W6D1 and Ode to a Legend

Tonight I graduated to week six. It was a good run. There were no inhibitions about it because it seems easy (5-5-3-8-3-5-5). There were no double digit runs for this day. I think running on my treadmill at home is harder than running on the one at the gym. Maybe it is because my treadmill is over 10 years old. I am not sure. And yes, I have owned a treadmill for 10 years and moved it to six different homes and never used it to its full ability.

About seven years ago I started working out and would walk on my treadmill for 20 minutes about three times a week. But about four years ago, my business suffered a small setback and it caused alot of stress. The stress took a toll on my lifestyle. I couldn't focus, I started eating comfort foods, and I stopped working out. Four years and sixty pounds later, here I am.

But I am starting to see alot of changes in me and my family. Not just in my improvements in my runs but my home life. I am happier and my family is happier. I have the energy to keep up my household and my family helps more. Since we started working out, we encourage each other. Everything is a group effort as oppose to keeping score to see who did more or less in the household. We are far from perfect we are better.

I was shocked yesterday at the sudden death of Michael Jackson and Farrah Faucet's death. Farrah was part of my seven degrees of separation. Her parents were clients of my father. Farrah was often seen around our neighborhood doing everyday things. I grew up far from the Hollywood lights...small town in Texas so it was unusual to see anyone famous. But she was kind enough to give my daughter an autograph and we are both survivors...or we were both survivors. It still shocks me when someone that had cancer after I had cancer, gets cancer again and passes away. It just makes me wonder why I am still here. But only God knows. She will be missed.

Michael Jackson defined my generation. He defined how music videos should be produced and choreographed. I danced and sang to his songs throughout my teenage years. Yes, I know what they say he has done recently, I don't know if it is true, even so, another truth about him is that he was a great performer and I will celebrate that part of him. So, in honor of him, I put together a playlist of Micheal Jackson songs and ran to them today. Off the Wall, Black or White, Dirty Diana, Smooth Criminal, Wanna be startin something...wooooo those songs took me back. Pin It

W5D3

I struggled with what title to give this entry. This entry has soo much for me.

• First time to run twenty minutes straight
• First time to run a complete mile
• First time to cry at the gym
• Tiger woods congratulated me on my best mile ever

Tuesday I was suppose to run my first full 20 minutes and I was scared. So on Tuesday night, I cleaned house like a mad woman and did the weekly grocery shopping. In other words, I tried to keep myself busy so that I didn't have to do it.

Wednesday rolls around and I know it is now or never. My Mini is giving me smack and the weight of the fear is worse than not even trying. I mean, in reality, if I have to start walking in the middle of it, who cares? How many times did I stop in W2, when 90 seconds seemed too hard, or during the three minute runs, I felt as if my legs were going to give? It happened too many times to count. So at 10pm, I got up enough nerve and went to the gym with my family. ( I love 24 hour gyms).

I got on a treadmill, decided I was going to do the run without the C25K prompts on a podcast or on my Iphone application, changed the TV in front of me to Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares and started. The warm up was usual and then I started to run.

My pace was 3.3 on the treadmill. Believe it or not, the first 7 minutes were the hardest to run and I thought I wasn't going to be able to do it. To take my mind off the minutes, I started to read the closed captioning on the TV and before I knew it, it was 12 minutes into the run. I remember looking down at 14:51 minutes (this is the girl that died on the 90 seconds and now 171 secs go by and I don't even feel it.) I felt amazing. Because it was dark outside and the blinds were open, I could see my reflection in the mirror...I looked like a runner. When I hit minute 15, I knew I could do this. Mentally, I was saying, 5 minutes is nothing. Two weeks ago, 5 minutes seemed like so much to me. I am getting better and I am loving it.

At 19:01 minutes of running and the treadmill was at 1.21 miles, I hit my first big milestone. I had run a complete mile. I started to cry and yelled out "I just ran my first mile". Thank goodness the only people in the gym were me and my family. Oh, no, I was crying so much that I couldn't catch my breath and I was still trying to run...I had 50 seconds left. I felt great but just couldn't catch my breath. But I did it. I finished my run. My family heard me yell and they saw me crying so they gathered around me to congratulate me.

But you know what was my proudest moment? When I was looking at the reflection of the gym in the glass window, I saw my daughter behind me on an Arc trainer. She was watching me and smiling. Every once and a while, she gave me a thumbs up. And when she came over to my treadmill, she said, "Mama, I am proud of you. You did it." My husband said he was proud of me. He said he remembers me dying on 90 second runs and now through patience and perseverance, I am able to do twenty minutes. Even Tiger Woods congratulated me on my best mile ever.

This gal, whose comfort zone was the fact that she was too big to run, just ran 20 minutes. I couldn't believe it. I didn't stop when I got tired and pushed through. It felt good to run. It no longer was a struggle.

Running has given me back my confidence. Who knew I would become a PR junkie? I have to be honest with you. I have seen those initials everywhere in magazines and didn't know what they meant. They mean Personal Record. Yes, I am a PR Junkie. I also started biking and I want to Kayak. These are things I didn't think I could do and the Kayak thing scared me last summer. Now, I can't wait to try it.

Pin It

Nike Mini Really Works

I was going to take the whole weekend off from running. I had a full schedule. It went something like this:

Friday
4:00 pm get off of work
4:15 make side dish for pot luck dinner
5:00 get dressed
6:00 get to dinner party and stay til past 1 in the morning

Saturday
5:45 am get up for swim meet
7:00 am -1 pm---stay outside in 96 degree weather at swim meet

2-7 pm catch up on some sleep
7-10:30 go shopping for Fathers Day gifts

Sunday
9 am church...I didn't go because I over slept
10 am yikes notice my Mini is talking smack about me
10:30 washed clothes, cooked breakfast, cleaned house
3:30 get on treadmill for only 30 minutes
4:15 cook for Fathers Day dinner
6:00 travel an hour to dinner
7-11pm visit with family then drive home
12-2am come home to a house full of diarrhea. One of my dogs was sick and did it everywhere

I say all that to say this....being busy is not an excuse to not work out. 30 minutes is all you need. I would not have learned that lesson if my Mini was not holding me accountable and was visible to all you guys. I would have just let the weekend go by without working out and I would have felt justified. Find something or someone to hold you accountable....it helps. Pin It

Am I running?

I am all over the Internet looking at running blogs. I want to learn all I can and get tips from those who are actually running. Most are encouraging blogs with great tips. Some seem to be just snobby. The "feel" I get from them is that they seem somehow justified in thinking they are above everyone. Case in point, I read a blog where the writer mentioned how he hated when people call themselves runners but their pace is X amount. Being the curious new runner, I decided to look up the definitions of running and walking.

According to Merriam Webster the definition of running is : to go faster than a walk ; specifically : to go steadily by springing steps so that both feet leave the ground for an instant in each step.

There was no mention of pace. It seems to come down to technique. And if you technique can be described by the above definition, then by God, you are running. You may not be running fast but if you are running. So if run across one of these blogs, don't be discourage. Speed or pace will come with time. Just do your best and try to improve on that. If you are consistent with your work out, then it is inevitable that your pace will increase.

And as time goes by, you may find out that not only will your pace increase but it will build confidence. Ever since I started running, I am seeing a different side of me. I go into Academy and I am not embarrassed. I feel as though I belong. I started to go biking, because there is no reason why I can't. I am seriously thinking about kayaking. There are no limits to what I can do as long as I believe that I can and set a goal. Pin It

Week 5 Day 1 and Muddy Buddy

It has been a really long day, so I will start out with the good. I was in Dallas, on business, and dropped by the state park that is hosting the Muddy Buddy. Here is a picture of the terrain for the bike portion of the event. I will definitely need a mountain bike. Where are the paved roads or the dirt paths that I am accustomed to riding? This is full of rocks and hills and rocks. Did I mention rocks? Well, Dallas is 5 hours away so we can't train on this trail. We are looking for some in the area. However, the Gulf Coast is pretty flat so I will have to do the Kemah bridge for hill work.

Now the bad. I went to the gym today for my consultation. We just joined the gym last week and the consultation is free. I found out that I am over 50% fat and that I can do 9 sit ups in sixty seconds, my cardio endurance is good and that my flexibility is poor. So basically, no surprises. My work on Couch to 5K has paid off. But I knew I was in poor shape...which is why I started C25K and why I joined a gym. I have spent the last month working on that and I have made some great improvements.

So why did this trainer talk to me as if I was a lazy a$$ and was pretty much hopeless?!?!? He was shocked at how well I did on the treadmill test. He waited for me to break down when he mentioned that I failed all the other tests and kept repeating over and over again "that" while pointing to my percentage of body fat, was too high, life threatening, really bad, horrible, scary and that I would have to change my eating habits. When I said I had started, he said, not enough and that it was hard and he wasn't sure I could do it. Say what? And he kept asking me if I was okay? OH, and after he spent 40 minutes telling me how horrible I ate and how fat I was, he decided not to do the fitness test. He said that I would fail and probably couldn't handle the results? Can't handle the results? I knew I wasn't fit. Why else would I join a gym? Nonsense...lets do the test....that is when I failed. Hey my measurements said I had failed and my physical tests said I had failed...at least I was consistent.

He kept saying over and over, "Geesh, you are taking the news pretty well. I expected you to break down and cry." I simply said, "No, why should I? I know where I stand, it is my fault and now I need to make some goals. But I already started that with Couch to 5k.

I finished my day with my W5D1 run. I did pretty well. I was able to complete the 5 minute runs. During my second run, I did stop for about 20 seconds. On my third run was better. I felt like stopping but I noticed I only had 14 seconds left so I continued. I even did a second short run after completing C25K ( I usually stay on the treadmill for about 10 minutes after it).

Here is how I did:

Duration: 38'50"

Distance: 2.11 miles

Average Pace: 18'23" minute mile

Calories burned: 401

Max HR: 171

Average HR: 154

Pin It

My Nike MIni is talking smack about me

So, this past week has been crazy. Between, swim meets, starting a gym routine, going out of town and a big project for work, my running has been lacking. I ran last Friday but today is Wednesday. On Saturday, I did do the elliptical but the Nike+ doesn't count that. Needless to say, if you look to the right, my Nike Mini is either playing video games or some other mindless game. I am suppose to meet with the trainer tonight, so at lunch, I am going to have to run. Pin It

Week 4 D3...and counting

The GYM. Ahhh!!! I use to know it well. There was a time in my life that the gym was my Cheers. Yah know, the place where everyone knows your name and they are always glad you came. Well, those days are long gone. But today, today my family joined Snap Fitness. I live in a small town and local gyms are hard to come by. But a few months ago Snap Fitness came into our town. My daughter is thirteen and is now old enough to go to a gym, my husband feels he is getting old and I want to become fit, so the gym seemed like a natural next step for my family.

Now this gym is sandwiched between a great Mexican restaurant and an even better Chinese restaurant. But it is also open 24 hours, which is great for my night owl family. As a matter of fact, it is midnight and we just got home from working out.

Oh and a great feature to this gym? I get an online place to view my workouts and see my planned workouts...in detail. The best part, I can do it from my IPhone and even see videos of the exercises to make sure that I am doing them correctly. That's right, one more use for my IPhone, one more place to track my progress and one more gadget to fall in love with. It's a sickness, I know.

Well, I haven't had my official introduction to all the equipment but I did go tonight to do D3 of W4. (Yeah, I entered the wrong week on the previous post, but I fixed it.) Now, I have one question for all those gym designers...who the heck decides to put the treadmill in front of all the other machines? Do they not realize the ramifications of this? Do they not realize that while my big behind is jiggling that the whole gym will be able to see me? Are you getting the visual here? I am and it is not pretty. But I am not there for the others, sorry folks, you are just going to have to live with it.

Now I have a treadmill at home that is pretty slick but I bought it ten years ago and there have been many improvements made to these slick machines. For example, they can read my chest band on my HRM. They can sync with my Nike+. They can even tell me my weight. Yes, today I had to face an unexpected weigh in. You see, if you read my very first post, I am not doing this running thing to lose weight. I am doing it to get fit. I am assuming that losing weight is going to be a great by product of becoming more fit. So I haven't weighed myself in about 6 months and had an "idea" of what I weighed.

Well, I get on the treadmill and set my pace and incline and hit "Quick Start", easy enough. Then numbers start to scroll past me on the screen. Ok, that one is the time as it is passing, that one seems to be my heart rate because it matches my Polar watch, that one is my current pace, that one looks like my calories only it is really really high, oh wait a minute, this number is my calories burned, so what is that other number that flashed by?.......It was my weight. It was my weight thirty pounds more than what I expected. I almost stopped the machine. That number scared me. There is no way I am able to make that amount of mass move on a treadmill.

It reminded me of my days of cancer. I had Stage III breast cancer when I was 28. I didn't know I had Stage III breast cancer. I just knew I had cancer. My doctor didn't tell me and I never asked. Later on, after the cancer was gone (Praise be to GOD). I saw my medical records and the diagnosis "Stage III" and was shocked. I called my doctor and asked her why I was never told that my cancer was that serious? (As if any cancer is not serious...what was I thinking). She said she didn't tell me because she didn't want it to affect my hope in surviving. She didn't want me to become hopeless. She said that hope is needed in healing.

That is what I felt about my weight. I didn't want to know the number because I didn't want to lose hope. You see, I will take measurements and accept those numbers but the number on the scale....I didn't know if I could handle it. So I was quite upset when I saw the number. I had to keep reminding myself that before now... I was able to do this, so just get over it. And I did and I finished. Afterwards, I went to cool down with my family and told them of my discovery. They had weighed themselves on the scale the trainers use and suggested I weigh myself on that one. I was scared but I did it. And to my amazement...it was 25 pounds less than the treadmill. Damn treadmill. Lying treadmill. Vicious treadmill. Who would ever think I would love a scale so much.

In that split moment, I realized it is just a number. Don't let it bring you down and don't put too much value in it. Treasure the other moments.

• When you realize running from the dressing room to the men's department at Target for your husband (another poor design idea from the Target folks) you don't get winded
• When you walk with your husband, his pace isn't soo fast that you have to take breaks
• When going up and down the stairs, no longer seems like a chore
• When you no longer feel exhausted by 4pm
• When your pants no longer feel tight when you sit down

I can do this. You can do this. Don't let a number make you feel like you are incapable of running, swimming, biking, belly dancing or anything else. Live life. Enjoy who you are...right now and in this moment.

Pin It