Just a few days in Chi-Town

Well Chicago---I’m back!

I lived in Chicago for a semester a few years ago when I had an internship downtown. It was quite the experience living in a big city for a few months. Overall I’m glad I did it but now know that I don’t belong living in a big city.

Back to present: I’m in Chicago for a conference (and sleeping on the floor of the hotel room) and it’s beautiful weather out! Unfortunately for you, I forgot my camera (along with my dress shoes) so there aren’t any cool pictures.

Day 1:
Got up and did speed work on a treadmill at the hotel: 2 x (1 min @ 7:00 pace, 2 min @ 7:30, 3 min @ 8:00).

Had breakfast and hit the town, along the way I stopped by the Garmin Store, NikeTown and the Oakley Store (just window shopping) before grabbing lunch at Potbelly’s.

Went to a few sessions, and hung out with academic snobs before heading to dinner with the department. Boy was this an experience. We (6 grad students) blindly followed our professors to Fogo de Chao, a Brazilian steakhouse. It’s a REALLY nice restaurant that had great food, but here’s the kicker…the meal itself was $55!! As in my meal alone with my water in total cost me $65!! Needless to say, it was a hard learned lesson: always ask to see a price menu before eating.

Then we all partied the night away with a bunch of professors and scholars…clearly I roll with the cool people.

Day 2:
Slept in until 7:30am before going down to the gym. The cardio machines were all full so I hit the weight room (a pretty nice weight room for a hotel) and did a leg and arm workout for an hour.

Hung out in on the town before presenting about my thesis work. Surprisingly enough, 15 people came to the session (which is a good number for these things) and things went well.

After my head hurt from the academic-speak I headed back to the gym for another speed workout (5 min @10:00, 2 x 1 min @7:00, 2 x 2 min @7:30, 5 min @10:00, 2 x 1 min @7:00, 2 x 2 min @7:30, 5 min @10:00)….did ya get all that?

After I was officially dead, we headed out for Chicago style pizza and hanging out with the other grad students until the wee morning of the hours.

Highlight of the night: I ran up the down escalator…I’ve always wanted to do that! Only stupid me, it was a two floor escalator, I had just done sprints and had lifted in the morning…my legs did not like me afterwards!

Day 3:
After 3 nights on the floor in a sleeping bag (did I mention there were 6 of us to a room?) I am so ready to get back into my bed. Unfortunately that won’t happen for a few more nights but we head out finally today. I could have worked out early this morning but decided to skip it, my body is sore from yesterday.

Overall, besides dealing with politics with professors, I had a really good time with the other grad students. I’ll admit that spending 3 nights in a hotel with 5 other people made me nervous about possible drama emerging but nothing happened! They good people, maybe I’ll keep them around for a while.

Now we’re heading back across the river and I get to spend a whole 10 hours in Iowa City before heading south for my school visit. I’ll keep ya posted! Hope everyone’s training is going well!