#IMWITHCUPID

What an attractive looking group of people ;)

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone!!  Hopefully everyone had a good one, whether it was spent out with someone special, or sitting at home with a bottle of wine (for me it was at a hot yoga class followed by some shawarma and a big ass bowl of bananas, peanut butter, & almonds...don't judge me). But more importantly the day AFTER V-Day........

 I literally thought after the cold that was the Winter Classic & Alumni Games, I was completely done with being outside until winter went away - but I had signed up for the 2014 Cupid's Undie Run, & it's an awesome (and super short) race, for a great cause, plus I was doing it with some friends I hadn't seen in ages, so I decided to be cold one more time.  The idea of Cupid's Undie Run is simple - dress up in your underwear and freeze your ass off for about a mile or so - with a big Valentine's-themed party full of pink cocktails before and after.  The Detroit race was sponsored by major local radio station Q95.5 last year, so it received a ton of coverage and got even bigger heading into this year.  The race party central moved from Cheli's Chili Bar to The Fillmore Detroit, & went from having a "meal" ticket you could redeem afterward for a quick lunch, to having a huge buffet table full of fruit & veggie cups, PB&J sandwiches, granola bars, bananas, apples, & the like.  The race also expanded to have an actual bag check this year which made a HUGE difference. No more racing back to your car in your undies frozen to death.  So a big shoutout to the organizers for improving an already awesome event!

I'd met up with a friend who I used to work with at my old job & a few of his friends, so we were able to run the race in a group which made the event even more fun! The route changed a little bit from last year, and it seemed like it was over practically as soon as it had begun - I'm honestly not sure it was even a mile!!

The ladies with our new friend outside trying to keep warm before the race started.

Ready to race!

Working on warming ourselves up again afterward.

Following the great Undie Run success, we made our way to Green Dot Stables for some post-runnin' sliders & beer.  For some reason I didn't take any pictures of the vast spread of food, but it was all phenomenal.  Green Dot boasts $3 rotating Bells & Shorts taps, as well as $2-3 fancy sliders, of which we ordered practically every option, along with some poutine & some venison chili cheese fries.  Topping my list was the catfish, the current week's mystery meat (which was a bison short rib & scallions), and my absolute favorite, the Korean (a burger with kimchi & peanut butter).

The Detroit vein of the Undie Run raised $203,217 for the Children's Tumor Foundation, & the run as a whole is nearing the $3 mil. mark - plus they're about to get another $25 from me, because who doesn't need this t-shirt???
 

QUESTION OF THE DAY: Well.........would you do a mile run in your undies in mid-February??

beer #1 - ipathermia

Our very intricate garage brew setup.

Disclaimer: this post is going to have absolutely zero to do with fitness or health or food of any kind. In fact it is going to be 100% about brewing beer, because that is another thing that I do, on occasion. Carry on!

So this is not actually my first brewed beer. Prior to this I assisted a good handful of times on beers brewed by a group of my buddies, but decided recently to take the last big leap - this is my first beer brewed completely with my own ingredients, in my own garage, and without anybody reading me off what to do. And I can't bottle it for another week, so I'm mostly just praying it doesn't turn out like crap.

We wanted to go easy on this "first" one - I'm really hoping to get into all-grain brewing eventually, but right now I'm buying extract kits and modifying them with a little personal touch each time. For this particular brew, we used a Brewer's Best India Pale Ale kit, but planned to modify it by dry-hopping with the last of the Cascade hops I grow out of my backyard (another topic for another post, another time) - just to add a little extra bitter fun ;) (Another reason for the extract kit - it's COLD out there and my little propane burner doesn't make 4 hours of garage brewing feel any better!)

The brew went pretty smoothly (we took the 2 hour sanitizing & boiling opportunity to eat 5 lbs of peanuts and drink other beer) until we got to the very end - we're planning in building our own wort chiller but haven't had luck finding 25+ feet of soft copper coil yet, so we decided to do it the old fashioned way - use those giant snowbanks!

My neighbors must think I'm insane.

Note also the upside-down Christmas tree on my balcony - don't worry guys, I got this.

This is bound to work, right?

We knew it wasn't going to be a 20 minute quick chill, but it ended up taking over an hour!! Thanks to the cold, though, we were inspired (and frostbitten) & able to christen our soon-to-be beer - IPAthermia! Luckily when it finally got down to around 80 degrees, we measured the OG at 1.060, right around where it should be, sealed it all up, and left for dinner at a bar we heard had 2014 Hopslam on tap (they did, and it's great!).

I started to get a bit nervous when it took over 72 hours to start fermenting, but it did, at last, and by the time I got home from Ottawa it had stopped bubbling, I measured an FG of 1.015 (which puts our estimated ABV at 5.9%) we were ready to rack to secondary and add the hops!!

Goodbye, last of the 2013 Cacade Hop Harvest!

I read the best at to dry-hop with whole cone hops is to add then all to the carboy first and pour the beer over then, so that's exactly what we did....not looking forward to somehow getting all those hops out of the carboy when the bottling is over.

We pulled a tiny sample (which we should have done sooner because I'm pretty sure it was 50% trub) and holy bitter!!! Things bode well :)  It's insane how much darker the lupulin from the whole hops has made the beer, but it's looking (and smelling) good, so we're hoping in a week we'll be able to sample, bottle, and continue the waiting game....

BATCH #1: IPATHERMIA

Kit: Brewer's Best IPA modified by adding Cascade whole cone hops prior to secondary fermenting. 

OG: 1.060

FG: 1.015

Approximate ABV: 5.9%

Stay tuned for bottling & sampling!!

2014 race schedule

I hate running, but ALL I POST ABOUT is running!  I think I might be exaggerating just a tiny bit when I say I hate running.  It also seems crazy to be planning to do things as far off as October (7 months away!), but it's so much fun to have a full schedule to look forward to & get excited about!

Of course things could always change, but as for right now I'm looking at...

• February 15; Cupid's Undie Run.
• April 6; The Cocoa Classic.
• June 21; The Color Run.
• June 29; Spartan Race (In Ottawa!!)
• May 2; Hightail to Ale (Thirsty 3 Series Race #1).
• August 16; Running Between the Vines (Thirsty 3 Series Race #2).
• October 5; Scrumpy Skedaddle (Thirsty 3 Series Race #3).

Also hoping to do the Mustache Dache again - but 2014 dates haven't been announced yet - as well as Warrior Dash...bringing my total to at least 9, which is 2 more than I did this year. Not only that, but I think I have a nice blend of serious, timed races, and just-for-fun silly themed races.  Ready, set, race!

Question of the Day: What races are you planning on running this year?

ottawa 2014 (aka doing all of my favorite things, but in canada!)

Ladies & gentlemen, I have, at last, a shiny brand new MacBook (my first mac!) to replace my poor old Sony, which is definitely in the twilight of its lifetime (I'm pretty sure you can hear the death rattle when it kicks on, these days).  Part of my bargain with myself when I handed over the paltry $2000 sum was that I would get back to all of the things I used to use my old beloved computer for - namely blogging.

Scarf Head & Pouty Helmet Face on the Canal.

Last weekend I took a little mini-vacation out to Ottawa to visit my friend Deiss & her husband, skate on the Rideau Canal, eat lots and lots of pancakes (and drink lots of beer), and also get in a little bridge run (she's much more of a runner than I am, so she was an amazing running buddy!).  Admittedly I've been a little bit lax with my fitness over the holidays, so it was awesome to have a vacation so full of activity (I like to think it did at least a LITTLE bit to balance out all the beer we drank and pancakes we ate).

Friday morning we went for a 15.6k skate up and down the entire length of the canal (the full distance you can skate when the entire thing is open is 7.8k) - it was the absolute most perfect day, and it didn't even feel like we were working out!  It snowed the entire time (hence my super attractive head scarf, meant to keep the snow from melting all over my hair, as I am a big vain jerk sometimes), which made it even prettier.  We ended up going back on Sunday as well, for a quick 5k skating jaunt.  The coolest part of it was seeing people skating by with backpacks & briefcases, using the canal as a means to get to school and work - I would LOVE to be able to skate to work every morning!! Mega jealous. Having Deiss as a tour guide was awesome too - she taught me all about the history and the maintenance of the canal & was able to point out all the coolest attractions.  Ever since coming home I've been absolutely craving putting my skates back on, even just at an indoor rink.  Skating that much worked up a huge appetite, so we headed out to the Pancake Shack, which is my new very favorite thing - a food truck that cooks up amazing breakfast sandwiches between two buttermilk pancakes.  I highly recommend Babe the Blue Ox & The Campfire, for any Ottawa locals who may have found their way here!  Shout out to my Pancake Shack buddies, from your biggest Detroit fan :)

Heading into Downtown Ottawa, about 2.4k up the canal from here. An absolute perfect day for skating!

Ottawa did not come without beer, either - after breakfast, Deiss and Pav took me across the water to the Quebec side to hit up Brasseur du Temps (where I tried every high gravity beer they had - go figure - and especially and surprisingly loved Grande Riviere, a Belgian style cranberry blonde), and then back to Ontario to Beyond the Pale, where literally EVERY beer was a new delicious sort of hop explosion in my mouth.  It was also really cool to see a smaller, newer brewery's setup (I got to walk through the back and take a little tour of the operations) - with any luck, someday I'll have one of my own!!  After all that beer we went back to the homestead where Pav cooked us the best Indian meal I've ever eaten in my life (you had me at oysters & horseradish, but that fish curry, though...), and we all stuffed ourselves full of more beer and more food that I thought could actually fit in me, and then went to bed early to prepare for our Saturday adventure!

Beautiful view from the bridge on our Sunday run!

Deiss is a big runner (much more so than I am!), and one of the reasons I think I'm so disinclined to become a true "runner" myself is because I get bored with it.  Maybe I just haven't found my inner running zen yet, but one of the reasons I was so excited about this trip is because I knew I'd get to go running with a runner buddy!  Not only that, but she had a beautiful route planned out for us - an early morning ~4k bridge run!  Part of me thinks I would love running a whole lot more if I had beautiful scenery like this to keep me going - Michigan is beautiful, no doubt, but where I live is so suburban any route you could run is basically trees...cars...more trees...

We clocked in at about 34 minutes for those 4k, but we stopped to take pictures on the bridge, again at the end of it, and again at the giant spider statue on the way back, so I think our average pace was pretty much in line with my usual 5ks!

Neither of us look our finest, but we're both thrilled at our morning run opportunity!

After the run I felt great - we came home to shower and then headed out to take in an Ottawa Senators game (the home team lost, as per usual, and I neglected to proclaim MINE ALL MINE in front of their giant Daniel Alfredsson tribute on the concourse...but we did get free Hockey Day in Canada hats, so all was not lost!  The evening took us to Brothers Beer Bistro, which was just incredible - from the beer flight, to the charcuterie & carpaccio appetizers, to the duck & octopus entree, to the peanut butter chocolate dessert, some of the absolute best prepared food & service I've ever experienced.

WILL RUN FOR PANCAKES!

Overall the whole trip went off without one single hitch - Pav had made us a perfect weekend agenda and everything could not have been smoother.  I hadn't seen Deiss in over 6 years, so it was SO awesome to catch up and see how much we'd both changed (and how oddly - but awesomely - similar we'd become!!).  I couldn't have asked for a better 4 days & I want to thank my wonderful hosts again for having me and treating me to all kinds of amazing things.  Your hospitality was absolutely incredible.

We of course also made plans to meet up again soon - namely in June, to run Spartan Race together in Ottawa, hit up some Montreal breweries (DIEU DU CIEL!!!!!!!), and enjoy some awesome Canada Day home cooking on their Tandoor grill.  (And, of course..........more pancakes.)

Now of course I'm back home & realizing how the results of all of my extravagant indulgences the past few weeks...it's back to fruits & veggies & the gym for this girl.  Time to give all those pancakes & beer a rest!

Up next.....my current batch of beer, & a tentative 2014 race schedule!

QUESTION OF THE DAY: What are your go-to vacation indulgences?  Do you try to balance them out by squeezing in some travel fitness, or do you consider a vacation a free pass to indulge?

will run for chocolate!

I've mentioned before that I only really like to run kitschy "theme" 5ks - the Hot Chocolate 5k is only half that. It's basically your standard 5k with a twist - instead of the usual water and protein-filled post-race snacks, this one gives you a giant mug of...yep, hot chocolate! Along with chocolate fondue and plenty of stuff to dip in it, including marshmallows, Rice Krispies, pretzels, and a banana.

Originally we were going to run this race in Detroit, but the date got canceled! So...road trip!

Unlike any 5k I've done so far, this one only had packet pickup the two days prior to the race, at a mini Runner's Expo in the convention center next door to our hotel. The Expo might have been small, but it was mega fun! There were a few different booths from local health, nutrition, and fitness related businesses, a stack of running-related Christmas tree ornaments, tons of discounted fitness merchandise including clothes and shoes, walls of chocolate-related running merchandise, and best of all, a chocolate marshmallow sample of what was to come at the race... 

They had these in all sorts of race lengths - 5k, 13.1, 26.2, even some that just said RUN! I bought this one as a Christmas gift, but got the same for myself in hot pink, as well as one that says, "May all your miles be merry". Too cute!

Only a small preview of what was to come when we finished the run...

I ended up buying 3 ornaments, a discounted Nike workout shirt I'd had my eye on for a while, and a new cool-weather Hot Chocolate 5k compression shirt. Oops! 

The race itself was at 7:30 on Sunday - getting out of bed to be there at 6:15 (the time or packet suggested) was rough, but I loved that the whole even was so early in the day - awesome for those of us who have to drive 4 hours home.

The weather was a bit of a downer - steady downpour all morning that let up just a little but before the race (and then was stop and go the whole time...), but it was a nice temperature to run, and our race packets came with really nice quarter-zip running tech shirts with hoods, so we were all set! 

The course wasn't as gorgeous as last weeks romp along the water, but downtown Columbus is full of some really lovely old bridges and buildings, and the race went by super fast. I didn't PR, but I'm not unhappy with my time either. And moat importantly, Theresa and I got a whole bowl of chocolatey goodness to warm up with afterward!

The mug/bowls came with a cup of hot chocolate, some chocolate fondue, banana, marshmallow, rice krispie treat, mini pretzels & a Keebler wafer - chocolate overload!!

I could only eat/drink about half, it was so big, but soooo yummy!!  I'm ready to take a little 5k break now, after 3 in 3 weeks, but it's been fun, too. Thanks for the memories, Columbus - you're pretty all right!!

QUESTION OF THE DAY: Have you traveled for a race or a fitness event before?

fitness away from home

Greetings from Columbus, OH! 

My friend Theresa and I headed down here on Friday night for a quick weekend away because we signed up for the Hot Chocolate 5k that happened this morning. Conveniently, it coincided with a Columbus/Montreal hockey game on Friday night, so we nabbed some really nice tickets and took in a game that played out in what seemed like an endlessly entertaining NHL blooper reel. I also got to meet up with my friend Skye, who I've known since 2004, but rarely get to see, and picked up dinner at Barley's Brewery, where I had a nice, smooth Centennial IPA, their firkin of the night, and a yummy, spicy Christmas Ale. Ohio beer is pretty decent!

Saturday morning I really wanted to get some kind of workout in, since I knew we'd likely be eating out and drinking more beer. I see "hotel room" workouts posted all the time, and my hotel actually had a small fitness room, but I don't enjoy working out alone on machines much - I just don't feel the motivation!! So instead, since I've been really into yoga lately, I sought out a studio near the hotel and ended up finding Yoga on High, which was about a mile up the road from the hotel, and had a slow burn (my favorite!) class in the schedule for 8am. Perfect!

It was a nice walk through downtown Columbus to get there (I love cities!), especially that early in the morning. The studio itself was wonderful - they were very welcoming when I told them I was in from out of town and just wanted somewhere to practice for a weekend - and I have nothing but awesome things to say about my experience. The instructor Michael was lovely - I really love when instructors get right up in your personal space and basically (in a respectful way of course!) manhandle you to get you deeper into poses, or show you just how it should feel and where you should be feeling it (especially because when it comes to yoga I'm still a beginner when it comes to the vast majority of poses!), and push your body's limits in a way you wouldn't necessarily be able to on your own. After that hour and fifteen minute class I felt AWESOME and ready to face a day of shopping. Thanks, Michael and everyone else at Yoga on High!

I felt so good afterward that I walked another mile north up to The Little Donut Shop to bring some goodies back to the hotel room: 

The Little Donut - directly underneath The Big Tavern!

Maple bacon, strawberry shortcake, and cookie dough - I was good and only ate a third of each, but I couldn't choose!!

After we ate these babies we went out for a day of downtown shopping - the highlight of which was finding a shop where you could blend scents and pour your own candles!! Of course since they had a hops scent, I mixed it with a bit of grapefruit and blue spruce and made a nice little IPA candle - it really does smell like a nice cold glass of Huma Lupa!! 

I got a little overexcited about designing a label...

All in all I'd say I got in about 8 good miles of walking between this excursion and shopping on top of the yoga class - not a bad day for exercise on vacation!!  

QUESTION OF THE DAY: What do you do for exercise while traveling? Have you ever sought out and taken classes in random cities you've visited? 

3.1 is still too much

Like (I think) I said in my intro post, I hate running!  Don't get me wrong, I love cardio - I'll take hour

long dance fitness classes all day long and love every second of it, but just plain running feels like torture.  Some people say you learn to love it, some people say it gives them time alone with their thoughts & lets them step away from the real world for a bit, some people just enjoy the physical aspect of it.

Absolutely loving this Race T-Shirt!

I am not one of any of them.  Generally when I run a 5k, I spend the first minute thinking this isn't so bad, it almost feels kind of good, maybe today's the day I start to like running, and by about the 5th minute I'm thinking holy crap is this over yet? Why did I talk myself into this again?  Then I inevitably check my watch, realize I'm only about 1/4 the way through (I run about a 28:00-29:00 5k) and I spend the next few minutes thinking how after this one, I'm DONE.  No more 5ks for me, no more forcing myself to do something I hate.  At around the 10 minute mark, I start bargaining with myself (just make it to that stairwell and you can walk for a bit, we'll just run 2 miles and then we can walk the 3rd) - and coming up with reasons why the run feels so bad today (it's so windy, it's too hot out, it's a hillier course than normal, my calves were so tight this morning).  By this time I've usually passed the Mile 2 marker (but not noticed it, because I was too busy thinking about how miserable I am), and I spend the next mile looking desperately around for it.  Somehow the looking around usually winds me up settling into a decent pace and not hating my life so much, and about a mile goes by of peaceful semi-misery before I hit mile 3, try to do that thing where you bust it for the last .1 mile to get across the finish line, and then spend the next 15 minutes positively dying.

But then the most inexplicably glorious thing happens - all of a sudden you start to feel awesome.  Surrounded by a bunch of other miserable runners, all exhausted but high on endorphins, I look at my heart rate monitor and think hell yeah, I did that!

So I keep running 5ks.  I ran my first on January 1, 2013 - Lifetime Fitness' Commitment Day 5k - and since I've done 7 others.  I admit, as a run-hater, my 5k niche is basically the silly, kitschy, theme/obstacle/etc. runs that are pretty non-serious, as far as races go.  These past two weekends, however, I ran two pretty basic 5ks:

• Saturday 11/2 was the 2013 Run of the Dead in the Southwest (Mexicantown) area of Detroit.  The run was in celebration of Dia de Los Muertos, and the course took participants through Detroit's Holy Cross Cemetary (the 10k route went through a second historic cemetery as well).  The highlight of the run was absolutely the loop through the cemetery, where they also had members of the Living Arts Youth Ensemble performing a traditional Danza de la Muerte through the headstones.  It was tough not to stop running just to watch them!  It was a cold, damp, rainy day, but the run was really enjoyable regardless.  At the end they served us bottles of water, traditional tortilla chips from a Mexicantown bakery, and Mexican style cookies!  I finished the run in 28:58.8 (which is about 40 seconds from my PR), and 44th out of the 247 participants, so I wasn't unhappy.  And the Race T-Shirts were lime green and feature an awesome looking traditional sugar skull!!  I'm definitely in love with mine.

The Mustache medals were sooooo cute - and we also got chocolate mustaches
 for finishing!! I gave mine to my BFF Alyssa for coming to cheer me on :)

• Yesterday, 11/9, was the Mustache Dache Detroit.  I admit, there are three things everyone seems to be obsessed with that I just don't get - bacon, Shark Week, and mustaches.  The Movember thing is for a great cause, but I won't ever understand the obsession with it!  However, I had a couple friends who were planning on running this race, and it is a neat idea - plus it started at Atwater Brewery and I love few things more than beer ;)  This race started out extremely rough - the wind was crazy yesterday and for the first 1.5 miles it was basically blowing directly into us - and most of that section of the race was uphill!  I confess about a mile in I started to really think I was just going to walk - I even did, for about a minute or so.  Luckily right after my almost-breakdown, we turned the corner and started doubling back.  Suddenly the wind was at our backs, and the next mile plus of the course was run on almost completely flat ground right along the absolutely beautiful Detroit riverside.  It was sunny, the scenery was gorgeous, and I fell into a nice, steady pace that didn't even make me feel like I was going to die.  That mile and a half was probably the happiest I've ever felt while running.  Thanks to my poor start, I finished with a time of 29:39 - as soon as I saw the finish line and the clock time at almost 30:00 I busted ass to get across it!! While I didn't even come close to my PR time, I was determined to finish under 30 and I did.

After the race we got some seriously cute Mustache Dache medals, and a free beer at Atwater (my best friend had come down with me, so we split a Decadent Chocolate Ale (which was delicious), and a Hop-A-Peel, which was the perfect bitter end to an exhausting race.  I would absolutely do this 5k again!

Following the race, we grabbed some lunch at Slow's BBQ, took a little trip to explore the old Detroit Train Station, and hit up the Red Wings game (even though they lost, I got to see my boy Richard Panik assist on Tampa's winning goal, so it wasn't all for nothing!).

Next it's time to gear up for yet ANOTHER race next weekend - the Hot Chocolate 5k in Columbus!!  Enough already!!

QUESTIONS OF THE DAY:  Do you enjoy running?  What makes it tolerable to you or how did you learn to love it?  How do you feel about "trendy" theme 5ks (like color runs, obstacle races, glow runs at night, etc.) vs just plain old running races?