Happy Tuesday! November has arrived and with that, the promise that winter is quickly approaching! Check out the view from my desk this morning. Yes, that white line is the first snow which fell in the mountains last night! Soon we will be spending our weekends skiing and enjoying the cold weather but for now, I’m more than happy to enjoy a few more weeks of Autumn in Geneva and London. Afterall, the meteorologists and Farmer’s Almanac all predict another year of colder than normal temperatures and heavy snow for Europe. In advance of Winter and the holiday chaos, I find November to be a great month to reset after marathon training.
Now that the marathon is over it’s time to redefine my goals. A creature of habit who needs constant motivation, I never like going more than two weeks without an end goal in mind. November is all about strength, both in mind and muscle.
Mind: This evening Renaud eagerly asked me when we could begin running together. I laughed, not taking him seriously. Then I realized he wasn’t joking. “You have a trail race to win in June afterall Ashley.” I laughed at him knowing damn well that there is no way I’m going to win a trail race in June. In fact, I’ll be lucky if I can run the entire thing considering the elevation change and the fact that it will be my first. But, then as he continued to ask me when we could run and if he can coach me, I realized that my mind was getting in the way. I absolutely loved running the Saleve with Renaud back in February when I was a guest in his home and had no choice. Why is it that I’ve lived here for four 3.5 months and haven’t been back up those challenging trails? My goal is to run with him at least once a week this month beginning with an after work trail run tomorrow night followed by a jaunt up the Saleve next Saturday. It’s going to be hard but until I get out of my own head I will never get stronger.
Muscle: Since moving to Geneva, strength training has taken a back seat. While I am still climbing stairs and walking a great deal daily, I would like to regain some of the strength I built during my year of personal training and then Barry’s Bootcamp and Uplift classes. I am doing this by getting back into the habit of doing pushups and planks daily in addition to two dedicated strength workouts each week. Today I finally took advantage of the lunch time Body Pump class offered in my office gym. It was fully in French and the weights were in kilograms which resulted in some weight and plate confusion but overall I loved every, sweaty minute! It was also a good wakeup call as I could feel my glutes engaging and left the class quivering all over. Bodypump 87 is definitely a challenging workout filled with lots of squats, lunges, chest presses, and clean and press!
I’ll update you all each week on this month’s goals through training updates!
What are your goals this month in advance of the chaotic holiday season?
