9 Top Recovery Run Tips + Choc Chia Recipe
Blog by Rachel Grunwell: Rotorua Marathon ambassador, multi-marathoner, qualified yoga teacher, magazine wellness columnist, magazine recipe creator & Rotorua’s Polynesian Spa ambassador
Follow Rachel via InspiredHealthNZ’s Instagram and Facebook
9 Top Recovery Run Tips + Choc Chia Recipe
It’s not long now until the Rotorua Marathon event on May 5 and so training is hitting its highest gear. The long runs are longer and it’s an increasingly longer time on the feet for walkers too. So, use some great recovery methods is incredibly key right now. You want to be using everything you can in order to arrive at the start-line injury-free and ready to do your best on race day!
Here are 9 Top Recovery Tips: I use all these tips and they’ve helped me conquer 19 marathons. So I swear by them!
- * Make friends with a foam roller. These are seriously amazing for “ironing” out niggles ie making those tight muscles less oucheeeee. Use a roller for a few minutes on areas like your calves, IT bands, thighs, shins and quads. It’s even lovely to roll your back over a foam roller – it’s an amazing self-massage tool. There are other self-massage tools on the market too like stick rollers and other weird-shaped (torture) tools! Find the tender spots and roll them with LOVE. Your body will thank you for this, I promise.
- * Eat ideally within 30-mins roughly after a long training run or walk to help boost muscle recovery.
- * Some sports physios and massage therapists are increasingly training in needling. This can target really deep tissue hotspots if you need to iron out niggles that are really deep and you can’t seem to shake. If you are not afraid of needles, then I’d recommend trying this treatment. It doesn’t hurt a bit, I reckon.
- * Get a professional sports massage. I can’t rate these high enough. These experts are worth their weight in gold. They can target any tiny issues you might have and give you amazing advice too. Plus you get to chat away to them and they have to listen ha ha ha ha. Or is that just me who loves to talk, talk, talk lol.
- * Sleep like a prince or princess. This affects your physical and emotional health. So, it affects how you recover from training runs and how well you feel while running (or walking). Feel more alert and power your performance with more shut-eye… This is also FREE, of course. Bonus! If you get to bed by midnight, this is most ideal (it’s to do with cortisol levels ok babe…)
- * Drop the habit of drinking so much alcohol. This can disturb your sleep patterns and can stop you from going into REM – the very rejuvenating sleep.
- * Try some gentle yoga classes or at least take several minutes to do some static stretching after running or walking to reset your body. This will help you to move well. For some of my fave run stretches that I use often and highly recommend CLICK HERE.
- * Go for a recovery swim. If you are in Rotorua, then I’d recommend the Blue Lake, Lake Tarawera or Lake Okareka. Better still, indulge in the rejuvenating hot pools at the Polynesian Spa. Bliss!
- * Make a pact with yourself to eat more nutritionally-rich kai. Smart eating will help you think better, feel better and perform better. So, add spinach to your scrambled eggs or swig back a home-made juice (so you know what is in it). Here’s an amazing beetroot juice recipe CLICK HERE. Or here’s a Choc Chia Pudding to try below which is full of chia seeds which boast Omega 3 alphalinolenic acid. This is good for your brain, building new cells, and heart-health. Chia seeds are great for satiety too ie filling you up! This also tastes amazing and you can eat it anytime for a snack. Hopefully this will stop you from reaching for chocolate instead!
Post Run Choc Chia Pudding
Ingredients:
1 banana (skin removed)
2 cups almond milk
½ cup coconut cream
1 tablespoon rice malt syrup (or you can use maple syrup instead)
½ teaspoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon cacao powder
½ teaspoon vanilla essence
3 tablespoons Chia seeds (back or white)
Method:
Put all the ingredients (except the chia seeds) into a blender and blitz until smooth. Lastly, add the chia seeds and stir these in with a spoon. Pour into pudding bowls, or I put them into small glasses. Leave them to set in the fridge for 30-minutes or longer. Use a spoon to dig out the mixture and enjoy!
Blog by Rachel Grunwell: Rotorua Marathon run ambassador, wellness blogger & magazine columnist, yoga teacher and Polynesian Spa ambassador. Follow her via InspiredHealthNZ’s Instagram and Facebook
To enter the Rotorua Marathon event or find out more Click Here
This post was sponsored by the awesome peeps who “run” the Rotorua Marathon event. #collab #officialblogger #runambassador
Bionic Woman walks the Gazley Volkswagen Marathon event for The Heart Foundation
Pictured: Helene Kay
WIN: Go into the draw to win a free entry into the Gazley Volkswagen Wellington Marathon event. Enter on our Facebook or Instagram pages!
By Rachel Grunwell
Helene jokes she’s kind of like ‘A Bionic Woman’ – she’s in part made of titanium. But that won’t stop her from entering the Gazley Volkswagen Wellington Marathon event on June 18 and fundraising for The Heart Foundation .
The 59-year-old Kapiti Coast mum (and soon to be grandma) suffered from rheumatic heart disease a year ago. She was so overwhelmed by the care and help she received from The Heart Foundation, that she wants to “give back” now that she is well. She is raising money for the foundation by walking the 21km distance at the Wellington Marathon event and has so far raised over $2300.
Helene says her world was turned upside down last year. She had been feeling unwell, and just generally fatigued, but doctors couldn’t pinpoint why this was the case for quite some time. Finally she had an echocardiogram and doctors discovered she had rheumatic heart disease, which was traced back to having undiagnosed rheumatic fever when she was very young.
Two heart valves were failing and so she needed open heart surgery to replace these with mechanical valves. Hence, she reckons she’s a bit like the Bionic Woman (a series based on the adventures of Jamie Sommers, who is rebuilt bionically and goes on dangerous missions).
Helene’s heart ticks loudly with the mechanical parts and you can hear it if you stand close to her, she says. She jokes she will become ‘The Ticking Nana’ when she becomes a grandmother for the first time (her grandchild is due in June).
Since her health issue, she has been slowly rebuilding her strength and fitness and says an 8-week exercise course post surgery run by the foundation had been integral to her great recovery.
To get even stronger, she set the goal to walk the Wellington event so she can get back to her fitter self (she recently returned to work teaching exercise classes again). She says her goal for the event is simply to finish. And she’s ecstatic that one of her two sons, Devon, will join her on this mission.
She has fundraised the biggest amount for the foundation through this event to date – and credits this to some wonderfully generous friends.
She also hopes to raise awareness that people should seek help and get thorough check-ups when they are feeling unwell.
Helene wants to thank her husband Paul, and other family and friends who have helped her on her heart journey. She couldn’t have done it without them. She particularly credits friend Lyn for inspiring her to walk most days to help her on her journey back to wellness.
Helene is looking forward to reaching the finish-line at the Wellington event, saying “it will feel like the end of my rehabilitation and the beginning of a new me”.
- Join Helene by entering the Wellington Marathon (and run or walk for charity too if you choose). Click HERE
- If you’d like to sponsor Helene’s fundraiser click HERE. The Heart Foundation is NZ’s heart health charity leading the fight against heart disease. They fund research, promote healthy lifestyles and aim to advance cardiac care in NZ.
Blog penned by Rachel Grunwell: Writer, marathoner, Good magazine’s wellness columnist + smoothie chick & yoga teacher. Follow her via Inspired Health’s Facebook & Instagram for lifestyle inspo, recipes & giveaways.