Hope you had a great four-day or two-day (non-Thanksgivingers) weekend.
Thanksgiving started with a “Pumpkin Pie” yoga class where sadly no pumpkin pies were eaten. But we did try to get into the most ridiculous crescent roll pose.
Something like this – minus the beach.
Then a quick stop at home to get some dough ready for our contribution to the Thanksgiving festivities.
Freshly baked sourdough courtesy of J.
And then on to the part that I was dreading/looking forward to all week – my first run outside in about 7 weeks! My treadmill runs had been going fine but were incredibly boring (I swear that time slows down in the vicinity of the dreadmill). I wanted to get outside so badly that I was having serious runners’ envy when I spied people on their daily runs. I decided that Thanksgiving was the day to take things outside.
But there has also been the ever present knowledge that doing too much too soon (AKA the classic injured runner trying to get back on the road ASAP) could lead to recurrence of my injury or even worse a full scale stress fracture. I haven’t noticed any symptoms in my foot since taking a break from running back in October but I am all too familiar with finding myself with a brand spanking new injury while recovering from something else. Yay – runner’s problems!
So with a little trepidation I headed to one of my favorite trails near SLC – the Pipeline in Millcreek canyon. The temperatures in the valley have been pretty mild lately and our high on Thanksgiving was set to get near 60F. Obviously I decided to wear some shorts and contemplated running in just a t-shirt. That is until we got near the trail head and saw snow everywhere! Yike! I guess I forgot that 1500 ft can make such a difference in winter.
It wasn’t that cold – 39F – but the trail was packed down with snow for the first mile which made running a little slower and a lot slicker than normal. The second half was snow-free and mostly dry although I still manage to get my legs nice and muddy.
Just a little over four miles but with 898 ft of elevation gain. Maybe not the easiest way to return to running but it felt amazing! Pain-free and out on the trails – who could ask for more?
I woke up the next day expecting to feel pain – and I did but mostly from my intense yoga posing – hello hip flexors! My calves felt a little tight, which seems to be the story of my life. But I can deal with muscle pain – it doesn’t scare me like tendons/bone pain.
After de-muddifying we headed for dinner and filled our bellies with an amazing spread. This might be a controversial opinion but my favorite thing about Thanksgiving dinner are the sides. Give me extra mashed potato and stuffing over pie any day. And pumpkin flavored things – meh – I can take it or leave it – and this even applies to pumpkin pie. Sorry if we can’t be friends anymore – although if we stay friends I’ll give you all of my pie (in return for some of those taters).
Friday was some low impact cardio – a 35 minute (uphill) bike ride to work (yes work – boo) followed by a core yoga class. And then more trails on Saturday (right now I’m running every other day) – 3.75 miles – bringing my total mileage for the month up t0 28ish miles. Not exactly what I wanted but I am going to take.
And I’ve become an accidental triathlete. Biking + trail run on Saturday and a swimming session on Sunday. Don’t worry – I have no plans to ever ever ever intentionally do a triathalon – that is officially for badass/crazy people. But I am really digging all of this cross-training right now.
