Yesterday was my standard Saturday long run. On schedule was a 12 miler, so I took off from CDM early and made my way around the Back Bay. I had a problem though - I couldn’t find my heart rate strap. I looked all over the place and it was no where to be found. The last I remember is it falling off as I got out of my car after the Turkey Trot. I was going to go back home and look for the strap, but decided that I would just run by perceived effort and pace and see how things went.

I ended up being late and missing most of the Cal Coast group as they took off from CDM.

Yesterday was a different kind of racing experience. I did the Dana Point Turkey Trot. In the rain. Not just any rain, but a downpour. Rumor had it that over 10,000 runners had signed up for the event. Knowing how crazy traffic can be for smaller events, I got out of the house and on the road at 5:30 - an hour and a half before the 7:00 AM start time.

As I pulled off the freeway and into Dana Point, I was a little surprised by what I was seeing. Roads closed. Traffic (okay - that’s kind of normal). But what was conspicuous was what was missing.

Yesterday I was back on the track for some speedwork. The weather report was calling for rain, so I was in a hurry to get things wrapped up before the rain started. The skies were cloudy and the wind was blustery. The workout was 8 by 400 with a 2 mile warmup and a 1 mile warm down. I fired up the iPod and hit the track at about 4:15 and was wrapped up an hour later before the football team was done practicing.

Vital stats - total mileage - 7; max heart rate - 170 (94% MHR); time in VO2Max - about 12 minutes.

I’ve started using a new calorie tracker this week too.

The other day I had the greatest idea. I hope you think it is great as well. I want to go a little Oprah on you and have a favorite things week or two for the month of December. I have a lot of great ideas. Fitness items to feature for the next couple of week. These will be some of my favorite things or some items I wish I had or things on my wish list for Christmas. Hopefully this can give you some ideas of gifts you may want or gifts for the fitness guru in you life.

I’m going to my 3rd Yoga class today and I never felt ‘cooler’ in attending one!

Today’s class at 6.35pm at Fitness First, IOI Mall, Puchong. Anyone would like to follow me? I have guest passes with me! *wink wink

At least I had some company yesterday. My son and my niece looked at me with some manner of disgust that they were going to be embarrassed by the clown with the reflective vest and headlamp that was running with them. But, we didn’t get started until 4:45, so there was no doubt it was going to be dark by the time we finished. We took off from Eastbluff and headed up San Diego Creek for an easy two mile out and back.

Final stats - 4.2 miles, average heart rate 76%MHR. Mission accomplished!

My bike has a flat this week. I need to get it fixed or my knee is going to be dead with all my running. I am excited for Thanksgiving, for yummy food, and being with family. I am hoping to exercise self control and not go over board with my eating. I am going to have some pie though, since it is the only time I get pie. (Besides my birthday.) I am also hoping for some great workouts before Turkey day. Just need to be motivated!

Workouts for week of Nov. 17 to Nov.

I do a lot of my shopping online now, buying stuff that is hard to find in my area from shops on the Internet, and one if the things I find hard to find in my area are home health care products. Shopping for medical supplies online at a store such as AllegroMedical.com means that you can find everything collected together in one easy to shop location. And with over 55,000 products on their website, it is fairly certain you can find everything you need from just one location.

They say that if you stick with something for long enough that it gets to be a habit and you will do it without thinking about it. I’m going to try that with exercise. I had tried it before, but then stuff happened and I was not able to get in the time to exercise and ended up not getting back into the routine.

I think it is time that I got back into the routine of exercising once again. It’s not easy for me, and I don’t mean to say that exercising itself is hard - it is a mental thing.

I have decided that I am going to see if I can’t stick to the Slim Fast diet plan this week leading up to Thanksgiving. I don’t expect to feel much like eating anything for Thanksgiving, but if I do end up eating something, or just eating stuff that is really high in calories, I don’t want to have that mess up what weight loss I have achieved.

So, for the next just shy of a week I am going to be very good and not overload on stuff that I know I really should not be eating.