The Zen of Ultra Running

Tortoise and Hare is a race organized by a local running club. This 5K race is also walker friendly. I signed up because I recently became a member of this running club and thought it would be nice to have a lot members participate in all races organized by the club. And because I am also training for the triathlon. Thursdays are my Brick training days. Meaning that I had to do two sports back to back. So, I biked 6 miles before the race started. I took advantage of the biking by going through the race trail to see how it ran. Biking before the race was like a warm up for me. So, when I actually ran it, it's not too exhausted as it would have been. Not sure if I made a PB today because I immediately left the finished line area. It's a point-to-point race meaning that I had to walk back to the car, which I parked at the start line (urgh. Another 2 miles here).

Forget what you know. Forget your "hindsight bias" from previous practices. This yoga session focused on what you know at the moment, not what your past experience had taught you. This session was shorter than the previous two sessions and was "beginner friendly". The session stressed on the core strength and balance.  I feel that sessions that are beginner friendly is good to develop your basics and foundations. I'm glad that Adriene included this session in her 30 days of yoga series. However, I guess that she must really like the "boat pose" because she has been doing it in every session since the first one. In my yoga classes, I don't usually do the boat pose so this is good to help me develop the core strength.  Then, back to my triathlon training. After skipping a day of workout, today I ran 4.5 miles outside in a windy/hot weather. The sky was so clear as if someone has painted it. Now I realized why I rarely see running races i

Second day of the 30 days of yoga with Adriene. Today, the class focuses on stretching and cultivating the energy from within. When I started practicing today, I felt sluggish from sitting in front of the computer all morning feeling demotivated. After the yoga session, I felt more energetic and warmed up. Glad I made the right decision to take a break and do yoga. I found that, for my home practice, 30 minutes works best for me as it's not too long to be boring and I still gets the benefits of yoga. I even felt ready and had a chance to practice my headstand away from the wall. First attempt = success but too bad I did not take pictures :(  

This is not a kind of challenge that you see other people are doing online. I have seen some people do the "30 day challenge" series that are not only for yoga but for other things in life such as thankfulness, gratitude, weight loss, exercise, etc. I was googling (is that a word?) some sort of free yoga videos that I can do for a short amount of time everyday and found the "30 days of yoga" by Yoga with Adriene and thought it would be fun to try a video a day for 30 days. I don't aim for 30 consecutive days but hope that I can practice as frequently as I can. Day 1 of the 30 days of yoga series titled "Ease into it!". Adriene only goes through easy yoga poses focusing on stretching and increasing flexibility. The video is good for beginners and advanced students alike. It's only 30 minutes so I was able to do it during my lunch break (at home).

I recently found a new power yoga class at Dragonfly Dance and Wellness. This class is on sunday at 3pm so it's good for my schedule. I usually add another workout from my training schedule after this yoga class. The class is power yoga. The instructor, Wendy, promised that you would sweat at the end of the class (see her website here ). I really like it as it's a vinyasa style class with fast movement. My sweat was dripping on the floor by the end of the class. After the sweaty yoga class, I continued with my triathlon training by biking 15 miles along the Chippewa river trail. The weather was hot but biking was not too bad. 

We saw that there's a new restaurant in town in Volumn One's article . According to the article, it was just opened on Monday July 20. We are always excited every time there is a new restaurant in town as we currently don't have many choices. The restaurant is on Hastings Way on the corner of Hastings Way and Fenwich Ave across the street from O'Reily's auto parts. It used to be another restaurant that I've never visited (thought about it so many times but kept forgetting to go). We went to Lynn's Chatterbox Cafe for lunch on saturday. Here is what the front of the restaurant looks like.   They also have 2 purple rocking chairs in front of the restaurants but I forgot to take the picture. Inside was kinda neat. The yellow and red wall makes it bright and inviting. They also have "busy boxes" for kids to keep them occupied while waiting for the food. It's quite a family friendly environment. We ordered burgers with side salads

It's been a week since the last update. I had been on a do-nothing vacation in the Dominican Republic. We booked an adult-only, all-inclusive resort in Punta cana and were there from Friday to Wednesday. Luckily, the hotel gave us an upgrade to a honeymoon suite (yay). The resort was nice and most importantly drinks and food were already included in the price! I got a chance to practice open water swimming in the sea. The shore is pretty shallow with a lot of seaweed under the water making it difficult to swim. However, I practiced the sighting technique and am now more confident in open water swimming. Workout at the gym. All equipment menus are in spanish AND in metric system!! I had to run with a calculator (on my phone) in my hand. The gym played folk music from Venezuela, which is pretty much like Thai Loog-Toong music. haha We came back from the DR on Wednesday and I continued my training on Thursday and Friday. Thursday, I swam 1km and Friday I biked 10 miles. Ha

I was exhausted on Monday and still sore from Jivamukti class on Sunday. So, I skipped the regular yoga on Monday evening and went to a frozen yogurt shop instead :P (yes, cheatingggggggg) Tuesday, I was able to bike 15 miles by taking the US 93 south. It was good until I saw two big hills at Mile 5 and needed to cross them. Not fun but it was a good workout. Wednesday - swim day. Last week the pool was crowded around 4ish so I went there almost 5pm. They were going to have a water aerobic class at 6. So, I swam for only 45 minutes. According to the schedule, I was supposed to do BRICK training on Thursday (outside). Realized how important it is for the triathlon training. However, it rained all day yesterday so I ended up working out at the gym instead. Different experience but still got it done :) Here is the picture of my gym workout. I forgot to take the running portion.

This weekend was another weekend that I looked forward to. Our friends invited us to a birthday party on Saturday evening in Lakeville, MN. Friday, we went to the Northern Wisconsin State Fair in Chippewa Falls. The fair was much smaller than Minnesota state fair but it still had deep fried stuff, which was the main purpose of our trip. I had deep fried apple pie and deep fried smore. They were sooo good... The yoga class at the gym on Saturday morning has been resumed. It was canceled last week because of the 4th of July weekend. After the class, I logged in 5 miles in the hot/humid weather. The weather was nice with breeze when I started but it got really humid toward the end of the run. Here is the selfie that I managed to take during the run. We stayed in Lakeville, MN on saturday night and I went to the Jivamukti class at Yoga Center of Minneapolis this morning (sunday). They changed the instructor this time because the previous one was on maternity leave. Though the A/

My first brick training started with a broken sunglasses and cant-find-my-phone panic. Today I aimed for 8 miles bike ride and 2 miles run. Almost close to the real distance. I heard bout legs felt like jello feeling during T2 and I just experienced it today. I could barely move/walk in the first 0.2 mile into running. So wobbly. I think I have to do more Brick training to get used to the feeling.   

Finally, I am able to do another arm balance pose - side crow. Today yoga class at Gold's gym was quite intense and I sweated like crazy (again). My arms were still hurting from practicing yesterday. We practiced headstand and other side planks. Very fun.  When I got home, I felt warm up enough that I would try a side crow pose and take a picture if I succeeded. Voila!  I'm very happy with my progress with yoga and it's a very good cross training activity. 

I recently discovered good yoga classes at different places in town besides my gym. There are more people in Eau Claire doing yoga than I thought (which is good). Yesterday I tried the Power Flow Yoga at Dragonfly Dance and Wellness (http://dragonflydanceandwellness.com) for the first time. It was intense and I sweated like crazy at the end of the class. Love it! Then, went biking along the Chippewa River trail. I know how awesome trail biking/running is but could not help feeling a bit scared when I bike/run alone. It would be nice to have a friend or a running group go to with. 

I would say 10K is one of my favorite distance. It's not too long and doesn't require as much training as the half marathon (I don't consider a marathon would be something on my range as it takes time and dedication to train for one). 5K is a good distance if you like sprinting. For me, I'm kinda a slow runner and it takes a while for my energy to "kick in".  The drive to Red wing, MN took us 1 hr and 20 mins. It's a small town on the Mississippi river south of Eau Claire. The 10K started at 8.30am and had only 50++ people. Small and friendly. The 5K started 10 minutes later and had a lot more people. There were a couple of hills on the course but thye were manageable. Today I recorded my new PR for this distance! After the race, we went to the farmer's market and Falcon winery. Farmer's market was a lot smaller than the one in EC. Only 10++ vendors but we got some veggies and a jar of (spicy bloody mary mix). Guess what is our plan to

My triathlon training has progressed very slowly. I'm not very stressed about it though because the race is first timer friendly. Even though it's timed, it's going to be NOT hectic and everyone is going on their own pace. Ran 4 miles this afternoon as I'm also training for the 10K on Saturday. The race starts at 8.30 in Red Wing, MN and we will have to leave the house around 6.30. Urgh. very early I also received the triathlon shirt and pants today. Bought them from Amazon. They are Pearl Izumi tri shorts and singlet. The first time I ordered a medium but had to exchange for the large! and they fit perfectly :) Below are pictures of me wearing the suit compared to the picture on Amazon.      In the evening, there was a band playing at From the Vine. So, we went there for wine and music (of course, after my run).