my garmin thoughts & eating asheville, day 2

Good morning! After the most epic Monday ever (starting at 3 am and ending at 10 pm), I’m glad to say that Tuesday is off to a good start.

I headed to Shelby park to get my run on. One mile easy, then alternating fast/easy every half mile, then one mile easy. Since my half-mile fast portions were at the start of each mile (4.0-4.5, for example), it was easy to check my pace during these segments. I stayed below 7:00 for almost all of them!

I was randomly thinking about the days before I got my Garmin and wondering whether I would have gotten faster with or without it over the past couple years. Even though I’m a fan of intuitive running and learning to feel (rather than see) the intensity of a run, I also think that having my Garmin has helped me become a faster runner. Because it’s such a black-and-white analysis of each mile, I think it makes me more honest with myself and more likely to push the pace when I know I can. I try not to obsess over each mile time (especially for long and easy runs), but I do find it helpful for speed workouts. Anyways. What do you think?

6.5 miles total, with a lovely turnaround point over the Cumberland River:

I realized today that I haven’t been out for a normal run since Wednesday of last week, so it was nice to get out there and do my thing!

Okay, time for more Asheville eats! This town was basically created for foodies, so Anthony and I had to eat as much as possible in our short stay. It’s a tough job.

Sunday kicked off with sad egg white McMuffins and rocket fuel coffees since our hotel and the Starbucks beside it had no food offerings. I’ll spare you a photo! Then we went on an amazing and incredibly difficult trail run…

and then were officially starving for lunch.

Around 2 pm we rolled into Farm Burger and our lives improved dramatically. I got a chicken burger which included a delicious kale coleslaw. I really want to recreate it — maybe this recipe will do the trick?

Anthony kept it classic with a beef burger, cooked to perfection. Farm Burger sources its meat from its own grassfed cow collective in Georgia. Pretty cool!

The sweet potato fries were also amazing. We dominated lunch.

After a stroll around downtown (which included a Kristen Wigg sighting! I got a photo but feel bad posting her to the interwebs like a stalker), we “accidentally” stumbled upon French Broad Chocolates, a sweet shop that our insider guide Kevan told us about.

Cold sipping chocolate in a wine glass? Sign me up.

I was actually supposed to leave Asheville and drive myself home at this point (Anthony is staying for work), so I packed up my bags, got in the car, and was about to start the 4-hour, 45-minute journey home. But then I randomly decided that I should stay another night and put off my road trip until Monday morning. YOLO.

So we took a nap (see above note about insanely tough trail run), saw Hercules, and got PHO. At Pho-R-Us.

Pretty good soup! Their chicken pho is made with all white meat, which I loved because I’m not a big dark meat eater, but didn’t love because it made the soup a little less flavorful. We just piled on sriracha and everything was good.

And since it was our last night in Asheville, we had to hit up one last brewery…. Wicked Weed.

Anthony got the “coolcumber” beer, which was unique and surprisingly yummy. Cucumber beer? Strange but good.

Considering that all of my food/drink photos from a single 30-hour trip filled up two entire blog posts, I’d say we did a good job eating Asheville. That was fun!

• Garmin: Love it or hate it?
• Flavored beer: Love it or hate it?
• Kale: Love it or hate it?