Gretch Runs

Week one of training is in the books!  Once again we had some crazy weather (huge snow storm, followed by an intense wind storm that left us without power for 10 hours), but I had a pretty good week of workouts.  Here's how it went! Monday 4.5 miles / 9:48 pace Nice and easy loop around my neighborhood.  There was some snow, but there wasn't much wind and it wasn't too cold, so it was actually pretty pleasant.  I ended the run with a few striders. Dirty Dozen The plan that I'm following has a core workout that's supposed to be done on Mondays, so I made sure to do all 12 of the moves right when I got home from my run. Tuesday Beat Fitness / 1 hour Class was pretty intense today, and I left completely sweaty.  The moves we completed were- dumbbell pull-down, kettlebell squats, TRX row, barbell back squat, hip thrusts, bicycle crunch, True From treadmill sprints, wall sits, mountain climbers, and club swings.  It was challenging bu...

Hello everyone from snowy Pittsburgh!  We've gotten a ton this morning- when I woke up there was nothing outside, but by the time I was about to leave for work, it was a complete blizzard!  Now we have a hefty few inches of snow, and it keeps falling. Training for my next half marathon starts this week, and I'm really excited to get back in the training groove.  Last year my entire focus was on completing my first triathlon, so I'm ready to get back to running and chipping away at a new PR. I will be running in the Capital City Half Marathon in Columbus, Ohio in 10 (more like 9.5) short weeks!  There are a few reasons why I picked this race, mostly because it's a flat course, good time of the year, and a few of my friends are also running it.   Plus, the post-race party sounds legit , with beer, pizza, margaritas, and carousal rids at the finish line.  So, I can either celebrate a good race or drink my sorrows away. Either way I win! Once ag...

Preseason is officially over, and my next training cycle starts TODAY!! I had another solid week of workouts, trying out a few new things, and taking a bit of rest when I got hit with a mini cold in the middle of the week.  I'm feeling back to 100% and ready to get running!  Here's how my week went-  Monday Core Workout I decided to start doing some home workouts during the week when I'm not going to a class or doing a run.  This workout was SO HARD and from the beginning my abs were on fire.  2 mile walk I took Selma for a walk around the park on a chilly, rainy day.  It wasn't ideal, but we had fun and it was still great to get fresh air! Tuesday 4.1 miles It was another cold and rainy day (one of those days where the temperature is right on the brink of turning the precipitation from rain to snow), so I wasn't really looking forward to the run.  I decided to just go out for an easy one or two miler, but of course on...

The first day trip that we took in Japan was to a town north of Tokyo called Nikko.  I did some research about nearby cities, and was really interested in this one because of the natural beauty surrounding incredible UNESCO heritage sites.  There's even a saying in Japanese- "Never say 'kekkō' until you've seen Nikkō"—kekkō meaning beautiful, magnificent or "I am satisfied"-which just proves the beauty of Nikko. Here's a look at my favorite things that I saw and ate during our day trip to Nikko! Transportation The trip from Tokyo to Nikko was pretty simple, and we were able to take all trains run by Japan Railways, which is covered under our JR Pass.  Here is the route that we took- JR Shinkansen from Tokyo Station to Utsunomiya Station (this is a bullet train, which means we got there very quickly! We got reserved seats, but there are also unreserved cars if you don't have a Rail Pass and want to save money). Nikko Line fr...

We can just call this a cut-back week for running, because I definitely lowered my mileage!  We were hit with the Polar Vortex in Pittsburgh, which gave us temperatures below zero and no desire to leave the house.  I switched things up a bit this week though, including trying out a new outdoor workout.  Here's how the week went- Monday Total Body Conditioning This is one of my favorite classes that I've tried with ClassPass, and today's definitely didn't disappoint!  The hour of class seemed to fly by, and by the end I was super sweaty and sore.  Loved it! Tuesday 4 miles / 9:45 pace I did an easy course around my house after work.  It started to snow pretty hard while I was out (hopefully you can tell in my shaky pic above!), but I powered through and ended up having a great run! Wednesday Rest Day! Stayed home from work, didn't leave the house.  Brr! Thursday Rest Day! It was actually even colder than Wednesday, s...

If January is any indication for how 2019 will be, I'm in for a wild ride this year!  I started out the month by going to the emergency room (everything is fine- I thought my appendix was bursting and it turns out there was some kind of GI issue going around Pittsburgh).  Then, we had a girl I met during our trip to Hawaii and who is from Paris stay with us for a week which was a ton  of fun. To end the month we a bang, we decided to trade in our used Subaru for a new one! Let's hope that February is full of just as much fun, but hopefully not as much money spent or time in the hospital ;)  Here's a look at how my goals went- Write on the blog more Done and crushed this one!  I wrote quite a few posts which you can check out here- Tokyo Basics 3 Days in Tokyo Weekly Workouts 1 and 2 It's been really great getting back to writing again, and I'm looking forward to continuing this in February!  I have more Japan posts to share, I'll contin...