nutrition

Race week! Rock ‘n’ Roll Raleigh!

| cheriarmour

It’s race week.  Which I almost forgot with everything going on around here, but I am so so so excited for the Rock ‘n’ Raleigh, but it’s so interesting to be doing races at a time in my life when I’m busier than I could ever have imagined, and all in positive ways.

This time last year, I ran these races with a very specific goal in mind, wanting to get better and better.  Now, I want to run fast, surely, but I also want to run strong, and feel happy and healthy throughout the race, and warp it up with a smile like this one.

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Without further ado, here are some of the things I strive for this week, and in the race on Sunday morning.

  • Hydrate, hydrate, hydrate.  This time last half marathon, I was vomiting violently from a little stomach bug I’d contracted.  If we can stay healthy, hydrated, and not drink this week, that would be great.  I will certainly allow myself a beer the night before, but other than that, I’m gonna chill on what I drink, and focus on consuming a good bit of water.
  • Rest.  I’m not good at this.  I am going to sleep this week.  I am going to sleep this week, dammit, if it kills me!
  • Foam rolling.  From last week’s 15-miler, the lactic acid has built up into my legs, and during a little maintenance run yesterday, my legs burned the entire time.  I grabbed the foam roller after, and rolled, and need to stay on that in general, and not neglect my poor legs/quads/butt.
  • Compression.  Along the same vein, I need to be sleeping in my compression socks to keep my legs fresh and rested for the race.
  • Time goals? Eh, it’s funny where I am at this point in my life, but until I get married, I don’t feel like I’m gonna be too crazy about time goals.  As long as I feel good and strong throughout the entire race, I feel okay.

Anyone else running the Rock ‘n’ Roll Raleigh? Racing this weekend?  What are your goals leading up to/the day of the race?

Friday Night

| cheriarmour

Sorry about my late post, but I woke up this morning at 6:30 on the couch.  Last night, I laid down on the couch after a long, long week around 8, and woke up around 6:30am.  Fully clothed.  But here’s a little recap of what we did to escort out a really crapptastic week.

Just to be clear, I love this blog, and nothing about this blog was craptastic.  It was just a craptastic work week, and one of those weeks I wanted to lay down on the couch for like 16 hours straight.  Which I pretty much did last night.  I stopped by the hoose (house) first to grab the camera, and snapped a quick pic of the dog, who’d shoved herself into the cat bed on my way out.  Look at that face?

DSC_0044We met up at North Hills for some drinks.

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And I met up with Matty, a co-worker, and we processed the week, and he helped me play with my camera and some of its filters.

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DSC_0055I’m living in my Fabletics Kingston Hoodie – their company is going to start thinking I am homeless and I have no other clothes.  But to clarify, I do have the sweatshirt tied around my waist now.  Oops!

DSC_0058And to finish off the night, instead of eating a real dinner, Matthew twisted my arm and forced me, under threat of grievous bodily harm (GBH for short), to eat half of his strawberry shortcake.  Oops again!

How is your Saturday going, beautiful people? 

 

When do I?

| cheriarmour

P1020103This is Scott, over at One White Guy.  He’s a bestie of mine, and has been for like, 10 years now?  That makes me sounds really old, but I promise, I’m not.

Anyhoo, Scott suggested a really really good blog topic, so I credit this entire masterpiece that you’re about to get.  🙂

I’m a new runner.  When do I….

…Invest in “real” shoes?

photoThe first thing that you do, even if you don’t consider yourself a “real” runner (which I hate, if you run, you’re a “real” runner), is invest in a good pair of shoes.  When you go running in a crappy pair of shoes, and your feet throb after, you’re never really going to want to run again.  Reduce your chances of wanting to quit, and invest in a good pair as soon as you decide you’re going for a run.  Plus I think pretty new shoes are a great way to motivate yourself.

…Spend a good bit of money of a sports bra?

cb48f29e904411e392aa125441224967_7Well that really depends?  How big are are your breasts?  If you’re a smaller chested women, I’m thinking small C and below, you can get away with a perhaps, not as expensive bra, maybe like you’d find at a Target.  However, if you’re a mid C and above, or if you’ve ever had the experience of having to put two bras on, it’s time to drop some cash on a real bra.  Your nipples and your breast tissue will thank you when it’s not being chafed and stretched all over the place.

…Buy shorts/shirts (running apparel) other than the t-shirts/shorts I have in my drawers

IMG_1908This is one of those things that I think you can wait on, especially if you don’t have particularly sensitive skin.  Wear your t-shirts and shorts until you get sick of running around in sopping wet clothes, and invest in a few  pieces that you can reuse again and again.

…invest in a gps watch

Garmin 610This is one that can wait too.  I love love love my GPS watch, and I’m a big fan of Garmin and their products, however, with the advent of Smart Phones, generally there is some type of app you can download.  The app will not be as accurate (Garmin is accurate within 5 feet), and the life of the phone can be a lot shorter if you have a music app opened up along with a GPS app.  This is one of the products that is extremely useful, and luckily, Garmin has a few products that aren’t $400 that you can choose if you’re really in want of a GPS.

…Buy a pair of socks for $15/pair

unnamedThis is one of those that seems dumb (like who spends $12 on a pair of socks!) but once you make the jump from cotton socks to socks that are an acrylic blend, you won’t want to go back.

…Start taking Gu/nutritional supplements.

20 Mile NutritionAt the point at which you’re running for an hour or more, it’s time to explore the ideas of nutrition, especially if you’re a person who is sensitive to shifts in your blood sugar.  If you’re planning one of those longer runs, take one of these before (with a lot of water), and then one about every 45 minutes.  Experiment prior to a race situation because these things (some of them) have been known to cause stomach problems.  I avoid the ones with caffeine generally.

…Start carrying water. 

Same rules as nutrition.  If you’re running for over an hour, take water.  If it’s hot, take water.  If you’re just a thirsty lady or gent, take water.

Do you think I covered it all?  What other questions do you have?

 

 

 

 

 

Zevia Zero Calorie Soda Review + Reader Giveaway!

| cheriarmour

Yep, that’s right, I said giveaway! Holla!

So in light of the awful fate that befell me yesterday, where I had a terrible reaction to some scallops I was excited to cook, I was shuffling around the apartment like a zombie – I looked and smelled terrible, and I felt like I’d spent the entire night partying.  I was digging around in the fridge making my lunch when I spotted the 6-pack that Zevia had sent me a few days ago.  I fumbled around for the ginger-ale flavor, and slammed it before my stomach had any time to go back on the promise that it would never to do me what it had done the night before.

zeviaSo Zevia, which I first spotted at Whole Foods a while back, is a zero-calorie soda, sweetened with stevia, an artificial sweetener that my father (a type-1 diabetic) seems to enjoy more so than the other sweeteners out there, because it doesn’t leave that really weird taste in your mouth that diet sodas can tend to leave.

Zevia was kind enough to send me my very own variety pack of the stuff as a way to try a good bit of the flavors, and I was pleasantly surprised!  There are a couple of things to remember when you’re drinking your Zevia, which comes in 12-oz. cans, very much the same way that a can of any old soda might come in.

  1. Drink it cold . Zevia suggests this and reminds you that cold is not cold enough!
  2. Drink it out of the can.  Zevia tends to get warm and flat in a cup and that’s sorta gross for any soda.

So as I sampled Zevia, I was really pleasantly surprised with the ginger-ale, which is probably my favorite flavor, and the cream soda, which tastes like the cream soda that my mother used to give us from Haiti, minus the really weird dye, calories, and sugar.  My least favorite would probably have to be the cherry cola flavor, but generally this flavor kinda creeps me out in real life, so that makes sense.  Generally, the sense that I get with these is that they’re more water, less sugar, and lacking in the weird aftertaste department that I get with a Diet Coke.  This morning, I actually gave my beloved caffeinated Diet Dr. Pepper away because the thought of the aftertaste was making me more nauseated than I felt like I needed to be at that point.

Onto the giveaway!  

I’m giving 5 readers a 6-pack of Zevia!  Enter below, and I will announce winners on or around 3/20/14!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

For more info on Zevia, visit their website

Or their Facebook

Or their Twitter

Or on IG 

🙂 Enjoy!

A tale of some scallops.

| cheriarmour

So yesterday, I had a hankering for some scallops over veggies, after I spotted this post on IG.
photo (2)I looked up a recipe online, went to Harris Teeter, bought .75 pounds of sea scallops, and set to prepping a delicious dinner, complete with a glass of SkinnyGirl California Red Wine.

I blogged for a little while, and hopped into bed.  As I was falling asleep, sweat sprang up on my forehead, and I knew what I happening, but I chose to pretend like it wasn’t.

1 am, I sat straight up, jumped out of bed like a ninja, and proceeded to throw my entire dinner up, and take a nap on the bathroom floor.  And my only thought was, my race this weekend won’t be a PR! And I started to whimper.

So, I’m pretty sure that between this and my situation I got myself into in September, I need to take a little break from shellfish for a long, long while.  And come hell or high water, I will be running

 

Part 2 – Would I train with an overweight trainer?

| cheriarmour

So before we get started on all the dramz, lookie at what Mama Chelsie sent me yesterday! I was laying on the couch yesterday, when she sent me a gorgeous pic and a recipe of what she’d made for dinner. Since I had nothing for lunch today, I decided to give her recipe a whirl, put a little more of a spicy twist on it, and pack it for lunch. I hope it’s good, cause it’s all packed up now!

photo 1

photo 2

So the way it all works is really easy. One can of seasoned black beans, drained, and I smooshed them all up in a ziplock. I mixed the smoosh up with an egg, some paprika, some garlic, and some hot pepper, added a half-cup of bread crumbs, and I grilled it up with some olive oil. With my refined palate, I added a dab of ketchup to eat it with tomorrow, and I’ll let you know how it turns out. But it smells BALLER. And in case you forgot about Chelsie, she’s the mom who helped out with my post last week. Click to read, it’s super, super good, plus there are pics of my super cute niece on there!

But moving right along.

Yesterday, without any prodding or judgement, I asked you all if you would work out with an overweight personal trainer.  The answers ranged from “absolutely not,” to “why not,” to one particularly sweet answer from one of my campers, and here it is.

Considering I’m still considered overweight but I am very healthy and teach Zumba and am becoming a personal trainer I would say I would pay a person who was overweight because the weight doesn’t mean anything. I have a dangerously slow metabolism which makes it extremely hard for me to loose weight consistently unless I’m working out all day basically, but I still know how to help others to be successful, ya know?

God. I tear up when this beautiful girl says this.

Here’s my take. 

Would I work out with an overweight personal trainer?  

Yes.

I am very fit, and very active now, but if I ever freed up some of my time and got into weightlifting, I would employ the help of a personal trainer.  Damn right I would allow an overweight personal trainer to train me, and here’s why.

I’m not perfect, and I don’t have x-ray vision.  Can I tell if someone is healthy by the way they look? Can I tell if they know what they’re doing?  Can I tell really much about them?  Not a ton.

I’m not overweight, nor have I been.  I’ve lost weight, gotten fitter, and learned to love my body. If, when I was in my transition period, someone had not given me a chance, I wouldn’t have had the strong Zumba following I have today.  I appreciate folks who stuck around while I figured things out, and I would do the same for others, especially given if they know what they’re doing.

I am a counselor.  Do I need to have gone through a divorce to counsel a divorced couple?

Does a heart surgeon need to have had a heart attack to successfully operate on patients?

To raise funds for Haitians in the earthquake last year, need I have been a direct victim of its devastation?

I think you know where I’m going here.  And I don’t hate or fault anyone for their opinion.  But for me, if Bre wants to train me?  Bring it on sweet pea.  I know you know what you’re doing. 🙂

Can I shop in peace?

| cheriarmour

I taught a class yesterday morning, like I always do on Saturday mornings, and then headed into Fleet Feet Raleigh to moonlight for the weekend (which I love doing btws).

I ran after class, so I was smelling extra ripe, so I decided to jump in the shower after class to spare my coworkers the pain and suffering of having to smell me for 5 or 6 hours.

This is all to say, I wasn’t looking particularly fine on Saturday afternoon.

Midway through the afternoon, I headed to the mecca for health-conscious 20-somethings, moms with tattoos, and people who smell like patchouli.

l

Duh.

And I was ordering my pizza sandwich, the sandwich that I eat when I’m feeling like pizza but when I know I don’t need it, when this short sorta frumpy guy sidled up to me.

“Just cause you pretty doesn’t mean you can hold up the line.”

[Polite laughter]

“So what do you order?”

I told him with a polite smile glued to my face.

“So what are you, some type of vegan or something?”

And then his creepy friend rolled up and smiled in a creepy fashion.

“Are you a student athlete?” [He looked my body up and down.]

And the conversation went like this, me politely laughing and trying to ignore Dumb and Dumber whilst they looked my body up and down, a body that, I might add, was barely showered and not looking its best.

I can not express to you how painful it was to get looked up and down while I just tried to order my sandwich.  Seriously.  Can anyone else empathize with me? Can I shop in peace?

Here’s what. What three things are you obsessed with?

| cheriarmour

You guys literally get so much of me today, you probably can’t stand it right?  So last week, I did my “Here’s What,” as a tribute to the great Andrew Cohen, the executive producer of like, so much amazing stuff on Bravo.  And here we are, back again for the second round on Friday.

So, here’s what.

  • Buying these Oreos last night.

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I think I told you guys that Oreo was coming out with two limited edition flavors.  One of them is like super weird, so I really couldn’t bring myself to try them, but last night, after a friend alerted me of their arrival to the local Food Lion, I grabbed them on the way home from class, and waited until after dinner to try them.  The verdict?  They wasn’t all dat.  They wasn’t all dat at all, and they’re really too sweet for anyone to be feeding them to their children.  I’m still convinced that the best part of the Oreo is that outside cookie part.

  • Veggie Dinner. 

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I’ve talked to you guys about my love of veggie dinner, which is when you heat up a bag of vegetables, throw some protein in it (like some tofu or an egg), and then you eat it.  Low-cal, easy, and a good way to get back on track if you feel like you’ve been eating nothing but crap all day.  Veggies and Oreos.  My kinda lady.

  • And finally, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but the treadmill has been a good friend for the past few weeks.  In case you’ve been out of touch with the mainland here, last week the weather in North Carolina was atrocious, especially by southern standards.  Running outside was not only really uncomfortable, but it also sorta dangerous.  We don’t have equipment to really plow a whole lot of snow and ice, so a lot of the sidewalks, trails, and driveways were totally iced over for the week.  So that said, I took to the treadmill for a few of the longer runs last week, and actually survived with the help of Netflix.  Now quite obviously, I’d rather be outside just so I don’t have to make conversation every time someone wants to use my treadmill, but I’ll take what I can.

What three things are you obsessed with this week? 

Piggybacking

| cheriarmour

PS, piggybacking was the buzzword of the century when I was in college.  Seriously.  But moving right along!

Piggbacking off of my emotions regarding Rachel Frederickson’s weight loss, I’ve noticed this really weird phenomenon regarding women and their weight.

We can’t win.

In college, I gained a pretty decent amount of weight, which I’ve been really open about here.  But I supposed a lot of people I’ve known in the recent years might not know that.  So anyhoo, at the end of my freshman year, I was at Cram Jam, which was, coincidentally, a late night brunch so you could have fuel to study.  I ran into this girl, Kea, who I’d known in high school.  Kea greeted me by grabbing my stomach, and practically yelling, “Man, you’ve put on some weight.”

The day of Elon’s graduation, I actually graduated wearing this cute slinky skater dress because I couldn’t zip up the floral strapless garden party dress that I’d been intending to wear.  Another blow.

This is what I ended up wearing at graduation when I discovered the dress I wanted to wear wouldn't zip up.
This is what I ended up wearing at graduation when I discovered the dress I wanted to wear wouldn’t zip up. Ouch!

So in my mind at that point, I’m thinking that if I lose the bit of weight that I needed to, the comments should stop, right?

Well.

After losing the weight, I got a few backhanded “compliments” from folks that would get filed in the same manila folder entitled “rude-ass comments that people need to keep to themselves.”  One was when I saw a guy who I hadn’t seen in a while at the gym who stated “I wasn’t sure that was you!  I knew you’d lost a ton of weight, but I couldn’t recognize you!”  But the amount of weight I’d lost wasn’t like hundreds of pounds, so I’m guessing he was just saying that for dramatic effect.  And most recently, a superior of mine directed my direct supervisor to grab me an extra brownie after I went for the salad in the conference room, as she was “concerned about my weight.”

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t take a whole lot of stock in what folks say about my weight, for larger or smaller, however I really feel like I can’t win between a girl physically grabbing my belly, and then the uncomfortable levels of attention I started receiving upon losing just a little bit of weight.

So how do you comment on someone’s appearance without making it about a number on the scale?

  1. Don’t mostly.  Seriously, if you’re not good with your words, just don’t say anything.
  2. Try to avoid the words skinny, fat, or anything that is indicative of a number.  One of the nicest compliments I received was from my dad, when he told me how strong I looked after a stint at the camp.  I won’t ever forget that!
  3. If you’re truly concerned about someone’s weight, for bigger or for smaller, ask if they’re okay.  “Are you okay?  I’ve just been sorta worried about you lately!”  Please avoid announcing to the room that they could lose a few or they could eat a brownie.  If someone’s truly sick, your offer of a brownie really isn’t going to help them out.  Just FYI.

So what do you think?  You ever feel like you just can’t win?