Category Archives: custard oats

45-mile ride and carb loading!

Thank you all for the nice comments on my hair.  It’s going to take some getting used to again.  A year ago my hair was about this length.  It grew a lot!

I had a nice carby breakfast to get ready for the bike ride today.  Banana custard oats topped with some of that fresh made peanut butter and some jam.

Yum!  Plus a couple cups of cafe au lait.  I am going to do a nut butter primer this week some time.  Just gotta find the time to put it together.

I made up some protein snacks for the ride.  These are a mix of dates, cashews, unsweetened coconut, coconut oil and brown rice protein powder.  Formed into balls.

These are flipping good!  They are just begging to be dipped in chocolate, too.  I love these!  I’ll have to figure out an exact recipe for them and post.  They are calorie dense, but good for fueling.

We were debating on where to ride today.  This was going to be my first long ride (more than 20 miles) since I hurt my back.  It was pretty windy today, but we decided to head down to Saratoga.  I was a little bit nervous because of how hilly it is.  We took this same route a few days before I hurt my back  about 6 weeks ago.  I told John that I was worried I would be holding him back, and he said that we were a team.  I almost cried at that.  We did pretty well.  It was quite windy, and a headwind to boot.  Perfect temperature, though!

( I love John’s legs. 😳  )Snack time!

Those date balls.  So good.  The bike route going this way is part of the main road, so it is just a wide shoulder.  We got to Saratoga and stopped at the farmer’s market.  I wish the Glens Falls market was like this one.  It’s quite large and lots of fun stuff!

I would have gotten some greek yogurt if we weren’t riding!  These are alien and scary:

Celeriac.  I should try this sometime, but I don’t like celery that much, and that is what it is supposed to taste like.

We did buy some cheese, though.  Had samples of it.  This was sooooo good!

Spendy, so I only got a 1/4 pound.  I think eating it with some crusty bread will happen at some point this week.

We were pretty hungry for lunch at this point, so we stopped off to Uncommon Grounds to have one of their fabulous bagels!

Banana nut bagel with honey walnut cream cheese.  Now *this* is a bagel.  Worth every carby bite.  We then spent some time in town, and John got a new wheel put on his bike.  We ended up riding a few miles around there and stopped to get more carbs for the ride home.  This is a german chocolate cake cupcake:

We split this cupcake and lookie what was in the middle!

Scrumptious!  And very rich.  Good thing we split it.  Although truth be told, I definitely probably could have eaten the whole thing myself.

Then we headed home.  Still pretty windy.  I was doing quite well until we hit mile 35.  We had just made a turn and there was a steep hill.  I just knew I wasn’t going to make it to the top without walking some without all my former strength, and my speed dropped too much to make it all the way up.  This time I did cry.  I got to the top where John was waiting and I just was so frustrated about this stupid injury that I started to cry.  John said it’s okay because I am still recovering, but I just said, “but I don’t want to be anymore!”  Sometimes the emotional part of this injury really gets to me.  I know it will take time, but it just takes a toll on the psyche.

Anyway, we rested a little bit so I could compose myself and we continued on.  I knew that the hill to home would not be happening, so we took a different route around.  It added a few miles to the trip, but I was so pleased we took it.  It’s much flatter and this was where my clip shoes shined (shone?).  I felt so efficient and got my second wind.  Yay!  I could have kept going after we got  back.  I found my quads didn’t burn much, which I attribute to the clip shoes.  And I was wearing my new padded bike shorts.  My butt never hurt before riding, and it certainly didn’t hurt at all with the shorts.  Cool.

Arrived home:

Total distance:  45.6 miles (Longest ride of the year to date!!)

Average speed:  12.3 going, 13.2 coming home.  Pretty good with wind and hills.

Time:  3 hours 30 minutes

Top speed: 27.8 mph (Hills and kinda scary!)

Calories burned:  1380  (per odometer, I say 1200).

Assessment:  I feel really good.  My back is a squidge achy, as well as my knee, but it doesn’t feel injured, if that makes sense.  It only gets better from here.  Who needs running?? :mrgreen:

I was pretty hungry for dinner, and wanted a good protein hit.

3.5 oz of chicken with 1 oz of feta cheese and some toasted almonds.  Mixed with BBQ sauce.  The standard salad.  I wolfed this down and my body wanted a few more carbs, so I had a small dish of rice.

Now I am munching on an Attune bar.  I feel like a bottomless pit right now.  I’ll probably have some cereal later to make sure I have eaten enough today.

Hope you all had a super Saturday!

Question:  Do you shop at farmer’s markets?

The letter P!

Happy Monday to all!  I woke up a little later today again because of the time change.  No one was at my gym either, maybe because it was still a little dark when I got there.  That just seems too early, even though it was near 7.  I jogged a mile on the hamster wheel to warm up, then moved some heavy stuff:   P is for Power!

  • Pull up:  0 (see below)
  • Chin ups:  2 sets of 4, 1 set of 3 (see below)
  • Barbell deadlift/row combo 3 sets of 8 at 65#

Superset:

  • Stationary lunge:  3 sets of 8 with 35# plate
  • Pushups:  3 sets of 10.

Superset:

  • Dumbbell Pliet squat: 1 set of 10 with 35# DB, 2 sets of 10 with 40# DB
  • 1-point dumbbell row:  3 sets of 8 with 20# DBs.
  • Planks: 1.5 minute hold, then two 1-minute hold
  • YTWL:  3 sets of 4 (each letter) with 10# DBs

Giant set:

  • Cable woodchop:  3 sets of 10 at 40#
  • Bicep curl with EZ curl bar:  3 sets of 10 at 30#
  • Overhead triceps extension:  3 sets of 10 with 10# DBs.

Yay!  It felt great 😀  I attempted a pull up just for kicks.  That was quite amusing, I have to say.  I dangled like a fish on a hook before giving up.  I moved to chin ups, but I went back to the way I did them before from a box with bent arms instead of dead hang and that is why I was able to do more.  I am getting stronger.

I was ready for breakfast and started the day with the letter P for pumpkin!  Pumpkin custard oats, to be exact.

Yum!  Work started off slow today.  That is always annoying because it means I have to work later into the evening to make my line commitments.  It’s not like a job where I go and work for 8 hours no matter how busy or slow it is.  If there are no files, I don’t get paid.  The not so glamorous side of working at home.  P as in Pfffffftttt…..

Lunch was an egg puff (just scrambled in the microwave) on a tortilla with laughing cow and hot sauce.  I am so into the hot sauce.

And on the side? P is for Plum!  This is called a lemon plum.  It’s yellow on the inside and has a lemon shape to it:

Interesting.  More sweet, as I find plums to usually have a tart side to them.

Afternoon snack – P is for protein!  I remember when Starbucks offered a protein shot with lattes, so I asked John to put 1/2 a scoop of protein powder in the milk when he steamed it.  He used chocolate PP and it looks like this:

It kind of was like a mocha.  This baby packed in 21 grams of protein!  I think I would use plain next time (which we don’t have on hand at this moment).  I am not used to sweet lattes, so this was a little odd for me to drink.  I know you are all probably proteined out, but I need to up my protein for snacks (meals are fine).

Dinner time.  I love how with daylight savings, dinner pictures have plenty of natural light.  Behold my plate:

Stir fry with chicken, broccoli, and sweet Potatoes!  This was excellent.  And these strawberries are like candy, seriously.  (There may have been some P for Peanuts snacked upon while cooking, too)

Does anyone else think it’s earlier than it really is at night now?  I keep getting surprised when I look at the clock and see how late it actually is.

Getting settled in for my evening snack.  P is for Pomegranate!

A couple squares of the new Hershey’s Extra Dark with Pomegranate.  Yum, yum.

The last P for today? P as in Publish post!  😀

A 10% off coupon is available to my Open Sky shop – just use the code THANKS when you check out for 10% off your order from my shop or any shop!