So this is Christmas... I lift!

Hmmmm.... lifting...

Just a quick pop in here (mostly because I did my first at-home lifting workout just a little bit ago, and I have the feeling that I won't be able to move my arms to type later...).

Got this great surprise this morning for Christmas from my DH and DD. I went out of town with my best friend for the few days before Christmas, and while I was away my husband and daughter converted our basement into an at-home gym complete with some weights, a bench, a covered floor, an exercise ball, a medicine ball, some sort of squishy ball thing I don't yet know how to use, some rings that are yet to be hung, and other assorted surprises. How amazingly cool. I have access to the fitness center at school, but I have always wanted a space to do an at-home lifting workout, and now I've got it. 

Now, to use it.... workout one down. I used the Runner's World "Strength Training for Runners" workout today. It will be a while before I outgrow that one!

It's been a quiet month in Lake Maxinkuckee... so I #NEVERDID some stuff

Who has two thumbs and hates the snow? This gal. 

It's been a quiet month here. After fifteen months of training using consecutive training programs (half marathon followed by full marathon followed by Dopey Challenge), I took an easy month. I ran a couple of times in the cold, but not in the snow. And it took me a couple of weeks to unpack my bags from Dopey. But it was a quiet month. No pressure. I also was looking for some inspiration. I crossed off something from my bucket list at the beginning of January. I really didn't have any "what's next?" inspiration. Not all who wander are lost, though! 

And then I received the exciting news that I have been named an ambassador for Skirt Sports. I'm a huge fan (although some of my new Skirt Sisters are showing me through their posts that I have to up my Skirt game!) 

Who doesn't love this? 

 One of the best parts of the Skirt Sports mission is that they are a group of strong frickin' women who support one another. It's about the skirts, but it's not about the skirts. So while I was looking for a challenge, I found one at Skirt Sports; I was inspired by a challenge they put out to the ambassadors. 

The #NEVERDO challenge asks that we choose something that we never do and do it. Simple enough? I interpreted it a little differently from perhaps the original intent of the challenge. I kept thinking of how I often remind my students that "sometimes they must do the thing that they don't want to do so that they can do the thing that they want to do." So I picked out a thing I don't ever want to do, and I did it. I ran outside in a snowstorm. Well, on snowy roads after a snowstorm. I have seldom run outside in the last two years if there was snow on the roads because I didn't want to risk injury in my pursuit of Dopey. So off I went! And I didn't hate it. 

And then I did another #NEVERDO. See the picture below: 

Bike on Trainer--My butt never likes this. My brain also never likes this. 

In the last two years, I haven't had my bike on the trainer. And in the summer months, I've mostly been running. I think I may have ridden my bike three or four times total all summer. I was running. So I headed to the basement, and I threw my bike on the trainer, and I watched an episode of The West Wing. And then I did planks! And crunches! And then a pig flew past the window...
not really. But it is a rare, rare thing for me to do anything but run. So maybe I'm turning a corner on this thing...

Because today, I rode again.

What's your #NEVERDO? Gonna do it?

Thinking Gear Thoughts...

Thinking gear thoughts this morning out on my run. It was a hot one. And a blister on my little toe from Sunday's run was bugging me, so I decided to pass my mental time by making a list of current favorites. I like the simplicity of running because it really just requires minimal gear (compared to triathlon, for example), but I also do love me some gear.  (Interestingly, I spend more money on running gear than I spend on clothes for work.) So here's my list from this morning's run (and there are links here for your convenience, I make NO money if you click if that's important to you to know):

Shoes:
I'm currently running in Brooks Ghost 9s. From where I'm sitting as I write this, I can see three different pairs of them in my living room. There are another two pairs upstairs in my bedroom closet. So now that they are going to Ghost 10s, I'm watching for sales with dread as the sales indicate that my shoes are going to be gone forever.

Yesterday, I found my $120 pair of running shoes on www.jackrabbit.com for $72.00. Bought two pairs. I'm thinking that two pairs @ three months a pair will get me to the end of the year and Dopey. But then they sent me a coupon for 10% off my next order, so now I'm thinking about ordering two more pairs. With an extra ten percent off, it's nearly two for the price of one, really. (The things I do to justify my thinking...) There's another website that's pretty good about finding shoe deals: www.runrepeat.com.

Bottoms:
Go to the skirtsports website and read Nicole DeBoom's story about wearing her first skirt in her win at Ironman Wisconsin 2004. I was there! I wasn't remotely close to the finish line the she won, but I was lucky enough to see Nicole on race day. The morning of the race, I found a small, quiet room in the convention center to collect my thoughts before the race, and Nicole found the same room. I didn't realize it at the time, but it was a cool after-note to know that I had warmed up in a room with the race winner, and she was so nice!

Last year, I bought a couple of the Happy Girl Skirts for running, and I love them. I used to run in shorts all the time, but I always found chafing to be a problem, and they weren't long enough, and they often rode up, and it was just all kinds of awkwardness.

Skirtsports is running a summer sale, so I am picking up another of their Happy Girl Skirts, and then I'm going to try a tights/skirt combo. I'm thinking ahead to Disney, and I know that the weather could be such that I have to wear tights or it could be a skirt day. I want to be prepared either way.

Nutrition:
And it's time to order some more nutrition for while I'm running. My favorite of favorites: Gu Salted Caramel Gel. There's a long and not-all-that-interesting story about why Strawberry Banana gel is my kryptonite, so I haven't had that in quite some time. But I'll also say that I haven't done much in terms of experimentation with nutrition for long runs. Might be time to do some reading.

There's other stuff I love: Tifosi Sunglasses, Bodyglide (how does anyone live without it?), my Road ID, and Swiftwick socks. But I am not feeling all that inspired to write about them this morning. Just wanted to get this up in the blogosphere and ask if anyone out there has favorites, too. What are they? Any great stories?