Weekend Fun

This past weekend the family and some friends headed into Connecticut for the 2008 Mystic Connecticut's Saint Patrick's Day Parade. We all had a great time and the kids just loved seeing the fire trucks. The highlight of the parade this year were the budweiser clydesdales! Those are some big horses!

And you got to love those Shriner's on their little cars!

Happy Monday!

Spinning Class Will Kick My Butt

Today I went to the Y's orientation class for spinning. Before anyone can take a class they must go through the orientation. So today during class I was fitted for the bike and we went through a couple of different drills and techniques. The whole time I was there I was peddling away trying to get a little work out in. Once everyone was set with their bikes, the instructor gave us a 20 min lesson. Wow! This will be difficult. By the end of the session, I was sweating up a storm and dying for some water. I can't wait to complete an actual class.

Nothing much else is going on. I ran another mile on the treadmill yesterday. It was so nice outside and I just wanted to run on the road, but I don't think I am ready for that yet. I think by the end of next week I will take a crack at running outside. Until then I will suffer on the treadmill.

I am really excited that the weather is getting warmer. I can deal with 40's and 50's. I just hope that we are all done with snow.

Workout Today

Today's WO:

Elliptical: 3.5 miles, 25 mins
Spinning: 6 miles, 20 mins

Ankle still feeling good! I am still a little cautious with my left ankle, who wouldn't be?

Happy Monday!

I hope everyone had a great Easter weekend. Ours was filled with candy, easter egg hunts, family and tons of food! The kids enjoyed the easter egg hunts loved their special easter baskets from the easter bunny. Now Kim and I just need to survive sugar rushes!

Today was the first day of a training schedule that I have developed for the next month. It is just a general schedule filled with running, spinning, swimming and weight training. For the past few months I have really battled with working out and weight control and today I am taking control and going to bust my butt to get back to where I was in December. My mile run on the treadmill felt great! Again no pain. But my ankle was a little sore after I got home. Today's swim was a killer. Has anyone else had those days in the pool were you just felt like a brick and no matter how hard you tried you just couldn't stay afloat or even move forward? I had one of those days. The lifeguard asked how my swim was and I told her I felt like I was carrying a load of bricks while swimming against a rip current. Hopefully that will change on Wednesday. Tomorrow I will be spinning for 20 mins and then jumping on the Elliptical for 20 mins along with some weight training. Oh yeah, I signed up for my spin class orientation on Thursday. I can't wait to try that out!

Friday!!

Not much to report. Had a great time in Florida. I didn't get much sleep, but who does on vacation. I will write more about it next week. I got one work out in this week. It took me a few days to get my butt in gear. So I ran for 10 minutes on the treadmill and rode 20 mins on the stationary bike. I have spent the last few days tweaking my training schedule for the next month. I am very optimistic that I will be ready for my first race of the season, a 5K on April 27th. After yesterday's workout my ankle was a little sore, but my achilles felt fine. I guess I need to work on that ankle a little more. Hope everyone has a wonderful Easter!

Off to Florida

I am off to Florida for a few days. My brother and I are driving my parent's car down for them. On the way down we are stopping off at my dad's house and going to the NHRA Drag race in Gainesville, FL. It is just awesome watching these cars do over 300 MPH!

On the training side, this week I ran 1 mile twice with no pain!! YES!!! I will continue to the take it slow next week and just run a mile and then slowy build after that. Swimming has been great! And I am just starting to get some miles on the stationary bike at the Y. I figure something is better then nothing.

Have a great weekend!

Tagged, Update and Aero-bars!

To start off I complete my 7 random things since I was tagged by IronMin the other day.

1. I served in the U.S. Navy for 4 years. It was a great experience and I am glad I did it.

2. My favorite ice cream is Chocolate and just love the Chocolate Chip ice cream from a little restaurant called Shady Glen’s in Manchester, CT.

3. I was born and raised in Rhode Island. A lot of tourists come to RI for vacations and whatever. So when I was a teenager I would wear a shirt that said “I am not a tourist. I live here and I don’t answer questions.” I didn’t like tourists back then.

4. I have 2 cats, Oreo and Fluffy. Oreo of course is black and white and my other cat Fluffy is an orange tabby. When Fluffy was a little kitten he was really fluffy, hence the name.

5. While stationed in Florida for the Navy I started inline skating and joined an aggressive inline skate team. We would do demo’s and host a clinic every Tuesday night for those who wanted to learn how to rollerblade. I miss those days, but I don’t miss the injuries.

6. For my first job I was a bagger at Stop and Shop.

7. Also while living in Florida a couple of friends and I auditioned for a Techno/Rave dance show at a club in Jacksonville called Club 5. We made the cut, but they only filmed one show that never aired.

So I will pass the Tag to the following peeps:
Moonpie
Chad in the desert
Jennifer – Runnergirl
Michelle
Chris

Onto other things. My ankle is coming along nicely. I hope to begin light jogging by the end of this week or beginning of next week. My physical therapist has been awesome! He also is a runner so he knows I want to get back out there and run ASAP! But he also knows that I need to take my time and start off slowly. I have had no pain for the past 2 weeks which is an awesome sign! I actually hit the Elliptical last week for 10 mins at a really slow pace and felt no discomfort. I will jump on that again a few times this week and start riding the stationary bike as well.

And to finish off I would like to say thank you to Tri-John for picking me to receive a set of Airstryke Aero-bars. Tri-John won these bars from Tri-Geeks Dream website. They wanted to give the bars to a newbie Triathlete. So Tri-John left a comment on why he should get the bars and WON! So this year Tri-John decided to offer the same bars to another Tri-newbie. So I left a comment and over the weekend Tri-John’s wife picked my name out of a hat to win the bars (there was only 2 of us who left comments so pulling a name out of the hat was the best way to decided)! So thank you very much John for the bars. I will definitely put them to good use and after this season I will pass them to another Tri-Newbie.