This Week’s Fitness + Food Highlights

Hey friends! I’m glad many of you liked the look of the salads in my Healthy Summer Salad Recipes round up post! Let me know if you try any of them and what you think. :)

And now – for some food and fitness highlights from the week! Chelsea and I have had not one but two fun fitness adventures this week, which I love! First up was Monday morning – we decided to check out a new-to-us studio that popped up on ClassPass – True Health and Wholeness over in south Arlington. We did their 7 a.m. “Bi’s, Tri’s, and Thighs” workout. We both liked the class – fast paced and the instructor had us do a nice variety of moves so we didn’t get bored. It was only 30 minutes, though, which felt really short – wish it were longer!

For our second workout adventure of the week, we met up for a run this morning! Now that she lives in Arlington again, we thought it would be fun to mix it up from our usual ClassPass dates and do a run together. Apparently we were both feeling the orange!

We did a fun 3.5 mile out and back and stopped 3 times for mini boot camps. Always a fun way to break up the run – try it! :) At the stops, we did lunges, squat jumps, push ups, sit ups, supermans, and dips. A variation on my “Total Body Circuit Workout”!

On our way back, we discovered this fallen tree on the trail – pretty sure that wasn’t there on our way out?! Yikes! We had some crazy storms in the DC area last night!

Anyway, it was a fun way to start the day – thanks for getting me out there, Chelsea! :)

We are in town this weekend so I didn’t have to worry about getting my long run in early for once. My coaches want me to do a 14 or 15 miler this week… oof!

Speaking of running and other endurance events – if you’re sick of gels and gummies, give my Long Run Energy Bites a try. The recipe is featured over on Strength Running this week!

As for other fitness this week, I had a great track workout on Tuesday (more on that in tomorrow’s post) and a stretching and mobility session with Paul from Capital Energy Training yesterday evening! My right outer calf area has been feeling a bit tight/irritated this week so in addition to our usual hip stretching (my hip feels a thousand times better than when we first started working together – so impressed) Paul used the body buffer machine that I wrote about previously on that area of my leg. He also put some castor oil on my leg before using the massager – interesting! Apparently castor oil + massage is used a lot in the Ayurvedic treatment world to help with sore muscles. Have any of you guys tried using it before?

On the food front, one of the big highlights was dinner at my friend Sokphal’s place on Monday night! You guys know her as one of my favorite running buddies, but we haven’t met up in awhile because our running schedules weren’t jiving well, so we decided to do a dinner date to catch up instead! Hanging out in normal clothes, not at the crack of dawn, and while not running?! Weird, but I like it. :) Here’s our first non-sweaty selfie where we both have visible hair, for your viewing pleasure:

I threw together a salad to bring with me for the occasion – a mix of arugula and spinach with cucumbers, strawberries, and feta. The vinaigrette is homemade and was a mix of hemp oil + red wine vinegar + dijon mustard + lemon juice.

For our main event, Sokphal made salmon (simply seared in a pan with some olive oil and spices – delicious!) and roasted brussels sprouts with bacon (homegirl knows me well – bacon FTW). It was all so good!

Dessert was pineapple. It was super juicy – perfect for a hot summer night!

One more food highlight from this week: if you live in northern Virginia and haven’t tried Koi Koi sushi in Falls Church, do it. It’s so good! I went there yesterday for lunch with my friends Ben and Taylor (who, btw, are Washington DC wedding photographers if you’re interested – they photographed our wedding back in 2012)! Fun to catch up with them – Ben and I have been good friends since high school. :)

I’ll leave you with some of my fave links from around the web this week. Have a great day!

• Eat: The Importance of Healthy Fat for Kids // 15 Protein Ball Recipes from Healthy Living Bloggers // Crispy Cheese Tortilla Breakfast Tacos // Recipe Ideas for Ripe Bananas // Long Run Energy Bites
• Move: Running Motivation from Marathoners // 10 Workouts to Try When You’re Bored at the Gym // 10 Minute Lower Body Barre Burner Workout Video // Hiking Kilimanjaro (loving Charlie’s recaps from her recent trip – it’s now officially on my bucket list!)
• Think: What if Intuitive Eating Doesn’t Work? // Elementary School Deals with Conflict by Sending Kids to Mindful Moment Room instead of Principal’s Office (LOVE this idea)