Thursday 14 June 2012

I survived!

I survived my first proper spin class last night, whoop!

I did end up going into Exeter during the day yesterday, and bought lots of new sports clothes from Sports Direct - 3 tops, 2 sports bras, a pair of padded cycle shorts and some trainer socks for less than £50 thanks to them having a sale on. I also need to buy another pair of capri pants but I didn't like any of the ones in Sports Direct and Debenhams didn't have any of the ones I usually buy in my size so I'll have to order online. Now I'm doing 3/4 classes a week (ha, go me!!) my one pair of decent trousers plus one pair I don't really like isn't enough!

After shopping we went for lunch at Herbies - a vegetarian restaurant in Exeter. The food is delicious but the portion sizes are huge! Each main course comes with either a trio of salads or potato wedges, so we got one of each but then took all the potato wedges home for Liam to take into work today...too much food. The trio of salads were delicious though - they are specials that change regularly and yesterday the salads were raw root salad, potato salad with cashews (which was much lighter than regular potato salad - loved it!) and green salad which had some kind of tasty dressing on it:

That's just half the salad - Mum had more on her plate too!

For my main, I had a filo pastry parcel with roasted veg, some kind of tomato sauce and feta cheese...


I also had some of Mum's spinach and mushroom lasagne but that has come out even more blurry than these ones! I took the photos on my phone and they did not come out well, but I wanted to share as the food was so delicious! Luckily the most important photo came out slightly better - even though Mum and I were both full, we really wanted to have a pudding. Something we've never managed to do before as the portion sizes are so huge. We decided to push are tummies to the limit though and get one dessert to share, and I'm so glad we did!


This was a ginger biscuit base topped with lemon and lime curd, served with natural yoghurt, but you could have also had clotted cream, ice cream or non-dairy yoghurt. This was one of the best desserts I've ever had in a restaurant. The base was divine but it was the topping that was really special - citrussy and sweet at the same time and super sticky...yum!!

After this we were more than full, so after a couple more shops we headed home to pick up Izzy from school. I then had a spin class at 7pm and, as usual, was worrying about if/what to eat. I wasn't hungry, indeed I was still full from lunch, but I seem to have this paranoia that I'm going to suddenly get overcome whilst exercising and not be able to continue! A little bit ridiculous considering the fact that I eat plenty every day, but still, I ended up having half a banana (leftover from Toby eating half that morning) smeared with some honey peanut butter at 5pm.

I chickened out of wearing just padded shorts to spin...sorry Lara! ;) I did wear them, but under my usual capris. Luckily they didn't show too much unless you were looking for them. I was walking to the gym so just felt more comfortable like this, plus being my first class I didn't know what to expect. There were a couple of people wearing just the padded shorts though so maybe next week. Either way I'm very glad I was wearing them - at one point we did some kind of pyramid sequence where we'd do 2 counts hovering then 2 counts seated, 4 hovering, 4 seated etc and at the end we just repeated lots of 2s so we were constantly bouncing on and off the seat again! The class went ok though. I didn't love it in the same way I do Body Pump, but as far as cardio goes it was alright - the class went relatively quickly which was a good thing in my book! My legs were super sore immediately afterwards, but are fine today, although I may not be saying that by the time I finish boot camp tonight!

I have woken up feeling really really tired today. I suppose, even though by most people's standards I'm not exercising a huge amount, I have gone from just Body Pump on Mondays (and not last week because of the bank holiday) and occasionally Boot Camp on Thursdays (but this will be my first class in about 3-4 weeks) to this week doing:

Monday: Taster Spin, then Body Pump
Tuesday: off
Wednesday: Spin (45 mins)
Thursday: Boot Camp

After tonight I haven't got any more exercise planned until next Monday Body Pump though so I'll be glad of the rest! I might fit in a daytime exercise into my week next week as I want to take Toby back to creche again, but that will either be swimming or possibly Body Balance if my friend wants to go, so it won't be as tiring as spin hopefully. I like not exercising at the weekends as we always have so much on anyway, but it does mean that I do end up doing quite a lot of classes during the week if I want to make the most of my membership. I don't know how some of you manage exercising most days, I'm exhausted!!

Today has been a nice easy day though - lots of coffee including a trip to Costa with my friend for lattes and toasted teacakes. We also went to the toy shop that has a ball pool in the back. Toby has been wanting to go there all week and dived straight in!!

I've also had another of the bars that Maria sent me...


It tasted like a sticky, slightly less sweet, Bounty bar. I really enjoyed it, will keep a look out to buy one of these again!

On the school run this afternoon it was slightly drizzling, so Izzy requested hot chocolates. Oh go on then...! ;)



Using the hot chocolate powder from my foodie penpal parcel, delicious. And of course the whipped cream on top is very important. I always eat it first with a spoon, but I resisted adding a 2nd helping of it today!

Despite eating the hot chocolate plus a handful of dried apricots at 4pm, my "I'm going to get hungry during exercise" paranoia kicked in just now so, just before my 5pm "deadline", I had a peach (my 2nd of the day, love them!) with some cashew butter...

Could not get a decent photo of these, ha, took photos in about 5 different areas of the kitchen!!

I love the combo of fresh fruit with nut butter, so tasty and it seems like the perfect, not too heavy but still slightly substantial, pre-exercise snack. Although, deep down I do know that the hot chocolate and apricots would have been enough "fuel", I guess I just like the extra excuse to eat! ;)

How many times do you exercise a week? And what is your favourite pre-exercise snack/meal? Part of me thinks I should be eating more of a meal before exercise, as when I come home I tend to eat something quick and easy for "dinner" (scrambled eggs on toast last night for example). I definitely need to add in some more vegetables - dinner on non-exercise tends to be when I eat most of my veg so I have definitely been lacking in greens this week.

6 comments:

  1. Walking TO gym I would still certainly wear tracksuit trousers or something over :-) and WELL DONE on doing the class, rest up and be fit and ready for next week xx

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  2. At the minute I exercise 6 days a week, and take 1 rest day. Which is better than the last few months when I wasn't taking any rest days! Im doing the livefit program so I do 6 days a week of weights usually 45-60 minutes and then on 4 of the days it's followed by 30 minutes of cardio. It's pretty intense, but after a few weeks I am kind of used to it, and don't feel as exhausted! I like nuts or dried fruit or fruit as a pre-workout snack.

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  3. I had (and still have a little) a massive paranoia about not eating enough before working out and being light headed that I'd end up over eating before hand and feeling awful during my workouts. I would never work out in the morning because I thought I'd feel awful without eating but I ended up eating less before hand one time and didn't keel over, and now I will work out in the AM. If your diet is balanced and yours meals a decent size then I wouldn't worry about it too much (obviously if I'm hungry for a PM snack I have it but if I had a massive lunch or something and I'm not hungry I don't force the snack now). Eating before/after takes a while to get the hang of, something I am still working on.

    Also, I'm the same as you as I do most of my workouts in the evenings, so I've tried to make my lunch more like my evening meal and then eat a lighter evening meal, sometimes just a smoothie/toast/eggs like you. Don't stress about the veggies, just try and get them in during the day a bit more maybe like snacking on them.

    Sorry this is such a massive comment, I just relate to a lot of what you've said. I'm glad you're enjoying your classes! :)

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  4. Glad you liked the coconut bar- I bought one for myself too but have not tried it yet- I must find it!
    I think 4 classes a week is quite a good amount really- that must be more than the average person. I am just getting back to a proper routine, but at the moment I have been running 3 or 4 times a week, doing body pump (although it was not on this week) and some walking/gardening. I have not braved aerobics yet!
    I used to worry so much about being hungry when I exercised too- I would always have a snack, and then recently I have been doing short runs at the weekend before breakfast (mainly for time because then I don't have to wait for breakfast to go down)- and even though sometimes I feel hungry, I have been fine so I am trying to learn that I have energy within me even if I have not eaten in the past few hours!
    And well done on going back to the spin- I suppose after the first few classes you start to get used to the feeling and you won't be quite so stiff which is why they say to try it a few times before you decide.

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  5. Congrats on going to your first spinning class; ive got to the point where i actually dont like to eat before i work out as im always worried im going to be sick and bring it all back up! Almost the opposite of what you feel like! I normally exercise about 7-8 times a week, some high intensity some low intensity like pilates, like to mix it up!

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  6. I'm so glad that you enjoyed the spinning class. I haven't been for ages, but used to love it.

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