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Showing posts from January 17, 2016

Two simple swaps for more real food

Over several years, I've slowly changed my lifestyle habits and moved myself more and more away from a heavy processed and convenience-food diet toward a very real food diet. Some dietary changes happened quickly whereas other changes required a different appreciation and time to create new habits. I really value what real food can do for a body, when it comes to health and performance so I've worked really hard over many years to make some swaps when it comes to incorporating more real food into my diet. I'm not against processed food and don't cringe at the thought of "food" in a bag but I do believe that some foods, like well-fortified foods, help to keep people healthy in all parts of our world. And since I don't have an off-limit food list, I never feel guilty, anxious or remorseful if I eat something processed. I have a most of the time diet and then there are foods that I eat some of the time/on occasion. The great thing is that neither one i

Let go of your psychological safety net

As a lifelong athlete, I have found that when I train my mind as hard as I train my body, I perform well, often exceeding my personal expectations.   However, mental training is easier said than done! There have been many times in training and racing when my mind just wasn't in it to win it! In the past few yeas, I have actually had to work on my mental strength as I was finding my mind to be a major limiter with my training as it relates to the following: -Overcoming injuries - a fear of an injury coming back, having fear when pushing hard or going long -Bringing my work/life to a training session - not being 100% present during a workout and thinking about everything that I need to/should do I've really worked hard on these areas over the past few years so that I can execute better in my training sessions.  When athletes talk mental strength, I believe many athletes think toughness, digging deep, grit, perseverance. Absolutely, all of those components are

Super Scrumptious Blueberry Muffins

After my run check-point "test" on Sunday morning, I came home in the mood for a blueberry muffin.  I didn't rush out to buy a muffin but instead, I went to the internet to Google "Blueberry Muffin recipe" and I combined several recipes based on what ingredients I had at home. While drinking a glass of 1% Organic milk and about 20g of whey protein and eating a banana with a few pitted dates as my recovery snack, I went to work in my kitchen, making seven super scrumptious blueberry muffins.  INGREDIENTS 2 Tablespoons butter 1 egg 2/3 cup 0% Greek Yogurt 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 3/4 cup all-purpose flour (you can sub with gluten-free flour if needed) 3/4 cup instant rolled oats 1/4 cup brown sugar 1/2 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 1/4 tsp salt 2 tbsp chia seeds 1 teaspoon cinnamon 1 cup frozen or fresh blueberries (I used frozen) Water Instructions P

Find and KEEP your training motivation

It’s normal to experience waves of high and low motivation throughout the year and the early months of training (in the cold, dark winter months) can often be a rough time for many athletes to stay focused with training and to remain present for workouts.  Although there is no need to be hard-core with your training right now, it is extremely important that you do the work when it needs to get done because in a few months, you can't go back in time. You don't want to look back, wishing that you would have built a better base/foundation, wishing you got yourself stronger so you could adapt better to more intense training or wishing you would have taken the time to focus on weaknesses like skills, form, diet and/or sleep/stress management so you could stay as balanced as possible with training.  We all know that being a triathlete (especially long distance) really doesn't allow for 100% balance in life as some sacrifices have to be made in order to properly mentally, phy