Sunday, January 11, 2015

The Weekend Wrap-up

Friday ended up being a rest day for me. Coming off of my double workout/double run day on Thursday I decided to give my knee a break. I really think I need to avoid running twice in one day. I'm not sure there is any great benefit from doing it right now. In the future, if I can't get the mileage complete in one sitting for some of my longer long runs (18 miles etc), I might need to reconsider this option, but for right now...3 Running Days = 3 Running Sessions; and I will have to make those sessions count!

Friday would have been the perfect day to swim but I had an early event at work so I just decided to take the morning off. And my baby sister (Jule) and mom came up from Jamaica to do wedding related activities (for my sister), so my evening was void of any workout activity as well.
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On Saturday I spent the day with my mom, Jule and Kai shopping for wedding shoes. Jule has to bring her shoes to her final wedding dress fitting on Monday and therefore we were on a mission to find the perfect pair. The Operation "Perfect Pair" team...

I think we went to every shoe store in the mall (even stores that only had shoes on their mannequins) but we were unable to find anything. We spent the most of the day at one of the major malls close by and then we eventually had to stop for lunch since the "troops" needed sustenance for Round Two of shopping. Lunch was at...
I wish I had pictures of the food to show you but honestly I was so hungry when the food came the thought of stopping to take pictures didn't even cross my mind :(

Round Two of shopping included heading to other malls/stores in the area...where we were met with the same devastatingly bad luck we experienced at mall #1. After a while the troops were tired and grumpy and (since you know how much I hate shopping) I was more than happy to hear we were "taking the rest of the night off from shopping" (hallelujah!). On the (very tangential and totally irrelevant) bright side, I found the perfect race outfit for the Miami Half Marathon! I decided to wear it on my long run on Sunday to make sure there are no "things only runners would understand" challenges with it :)
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Since my focus right now is on endurance training, I'm trying not to be as focused on speed for my long runs. Irrespective of my "no PR for Miami" mindset, I was still hoping for a really good workout this morning to give me the confidence I need heading into the half in two weeks...

I got to the beach for my run and there were a few of my fellow running group members there early as well. We were all planning on doing more than the scheduled miles for today so we decided to run them together. My initial plan was to complete 10 miles at 6:1 intervals; however Belinda & Debi were going to run 2:1 intervals and aim for anywhere from 10-12 miles, so I decided to run with them and complete 12 miles.

The backdrop to our run this morning...

Five miles in Debi had to stop (it's never worth getting injured...especially not on a training run), but we managed to take a "at the 5 mile mark" picture (our photographer was Debi's son who graciously snapped the picture for us)...

And since I'm now a member of the Garmin Forerunner 220 club, we took "watch selfies"...

Then Belinda and I continued for an additional 7 miles at 3:1 intervals. So even though I didn't do the 10 miles at 6:1 intervals I originally scheduled for today, completing 12 miles at 2:1/3:1 intervals turned into a really great running session, made even better my my amazing running partners. 
Post 12 miles pic with Belinda...

Today's summary and splits...

The rest of the day was spent completing Day Two of Operation "Perfect Pair" at different malls and bridal stores and finally, after hours and miles of walking (or being pushed on the trolley)...
...Jule finally found the perfect pair!!!! You can't even imagine what torture two days of back-to-back shopping is for people (like me) who hate to shop! I think I'm happier about finding the shoes than Jule is (well maybe not "happier" but definitely just as happy!). Plus my knee was hurting me and Jule is having (what seems to be) a sciatic nerve "type" pain when she walks...so as you can imagine we were grumpy all day :(

After the truly perfect pair of shoes were found (and immediately purchased) we were in better spirits and off on a quest for food (my favorite kind of quest to be on). We went to Casa Mofongo Latin Grill on Miracle Mile in Coral Gables, for AMAZING cuisine & superb service! The dining experience at this restaurant deserves it's own blog post so I went to the owner and specifically asked her if I could do a feature on her restaurant for my blog and she said yes! This really isn't a blog about food (and I explained that to her) but honestly the food was that good so I will post the review tomorrow :)

Until then...
Have a great Sunday!

How was your LR this weekend?
Has anyone had a recent "accidental" discovery of an amazing restaurant? Share where!

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