Amelia: Run in the Streets

This morning I got to take part in two new-to-me NY running experiences – the Summer Streets program and crossing the Brooklyn Bridge!

Summer Streets is a great program that runs three weekends in August and shuts down a lengthy area of the Manhattan streets along the east side.  From 7am to 1pm that section of streets is car-free and full of runners, walkers, bikers, rollerbladers, etc.  Along the path of the Summer Streets there are “rest stops” with vendor sponsored booths and areas where Crunch gym holds free mini-classes.  It is such a wonderful way to get people outside and moving.  You can read more about it here: Summer Streets site.  There’s another one next week!

Summer Streets!

I have heard about Summer Streets before and walked by it, but never had the chance to fully join in and run the streets.  I was very excited to use the Summer Streets as a way to spice up my 10 mile training run.  (I’m currently training for the NY Marathon.)

My run started at 42nd and Park and wound down toward lower Manhattan.  For the most part the streets weren’t too crowded and everyone was courteous and followed the directional signs that were posted.  I felt like this was (sort of) a preview of what it would be like to run through the streets of NY in the marathon.  There are so many sights to serve as a good distraction.  I was also able to see a ton of runners from Team in Training and some of my old coaches.  Running community out in full force!

I had originally planned to turn around at the end of the Summer Streets path, but once I got downtown I couldn’t resist following all the runners and bikers streaming over the Brooklyn Bridge!  I can’t believe I’ve been in NY for 8 years and never been across this iconic bridge!  It was a fun run, but tough!!  Way steeper than I thought it would be.

Let's do this thing!

Once I was across the river to Brooklyn (where I passed Melissa, who was running into Manhattan), I ran around kind of randomly to burn a few miles.  I don’t know Brooklyn well enough to tell where I was, but I know I turned around at the Atlantic Yards (under construction) arena.

No excuses, legs!

As far as the actual run itself, my legs weren’t really in it today.  They felt fine, but laaaazy.  (Yes, my legs, not me. )  I walked more than I would have liked, but no worries.  10 miles in the books!  This run showed me I need to find more “experience” runs to do.  Running is a great way to see a city and there is clearly so much I haven’t seen!

These sand castles were being worked on near the courthouses downtown.

Deirdre: I Cheated on Tofu

First off I’m super excited for the Healthy Living Summit! This is the third year that Amelia and I are attending. These are my recaps from  Boston and Chicago. I am also excited to be rooming with Danielle and Shannon. Yay for New York blogger love!

Anyway…

For a long time, tofu has been my main squeeze.  It has been my favorite form of non meat protein.  But I knew I needed to venture out of my comfort zone. I knew I should probably try other things like tempeh. I was a little scared of tempeh. It looked so grainy. But finally I was inspired by this lovely recipe by Mama Pea. She admits that she too used to be afraid of tempeh. But Mama Pea actually grates it with a cheese grater! This was awesome to me because what  weirded me out most about tempeh was the long loaf like appearance.

My ingredients were all from Trader Joe’s: Thai Red Curry Sauce (contains eggs), broccoli slaw, and of course tempeh.

Mama Pea says to grate the tempeh over the pan, but I am a  SPAZ and started to get tempeh bits everywhere so I had to switch to a bowl.

This is what the tempeh looks like when it is cooking.

After 3 minutes I added my slaw and sauce and let it cook for only 3 minutes because I like my slaw kinda chewy. So easy!

All ready to eat!

The best part was I had leftovers to eat for lunch for 2 days and the curry tempeh slaw tasted just as good cold as heated. Next time I would add even more vegetables.

I’m currently totally into tempeh and broccoli slaw so I’ve also used it to make a healthier stir fry.

So that’s how I overcame my fear of tempeh.

Anyone else try tempeh or have a good tempeh recipe?

Deirdre: Hello Again

Hey Friends!

Here’s what 2011 has been like for me so far:

In February, I met The Pioneer Woman! She signed her book and we talked about West Side Story. It was surreal because I’ve become such a huge fan of hers in the past year.

For the Superbowl, I made buffalo chicken dip. Yes, it is the most unphotogenic food ever but tastes just like wings. Tina was right because this stuff is like crack. I will only be making it once a year because it is ridiculously unhealthy, and I felt grossly full after eating it.

For President’s Day weekend, I visited my sister and brother in Washington, D.C. I visited D.C. last year on President’s Day weekend, but the city was full of snow. This year it was beautiful spring-like weather. For lunch on Friday, I met my sister at Jaleo. This fantastic tapas restaurant has a great lunch special where for $11 you can have a sandwich with half a soup or salad. I chose the ‘JLT’ which the menu describes  as Jamón, lettuce, tomato, Manchego cheese and mayonnaise on a fresh brioche. To me it tasted like the best prosciutto I’ve had in my life with the exception of the prosciutto I’ve had at Mike’s Deli.

For my soup, I chose gazpacho which was so phenomenal that I was half finished with it before I remembered to take a picture.

During my trip, we also went to Ben’s Chili Bowl, a D.C. institution.

Chili fries split with my siblings

A chili dog that was consumed by me. I really loved Ben’s chili. It was typical comfort food but felt lighter than most chili because there wasn’t too much ground beef in it. It was the most flavorful chili I’ve had in while.

Source

On a personal front, I gave up all caffeine for Lent this year. I put up a picture of Diet Coke because it is the form of caffeine I consume the most. I’ve never been a huge coffee person. I love the taste, but I don’t need it every day like some people do. I’ve probably consumed more coffee and iced green tea in the last 4 years or so because there is a Starbucks in my office building. I actually don’t normally consume caffeine in the morning. I am more of a I need a pick me up at 3pm to get me through the rest of the work day type of person. The first week I had a few headaches and every now and then the headaches return but so far so good. I’ll give you guys a full report when Lent is over.

Question Time

Anyone read any good books lately?

I feel like I’ve been a reading machine this year. I think its because of the long winter. Some of the best books I’ve read this year have been The Hunger Games Trilogy. I am not a person who normally reads young adult fiction. I never read The Twilight series, but I really enjoyed The Hunger Games books. I am warning you right now this is an intense series and I sometimes wonder if they are totally appropriate for young adults. But if you like futuristic, dystopian society stuff I definitely think you will love these books. They really make you think and the themes are timeless.

Amelia: More+Fitness Half Marathon Recap

Annnd I’m back!

After way too long a winter, I finally kicked off my 2011 racing season this weekend with the More+Fitness Magazine Half-Marathon.  I was actually supposed to do two other races in March, but scheduling conflicts (cousin’s wedding!) prevented me from racing.  Therefore, I was very excited to shake off the spider webs, stretch my muscles, and pound some pavement!

You might remember I ran the More+Fitness Half two years ago – my first half marathon!  I loved the race then and was happy to find that not much has changed.  The race, which is women only, is 13.1 miles around beautiful Central Park.  This means two loops of the whole park and then a small loop around the bottom of the park.  For those that have run Central Park before, yes that meant TWICE up Cat Hill and TWICE up Harlem Hill.  A workout to say the least.

I arrived at the race about 25 minutes before the start and it was already in the 40s, perfect running weather.  Before the start of the race there was a nice tribute to Sally Meyerhoff.  Sally won last year’s race but died in March 2011 when she was hit by a car while riding her bike.  The award for the race’s winner is now named for her.

Once the race began, the main thing on my mind was how I would be feeling as the miles started to pile up.  I’ll be honest here.  I had not trained well for this race.  Between work, the weather, and any other excuse I could think of, I had not gotten a lot of running done.

My first few miles felt kind of sluggish, but I was happy to see I was maintaining a little over a 10 minute mile.  As I settled into my running groove I started to feel better, more confident with my abilities.  It just felt so good to be outside running again!!  The first loop around the park went by fairly quickly.  However, I knew the real test would the second time around the hills.

Around mile 7 (shortly into the second loop), I was grabbing water and realized I was right next to a pacer for the 2:10 group.  Errr?  I was not on pace for a 2:10 finish.  I decided to try and stay with the group for as long as I could.  Did not last long!  My guess is that the 2:10 pacers were a little behind because I felt like they were gunning it the whole time I was with that group.  Once I accepted that I was not going to hold their pace I was able to get back into my stride.

Of course the hills sucked the second time around.  There was no getting around that.  But they were do-able and I knew it was (pretty much) downhill from there!  In past half marathons I have struggled around miles 9-12 and summoned just enough energy to push through to 13 and into the finish.  This time, even though I was slower than I would have hoped, I think my pacing was much better.  Before I knew it I was at Mile 11 and still feeling pretty good!  I held my pace through 13 and sprinted that final .1 mile.  Final finish time was 2:30:03.

I was treated to a nice surprise near the end of the race.  As I headed down the finishing chute I spotted Deirdre and Shannon cheering for me in the crowd!!  Totally made my day.  I have such awesome friends.

The other thing that made this race great was that someone had written “Become Your Dreams” in chalk all along the course.  It was like my running angel the whole time.  Each time my foot landed on one of those messages I knew I’d be able to push it a little further.  Big thanks to whoever took the time to write that!

Love the shirts too!  How genius to have women’s-cut shirts for a women’s event!

Amelia & Deirdre: Eggland’s Best Pink Blogger Brunch

Yesterday Amelia and I had to opportunity to attend a brunch sponsored by Eggland’s Best and hosted by the lovely Ashley of A Healthy, Happier Bear. It was great to see Ashley and her beautiful apartment.

She put out a delicious spread. I especially enjoyed the quiche and the pumpkin bread.

There were many fabulous ladies in attendance.

Amelia and I were excited to see Megan Check out Ashley’s post for the full list of fabulous ladies in attendance.

After eating and socializing, Ashley spoke to us about breast cancer awareness.

After a great brunch, Ashley sent us home with goodie bag!

Keeping with the pink theme the bag contained Orbitz bubblemint gum, Emergen-C, a loofah and even a coupon for a free dozen eggs! Amelia is making Thanksgiving dinner for her family and she is psyched to cook with Eggland’s Best.

Deirdre: Taking A Closer Look

Hey! I’ve missed ya. So let’s get to it.

I am a firm believer in truly examining everything. I feel it is important to see all the details and take a closer look.

Here are two examples:

This was my Halloween costume. To many I looked like a goth chick or a dominatrix. But after taking a closer look (and when my jacket was off) one could see my full costume.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo i.e. Lisbeth Salander. Okay so only a handful of people got my costume, but I liked it and it was fun to spend a night not looking like myself. Plus, I just finished the 3rd and final book in the series and I think Lisbeth is an amazing character.

Taking a closer look is also important when you are purchasing food.

So I have a confession to make. Despite being a fairly intelligent person and a reader of numerous healthy living blogs I am sometimes a sucker for certain buzzwords. I try to read the nutrition labels on everything I buy, but when I see certain words I just assume it is very healthy. In this case, the buzzword was:

VEGAN

I read vegan and I assumed very healthy.

Sorry, for the blurry picture but if you can read the nutritional label it reads 600 calories! Sure there are no preservatives or artificial colors or flavors but 600 calories is a lot!

And look at the portion:

I hadn’t even eaten any of it yet! I’m not a huge calorie counter but for 600 calories I want a lot of bang for my buck! Caloric and portion complaints aside it was decent for frozen Thai food. It could have been spicier, but I could say that about a lot of Trader Joe’s products. I did learn the important lesson of checking my labels more carefully and remembering that vegan does not equal low in calories.

Are there any buzzwords that trip you up?

Amelia: Running with Purpose

  

  

Hello everyone!  I wanted to share something I’ve been working on for a while.  Since July, I have been training for my second marathon!  And this one is special.   

 

On October 2, I will be racing in the 2010 Hamptons Marathon in East Hampton, NY.  I decided to train for this marathon with Team in Training.  I’m sure many of you are familiar with this wonderful organization already, but just in case you are not let me explain.  Team in Training (TNT) is a national group that helps train its members for endurance events, such as half and full marathons, century bike rides, triathlons, etc.  While participants train, they also work to raise money for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS).  Through LLS, the money is used to find a cure for blood cancers and also provide support for the patients and families struggling with these cancers.   

I have always wanted to do a race with TNT, but kept putting it off.  However, when I was looking to train for my second marathon, a friend mentioned that she was training for the Hamptons with TNT.  I signed up that day.   

  

Although I do not have a personal connection with blood cancers, I know what it is like to watch loved ones battle cancer.  That is why I have chosen to train for this marathon with a purpose.  Instead of complaining about long runs or hill workouts, I think of how lucky I am to have the ability to run!  I am strong and healthy and will not take that for granted.  

I will be sure to give you a full post of my thoughts on training with TNT, but so far I can say that it has been a very positive experience.  

**If you’re interested in donating to my fundraising, or learning more about TNT, please click HERE.**  

Have you ever trained for an event with a charity group?  I’d love to hear your thoughts!