Thoughts on Training

As someone who lives an incredibly busy lifestyle without a regular routine each week is full of new challenges.  I have my three days at my day job, study, doing admin and attending various screenings and events for my husband's career, days where I'm generally just too tired to do anything, and in between all of that I try to have a social life too.  Add planning meals and when to train to the mix and if I don't take that time to plan the week, the whole thing is going to fall over in a great big heap!

But I do plan, and I make it work.  But what happens when something gets thrown into the mix I wasn't expecting?  I'm thinking of this in particular today because over the past few days an ongoing condition with my two top left ribs and scapula flared up, which gives me a lot of pain.  

I can usually train with it, and do, but yesterday it was hurting in a way I wasn't very comfortable with I decided to take the day off my planned 10km run and rest with a heat pack.   Oh the guilt!  It got me thinking today about what the line is between listening to your body and making excuses? 

Today my neck was a still a little stiff and my legs were aaaaaaching with DOMS but because my neck had loosened up, I headed out for my delayed run anyway, promising myself I could take is slow as long as I got it done.  But once I got out there in the crisp air, with the music going I found my stride and while my legs felt heavy I smashed out a run only 20 seconds longer than the PB 10km I did on Thursday.  HOW, HOW, HOW?  Bodies really are amazing.  Sure when you're muscles are sore and fatigued, it feels harder, but you're still capable of doing things you never thought possible.

After today I'm definitely starting to find that balance between listening to my body and making excuses - hopefully next time I need to let my body rest I won't have to beat myself up so much and I can take that recovery time without the side of guilt.

Heading out all strapped up earlier this year - not a lot gets in the way of a run!
(PS: I promise to start taking some more recent photos soon!)

Anyway.  Since I changed my plan yesterday and let my body rest, and I had an appointment with my osteopath today who told me to skip exercise for 24 hours I wasn't able to go to Bikram yoga tonight either.  So.  The new plan is this:

Tuesday night:  Rowing intervals then Combat at the Gym
Wednesday: 8km run with hill reps
Thursday: Strength training
Friday: 9km run
Saturday: Remember how I said I was hoping to find a local bootcamp?  Well I didn't so I've rounded up some local 12WBT girls to participate in our Week 4 Fitness Test and the Super Saturday Session!  Just a touch excited about this!
Sunday: 17km run 

Not a bad week coming up although not as much strength training as I would like.  

Week 3 Round Up

Getting this week's round up in a little earlier - well actually my round ups are usually late, so I guess I could say I'm being timely in this case! 

So firstly, I'll start with how the #nutritionphotolog went - except for the fact I sometimes accidentally ate my meal before remembering to take a photo, for the most part it went well and do feel like it's not only keeping me accountable but it's also ensuring I remain mindful of what I am eating.  I've just been putting together some "highlights" from my nutrition for the week and looking over it I am amazed how much great food I've been able to eat all while remaining at my daily calorie intake.

Here's a sample of what my week looked like food wise:

So here we have my beloved morning skinny flat white (130 calories), 2 egg and ricotta omelette with tomato, capsicum and mushrooms with wilted baby spinach (193 calories), broccoli soup with two slices of wholemeal bread and olive oil spread (260 calories), pumpkin and green bean red curry (290 calories), All Bran Wheat Flakes with Honey and Almond, skim milk and strawberries (242 calories), the trusty apple (72 calories), lasagne (269 calories), penang chicken (257 calories), another morning coffee (90 calories), All Bran Wheat Flakes with Honey and Almond, skim milk and sliced banana (273 calories), Beef with creamy mustard sauce (291 calories) and some Green and Black's dark chocolate (28 calories for 3 pieces but I'd already scoffed half before remembering to take a photo).

This week I'll make a more concentrated effort to get a photo before I hoe in!  

Training has been fairly good.  In fact I smashed out some of my best running times in this week's training runs which was really satisfying, and yesterday I had a killer strength session with my PT - today I have one of the most hardcore case of DOMS I've had in ages and I've been practically living in a hot bath and I'm almost too scared to spend some time with the foam roller!  But this is what it's all about right?  

In other news, those who are in Vic Crew get over to the Vic Crew page as we are arranging new team shirts - of course there's the usual debate over colour and style which is tiring, but I'm really excited about the Vic Crew coming together with some gorgeous new tops at the Sydney finale!  I really hope I can go to finale this time round as our lease is up at the same time and we have been told we are moving as our landlord wants the place back to live in.  I've been putting $2 aside each time I train for about a month now with the idea that might pay for my flights down the track.  

Anyway, next week is a big week training wise (ok, ok, when isn't it these days?) but being week 4 I really want to get into it and ramp it up!

Sunday: 10km run

Monday: Brikram Yoga

Tuesday: 8km run with Hill Reps, Body Combat in the PM

Wednesday: Strength 

Thursday: 9km run 

Friday: Strength with PT

Saturday: KIMAX at AVLC maybe?  I'd love to find a local bootcamp to attend though.

Sunday: 17km big kms to run!

By the way, got this message from Mishy herself on Twitter after my 10km run on Thursday morning.  Made my day :)

Have a great Week 4 everyone!  

Nutrition Photo Log

Hi All,

As I mentioned, I'm now creating a photographic diary of my nutrition keep myself accountable, and just thought I'd take stock briefly of how it's going.  So far so good!  I've been posting them on Twitter and even had a few join in.  If you're on Twitter and you want to join in, simply use the hashtag #nutritionphotolog and I'm @nikkimaloo if you want to follow me!  Just be warned - Twitter is my therapy while I am using public transport, so I tweet a LOT!

I'll also be posting a collage of my Nutrition Photo Log here on a weekly basis, so stay tuned! 

And while I'm here, just a quick note to wish all my fellow 12WBTers well for weigh in tomorrow!

xx Nikki

Week 2 Round Up

Well, to be honest this week went a little pear shaped and as far as staying on track with my nutrition went.  As I ramped up my training - I added a Bikram yoga class and a couple of extra evening training sessions to my week - it seemed like the old "well I've been training hard, so I can have a much larger portion / an extra snack" mind set came creeping back from where I left it just the week before.  

So, time again to put a lid on it.  I was chatting with some gorgeous 12WBTers on Facebook and one of them told me about a friend who took photos of every meal and snack she ate and posted them to keep herself accountable.  I already keep a food diary using the My Fitness Pal app, but honestly, I'm so good at telling myself that I am "refuelling" or that the calories in couple of glasses of wine "don't count" and it doesn't seem to bother me that I'm clocking over 1800 calories some days.  I'm never going to lose these final kilos if I don't tighten it up and I also think this could be a fun project.  

I'll tweet my eats over at @nikkimaloo on Twitter, but every few days I'll put together a collage of my meals and EVERYTHING I have eaten is going in it, no matter what it is.  Good healthy egg white omelette for breakfast?  Sure!  It's going in.  A sneaky slice of bread with peanut butter?  Sorry Nikki, but you ate it, so own it.  

That aside, I now want to finish my round up of week 2.  I tried Bikram yoga for the first time, something which I have always wanted to try and my lovely friend Bec had started going in South Melbourne so I invited myself along. I was actually really worried I wouldn't have what it took to get through a 90 minute session of yoga in that heat and I was warned by the instructors that it might make me feel unwell and to just lay down and rest if it did.  Well, I'm pretty proud of myself and my fitness level, because I breezed through the entire class and loved it!  Sure it was super intense and hard work but I really enjoyed it and felt AH-MAZ-ING afterward.   I've decided this will most definitely be a regular thing for me.  

Also this week I got back into my interval / speed runs. I ran 8kms containing 4 x 1km intervals running at 80-90%.  For once I didn't find myself swearing under my breath at my running coach because as I hit the fourth interval I felt strong and ran hard and remembered only 6 months ago accidentally reading my running plan backward and running 1km intervals and barely being able to make it through the third one and the fourth I shuffled through and it took over 8 minutes.  NOW each km came in at about 5 and a half minutes - even the last one!  It never ceases to amaze me how consistency will bring you amazing rewards when it comes to training.  I guess you could extend that to just about anything in life really.  

Me, heading out on a 16.5km run last Sunday morning.  Don't I look excited?

So with that I'll conclude that while Week 2 wasn't what I would call a screaming success, I have managed some wins and what I didn't get right, I now have a plan in place to fix it.

Week Three - WATCH OUT!