Monday, April 7, 2008

My new toy! And the 8 miler...

I had the best of intentions to run Saturday morning. My alarm went off at 5:30 so I could in theory be out on the road around 6 since I had a ton of stuff to do during the day. When the alarm went off I realized I was not well rested as my cough had resulted in a pretty fractured sleep. I turned the alarm off and rolled over and decided that running was just not happening that day. The rest of Saturday was crazy busy as Neil and I were hosting a wine tasting and tapas party at my place. We prepped a ridiculous amount of food - raw oysters, bacon wrapped blue cheese stuffed dates, garlic mushrooms, albondigas (a.k.a. meatballs) in a chipotle sauce and chicken with peppers, onions and chorizo. Plus cheeses and olives courtesy of my brother and sister-in-law. All followed by a chocolate fondue. People brought two bottles of the same kind of wine with them - one to taste at the party and one to go into the wine exchange pot so people could take a new bottle home with them. We wound up with 8 or 9 bottles to taste among 14 of us and it was a great time. I may have made a little too much food as I can probably get away with not cooking all week. Umm, needless to say when I woke up on Sunday morning I might have been a little hungover. So....no run on Sunday morning. I eventually felt human enough to head down to Bowcycle to do a little road bike shopping though! I had been eyeing the Cannondale Synapse Femenine 7 but my size was no longer out on the floor. I looked at the Specialized Dolce and Dolce Elite and the Kona Lisa RD. The Kona Lisa was a few bucks less than the Dolce Elite, it fit better and had better components than all the other bikes I was looking at. After a test spin around the neighborhood I was in love.

So there we go folks, I am now the proud owner of a brand new bike. Calgary has a great system of bike paths so my goal is to commute into work via bike as often as possible during the week. There is a monster hill between the end of the bike path and my neighborhood so if I don't cycle in straight from my house I can at least drive down to Edworthy Park and cycle in from there if some days my legs aren't up for the climb. I also wanted a bike that would be usable for the day I want to branch out into duathlons and triathlons.

Anyhow...after all was said and done I wasn't sure whether to bag my run or not. My cough was feeling better but I sounded awful (hello laryngitis). I knew I would feel really disappointed if I didn't get any miles in over the weekend though, so at 7 pm I set out for my run. I must have managed to rehydrate well enough because the run went pretty well. Since I was running through my neighborhood it even came complete with some pretty good hills. I finished up, cooked up some rice and microwaved some albondigas and pretty well was out for the night after that. I'm definitely happy I didn't skip my run, and I cannot wait to take my bike out for a proper ride..!!

7 comments:

Sonia said...

WOAH CLASSY RIDE!!! She's beautiful!!!! =) I want one so bad, I'm itching to do some of those triathlons lol =) And with my foot issues, I should switch some of my trainin to the bike anyway!

I'm sure you'll love commuting by bike and its a hidden work-out so that's even better!

Danielle said...

Nice...I need to start looking at bikes...that's if I'm going to get serious about the idea of an ironman someday.

You know, I find some of my best runs end up after a night of indulgence (that's not always the case, but sometimes) wonder why that is...

DGB said...

It's odd that no one has commented on the food, since it was DELICIOUS! I've never had a better appetizer than the blue cheese stuffed dates with bacon...... Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm.... my mouth is still watering......Ulllllllll.

Speed Racer said...

You stole my thunder! This is the second blog I've read about a new bike TODAY!!! Yours is real purdy. I bet you'll love it. I can't believe you got a brand, spankin' new, bright, shiny bike and went home and went for a RUN. Something's wrong with you. I'm sure once you get a taste for it you'll be looking for excuses to ride it whenever possible. Congratulations!

audgepodge said...

Nice bike! Who knows, maybe I'll take the plunge myself these days. Right now, my biking is just limited to my spinning classes.

Anyway - YES, I finally signed up for both the Disney 5K and 15K. I'm very excited!

rocketpants said...

NICE RIDE!! Just get you to a pool and I'm sure you'd be set to do a tri this season! ;-)

Amy said...

SWEET ride Leana! I love the color ( I know..we're not supposed to care about color)...BUT STILL...it's a great looking bike! Congrats!!