Gretch Runs

It's time for day two of my Big Island adventure!  This day, we ventured up north for a day full of hiking and some beaches thrown in.  We got to see some of the most famous and beautiful Hawaiian sights.  Like the other days we were on the island, the weather cooperated and we got to do so much! Here's a look at how we spent the day: Puako Petroglyph Archaeological District Dan and I started our second day on the Big Island by traveling up to the resort area of the island in Waikoloa to pick up my race packet (coming to my next post!).  I heard about a short hike that we could go on, where we see one of the largest collections of petroglyphs (rock drawings, or in this case lava flow drawings). The walk was short and easy, and it was fascinating to see all of the petroglyphs that were still in impeccable condition, despite being hundreds of years old. Holoholokai Beach Park After we finished up the walk, we stumbled upon the most beaut...

Hi everyone!  This post is a long time coming, and one that I've been really excited to write!  Back in December, I took my first trip to Hawaii and had the most amazing trip ever.  When Dan had to go back for work again in June, I jumped at the chance to join him again.  This time, we decided to stop at the Big Island first for a little vacation, then head to Oahu for his work. When we were planning, we picked a different area to explore each day.  While the island is, like the name suggests, BIG- I decided to focus on different cardinal directions and tackle a new one every day.  While I don't make itineraries for travel, I did have a few items booked (a few of which got changed around which you'll see in a later post) and that helped us decide what to do each day.  Besides that, we played everything by ear and just did what sounded fun! Today I'll be talking about what we did on our first full day in Hawaii, where we traveled down south to ...

Hi everyone and Happy Friday!  I have an exciting post and update to share today- I completed my first triathlon!  If you've been following for the past few months, I've been training for the North Park Triathlon.  I chose this race because it's close to my house, so I could get in a lot of on-course training, and it was also a sprint, so I could ease my way in to this new sport! I really enjoyed the entire process of tri training and the actual race!  I'm definitely going to be doing more, and now know exactly what I can improve on next time (spoiler alert- SWIMMING).  Here's a recap of how the race went- Swim  700 meters Goal : 15:00 Actual : 19:00 For the swim, we were in a huge pool (the largest in the county) for a 700 meter swim.  The pool length is 50 meters, so luckily I only had to do 7 laps (or 14 lengths).  In each lane, there were four athletes, with two at each end.   As soon as my heat started, I to...

Happy Monday everyone!  It's that time again- race week.  While it feels familiar to have a race coming up, it also feels completely foreign to me since it's my first triathlon.  I still don't really know what to expect or what race day will look like, but I'm very excited (and super nervous!) I've missed a few weekly check-ins during my training, so I decided to give an overall look at how my training went. Swimming I would probably have to say that swimming is still the area that I'm most uncomfortable with.  I was going an average of 3 times a week and had a good schedule going, and then my gym closed back in May and I really struggled to get back on track.  I also feel like I hit a plateau and haven't made much progress in the past few months- once I was able to swim 1000 yards non-stop, my paces pretty much stayed stagnant around 2:05/100 yards.  I'm not intimidated by the distance any more (and my race is only 700 yards) but I know I'll ...

Let me be completely honest- this was not the best week of training!  There were a couple life events thrown in the way that I had to work around, so I was just happy to get in at least one swim, run, and bike this week.  There's only 3 weeks to go until race day, so let's just hope I'm doing enough to finish at this point!   Here's a look at how training went- Monday 1 hour SUP Such a perfect day out, so after work I immediately headed to the lake for some paddling.  It was really crowded but I still got to relax and enjoy the weather! Tuesday 3.1 mile run For some reason, I thought it would be a smart idea to go for my run after work, during the highest temperatures of the day, without water.  Luckily I was going on a trail run (since my tri run portion is on trails) which helped A LOT!  I love running on trails and need to get on them more, but this was such an enjoyable run. Wednesday Rest Day! For work, we ...

Believe it or not (I sure can't)- it's the final countdown until my first triathlon!  In less than four weeks, I'll be toeing the pool line and getting ready to dive in to this new adventure (jk about diving, I don't know how to do that yet).   I haven't posted a training update in a while because I was in Hawaii for the past two weeks, and didn't really do any specific workouts while I was there.  I did run in a race and do lots of active things, but I'll share those in a separate post.  For today, I'm going to look back at last week and how training went! Monday Rest Day! This day can also be known as struggle city.  I traveled home from Hawaii on Sunday, and because of the time difference got back around 6AM in Pittsburgh and immediately worked.  I ended up being up for about 35 hours straight, so working out was definitely not in my cards. Tuesday 2 mile run I was still not feeling fully recovered, but I wanted to at le...

It took me a while, but I finally finished up my post all about my trip to Ireland!  This was the second part of our trip to Scotland back in May (which we bought on Groupon), and unfortunately this leg of the trip was way too short.  I've heard so many great things about Ireland, so I definitely feel like I need to come back for a longer time to really experience the country!  It was extremely beautiful and amazing, but we were constantly rushing through things because we only had two full days. Here is my very abbreviated trip summary!  I hope you enjoy, and make sure to give me recommendations on what I need to visit when I (eventually..hopefully...) make it back! Green Acres Bed and Breakfast One of the best aspects of our Groupon was being able to choose any Bed and Breakfast that we wanted.  Since we only had a few days in Ireland, we decided the best idea would be to pick a place that was near Dublin, so that we could easily get in to the city and ...