See Amy Run

I ran my first half marathon!!  With a time of 2:02:25 at a 9:20 minute mile average pace, I placed 38th in my age group and 143rd overall.  Here are my results!

I went to the registration/packet pick up Saturday in Jack London Square after my bike race in Pleasanton.  The See Jane Run staff made an exception to their non-transferable rule to give me Catherine's bib (an OTC friend who had to leave town unexpectedly).  #1819  Woohoo.  This is going to hurt tomorrow...

Merry Christmas from Paris!

Today after breakfast I set out to run to the Eiffel Tour, and you’ll never believe this, but I ran for twenty minutes in the wrong direction.  Haha!  I was at the Place de la Bastille before I realized my mistake.  Due to this blind trust of my terrible sense of direction, what had started out as a forty minute there-and-back fun run turned into an hour and a half knee-grinding, hip-popping mini-marathon.  Oy!

When I did finally make it to the Eiffel Tour, I found it crowded with tourists from all over Europe and Asia.  I heard so many different languages: Arabic, German, Russian, Chinese, Korean, you name it!  Globalization at it's best?  My cold Christmas jog back along the Seine brought on the starkly contrasting feeling of solidarity with local hardcore athletes who were also running along the river alone.  Church bells all over town were ringing and a half moon hung in the day sky, making this particular Parisian morning just a tad more magical.  

I made it back to the hostel and realized that if I was going to get to yoga, I required a nap.  After a quick lunch, I conked out for a good two hours straight.  Yoga was calling, but first I had to turn the town upside down to satisfy my intense craving for banana nut bread (Thanks, MacDonald’s).  The five o’clock class was crowded, so we sweat a lot!  My back bends were back (Woohoo - I saw the tip of my mat!), but my legs felt like lead throughout the entire rest of the standing series.

I grabbed a mushroom and emmental cheese crepe from a vendor outside the Pompidou on my way home and made it back in time to skype with my family Christmas morning.  

Nutrition: Eat Like the Athlete You Want to Be

Sunday was the 10k & 20k de Tours!  A beautiful day... So, I wandered down to Tours Center to check out all the athletes and the cool booths and stuff.  I stood in line (forever) to get Paella and got to the front of the line only to realize that not only is there meat in Paella, there is *every kind of meat* in Paella (sausage, chicken, and seafood) - and I became a vegetarian (kind of) on Mother's Day this year...  Doy!  Ahahah!  I ate it anyway...  Ooops!  :)

Since I stopped eating meat (okay, fine, not entirely, but for the most part - haters...), I've been told more times than I can count that I'm probably not getting enough protein.  This inspired me to analyze my diet and, believe it or not, it turns out I'm getting more than enough protein, but could stand to DOUBLE my carbohydrate intake.  Insane!

Here's what a day looks like for me right now (a double day is when I workout for more than 4 hours total):
Breakfast - plain yogurt with honey and cinnamon, muesli (double days add eggs and toast)
Snack - fruit
Lunch - spinach salad (double days I get to eat whatever I want for lunch)
Dessert - plain yogurt with honey and cinnamon
Snack - fruit
Snack - peanut butter rice cakes with honey and cinnamon
Snack - bread with olive oil and vinegar
Dinner - vegetables + grains + beans or tofu (double days add pasta)
Dessert - plain yogurt with honey and cinnamon

This gets me to exactly 100g protein, 360g carbohydrates, and 100g fat (around 2600 kCal) on single days... and on double days I get to eat carbs like it's my job (like just throw in a whole baguette there somewhere, double the grains for dinner, and maybe even a pastry and coffee) to bring me to 800g of glorious, golden, crusty, delicious carbohydrates.

When I'm training, I also like to follow a few general rules:
1.  Low alcohol and low caffeine.  That's right.  Except for occasions, if I'm training right, alcohol becomes a distant memory and caffeine stays out of the picture as much as possible.

2.  High-protein post-workout snack:  nuts, hard boiled eggs, or apple with peanut butter...  My go-to post workout snack right now?  Rice cake with peanut butter, honey, cinnamon and banana - YUM!

3.  Hydrate!  I drink about 2 liters a day of water (at least).  When I'm back in the States, I'm drinking electrolytes like a coconut water, or gatorade diluted by 50% to keep that post-bikram head ache away.  Here, I've been drinking lemon water and diluted apple/pear juice with a little pinch of salt after workouts.

This link is an amazing article written by US Anti-Doping Agency about the best diet for athletes:
http://www.usantidoping.org/files/active/what/dietary_intake.pdf
My targets are based off of this and this fitness calculator from active.com.

On that note, if you have anything to add - please leave a comment for me!  I love hearing about new recipes and things that work for others!!  Thanks!