Week in Review (October 20 - October 26)

Tuesday (20,252 steps) - Yay for no HIIT again! Arms with some very short cardio intervals was a great way to start the day. With A feeling better we went to the gym, where I ran a super speedy (for me) and not so awful 3ish miles (in my new INKnBURN zombie shirt, which I love). With A finally hungry and craving food we went to Chili's for dinner, using the $20 gift certificates we had. 77 cents for dinners isn't bad. I was able to squeeze in this week's episode of the Walking Dead while A was on the phone with her dad and getting her homework done. Can I just say... WOW.
Wednesday (17,260 steps) - Core and cardio intervals. One would think that a 21 minute video that consists of a warm up, abs and a cool down would be easy. FALSE. I have NO abs and my muscles are very atrophied, so this was a hard one! A had to be at school early this morning to prepare for her awards ceremony. She got a "mathematician" award (because she is more than a year ahead of where she should be), was recognized for her participation in Arvada Harvest Festival (so she was one of the students who led the "Firebird Five" chant), AND she spoke with her Environmental Club about ways to save energy at the school. Whew.

Easy 3 mile jog in the basement while A finished up her homework and dinner was cooking.
Thursday (22,717 steps) - A blissfully short HIIT video followed by a quick butt and thigh video in the morning. 4 mile treadmill run after work that wasn't great, but wasn't terrible.
Friday (17,238 steps) - An upper body video that I really liked. Have no recollection of the rest of the day.
Saturday (25,688 steps) - Delicious breakfast at home with A (she makes a mean omelette). We went to one of her friend's soccer games before heading home for a small lunch before the Monster Dash.

A had invited her friend to spend the night, so we went home, showered, had a small dinner and then picked her friend up. Went to the store to buy something for them to bake. We attempted to watch Zombieland, but A was freaked out so we ended up watching Pitch Perfect instead. They went to bed pretty early.
Sunday (50,738 steps) - Up EARLY. Like just after 4 am so I could do my long run on the treadmill. I ran this RIDICULOUSLY slow. Therefore, it took a hundred hours to run my 18 miles. Especially once the girls woke up and needed to be entertained. I helped them make breakfast and while I finished up my run they watched Harry Potter and played monopoly.

Her mom picked her up, A and I had lunch, and then we met up with friends for the "Boo at the Zoo." Holy cow. It was so crowded. The kids were way more interested in candy than animals. It was a LONG day.

Went home, had a bowl of the turkey chili I had simmering in the crockpot. As I planned on having that for "snacks" during the week, I had "real" dinner at Tokyo Joes. A and I had a "Tiny House" marathon before bed. I love that show and think I want one someday, lol.
Monday (16,942 steps) - Unfortunately, this seems to be a HIIT/cardio week for videos. I really liked the video this morning though - it was actually much more strength training and just a few HIIT moves in between sets. I added this one as a favorite. Picked A up at Girl Scouts and then we headed to the mall to get her some new jeans. All her jeans from last year are now like 3 inches too short! Unfortunately we will have to go BACK to the mall, because the store I bought them at did not have a dressing room and after she tried them on at home they were too tight. Grrrr. WHY WOULD A KID'S CLOTHING STORE NOT HAVE A DRESSING ROOM???

Stats

• 187,777 steps
• 37.3 miles run
• 23 minutes of cross training (HIIT/cardio)
• 114 minutes of strength/stretching

Everything Else

• So my furnace broke. Wheee!

Monster Dash 10k (Race Recap)

Saturday, October 24
Louisville, CO
Weather - sunny and warm
A's second 10k

Halloween races are my FAVORITE. Ariel, Heather, Dan and I were looking to find a fun race that we would be able to wear costumes at. We found the Monster Dash race up in Louisville with both a 5k and 10k option. We gave A the choice of what distance to run, and I was surprised that she picked the 10k.

One of the best parts about the race is that it was NOT a morning race! That meant we would actually be able to sleep in! And there were tons of other things at the race for an afternoon/evening event.

With the race starting at 3 pm, we headed up around 1:00 to find parking and our friends. We arrived around 1:30 and found a spot on a side street behind the finish line with minimal difficulty. We spent the next hour doing pre-race pictures, talking to people and wandering around.

Team Goblin!

The 5k and 10k lined up at the same time - right before the start we ran into our friend and teammate, Maureen, and we all headed out together for A's second 10k.

A and Dan had both chosen horrible costumes to run in. Full length black robes and masks and head coverings. It was a fairly warm day and the sun was shining. I had a feeling that A was going to get HOT in her costume, and I was right. Between the hot costume and the annoying "medallion" - there were plenty of things BESIDES running for her to complain about.

Right off the bat this was a better event than the race we had chosen last year. Most of it was on "trail" and it was a lot prettier. Plus, there wasn't a giant hill on the course. A did great the first few miles, struggled a bit the middle 2, and then had a strong few miles for the finish.

Mile 3

The most fun we had on the course was when Dan ran ahead and while us girls were gabbing further back, we managed to jump out from behind a tree - scaring us all nearly to death. It was a fun race though.

Thankfully, we were NOT at mile 13... I think this was around mile 4

My only complaint was that they started the kids races before we had a chance to finish... The last 10th of a mile we were trying to run into the finish line and there was a sea of flailing arms of hundreds of kids and their parents and strollers and dogs headed straight towards us. That was a bit of poor planning, as at least part of the road should have been coned off so that we could finish.

There was no "chip" timing for this race so we don't have an official finish time, but my Garmin definitely showed a HUGE 13 minute PR for A!

Garmin time - 1:20:05
Garmin distance - 6.3 miles
Garmin pace - 12:43
Mile 1 - 10:56
Mile 2 - 12:33
Mile 3 - 13:17
Mile 4 - 14:19
Mile 5 - 13:21
Mile 6 - 12:27
Mile 6.3 - 10:49

We collected our wine goblets (with a comment from the volunteer "did you guys even finish?") and then we wandered around looking for the food and beer.

The finisher party was at a restaurant a few blocks away, so we all walked over and got a seat on the patio so Maureen could have her dog sit with us. It was a great evening of good beer and good food (seriously, the restaurant made an amazing mac and cheese with green chilies and bacon and to die for brussel sprouts!).

I went for a quick walk to the car to move it closer to the restaurant and to get our hoodies, as it was getting chilly in the shade.

A great time!!

Thoughts:

• Course was very well marked. Mile markers at every mile - chalk in the dirt at an "confusing" intersection.
• Plenty of aid stations with both water and Gatorade.
• Most people wore costumes - which made this FUN.
• The shirt was cute - with a vampire on it, but I didn't take one of course.
• The race was "time" and yet there are no results that I can find. I guess I don't understand why you would bother timing if there are no results anywhere?
• My only complaint, again, was the kids race starting before everyone had finished. We were not super slow by any means (I mean, not the fastest, but still) - they should have waited maybe another 15 minutes, or at least coned off a small section of the road.
• Yay for the free beer! 
• We had a great time and we will likely find another fun Halloween race for next year :)