Lately in my life..

Since I have yet to fall back into a normal blogging pattern, let’s play a bit of catch-up, shall we? Here’s some random bits of things that have been going on lately.

Food

I am getting very excited about digging deeper into Eat To Perform. If you are unfamiliar with it, at its most basic level, eat more food, carb load around your workouts, make massive gains.

What could go wrong? How horrible is it that it is recommended I consume 2+ cups of a rice in one sitting? Or that it is okay to eat oatmeal and sometimes cereal? Major win for me from a performance and a mental health standpoint. Been loving this post-workout formula by TrueNutrition, which I add right into my protein shake (snag a discount using “W2W” at checkout).

Of course I had to order one of each to see what I liked best..

My biggest issue with this has not been finding the capacity to shovel massive quantities of food into my mouth, but rather finding a bowl big enough to accommodate my meals, which most nights post-workout involve rice, some form of meat, and some veggie. Target clearance section came to the rescue with this beautiful piece of bowl, which I nightly loaded up with some deliciousness.

Crossfit

Let’s see.. I haven’t had anything too exciting to talk about. I never ended up writing up a recap on my last partner competition which I mentioned recently, but the quick and dirty summary is I PRed my number of kipping pull-ups to 10, followed by 5 minutes of burpees. Then, had an awful ugly deadlift that took me about 20s to pull my hips forward (quite comical, actually, being stuck halfway standing with some horrible form, with the judge yelling at me to just STAND UP!!..), and I experienced a WOD that I never, ever want to do again in my life. Seriously, I have never had a workout that was full of such major suckage as this one. I would rather have done 15 minutes of burpees.

15 min AMRAP Chipper
Partner WOD, one working at a time, other holding 25# plate locked overhead the whole time. 5 burpee penalty for dropped plate. 

100 Wall Balls (20/14 – 10’ Target)
100 Hand Release Push Ups
100 Sit Ups
100 1 Arm Alternating DB Snatches (45/25)
200 Lateral Hops over parallettes

We made it through almost all of the sit-ups. I thought I would never feel my shoulders again. Total mentally and physically taxing workout!

Speaking of arms.. I am STILL battling a pesky wrist injury. It’s been just about three months and it is lingering on forever.. most logical advice was to stop using my wrists for awhile. But most days, the ego wins and I keep using them anyway. It’s more of a discomfort than pain, so usually ends up being matter of how much can I tolerate, rather than being wise and taking extended time off.. Can anyone relate?

Other Crossfit noteables: I finally have a “Karen” time of 11:57 (ugh), PRed my jerk at 115#, my squat clean at 120# (I know I have more in me!) and a x5 deadlift PR at 215#. A 1RM must be coming soon!

My focus lately has been on working on skills for The Open. I cannot wait!!

Running

Oh yeah.. I signed up for a handful of 10ks, starting with a St. Patty’s Day run. Despite not having run since Thanksgiving, I have a goal in mind of a sub-hour 10k. My last two were 1:00:16 and 1:00:36, so I have to be close, right? Michigan weather has not been kind to the running community the past couple months, but I am hoping to get in a few miles before the race. Otherwise, I suppose I can’t expect much without training. 🙂

Also.. I have signed up for another year of participating in the Fight for Air Climb! You can read a bit more about why I chose to do it last year here and my event recap here. If you could spare even $1, would love you visit my fundraising page! Every dollar helps!

Podcast

I briefly talked about it in my last post, but I am crazy excited about this new venture that I am doing with Alex of Distance Obsessed. We “met” on Twitter and even though we are crazy opposites, with Alex being a male, Canadian, vegan, ultra-marathoner, we have had a blast talking about all things health, fitness, and single people things. So far, we have three episodes recorded, talking everything from online dating, first date etiquette, and our latest episode about how sometimes with so many options, it’s just easier to stay single.

You don’t even need to be single to enjoy. I promise.

Check us out on Twitter, Facebook, or go right to iTunes and download it. Today. I’ll wait while you do it. Thanks.

Life

To summarize everything above, I have been doing Crossfit, eating, and enjoying being single! 😉

With this new way of eating, I have gained another 5lbs, tipping the scale at 140# for the first time ever on my 5’7″ frame. Body issues or not, it’s still always a bit scary seeing the scale go up. However, have to keep the gainz in mind! I love following Gabby because she makes me want to keep eating and gaining and being all around awesome. 😉

I did get a snazzy new header image thanks to the lovely Janine over at LIFTmeupFitness. I LOVE everything she has to say on women and body image and she preaches self-love over the scale and all that other good stuff that I am a firm believer in. She is SO positive and even has created a #REALFITSPO project which I encourage you to check out!

Other than that, not much is new in my little corner of the internet other than waiting for some warm weather!

Your turn..
Anything exciting going on in your lives?
Have you ever looked into Eat To Perform?
Any recent PRs to celebrate?
Do you ever listen to podcasts?
Are you single and sweaty?
Do you think winter is ever going to end??