (Jumbo cashews get in my mouth). And of course a big shout out to all the local farms for the delicious produce & meats - I also bought my first ever whole chicken there last weekend - giblets and everything!

Like I said.....possibly just a LITTLE bit overboard!!

The biggest brussels sprouts you've ever seen in your life.

My beautiful roast chicken resting on a bed of baked garlic kale. A success, if I do say so myself :)

• Last week I had a bit of a whirlwind Thursday that led in to a crazy busy weekend - inducted a buddy into the world of craft beer Thursday night at Dragonmead (get the waffle fries with chili and jalapeños ALWAYS), bumbled hungover through the workday on Friday, and then recovered just in time to ride go-karts and play excessive amounts of mini-golf at my work picnic on Saturday. 

This boy is 400% trouble & I love every minute.

• Last but definitely not least, today I am finally, FINALLY getting an estimate on putting hardwood floors in my spare bedroom!! I've been wanting to build a mini "studio" for over a year now, but time and money have finally come together, and after spending an hour ripping up carpet this weekend, I'm good to go at last!! I've already got mirrors and gym supplies all picked out ;) Whew!

Now things have slowed down a little but it's definitely only temporary - got some big weekends coming up!!

HOW HAS EVERYONE ELSE'S JULY BEEN??

two firsts!

Happy beautiful summer day!!  I just went for a beautiful 2 mile walk around my condo complex while listening to the latest episode of the Strange Brews Podcast (I'm fan #130!) & now I'm taking a chill break on the couch with all my windows open, a mug of coffee (shut up, I drink coffee in hundred degree weather, today is nothing) & two incredibly snuggly kitties for a quick break before a Whole Foods run.

Shoutout to Reebok - I LOVE these new leggings!!

This morning I went to my very first ever Pound Fit class!  Ever since I heard about it I've been stoked to try it. I spent my formative years in marching band, jazz band, small group ensembles, etc. - playing every form of percussion instrument that existed. How could I NOT love a class that incorporated drum sticks into a loud, high-energy/intensity workout??  So when I heard that the fabulous Nancy G was going to be teaching Pound classes at Ken Jackson's, I signed up immediately.

The class was full of new people (like me), so we were warned that it was going to be a slower pace than usual - we filled out the 45 minute class two songs short of what Nancy told us would eventually constitute a "full" class - but it was still a fantastic workout. I hadn't read quite as much into the workout history, so I wasn't aware that it was so pilates-based and didn't realize how much core and lower body work would be involved - the songs that have you sitting on the mat doing a thousand torturous variations on the yoga boat pose were KILLERS, and I can feel all the squatting & lunging in the hip flexors/glutes/quads already.  I can't wait to take the class again & get it up to speed - I burned about 400 calories in the 45 minute class, but we took lots of breaks so that Nancy could explain poses, make sure we all knew what we were doing & that we all had correct form, so I think you could easily hit 600+ later on down the road.  I'm always looking for a core/strength type class that ups the energy and has a nice cardio element to it - call me a cheater, but I just get so bored doing traditional pilates.  Plus, DRUMMING!!

Not nearly as pretty as all the ones on google.......

My other first was something I've been hearing about EVERYWHERE for the past couple months, but living in the Midwest we just don't see them anywhere - acai bowls!!  The more I keep seeing pictures of these delicious creations, the more I've been craving them, so I took matters into my own hands.  I'll admit, I've never taste acai OR pitaya (the two - from what I can tell - most common bases to a smoothie bowl), so I really had no idea what to expect.  I did a little research and ended up snagging a couple packs of Sambazon original smoothie packs, hitting up the internet for topping tips (most especially this blog post over at The Fitnessista) and ended up blending mine with a banana & some almond milk, then topping with banana, blueberries, almonds, a little bit of granola, some goji berries and a drizzle of peanut butter & honey.  I accidentally added too much almond milk so my first bowl was a liiiiiiittle bit soupy, but it was so so so good that I forgave myself.  I can't wait to try a million different toppings - I was so leery about adding peanut butter for some reason, but there are few things in the world I love more than nut butters, so I talked myself into believing it would be good and damn, was it ever.  I feel a new late night post-gym obsession coming on......

QUESTION OF THE DAY: What's something new you've tried lately, & what inspired you to take the plunge?

hot date on the detroit river

In my favorite place, showing off my other favorite place; whats a Canadian/American girl to do?

Skye & I and the most obnoxious tech shirts
I have ever seen.

I did the best thing ever this weekend, which was a 5k for a super amazing cause that I wholeheartedly support with NONE of the mega-stress that usually surrounds a race for me (that impending doom leading up to the moment that it starts, then abates for the first two minutes of feeling good, and then picks back up and spirals into the WHY DO I DO THIS TO MYSELF despair that keeps me company for the rest of the race as I feel like my body is being broken down into a thousand miserable little non-runner pieces).  Why? Because my non-athlete friend Skye was in town from Ohio to support the cause with me, so as part of the deal to get her up here I agreed to walk it with her.  HA!  Take that, running!  (I admit though, I felt super guilty watching people pass me knowing I could pace them or even finish before them, had I been trying - and also kind of disappointed that I didn't truly run it because the course was BEAUTIFUL.)

The race we ran was Mickey's Run up in Windsor, sponsored by the Windsor Spitfires hockey team. The Spits are near and dear to my heart, and even more so is former captain Mickey Renaud, in whose honor the race is held to benefit the Windsor Spitfires Foundation.  I wasn't able to run the inaugural race last year because it was the same weekend I had another 5k planned, so I was extra excited to run this year.

Part of the track we ran - the whole thing was this beautiful & I want to go back and run this course for real some day.

The beautiful finisher medals we got.

After the race, we headed down to take a nice walk by the Riverfront before coming back to Detroit, & then decided that it was such a beautiful day that we should take advantage of it by staying outside, so I drove us over to Belle Isle to spend a few hours!  I can't remember the last time I was on the island, but it was definitely a perfect decision. I've been wanting to go to the aquarium ever since it reopened.  I wasn't disappointed - it's AMAZING to see it in working condition again - and even more cool is the fact that it's still undergoing renovations, but instead of trying to hide it, the aquarium almost flaunts this fact, filling open display tanks with local artwork, advertisements for local interests and signs for coming attractions.  Hallways under construction are only haphazardly blocked off, so visitors can see the work being done, and the employees are more than happy to tell you what they're working on renovating next. Such an amazing display of what makes Detroit so special.  We also spent some time walking through the Anna Scripps Whitcomb Conservatory and the Dossin Great Lakes Museum and dipping our feet in the river before heading back home.

Riverwalk selfie!

Belle Isle Aquarium.

The beautiful koi pond out back of the Anna Scripps Whitcomb Conservatory made me long to be back in Asia. I could sit out there all day just basking in how peaceful it was. Unfortunately there was a wedding photo shoot going on when we were there, so this is as close as we could get :(

Enjoying the beautiful Detroit River.

Of course I couldn't leave without some spoils from the LCBO..........

Amazing Michigan history including a full spread on the Edmund Fitzgerald (which, as I pointed out about forty times as we walked through, is also an awesome beer).

We could have probably stay there all day to be quite honest - but we ended up leaving around the middle of the afternoon to meet up with some friends, grill some delicious venison burgers topped with blue cheese & horseradish sauce & marathon as many episodes of Orange is the New Black we could before passing out (which was way early....being out in the sun all day is exhausting!). 

Most delicious lettuce wrap I've had in a while....

QUESTION OF THE DAY: Do you feel guilty when you don't put your all into a workout, for whatever reason? Do you find yourself spending the rest of the day trying to compensate for it?

communing with nature.......or something

I have a new obsession, and it's long walks through beautiful scenery. I try (as I've said before) to run, but I just can't find a way to truly enjoy it in a way that makes me want to do it for fun (aka not a race). But now that the Michigan chill has FINALLY broken, I want to spend every second outside forever.  

Tuesdays I usually go to an absolutely phenomenal hot vin yoga class, but this week the sun was shining, it was beautiful, and stuck in a dark, hot room at my gym for an hour was just not what I was feeling, so I headed out to Stony Creek for a nature walk instead!

This is the first year I've bought a park pass, so I'm determined to make the most of it and go as often as I can. I had heard they had gorgeous walking trails so I sought them out and intended to walk the 2.5 mile Habitat Trail, but when I finished I wasn't satisfied...so I tried to hop on the 1.5 mile Landscape trail, but apparently I'm not very good at signs because I ended up doubling back on myself twice and walking almost 5 miles...oh well; at least I made a nice dent in my huge backlogged list of podcasts. 

I'd also be remiss if I didn't point out that this was my first opportunity to try out my new BondiBand headband! A really fantastic store called GearBox Rx opened up in downtown Rochester Hills recently, selling CrossFit gear of all kinds, from shoes to apparel to hear & equipment, to my favorite part - a huge, huge selection of Paleo snacks from all over the internet. No longer do you have to submit to $8 shopping charges on one jar of almond butter or bottle of wing sauce, and no longer do you have to order a months supply of treats at once (at least if you live here). Plus the guys who run it are super knowledgable, personable, and assure me I will always be able to get my fix of Rickaroons from them (they also carry Steve's Paleo Goods, Nikki's Coconut Butter, PaleoTreats, Meenut Butter, Nohmad cookies/chocolates... Basically go there right now because everything delicious is literally at your fingertips. ANYWAY the BondiBand is AWESOME - kept the hair and sweat out of my eyes without getting irritable or itchy or hot (and as I am temporarily growing my hair out, this is the most important thing in the whole world, because I am decidedly NOT use to hair on my neck). New favorite!

Afterward I was feeling so summery that I stopped and picked up some fresh cut flowers for my condo - amazingly it's been 2 days and the cats have only eaten one or two flowers...... (This is why we can't have nice things.)

QUESTION OF THE DAY: Do you have spring/summer fever, too? How are you adjusting your workouts?

double brew day

The best thing about brew days is that you literally get to spend them sitting outside sampling brews, smelling delicious malt, and eating tasty appetizery food all day while your wort boils away - and then when the hard work is over, there's always an epic dinner (and, if you're me, a cheesecake!) to be enjoyed.

Memorial Day weekend because of the long weekend holiday we decided to go extra ham in the brewing process and make two batches in one day! That meant (after a nice early morning 3 mile walk to counter the effects of all that beer), setting up and starting the burner up around 11 am so we could literally brew alllllll day.

We started off with a simpler extract brew, but a recipe I created from scratch, for an oatmeal stout (I went really light on the oats, though) brewed with some farm-fresh buckwheat honey that a coworker provided me with. This was kind of my "scraps" beer, since I had some leftover LME & hops from precious brews that I wanted to use up - but it will also be the first brew I try priming with honey instead of corn sugar. It smelled sooooooo good!!

The new set up - check out that fancy ass Dark Star burner hanging on the wall above my healthy collection of sample brews ;)

Our brew mates started to arrive around the time this batch was finishing, so after a healthy dose of snacks (yucca chips with guacamole & a metric ton of shelled peanuts for this girl), we got everything not the carboy & set up for the main even: an all-grain Pliny the Elder double IPA clone. 

Let me tell you how fun it was to lift up those 14 lbs of
soggy 2-row malt + 1,000,000,000 lbs of water.

Almost immediately we realized we had a problem - we just splurged on a shiny new Dark Star burner and a gigantic 18" brew kettle, but we haven't build our sparge system yet so were still doing BIAB - and no paint strainer bag is big enough to fit around the lip of an 18" pot!! We ended up having to construct a metal "table" for the bag to sit on at the bottom of the pan so it the grain wouldn't burn. Not the most technical approach, but it got the job done!

Not gonna lie...this one smelled sooooooo good and fresh and hoppy. There are so many hop additions that the wort actually looked green at some points!!!

While it was boiling away, we dug up the last bottle of an old brew a friend of ours made nearly 4 years ago - it was a phenomenal double IPA at the time, but woooooow was it ever strong now. There's a reason those aren't meant to be aged (or, as it's brewer says, hoarded)!! We also sampled Atwater's Maibock, Blue Moon's Pine in the Neck, Lagunitas Undercover IPA, Rogue Ales Yellow Snow, and our very own PCP - a chocolate porter with cocoa nibs that was my very first all from scratch recipe (and it came out better than I expected!)

Post-brew dinner was a BBQ rib feast with corn, potato salad, fruit salad and most importantly PRETZEL JELLO(!!!!!) - but we were so hungry I never bothered to snap a picture.

Both beers started fermenting super fast (probably due to the honey in the stout and the high alcohol content in the Pliny clone) - by the next morning the stout's airlock was already clicking away so loudly I could hear it from across my living room...

My new babes, settling into their temporary home.

The Pliny is just days away from being transferred to secondary and its first schedule dry hop now - can't wait to see the gravity on this baby ;)

cardio blast & my weekly workouts

I admit:  I'm a cardio junkie.  When I first started working out & switching over to a healthy lifestyle, it was all cardio all the time - and it did wonders for me, too.  I know there are a lot of people who knock it, but I've always enjoyed cardio 400% more than any other kind of workout (except running - ohhhhh do I hate running).

All winter long I subjected myself to strength & resistance training - and I'm not going to say I didn't get anything out of it, because I love love love my back/shoulder muscles, toned arms, & the way I am finally able to look in a mirror and appreciate that my ass isn't COMPLETELY flat - but as soon as the weather starts getting warmer, all I want to do is jump around and sweat...which is exactly what I did all week long:

Selfies on the beautiful CTC campus.

Monday - I spent the work day at the Chrysler Tech Center, which has a beautiful campus, so I took advantage of my longer than average lunch break between classes (after scarfing down an amazing free salad) to do a few laps of the property, which was blissful.  After my seminar was over, I had a couple hours to kill, so I changed, headed out to Mae Stecker park to do some more walking (now that it's beautiful outside, I can't stop!) and then shot down to Lifetime to take a Zumba class with my friend Emily & one of my favorite instructors. Monday/Wednesday the class I take is super dance-oriented, so I feel like it not only works my body, but also my brain - I was never a dancer as a child so I can only hope to look even remotely as good as the instructor!!

Tuesday - After a looooooooong day at my actual job, I took a hot vinyasa yoga class with my favorite yoga instructor.  She strays from the typical Lifetime Yoga format of sun salutation A, Sun Salutation B, a longer flow, and then some stretching & a cooldown & instead adds a lot more longer, more challenging flows, complete with oodles of balancing work (which is one of my favorite things about yoga!) and a horrible (but awesome) core section in the middle. I never knew boat pose variations could hurt so good.  Then I came home and did a nice few laps around my condo complex while listening to a couple podcasts (the newest episodes of Barbell Shrugged & Strange Brews)!

Wednesday - Met my friend for another Zumba class with the same instructor as Monday.

Thursday - Normally every Thursday I take a Dance Jams class with my all time favorite instructor, but she was having a sub I don't care for as much this week, so instead I swapped Lifetimes & tried a new instructor at the Shelby gym, and he was WONDERFUL!  A friend of mine who had gotten there early graciously swapped spots with me so I could get close to the stage & actually see what moves I was supposed to be imititating which was sooooooo helpful.  The guy who was teaching had lost 100+ lbs doing Zumba, which is what made him want to be a teacher, and he was GREAT. The class was hot hot hot, everybody was yelling and dancing and interacting, which made it a million times more fun than the usual Zumba class - plus he was super interactive with the crowd & got up in your face a lot, which isn't something everyone likes, but it's something I LOVE.  Considering I passed up free beer to go, I'm glad it was so perfect!!

Friday - This morning I got up and went to yet ANOTHER Dance Jams class - I had the day off because of the holiday, and a friend of mine teaches only morning classes, so I never get to go, and therefore I justified yet another bout of cardio ;)  Later I plan on biking over to my parents' house to do some pre-brew shopping & then hit up a homebrewer meeting!!

Saturday - The instructor I normally take on Thursday nights is going to be back, so yes.....I'll be doing Dance Jams yet again.  The more I type, the more I'm starting to feel ridiculous...  (On a sidenote - I forgot my FitBit this morning & I got so upset that none of my steps were going to count.....and then, like a genius, I read the help forums and found that you could manually update your steps in!!  I guess that might just tempt some people to cheat, but I was sooooooo glad my hour long efforts were recorded after all - when I got home and saw I only had 184 steps, I wanted to cry!)

Sunday - AT LAST! Sunday is my big brew day (we're making two batches in one day - never before attempted!) so I need to be up & at 'em earlier than normal, which means I'm taking a super early morning hot vinyasa yoga class. Hopefully it'll stimulate those creative juices & help me make some tasty beer.

And finally, the holiday Monday - A special 1:15 long Dance Jams + Strength class with my favorite instructor and another who I've never had before - I can't WAIT for this class!!

A little ridiculous on the amped up cardio, I know - but I feel great!!  I'm getting my high-impact endurance back, and I've been really rocking out the past few classes, sweating and getting my jams on.  I'm trying to find a new strength class I enjoy to work into my routine, but in the meantime, I love what I'm doing & I'm seeing results, so I'm not going to let anybody tell me too much cardio is all bad!!

QUESTION OF THE DAY: What do your weekly workouts look like?  Are you a cardio junkie or a strength training buff?  Does the weather impact your workout regime?