Month: January 2013

Motivation Monday – Expectations

Joel here.

Last year I had a huge goal for 2012 – to do 24 races in 12 months. We were able to check that off the list, but it didn’t come without sacrifices elsewhere. I didn’t go hang out with friends nearly as much as I should have. I didn’t go to any Game Dev Beer Nights until after race season. I didn’t write as much as I wanted and I for sure didn’t read nearly as much as the year before (I read over 100 books in 2011, only about 80 in 2012).  My motivation was to live my life in a way where I could race as often as was required to meet my goal.

expectations

2012’s 24 races in 12 months was amazing but it was draining and I accomplished what I wanted to out of it.

1. I was able to accomplish all my work and still get to every race healthy, fit, and ready to fight.

2. I was able to prepare properly the day of a race.  We got the day before and the day of racing prep to a science (this will be a post in the future).

3. I was able to sleep before a race and not wake up every few minutes during the night.  Before this I would be too nervous and sleep fitfully.  Now I am way more calm about the whole process (most times).

This year my expectations are to:

1. Train properly for each race and distance.  We will be using racing as a compliment to our A races, and not something to schedule training around.

2. Keep up with my nutritional needs for each stage of training.  Eating as healthy as possible while staying sane, and fueling each workout properly.

3. Get better quality sleep the weeks leading to a race.  Dependent on work hours as always, but making sleep a priority.

My motivation: It is going to be TRI season in a blink of the eye. If I can commit to better habits of eating and sleeping now, they should be able to carry over into the times when I will need them the most.

 

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Batch Cooking and Food for Week 1

Week 1’s batch cooking video was a disaster.  We’re still learning how to be film makers, and the film we had might have been usable… if we had days to edit it.  So, for the first week, you get recipes and commentary, and we’ll save the cooking shows for later.  Look forward to it, we have cute little aprons and everything!  And pictures.  For now, just imagine with your minds eye.  Pretend we’re the dudes from the Game of Thrones describing the feast.  Or whatever.

MEALS:

Chicken tortilla soup

meatloaf, cauli-taters, and green beans

Parmesan encrusted chicken with rice pasta, light alfredo, peas, and broccoli (next time I’ll make sure I get either corn, quinoa, or whole wheat as rice means white rice which means refined carbs, oops)

The tortilla soup, which is usually Leah’s specialty, was off.  It was ALRIGHT, but we think it just had too much broth in it and not enough STUFF and it needed to be made on the stove, not the crock pot.  Everything else was phenomenal.  The chicken alfredo was about 350 calories and definitely killed our cravings for the full fat stuff.  The meatloaf was a wonderful dinner.  The cauli-taters just tasted like mashed potatoes.  Those will definitely be staples.  We ate turkey wraps or sandwiches with the soups.

To fill in the holes, one day we had fish, quinoa/brown rice, and a salad, and one day we had a micro meal (chicken korma and basamati rice) and some other various munchies.  For breakfast, Leah had fage 0% w/granola and some fruit, or a sprouted grain english muffin and cream cheese w/morningstar veggie patties. Joel had Jimmy Dean Ham and cheese omelets or Jimmy Dean Delights pancake and turkey sausage.

Snacks for snacks sake became really non-essential most workout days since we were way full with the fueling (snacks != pre/post workout fueling), but Leah dug into some carrots and tzatziki and/or fruit at times.  For Monday/Wednesday snacks (workout after work) Leah  is eating an english muffin w/jelly and some fruit and dried mango and finding 100g carbs not hard to get in (essentially meal #4 instead of a snack), though my diet quality score (we’ll talk about that soon) seems to go up when Leah  fuels with whole foods and fruits and veggies, so that’s good.  Joel had gels and whole grain crackers as snacks.

Onward and upward for week 2!

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