American River Parkway Half Marathon

This past weekend I completed something that I wasn't even on my bucket list but probably should've been: I ran in and completed a half marathon. That's 13.1 miles for those of you wondering just how far that is. It all started with one of my coworkers saying something in random conversation about wanting the 13.1 sticker for the car. She made it to about 6 miles in her training and started having minor health concerns. We had even gotten a team in the office going but one by one they either had an excuse or something come up as the time came to pay the race fee. In the end it was my coworker and bootcamp companion Heather, and my supportive husband, who were out on the race course with me.

I didn't start really jogging until February of this year. I trained every Saturday increasing my miles by 1 mile every week, and I did interval training of jog one-mile walk one-mile. The weekend before the marathon I did a test run on the actual course and found this to be very helpful as I can't run up hill so I was able to determine which mile should be walking and which ones I should jog. I was good until about mile 8; that's when my knee started to bother me; mile 9 my hip started to hurt but at mile 10 I was able to block out the pain and speed walk to mile 12.

Then we slowly jogged to mile 13 and ran across to the finish line. Sure I didn't make it as quickly as I had hoped, and sure most people had finished before me, (there were about 50 or so people behind me), but I did it. I got in that crowded starting line and went for it. I've never run so far, I've never push myself quite so hard, especially in 80 degree temperatures, and I wasn't the one who ended up in the ambulance--thank goodness. I may have been limping and in serious pain, but the feeling I had when I crossed that finish line was worth it.

If you can't do a half marathon, do a 5 K, and maybe some day you just might be able to go the distance too.

Make sure you have a plan for after the race: a massage, a rewarding meal...me, I'm heading to the beach. Hawaii here I come. Blogging community, see you in 2 weeks. 

Quest Bars

The world of bars is a very competitive one because there are so many choices on the shelf. Protein bars specifically all aim to provide athletes the nutrition their body needs to sustain activity. With more of a focus on heath in the media it has become more and more important to be able to read your protein bar label and not have it made up of junk and a bunch of chemicals. I've heard a lot of talk of Quest Bars from the fitness community and given that they are gluten-free I felt I had to try them. Now recently I have turned away from bars as a meal replacement for me and have been eating other healthy options, but I still like to have one or two bars in my purse just in case, especially when traveling. With some trips coming up I was hoping that the Quest Bar could be a new companion however that will not be the case.

While the flavor variety is quite compelling it seems that one of two ingredients do not agree with me and make my tongue tingle and my lips slightly swell. Lo Han Go, a natural sugar from a plant, newly popular sugar replacement ingredient for low sugar bars, and IMO Fiber. I first experienced this while eating the cinnamon roll bar and I thought perhaps this was just a side effect of the flavor and the Stevia. Overall the flavor was decent; it kind of tasted like raw cinnamon roll dough; very rich, slightly grainy and very soft. I was eating it slowly for my morning snack and decided to stop eating it about half way through the bar. It took until 8 o'clock that night for my tongue to feel normal again.

I need to know if this was a fluke so in the confines of my own home on the weekend I had two bites of a different flavor and waited to see if my tongue felt funny again- yes it did! I packed the rest of the bars up and I gave the rest of them to a fitness buddy who I knew would enjoy them. It really was a shame because besides for these two ingredients that were responsible for my tingling tongue, everything else in the ingredient list was very clean. They almost had the consistency and taste of a raw bar, except this fiber replacement that they're using is definitely not natural. I did a little research and while this IMO can come from a few natural resources, it seems to also be very chemically manipulated and can be derived from wheat. If they were using psyllium husk in their bars instead I would be completely happy with them, but regardless of what made my tongue tingle, I strive to eat only things I can pronounce and know what they are. 

Dates

I have found the combination of dates and almond flour to be a great kitchen duo. The stickiness of the dates glues and moistens the almond flour to make an incredibly easy and tasty raw crust. I had bought some fresh dates in my local grocery store; you should be able to find them near the mangos and pineapple. If you buy them fresh they taste a little bit more rich than the prepackaged ones but then you'll need to remove their pits, but they are very sticky and it will be up to you as to if you buy the super fresh if you can find them, or the semi-processed ones, with no pits. If you haven't ever had a date, like me (until now), I find them tasty. They are a great source of fiber and protein and great for boosting your energy; plus they are great for your digest track. 

I made some raw key lime pies using this date crust and I want to make many other fun combinations using this date crust. This is certainly going to be one of my go-to no-bake desserts for the summer. I like some sort of frozen banana cream pie is in order.