California love and stuff

I am still hanging out in California.

It's been an awesome whirlwind of a trip. Saturday took me across another finish line at the Hollywood Half. - It wasn't easy but it was awesome.

Sunday, I headed up to San Francisco on a road trip for a little business.

Along the way I was tempted by tons of fast food options. In the old days I would greedily eat a burger and fries and "blame" the road trip for "messing up my diet." But this time was different. Instead of giving into that little voice that was begging for something crappy, I went to Starbucks and picked up this:

It's a little box meal that had hummus, fresh veggies, grilled chicken and a little whole wheat pita. I don't remember exactly the NI but it was pretty good. Had fiber, low in fat, not too bad in sodium and some protein. Way better than anything else I would typically get on a road trip. My biz partner, Ang, also stocked the car with low fat cheese, fruit and hard-boiled eggs so we really were able to eat well on the journey.

While on this trip, I got to meet a few of my fellow Ragnar Racer teammates for the first time! It's been awesome.

Before heading North, I met John after the Hollywood Half. John writes this awesome blog - check it out. 

John looking handsome, me still skanky and in race outfit

While up North, I met Ada Wong (from Biggest Loser contestant) I did a little interview with her (more on that to come) and then took a hard core fitness class with her. Fun but OUCH! (There were NFL players in that class!)

me looking all interview-y and news like

Finally we swung by Merced and met Mary - she writes this great blog that has been documenting her 155+ weight-loss/running journey.

My little grey jacket gets around, huh?

How much do you love the words on her wall?  Me too. I mean, it couldn't be more perfect. Fell in love with this girl.

Hope all is well with you.

How do you keep on track when you travel?

Do you find it harder to resist "crap" food when you're on the road?

XO

Jen

Ten Freakin' miles! Yippee

OK, this is an exageration, but how the wind felt to me

Today I felt like one BAMF'er out there.

I'm recovering from some weird flu like thing (chills, aches, swollen glands) that ruined Turkey day and holed me up yesterday, but feeling 85% back, figured I'd give the long run a go.

With slightly less energy, wind howling in my face, chilly conditions, an annoyingly runny nose the whole time (and horrors - no tissues), I stared down my long run day of ten miles and took it on.  Pace was 11:56 and just under 2 hours but I felt super victorious. The last time I ran ten miles was for my half in September and I had hit an awful wall right before ten miles, so I had that mental thing to get past too.

And I did it. I did it strong. It was the very first time in my entire life that I'd ever run for that kind of distance without walking at all, that accomplishment makes me feel really happy.

Oh there's a lot of mental cheerleading and stuff going on in my head. Many mantra's. They got me thru.

So that's pretty awesome.

And in slightly more annoying news - I gained FIVE pounds at WW this week?  WTF!? Even without the long run on Friday I ran 12 miles and cross trained twice. I didn't eat Thanksgiving (no dessert, no alcohol) thanks to the flu... I'm baffled. I eat clean and lean and it just doesn't add up.  I always have a lot of points at the end of the week, I don't eat anywhere close to all the points I accumulate from all the exercise (HELLO, today I earned an extra 16 points for the long run - that's almost a whole day of food!)

I'm not upset, just confused. OK and a little annoyed because I was so happy about 81.8 pounds and I'm going backwards. And of-course there's always this guy in the meeting, "Well, I'm totally shocked but I lost 2 pounds this week and I ate everything not nailed down..." Good for you buddy.

GRRR.

I'm hoping being sick and drinking a lot of salty broth yesterday to soothe the throat is what's tripping up the scale this week, we'll see. I can only keep on eating right, training and doing the right thing. I have to think the good will catch up.

My saving grace is, I feel good in my skin, I feel strong, I feel accomplished, I have the knowledge that I'm doing a million good things for me...  so while I'm slightly annoyed I do not let the scale ruin my day anymore.

XO

Jen

PS: After reading this post, my friend Jackie sent me this article about weight gain and exercise - I'm doing a lot more lately, so perhaps this is it? Make more sense and at very least, is very comforting! Thanks Jackie!  Gain Weight with exercise

Three lessons I've learned: down 4.4 this week and back on track!

Last Saturday my weigh in wasn't my greatest achievement: I was up 3.4 pounds and told you all about it.

This week, I'm down 4.4 which means I lost the gain and a pound as good measure.

This is great motivation.  I am soooo happy! Yippee.

The weight watcher / running gods have conspired to help me get my groove back, which just a few days ago, I wasn't so sure of.

Thank you, thank you universe.  I did run on Thursday which I failed to blog about for some reason and I did a lot of general running around while keeping an eye on food.  But because I was still feeling down about backtracking, I wasn't noticing or appreciating all the things I was doing right this week.  Turns out, I must've done a lot right.

Which brings me to a few valuable lessons:

1.  Never be so focused on the bad that you miss the good.
We all do this.  We beat ourselves up for "only running" x amount of miles, or the pace was only --- whatever.  Maybe you ate too much cake or blew it at dinner.  How about celebrating what you did right.  Lacing up your sneakers when you much rather had watched a marathon of The Hills, or you may've eaten too much at dinner but the rest of your day was healthy and controlled.  I did it all week and instead of feeling good about it all, I lamented about, "where was my groove," when it was there all along.

2.  Someone else is watching
Last week, after my 3.4 gain weigh-in, A woman who hadn't been at our meeting in almost 2 years came up to me.  She hadn't seen me in more than fifty pounds.  She had tears in her eyes, apparently we had joined around the same time, a few weeks in, she gave up.  She said she remembered me because I had said in a meeting early on, "no matter what, I'm coming every week."  She was doubtful that I would still be here and when she saw me, she said that I was so inspiring to her, because I did it.  Even though, I was feeling low from the gain.  She didn't see that.  She didn't see my internal struggle with feeling like a failure.  She saw me as an inspiration.  Your failing is someone else's inspiration - even if you never know it.

3.  Slip ups and Set backs are simply times to reflect and learn something - Not a time to quit
I know this isn't radically new and I've said it before but it's worth reiterating.  A "never give up" attitude is a must.  Set-backs, hills, bumps in the road, getting lost -- all a part of the journey.  Whether you lose your way for just a meal or even a month, there's always a way to get moving forward again.  Our set backs need to be viewed as great opportunities that we learn and grow from, that will eventually propel us to greater heights instead of a reason to quit.

XO
Jen