Do you taper before a race?

"Are you tapering?" he asked me as I foam-rolled away this morning's run on the treadmill. "Um...we'll see how it goes," I stammered in an effort to avoid having to admit that I had not yet begun to taper my efforts. I will be running 8K (5 miles) in Chicago's Shamrock Shuffle this weekend, I ran nine miles on Sunday, and I whipped out three very quick, 8-minute miles yesterday morning. True, those three miles don't equal 8K. Double true—I should be tapering. Why? "Don't leave your race on the treadmill," he said to me. Translation: Don't exhaust yourself right before a race. Thus, the concept of tapering. Something I always have to remind myself to do. When you get in the groove, you don't want the groove to stop. And "practice makes perfect," right? But tapertime tells us we're at a point where our practice has made us "perfect," so we should be taking a few days to rest up for the, well...for the big event. Because over-practicing, once again, just makes us tired. And so, rather than squeeze in another run this week, we'll see if I can squeeze into my Thursday spin class. If I can't, then I'll probably just go for a nice, leisurely jog along the beach. The weatherman promises warmer temperatures this week, and I plan to hold him to it.

Speaking of jogging, I've been drooling over the Nike LunarFly+ 1.5 iD running shoe. You know, the one you can customize. First of all, I love the shoe. It's sorta similar to what I'm running in right now (when I'm not in my FiveFingers). Second of all, how cool is it that you can customize how they look? 'Cuz let's face it—there are some seriously ugly running shoes out there. I'd make mine look like this:


Or maybe I'd go with this:

Love me some dots. And I'm really liking the pink and green. Truth be told, I probably won't be ordering them anytime soon, though. I'm still getting some life out of my current shoes. And I've never really been a more-than-one-pair-at-a-time kind of girl.

I am, however, a granola bar girl. (Duh.) I figure it's time for another of Terry Walters' delicious recipes. Have you signed up for my giveaway yet? If you do, you might win a copy of Clean Food in which you'll find the recipe for the following:

But since I'm nice, and since she's given me permission to reproduce a few of her recipes on Daily Dose, I'll give it to you right now. 

Terry Walters' Raisin Nut Bars
Ingredients:
1-1/2 cups raisins (I used mixed berries.)
1 cup brown rice flour
1 cup rolled oats
1 cup toasted walnuts, chopped (I didn't toast mine.)
1/2 tsp. sea salt
1/4 cup canola oil
1/4 cup maple syrup
Apple juice as needed

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350F. Place raisins in bowl and cover with boiling water. Let sit 10 minutes or until soft. Drain and press out excess water. Chop softened raisins and set aside.

In large bowl, combine flour, oats, walnuts and salt. In separate bowl, whisk together oil and syrup. Pour wet ingredients over dry ingredients, add raisins and mix until blended. You want the dough to be moist enough to just stick together. Add apple juice if needed to achieve this consistency.

Oil a 6x9-inch glass casserole and press in batter so it sticks together and is consistently thick throughout. Pre-cut into squares and bake 25 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool completely before removing from pan. Store in airtight container.

Word of advice: Add the apple juice if you have it. I didn't have any on hand, but noticed that my dough wasn't quite the consistency she calls for. I hoped for the best, and while it still tasted delicious, the bars ended up a bit crumbly.

Question: Do you taper? What running shoes are on your must-have list?

REMINDER! Don't forget to enter my giveaway! You just might win one of two cookbooks from Terry Walters! (Contest ends at midnight EST on Friday, February 8, 2011).


Recipe reprinted with permission from Clean Start ©2010 by Terry Walters, Sterling Epicure, an imprint of Sterling Publishing Co., Inc.