This weekend, the regret of having bought a mattress online without actually trying it - a problem that has amounted to about 6 months of poor sleep - finally caught up with my husband in the form of me completely refusing to allow him to spoon with me. We had gone to
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| easier to sleep on than it is to pronounce |
It's a good thing I sometimes live in blissful ignorance of the state of our bank account, as it turns out we were better able than I had thought to spring for the new mattress. Get it? Spring? Oh.... sorry, couldn't resist. I'm really glad we/he went for it, even if I wasn't sure we should spend the money. Sleep is so important. I've been reading a lot of articles about it lately, like this one from the Huffington Post. While I sometimes joke that I pride myself on my ability to go on 5 hours of sleep, several nights in a row, it's really nothing to brag about.
Today I started of pretty well-rested and well-fed. I had my usual bowl of cereal with Silk Vanilla Almond, but I've been working on shrinking the amount of cereal and increasing the amount of fruit on my plate. I think this is easier in the summertime, when ripe, juicy, too-sweet-to-be-good-for-you fruit is in abundance just about everywhere.
I needed to make sure we both started off on full tummies because I hate when we set out on our morning trips only to wind up starving and eating cookies or froyo by 11:00AM. While I did have to cave and let her have samples at Whole Foods as we were there looking for MSM and chia seeds*, I managed to tame the beasts in both of our bellies to get us home to eat the food in our fridge.
*I've been reading a lot of bloggers proclaiming the benefits of chia and decided that for $13, I'd grab a bag of it and start throwing handfuls of the stuff on my cereal and in my yogurt to see what all the fuss is about. Of course, I don't really pay attention to my mental or physical state other than to double-check that my eyes are open and I have a pulse, so we'll see.
From the best web know-it-alls ever, wikipedia:
In a one-ounce (28 g) sample, dried chia seeds contain 9% of the Daily Value for protein (4g), 13% fat (9g) (57% of which is ALA) [<- that's alpha linolenic acid, or "good" fat] and 42% dietary fiber (11g), based on a daily intake of 2000 calories. The seeds also contain the essential minerals phosphorus, manganese, calcium, potassium and sodium in amounts comparable to other edible seeds, such as flax or sesame.I'm thinking chia seeds in conjunction with the MSM and base-chain proteins I already take for muscle and joint maintenance and repair, I should be more than good to go as I get ready to start on my fall marathon training cycle.
Do you do the chia?
Switching gears now - HA! Gears! I'm on a roll today... how about some spinning music? Amazon.com had a bunch of new music for $.25/single so I figured it was time to load up on some fresh songs. All of my playlists from June through September definitely keep with a summer theme, but this one I made a little more party-worthy with the Fourth of July in mind. I couldn't find any sufficiently rockin' patriotic songs, though. I considered Hendrix's "Star Spangled Banner" but it doesn't lend itself very well to any cycling drill, really. Maybe I'll just keep it for my own listening pleasure.
Blister in the Sun - 4th of July Mix
1. "The Sound of Sunshine" Micheal Franti - Warm up, flat road, alternate lead legs.
2. "Party Rock Anthem" LMFAO - Add a gear, do some moderate spin-ups on the chorus, going up about 10 rpm from your warm-up pace on each run.
3. "Sweet Emotion" Aerosmith - Add another gear and start your first hill in the seat. About a minute in, add another gear and take it up to position 3, keeping a strong cadence. Alternate 1 min. aggressive climb with 30s. seated recovery.
4. "Beverly Hills" Weezer - One more gear, getting to that "pedaling in the mud" point. Sit and climb on the verse, take it up to 3 and try to pick it up on the chorus.
5. "Block Rockin' Beats" Chemical Brother - Flat road, recover 30s. Take it back up to a moderate pace (75% effort) for 30s. then gradually add a hair of resistance back in every 10s until you reach the max you can maintain your cadence at. Hold it there for 1 min. Recover + repeat.
6. "Wild Ones" Flo Rida feat. Sia - Sustained run, light resistance (1-2 gears up from your flat road) to start. First run from the start through the 1st verse, recover on the chorus. Add a gear and do the second run in position 3.
7. "Sunshine" Matisyahu - Jumps at light resistance: 45s on each count, 8/4/2, cycling through twice. Try 1-counts at the end if you're feeling extra jumpy :)
8. "We Are Young" Fun. feat. Janelle Monae - Add resistance to start at medium resistance or higher. Add another gear every min. of the song, or until you're fighting to keep going at 60rpm, or until you reach your max resistance you can pedal smoothly at. Stand if you wish.
9. "Blister in the Sun" Violent Femmes - Flat road flush out. Recover!
10. "Mercy" Duffy - Add 3-4 gears, keeping a relatively easy cadence. Before each chorus transition to position 3, then slide your rear back over your saddle to "hover", focusing on using those hamstrings to draw your knees up toward your chest.
11. "Uprising" Muse - Last aggressive climb. Keep your resistance where it's at to start. Add a gear and climb in position 3 on the chorus, picking it up any amount that you can. Take it off when you sit for the verse. Add 2 gears for the 2nd chorus, 3 for the 3rd, etc. Even if you can't pick up the pace, don't slow down!
12. "Bright Lights" Matchbox 20 - Take it back to medium resistance as we start our down climb. Start in position 3, then take a gear off and pick up the pace in the seat for each chorus until back at a flat road. Spin it out to the finish!
13. "Starlight" Muse - Cool down
14. "I'm Yours" Jason Mraz - Stretch
Happy 4th to everyone! Hope you get in some good races, runs and/or rides!
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