Dock to Beach to Dock

This year for Memorial Day weekend I was thinking about a hike, but then I thought about all the bugs and decided that I would do a practice long swim for the landshark next weekend. It's been very busy at the lake, and they are ticketing and towing, so I decided to just park a mile away at joe pizza and bike. But then I couldn't find my bike rack, so I decided to walk instead. It was actually a nice walk, and much less stressful than trying to park. Thumbs up, would definitely do again.

I got to the dock and there were a ton of people there. The club that's across the lake is open now (and they have their slide and high dive out again). After the walk I was pretty hot and got right to the swim. I felt pretty good for the entire swim, I worked on my pull and on my breathing. There were a bunch of boats out there, but I didn't have any issues. And, the water was nice and smooth. My swim cap came off a little on the way to the beach, so I stopped when I got there and fixed it, and then turned around and went back. When I got to the docks it was almost exactly one hour, which is pretty much exactly the same as what I did this weekend last year. Booo. Here I thought I might be getting faster, but turns out that's not the case. Well, at least I'm still swimming.

Last week we did a full moon swim, and I decided to try biking to the lake. It was fun, but also it turns out that 10 miles is kind of a long bike ride. I was so glad I didn't do the marathon when I was thinking about it! Definitely a good way to get to the lake, though on a really hot day it would probably be difficult. 

Swim across Walden

I did my first swim across Walden this year today, and it was lovely! It was a beautiful sunny day today, though a little windy. After work I went to the garden store and got two tomato plants, some peppers and rosemary and thyme (resisting the urge to get parsley and sage) and planted them in my garden. I only got the small sungold tomatoes this year to keep down on the rats, but decided that two of them was reasonable. Over the weekend I put in two tomatillos and some potatoes. I think there's space for one more tomatillo and maybe a little of something else - I have to decide what though.

I brought my swim gear with me in the hopes that I could push myself to go for a swim. I'm signed up for the land shark on June 2, which is less than 3 weeks away, and I haven't done a long swim for a while. I was a little concerned about my ability to do the swim, so I decided to go swim across Walden as a first warm up. It was a really nice swim!

When I mapped out the swim it looks like it was about .9 mile, so I swam across a shorter part. According to my fitbit I was swimming for 46 minutes, so that would be a little over 50 min pace for a mile. The water is about 61 degrees, though there were a few warm spots and a couple really cold ones. When I got out I was glad that I had my dryrobe, though I don't think I will need it much longer this season.

I've been really working on the pull on my swimming so that I can move faster. It's really hard, though. I think I have to go more often to work on my arm strength. I've also been working on my breathing - turning my head just enough so only half of my mouth comes out of the water. I'm doing much better with it. Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny and 80, but of course I have a silly busy day, so not sure I will be able to get to the lake, but I hope so! 

Zoe

A couple weeks ago I learned that one of my favorite podcasts, Zoe, has a whole nutrition program that goes along with it. They test your microbiome, glucose levels and blood levels and then help you find a diet that works for your body specifically. I love the science focus in the podcast and so I thought I would try it!

I started the program yesterday - they send you a glucose monitor to wear on your arm, and so of course now I'm checking by glucose levels every 10 seconds. I learned that my fasting glucose level was a little high this morning. For the first day, which I am doing now, you have to eat two disgusting breakfast cookies and then fast for 4 hours (they said the cookies were "delicious" which was my first clue that they were not going to be delicious. Seriously, I had to choke them down.) And, there are two more for lunch - slightly different but I am betting equally disgusting. They also have you send in a sample of your poop and blood. It said to get the stool sample later today, but I had to go this morning, so I sent it in early. I can't just be sitting around for 4 hours waiting! After I took the world's slowest walk to the post office to mail it in because you are also not supposed to exercise, but if I wait until later today the post office will be closed, and it's Saturday. Later today I will do a blood sample, which I'm not excited about.

I'm curious to see what the results will be!

Today I am Julie

I've done the triangle swim a couple more times since I last wrote - the water's getting warmer and it's not hard to stay in for 20-30 minutes. When I swam on Sunday it was between 60 and 63, depending on the part of the lake. There were people on the beach and they were sitting on our bench and using our picnic table. Cold water season is coming to an end. It was a good year, except for the whole Memphramagog fiasco, but I'll be back next year!

I've been going to this HIIT class at the Y - well, I've gone twice now. It's pretty good. The coach is 20, but he puts together a good set of exercises. Today we did 2 sets of 4 and 1 set of 3, with each exercise for 45 seconds. The first set was burpees (yuck), weighted lunges and some exercise I can't remember. The second round was push-ups, weighted jumping squats and Russian Deadlifts with kettlebells. And then the third round was leg raises, side arm lifts and heal lifts. There were a few moments when I felt a little like puking, so good workout. 

I missed yoga last Friday and I've been feeling it, so I decided to go to yoga after - the class was a meditative one, so I figured it would be fine. The teacher, though, started taking attendance, and it's such a pain to sign up online that when she called out "Julie!" and looked like she didn't know the woman, and no one answered, I said that was me. It seemed like and easier thing to do. But then of course fricking Julie showed up. I figured a yoga teacher wasn't going to call me out on it, and I lay on the floor and pretended I was meditating, which was effective. The class wasn't even that good, though I did get some stretching in. 

Over the weekend I went climbing with my brother and his partner. I actually did a 5.9+ clean, but just because it was on the slabby wall. I got up a 5.10 on the slabby wall with a few rests, and up a 5.8 and 5.9, but after my arms were killing! It's been three days and they are just starting to feel better. I'm so out of climbing shape.