Christine Burke Fitness

I’ve been experiencing some pain in my right hip and adductor (think thigh-master muscles) since the Kauai Half-Marathon last fall, and I had assumed it was an overuse injury. It came and went for some time, but it significantly improved in the last few weeks, and I was delighted that it didn’t bother me at all during the Carlsbad Half last Sunday.

I noticed yesterday that it was bothering me a little again, and then today, it was hurting me quite a bit. I was so bummed! I was wondering if I had injured it again during the race when I suddenly realized… I wore different shoes for the Carlsbad Half.

I prefer lightweight “performance” shoes to run races, but they wear out so fast that I tried a heavier one for regular training. I realize now that my hip pain disappearing a few weeks back coincided with switching to the lighter shoes, and the hip pain coming back coincided with my switching back.

This, in fact, is my second running injury from not realizing it was my shoes. I had plantar fasciitis and achilles tendonitis from running on worn out shoes. They didn’t look worn out at all… they were the lightweight ones I like for racing, and I guess they just wear out faster. Once I got new shoes, my heel healed and life was good.

Moral of the story… if you’re a runner, and you’re experiencing pain, CHECK YOUR SHOES. The solution may be as simple as replacing worn out ones, or switching back to a brand/model that didn’t give you trouble.

Happy New Year, everyone! 2010 is going to be great!

If you haven’t figured out details for your fitness goals this year, let me suggest finishing a walking or running event! You’ll have a very clear goal and it’s super fun!

I’ll be running the Carlsbad Half-Marathon later this month, then the Surf City Half right after that. If you’d like to train for the Carlsbad Marathon or Half-Marathon next year, the InMotion Fit training program starts in July!

The original Rock N Roll Marathon in San Diego is June 6! Start training now! Contact me if you need a training plan, a training group, or a relay team!

You say a marathon’s too much of a challenge? How about 6 miles? 4? 3? OK, how about 2 miles? Run or walk with me at the St Patrick’s Day Run/Walk in March, the Carlsbad 5000 in April, and the Oceanside Turkey Trot in November!

All of these events are sunny, close to home, and runner and walker-friendly! Let me know if you have any questions about finishing an event or training for time! Hope to see you out there!

We adopted 2 kitties from FOCAS a few months ago, and I got it in my head to try clicker training them. I had a few false starts, but after a little research on YouTube, I’m getting pretty good results.

One of the super useful things about clicker training is that you can train your pets to calmly get into a carrier or even sit still for a blood draw. Dr. Temple Grandin talks about this in her latest book, Animals Make Us Human. So, I was working on getting the kittens to enter a carrier by themselves, when Alan walked by. He got a very sweet, fond expression on his face, and he smiled and said:

Awww… it’s so cute that you think you’re training them…

New core exercise! The Kitten Crunch!

You’ll need to adopt a cute kitten (or 2) from your local shelter or animal welfare group. When the kitten on your lap decides to take a nap, hold the position below for 30 seconds. As your core gets stronger and your kitten gets older, you should be able to increase to 1, even 2, minutes.

Kitten was adopted from focas-sandiego.org (Friends of County Animal Shelters). Please support their good work.

Hawaii is my favorite place to visit, and I especially love Kauai. Here are some things that made this last trip wonderful, if you ever have the pleasure of visiting:

• The Ultimate Kauai Guidebook by Andrew Doughty – My sister and I bought Maui Revealed for our Maui Half-Marathon trip, and these are simply superior guidebooks. Friendly, funny, up-to-date, and the ONO restaurant ratings won’t let you down.
• The Kauai Marathon & Half-Marathon – A well-organized race, with very pretty scenery. This was the inaugural year, so I’m looking forward to seeing it grow. The elevation for the half was fairly sane (800 feet uphill, then 800 feet downhill), but the marathon route looked more brutal. Hardest part for me was the summer training and the humidity. Also, I really like the logo! It’s an island, a flower, and a runner! Goodies included technical tee and aluminum water bottle. And there was a great shirt with a chicken crossing sign.
• Postcard Shot #1: Kilauea Lighthouse – You can’t take a bad photo there.
• Postcard Shot #2: Waimea Canyon Lookout – Breathtaking. Again, any photos you take are going to be amazing.
• Waiohai Mariott – 2nd time staying here, and I like the big suites with private, roomy bedrooms, air conditioning that works, WIFI, full kitchen, and washer/dryer. Shower heads kinda sucked, but oh well. Cell phone reception in the room sucked, too, but… I kinda enjoyed that.
• Garden Isle Inn – Not a fancy resort or anything, but we stayed here for one night, and it really was nice! Near the airport, clean room, air conditioning, and free WIFI… works for me!
• Puka Dogs – Nom! And happy, friendly service!
• Grove Farm Homestead Museum – Low-key but interesting guided tour about Kauai/Hawaii history.
• Grass-Fed Beef – Dad grilled up some super yummy hamburgers. It seems beef grown on the island is mostly grass-fed.
• Always Awesome: snorkeling at Poipu Beach, doing nothing to island time, the color of the water, reading all the road signs out loud, sushi, Kona coffee, macadamia nut ice cream, and honey roasted macadamia nuts.

I’ll post photos on Facebook! http://facebook.com/cparkburke

My husband, who likes solving crosswords, sometimes asks me for help. Apparently, looking up words in a dictionary and asking your wife for answers is not cheating. Buying a special crossword dictionary or searching Google is.

Today, Alan asked: Do you know the song “The Year of the Cat”?

Me: No.

*pause*

Alan: Do you know who sings it?

From baseball great Jimmy Piersall (at Annie’s Mailbox):

“Spread the diaper in the position of the diamond with you at bat. Then fold second base down to home and set the baby on the pitcher’s mound. Put first base and third together, bring up home plate and pin the three together. Of course, in case of rain, you gotta call the game and start all over again.

Happy Father’s Day!

My husband announced he was making steak for dinner and started making noise in the kitchen. I noticed that he had pulled out our cocktail shaker and a few bottles of liquor. I noted, “That doesn’t look like steak…” He gave me a LOOK and said:

Baby, you clearly don’t understand The Process.

He then went back to “making dinner”, muttering something to the effect that I might enjoy cooking more if I did it right.

(Reposted from National Running Day discussion board on Facebook.)

When I workout to music, I like to fall into sync with the beat. For example, it’s very natural for me to take about 170 steps per minute when I run, so I like to listen to music that has 170 BPM (beats per minute) like Misirlou from Dick Dale & His Del-Tones.

To find the BPM of a song and save it to iTunes, search for “BPM detection software iTunes”. On a Mac, I personally use:

For Automatic Detection:
http://www.wildbits.com/bpmer/

Manual Detection:
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/19324

Finally, to determine your running pace in BPM, download this awesome free MP3 file from hellasound.com: http://tr.im/mlK6

This is my husband’s impression of Twitter:

Got one leg in my underwear!
Got the other one in!
Pulling my underwear up now!
Feels good!

Happy anniversary, sweetie! Love you for making me laugh!