And yes…. With balance, you really can have your cake and eat it too.

Keep on rocking… I might just have to sign up for my own half marathon! Next BHAG? EEK!

Doesn’t it feel just great to have a good week? I’m not training for any races, but I started jogging about 8 weeks ago, when I moved way up north for a summer job. There’s nothing to do here, and no distractions to keep me from running. Yet, some days it rains or I feel tired. I stay motivated by imagining my heart beating and my muscles moving and blood pumping and health increasing. I keep going because this body is the only one I’ve got and I need a well kept home for my mind a soul.

My delicious recipe this week was a soup made of vegetable stock, a 13 bean mix, brown basmati rice, sautéed vegetables and coriander and cumin for delicious flavour. I brought dried beans to a boil at lunch, put the lid on the pot and left them there until after work. Then I rinsed them after about 5 hours and added them to veggie stock to start simmering. I added the rice about half an hour later. Then sautéed some onions, garlic, coriander, cumin, carrots, celery, and zucchini in a little bit of sunflower oil, then added it to the pot after the beans had been cooking for an hour. I let the soup hang out together for about another half hour on low, then ate it with my roommate!

It’s been great for leftovers and has so much flavour there’s no way you’d miss the meat.

For me, the key to cooking great food, especially veggie, is lots of flavour added through spices.

Tonight: quinoa and dried pea stirfry. I wonder how tonight’s adventure will turn out…

Love reading your blog, it’s awesome.

Deb

Best of luck!

I know what you mean about feeling lonely on those long runs! I trained for my first half marathon (it was 2 months ago- in April) by myself. During training, my husband would come along on some of my easy 2-3 mile runs, but any longer than that I was on my own.

Don’t feel discouraged if it’s hard to keep up that pace over longer distances! I ran my first 5k last July in 30:39 (~9:51 pace?) and based on that race time, I made a training plain through runnersworld.com (“smart coach” – it’s free!) for my half marathon training. It tells you what pace to run for each of your runs (easy, interval, distance, etc). I finished my half marathon right on target, with a chip time of 2:21:10 (~10:46 pace).

I found it helped for me to plan out my runs ahead of time too. My training plan helped – I kept a copy bookmarked online, and a printout in my work calendar book & on the fridge as reminders! I just had to figure out if I was going to do it before or after work. If I ran in the morning before work, I’d lay out everything I needed the night before so it was all ready and I wouldn’t waste any time.

I’m training for my second now this fall, the Rock n Roll half in Philly. Looking to shave ~5 minutes off my time (or a ~10:22 pace). Good luck with your final weeks of training!

@Christine, I am wearing a Bold Blue Swiftly Tech SS from last summer!

@Elaine, you go lady! I am trying my best to maintain the 10 minute mile, and so far I have done okay. We will see this week when I run 7 miles, because that’s a whole different story!

Thanks for your support everyone!!

You’re not trying to do 10-minute miles on your long runs, are you? I’m a week behind you in my half marathon plan, and I usually run 10:30 miles — but only for less than 4 miles. When I’m on my long runs, I can’t maintain even splits (let alone enjoy myself!) unless I aim for 11:30- to 12:00-minute miles. And if it’s hot out, I have to take it down even more.

Enjoy!

K

I’m not sure what kind of music you like, but my favorite for running is Girl Talk… it’s a DJ that has the best mash-ups I’ve ever heard. Super upbeat and the music is always changing, so you never get bored! Plus each CD is a continuous stream of music, arbitrarily broken into “songs” so one flows into the next. (http://www.myspace.com/girltalk)

Best of luck with your runs!