Had A "Brick" For Lunch...

Today I was hellbent on getting a lot accomplished during lunch, and I did. I did what is known in the tri world as a "brick" workout, which is a workout consisting of a combination of at least two sports. So since I have no bike that meant a run/swim. The run was good, not super fast but I got in a good 20 mins and even found a nice wide bike path that was goodtimes. The swim was cold. Man it was cold. I don't know how my classmate Oscar just gets on in there with no problems. It's insane. As I sat on the edge and dipped my toe in shuddering he asked, "I thought you were a super triathlete." Yeah yeah. And before I started he asked me if I had brought earplugs for my ear issues which made sense to me but I hadn't. And I wish I did...

...because, again I got that whole pain in my ear thing. It annoyed me. It made me try to switch strokes to change it up but breastroke got boring and backstroke was near impossible given the short distance of the pool. Soooooo...that lasted for less than the 10 minutes I'd slated for it and made me realize I've got to figure that out if I want to keep swimming...

Anyway, I'm pretty proud of my little lunch workout. We were only given an hour break so to complete almost 30 minutes of exercise, take time to change in and out of my gear, time to dry off, eat, and walk to and fro class, I think I did mighty fine.

I also got a voicemail from Kate that said she hasn't worked out a ton lately so I felt better about my decrease in exercise since I came to G'ville. I am sure we'll rock out when the holidays pass.

One thing on my mind though...love. Where is the love on my blog from y'all?! I have supposedly had 101 profile views...how can this be? Considering the lack of comments on here, I'm wondering if my counter is broken. Come on now, give the love here!!!

xo,
K

Some "runs" are better than others...literally

Since it is my day off today (after a stint of six 9-hour days of learning learning learning) I figured I'd go for a nice solid 40 min run. Since I have an acupuncture appt in the later morning, I knew it would be best to get the run out of the way early. So I did.

My stomach was feeling a little wonky but I figured if I kept it light I could do it. The run started off OK, a little tight but feeling normal since most runs start like that. I wasn't sure where I could take this run (last intensive I ran down the main street I'm living on and it was constant baby hills) so I figured I'd just plan to run 20 out and 20 back cutting down side streets off the main drag to keep things more flat and easy. I'll admit I was a little tense thinking about how to work it out and this kept my run tighter and my shoulders higher. All I could think back to was my time in college spent on the rowing team where we would run for cross training workouts and my coach would always give me a hard time about my hiked up shoulders. "RELAX!" she'd yell out to me. Easier said than done, you see, the mind is a very powerful thing. Very...

But anyway, about 15 mins into the run I saw an actual park/trail to my right so I figured I'd try that out. At first it was awesome. Very wide paths with shady green trees, some fallen leaves crunching under my feet, squirrels scurrying about. A fine fall Florida day, basked in sunshine and peaceful due to being set back away from traffic and life. All was well. Then the path kind of became more of a trail, and I got a few cautionary thoughts scurrying about my mind having to do with a) getting lost on a trail I'm unfamiliar with since my sense of direction isn't too keen and many trails aren't marked well, and b) getting attacked on the trail since I was alone. Those thoughts coupled with the fact that the trail narrowed enough leaving me a smaller path to run on which was filled with knobby roots and heavy sand made me think to stop. Better to be safe than sorry. I ended up feeling a little ugh in my stomach so I turned and walked my way out of the trail and picked back up to a run once I hit the main drag. On the main drag I got a strong cramp in my stomach which I decided to walk through for about a minute and then I ran the rest of the way back just fine.

Total run time, or rather, total time spent actually running? Approx 30 minutes. Ugh. It wasn't pretty folks, let me tell you, but it is done and that has to count for something.

What valuable lessons have I learned on my run today?
1. Run more often in the week so that you don't feel forced to go for a run with limited time and a upset stomach.
2. Check out trails online so you get the gist before deciding they are going to be great to run on.
3. Don't beat yourself up mentally before you even get your foot out the door.
4. Don't write about upset stomachs in blogs otherwise Jenny won't read them. (Sorry Jenny!)
5. Exercise tomorrow so I have more to blog about. It would be a shame for a new person reading my blog to start by reading my crappy blog. Literally. Sorry again, Jenny! ;)

I think that's that for now. Must run off to my appt now.
Cheers!
K

Finding Balance

"You didn't actually think you'd wake up at 5 a.m. every day to exercise for 2 hours before school, did you?"

These were the words one of my school roommates asked me today. My response? "I didn't expect to, I aspired to. There's a difference."

It has been brutally cold here (exaggeration, just roll with it) lately and swimming in a non-heated pool is just out of the question. Since I'm still sans-bike, that leaves me with running.

And honestly, lately, I just haven't. In between the 9 hour a day, 6 day a week classes, exhaustion, sewing, eating, and getting an adequate amount of sleep for once (with the exception of this evening), it hasn't fit in. I will run tomorrow or Saturday, for sure, and I'm looking forward to it. So don't worry. Just know that I'm taking good care of myself here in lovely G'ville and all is well.

In fact, what I think is happening now is this is a perfect example of the need for balance. Often in life we try to be so many things: Perfect employees, partners, parents, line dancers, etc. It is important to stay humble in life, to remember that we can't be the best at everything all the time, and just to work hard, rest enough, eat healthily, and be good solid human beings. Right?

Don't forget that you are amazing, don't beat yourself up if you don't accomplish every little thing. Do your best and I'll do the same. I promise.

As I type this, Wooby the bird keeps chatting to me from her cage in the corner of the room. "Wanna go goodnight?" she asks. I think, at this time, I'll take her advice...

Dough-Nation!

Yesterday I got the first real donation (that I know about anyway) from a fellow classmate. He gave me a little envelope with some $ and said that he was donating instead of purchasing some bamboo he had wanted because, he said, it was going to a great place. So I'd like to take this opportunity to thank Oscar from the bottom of my heart. I feel so grateful of your donation and I want you to know that you made my day!!!
xo,
Kristin
P.S. For those of you who were having difficulties donating on the AWB website, is everything good now? Keep me posted!

Swimming In Ice

So here I am, at school. Due to a last minute car snafu I didn't pack my bike, leaving me with 3 weeks of training only via swimming and running. Totally fine. And yesterday I woke up early to do a swim at the pool where I'm staying, only to realize that it was dark and cold out and I had no idea if the pool was even lit, etc. I figured I'd swim after school that day, but an interesting thing happened during lunch. A classmate of mine talked about how he was swimming in a pool next to the school for his lunch breaks. So I walked over and checked out the pool and all looked good. I planned to get a nice solid amount of sleep the next night and swim for lunch.

When it came to lunch, I was kind of excited about the swim. School is pretty intense (they call the sessions "intensives" for a reason!) and so I thought it might be a nice way to kind of wake myself up midday, add some energy to my life. Also, it seemed like the best time to swim because there is less time in the morning and I'm wiped out in the evenings and anyway, midday is the warmest time for sure.

I was standing in front of the pool pulling my cap on when another classmate asked me if it was cold. I hadn't considered that before. I dipped my toe in and sure enough, it felt coldish. "Yeah, but I'll get used to it" I told her. I'm always a bit of a wimp about getting into a pool since it always feels cold but no big deal. I mean, my other classmate had gotten in effortlessly so why couldn't I? I got in up to my waist, felt cold, and dove under. It was the whole "take your breath away cold" type of cold. But I swam. I like swimming in the cold because it keeps me movin'. Had me a great swim. Did a little warm up, a stretch, and then swam for over 20 mins, getting 70 lengths in.

Despite all this, I didn't seem to warm up. Ever. Maybe I got too spoiled with the heated pool I've been practicing in. Who knows? Either way, I got water in my ears and felt imbalanced and when I got out I fully thought I was going to pass out. I mean, I was honestly feeling super grateful that I had two classmates next to me in the event that I keeled over. It was really bizarre and awful and after just lying around I started to feel a little better. Thankfully!

But you know, I'm still not pumped about that feeling. I'm going to take tomorrow off and then Tuesday afternoon when I'm back at school I'll give it a whirl again. Well, unless there is that cold front coming in in which case I will swim later in the week when it warms back up again. But it would be great to balance the swim with run, doing some brick workouts too. I've got some plans, man. We'll see what happens. :) Till then just know that I AM thinking about exercise here...and it WILL come together and be rockin' out while I'm here. It has to. :)

HOW TO DONATE

I've gotten some feedback (thank you!) that there was confusion about how to donate, so I figure I should try to clarify that now...

There are two ways to donate:
1. Online through AWB
2. Sending a check to AWB

If you chose the first way, you MUST find the notes field and put 'Kristin Althea' there so they know your donation is part of my cause. I know that might not seem like a big deal, but it means a lot to me because then I can keep track of my numbers to see how close I am to my goal, ya know? Anyway, I believe you can pay via PayPal or credit card.

If you chose to send in a check, you must put 'Kristin Althea' in the memo section of the check, again so they can track it to my efforts. You can get AFEA's address off their website.

Their website again is: www.acuwithoutborders.org

Now if you have any struggles with donating, please drop me a line at: kristin@kristinalthea.com and I would be MORE than happy to help you. :)

Thanks again for all of your help...from the very bottom of my heart.
xo,
Kristin