Wednesday, February 25, 2015

Avoid the Taper Tantrums

Here's the scenario.

You are a runner. You run as a way to relieve stress, shake out the craziness of the day, have some YOU time, and just plain center yourself. You are training for a race. Said race has you a little, okay, no, how about more like pretty EXTREMELY anxious. As the race gets closer, instead of being able to run more to release those tensions, you actually have to pull back and run LESS! I mean, quite literally, it is the PERFECT STORM!

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One way to avoid the taper tantrums (although I can't say it will work for everyone), fill your schedule with soooooooooooooo much FUN that you don't even notice notice your decrease in running less.

Oh, you thought I was going to say the standard "trust your training", "hydrate", "read a book", "make lists", "visualize your race", etc... HA, nope!

Okay, okay, I can't say I totally planned it this way, but life has been pretty chaotic lately so I haven't really had time to focus on the fact that the race I have been training for since SEPTEMBER is HERE! Yup, the Phoenix Marathon is SATURDAY MORNING!

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Two weeks ago my dad was in town. Since he rarely comes out to visit (normally he is the one that stays home to work and my mom is the one who comes out to play), I had to take full advantage of his trip! Check out my post here about some of the fun we had together.


Last week Ryan's sister, her husband, and their two oldest boys came out to SoCal. They were up in Newport Beach for a week and we had to make sure we got in as much nephew time as possible! If you missed my post (including a hike, the beach, a trip to Medieval Times, and much more), make sure to check it out here.


Well, the fun never seems to stop around the McDot household (as one of my Instagram friends said "Man, you guys sure do lead boring lives" to which I replied "WE ARE BEYOND BLESSED!")!

A few months back, Ryan had seen that the Red Wings were coming to town in February. Since they are now in the Eastern Conference and coming this way is a rare occurrence, we know we HAD to go see them! On Monday they would be in Anaheim to play the Ducks and on Tuesday they would be in LA to play the Kings. WHY NOT GO TO BOTH?!

We decided to splurge and grab up tickets for both games. And while we were at it, why not just take a Mental Health Day on Tuesday and instead of going to work, let's stay the night at a hotel in Anaheim Monday night and go to Disneyland Tuesday before heading to LA for the second game?! SOUNDS LIKE A PLAN TO ME!

We ended up walking over to Disney's California Adventures for a few hours
Monday night before heading to the Wings Ducks game!

We found some YUMMY vegan food in Anaheim!

CHECK IT OUT. WE CAN ALMOST TOUCH THE GUYS!

Intermission Picture!

A super sweet stranger came up to us as we were getting
in line for Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and gave us
Fast Passes! RANDOM ACTS OF KINDNESS ROCK!

So, uh, yeah... Cardboard Castle Problems...

And then we found some DELISH pizza before the Wings Kings game!

We might have been in the nose bleed seats for the game, but
we were ON THE GLASS for warm-ups!

I am hoping to do a FULL post on our adventures from this week (we have some great pictures on our "real" camera), especially the Red Wings games (our seats for the Ducks game were 4 rows from the glass and my parents said they saw us on TV a ton), but for now the few Instagram pictures I posted will have to tide you over.

Wanna know why I don't have time to blog more about the adventures? Oh yeah, that's right... Another way to avoid thinking about the lack of running you are doing is apparently let your laundry pile up to the sky and require yourself to do loads upon loads before you can start to pack for said race... (And yes, if you read that closely enough, you noticed I haven't even started packing for this weekend - EEKS!)

How would YOU avoid the taper tantrums?

Monday, February 23, 2015

#TeamSparkle Virtual 5K: OCEANSIDE MEET-UP

I have mentioned it a couple times in passing (and I swear in the next couple weeks I will give more details), but I will be running the SoCal Ragnar {Ultra Style Baby!} with the amazing ladies of Sparkle Athletic. Not only will this be a super fun (and somewhat challenging  seeing as I have over 37 miles to run in the course of 2 days), but it is something MUCH bigger than a run.

The ladies of Sparkle Athletic use this race as a way to raise money and awareness for Rett Syndrome. One of the runners on our relay team has a daughter effected by this disease, another has a cousin fighting this battle as well. We want to raise as much money as we can to help fund more research for this issue.

I mentioned a couple weeks ago that there was a Virtual 5K  the ladies were setting up as a way for folks not on the relay team to still run along with us and participate. You can register for the 5K on their site (link here). Your registration will get you a personalized bib and #TeamSparkle medal - but more importantly you should know that the profits will be going towards Girl Power 2 Cure.


The original thought was to have everyone do their 5K over the April 10-11 weekend while we are running Ragnar (and you are still encouraged to do this). Carrie (one of the amazing women of Sparkle Athletic) will actually be down in Oceanside the week before with her family for Spring Break. She and I were talking about potentially setting up a meet-up so folks could do the virtual 5K together.


We don't have all of the details worked out, but the basic thought is it will be on April 4th at the Oceanside Pier. When the date gets closer we will make sure to spread the word so everyone will have enough notice. I did want to post about it TODAY though because the deadline to register for the virtual 5K is TOMORROW!


That means you should register TODAY and then if you will be in the Oceanside area on April 4th you should plan on joining us at the pier to do the 5K together (I will have a course mapped out, have some giveaways, and obviously be wearing as much SPARKLE as possible!). If you won't be in the Oceanside area on April 4th you should still register TODAY and then run your 5K the following weekend when we are racing from Huntington Beach to San Diego.

Will you be registering?! 

Sunday, February 22, 2015

Workout Recap - Week 8

Sunday, February 15th Hiked around Crystal CoveFoam Rolled & Stretched


Monday, February 16th – 4ish mile (easy pace) run, Foam Rolled & Stretched 


Tuesday, February 17th –  Strength Training (abs, back, arms and legs), Foam Rolled & Stretched

Wednesday, February 18th –  4 mile (easy pace) run, 1:01 Plank, Foam Rolled & Stretched


Thursday, February 19th – 19.44 mile bike ride, 1:02 Plank, Foam Rolled & Stretched


Friday, February 20th– 7 mile (long run pace) run a friend, 1:03 Plank, Foam Rolled & Stretched 



Saturday, February 21st – REST DAY, 1:04 Plank, Foam Rolled & Stretched

CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT THE PHOENIX MARATHON IS IN LESS THAN A WEEK?! OH MY GOODNESS! Thankfully we have been insanely busy lately (and it isn't slowing down anytime soon) so I haven't even had time to pay much attention to the taper craziness. This week I only ran 15 miles and next week I only have 7 on the calendar before Saturday's race. I am hoping by race morning my legs (and body) will be well rested and ready to tackle my THIRD marathon!

How were your workouts this past week? 

Saturday, February 21, 2015

Visitors Just Keep On Comin'

Living in such a beautiful place (and having such sunny personalities ourselves, hehe), it is no wonder we have people that want to come visit! I mentioned last week that my dad was out (check out the post here about his visit while he was in San Diego for a conference) and this week Ryan's sister, her husband, and their two oldest boys were up in Newport from Michigan (trying to escape the below zero temperatures, but who can blame them?!).

I thought I would post some pictures from some of the adventures we had with them while they were here. They flew in on Saturday and had to head back to the frozen tundra today.

Sunday we drove up to Newport to hang out with them for a bit. We started off at Crystal Cove State Park and ended up over at their hotel pool for a while.

Leave only footprints, take only memories (and maybe a couple pictures)!

Looking for dragons in the caves!
PS You know it is bad when "ginger" Ryan looks tanner than these two! The winter has been harsh in Michigan!

Not too shabby!

The rocks were pretty slick, but we saw a ton of hermit crabs and some sea slugs.

Group shot!

What boy doesn't love climbing rocks?!

Scaling the walls

Uncle Ryan trying to keep a watchful eye on the nephews

Mother Son shot!

Barnacle Bill!

Getting ready to head to the pool with their tinted goggles

Tuesday they came down to Legoland (and the boys LOVED it). Since Ryan and I were both working (and have you seen the ticket prices?!), we decided to meet up after they left the park. They came over to our place for dinner, lego building and a little Wii playing.

Thursday night after Ryan got off work we jumped in the car and made our way up to Buena Park to meet them at Medieval Times. I had never been before and it had been about 6 or so years since Ryan went so it was a fun time.

Our knight was the Black and White Knight, so we got white flags to fly for him!

Dinner AND a Tournament?! Lucky us!

You gotta get into it, right?!

Someone wasn't too impressed with Uncle Ryan's silly face...

There's our knight!

He even threw me a flower during the show! 

Dragon's blood (aka tomato soup) during the show

The king and knights

This was the falcon trainer!

The falcon flew all around the arena, it was actually pretty freaky how close it got to us!


The vegetarian option was a three bean stew - pretty yummy!

I guess the buzzard tasted like chicken...

Jousting!

PS It is pretty sweet when Medieval Times tweets out your picture ;)


Yesterday afternoon they made their way down to Oceanside. We hung out at the beach for a while then went to grab some dinner and finished the night at the Vans store picking out some new shoes for the boys (Ryan gets a discount since the parent company that opens Reef also owns Vans).








Not too bad for "winter", eh?

Under the pier

Yes, 60s and overcast is chilly to us!

It was a ton of fun having them out (especially since we hadn't seen them {other than Facetime} since Christmas of 2013). It always seems like the time goes by too quickly, but we are already planning our next trip together!!

Do you have visitors often?