'24 South Africa - Day 3

 

I was really looking forward to today (Feb 13th/Tuesday). I love swimming and I love swimming outside and during my online hunt for an outdoor swimming pool around the area, I came across a 50-meter outdoor pool in Stellenbosch at Coetzenburg University. I asked the open water swim group on whatsapp about allowing vistors and the group said that visitors were allowed. 

I looked online at the lane availability schedule and noticed that after 8am was a good time to swim. We left our Airbnb around 7am for the 15 mile drive to Stellenbosch but there was a lot of traffic so it took us over an hour. Our route took us through Strand, which goes by the beach, so I made a mental note of this route for my run later in the day. 

The Stellenbosch area has a different vibe to Gordon's Bay as the campus as there are several schools and students and the area is very pretty with lots of fields, trees, and paths for biking. As we got closer to the area, we saw a lot of people on mountain bikes as the area is known for the mountain biking (we biked there last year). 

When we arrived around 8:15am we needed to fill out a lot of personal information on tablets, inside the gym. This took about 15 minutes. When we finally paid (80 rand each or $4.20) the girl behind the counter told us that the outdoor pool was only open until 9am. This crushed me. We drove all that way to only swim for 30 minutes. She said we could use the indoor pool at 9am. 

After swimming for 30 minutes straight to make good use of our time in the outdoor pool we noticed that a small group of triathletes moved over into other lanes to free up the reserved lanes for the swim teams. We asked the coaches on deck if we were allowed to keep swimming and they said the first few lanes were open for gym users. I think the "open" swim times for vistors were until 9am but the pool was still open so we continued to swim. Thankfully we didn't get in trouble and we were able to get in a great workout in the outdoor 50 meter pool. 

The water felt great and it got warm swimming. There were hoses emptying cool water into the pool to help cool off. 

I felt pretty blah to start and it took me an entire 2000 meters to finally start to feel better in the water. I felt heavy in my arms (perhaps from the open water swim the night before) and just low in energy but as I continued to swim, my energy came back and my arms loosened out. 

For my main set I did: 

10 x 100s steady on 1:45 (coming in around 1:23-1:25 long course meters which is around 1:13-1:15 short course yards)
500 w/ buoy smooth (we only brought FINIS Agility paddles and buoy for pool toys)
5 x 100 w/ paddles steady w/ 10 sec rest 

Karel finished with ~4400 meters and I finished with ~4800 meters. 
After our swim, we changed in the outdoor changing area and had some food and drinks in the attached coffee shop. The price of food is very reasonable here. We each got a smoothie and I got a bran raisin muffin and Karel got a flat white all for ~$6 USD (or 114 Rand). My banana whey smoothie was so good. It tasted like a cupcake! Karel got a strawberry smoothie (and he brought a croissant that we got from a store yesterday).

Karel needed to get some CO2s for our bikes (which go by the name bombs here ;) so we went to the local Specialized bike store. This was one of the nicest bike shops that we have ever seen. There was a track outside for kids to ride on (and a few specialized kids bikes laying around). There was also a coffee shop with indoor and outdoor seating. The shop was huge and it had everything you could ever need for biking. 

When we returned back to our place around 1pm, we were pretty tired. We worked on the computer for a few hours and then around 3pm, Karel did some mobility and then went for a run. 

I had a very stressful afternoon as I received an email from the organizers for our upcoming MTB stage race (which starts next Wed) that I had booked a flight to the wrong airport. I accidentally booked us flying CemAir from Cape Town to Plettenburg instead of booking Cape Town to Port Elizabeth. The website said PE and because our event was PE Plett I thought we would be flying into Plettenburg. Well Plettenburg is 2 hours away from Port Elizabeth and we were being picked up by a shuttle service in PE (which I now know is Port Elizabeth). I learned a major lesson about checking airport codes. 

Thankfully I was able to cancel our flight and get most of our money back (CemAir was responsive as soon as I emailed which I appreciated) and I also cancelled our hotel room from before and after the race (received 50% money back but thankfully the room wasn't expensive). The good thing was that the new flight from Cape Town on Safair was much cheaper and we only needed a hotel room for one night (Mon) so we ended up saving some money in the big picture. But oh the stress to have to make all of these changes so last minute when I had booked everything back in October. 

When this was all settled, I needed to get outside and exerise to release some stress. I did ECFIT mobility for ~20 minutes to loosen out and then around 4pm I went out for my run. I ran 3 miles on side streets to Strand and I was so happy to be running by the ocean. It was a bit windy. When I got to the beach I did 6 x 1/2 mile pushes with 75 sec EZ between (plus some extra stops for pictures in my recovery). I ran 3 intervals out and 3 intervals back (a bit more wind coming back). It was a very scenic run. The weather was much more tolerable than on Monday as it was in the mid 70s and I was feeling so much better (and heart was more controlled/normal). I was surprised with my paces as well. 

I really enjoyed my run and felt so much better when I returned home. I ran 9.46 miles in 1:14 and Karel ran 8.3 miles in 58 minutes. 

I had a recovery drink (INFINIT custom protein mix) w/ milk after I returned home and then had leftovers (tofu potato stir fry) for dinner. I worked a little on the computer before going to bed around 10:15pm. 

Trail run, beach and Tacos

When you own your own business, the weekends often get squeezed together with the weekdays as every day is a work day.

Trimarni Coaching and Nutrition, LLC works great for Campy because in his world, every day is a weekend!!

I'm really looking forward to speaking at Speaking Of Women's Health in Jacksonville on August 24th on behalf of the HeartWise for Women prevention program. I can't wait for my talk on "Keeping eating healthy, easy and delicious" and doing a cooking demo with Mai Oui Gourmet catering my talk.

I also have a talk this Sunday with two other GI MD's at Baptist Medical Center Beaches where we will all be discussing GI related diseases and how they affect the fitness enthusiast. My portion will be on fueling the individual who has a GI-related disease (Crohn's, stomach cancer, IBS, celiac). 

I wonder what they are dreaming about?

It's been a very busy two weeks since returning from Lake Placid but I wouldn't want it any other way. 

                            

This morning (after my 2500 form focused swim + hip/core work) around 7:40am, I prepped the set for my 8am hour TV segment with News4Jax on "Healthy budge-friendly lunches for kids". I will share the link via Facebook and blog when it is on the website. 

So for my last weekend of unstructured training....

A little girl time on bikes with my friend Heidi

A little mountain biking in Hanna Park for Karel (Sunday - 1 hour) after we slept in with no alarm. 9 beautiful hours of sleep and not working out until 9am.

And on Sunday, my 2nd run since Ironman Lake Placid, a 40 minute run on the trails (10 min run, 2 min walk after each trail segment). I was drenched in sweat and covered in spider webs and looking forward to wearing my new swim suit from Oakley Women. 

Love my unstoppable Oakley bag - perfect for a beach day with Karel to enjoy unstructured exercise before easing back into structured training. 

So on to more delicious news.....

Plant strong tacos

1 wrap
Veggie meat
Mixed greens
Onions
Broccoli
Mushrooms
Garlic
Lentils
Salsa
Cheese
Greek yogurt

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2. In a casserole dish (small yet tall rectangle), spray lightly with non stick spray and place 1 cup (per person) veggie meat and 1 package sliced mushrooms (washed) w/ 2 cloves garlic chopped and 1/2 large onion chopped (thick slices) into the dish.
3. Steam broccoli and then cut into segments and place on top of mushroom mixture (the meat, mushrooms and onions will soak up a lot of flavor from the meat and the broccoli will be nicely roasted). Sprinkle with turmeric and a pinch of salt. See step #6.
4. After 20-25 minutes or until broccoli is a little brown, remove from oven (and turn off oven).
5. Remove broccoli from the top of the casserole dish and stir together meat with mushrooms, onions and garlic.
6. Prepare lentils according to package (I did a 1:3 ratio of lentils to water).
7. Place 1  warm wrap on a plate and spoon cooked lentils on the wrap. Add a little cheese (any kind - the real kind, not factory made cheese like fat-free) and a spoonful of salsa and then top with a big spoon of mushroom mixture and then with leafy greens. Close wrap and top with dallop of greek yogurt (not pictured as that would make my picture messy looking).
8. Serve with roasted broccoli and enjoy!

Homemade "chips" - toasted wrap at 375 degrees for 3-5 minutes each side (or until almost hard and slightly brown), then broken carefully into triangles (kinda) and drizzled with a little olive oil and a pinch of salt and black pepper. I bet cinnamon would be yummy on these too!