Sin azucar otra vez

It's that time of year again. Time to lock down the eating habits. I have done well with the no cheese, no donuts diet but now I am upping it a notch for the final push. No more sugar. I am hoping this will help me drop a few last lbs before race day and assist in an immodium free race. Of course, I will still eat fruits, but no more cakes, candy, dr. peppers, and donuts. At least not until the race. Of course, there are a few exceptions.
1)I can still have sugar when I run my long runs since pretty much anything other than gummy bears, gummy worms and reeses peanut butter cups come right up in runs over an hour. And added bonus - this may also entice me to run longer.
2) I can have chocolate milk after my long runs. For me, it is the best recovery drink out there. If possible I will use sugar free chocolate, but I am not switching to a soy milk.
3) I can have dessert at Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Other than that no sugar until race day. I have a friend who is my inspiration, although she is way more hard core than I am. She is going 52 weeks no sugar, and every time I want to pick up a cupcake, I can remember that she is not caving, so I cant either. Go Michele, I am right there with you for the next few months!

Training and stuff

I know I have been slacking again on the blog postings, so hopefully I havent driven off all two readers that I have (Hi huk, hi mom!). After the travels last week I came home and all I wanted to do was sleep, but I did make it out on sunday for an 11 mile run. I ran into Chris part way through and he said it was so crowded it had taken him an hour to get through 4 miles because he had to run around all the people. Apparently people were celebrating early for independence day. I showed him some other more remote trails and we finished the run and went home to watch movies and eat the rest of the day. We got half a day tuesday off and yesterday off for the Independence day. Tuesday night at midnight is El Grito. Everyone lines the streets, zocalo, bars and restaurants and shouts Vive Mexico. This is what the zocalo looked like.

Since I am not 22 anymore and no longer like to brave mardi gras size crowds, I opted to stay home and eat some of Chris's fajitas instead.
This sunday is a 15K race that I am hoping to do. I am also hoping to get Chris to do it as well since he does have a half marathon in the not so distant future. It will be his first race since retiring from running almost a year ago. Also, I am debating about running the vegas half instead of the full. I am really trying to work on my speed and that just doesnt come with training for a full marathon. There are a few marathons early in 2010 that I would like to do, so if I dont run the full in vegas I will be doing one in February or March. It is still up in the air, but my brother is getting really fast and I dont want him to smoke me in the turkey trot.

Photos from the Yucatan

This post has a whole buncha fotos. Mostly for my mom who is constantly telling me to upload pictures when I travel, so this post is for you, mom. I am halfway through my whirlwind tour with three hotels under my belt and a light show at the ruins and two more hotels to go before I can go back home on Saturday. I am missing my peeps (or peep) at home, but am getting 12 hours of sleep a night here with no dogs crowding the bed, so things arent all bad. Last night I had the pleasure of welcoming in 1 tarantula and 1 HUGE millipede to my room, and tonight I am covering the door openings with towels so I dont get any more unwanted guests. Although at breakfast today I was told by the resident manager that the Haciendas are haunted and the one I am in tonight has been frequented by a little girl ghost. Every since the Shining I cant deal with little girl ghosts. The resident manager is also a part time shaman and told me if she comes in to tell her to leave and she will. I hope he is right becasue every 30 minutes or so I am utteringgo away hoping to keep my little Shining friend out of my room for the night.
Here are lots of photos from the first half of the trip. The Haciendas are in tiny pueblos in the Yucatan where we are running up in the high 90s so my runs have been brutal to say the least. Good thing there is lots of new things to see and keep my mind of the heat.
These are photos of my hotel from last night. It was amazing, and is the only one of our properties down here with a consecrated Catholic Church.




Outside tub in the room that also doubles as a post run ice bath. It is only about 70 degrees but feels so good after running on the hot roads.


Some photos from today's run:
My road out of town

Here is the friendly cow that may be tonight's dinner hangin outside of the hotel with his turkey friends.


They love the churches in Mexico

This seems to be the local hangout with video games and all

This is one of the town's schools. All the kids were outside playing soccer.



There are thousands of stray dogs running around and I want to take them all home with me, but these two little guys stole my heart.


Good night from Mexico!

Traveling

Last weekend was sort of a blur. Not much more was done other than eating and sleeping and running. Saturday Chris had to work so I ran to pick up my packet for the race and there and back made an easy 5.5 mile run. After that I decided to be a nice girlfriend and went to Krispy Kreme to get him some donuts. I am pretty impressed that I didnt even have one bite, though it was damn close when I was actually in the store. I ran home with a 1/2 docena in my hands and quickly made a smoothie to curb the craving. The rest of the day I rested, but was feeling really tight in my hips. It could have been the fact that one of our dogs has taken to sleeping on my back at night. Anyway, sunday came and I woke up barely able to walk. I stretched and rolled, but I was still super tight. I was (and still am) a little worried that it is the start of another IT problem. I got to the race and found my spot in the start. The races here are VERY strict about starting and put people in line based on their most recent 10K time, which make the starts very smooth. Anyway, the race was two loops, one being an 11+ mile loop and the other being a 5ish mile loop. I started planning on doing the full 2 loops, but after a few miles realized that the leg was more important than the race and decided on doing an easy-ish first loop. I called Chris and told him my plan and I met him at the finish. I am actually glad I did that since about 98% of the people only did one loop and the people on the second loop were spread out with about 2 minutes between each one making it a really confusing and boring second part.
Once I decided to take it a little easier, I ended up walking up the hills since this is usually where I have most of my problems with my IT band. But I had a good effort on the flats and downhills. My chip messed up, but the garmin gave me an average pace of 8:45, which I am happy with.
Now I am in the Yucatan traveling for work and staying at these amazing hotels solo. I will be posting pictures tonight. I saw my first spider since moving to hawaii and also my first scorpion. I tried to convince Chris to come, but he has to work. So instead of soaking up sun by the pool I went for a run last night, and also did some yoga. I think I would have had more fun lounging by the pool with Chris.

Another week down

Almost right on schedule I got a little sick again here. Nothing major, just sick enough to remind me that it is not ok to eat anything I want. I think I had lettuce that was washed in tap water. I knew it when I was eating it because you could smell it. But I thought eh, I'm gonna gamble. Well I did, and I lost. I also lost about 2 kilos. I have no idea how many lbs that is and I am too lazy to look it up. I do know that if my weight were in drugs I lost enough to put me in jail for a very long time. I guess I am watching too much Weeds, that or reading too many Mexican newspapers. Last weekend we had a comida with some friends who like to drink. True to their word, lots of wine was consumed, and lots of American Idol was played. But, I didnt crack, not a single donut hit my mouth. It was fun and we stayed out way too late which made for a rough sunday morning. But since they are just about our only friends, we have to try and keep up so they dont ditch us.
Marathon training is in full swing and I am enjoying it so far, although I havent hit the long mileage yet, but this weekend is a 16 miler and I am hoping to finish. I am also hoping to put a little tempo run in the middle of it with a race here in the city that I just found out about today.
And just to prove that it isnt all fun and comidas around here, this is a picture of Chris last friday night. We didnt move from here until we went to bed at 10.

I might need help for an addiction

This is a picture of my desk from 10:00 today. I may have a problem with caffeine. I can barely wake up in the morning, but by lunch I am totally wired. I wonder why? Does it mean I am addicted if I cant function without a venti lite latte with an extra shot?
But I am slowly getting rid of my vices. This will be the first saturday in a while with no donuts for me. I told Chris he had to go to the store while I was running and eat all 6 of his donuts before he comes home. And then lie to me when I ask him where he was. I hope I can make it all weekend with no krispy kremes. We do have two comidas planned so maybe the tequila will make me forget about the donuts. Although history tells me it will make me forget about my deal not to have donuts and I will wake up next to an empty krispy kreme box.

I needed sleep

This past weekend didnt really go exactly as planned. Friday afternoon at 4PM I was ready for bed and could barely keep my eyes open. Usually this time of day I am wide awake and ready for a run. I spent 43 hours of the weekend like this.

The rest of the time I was in that same position on the couch. I had no energy and needed sleep. I made it outside three times - twice for a run (very slow ones) and once to go to the grocery store. My only other form of exercise was a trainer ride. I didnt have to move far from the couch to the trainer and I didnt even have to hit pause on the movie. Needless to say the half marathon didnt happen. I have some friends who ran it and it was their first half, so congrats to all of them. Apparently the weather was nice, but I wouldnt know.
I also gave up cheese and Krispy Kreme until after the marathon. The only caveat to that is that I get to eat queso when I am in Houston. I am not crazy enough to give that up. For you non-Texans, queso is what you may call cheese dip and looks like this.

It is a heart attack in a bowl full of deliciousness.
In other news the current water supply in Mexico city will apparently last us through december and then we are out. It should make for an interesting first part of 2010. The city has been trying to save water and one of the ways is shutting off water supply in areas that are in the most trouble. The office where Chris works doesnt have water during the day because the city shuts it off, so he has to walk to the hotel to use the rest room. I am pretty freaked out by going through potentially one of the worst flu seasons in recent history with no water supply. But at least now I may not stand out as much when I go to the store or to lunch post workout because I wont be the only one who hasnt showered that day - see, I am trying to stay positive.