Rave Run: Redondo Beach

Last week, I was in LA for the weekend and had an 8 mile training run on the docket. Since it has been too hot for me to run outside in Albuquerque, I decided to hit the pavement while I was in sunny Southern California.

I ran from where I was staying in Torrance down to Redondo Beach.

Look at all of the palm trees!

Activities at the Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort and Spa

Our weekend at the Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort and Spa was super active. There are tons of things to do on property to keep both adults and kids occupied all day long! In fact, Tamaya was recently named one of the "10 Best Family Friendly Luxury Resorts" by USA Today.

Here is a look at some of the activities available at the Hyatt Tamaya.

Walking / Running / Biking Trails
The resort is home to an elaborate system of dirt trails that run along the Rio Grande and throughout the surrounding area. The first thing we did when we arrived at Tamaya was borrow two beachcruisers and bike helmets and enjoyed a 2-mile bike ride along the trails.

I loved biking among the cottonwood trees.

We had a lovely view of the mountains and the river.

Along one of the trails are a series of exercise stations (like chin-up bars, climbing walls and ladders), I remember playing on similar equipment when I was a child, so we had some fun on our bike ride and stopped at the ones we came across to have some vacation silliness!

Pools
The resort has three pools and a whirlpool for all of your outdoor water needs. The Plaza Pool is the main pool with its two-story water slide. There are plenty of lounge chairs as well as a bar adjacent to the pool.

Secondly, there is the Oxbow Pool, which looked to be a shallow depth kiddie pool.

Finally, the Kiva Pool is the adults only pool. This is a circular pool surrounded by a high circular wall, which is supposed to protect from the wind. I spent all of my pool time at the Kiva Pool because I wanted quiet, away from the screaming/splashing children, and it was heaven!

Outdoor movies are shown on a big screen at the Plaza Pool during the evening. On our first night there, they were screening one of the Toy Story movies. 

The Stables at Tamaya 
When we booked our trip to Tamaya, we purchased a package that included our hotel stay plus either two rounds of golf or two horseback rides at The Stables at Tamaya. Since neither of us enjoy playing golf, we decided to do the horseback rides.

Before our scheduled trail ride, we met at the concierge desk and were shuttled to The Stables.



In addition to the horses, there were lots of other friendly animals like these goats.

The horse I was assigned to is called Hollywood. He was gentle but loved to be at the head of the pack! We enjoyed a roughly two hour ride on the grounds of Santa Ana Pueblo. The brush was much taller than usual because of all of the rain we had been getting. It was like walking through a salad bar for the horses. 

After our ride ended, we headed back to The Stables. Look who else has visited! Jessica Alba!

I'm not one to have celebrity crushes, but if I were, my celebrity crush would be this guy: Tom Hiddleston! 

Evening with the Artist

On our first night at Tamaya, we attended this happy hour of sorts, only that we got to view beautiful sculptures by a local artist and speak with him, if we wanted to. It was near the tail end of the event, so after we looked at the art, we decided to grab some of the refreshments and enjoy them al fresco.

Pueblo Bread Tasting

Our last activity of our stay was attending the traditional bread tasting, freshly baked in the outdoor oven.

Along with the bread, delicious butters, like cinnamon, red chile and green chile, and jams (my favorite was the apricot) were used to accompany the light and fluffy bread.

Fitness Center
Located next to the spa, the fully-equipped fitness center is open 24 hours. It has everything from treadmills, ellipticals, stationary bikes, free weights, kettlebells, stability balls and exercise mats. I stayed in the fitness center for two hours and no other guests used any of the equipment. There were a few people who stopped and poked their head in but no one else worked out.

Yoga classes are also available for a fee, but I was not able to attend any of the classes.

Other Activities
There is so much to do at the Hyatt Tamaya, and we definitely were not able to do everything. The weekly Tamaya Times  details all of the activities for the week. Many require an additional fee and include cultural and art classes, like leather stamping and jewelry making.

As I mentioned before, golf is available at the Twin Warriors Golf Club and there is a full-service spa.

With so much to do, you will be at a loss for how to spend your time at The Hyatt Tamaya!

Carson's Crusaders Foundation Trek or Treat 5K 2014 - Race Recap

I have now officially run in seven states! Last week, I was in DC for work for a couple of days and then visited my sister in Dallas for the weekend (more on that later).

My sister, brother-in-law and I are all in the midst of Wine & Dine training, so we decided at the last minute to do a run together while I was I town. We chose the Carson's Crusaders Foundation Trek or Treat 5K, which was held at Watters Creek at Montgomery Farm in Allen, Texas. Despite what its name might suggest, Watters Creek is actually an outdoor shopping mall. That's one setting I have definitely not run in before!

As races go, this one had a fairly late start time at 8:30 am, which meant the sun was up. 

Obligatory pre-race photo

The start and finish lines were both in the middle of the shopping mall. Too bad none of the shops were open yet though! The race started right on time and we were off.

The first part of the race made a loop around the shopping mall. 

I was surprised that behind the mall were beautiful tree lined paths. Most of the distance wound up being in this setting. The course was pretty much an out and back which meant we had to share the paths with runners coming back in the other direction. At times, this made the course very narrow and confusing.

The trail led to a gorgeous lake that we did a loop around. As you can see, the weather was just perfect for a 5K. It was sunny, slight breeze and no humidity. 

I have not run a timed 5K in quite some time, so before I knew it, I had reached the finish line! 

I grabbed a banana and some water and joined up with my brother-in-law who was right behind me. I rarely, if ever, drink milk, but there is just something about chocolate milk after a race that I love! Sister came through a short time later. 

Besides wanting to run with my sissy, I also really wanted to find out if I have really become super slow or if it is the altitude in Albuquerque that is doing me in. 

Turns out, I was able to PR in this race, so it is not me. Hooray! What a difference 5,000 feet makes!

I have been running about 12-13 minute miles in New Mexico, but check out my split times on this day:

Mile 1: 10:03

Mile 2: 10:45

Mile 3: 10:16

Official finish time: 32:19

I also placed 99th overall. Not a great feat but I love the number. It was a fun race and I am happy that I not only get to cross another state off the list but that I PR-ed! Thank you, Texas!

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Hiking Elena Gallegos Open Space

From my first visit to New Mexico last year, I discovered that one of the things that sets Albuquerque apart is its gorgeous landscape. Enjoying the outdoors is one of the things I was looking forward to the most when we learned that we would be making this city our new home.

Over the weekend, we went on our first hike in Albuquerque since we moved here. It also was Gus's first hike ever! We decided to head to Elena Gallegos Open Space or Elena Gallegos Picnic Area, which it is alternately called.

The location of the park allows for amazing views of the Sandia Mountains.

The weather was sunny and beautiful, and the sunlight illuminated all of the colorful desert plants.

We did not bother to look at the trail maps before we went because we did not think Gus would last very long, so we just picked a direction to go in and then turned back around when it seemed like he had had enough exploration of nature.

Gus was very curious about all of the plants. He was a little too curious about the cacti though because he wound up with a spine stuck in himself! Ouch!

The trails were well maintained and well-marked. We wound up going on a portion of the Pino Trail, but I can't tell you how long the trail is or where it leads to because we had to turn back after about 0.7 miles.

The park is located at about 6,500 feet so we also had great views of some of the city below.

When it was time to leave, we hopped in the car and made our way back to the exit. I missed a turn and wound up in a different part of the park. Then I saw something in the middle of the road that made me exclaim, "That is awesome!" I put the car in reverse and there it was: a huge hairy tarantula!  It was at least the size of my hand. Normally, I would be grossed out, but seeing this thing out in the wild was....well, wild!

I hope to never find one of those in my backyard though! I would probably throw up and then faint.

Hopefully, we will have lots more visits to Elena Gallegos Open Space in our near future.

Elena Gallegos Open Space

7100 Tramway Blvd NE

Albuquerque, NM 87111

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Wine and Dine Half Marathon 2014 - Week 6 Training Recap

A little over 30 days to go for Wine & Dine and I am woefully unprepared. The last few months have been way too much for me to handle. On top of moving across the country, we moved into a new house that is needing about 100 percent more work than we anticipated - basically, we thought we would not be doing many renovations. Instead, we are needing to fix up each and every room in the place! We also brought home our little Gus two months ago. If you have ever had a puppy, you understand how much work and supervision a little puppy needs.

These two changes in my life have brought on a lot of additional stress, and making time for half marathon training has been extremely difficult. Not having time to work out is also stressing me out!

I did not have much of a goal for this race besides the fact that I wanted to run/walk with my sister. It looking more and more like I am going to either need a good training push over this next month or I am going to have to walk most of the race. I am a little disappointed with my training progress to date, but life happens.  

This week saw absolutely zero running miles.

September 29 to October 5, 2014

Monday: rest

Tuesday: Yoga - 25 minutes

Wednesday: rest

Thursday: Yoga - 25 minutes

Friday: Yoga - 25 minutes

Saturday: 1.28 miles hike with Raisin Bread and Gus

Sunday: Yoga - 15 minutes

Wine and Dine Half Marathon 2014 - Week 5 Training Recap

40 days and counting until Wine & Dine! I can't wait to run my 3rd runDisney half marathon! This week saw some pretty consistent yoga and some mileage. Still not where I am supposed to be though.

September 22 to 28, 2014

Monday: Yoga - 25 minutes

Tuesday: Yoga - 25 minutes

Wednesday: 2.36 miles

Thursday: Yoga - 25 minutes

Friday: weed backyard

Saturday: walked 2 miles

Sunday: Yoga - 25 minutes and 3.55 miles

Total mileage: 7.91 miles 

Susan G. Komen Central New Mexico Race for the Cure 10K 2014 - Race Recap

Let me start off by saying - THE ELEVATION IS KILLING ME! If you have never gone from running in a low elevation region to a high elevation region, consider yourself lucky because it is tough!

To be honest, I was not even sure what the elevation difference between DC and Albuquerque was until I looked it up this weekend after this race. The mean elevation in DC is 150 ft while the mean elevation in Albuquerque is a whopping 5,800 ft! No wonder I can't breathe!

As I mentioned last post, I only signed up for the Susan G. Komen Central New Mexico Race for the Cure 10K four days before this race because I really needed to get some good mileage in for my Wine & Dine training. I am so glad that I did this race because I think I would still be in the three mile range if I hadn't.

For this event, there was a 5K option as well as the 10K. Additionally, there was an untimed option. I signed up for the chip-timed option.

On Friday, I picked up my bib and race shirt and prepared my race day outfit. I decided to stick with the theme and went with a hot pink top and KT Tape.

The race shirt was a long-sleeved cotton t-shirt. The design is cute and I am in need of more long-sleeved shirts, so this was perfect. 

Race for the Cure long-sleeved race shirt

The race started at Wilson Stadium at Manzano High School. The 10K started at 7:00 am and there were probably less than 30 people signed up for this distance. 

I predicted that it would be fairly small so I arrived with about 10 or 15 minutes to go to the bathroom, stretch and walk to the start line.

The race started promptly at 7 am and we were off to a slow and painful start. 

Obligatory pre-race selfie

Mile 1: 13:03

The first mile and half took us up Lomas Boulevard towards Tramway and it was all uphill, which is why my first two miles were also my slowest miles. 

Mile 2: 12:46

Mile 3: 11:17

Once we hit Tramway, we ran along a popular running/biking/walking trail and I started to get into my groove. We hit the turnaround point a little past Candelaria Road and made our way back.

  

Mile 4: 12:14

The longest distance I have run in this training cycle prior to this race was three miles. At the four mile mark, I was started to fade a little and started taking some 30 second walk breaks.

Mile 5: 11:11 

Somewhere around mile five an older gentleman who was on his Sunday morning run came up from behind me and gave me a few words of encouragement. Then he said that he was going to run with me for a little. At this point in the race, I knew that I was almost at the end but I really really wanted to walk. Instead, I had a really nice man pace me and gave me my fastest two miles! 

Mile 6: 10:01 *fastest mile*

Once we reached Lomas again, the gentleman shook my hand and told me to, "Keep it up." From that point, it was all downhill.

The finish line was inside the stadium, and I am pretty sure I was one of the last people in the 10K group to cross the finish line.  

Finish time: 1:12:28

After the race, I picked up some refreshments, and visited some of the booths set up around the stadium. The 5Kers seemed to be gathering at this point and it was fairly crowded. There was even a face painter and balloon animal maker. I was tempted to get my face painted but the line was too long. 

After the race, I grabbed a breakfast burrito and coffee from Golden Pride to enjoy at home! I was so hungry!

I am really glad I ran this race. If nothing else, I got in my 6 miles and also am beginning to understand how rough the elevation is on me. I do have one big gripe about this race though. I cannot for the life of me find out how to get my chip time. Every other race I have run had the results posted to their website that day or the following day, and I cannot find it anywhere. 

This is a problem because I paid extra to be chip-timed, and the only way I know what my time was is from my RunKeeper app. Not cool! I would have just gotten the non-timed option, saved the extra $5 and bought another burrito. 

UPDATE: I sent an email to Komen Central New Mexico, and they finally posted the results. My official time was 1:12:32 for an average pace of 11:42.

Wine and Dine Half Marathon 2014 - Weeks 3 and 4 Training Recap

It has been another crazy two weeks! As I described last time, we are currently in the middle of remodeling our guest bathroom. It still needs a few finishing touches, so I am not going to share the pictures of the room just yet! 

The in-laws returned home on Monday, and Gus immediately got sick. He went to the vet and got some tests and it turned out to be nothing major. (Thank goodness!) Speaking of Gus, he is going to be going in for his last round of shots this week. I am so excited to be able to take him out soon! He is on my last nerve, but because he is so cute, I can't stay mad at him. 

While he was sick, Gus was on a diet of boiled chicken and rice with pumpkin. He ate so messily that when he was done eating, his face was orange from the pumpkin! He is so silly.

With all of the activity going on, I haven't been keeping up with my training runs. I decided to sign up for the Central New Mexico Race for the Cure 10K four days before the race because I had a 6 miler on the calendar and figured this would probably be the only way I would actually get it done.  

September 8 to 14, 2014

Monday: rest

Tuesday: 2.34 miles

Wednesday: rest

Thursday: weed backyard

Friday: weed backyard

Saturday: weed backyard

Sunday: rest

Total mileage: 2.34 miles 

September 15 to 21, 2014

Monday: rest

Tuesday: rest

Wednesday: rest

Thursday: 1.6 miles

Friday: rest

Saturday: rest

Sunday: Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure 10K (recap later this week)

Total mileage: 7.8 miles 

Wine and Dine Half Marathon 2014 - Week 2 Training Recap

This week's training did not go as scheduled. I was away on business for two days this week, and we currently have visitors staying with us. Our first visitors to New Mexico actually!

We are also in the midst of remodeling our guest bathroom. Just another project in our 6,000 home improvement projects!

I thought I had taken before pictures, but this gives you an idea of the horror that was in the bathroom. There was three different types of tile: all different sizes and not matching. The floor was partially tile and partially laminate. The hardware and electrical outlets didn't match either, and also was not our style. 

This is what the bathroom looked like after day 1 of demolition. I'm so happy to see it go!

September 1 to 7, 2014
Monday: rest
Tuesday: Yoga Flow at home (25 minutes)
Wednesday: Travel to DC, ran 1.65 miles, YogaVibes.com - Post Workout Stretch Yoga for Athletes (9 minutes)
Thursday: Travel back from DC
Friday: rest
Saturday: help with bathroom remodel
Sunday: help with bathroom remodel

Total mileage: 1.65 miles

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