Drinks that make me go mmm!

Now that the weather is getting really warm and nice, I’ve gone back to some of my favorite drinks. I didn’t really stop drinking them all together during the winter months, but they are just more refreshing in Spring and Summer and I’ve been drinking them more often now.

I’ve previously talked about the things I eat and drink or my “nutrition”. I try to eat as healthy as I can. Yes, I don’t do it 100% of the time, but as much as possible. I drink beer and champagne and a mixed drink occasionally. I eat chips and salsa (duh!) and a little ice cream (courtesy of my boyfriend’s sweet tooth) or root beer floats here and there. I don’t deprive myself of things I like. I just eat or drink it in moderation and try to balance it all.

photo(30)I discovered kombucha a couple years ago and love it. This beverage is high in antioxidants and probiotics and I could drink it all day long. When I find it on sale, I’ll stock up. GT’s or Clearly Kombucha, a brand I just discovered, have a lot of great flavors to choose from and taste great! I discovered Clearly Kombucha because it was BOGO at Safeway and caught my eye. What a great deal! They are cute 12oz bottles that come in Black Currant, Tangerine, Chai Cola, Asian Pear, Grape, Strawberry Hibiscus, and Raspberry Ginger and Raspberry Lemonade (I haven’t tried these last two yet as they were sold out when I went shopping the last two times). Some of GT’s Kombucha products also have chia seeds in them and I love these as well. Bonus!

Speaking of chia, I love chia seeds! I like to add them to kombucha (if it doesn’t have it already in it) or in coconut water. And they are so good for you! I recently got an energy gel from a local bike shop. It’s made by Vitalyte, called Chia Surge, and comes in pineapple-orange and raspberry. I had never seen a sport energy gel with chia seeds so I was excited to try it. I decided to try the pineapple-orange and took it with me on my 15 mile run this past Monday. I’m not a “gu” or “gel” kinda gal but I liked the idea of it having chia seeds. I normally eat Shot Bloks every 4 miles on long runs, so this was going to be an interesting test as the package says it was one serving and to take it every 1.5 hours “for maximum benefit”. I wasn’t sure if I should just down the thing since I had never had it before on a run, so I just took little bits of it every so often. I really liked the flavor and consistency and was surprised at how well the seeds went down. I was afraid I would have a mouth full of them and would have to chew them up. It seemed to digest pretty well also. Looking back on it now, I probably should have taken the whole thing at once and maybe brought a second one with me because I didn’t feel a great amount of energy boosts from the small amount I was consuming each time. But I would definitely try it again.

Here is an article about the benefits of chia seeds and 10 reasons why you should add them to your diet:

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/06/03/chia-seed-benefits-_n_3379831.html

I also drink coconut water as often as I can. It’s so delicious and refreshing and a great way to hydrate! It also has a lot of potassium, so if you don’t eat a lot of bananas, like me, this is a great way to get some of this much needed mineral into your system. Runners need potassium! I drink the brand Zico a lot (it comes in regular, chocolate, pineapple and tropical fruit), but there are so many other brands of cocount water on the shelves at your local grocery store and most taste pretty good. Try it!

alo1-main1On occasion, I will also drink aloe vera water (juice). We drank a lot of this on our trip to Costa Rica and Trinidad & Tobago. It’s really refreshing and also has a lot of health benefits. It has a lot of vitamins and minerals, hydrates and helps with digestion among many other benefits (see the link below). There are also chunks of the aloe vera plant in the water that I find quite delicious.

http://skinnywithfiber.org/14-really-important-health-benefits-of-aloe-vera-juice/

I am not sponsored by any of the brands I wrote about above (although, that’d be cool!). I just like those particular products and brands. There are lots of other brands to choose from, so do a little taste-testing and hopefully you may find some of these drinks and products as tasty as I do.

If you have any other healthy drink suggestions, send them my way!

Oh life…

I’m lame. I haven’t written a blog post in a while. I have let life get in the way. Oh, that thing called LIFE. Well, there were some tough things going on so I guess had no motivation to post anything interesting about my running.

cd0eedca32c6d4fd92938b8c65842970I officially started my training plan for Eugene about 8 weeks ago. So, I have been running just fine getting short and long runs in. I also decided to become a member of the Sacramento Running Association (SRA) and started a free 8-week training last week. I figured it couldn’t hurt to get some extra training and an extra push for my next marathon. I feel really good about it!

Last Wednesday I did a double workout. I had missed my workout on Tuesday, so I didn’t think too much about doing this. I got in a cardio/weights/lunge workout in the morning, then met with the SRA training group for a speed workout in the evening. Everything felt great. Then I did a run Thursday morning and the side of my knee felt a little sore after, leading me to think maybe my knee popped out again. I had done some intense cycle and lunge work and then a hard speed workout back-to-back on Wednesday, so I thought maybe just my inner quads were sore. But after a couple days, I knew it wasn’t just sore muscles. I haven’t had any problems with this since January or maybe even December. It’s been quite a while. But I just knew something was off.

I iced and continued to pay close attention to the sore area. It wasn’t as bad as it had been in the past (last November), but I knew I should get in to see my PT. In the meantime, I got a long run in on this Monday and it was fine. My knee never hurts when I run or walk or anything, just after the run is when it’s a little tender. I met with SRA last night for a Fartlek workout and everything went great! I felt good and after the run, my knee didn’t feel sore. Of course! The day before I am supposed to see my PT, now my knee doesn’t hurt. But I was still going to see him anyway.

So,  I saw my PT this morning. Right after I laid down on the table, my PT saw that the back of my leg had fluid on it and was swollen. I didn’t even notice this morning! But I know for sure it wasn’t like this yesterday. He checked different spots on the knee to see where it hurt and then tried to pop it back in. He realized he wanted to do some muscle massage and stimulation to the hamstring and calf first before popping it in. I hate the stimulation machine thing he uses. It’s a tingly sensation that feels so weird. The massage mostly feels good until he gets to the super tender spots in the muscles that you didn’t even realize were tender. Ahh!

After all that, he was able to pop in the knee and everything was fine. It actually didn’t hurt as bad as it had in the past, which is also good. He also said my quads and calves are looking rounder and beefier, which is great. I have been working on my inner quads a lot the last 6-7 months to make sure this knee-popping thing doesn’t keep happening. I need those inner quad muscles to be stronger.

photo(30)He wrapped my leg up with Rock Tape and now I’m all good to go! I’m going to take it easy today and tomorrow with some cycling and strength training and continue with icing. I have a 15 mile long run planned for Monday and he said I should be fine to run that.

I asked him what could have caused the knee to pop out again. He said it could have been anything. He said maybe I stepped wrong. I explained that I thought maybe my shoes might have contributed to it also. I had recently (about mid-March) gone back to my old shoes that still had some mileage on them but were coming up on 300 miles. I finally looked at the bottoms of the shoes a couple days ago and noticed the wear on the tread on the heels. Yup, these are dunzo! And I had put 298.5 miles on them as of Monday. Lol! He said maybe I should only put 250 miles on my shoes instead from now on.

One thing I have learned over time with all this constant running is to listen to your body. As soon as I feel something different or have a feeling something is out of whack, I get it fixed as quickly as I can so that I can recover faster. I’m not stressed about this. It just goes with the territory.

Oh life…as a runner.

I hope you all are running injury free and having a great Spring!