Advent Challenge: Day 12- 24

It feels like forever! Oh wait, it has been forever.

After finishing up work I was lucky enough to get down to Tassie last week to check out Bruny Island and MONA. Both highly recommended. Then it was all Christmas parties and birthdays and plenty of recovery time. It felt incredibly indulgent to take the week off from exercise, not exactly planned, but I tell you I caught up on sleep and was able to start this week full of beans. And man, those beans quickly ran out, because last night I was exhausted. Lucky I've got another week off ;).

Happy festive season to all!

Day 12. Monday
Beep test: Level 5.6. Not ideal. But I figure when I run it for real with people, I'm going to do better, plus I will take ventolin.

Day 13 - 18
Rest: 6 days of it. Oops. But it feels so good to be well rested.
Day 19. Monday
Vibram run: 10m | 1.69km | 5.56/km. Ugh, asthma put paid to this run.
Strength: 20 min. Bumped up the time due to the short run.

Day 20. Tuesday
Vibram run: 20:28 | 3.65km | 5:37/km. Finished off what I started yesterday.

Day 21. Wednesday
Beep test: Level 8.1. First fitness assessment, happy enough with this. Finished with something left in the tank, so there should be improvement next time.

Day 22-23
Rest.

Day 24. Saturday.
Ride: 1:15:30 | 33.16km | 26.35km/hr. Easy ride. No wind!

Advent Challenge: Day 10- 11

Day 10. Saturday
Rest: I shouldn't have, but I did. Lots of errands run. All in preparation for Sunday.

Day 11. Sunday
10km race: It was windy, but the rain held off. Waiting for official time, but it was sub 60m and I was happy enough. Raced home to host the girls for a gluten free pre-Christmas catch up breakfast. Corn fritters with avocado, feta & lemon, mini chili polenta-men, and spinach & ricotta brownies. Served with plenty of coffee and a Skype with one of our girls in San Fran.

Swim: 35m |1700m | 2:05/100m. Met J at the pool, who promised me his homemade lemon lollies as post swim treat. Mixed it up today and threw in some efforts. There was noticeable shortness of breath! Said lollies were pretty good.

Considering I did a double, I'm going to bag a rest day for later. Might be sneaky and try and do the same tomorrow!

Advent Challenge: Day 07 - 09

Day 07. Wednesday
Strength: 15m. I was so close to not doing this, we got home late after hanging out in the city, checking out the forest of Christmas trees in Fed Square and the light projections on St Paul.

Day 08. Thursday
Rest. Today was exhausting, of the emotional variety. I pretty much spent my last day at work in tears. Three days short of 11 years - my first real/professional job! While the work could be highly disturbing the people I worked with are freakin' awesome and I'm going to miss them dearly. But I am so excited for the next phase of my career.

Day 09. Friday
Bodyrock: This session was 7 mins of huffing, puffing and plank burn. I might do a beep test later if it cools down and bank a rest day! I can do that right? It's my challenge.

In other news I was pretty excited to step on the scale this morning and see a flat 60kg. My clothes fit better and I feel better. I've lost 4.5kgs since mid October, for some reason I find this time of year the easiest to lose weight. Really all I've changed is portion size and aiming for calorie deficit 5-6 days out of 7. It's working!

Advent Challenge: Day 05 and 06

It's handover week, essentially I'm at work just to answer any last minute questions and finish off some design work. I found myself with time to kill, so I went walking at lunchtime, in highly inappropriate footwear, but it was glorious.

We also finally got our Christmas lights up.

Day 05. Monday
Kickboxing: 45m. With 4x 100 skipping sets. Ahh my calves, ahh my heartrate!

Day 06. Tuesday
Vibram Run: 18:26 | 3km | 6:08/km. Not feeling the whole running thing today. Should have gone out at 6:30am rather than in the pm.

Advent Challenge: Day 02-Day 04

The proof is in my diary. And devastated that aviators will not be making an appearance in my new work wardrobe anytime soon. Unless they make them for people with teeny tiny faces.

Day 02. Friday
Run: 1:10:27| 11km | 6:24/km. This was tough, but more so because I didn't take any ventolin prior to running and my chest felt tight. Still, I'm not expecting a PB at next weekend's 10km!

Day 03. Saturday
Rest: Miraculously, I didn't wake up with a hangover. I think I should have given we had a work Christmas lunch that involved plenty of Rose and a stop at Lord of the Fries on the way home. Hello, mini (vegetarian!) burger.

Day 04. Sunday
Strength: 15 min. The plan had been to swim, but the pool had fed the internets the wrong info, and we were well and truly misinformed, so there were only 3 lanes available inside. Ugh, inside! We walked the lake instead and then while I was waiting for dinner to cook I did my strength. Hips, hammies, core & shoulders.

Advent Challenge: Day 01

I was up early and took advantage, pumping out 15 mins of strength. I managed to source the Man's weights from the garage, because 2kg is not quite a challenge anymore, but 4kgs certainly is.

Strength: 15 min

Monthly totals: November 2011

Ride: 3:21:48 | 67.14 km
Run: 6:40:12 | 63.01 km
Swim: 15m | 600m
Walking: 12:50
Kickboxing: 3:00
Strength: 1:30
Adventure racing: 4:29:32
Dancing: 2:00

Weight: -1kg, down to 61kg (134lbs). I thought I'd done slightly better, that said, I'm down a total of 2.5kgs since mid October. I'm not complaining!

Disappointing bike effort, but my run total doubled from last month. I definitely spent more time moving in November, compared to October. So I'm happy.

November was all about the Adventure race! And making a slow comeback with regards to my ITB injury sustained in September. I feel as though I'm making ok progress on that front.