EMPOWER Summer Camp: The Recap

Disclaimer: I received a paid invitation to attend EMPOWER Summer Camp from SweatPink/FitApproach in exchange for social media postings. As an attendee, I received free swag from NowFoods, AfterShokz, GreatLakesGelatin, TakeyaUSA, JadeLeafMatcha, GrassFedCoffee, MomentumJewelry, GimmeGrams, ThinkNoo, ArtisanTropic, LoveSuja, Goodr, and MyDandies. While I will mention a few specific products in this post, I'm sharing reviews of all those wonderful gifts in a separate post. All my opinions are my own. 

Where to start? I'm sure most of you reading this caught some of the social media posts from last weekend's EMPOWER summer camp. If you didn't see those, you at least felt my excitement prior to the big event! When the ladies of FitApproach asked me to come, you know I didn't say no! The biggest hurdle was my job. I was scheduled to work that weekend and I couldn't find anyone to switch.

Cue the temper tantrum. Ok, maybe I'm being dramatic but I wanted in. Lucky me, one of my partners took my weekend and the deal was sealed. I was going to summer camp!!! I don't even know if I can do this weekend justice in a recap. It's taken me about a week to absorb the entire experience. As Ruby, one of the SweatPink team commented, I'm completely blissed out.

photo courtesy of Ruby@fitapproach

In Pursuit of Happy Joints

Earlier in February, I posted an informative discussion about Great Lakes Gelatin Collagen Protein on Facebook Live. Check it out!

Disclaimer: Through my affiliation with Sweat Pink, I received Great Lakes Collagen products and compensation in exchange for this post as well as social media sharing. All opinions are my own. This post contains an affiliate link.

Most runners experience inflammation after a run, especially after one where you might have pushed your pace a little harder and/or ran a little farther. Sometimes you just feel sore, even if the run went well. Other times, the soreness comes a day or 2 later, aka delayed-onset muscle soreness or DOMS. What do you do when this happens? Do you reach for the bottle of ibuprofen? Do you let it go away on its own?

In the past, I took more than my share of ibuprofen to ward off post-run soreness. You and I both know that isn't the best thing to do. As I've gotten smarter about training, I incorporate foam rolling and stretching into my post-run routine to help ward off some of that pain. But even that wasn't enough. It wasn't until last year and my diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis that I began to really educate myself about inflammation--both as it relates to running and working out as well as RA. I've made changes in my diet and have incorporated more anti-inflammatory foods. I've also started using hydrolyzed collagen protein supplements.

Run and Be Open with AfterShokz TrekzTitanium: Product Review

Disclaimer: As a SweatPink Ambassador, I received a set of AfterShokz TrekzTitanium headphones from AfterShokz in exchange for my unbiased review. All opinions are, of course, my own.

As a music lover and runner, I have been intrigued by the AfterShokz TrekzTitanium headphones. I was super skeptical and had a lot of questions about them. How could headphones that use bone conduction for sound even work? Would the music sound "tinny"? Then there was the whole wireless Bluetooth thing. I've heard people complaining about their Bluetooth headphones--connection issues seem to be the biggest complaint. That, and the buds falling out of their ears made me think twice about giving up the cords.

Over the years, I've had ongoing issues with earbuds and so-called sport headphones. The biggest issue? Even when the earbuds claim to be sweatproof, they are not sweatproof. I believe that I am the sweatiest person on the planet. I just threw yet another pair of earbuds in the garbage because I sweated them to death. I consider myself lucky if I get 6 months out of a pair of earbuds. I'm also pretty picky about sound quality--I really am all about that bass--and so many earbuds sound so tinny. There's nothing worse than my rock and roll sounding like it's playing on an AM radio from the 1970s. Not that I know anything about that.  Finally, there's that whole cord thing--the cords fray, my flailing arms pull the buds out of my ears, they tangle into knots...

Naturally, when I was offered the chance to try the AfterShokz TrekzTitanium, you know I jumped at it. I do have one pair of corded earbuds that I love, so the bar was set pretty high for these!

I'm Springing For Prana! #spring4prAna

It's no secret how much I love prAna's line of casual clothing. From yoga clothes to everyday gear, I have quite a few pieces of their stylish, comfortable items. prAna uses sustainable materials and fair trade products so you can feel good about what you are wearing.

I was fortunate to receive several items from their spring 2017 line to try out and review for my blog! Our unseasonably spring-like weather put me in the mood to head down to my favorite running path for these pictures. I'm #springing4prAna!

Big Sur Marathon Training--Week 0

This week, I wrapped up my base building workouts and today I officially kicked off my marathon training for the Big Sur International Marathon. I didn't know what else to call the week before marathon training starts, so week 0 it is.

Like I did for Chicago, for Big Sur, I'm following a 12 week training plan. While Becky didn't develop this exact plan for me, I followed the plan she made for Chicago and tweaked it a bit. I reviewed my training plan with her, and made some adjustments based on her feedback. Right now, I'm feeling fairly confident that I've got a solid plan that will get me to the finish line intact.

That is if my plantar fasciitis behaves itself. I've gotten a ton of advice from everyone including my dad, who eventually became so frustrated when he had PF, he finally took a mallet to his heel. While that somewhat extreme solution worked well for him, I'm not so sure I want to try it on myself. Not that he hasn't offered to do it for me. What has seemed to work for me is the night splint aka my faux Strassberg sock, my Feetures compression sleeve (affiliate link), heel lifting, calf stretching, heat in the morning, and wearing shoes to work with a low (not flat) heel. I tried orthotics, but all they did was make me feel like I was 80 years old. Experiment=fail. I didn't like feeling old. I took the orthotics out of my running shoes and that's that. I'll use them in my work shoes for now.

So how did week 0 aka base building go down? Besides lots of yoga? The SweatPink #FlexandFlow yoga challenge continues, and I haven't missed a day! The challenge wraps up on February 5, and while I'll miss posting daily yoga poses, it's time to focus on the task at hand: the Big Sur Marathon. But you know there will still be yoga happening for me. I just won't bombard you with all my poses.

Monday: yoga class at the studio. This was an amazing class with one of my favorite instructors. She devoted the class to the full moon and we did moon salutations. She also introduced me to my new mantra, "Chill out or Burn out". Repeat as needed. Which I did all week.

Pose of the day was one legged chaturanga

Tuesday: 4.55 miles easy in the hood. I was glad to be done. It was blustery and cold. 8:45m/m.

Pose of the day: Upward facing dog

Wednesday: Mile repeats x4 on the treadmill. Last week I struggled with pacing, but this week was much better. I'm pretty sure my treadmill needs to be calibrated, because my splits were slower than I expected. I chose to focus on consistency and not pacing. Splits were 8:24, 8:16, 8:16, 8:34 (oops!). After I finished, I went to yoga for another studio class. The theme was hips and hamstrings. Perfect.

Yogi's choice inversion--I chose handstand at the wall. I used superphoto to edit this. My face kind of freaks me out. I look like a cyborg.

Thursday: Cycling x 1 hour. Thanks to the magic of YouTube, I rode in Thailand. I promised Becky these rides would be all about endurance and this one pretty much was. There were a few "harder" efforts but nothing too taxing. The video itself was kind of a turd. The cyclist would randomly stop to wait for his friend to catch up. Meanwhile, I'm pedaling away, just staring at his tire. This happened several times. Dude, ever heard of hitting the pause button? Guess I got what I paid for. This really was the first video that disappointed me. Looks like it's back to Italy this week. Anyways, I rode 13.75 miles/1h.

Pose of the day was lizard lunge. Felt great after riding. My ITB thanked me.

After that, I went to see Becky. She had me do some work on the GHD machine, reverse back extensions and traditional back extensions. Holy hamstrings! I did barbell cleans into a front squat followed by deadlifts, both with increasing weights. We finished up with some more hamstring exercises. And my foam roller got some attention that night.

Friday: rest. Pose of the day was tripod headstand. I have never done this version of headstand, and I had a nice surprise! You just never know what you are capable of, do you? What a great way to head into a long day at work. Pun completely unintended!

I was going to stay in half tripod, but my legs went up!

Saturday: 4 miles easy in the 'hood. The January thaw felt great! 8:45 m/m.

Pose of the day was humble warrior. I just love this pose.

Sunday: 8 mile "long run". This was my first long run since I ran that half marathon in November. It was 50 degrees, which felt great for January. Unfortunately, it was pretty gloomy out there. My foot felt pretty good most of the time but started to hurt towards the end. When I looked at my Garmin, it read 6.66 miles. Coincidence? I think not. Anyways, I finished up and stretched it out. 8:45m/mile

Pose of the day was reclined hero pose. This is a great hip opener and quad stretch. Take it slow. And yes, my eyes are closed. A moment of quiet for me in the middle of a run. Reflecting on how great this pose feels and gratitude for my body that lets me do hard things.

It's been a pretty good week off the road too. Uneventful for the most part. How about you? Any of you yogis ever done moon salutation? Anyone else doing the SweatPink #flexandflow yoga challenge? It's the final week!

I'm linking up with Holly and Tricia for their Weekly Wrap! Check out what everyone else has been up to!

Loving/Not Loving/Winning

I could think of no better way to wrap up what has been a hellacious week than to try to put a humorous spin on things. You know me. Always trying to make light. The only thing I can say about this week is that things can't get much worse, right? Or can they?

You know what? Don't answer that. I do have 2 teenage sons, after all. And none of my grief this week has come from them. For that, I am grateful.

Hopefully, by the time you're reading this, I'm on a beach somewhere exotic, counting my winnings from the $1,000,000,000 Powerball drawing. That's a lot of zeros. Buh-bye.

Oh, wait. I'm still here. Crap! That means it rolled over. I'll win next week.

Sigh.

So hey! I got to ride with this guy, virtually. Let's talk about what I'm loving, not loving, and winning..

Your perky instructor on the GCN.

Loving: riding my trusty Trek bike indoors on the trainer. Thanks to the magic of YouTube, I've been able to enjoy some fun rides in Italy, France, and Australia.
Not loving: The interval/spin class that I did on Saturday was interrupted 3 times by ads. Seriously annoying. Who puts ads in the middle of a workout video? The ads aren't even targeted for this audience. Ads for whiskey? HIV testing? Too bad, because this was a great workout/ride and there are a ton of them on the GCN channel on YouTube. I thought I found my every ride right here. This was GREAT. Except for the damn ads. Even the soundtrack was good. Guess I'll have to suck it up and ride with my phone in hand so I can skip the ads.
Winning: For all of my rides, I wore my heart rate monitor and got myself in my training zone, guaranteeing an effective alternative to running.

Loving: The new look of my blog. I'm sure I'll keep tweaking things. But for now, I'm satisfied.
Not loving: The spam.is.out.of.control.
Winning: Comment moderation has helped keep most of the spam for my eyes only. Some of the comments are so bad, they're entertaining. But most don't even make sense. Some robot out there's got my number.

Loving: Time off my feet and use of my night splint has reduced my PF pain significantly.
Not loving: That I still have some pain.
Winning: I reached out to Align Footwear to see if they would let me trial their orthotics. They came yesterday and I'll be testing them once I'm back on the road. Stay tuned for a review.

#oofos #feeturesPFcompressionsleeve #snoga #wheelpose #thesearenottheofficialhashtags

Loving: SweatPink has started a new daily yoga pose challenge on Instagram for January and February. You know I love me some yoga. I did this last year and it was fun to get creative with the poses. I was also able to hook a couple of friends into doing yoga, and now they've outdone me, continuing on a daily streak going on a year now. So proud. Like a mom.
Not loving: All the hashtags required to participate for prizes. Seems like I'm always forgetting one of them. I'll never win! #toomanyhashtags #andthehashtagsarecumbersomelikethisone
Winning: I get to do yoga. #yogaeverydamnday #yesthisisoneofthehashtags

Loving: Remember those men's Vans I was sent by mistake instead of the boots I ordered? I finally returned them to the Amazon marketplace vendor. After many painful phone calls to Amazon customer service, shipping was reimbursed by Amazon.
Not loving: The vendor called me to tell me he sent me a prepaid shipping label. I never got it. He asked me to remove my claim on Amazon. I told him I would do that when he refunded my money. Stay tuned...
Winning: I found the boots half price on another website.

Loving: Betabrand. On recommendation from 2 of my colleagues, I bought a pair of these "dress" yoga pants. OMG. Stretchy, comfy, and stylish. The quality is top notch.
Not loving: The price. But there are coupons and discounts if you refer a friend. I reached out to the company and they don't partner with bloggers.
Winning: Wearing yoga pants to work.

So much win! 

How was your week? Any wins you want to share? Keeping it all positive!

I'm linking up with Tricia and Holly for their Weekly Wrap. By now, they are done running the WDW Marathon! Be sure to head over to their pages to link up and/or check out all the posts. And CONGRATULATE them both on completing their first marathons!