Musings and Holiday Hustle

I had a great time yesterday at the Holiday Hustle.

It was GREAT weather for it being Dec 1st. My friend Ambreen came over about 3 (the picture in front of the fireplace is before we left for the race) and we walked down to where the race started. We planned on getting our picture taken with Santa. We were a little sad to see that Santa wasnt there. Last year Ambreen said they had a really nice set up for him under the pavilion with a couch and tree etc, so I am not sure what happened this year. He must have gotten held up at another location. We did have someone that "looked" like Santa drive past us as we were walking to the park that honked and waved at us. LOL. Lots of fun!

We ended up walking down to the library to use the bathroom prior to the race. They had porta potties but we had time and I thought maybe Santa might be at one of the stores instead.

Then we ended up asking someone to take a picture of us because the Santa thing didnt happen.

 

Then I think this picture (below) was taken right before the race was going to begin because I am with Ambreen. At some point after the turn around in the race, I looked back and lost her.

 

Not a very flattering picture of me but oh well. I am not sure what other photos there are of me. Ambreen found this one and when I went to the photographers site, they havent updated it since 2009 and the Holiday Hustle site just has the link for the 2011 photos. 

 

This photo (below) was taken by my friend Mark who lives on the route. He said it is a little blurry because I was moving too fast for him. LOL

This was taken after the turn around point and you can see that I managed to lose Ambreen somehow. LOL

One of the things that I thought was awesome about the race is that there were little groups of carolers out singing to us as we ran. Awesome! And I wish I could have gotten some pictures of all the different things people wore. Onsie pajamas, Santa outfits, one guy was dressed in his firefighter gear- oxygen tank and everything!, boxer shorts, fun socks, crazy hair, everything goes!

My official race time was 32:12 so that means I ran a 10:23 mile pace. I had to stop at one point to retie a shoe and then I stopped towards the end to see how far Ambreen is behind me. I couldnt see her after a few seconds so I turned to keep going. I was really hoping to finish around 30 minutes but I dont think this is too bad for my first race in a while.

The race was decently hilly. You dont realize how hilly Dexter is as you drive around in a car but man oh man. Get running and some of those long, gradual inclines almost kill you! And man the downhill spots were awesome. I should have really pushed it on those but I slowed myself down not wanting to twist anything. We got to run thru the downtown houses then into our sub and down our street. The boys waved to me from the front door (so of course I slowed down there a little bit too). 

I stayed on course for eating yesterday. Here is what I had. Breakfast- smoothie, Lunch- apple with peanut butter, 1T of guac with 3 pita chips, a 1/2 of my 1/2 of turkey burger Snack (post race)-nutragrain bar, Dinner- the other 1/4 of my turkey burger, 2 glasses of red wine and some pumpkin seeds

The hour before the race, when we walked to the race and walking downtown, I burned 247 calories. Then for the race, I burned 599 calories. That is a little high because I forgot to turn it off after the race so that total is for about an hour. And I didnt record what I burned when Ambreen and I walked back to our house. So not too bad.

Today I weighed in at 174.5. A 1/2 pound loss. I will definitely take it! My body is sore so I can tell that things are switching from fat to muscle. And I am starting to see some results in the mirror. Dont "they" say 4 weeks til YOU notice changes? 8 weeks til other people start to notice? Well it hasnt been 4 weeks yet since I started working with Eric so I am very happy with that. Heck I think I am only going into week 3 (I have had 5 sessions with him). Cant wait to take pictures come Dec 15th!

I must have been feeling sentimental with it being Dec 1st, but I decided to look thru my beginning blog posts just to see where I started out the year weight wise. It looks like I started the year at about 174. I cant be exact because I didnt start documenting my weight until about mid January. Part of this makes me happy- I maintained my weight for a year. Part of this makes me sad- I didnt come close to doing any of what I wanted to do for the year.

BUT I had a harder than average year. I was on a great course for 3 months until the tornado hit. I was down to 154 lbs for cripes sake! The tornado derailed me for quite a while and it has taken a while for me to get back in my groove, but I finally have.

So I guess that I just need to be happy with where I am right now. I am ending the year strong and I will be starting the year even stronger.

And one of my goals for next year is to finish a 5k race in under 30 minutes. I have only done that one other time.I am going to add this to my goals in 2013 list.

AND I have decided that if I can reach my goal weight (again) of 155, then I will reward myself by buying a new pair of Silver Jeans from the Buckle. My sister buys those jeans and gave me an old pair of hers and I love them. I have been able to wear them still since gaining weight back but had dunlops over the top. LOL. So they have since gone back into the closet. Silver's are pricey but they will last for a long time so I think it is a great reward after hard work.

I think that is it for today. Enjoy the photos. Tonight I will be doing some Zumba and then I will continue with my Christmas cookie baking. I got two types done yesterday (vanilla pizzelles and chocolate pizzelles) and 2 batchs of rim cookies stirred up and chilling in the fridge.

Have a great day everyone!

Tip of the Day: I know this is hard to read, but I think you get the idea from the pictures...