That Time I Didn’t Run the Miami Half

So, remember how I was going to Miami to run a half?

Yeah…I didn’t run it.

It basically came down to this: we just didn’t want to do it. And how often in life can you just not do something because you don’t feel like it with no further consequences than money you’ve already spent?

We went for a run Friday morning, and it was brutal: hot, humid, sunny. Tough when you’re used to those conditions, basically hell when you’re not. We spent the next day filled with uncertainty over the race, and finally last night decided that we just wouldn’t do it. It was really hot (glorious for laying out, not so much for runners from NY not acclimated to these conditions), none of us had been training much and we would have had to wake up at 3:30 or 4 to make it to the 6:15 start time. No thanks! (Meggie said it well, too.)

And not a single second of remorse was had. We woke up around 7:30 this morning and went out for a little run of our own. No bibs, no Garmins, just the four of us and the beach. Perfect. Afterwards, we headed back and took classes at the resort. Canyon Ranch=adult camp, basically. There’s fitness classes all day long. I took a yoga class, which was a bit more athletic than I’d realized. There were lots of deep, deep stretches that hurt like hell and really got into your muscles.

The rest of the weekend was lovely and relaxing.

Friday was spent lounging at the pool, and then going to Joe’s Stone Crab for dinner. We’d all heard a lot about it, and wanted to try it. The crab was delicious, but the prices seemed a little incongruous with the decor and ambiance (which seemed like it would be more suitable for Disney World.)

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Saturday, Gia had a meeting downtown so I tagged along, eager to do at least a little exploring of Miami, knowing that we’d be spending most of the rest of the afternoon at the expo and the pool. Her meeting was at Panther Coffee, which I heard great things about. I didn’t stop in, so that I wasn’t the total sketchball crashing her meeting.

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I walked around the Wynwood area for a bit, ducking in and out of shops, and just taking some time to meander and take in the water. It was such a nice, recharging solo morning.

We went to the expo, which was PACKED. We did our best to get in and out so we could get back to the resort for more pool + class time.

The four of us all have a lot of big things going in our lives, and we decided at dinner that we just needed some time to chill and not push ourselves to get up early and run a race none of us wanted to run…so we didn’t.

You might think that we then decided to go out and have a wild night in South Beach…but we’re old. We drank some wine and were in bed by 10, and it was amazing. (Yes, we are caricatures of all of those Buzzfeed articles about people in their 30s.)

And now I return to NYC, where it’s hopefully going to be a bit warmer this week. Even if it isn’t, I had a nice little break getting away from the cold.

Have you ever totally just bailed on a race like this? Did it feel this great?

Workouts Lately

Greetings from the sorta friendly skies (where this post was started.) 

I’m heading down to Miami to play with Gia, Meggie and K-Scott (aka RB on Gia’s blog.) Oh, and I guess run a half on Sunday. I haven’t been running much at all lately, so this will be a big science experiment to see how well one can run in the heat after not running for a while. Cool.

This is also my first vacation day since starting my new job in October. I actually was really lucky and took a bunch of trips last year – St. Croix, Puerto Rico, Sonoma, OBX, Hamptons, Dallas – but from February on, I had so much looming uncertainty hanging over my head. As much as I tried to just be there in the moment, it was hard not to worry about what awaited me upon return. Now, I leave knowing I’m coming back to a job I love, my upcoming birthday, my Junior League ball, and some more exciting stuff I can blog about soon but not yet!

I’ve been using this running downtime to do whatever damn workout I please – and I’m loving that. Here’s what this week of workouts has looked like for me:

Sunday: SoulCycle for Meggie’s birthday. I love Soul but try to make it a special treat that I save for when no other workout sounds appealing. I’d been sick all of last week, so the first few songs were tough, but the arm section (which comes about 2/3 of the way in) came around before I knew it.

Monday: Didn’t get into an Uplift class in the morning, and went for drinks with my dear friend Julie at night. Totally worth skipping a workout for.

Tuesday: CardioSculpt at work…because I work at a fitness company. We usually have a few people working out to one of our videos every day, which is really cool. I usually don’t tear myself away from my desk unless I have no other workout planned or a slower workday, though.

Wednesday AM: OMG, Wednesday. I started the day off with Strength at Uplift. To be honest, I wanted to cancel this class because I was planning on going to CrossFit at night for an event, but it was too late by the time I remembered this on Tuesday night. 

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Wednesday PM: My boss got invited to a CrossFit media event at CrossFit NYC and brought me as her plus-one, because she’s hazing me. For you CrossFit people: we did Fight Gone Bad. For none-CrossFit people: this is one of their benchmark workouts that they use to measure your progress. It was a five-exercise circuit that included one minute each of: rowing, overhead presses, kettlebell swings, wall balls (sweet Jesus) and box jumps. You teamed up with a partner and each person did the circuit three times while the other person counted their reps and cheered them on. 

I did a CrossFit workout once at the Reebok CrossFit, and they definitely went pretty easy on us since it was a media event. That didn’t happen this time. This workout was totally legit, and I really get now why you CrossFit people like this stuff, BUT we were one of three classes going on at the time, which was incredibly overwhelming to me.

Thursday PM: I try to go to Uplift in the morning because I can just get it out of the way and then don’t have to worry about getting stuck at work or fun plans coming up that I can’t do because I have a workout… but that means I miss out on Chelsea’s class. I <3 her Sculpt Fusion class so much and I’m always happy when I can fit it in. But good lord were my muscles sore from CrossFit, particularly my shoulder muscles.

We’re staying at Canyon Ranch this weekend, which I’m really excited for. Gia says they have lots of fitness classes, but I’d be happy to just do a whole bunch of yoga. Or lay on the beach.

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^ Pre-landing. We went for a run and then spent most of the afternoon by the pool. 

Tell me about your week of workouts! And where you’d escape to right now if you could?