Ringing in 2011

Happy new year! I hope everyone had a fun and safe new years eve!

Chris and I started New Years Eve out with dinner at Wine ‘N Diner.

I called ahead to see if we needed a reservation, but it turned out they weren’t crowded at all! Score!

We each ordered a drink, I ordered Champagne with raspberries and Chris got a New York beer.

We ordered black bean dip with avocado and house made hummus for an appetizer.

The pita bread was warm and chewy, and the hummus and black bean dip were really good, but could have used more of a kick. It was a bit bland.

I really like that Wine N Diner has lots of veggie options.

For my meal I got the Herbivore: roasted beets, fennel, shallots, avocado and hummus on toasted whole wheat bread.

The sandwich was really good–but again, lacking much flavor. I think the hummus really needed more tahini or something because it was bland. The bread was great though, and so were the chips.

Chris got the mac and cheese burger! How fascinating.

But Chris and I had a lovely time during our New Years Eve dinner!

After dinner we hung around until it was time to hit up Chris’ friend’s party where we rung in the new year! I only had one other glass of champagne at midnight! It was fun, and I’m glad I didn’t over do it with drinking because I was running a race in the morning!

The Hangover Half Marathon is part of the Hudson Mohawk Road Runner’s Club Winter Series, and they also had a 3.5 mile race at the same time. Heather, Katie, Cynthia, Melissa and I decided to run the 3.5 miler! We also met a new local blogger Erica! AND none of us were hungover! 😉

The weather this morning for the race was gorgeous. It was probably hovering around 50 degrees! And the sun came out too!

The race itself wasn’t too organized. I had to drive around the University at Albany campus searching for the race start for about five minutes. Eventually I found where tons of cars were parked, at the Physical Education building. There were no signs when I got there either. They would have helped!

The 3.5 mile race must have been really small, because we didn’t even get race bibs or timer chips! We had to write down our time when we finished and hand in the card.

The race started about 10 minutes late, which wasn’t too bad. I felt pretty strong the whole race, and I was running fast. In the back of my mind I wanted to beat my previous 3.5 mile race time of 33 minutes, but I wasn’t going to be too sad if I didn’t. I wanted to have fun!

The race itself was not scenic at all. It was a few loops around the SUNY campus, with sights of the highway and concrete buildings.

I crossed the finish line in 30 minutes and 53 seconds! Hurray, I beat my time!!!

Race Stats
Total Distance – 3.5 miles
Total Elapsed Time – 30:53
Average Pace – 8:42/mile
Mile 1 – 8:55
Mile 2 – 8:49
Mile 3 – 8:51
Mile .50 – 4:17

Since today I was supposed to run 7.0 miles today for half marathon training, Melissa and her friend joined me for another (slower) 3.5 miles around campus! We finished another 3.5 miles in 35 minutes and 12 seconds! This pace was much more comfortable than my race pace!

Cool-down stats
Total Distance – 3.5 miles
Total Elapsed Time – 35:12
Average Pace – 10:03/mile
Mile 1 – 10:28 (legs were feeling kind of stiff!)
Mile 2 – 9:50
Mile 3 – 9:52
Mile .50 – 5:01

Total Miles – 7.0

After the race a few of the ladies and I headed to Cafe Madison for brunch! I was pretty excited since I had a delicious brunch there a few weeks ago.

I ordered the strawberry almond stuffed french toast with a side of fruit.

The fruit cup was good, but I was actually kind of disappointed in my french toast. There were no strawberries to be found. The description on the menu said it would be stuffed with strawberries and drizzled in strawberry sauce. No such luck!!! I hardly tasted any strawberries in the filling (it was just cream cheese and a few slivers on almonds) and there was NO strawberry sauce, only maple syrup. I guess you can’t win them all…

Anyway–brunch with my favorite blends was so much fun. I’m so glad I got to spend New Years Day with them! I hope this means we’ll have many more awesome races and meet-ups in the 2011!

I rang in 2011 perfect: New Years Eve with Chris, racing, food, and blends on New Years Day!

How did you spend New Years?