LexySmash

New and Different!

So my sister, Meghan, is FAR fitter than I am (the woman did 100 pullups not too long ago!), and she is the one who introduced me to cross-fit.

We do the workouts and email each other back and forth on a nearly daily basis, so we decided that its possible some-one out there might like to take a peek into that conversation.

To that end we've started a blog over at wordpress. It's nothing big or fancy, but we're using it to keep each other motivated and to track our progress with the WODs.

So... if you feel like checking it out its called:

Crossfit Sisters!

July Challenge

So... end result of my 30 day CF challenge?

I lost 3lbs, 1.5" off my waist, 1" off hips, and 0.75" off of each thigh.

I'm pretty pleased with that... considering the fact that I've gained 10lbs since the start of this program last September, I still have a lot of work to do... but I am getting stronger and fitter and to that end I am starting again!

Today I'm starting a 60 day CF challenge... and my end goal is to get 1 pull-up (or chin-up, I don't care which) and be doing all of the pushups for the CF warmup on toes rather than knees, by the end of the 2 months. I'd ask y'all to join me, but as soon as I open comments I get spammed, and type-key is pretty much defunct at this point, so you couldn't even register to comment if you wanted to... maybe I can get my server-host to upgrade us to the latest version of MT or something and use those character/image recognition thingies that everyone is so fond of these days... but uh... I'm kinda busy these days.

In any case, Today is day one... get off yer asses and move, m'kay?

day 7

I nearly puked during todays workout.

I kinda wish I would have... maybe I wouldn't still feel like puking.

Day 7 of the 30 day Cross-fit WOD challenge and I'm REALLY hoping tomorrow is a rest day.

Please... dear cross-fit coach in California... please let tomorrow be a rest day.

Ouch

I hurt.

I hurt everywhere.

I hurt everywhere and I am exhausted.

I just finished my last shift of OB Clinicals. In 8 hours I put in 2 IVs, 1 foley, admitted 2 patients and assisted with 2 vaginal and 2 cesarean births (both c-sections were for breech babies, one footling and the other presenting its hip). My feet feel like shredded wheat.

I am also on day 4 of a 30 day CrossFit challenge. (Rest day! YAY!). I am going to do the Crossfit Workout of the Day (plus the standard warm up of 3 rounds of 30sec Samson Stretch, 10 push ups, 10 sit ups, 10 dips, 10 pull ups, 10 squats) every day for 30 days... hopefully that will be a stress release for me and help boost my energy because this school thing is sapping my strength and motivation like nobody's business. So, between running my ass off at the hospital, doing the WODs and trying to get school work done I'm just... burnt.

I keep feeling like I'm forgetting assignments or not finishing things and its really disconcerting. I haven't actually done that (yet) but that anxiety seems to always be hanging over me. Luckily I have all day tomorrow to really get caught up on readings and writings before my final exam in OB on Saturday.

Next week begins our "Aging Client" course... blah.

Right now, I'm exhausted and in pain, so I'm gonna pop some ibuprofen and get some sleep.

ciao.

Clean and Jerk...

Teehee.

Sounds dirty, don't it?

Today I learned to Clean and Jerk. I did it with dumb bells because I don't have a proper bar yet... but holy crap is that a fun (and powerful feeling) move.

The vid I linked to above is from the crossfit website and they have instructional videos and demonstrations of everything they use in their workouts... crossfit makes me want a bar (a real, heavy, bar) with bumper plates and gymnastic rings... mmm... ring dips...

Tomorrow is brutal...

So... you want a challenge?

Try Crossfit.

Seriously.

Every day they post a workout (today happens to be a rest day so you're safe) and when you look at the workout you think, "What? That's it?" And then you look at the videos to figure out the moves... and you see the AMAZING shape these people are in and you thin, "Sure... why not, I'll give it a shot!" And then you start doing the work outs. Usually 20-30 minutes... no big deal, right?

And then you puke because you've never done anything so freaking challenging in your LIFE and it kicks your ass right to the floor and you think... well no wonder one of their motos is:

"Cross Fit. Your workout is our warmup!"

In the last week I've learned to do a hanging snatch, hanging power-snatch and a thruster... I'm not doing them with much weight, mind you... but I'm getting the motion down so I can safely do so later on... I've only been at this a week and my body HURTS all over and I love love love love love it.

My sister Meghan introduced me... now I'm introducing you... share the love, you know you want to!!!

Upping the Ante

I started lifting again today. Made a happy little spreadsheet to track things (I know, geek!) and did a full upper body workout. Its been too long. I have always said that I love the process by which my body transforms when I exercise frequently... what I don't love... is the realization of what I've lost when I restart. It can be incredibly un-motivating seeing where you are when you know where you've been... but at the same time it makes it VERY easy to set goals. ;)

I made a huge pot of chicken soup on Friday and we're still eating on it. I LOVE making soup, especially chicken with lots of veggies (carrots, celery, onion, garlic, mushrooms, broccoli, etc... sometimes I'll chop up some greens if they look really good at the store and throw them in to). And I'm lazy, so I just buy the boxed organic chicken stock (or broth if you prefer) in the health-food section of the grocery store and throw that in once the veggies have sauteed in a little olive oil, bring everything to a boil and then squeeze fresh lemon juice and eat. I use simple spices too, a little rubbed sage, thyme leaves, crushed red-pepper and salt/pepper. Throw that down with a fresh biscuit and some salad and you're set for a few days worth of meals.

Today is my last day of freedom before classes kick in again, but I'm thinking I'll be able to get away for at least one weekend in February to visit friends before clinical rotations start up again in March. I'm excited to do a little traveling, so wish me luck!

Airdrives Review!

Since I've been back to running lately I've been using my iPod Shuffle and the little white ear-buds that came with it when I go out for a run. And while the ear-buds are perfectly fine for general use they're not the most secure things in my ears and there is the issue of being a bit cut off from environmental noise that we all know can be isolating and unsafe.

So, I was intrigued when I was asked to review a new type of ear-phone called Airdrives

If you don't want to go clicking the link (tho you should because the demos are pretty cool) I'll give you the lowdown: The premise for these particular headphones was to create a unit that would stay securely on the ear but not block the ear-canal like a typical in-ear bud so you can still be aware of environmental noises (like that delivery truck pulling up behind you to turn right as you prepare to cross the street it's heading for).

The speaker portion of the ear bud sits on your tragus (that little bump of flesh on the inner-front aspect of your ear) and projects the sound both through your mandible and back into the auricle (the big stickey-outey part of your ear... what you'd call your "ear").

Ok... the concept is cool, right? But what do I think of these new fangled devices? Well, overall I'm pretty pleased with the Airdrives. They do exactly what they say they're designed to do. They stay put comfortably with the adjustable over-ear hook, and they make me feel a lot safer when I'm road-running because I can hear everything going on around me, in addition to my music. I can even say, "good-morning" to my neighbors as we walk/jog past each other without having to wonder if I've just yelled at them. The sound quality is good on the upper and mid-range, but even with my bass-boost turned all the way up on my iPod I found the bass to be lacking. That said, I don't know that I've had a single pair of earbuds that performed adequately in the bass range... there's just not a lot you can do with a speaker that small.

Volume can be adjusted both on the music player and on the cord, which is a neat feature, but when you turn the volume way up (like when you're feelin' like Rocky and want to really jam out!) people around you will be able to hear your music much more clearly than if you did the same thing with in-ear buds. These are not necessarily the headphones you want to use at the gym (the dude squatting 450 in the cage might not want to hear your Michael Bolton), but when you're outside, if you want to be able to hear the world around you (before it runs over you) these DEFINITELY fit the bill.

I think these would make a fantastic Christmas gift for the runner in your life.

Day 3 of July Challenge

I have to work tonight. I work part time at a local nursing home and I work basically every other weekend on the night shift. I have to work tonight because everyone is required to pull a holiday shift every year and 4th of July is the holiday I pulled. The good part is that my shift is the night BEFORE the holiday, so after a few hours of sleep we'll still have the rest of the day and evening to play.

The challenge is going well. Yesterday I did Krista's beginner lower body workout which consists of Squats, Straight Leg Dead Lifts, Calf Raises and Good Mornings. I did most of the exercises unweighted (not the dead lifts) and I am still sore as hell today.

Today I ran over to the gym and did Krista's beginner upper body workout (lat pull, shoulder press, 1 arm row and bench press) and then 30 minutes on the eliptical. My legs were able to workout some of the soreness and that felt good.

I've probably mentioned that I'm not a fan of the scale... it is a useful datapoint in a lot of ways, but right now I'm just being discouraged by it... so I'm going to forgo it for as long as possible. A set weight has never been my ultimate goal so much as a level of leanness and a level of fitness and since the scale will tell me neither of those it can go jump in the lake for now.

I keep trying...

to write a final post... to sign off for good, but I can't seem to make myself do it.

I guess that means I'm not done yet... maybe there is something more I need to say... something more I need to do with this site.

The last few months... and really the last 2 years have been a time of extreme transition and trauma and recovery for me and my family... my health and fitness has improved and declined like the changing of the tides.

Injury, physical and emotional... upheaval, revelation, just... everything imaginable and then some. I'm not going to get into it, but what I've realized as I return to myself and return to the object of my fitness... that without leaning on proper nutrition and exercise I have truly done myself a disservice.

Krista's rant in April or May was about stress and how she went thru some amazingly HUGE stresses over the last year but was able to maintain a level head and even keel primarily due to the fact that her nutrition and workouts were her coping mechanism. She poured her anxiety into her workouts and she fed her body as tho her life depended upon it (when, in reality, it did).

I have picked myself up, dusted off some of the pieces and am in the process of putting them back together and the two parts of my hopefully fast acting epoxy will be my nutrition and exercise. I WILL lift. I will eat as tho my life depends upon it. I am, for the first time in literally years, extending a challenge.

I don't know if anyone even reads here anymore, but I did get an email recently from 'Jill,' after she had been reading thru my archives. So, Hi Jill! Thank you for the push to post again and for the encouragement and the realization that I can still have an impact. Yes, I'd be happy to answer your questions, Jill... I'll respond to your email shortly.

So now for the challenge:

July: (yes, starting today)

Every day I will do some form of strenuous activity. Today it was tennis with my husband for an hour. Work will not get in the way, the summer will not get in the way. This is my opportunity and my life.

Join me. Count off 31 days with me. 31 days of purposeful, strenuous, heart-pumping activity... I don't care what you do, as long as you spend at least 30 minutes doing it. I will be biking, swimming, playing tennis, lifting weights, using the cardio equipment at the gym, etc... anything I can think of (except running because I'm still banned from that by my freakin' podiatrist)... and it will be fun.

The plan is to do Krista's Beginner Split workout Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday and filling in with other activities the rest of the days of the week. Weekends will probably be mainly tennis because I can do that with my family... And there is no limit to how much activity you do... the more the better, I say.

Make it fun, make it a challenge, remember that your life depends on it. I will.

New Progress Pics

So... 14.5 lbs down from the last set on Sept 1, 2006:

Latest progress pics.

I, personally, don't see much of a difference. I mean, except that I'm super pale compared to the September pics, I mean. Hair is longer, ass is still fat, arms still flabby. In any case, it is what it is, and there will be another set March 1, 2007.

To be fair: 237-167=70 total lbs. lost, which is pretty damned cool.

Back at it...

Got my ass out of bed at 5 this morning to meet with my Personal Fitness Coach at the Y at 5:30am. Holly is great, very motivational and will put together a quick program for me to start with to get familiar with everything they have at the Y... the facility here is HUGE. Three pools, extensive cardio and free-weights, two full nautilus type circuits, Hot-Tub and Sauna in each of the locker rooms, etc. I was impressed.

I'll be back in tomorrow, Thursday and Friday mornings. I have 3 weeks to get myself back in the morning habit before I'm back in school full time, and even if I just do 30 minutes on the eliptical it will be worth getting out of bed to reinforce the habit.

I forgot to take pics yesterday (I know... blah blah blah). It will happen tomorrow. Year end weigh in was 167... so I missed my goal by 7lbs, but I am officially 3lbs UNDER pre-pregnancy weight at 8 months post partum, having gained 67lbs with the twins.

As for my other goals, they were mostly job and moving and pregnancy oriented:

I gave birth to two very big full term baby boys on May 1st.
I quit my job on June 9th.
I moved to Wisconsin on June 10th.
I started school at UWOshkosh in September.
I got back into a fitness routine.

So I missed the weight goal by a few pounds... I think the rest of the success for the year more than makes up for that.

New goals being formulated and percolated in the brainspace for now... I'll see what I can come up with tomorrow, when I've had some decent sleep.

its all about the sits, yo! (day 7)

And today there was much rejoicing because my delicate, pretty-princess of an ass had a lovely new saddle upon which to ride (sally ride). I decided to see what random selections from my "least played faves" would give me on ye ole iPod and it worked out well.

I was VERY uncomfy on the Terry Butterfly saddle at first, so I got off, adjusted it a bit, and tried again... and lo there was much rejoicing and the girlie bits were not squooshed, and the sits bones were settled nicely into the firm (but supple) foam of the wider (for her pleasure!) sides of the butterfly flare.

35 minutes at relatively mild intervals with a low hill thrown in for 7 minutes of good measure (*squee*) Not as much drippage tonight (are you getting sick to DEATH of my sweat reports yet?) but a good workout overall.

7 days... it feels good so far... still need to pick up the dbs in addition, but for now I'm meeting my goals.

Today I am Proud...

We Motherfucking Did it!!!

Thank you, America! And don't let the door hit ya where the good lord split ya on the way out, Mr. Rumsfeld!!!

Oh yeah... and Day 5 - I did 20 minutes on the trainer while obsessively refreshing Cspan.com and CNN.com... HR was up around 130, but nothing major.

I may have to celebrate tonight!!

day 4

53 minutes on the trainer using an "all techno" track-list. More dripage upon the mat. Hooray!

I can't wait to get into the double digits of this challenge... I think I'm not going to get on the scale until day 10, just for shits and giggles. I've been so/so with paying attention to my food tho, so its time to bring that back into alignment. Its funny really... these days my biggest indulgences are wine and bread. When I go for something "naughty" it isn't even entirely naughty... ya know? I can hardly stand chips and candy anymore (well... except for REALLY good dark chocolate) It makes me feel good to know that my eating habits are more solid, even when I'm off of a training plan.

Mike bought white-bread tho... I'm going to have to kill the boy. ;)

Off to watch MNF and hopefully see the Seahawks beat some Raider ass all over the field... tho... with the way Oakland has been... uh... "playing?" this season... it could be pretty ridiculous. I wonder if Seattle'll put in the 3rd string before the 4th... ;)

day 3

45 minutes on the trainer...

Several good climbing hills that kicked my ass... HR up and sweat dripping down on the mat (yay!)... I was able to adjust the tension on the resistance cable to provide enough pull for me to stand in the pedals to climb.

I am SO out of shape tho, I spend most of my time "pumping" my feet up and down rather than making circles, which is what I'm supposed to be doing.

Ah well... it will come.

It'll be interesting to see how my cardiovascular health improves with this regime... I am definitely liking it so far.

Speaking of which - Mike got me a new saddle. A Terry Butterfly Ti - which should arrive soon... I am excited to see if it makes a big difference on my sit-bones and girlie bits... supposedly its a HUGE deal.

Made a FABULOUS dinner tonight... dry spice rubbed NY Strip steak (one steak - it was 16 oz and we split it) and steamed broccoli (with home made cheese sauce for the kiddies) and Cheddar biscuits.

I think I'm embracing this whole "dairy land" thing. ;)

day 2

23 minutes on the trainer...

maybe I should dub this "National Brenna Cycle Month" NaBreCyMo... everyone needs a National month of Something... right? Am I right?

Come on... y'all KNOW I'm right.

;)

Ok... so maybe not.

Tomorrow I go for 60 mins... can she do it???

Of COURSE she can!

cycling...

I'm having a hard time dealing with this whole "no running" thing. I know I have to do this to allow my feet to fully heal, and I know its the right thing for my overall ability to continue to be athletic in the future... but its hard. When all else failed, I could run. Until I really got into it, I'd never thought that I could be a runner... but once that click happened... the one that allowed me to just keep running on my one 10 mile day... I realized that I COULD run and that just kicked my ego up a few notches right there.

And now, I can not run. And I have "good feet for cycling." I've been kinda pissing and moaning about that for several months now... hemming and hawing about what to do... its cold, but I have a good bike... a REALLY good bike... and I live in Wisconsin, where it is literally too cold to ride for at least half the year.

So yesterday I broke down and bought a trainer. I set it up in the bedroom and mounted my beautiful bike to it... and I looked at it for a while... and finally set up some track lists on iTunes, loaded up the iPod and climbed aboard.

I spent the first song just spinning up, shifting gears and resistance levels to figure out the trainer and what I could do... and then... something clicked... (vou-ja-de?) and I started pushing... and climbing and jumping and holy crap it was like a spin-class in my bedroom.

I will say that the mag+ is kinda loud at high speed... but bump up the resistance, shift down and climb and its completely tollerable. Its a good thing I only sprint for like 20-30 seconds at a time right now.

So... I'm giving the trainer a thumbs up... for now its in the bedroom, and I'm going to set a goal...

Starting yesterday my goal is to get on the bike every day for 30 consecutive days for at least 20 minutes. Last night was a 45 minute session... I've got more song lists to create... but I'm excited to be moving forward again.

Oh yeah... scale on friday was back to 176... so at least I haven't lost ground... just time...

Still pushing for 160 by December 31.

Tuesday Workout

Upper Body:

Chest Press 12x3 @ 30#
Bent Over Row 12x3 @15#
Standing Shoulder Press 12x3 @15#
Bicep 21s x3 @12.5#
Tricep Press 12x3@15#

Made Baked Monterey Chicken for my dinner. Cellery sticks on the side:

Boneless skinless chicken breast - liberally seasoned with monterey-grilled chicken spice blend and salt, baked on "convection roast" for 22 min. at 350 degrees. Place a slice of part-skim motzarella on each breast for last 7 minutes of cooking time.

Bloat is reducing, and I'm only .5 from last Friday's weigh in, so hopefully the downward trend is continuing.

I had my first exam in Human Anatomy today. 50 multiple choice questions, we had an hour to complete the exam. It took me 20 minutes (including re-checking). I didn't finish first... I finished second. ;) (out of 200 students, I thought that was pretty good). I am in the same chemistry and anatomy class with several other women and one of the women teased me for finishing so quickly.

I do think I missed one or two questions, mostly due to poor wording... but I'm not sure. We'll see.

Monday Workout.

2.4 mile run. Took 31minutes, and I ran about 1.75 of it... workin up is a good thing.

I feel REALLY good running. Its been so... perfectly autumn here. Crisp, cool, with RAGING thunderstorms in the middle of the night... we even lost power last night (*squee*)

Unfortunately my digestion has decided that school stress = shut down, so I'm retaining water and constipated... ugh. I'm restarting my daily fiber supplementation, so hopefully that will help clear things up shortly. Its a little disturbing to gain 3lbs in a weekend. If I didn't know what was up I'd be freaking out.

Feet feel good, and my legs are starting to remember the joy that is post-run twitching.

October is HELL MONTH for me at school. For three weeks I will be at school on the following schedule: Mon-3p-9p, Tues 11a-9p, Wed 8a-10a, Thu 8a-9p, Fr3p-9p, plus 6-8 hour clinicals Saturday AND Sunday. Yes... I am insane.

Sometimes I can't believe I'm doing this... I know I CAN do it... its just a matter of GETTING it done.

*sigh*

Time to shower and get back to studying. Anatomy Exam tomorrow (body organization, tissues, Integumentary system and Axial Skeleton) and Chem Exam on Thursday (atomic theory, radiation, conversions and moles).

Friday Weigh in and September Wrap Up

Scale this morning indicated 176.5 which means I made my goal of 5lbs for the month of September.

I didn't get in nearly as much exercise as I could have, but its nice to think that 5 months after delivering the twins I'm only 6lbs from pre-pregnancy and 16.5 to my year end goal of 160.

According to Fit Day (and their lovely BMI calculator which is rediculously stupid) I am on the cusp between "Severe Overweight" and "Moderate Overweight." Ha! WTFever.

I'm kinda surprised at the scale this morning, especially since I started my period on Tuesday. I don't usualy lose the period bloat until the end of the week, but hey... I'll take it.

School is going. Returning to education is a challenge and I'm stumbling in chemistry. I need to shape up tho as I NEED the A for my application to the Accellerated Nursing Program.

As for my leg workout yesterday, I wanted to try somthing a little different, so I did some combo moves:

All Unweighted:
Sumo Squat + Alternating Front Kick
10 per side x 3 sets.
Side Lunge + Side Leg raise
10 per side x 3 seets.
Calf Raise (on stair) + Hamstring Squeese
10 per side x 3 sets.
Abs on the physio ball (crunches to failure)

It is a very different sensation to do things unweighted... I took shorter breaks between sets tho and had a good elevated HR for the entire workout (about 35 minutes... not very long, but I feel it today).

Hope everyone is well and meeting goals!!

Tuesday Workout

Upper Body:
ChestPress/Fly SS - 10#dbsx15,12,10
Row - 10#dbsx15,15,12
Shoulder Press/Bicep Curl SS - 10#dbsx15,12,10
Tri Press - 15#dbx15,12,12
Abs and stretching

Feeling good and ontrack. Its interesting that yesterday I felt like I was eating CONSTANTLY, could not fill my stomach enough to not be hungry no matter what I ate... and yet... I feel fine today, and the scale didn't even creep up. I guess I needed to eat, eh?

Monday Workout.

So it turns out that all the BS about walking is just that... BS. Walking alone is not enough to get a person fit. It is a great way to start exercising, but if you don't get huffing and puffing for at least a portion of your workout its not gonna get you where you want to go.

Don't believe me? READ THIS

As I read the article, I realized that I had no right to get all "duh" about it because I haven't done ANYTHING to promote my own fitness in easily 3 weeks. So the shoes went on, and my ass went out the door for the first run I've been able to take in 4 months.

Oh good LORD did that feel good!!! 2.5 miles, alternating running and walking with at least 1.5 of it running. I practiced fore-foot running as much as possible, it felt kinda like tip-toeing but it was definitely easier on my heels than typical running.

While I ran I listened to little LS (My iPod) and planned the rest of the weeks workouts. I'll put them under the cut.

October is BACK ON THE WAGON month to prepare for the holidays that are looming... My goal for September was 5lbs lost (I'll check up on that on Saturday) but for October it is going to be hitting at least 4 of my 5 scheduled workouts every week.

Here's the plan:

Monday: Run or Bike at 8:30am (after dropping Val off at school)
Tuesday: Upper body at 8:30am ("")
Wednesday: Run or Bike at 11am (after Anatomy Lab)
Thursday: Lower body at 4pm (after school)
Friday: Run or Bike at 8:30am (after dropping Val off at school)

Friday Weigh In.

179.

Not surprising really, considering I've been Boozy McDrinksalot this week. (bad stress coping mechanism, I know... I'm done, I swear)

Back on track today and the rest of next week and we'll be seeing the continued 1-1.5 loss per week. OH! And my foot is SO MUCH BETTER after the cortizone shot (tho the flare the day after the shot SUCKED ASS). I may even try to run again before snow flies.

I've been reading articles about fore-foot running... if anyone has info to point me to on this I'd GREATLY appreciate it. I can't continue to distroy my heels with standard heel-toe running, so its time I learned somthing new.

Happy Weekend!!!

Progress

I know I promised... so here they are:

Progress Pictures.

4 weeks post partum and 4 months post partum. Enjoy.

Forgot to mention:

sometimes the whole weight loss thing can be frustrating at best. Having only lost a total of 2.5 lbs this last month really pissed me off... I mean, I wasn't drinking... I followed thru on my workout-goal (3x/week lifting) and I walked and played tennis a lot too... and I don't like being pissed off, so this morning I've been trying to gain some perspective.

On May 1st of this year I weighed about 237lbs.

Today I weigh 181 lbs. So in 4 months, I have lost... 56lbs. Now I can atribute the first 40 of that to babies (6lbs 7oz and 7lbs 1oz) amniotic fluid (lets say7.5lbs) placentas (5lbs) and reduction in blood volume (we'll give that the remaining 14lbs). Which means that in 4 months I've lost at least 16lbs of non-baby weight. Now, considering it took me 2 YEARS to lose 45 lbs the first go-around... 4lbs/mo for 4mo is really not all that bad... and yes it comes in spurts. It always has... that's why doing this exercise for perspective is so important for me. True, i want to step up the action over the next 4 months so I can see 160 again by Dec 31... but that's only 20 lbs away... 5lbs a month... TOTALLY doable.

in fact...

watch me.

;)

Thursday Workout...

Legs:
Reverse Lunge - 25#, 3x10
Side Lunge - 25#, 3x10
Front Lunge - 25# 2x12
Full Front Squat - 25# 3x8
Abs: 4 sets 3 way Ball Crunch (25 center, 20 left, 20 right is one set)

Feeling good... strong workout... Eating REALLY well this week... eggs and tea for breaky... cottage cheese and fruit for lunch... chicken breasts on salad for dinner... snacks of protein smoothies or beef jerkey or lite popcorn. I'm glad to be back on track after the trip to Portland and the extremely off-program weekend. I've promised progress pictures several times now, and I will be taking them tomorrow, September First. Three months from when I took the first set at the beginning of June... I'll post them all together and hopefully it will be obvious the progress that has been made... but even if it isn't... that's life.

Oh... and I made a teriyaki marinade for my chicken that rocked:

Low Sodium Soy Sauce
Fish Sauce
Brown Sugar
One clove of Garlic (crushed)
Pinch of red pepper flake

time for protein and then off to bed.

Tuesday Workout!

Arms/Shoulders:
I decided to go with short rest intervals for this workout... kept the rests right around 45 seconds between sets, definitely made a difference.
Shoulder Press - 20#dbs x10,8,6
Shoulder Death [tm] - 7.5#dbs x8,8,6
Bicep 21s - 3 sets @10#dbs
Tricep Kickback (bilateral) - 10#dbs x10,10,10
Tricep Overhead Press + 10 second static hold and pulse at the end of each set - 17.5# x10,10,10

Abs - Ball Crunch x50,25,25, Bicycle x20,20

Friday Workout

Legs (yes I know that was supposed to be Wednesday... shit happens... I'll do chest/back tomorrow!)
Front Lunge - 20#x12,12,12
Side Lunge - 20#x12,12,10
Squat - 10#(bars only)x6,6,6 (triggering muscle memory and practicing form more than anything)
Calf raise - 20#x12,10,10

We're off to p-town tonight, returning "home" to the midwest on Monday morning... its supposed to be gorgeous and we've reserved a convertable for the occasion. Chest/Back WILL be done this weekend at the hotel. Be safe and sane this weekend!

ciao!

Monday Workout.

Preface:
Generally its a good idea to work the larger muscle groups first and work your way to the smaller... its also a good idea to do your compound movements first (exercises which engage more than one muscle and joint)... but tonight I decided to see what would happen if I did bicep excercises before shoulder. My shoulders were MUCH weaker tonight than they were last week, due in part to the change in order. Shoulder Death (which I did sets of 10,8,8 last week) was the most noteable - I was only able to do sets of 8,6,6 this week with the same weight. In any case... its fun to experiment - as always YMMV.

Arms/Shoulders:
Bicep Curl 21s - 10#dbs x3 (21s are 7 reps of bottom half curl, 7 reps of top half curl, 7 reps of full range of motion... no rest between, that is one set)
Hammer Curls - 10#dbs x10,10,8
Shoulder Press - 20#dbs x10,8,6
Shoulder Death (tm) - 7.5#dbs x8,6,6 (barely)
Tricep Press - 15#db x12,12,10

Went for a 2 mile walk with the neighbor, the kids (her two and my two) and the dogs (her husky, our golden). It was a good walk, with a stop for kids to play in the fountain at the park in the middle... but nothing strenuous.

I am, however, currently wearing the BEST BATHROBE EVER! Mike got it for me for my birthday and it is microfiber on the outside and terry on the inside, and heavy and warm and DE-FUCKING-LICIOUS!!! We fell in love with these robes when we stayed at a very nice historic hotel in Jackson, WY on the way out here, and Mike tracked one down for me for my birthday. I'm also sucking down a creamsickle (OJ+Vanilla Whey Protein Powder+Creatine) and it is fantastically nummy too.

Saturday Workout...

Chest/Back:
Chest Press - 20#dbs x10,10,10
Fly - 17.5#dbs x10,10,8
Bent Over Row - 17.5#dbs x10,10,10
Upright Row - 15#dbs x10,10,8
Dresser Pushup - 3x10
Weighted Fly Stretchdowns - 10#dbs 30,20,20 (ow-fuckin-ch)
Abs:
100 Crunches 4x25
80 Bicycle 4x20

We also went for a long family bike ride today... I'd estimate about 3 miles total, but rather slow... just havin fun with the kids. Now that Nate is a two-wheeler (no training wheels for this 4 year old!!) he wants to go everywhere on his bike. Its pretty cool because there are lots of parks within riding distance... and today we put the bikes on the bike-rack and drove to a park that has a path across the Fox River. It used to be a train tressle, but its now a foot/bike bridge. It was good fun.

Mike asked me today how long I'd been working out since I started back up again. I told him it was about 3 weeks... his response: "I should work out for 3 weeks, cause its made a big difference in you already."

:D

The scale isn't moving (still fluctuating between 182.5 and 184), but I'm not worried... its just one tool for measurement. Another (my size 12 skirts and pants) are beginning to fit again. I REALLY should have taken better "before" pictures... but maybe I'll have the guts to do some progress pics here soon... maybe.

I start school on September 6th!! So freakin ready!!!

Wednesday Workout... (but on Thursday)

Legs:
Warmup - jog stairs 4x
Walking Lunge - 25#x12,12,10
Side Lunge - 20#x12,10,10
Full Squat - unweightedx5,5,5
Calf Raise - 15#x12,12,12
ABS: Short PBall Crunch x50, 4count PBall Crunch x15, Floor Crunch w/ 8# Medicine Ball x 15, Double Crunch w/8# Medicine Ball x15
Stretch

Monday Workout.

Arms Shoulders:

Shoulder Press - 17.5#x10,8,8
Shoulder Death (tm) - 7.5#x10,8,6
Bicep 21s - 10#x3
Hammer Curls - 10#x10,10,8
Tricep Press - 15#x10,8,8
Tricep Kick-back - *7.5#x12,10,10
*go heavier next time
ABS: Physio ball full crunch - 30, PB short crunch, - 30, PBw/8#MB Twist Crunch - 30.

You didn't see me post a workout last Friday... mostly because I spent 18 total hours on Thursdy and Friday doing this:

Laying 328 sq ft. of solid bamboo flooring in my bedroom

(ignore the drain-rat picture... and at the end are some random pics of some shoes and a dress I picked up for a wedding I'm going to in a couple of weeks... the important part is in the middle).

Anyway... since I could hardly move after the flooring work (and acording to caloriesperhour.com burned nearly 5000 calories) the trainer gave me a pass on the chest/back and arm/shoulder work that I missed last week. I'm not even calling it a missed week because... well... have you ever installed hard-wood flooring?? GAH!!!

Wednesday Workout...

Legs (plus punative, abbreviated arms/shoulders)
warmup - jog up/down stairs 3x
Walking Lunges, 3x10 carrying 20#
Side Lunges, 3x10 carrying 15#
Calf Raises, 3x10 carrying 10#

Interspersed Arms Shoulders:
Shoulder Press - 3x12, 10#dbs
Bicep curl 21s - 2x21 @ 7.5#dbs, 1x21 @ 10#dbs
Tricep Press - 2x12 @ 7.5#dbs, 1x12 @ 10#dbs

No abs yet, but I'll do 'em tonight before I crash... installin' a bamboo floor in my bedroom tomorrow... I'm STOKED!! Wish us luck.

Friday Workout

Chest/Back:
DB Press - 17.5# 12,10,8
Bent Over Row (bilateral) - 17.5# 12,10,10
Fly - 12.5# 12,10,10
Upright Row - 12.5# - 12,10,8
Weighted Fly Stretchdown - 7.5# 3x20seconds
Medicine ball Crunch - 40
Physio ball 3way crunch - 2x30

PLUS a BONUS: 9 mile ride at an average of 14.6mph for an additional 400 calories or so. I took a gorgeous route out along Lake Winebago, but holy damn was there a headwind comming back in. I was able to keep spinning for the entire ride, less the stop at the 4.5 mile ride to drink, adjust helmet and turn around. I wasn't expecting that, I figured I'd have to coast at some point, but despite the FUCKING BURNING in my quads I kept spinning... and at a pretty good pace too... got up to 20.1mph on one slight decline with a tail-wind... that felt cool... but that was an incline with a head-wind comming back into town. Ah well, can't be perfect, eh? The really nice thing about this road is that there are NO TRAIN TRACKS to cross, its fairly level (good for starting back up) and its easy to add a mile or so each ride until I'm up to 20 or so per ride. I'm stoked. I'm SO gonna be skinny again. ;)

Friday Weigh In...

I am suffering from major (and I do mean MAJOR) DOMS today... legs are such fascinating pieces of machinery... and mine hurt.

Morning weigh: 183. Consistant downward trend is what I'm going for... and it seems to be happening. Having a trainer to answer to is helping a LOT. I'm not a person who can do somthing half-assed. I'm a bit of an absolutist. But when I get somthing in my head... it gets done.

For instance: Went to dinner with my inlaws last night... when we arrived at the restaurant they'd ordered margaritas for both Mike and I and they were waiting on the table. I didn't drink mine, begged off that I was too dehydrated from the pool earlier, and gave it to my Father in Law. No alcohol means no alcohol.

Mojo: lifting anything that isn't a fork counts! I'm so glad you'll be getting your tube out on Tuesday, can't wait to hear how you're doing!

M: The babies weren't mine, I was a gestational surrogate for dear friends, but thanks! My boys are 8 and 4 and love to ride their bikes along with me when I run, which hopefully I'll be able to do again next week!

Wednesday Workout...

Legs:
warmup - jog up/down stairs 3x
Walking Lunges, 3x10 carrying 20#
Side Lunges, 3x10 carrying 15#
Calf Raises, 3x10 carrying 10#
Abs - 3x30 crunches, 2x20 slow bicycle
STRETCH.

My legs are SO not used to this... SO. NOT. USED. TO. THIS.

;)

Yesterday was my 32nd birthday... I celebrated by vowing (after last night) not to drink any alcohol for the rest of the month. Its an important step in aiding the weight-loss as well as generally a good detox... alcohol is empty calories... tasty empty calories... but empty, none the less.

Anyone care to join me?

Second birthday vow is to get in 3 weight-lifting workouts every week for the remainder of the month. Even if I do NOTHING else... I will lift. I need it. I love it... its who I am, and thus I will feed the iron-beast.

Again... anyone? Takers? COME ON... you KNOW you wanna!!! Lets finish the summer off right! Even if I can't run... I can still get strong... and so can you!

Monday Workout.

Going a bit heavier today:

Seated Shoulder Press - 20#x10,8,6
Shoulder Death (tm) - 5#x8,6,6
Concentration Curl/Tri-Press - 17.5#x8,6,6 and 17.5#x10,8,8
Standing Curl - 12.5#x8,8,6
shoulda done another tri exercise... but completely spaced it...
Abs - slow crunch (4 count) x50, 30, 20; Bicyclex20; Physio Ball crunch (left/cen/rt) w/8lb medicine ball x20

My hands are so soft. I have no callouses any more... its gonna take some time for my hands to get used to holding the dbs again... its kinda funny really... only another sign of how soft I've gotten.

Mike expressed interest in working out with me... asked if I'd do my workouts in the evening with him, and I said I'd consider it, but that I'd rather he just got up in the morning to do them with me... we'll see where that goes... I think it would be fabulous if he did... he's got the build that it would be SO easy for him to really look good... put a little muscle on the boy and he'd be a traffic stopper. ;)

Friday? Weigh In...

I don't know why I keep doing these on Saturday... when I'm actually doing the scale thing on Friday... I guess it just takes a while for me to percolate what I want to say each week.

This week 184... so only .5 down from last week... which actually is more than I'd hoped for. See... here's the thing... if I walk, my feet hurt; if I run, my feet hurt; if I don't walk OR run, my feet hurt... and its getting REALLY fucking old.

SO I did some small workouts thru the week... nothing to be proud of, and nothing worth posting about... but what I did do is realize that my motivation and habits are so broken right now that I really need to do some reeducation. So... its back to reading Krista every day, and reporting to a higher power (a trainer)... and remembering what it was that made me love being strong and muscular and powerful. Its helping.

I'm making better choices... not perfectly clean eating yet... but that will come... and not the greatest workouts yet... but that also will come... On Tuesday I turn 32 years old and I will begin reporting everything to my trainer... and he WILL kick my ass and remind me (daily) where I told him I want to go, and what I need to do to get there.

Also... hopefully on the 8th my feet will be fixed... cortizone shots in the heels baby!!! And I'll finally be pain free... at least for a while.

Sattidy Werkout

Chest/Back (all dbs, on physioball)

Superset - Press, Bent-over Row, 12.5lb 3x12
Pull Over - 15lbs 3x12
Superset - Flye, Reverse Fly, 10lbs 3x12
Abs - crunch - 50, 30, 20; Bicycle 20, 20; Plank for 10 slow breaths.
Stretch

Creatine (5mg)
Multi-vitamin
Water - 2litres so far...

Friday Weigh In...

No change this week... not surprising really, what with the first post-partum period showing up on Sunday and the requisite whining and eating that went along with it. BUT, I didn't gain, so theres some good in that at least... just means I have some ground to make up this week.

Speaking of this week... my birthday is August 1st and in celebration I've been given some AWESOME presents already... a bike mount for my Forerunner and a set of THESE!!!

I will admit to having coveted the B0wfl3x dumbells for a while now, but I didn't think I'd ever have 'em... oh but now I do!!! I will begin posting workouts on Monday. I wish I had a little bench, but I don't... so its the physio-ball for my presses and flys... which is really ok because it causes me to work my entire trunk to support my back while I do the exercises.

Thinking about working toward being dryer (leaner) than I've ever been... pushing for 12-16% bodyfat... just to see if I can do it... won't be for a while, obviously... and will require some training assistance... but I'd like to see myself there once... we'll see.

Friday Weigh In...

186 today. Can't wait to be free of the 180s... hate that I'm heavier than my husband who is 6' and wirey. It'll come tho.

Its been a good week but with very little structured exercise. Structured eating took the front of my mind. Its really nice to have a new kitchen to fill. There isn't any "junk" to get rid of as I haven't brought any in... so its mostly portion control and eating out that I have to watch for.

I still haven't found a GNC to get my whey... but hopefully this weekend I'll make it to the mall where I'm assured there is one. I miss my protein, yogurt and berry smoothies for breakfast.

Our eggs have been comming from a local woman who keeps her chickens on organic feed and no hormones or crap. She's wonderful and the eggs are awesome... but we've only been getting 1 doz a week and we're going thru them too fast. I don't know if we need 2 doz... but I may have to see if we can get more for a few weeks to see how it goes.

Knees and feet still suck. Braces for jogging is helping tho... just need to get the feet fixed and I'll be right as rain... well... except for the missing Iron... but I'm working on that as well!

Workout Update!

Day 2 - 30 minute brisk walk at lunch. It was chilly but clear and gorgeous out.

I'm concerned a little about the minor swelling I'm having in my feet and even a little today in my hands. It seems so EARLY for swelling!!! SO I've upped my h2o intake significantly - 3 litres so far today, working on #4 as I type... and upping my protein as well. I honestly haven't been keeping a close enough eye on my protein intake the last few weeks (darned holiday and work stress) and I've been eating WAY too many processed foods (too much sodium).

The babies are doing well. We have the followup ultrasound on Baby A on Thursday, and I am hoping we'll get some answers then, but chances are we will not have anything solid until the first week of January.

Honestly I wish I could stop working now and just focus on the pregnancy and these little guys... but that's not going to happen, so I keep taking my vitamins, supplements and eating as well as I can... I keep exercising and finding way to reduce my stress and in 10 or so weeks I'll be done working for a while and I'll be able to really enjoy the end of this... my last (probably) pregnancy.

Thanks everyone for all of the support!!!

Workout Update:

Hooray!!!

I know I've been lax in posting... and especially in posting anything fitness related, but I have committed (AS OF TODAY) to working out every week day this week and posting the efforts here. Its time again for some accountability... it's time again for some motivation... and its time again to get this fat (and ever growing fatter) ass in gear.

That said... please don't laugh at my workouts. My fitness has slipped I will admit... I'm also preggo with twins and required to keep my HR under 140 (blech!)... so like I said, NO LAUGHING!!!

Workout:
5 minute warmup walk on TM @ 3.8mph
Upper body circuit: 3 sets at 15 reps each, no rest between exercises 60 seconds between sets all with 5lb dbs.
Shoulder press
Chest Fly - on exerball
Overhead Tricep press
Bicep Curl
18 minute walk (gonna ramp this one up) at 3.5-3.8 and 2 incline.
2 minute cool down walk at 3.2mph

Day one - DONE.

Tomorrow I am going to just walk. Wednesday will be lower body and walk. Thursday I will be taking off as I have docs appts. all day long, and friday will be a repeat of today.

My goal is to get up to 45 minutes walking per workout 5 days a week (or better) and 3 days of weights.

Right now I feel very good... energized. Chicken for lunch and only 2 hours left to work... Gym-time makes the work go faster too! YAY!!!

Arms & Shoulders

I got up early to do my arms and shoulders work this morning... it is getting harder and harder to get up in the morning as it gets darker and darker, but I hauled my expanding ass outta bed and got to work:

Standing Shoulder Press - 10#dbsx15,12,10
Shoulder Death (tm) - 3#dbsx15,12,10
Standing Bicep Curl - 10#dbsx15,12,10
alternated with
Overhead Tricep Press - 10#dbx15,12,10
Concentration Curl - 10#dbx10,10,10
alternated with
Tricep Kickback - 10#dbx10,10,10

The whole thing takes all of 30 minutes, paired with a long walk at lunch it should keep me for a day or so.

I was chatting with Renee yesterday and she was asking about how long I'll be able to work out while pregnant and what my plan is and I decided I should just lay it all out so I have a record of it, and so y'all can call me insane or whatever, but I've already gotten my plan approved by a real live Doctor, so I should be good to go.

Expect that full update later today!

Leg day

Didn't get to the workin out this morning due to extreme fatigue... so I picked it up this evening. I lurve Leg day:

Full squats - 20#x10, 15#x15, 10#x20
Pliee Squats - 30#x12, 10, 15
SLDLs - 30#x15, 15, 20
Leg Curls - 10#x15, 20, 25 - did these light cause I was figuring out the mechanics of holding a db between my feet laying on my coffee table... but it worked (pillow under the knees helped.
calf raise on stair - 20, 20, 25 (straight, toe in, toe out)
Last set - full squats just 15#x15

Legs are good and shakey and if I stretch well I shouldn't be too stiff tomorrow... oh but the DOMS will be glorious!

Walking will work things out... chest/back tomorrow.

Bike route

well according to the nifty Google Pedometer (now with CALORIE COUNTER!!!)... My ride to work is closer to 7.8m!! If I were running that would be nearly 800 calories burned... but according to caloriesperhour.com its only 463 calories... *sigh* (heh... times two ways... I'll take that!)

so... uh... fitness, right...

I guess I should be writing about fitness topics and such...

did I mention that there's a wonderful guy at work (older and very sweet and very gay) who loves to call me "slim"? I love him.

This week has been going VERY well fitness wise. Tuesday I did hot-yoga, yesterday I rode my bike in to work and then back home (14+ total miles) today I did hot yoga again... but since I took my bike in last night for a service check I won't be able to ride in tomorrow, so that kinda sucks... I'll come up wtih somthing active tho. I'm planning on doing the Saturday morning hot-yoga as well... (have I mentioned how much I am LOVING hot-yoga?)

My eating this week has been rock solid as well. Lots of lean and healthy protein... fruit and veggies, and water out the yang.

I'm happy... I'm healthy... life is good.

My Plan

*sigh*

Ok J.J. and Kristin (who emailed me) and anyone else who wants to know (once again, and for the record).

My weight loss plan:

eat right + exercise.

I wish I could make it more exciting, but its not... I've done all sorts of workouts... from weights intensive, to running, to bikram yoga. I've kept my protein high, my sugars and refined carbs low, and my fats healthy. I keep my calories between 1200 and 1800. Sometimes I use protein shakes or bars.

I have gotten to the point that I could do a pull-up, and run a 10k or two. I did a triathlon (and hope to do more in the future) and got sick/injured and gained some weight back... and am in the process of losing it again (yay).

I try to eat organic as much as possible (including organic meats). I feed my kids the same shit I eat day in and day out and they cope with it just fine.

Sometimes I am super motivated and on-plan and sometimes I'm not, but there is no secret... no magic bullet, no special pill (tho I've tried some weird shit in my time).

How did I find the motivation? I looked at pictures of myself at my 10 year highschool reunion. I was fucking fat and disgusted with myself... I found Krista Smash... I realized that I wanted to be strong and I quit making excuses.

I got my ass up EARLY in the morning to exercise.

I got out of bed.

I put on the shoes.

I planned what I would eat for the day and I ate it.

So there you have it... in a nutshell... or not.

Four weeks.

So in four weeks I dropped four pounds. That's pretty fantastic to me, so I'm going to do my best to keep my motivation up and keep eating right.

My running hasn't been happening this summer, and I feel that I just need to admit that running is not blowing my skirt up anymore. Luckily I have my bike:

Lookie Here

And riding to work from the park-n-ride is a damned good workout in the morning (a LOT of uphill)... and a lot of fun in the afternoon (down down down!). 7 miles each way means I get to cover 14 miles every time I ride. Throw in a lunch yoga class here and there and perhaps some morning lifting, now that I've found my hand weights which had been tucked away from toddler fingers and promptly forgotten about, and you have a fairly well rounded fitness regime.

This is a "Good Thing" (tm).

I feel SO MUCH BETTER when I eat clean... its not easy in the summer with kids out of school and lots of snack foods in the house. Granted they're fairly healthy snack foods... no candy or chips or soda in our larders, but goldfish and granola bars are still concentrated energy that my body doesn't need.

I thank Pioneer Organics every day for the fresh organic fruits and veggies they bring to my doorstep every week... THANK YOU PIONEER ORGANICS... THANK YOU!!!

My kids grab handfulls of cherry tomatos, sliced bell peppers and baby carrots for snacks almost as often as they grab a pre-portioned baggie of goldfish (hooray!!!). Bananas, apples, and nectarines oh my!

Now if I could just get my home in order... *sigh*

not hot enough?

either I'm getting used to the heat or it wasn't NEARLY as hot today at Bikram as it usually is. Good class, I got the kick out on standing head to knee again (can you tell I'm proud of that?). I'm drinking a lot of water and finding it hard to actually eat... which is not normally a problem for me. ;)

Renee posted some really important, emotional stuff over at her site today. Being an online journaler, blogger, whatever can be pretty intimidating. It is very easy to stop being real and saying what you want to say for fear that people will stop reading you, or won't like you, or will say somthing mean... or whatever. I have censored myself more in the last 6 months to a year than I ever thought I would.

I'm not sure that's a good thing... especially when the reason for the self-censorship is centered in worrying about what other people might think about me.

There is a lot of emotion tied up in a blog after a while. The people who read what you write on a daily basis become like friends or even family to you... I know I think of Renee and Lee and Mojo and others as my sisters, and I applaud their successes, and try to be supportive when they slip up or are injured, or just lose focus... but the truth of the matter is that when we all started these things WE were the only ones reading what we wrote, and it didn't really matter that no one else read or cared.

Its hard not to self censor once you realize that there ARE people out there following your story, waiting for the next chapter. I, for one, feel a lot of pressure to perform in this situation, which robs from the reality and purpose of my blog.

Its not that I want y'all to go away... its just that I want to figure out how not to care what someone thinks of me or what I write... because unless I've let y'all in (and some of you I have) what you think really shouldn't affect how I live my life or blog my blog or work my plan or whatever.

This was/is supposed to be the one place where I can focus on me and me alone... where I can do what I want to do with no fear of repercussions... I need to get back to that.

Thanks Renee.

R E S T D A Y

well hey howdy hey. I have muscles, and joints, and connective tissues most of which are puffy and a little bit annoyed with me today!

65 minutes running + 90 minutes Bikram = R E S T D A Y

But really, I don't feel too bad. I am EXHAUSTED... dead tired... and am trying to get the good nutrients and vitamins to rebuild after the tear-down yesterday... but overal my hammies are a bit tight, shoulders and neck are stiff, but otherwise I'm feeling pretty normal.

I'm feeling very motivated right now. Not sure why. I know that I have an opportunity to get into really good shape again before I get pregnant I guess and I'm just really wanting to take advantage of that. I've never had a "Fit Pregnancy" to speak of, and I'd really like to do that this time. I want to stay active, flexible, strong, etc... it will do me good, I am sure, thru the delivery and recovery to stay in the best shape possible. And maybe its the yoga. Its somthing new, and VERY challenging, and I'm already seeing myself get better at it which keeps the motivation alive.

Motivation is an odd duck... sometimes its nearly impossible to find, and yet it can pop up at the oddest moments. I've needed some motivation for a good long while, so I hope to chain it to my ankle for the rest of the summer and use it to propel me forward. (I'm picturing motivation as a very strong dog... St. Bernard perhaps... that just keeps pulling and never lets my feet stop moving... I'm kinda visual that way, sue me.)

In any case, it's here, I've found it... time to go for a ride.

Ran, and will Yoga too.

I don't think I've been pushing myself hard enough lately. I certainly haven't been challenging my fitness levels with the on-again off-again training I've been doing. But despite that, I was reminded today that I am not in as bad a condition as I'd thought. Workout today was 60 minutes on the Treadmill. I did a 2 minute walking (3.8mph) and 10 minute running (5.5mph) cycle. And honestly my legs/body were fine. It was my brain that didn't want to cope with everything. I'm of the opinion that training your brain to believe you CAN do somthing is much harder than training your body to actually do it.

Now that I've registered for the Helvetia/Drop Top 10k I figured I'd better see if I can keep moving for an hour at a time, and shore-nuff I did! I covered 5.3 miles and burned 640 calories to boot. I feel good, I plan to go to Bikram this afternoon for another 600+ calorie burn and some DEEP stretching. I think I'll do an easy run on Thursday and take Friday off before Helvetia. (and yes, I'm hydrating... I just finished litre #3 of water and will be powering thru at least two more before yoga.)

I haven't talked much about home/kids/etc. lately but that's mostly because everything is good. We're anxious for school to get out (they're not done until June 22nd here) so we can do more fun family stuff and start swimming lessons and the like. My older son is at or above grade-level in all of his subjects which is a HUGE accomplishment considering the challenges we had at the beginning of the year. My younger son (3 yrs) can sing his ABCs and count to 20 and is recognizing about 1/2 of the alphabet. My hubby is spending a lot of time at work, but when he's not we're doing well and I'm feeling very loved and appreciated these days.

Oh... and DAMN I am loving the yard. Going to try to get the irish moss in between the rocks this weekend... its a goal, ya gotta have em, don'tchaknow.

Mid-day joy.

Bikram at lunch rocks.

I feel all loose and bouncey... like I'm not wearing a bra, only I am... just bouncey.

Which is funny because this morning I was a raging hormonal Bitch (yes,with a capital B) and was literally groaning due to the cramps that ibuprofen didn't want to mess with... Damn you ibuprofen, you used to be my go-to-guy... why has thou forsaken me??? I almost skipped class.

But I didn't.

I sucked it up, freshened up (read: got a fresh vaginal blood sponge) and went to Bikram. And now I feel bouncey. I don't know if its the heat, the movement, the exertion, the sweat or just the restorative benefits of yoga, but I feel 100% better.

I made granola from scratch last night... ala Alton Brown only I didn't have any cashews, so I just doubled the sliced almonds and HOLYGODDAMNBATMAN is that stuff GOOD! CHEEP to make too!!! The only spendy items are the nuts, and if you can get those bulk you can make a whole batch for round-abouts $2.50... and skip all the nasty preservatives and crap they put in the boxed ones.

PLUS... you get the JOY, the pure absolute JOY of smelling it as it toasts for an hour and 15 minutes in the oven... plus, can I just say... warm granola right out of the oven is WORTH the tongue scalding.

;)

Fabulous weekend, and a good run.

My sister was in town this weekend (happy birthday, sis!) with her two beautiful daughters. Our kids played outside a bunch (when it wasn't raining) and we went to the coast for a bit as well. The trade off to all of the fun is that I skipped the Starlight 5k. Ah well, such is life. I will be doing the Helvetia 10k next weekend (and cheering the half-marathoners!) as a run/walker. I am not ready to do 10k all running yet, but hey, I might surprize myself, right?

In any case, after Helvetia I will be returning to p-town to cheer the Zamboanga DB Paddlers to victory. I don't know if I mentioned but I made the decision to stop paddling with Zambo a while back. It was for several reasons... I missed a lot of practice with my trip to Alaska and subsequent illness, but more than that, I was really feeling over-scheduled and I missed my family a lot. As much as I really enjoyed padlding with Zambo, I just couldn't justify the evenings and weekends away from my hubby and kids. Mike and I get very little time together as it is with our oposite work schedules, and losing one evening and part of both weekend days to paddling sucked. It just did.

So I run, and I am going to do hot yoga at least twice a week for the next couple of months... and from there we will see what happens. I'm feeling leaner and I'm down a couple of pounds on the scale in the last week, so that feels nice and motivates me to continue what I'm doing.

Like today for example: 45 minutes on the TM, aproximately 3.8 miles and 460 calories burned.

Tomorrow is hot yoga at lunch... glee!

just a little better.

Denise said somthing yesterday that really hit me in the gut as being the gods-honest-truth. Its somthing I have always said to myself and to others, but in not such succint and clear terms. Denise definitely hit the nail on the head with this one:

"Yes, I'm getting stronger by the minute and I still have hope, so I know that anything's possible. I won't ever be perfect and I don't need to be, I just need to do a little better than I am right now. This I can do."

Those last three sentences are the most important... "I won't ever be perfect andI don't need to be, I just need to do a little better than I am right now. This I can do." I don't care who you are or where you are in your journey. I don't care what you've achieved or what you have left to achieve. I don't care what your goals are, whether they are strength gaining, fat loss, speed improvement or body accpetance and self esteem improvement. I don't care how old you are, how long you've been at this, how many times you've tried, slipped, tried again, gained, lost, given up or not given a damn. All you have to do is remember that you don't need to be perfect. No one is, no one ever will be, just do a little better than you are at this very moment and things WILL change, things WILL improve... and remind yourself of that... because "just a little better" is somthing ANYONE can do.

you can.

I can.

we will.

Hot Lunch!

So Yoga in the Pearl has a half-length Hot-Yoga class twice a week at noon. You do one set of each pose instead of two to get thru the whole set in 45 minutes.

I went today and it was fantastic. I mean, yeah, it was still hot as hell, but my body dealt with the heat a LOT better this time than it did the first time. I never felt woozy or dizzy. I am actually excited to go again!

I am slowly peeling off the weight that I've been annoyed with for so long. Measurements are changing again, which is nice... and this weekend my folks and mike's folks are in town to help us create the backyard of our dreams... as long as we don't fry to a crisp under the (again unseasonably weird) sun.

I just ate about 20 tater tots... with ranch...

I think, perhaps... now that I have the exercise back in control... it might be time to reign in the diet as well.

;)

cheers!

Slug Parties and Bikram Yoga

Lets start with the Bikram.

Ok... holy shit. Yes I knew the room would be 105 degrees. I knew this. What I didn't know was that at 60% humidity and 105 degrees my body produces more sweat than a full body towel can absorb. I didn't make it thru every pose. I had to sit out about 3 I believe, but I tried every single one... and I didn't puke, and I didn't pass out, so I will chalk it up as a goal achieved! And... for some insane reason... I want to do it again. Honestly it was hard to be faced with the reality of my body with this extra fat on it. I didn't like that, but there was no getting around it in clingy clothes made more clingy by oodles of sweat. Reality is harsh and it was commin at me from all angles. Three hundred and sixty degrees of ouch. It was hard to stay focused because of that. Self consciousness got me several times and it was very hard to get past it. Not that anyone was looking at me other than me, because they weren't... they didn't give one damned bit of attention to the new chick in the corner... but I did. There was also a huge mental battle I had to fight with myself. "This is insane, you can't do this..." went thru my head on more than one occasion and when it got to be really loud the teacher said, "Ok... two more poses and we're done..." and I realized that yes it was probably insane, but I could make it to the end and that kept me going.

This morning found me a little sore, mostly in the lower back and quads (damn those standing poses) and I have to think that after 90 minutes in a 105 degree room doing some very intense yoga I probably burned 3-500 calories... at least I hope so. In any case, despite the soreness, I put on the shoes at 5:30 and went out for a 30 minute jog. I'm not going to call it a run because I took it VERY easy. I spent more time dodging slugs than I did really running per say as well. It was like there was some huge slug convention... a slug party, if you will, that every slug on this side of the world had to get to and so they all squirmed off across the sidewalk to get to the party on the other side. And I'm talkin ALL KINDS and ALL SIZES of slugs from the tiny baby 1" long little guys to the 5-6" long HUGE ASS banana slugs that freak me right the fuck out every time I see one crawlin up a wall or across a sidewalk. I believe I was able to avoid actually treading on any slugs, but I didn't check the bottoms of my shoes to be sure, so I'm not making any promises.

OH... and let me once again pimp PIONEER ORGANICS. They've revamped their ordering system and you can pretty much customize completely the produce you receive in your box each week... its awesome! So if you live in the greater Portland or greater Seattle areas check 'em out!!!

today I put my shoes on

at 5:15 the alarm went off... I snoozed it once... and at 5:22 (before the alarm went off again) I realized that all I had to do was put my shoes on... so that's what I did... and 35 minutes later I'd completed a great out and back run for about 2.5-3 miles. I was sweaty, winded (I always sprint the last couple of blocks before walking to cool down) and happy that I'd put on the shoes. One run down, four to go.

hot yoga is planned for Sunday at Yoga in the Pearl with Alissa. Its a 90 minute class from 3-4:30pm... I'm EXCITED!!! Tho I do need to get my own mat before we go. I'm hoping to get a couple more classes in next week to use up the "3 classes for $15" pass that I'm gonna buy. Wish me luck and think good hydration thoughts for me on Sunday.

I'm feeling pretty high energy today. I attribute that primarily to going to bed at 9:15 and to getting my run on this morning. Morning exercise does amazing things for not only the metabolism but also the attitude and outlook as the day goes on.

Hey... anything else I do today exercise wise is Cake as far as I'm concerned!

*wink*

OH! Hey, BD - I know you know this, but there is nothing more intense than the birth of a child and I want you to know that my thoughts will be with you and J and T as your family grows by one. Good luck, best wishes, and since you probably won't be on again soon... welcome to the world little R!!

EDITED TO ADD: Whoops... Yoga has been moved to tomorrow at 4:30-6p!!! EEEPS. This is gonna be fun!

No More Cramps!

Running worked for mister crampy pants, so I'm feeling much better. 2.8 miles, 35 minutes, 315 calories, huzzah.

going out to dinner with the hubby tonight... for FREE!!! A good friend owns a restaurant and the last time hubby and I went the service was god-awful. I told friend about it and he asked us to be his "secret-diners" every once in a while to keep tabs on how things are going. Bad service = customers not comming back. Repeat business keeps restaurants going. In any case we agreed (well DUH!) so he's paying for our dinner and drinks tonight and all we have to do is report back on the experience in the morning.

glee!

FREAKIN RAIN!!!

This has been the strangest winter/spring I've experienced since moving to the pacific northwest. The winter was dry and sunny when it is usually excessively wet. In fact it was so dry that most of the ski resorts had very short seasons and everyone was talking about a severe summer drought. And then April came... along with 30+ straight days of rain. And now its May and its still raining. Drought talk has given way to "flash flood warnings" and "severe thunderstorm warnings" and for some reason the farmers and fishermen aren't at each others throats about water use yet this year.

What sucks ass for those of us web-footers who are used to lots of rain is that USUALLY in May we're peeling off the galoshes and raincoats to expose our waterloged toes and fingers to the sun. But not this year... no sir!

I am not comfortable riding my bike in traffic in the rain, so I'm not riding to work as much as I would like. I can run in the rain no problem, but thunder storms do tweak me out a little so those may cause a pass as well. The treadmill chaps my ass, but there ya have it: it is safe, sound, and dry. So, day one of training was on the treadmill. 35 minutes, 2.8 miles, most of it run at 5mph, some at 4.8mph and a few minutes walking to warm up and cool down and a 2 minute break between miles 1 and 2 at 3.8mph. 310 calories burned (yay!) and a daily trianing goal completed. I wanted to run at least 2 miles today. I ran 2.5 of the 2.8, so I am happy.

Alissa mentioned Hot Yoga to me today. She wants to take me. I want to go. Anyone care to share experiences with Hot Yoga with me? Any clues on how to find a studio near me? I am definitely intrigued.

back to reality.

OK... PFTs for Zamboanga start next week... what's a PFT you might ask?

Why its a personal fitness test of course! If you want to paddle on the rose-festival boat for Zamboanga you must be able to pass the PFT. The test consists of a 2-3m run, pushups and situps. I'm not sure how many of each of the last two, but the run must be completed within a set time limit, so busting ass is probably going to be a good idea from here on out.

I'll run the PFT course tonight to get an idea of my time and see what kind of improvement I need to look for. Practice may, in fact, be DRY today... but I'm not holding my breath (this is the pacific northwest afterall).

I'm finding that my bowels don't like it when I go on binge-eating weekend fests... fiber supplementation is the word of the day kiddies, maybe I'm just getting old, I don't know... but I do know that being regular is a Very Good Thing (tm) and right now I am not, and its making me angry.

Water intake = yes.
Fiber intake = yes.

Come on body... lets get rid of some toxins now, m'kay?

gassed.

on the schedule for today was either running or running and upper body.

I've got nuttin.

zero.

energy tank = empty.

So I guess today is defacto rest day. I'm pleased with how my workouts have gone thus far this week. We ran 2.3 miles yesterday (non-stop) before doing our calisthenics and then being on the boat for an hour... and according to http://www.caloriesperhour.com that's between 900 and 1100 calories burned for a workout. (yippee!)

Not gettin on the scale again till next tuesday (daily fluctuations are not worthy of my energy)... I ate like CRAP yesterday tho... not enough protein, lots of carbs... TOO MUCH FAT... and yet somehow I stayed under 1600 calories.

Now, how do I find out the nutritional make up of a tuna-roll???

other stuff

While the stuff I posted about below is occupieing a lot of my brain-cycles right now, I figured I should post somthing about fitness today. I guess I didn't update yesterday that the scale still hasn't budged... in fact over the weekend it looked like I'd gone up a solid 2 lbs... that is gone again, and since my menses is due any day I'm hoping that the proverbial whoosh fairy will grant me a small loss on the scale once my cycle has begun anew.

A lot of women bitch openly about their menstrual cycle, and I will admit that it is often a hassle to deal with so frequently... what other high-order mamal is fertile EVERY SINGLE MONTH of the year? None*, that's what... so yeah... just the effort it takes to prevent pregnancy every single month is a hassle... add bleeding for a week (which really wouldn't be so bad if we could take that week and go off to the spa with other menstruating women and be pampered like the goddesses we are) and you've got about 10 days every month where you're not actively dealing with one or the other. Its a hassle. I don't blame ya for bitching... I do it too.

But truly... right now I'm pretty thankful for my cycle... and the fact that I know my fertility is intact. I'm pretty lucky that way. In any case, I won't be bitching about my menses this month, just hoping its causing some delayed reactions from the scale.

*this is an anecdotal answer and I am aware that its probably wholly inaccurate, but at least among primates we are the most frequently fertile of the entire order.

Legs

Workout accomplished:

jumprope - 50 jumps
Smith Squat - 20#x 15, 20, 25 (jumprope 50 jumps between each set)
Calf Raise - 15#x 15, 20, 25 (jumprope 50 jumps between each set)
Pliee Squat - 12#x 20, 30, 40
SLDL - 24#x 20, 25, 20
Leg Exten/Walking Lunge SS - 15#x 30, 30, 20 / bodyweightx 30, 30, 20

I'd like to work up to doing jumprope between each set in order to keep my HR nice and high. I got my third set of the leg extension/walking lunge superset in today, but I cut the reps to 20... we'll see how I feel tomorrow.

I hate feeling rushed and today I feel rushed. I have lots to get done here at work before I leave an hour early to get my filling fixed at the dentist... I have to rush from there to the post office and then home so my hubby can get to work (he works a late swing four nights a week and is home with the boys during the day)... I'll have to rush to get them fed and ready for school tomorrow, rush to get the house cleaned, rush rush rush... I don't like it.

I know I'm not the greatest time manager... I'm doing better than I used to for sure... but still, is it the plague of our times that we never feel we have enough TIME? Not enough days in the week, not enough hours in the day.

I didn't even get my bath last night... *sigh* did make rice krispies treats with the boys tho, so that's somthing.

lumps of clay.

I took BD's advice and went for 3 miles today. I did not run the whole thing... I had 3 walking breaks for about 4 blocks each... I needed them, especially the first one. But not because I was out of breath, my breathing fell into the old-familiar comfortable pattern within the first 3 minutes or so. I needed the walk breaks because my legs felt like heavy ass lumps of completely worthless clay. I had to adjust the laces on my right shoe twice because my foot kept going numb, my shins were quite annoyed, my knees (suprisingly) were pretty ok... but my heavy heavy thud-thud stepping legs were just intollerable.

IN FACT - it wasn't until about 2.5 miles INTO the run that they even started to feel like I was running. Prior to that I was sort of shuffling along with a bit of a runners gait... it was probably pretty pathetic to behold. The last half-mile, however, felt pretty damned good. I didn't wear a watch so I don't know how long it took... I'm going to guess around 36-38 minutes tho because I was just that slow.

I'm looking forward to lifting tomorrow, anything other than pounding the pavement or pulling water would be a good thing (tm) at this point.

time for whey at half a turkey sammich.

cheers!

Much better...

After some rest yesterday I felt much better. We actually did a short (2.25m) run just before practice on Saturday and sort of got lost in the sea of portland-fit runners on the waterfront, it was pretty neat to see THAT MANY people running together... what a trip.

Just to answer Holly's question from yesterday, we have a "tiller" who stears us thru the worst of it... his main job is to watch for other watercraft and floating debris and move us around all of that as much as possible. We didn't make it all the way to Sellwood yesterdy mostly because we kept stopping to practice race-starts... but it was still a VERY intense practice.

Today was good (back in the Kaohsiung boats) and I could FEEL my shoulders and back burning long before I thought they should have, but I kept it up and we had a VERY strong practice... some really good race-starts and some fabulous endurance stretches. What's SUPER cool is that we had 15 paddlers of whom EIGHT were women!!! GO LADIES!!! Its cool when the majority of the boat is estrogen based fit ass women.

I've decided to go ahead and run tomorrow. I need to get back my cardio-vascular endurance and the only way that will happen is if I run, run, run... so no more monday rest day for me... here's the plan for the week:

Sunday: 1.5m run and DB practice (done)
Monday: 2-3m run
Tuesday: Legs
Wednesday: 2m run and DB Practice
Thursday: REST
Friday: 3m run
Saturday: 2.25m run and DB Practice (2 hours)

You don't see any upper body weight training in there, but I think I have to resign myself to the fact that I'm doing DB so often that I just don't have a good place to put it... doing it on Monday after two consecutive practices would just be stupid... and I really want my leg day in there, so that leaves thursday... which I suppose I could do... but again, its right after DB practice... argh!!!

THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH DAYS IN THE WEEK!!! I think I'll write my senator.

If someone wants to give my schedule a go to fit in a day of upper body weights, I'd love to see it!

cheers!

exhaustion=nausea

I know I've said that paddling practice has been brutal in the past... but today... today was different... today was... Extremely brutal. Even my fingers are having a hard time functioning correctly right now. We started with a LONG LONG paddle up-river... only one break to switch sides and then we turned and started our start/sprint practice... we did our race starts and 15-60 second sprints over and over... and then we paddled and sprinted, paddled and sprinted with no breaks, only active recovery...

I'm so exhausted that no matter what I eat or do I'm nausious... I'm seeing spots every time I stand up... I'm pounding water and simple carbs and its just not getting better.

I need a nap.

Practice again tomorrow... I'll keep ya posted.

DOMS

there isn't a muscle in my body that doesn't hurt right now.

even my fingers.

Practice last night was BRUTAL... but we raced another boat on the river and kicked their ass.

so that makes everything ok.

bath and ibuprofen tonight.

ugh.

Ok... how about a mental review...

First we have vague notions of what we want to get out of all of this work... ideas of an ideal weight, a proper clothing size, how we want to feel about our bodies in the mirror, in a bikini, naked, whatever... we think about how nice it would be to be able to do xxx, or go for an yyy, and we ponder and consider and pine for a time when these vague notions were closer to our reality than they are now.

And then, at some point, we decide that being affraid to fail isn't going to hold us back from trying any longer; and we decide that we are worthy of the time and effort necessary to create a reality that could be so much more satisfying than the one in which we exist right now....

And THEN... we set... GOALS...

I will be xxx on the scale, I will be able to do yyy, I will loose qqq ammount of weight and I will be happy.

We consult books, websites, diet and fitness gurus and we create a plan and we commit fully to working the plan for as long as it takes.

And we march off on our merry way thinking we're going to conquer the world, or at least our rebellious bodies... and we work for a time... and put in the effort... and we do this and that and we make progress... and then the progress slows... or even (God forbid) halts... and bad habits creep back in, or there is a trigger moment that sends us back to a binge, and we get depressed, our hinies planted firmly in the indentation of the couch cushion and we let go lamenting all the while how HARD it is and how much we tried and yet somehow, once again... we've failed... we aren't xxx on the scale, we can't do yyy and we're somehow... still. not. happy.

but why is it a "failure" any more than someone trying to quit smoking who is unable to the first 3 or 5 or 10 times they try? Why is it ok to fail at quitting and not ok to fail at getting fit? People who try to quit smoking are trying to kick an addiction that affects brain chemistry... so are those trying to loose weight and get fit. Smoking is a habit and an addiction... Over eating is a habit and an addiction... not exercising is a habit and an addiction.

I'd like to submit the theory that it doesn't matter how many times you've tried and "failed" in your journey to health... because everytime we try we learn and we get closer and we make a difference if only for a short time... every cigarette you don't smoke adds 7 minutes to your life? I wonder what watching what you eat and exercising does for you even if only for a short while.

So ya fell off the wagon... so what? This shit is hard, its scary and a lot of times we need an emotional break from it all because somehow we have to learn to deal with the world and the people in it without all the food. But the bottom line hasn't changed. We are all worthy of the work, we still deserve the time and effort it takes to reach our goals... and yes, its still scary, and yes we may fall again... the falling isn't what defines us... its what happens next.

My goals haven't gone away... my plan hasn't disapeared... I'm still here, and I'm still worth working for.

so are you.

Progress report

No change on the scale and while I have to admit to some not-so-mild annoyance and not-entirely-fleeting dissappointment I spent some time this morning reminding myself that I just jumped head-long into a pretty intesnse workout schedule so it's not surprising that my scale weight hasn't changed. Internal shifts are going on, and I'd rather see my muscle return to its once glorious state than worry about the scale's movement. (I shoulda taken measurements tho).

In any case, I am still on track and my workout today was pretty damned brutal... high volume on a leg workout is... uh... lets call it intense for lack of a stronger word.

Workout Accomplished:

1.2m jog on tm to warm up
Smith Squat - 15, 20, 25 @ 10lbs
Calf Raise - 15, 20, 25 @ 15lbs
Plie Squat (imagine there is an accent on that e) 20, 30, 40 @ 12#
Dead Lift - 25, 25, 25 @ 25#
Leg extension/walking lunge - 30/30, 30/30 (ext @15#)
stretch, poke, twist... off to the showers.

low weight, high volume... I was supposed to do one more set of the leg-extension/walking lunge superset, but I just didn't have it in me, my form was already suffering on the lunges, so I will add that in next week.

I'm going to catch a short run (probably 2 miles) before dragon boat practice (1 hour) tomorrow night... hopefully my legs will be up for it... if not, I will at least walk it... I know they'll need the help to work the soreness out.

Time to update fitday and get some lunch!

I hurt

ouch.

lets recap, shal we:

fri: upper body workout.
sat: 2 hour dragon boat practice
sun: 1 hour dragon boat practice
mon: I'm giving myself the day off... recovery is needed. I hope to go for a run after work, but that will depend wholly on how I'm feeling at that point.

Sleep came suddenly last night and I don't believe I moved much until I woke this morning.

*sigh*

Its the good hurt, but man... fucking hell.

Dragon Boating

Saturday's practice was different than the last couple of weeks... we warmed up for a few minutes on the water paddling upstream and then we stopped and talked about race-starts, sprints, power strokes, and lots and lots of stuff that I had absolutely NO idea what meant... but it all became clear VERY quickly as we practiced starts over and over and over and did start sprints for 15, 30, 45 and 60 seconds over and over and over again.

There was quite a lot of rest/recovery between the sprints, but it was a whole different workout and quite an eye opener. Up till yesterday our practices had been endurance focused... paddling and paddling with little rest... 7 miles per workout... we didn't cover that kind of distance yesterday, but I think the sprint intervals were very intense and a very good workout in and of themselves.

unfortunately I let my food go to hell yesterday, but I'm not worried about it and I'm back on track today... I may just have to allow for Saturdays to be thoughtful-free days, but we'll see how it goes.

First practice in the big-boats today... 1 hour... probably a lot of sprinting and starting practices again... wish me luck!

Upper body and all cottage cheese all the time

Have I mentioned that I love cottage cheese.

Now maybe I'm a freak of nature, but I could potentially live on cottage cheese and fruit for years with zero complaints. I'm having cottage cheese with strawberries for lunch... the strawberries were a little tart so I've sprinkled about 1/2 a packet of splenda on top and its like a sundae only GOOD FOR ME... YIPPEE!!

Workout today was upper body again, tho that may have been a bad idea what with two dragon boat practices on deck for this weekend:

workout accomplished:

5min w/u tm.
Assisted p-u/pushup ss - 10/8/8
incline b-p/upright row ss - 15/15/15 @8#
shoulder press/lat-raise ss - 15/15/15 @3#
ez bar curl/ez bar french press ss - 15/15/15 (just the bar)
db curl/dip ss - 15/15/15 @5#
knee up (on bench) 2@20 reps, Flutter kick (on bench) 2@20 reps.
10 minute incline walk on TM - incline 5 speed 3.8mph.

This weekend should be FANTASTIC: Dragon Boat tomorrow morning at 9:30 (2m jog beforehand) till 11:30, No knitting class, but then Dragon Boat again on Sunday (first time in the ceremonial Koshang Boats) at 4pm... so if you add it up, I will have probably burned upwards of 5k calories this week. Add to that eating healty whole foods for the whole week and I imagine we'll se some scale movement next Tuesday...

For perspective I am going to use my starting weight from last Tuesday when I finally pulled my ass outta the funk... that weight was 173... it sucks, but I don't care... it's real and its where I'm starting from. I'd like to see a solid 2lb loss this week, but even if I don't, I don't care because it WILL come eventually and what I'm doing now is so much better for me than stuffing dingdongs down my throat and drinking half a bottle of wine every night.

;)

and YES, I had one krispy kreme donut this morning, and I've logged it in Fit-day and I'm adjusting for it today. Tada... life, without excess and without deprivation. HOORAY!!! (I'm sounding awfully proud of myself today aren't I? heh.)

...update...

workout accomplished:

5min w/u tm.
Assisted p-u/pushup ss - 10/8/6
incline b-p/upright row ss - 15/15/15 @8#
shoulder press/lat-raise ss - 15/15/15 @3# (damn its humbling to be doing presses with 3# weights when I was doing 30# db presses about a year ago)
ez bar curl/ez bar french press ss - 15/15/15 (just the bar)
db curl/dip ss - 15/15/15 @5#
1 mile run on tm...

I know I can't expect perfection, but I'm done wallowing in self pitty and depression... I'm done. period.

oh... and I have a dentist appointment in 2.5 hours... yippee!!

and on and on we go...

listenin to "girls" as I sit at my computer and contemplate the weightloss potential of puking every morning before going to work... (yes, it was that bad this morning).

Dragon Boating was again cold and wet and fabulous. I still ache in my mid/low back arms, shoulders and hammies. My sit-bones are noticeably LESS sore this week than they were last week, so perhaps my butt is toughening up already (we can always hope).

The last two weeks we've been going out in the "long" boats but starting this week we'll be doing practices in the big ornate Koshang boats which will be used for the actual Rose Festival races. They sit higher in the water and are about as hydrodynamic as a washtub. It is said that paddling them is not unlike trying to paddle a bathtub full of cement... hmmm...

Starting this week we jump up to 4 practices per week as well... Saturday 9:30-11:30a, Sunday 4-5p, Monday 7-8p, and Wednesday 8-9p. I will not be able to make the Monday practices, but I will be trying to make all of the rest... That's three honest workouts (resistance AND cardio all at once... yippeee!!!) per week dictated by dragonboating... now all I have to do is get my ass running again so I can pass the Personal Fitness Test which is required before the paddling teams for the races are chosen.

Weekend was good... last knitting class for now... Mother in-law was here playing with the boys and we had a great time watching them hunt for their little plastic eggs full of goodies for Easter. It really baffles me what ideas Val is getting about "God" these days... I know his dad is religious, but man... the stuff that comes out of this kids mouth scares me... he's not questioning anything they're telling him... just blindly accepting it, and it makes it SO clear to me how easy it is to influence a childs belief systems at this age. When he asks me questions about "God" I always try to give perspective and tell him he can believe what ever he wants, but that some people believe this and others believe this, but Momma and dad don't believe in "God" at all, and that's ok too.

Last thing I need is my kid trying to save me. *sigh*

Ok... that got off of fitness for a moment... I'm going for a run today DAMNIT... I AM!

Walking is good

baby steps...

1. Drink my water.
2. Get my ass moving.
3. Find somthing that motivates me.
4. Get my food in line with my goals.
5. Goto 1

This week has been fairly successfull on all accounts... I have been averaging 2.5-3 litres of water per day... my ass has moved no less than 3 times this week (walking 3+ miles per session, but hey... its somthing) and dragon boat practice is tomorrow... found dragon boating to be motivating me so far and I have done a very good job (except for Wednesday night when there was much wine, and pot du creme consumed) keeping my foods clean. I haven't been worrying about portion control right now because I went back and read my rant about just eating real food and realized I needed to take my own damned advice and so that's what I'm focusing on.

Now if I could just figure out where I added two stitches in the pattern of the blanket I'm knitting all would be right with the world.

OH... and if the Terri Schaivo case teaches you NOTHING ELSE let it motivate you to create a Living Will / Advanced Directive for your Medical Care AND a Durrable Power of Attorney assigning someone who KNOWS and AGREES WITH your wishes to make decisions on your behest in the case of somthing like this. I don't care how old you are... if you don't do this, someone may have to make these decisions for you and they may not decide to do what you would have wanted them to do.

Don't let yourself be the next Terri... just don't.

Dragonboating

I wasn't prepared for my legs to be sore.

DW, April, Marya and I walked/jogged the waterfront esplanade loop (about 2.5 miles) before practice and then met at the marina... 9:30 am, its about 40 degrees... raining... miserable.

On the boat I'm placed near the back... right in front of the team captain and coach... he's an ex-marine special forces type... very intense, but also VERY motivational.

Zamboanga

Zamboanga is a well-respected competative Dragonboating team... they don't just do Rose-Festival... they do races up and down the west coast thru the summer. They've come close to taking the rose-festival title several times, this year they are intent on it. DW is the tiller, Marya is learning to be the caller... I just got in the boat and rowed.

and rowed.

and rowed.

and

rowed.

Alvin (captain) showed me how to sit and brace my hip on the side of the boat... how to angle my body and get the oar DEEP in the water. We rowed from the marina past the Sellwood bridge and back... according to the GPS - nearly 7 miles total. We were on the water for nearly 2 hours. I wasn't cold for a second.

Then we got off the water.

I couldn't lift my arms, my legs were sore and throbbing, but my @SS was the worst of all. Sitting on a fiberglass bench for 2 hours whilst rocking back and forth with your upper body to row and row and row can do a number on your sit-bones... and the soft tissues that surround them. YEOWCH!

Coffee, cinnimon apple french toast, a hair cut and a knitting class later I finally got home. Knitting was FANTASTIC. I've never taken a class before, but in 2 hours I learned more than I have in the last 8 months I've been knitting. The teacher was impressed that I'd only learned to knit last summer and she helped me a lot with reading the pattern and keeping count of my stitches... I'm not thrilled with the colors I picked for my blanket, but when its done I'm sure it will look great. That was before the muscle soreness set in tho...

Yesterday was an exercise in figuring how what I could do without having to lift my arms above waist level... some laundry got done, but not much else... even washing my hair in the shower was a comedy of errors (and pain).

For now my goal is to get SOME exercise (hopefully mostly jogging) every day this week. I seriously need to work on my endurance if I'm going to be rowing with Zambo until June... but man, what a blast.

Ok... I'd better get some work done! cheers!

Ever wanted to ride a Dragon?

It is no secret round here that I am having a HELL of a time getting back into the swing of exercising... nothing is inspiring or exciting me right now and thus I haven't hauled my ass to the gym or even put on the running shoes at all this week. Sure I've gone for walks and played with the kids but come on... this is comming from a girl who ran 10+ miles several times last year AND could deadlift her bodyweight not too long ago. I need to get my bike out and dust it off... I need to just put on my shoes... and I need some inspiration to get my ass moving again.

And then April asked if I wanted to row on a dragon boat.

And then her husband Doug asked as well.

And then the FULL COURT PRESS was initiated and it seems I am now showing up at 9:30 am on Saturday on the Willamette Waterfront to climb into a big heavy boat with 10-20 other people and paddle for 2 hours straight.

Inspiration...

Sometimes it comes at you from an angle you weren't expecting and sometimes its thrown in your face by your friends who see that you definitely need some and aren't comming up with it on your own...

Saturday looks like this:

8:30am - run the waterfront
9:30am - the boat leaves and I'm gonna be paddlin for 2 hours
11:30am - off the water - TIME FOR CANPAKES!
2:00pm - Hair appointment
3:30pm - Knitting class

Should be a good good time

(wish me luck!!! I hope my arms don't fall off!!!)

Juice Fasting

Ok...

Beth asked for some details on my juice fast and while I am an advocate of periodic detoxification I want to emphisize before I talk specifically about MY fast that I do not agree with fasting for weight loss, nor do I think that long fasts or water only fasts are healthy in the long run... I believe that those who fast for religious and spiritual purposes often go to an extreme that I would NEVER EVER advocate to anyone looking to fast for health... that being said, a water only fast of a few days to a week CAN bring spiritual clarity to many and has helped a few of my dear friends to break some toxic cycles in their lives (typically these were no longer than 5 day fasts).

In any case... I am not fasting for spiritual clarity, I am fasting to detoxify... and here is what I've done...

Typically a few days before you begin a fast you should start an elimination diet... getting rid of caffeine refined sugar, dairy, meat, etc... until you're eating fruit, veggies and legumes. I didn't do this part, but I have in the past and it does make the detox symptoms MUCH less severe. Since I don't have time to juice fresh fruits and veggies myself I stock up on Trader Joes organic and all-natural juices... I try to avoid too much citrus (only have it in blended juices) because it can irritate my tummy in large ammounts. Then for 3 days (72 hours) I drink filtered water and juice... I try to keep the water to juice ratio between 2:1 and 4:1 which keeps things in the digestive tract VERY dilute. When I'm hungry I drink about 8 oz of juice and chase it with 16 oz of water or so... and then continue to sip water until I feel hungry again. I also drink herbal tea sweetened with honey if I feel like it.

Fasting can help you break a cycle of poor nutrition that you may have fallen into... it can help you REALLY get in touch with your own personal hunger signals... and it can REALLY help to identify your non-nutrative eating habits... by that I mean that when you eliminate eating solid foods as an option, you may notice that you're spending a LOT less time eating than you were and you may gain some clarity on your habitual/emotional/stress eating patterns.

Here is a good generic non-religious article on juice fasting: http://altmedicine.about.com/od/detoxcleansing/a/juice_fasting_2.htm

I do need to reitterate once again tho, that when a person chooses to fast they are taking their health into their hands... if you are diabetic, have any sort of circulatory, respiratory or digestive issue that could be worsened by the removal of any specific nutrient from your diet or any shock to your system it is probably a bad idea to fast.

My fast will end at 10 pm tomorrow, but I may be asleep which will cause it to naturally extend into Friday morning when I will have a true breakfast of eggs and turkey bacon.

If you do choose to fast because of anything I've said here, please keep a journal as you do it to really explore how you're affected by it and PLEASE keep me posted... I'd really love to hear how it goes!

Isn't it funny?

So... having exercised for the last three days I am finally getting my energy back, tho it could be the fact that I crashed last night at 7pm and my lovely hubby let me sleep until my alarm went off at 6. I guess I needed the extra sleep, eh?

I am taking a rest day today as I have a very busy weekend scheduled and will be incredibly active with the boys as long as it stays nice out... otherwise we may have to improvise.

So what I'm finding in terms of pregnancy and fitness is basically that your level of fitness before you get pregnant really determines how hard you can exercise as the pregnancy progresses. Its VITALLY important to listen to your body and most "experts" seem to recommend keeping the HR under 140 or below 60% of max... this can get tiresome... but ah well.

Went for 45 minutes on the eliptical yesterday using a HRM that the gym let me use (straped around rib-cage) and it communicates directly with the piece of equipment you're on. I was surprised at how easy I had to take it to keep things under 140bpm. Now granted I was sweating and such but I never felt out of breath or like I couldn't have kept up a conversation without even thinking about it...

The good thing is that I can continue my weight lifting and hopefully find some prenatal yoga as well. I do love yoga, and one thing I've promised myself is a month pass to the local hot-yoga facility after the pregnancy is over... glee!

I'm going to be changing some admistrative things on the site (with the help of the most FABULOUS Renee)... there will be some pw protected entries and I'm going to set up comment registration so I don't have to moderate comments, but it should help cut down on the comment spam... and once you've registered you should be able to comment freely... I will give the pw out to pretty much anyone who asks, and most entries WON'T be pw protected... but well... sometimes I'm going to say things that I don't necessarily want any schmo on the inet to see, so there ya have it.

Hopefully these changes won't cause too much inconvenience... its just life I guess.

PROTEIN!!! (time for a whey-shake!)

exercise is a good thing

45 minutes on the TM yesterday and another 35 today felt REALLY good... it's been FAR too long.

Starving all the time is weird, need to up the protein intake for sure! Fruit and cottage cheese has been my mantra for breakfast of late... and I REALLY need to get back into my water consumption. I'm up to 40 oz today, but I know I can do better than that by bedtime.

still working on the extended entry...

I know yer all waiting with baited breath... (whateverthehellthameans)

dude... stop with the shoulders already

There is a guy who worksout in the morning at around the same time I do. His arms, shoulders, chest and back are HUGE and well cut... his legs, on the other hand, look like a couple of toothpicks wrapped in peach tissue paper. You can tell he is a fairly narrow person by nature, his hips are narrow and he is very lean, but GOOD LORD... lay off the presses for a moment and work on your poor scrawny little legs for a while!!! PLEASE!!! He is seriously the most unbalanced physique I have EVER encountered... I had no idea it could be that bad.

LINKS!!!

I updated SO many links on the left and its now chock full of wonderful fitness and weight loss blogs that you MUST READ EVERY DAY!!!

On the fitness front I was supposed to meet a certain workout buddy at the gym this morning for an upper body workout... but that didn't happen because she who will remain nameless didn't show up! That's right, ladies and gents, I got ditched for some sleepy-time! The NERVE! ;)

I did the workout anyway, and had a grand old time making my shoulders, chest, back and arms whine from their lack of use. Speaking of whining, my legs are definitely of the opinion that yesterdays workout was quite enough, thankyouverymuch and they have decided to unionize and go on strike for more favorable working conditions... what they don't know (obviously) is that this is NOT a democracy, it is a dictatorship, and they are the pleebes who will obey my every command.

And now its time for lunch!

ACK!!!

So my doctors idea of "take it easy" = nothing more strenuous than walking for two weeks.

WHAT THE F' IS UP WITH THAT???

I told him I was going to go insane at this rate and he said somthing to the effect of, "better safe than sorry" and I just about punched him in the face.

(seriously)

So I asked him if there was anything else, other than walking, that would keep me in his "safe zone" and he said, "stop trying to find the loopholes and go for a walk!"

Crap.

So Dr. day was Tuesday, and I had to spend most of Wednesday in bed (which was nice, but still annoying because after about 12 hours of TIVO there just isn't much left to watch)... and today... I am here... and I should go for a walk... but damnit I'm PISSED!

I am supposed to be LIFTING!!! I already missed two days of lifting this week what the hell is this man trying to do to me???

"better safe than sorry" my ever-expanding ASS!

so... I will walk... for probably an hour... because I'm just that stubborn.

*sigh*

(ok... so I'm exagerating my annoyance a little bit... I can live with daily walking for two weeks, it isn't going to kill me, and truly it is worth it to prevent future problems, etc... I'm just a stubborn bitch sometimes, and right now I feel like whining... )

ravenous

Morning workouts make me hungry.

seriously hungry.

ready to gnaw on my arm if I don't get some food right freakin now hungry.

So I horfed down my english muffin wiht PB and Orange Juice (freshly squoozed) and I am still starving.

I want canpakes (as JimVW always calls them) and eggs... and chicken fried steak... and regular steak... and regular chicken... hell, you can chicken fry the chicken while you're chicken frying the steak... and drop a couple of battered twinkies in that oil while you're at it.

ARGH!!!!

Ok... water, and a quick trip up to the cafe should help... I'll go for the yogurt.

Oh, and as an aside... is it a good thing when every rep of your second set of each exercise (yes, starting with rep #1) is painful? Not impossible... but definitely painful.

All weights workouts for the week are done!!! Tomorrow I'll cardio it up, and we'll see now next week develops.

I have some medical stuff going on and I'm affraid the Dr. will tell me to take it easy next week, but we shal see... His definition of easy may be VASTLY different from my definition of easy.

Cheers!

Jello legs

I have jello legs and I like it very much.

we did the full leg workout today except that we only did two sets of the leg extension/walking lunge superset... 3x30 on those was just too much for a first run thru... and can I just say that leg-extensions after squats and reverse lunges are just about impossible... I think I might have been lifting 15lbs and it was still very very very difficult.

I feel very awesome post workout, tho... as is usually the case. I seriously need to figure out how to eat in the morning before lifting tho... my bloodsugar was so low by the end of the workout that I was getting woozy... literally woozy. Some apple and my english muffin with pb straightened things out quickly, but I don't like that feeling... woozy is not a good feeling.

I fear tomorrow... we may have to move second upper body day to Friday to give us a better recovery period... but we'll see.

adapt, improvise, overcome.

shake it

ok... its not that bad... seriously... any one of you could do it easily. It took about 35 minutes to go thru 2 sets of the upper body blast and it is a GREAT workout. I haven't had this shakey unable to lift my arms to wash my hair feeling in a long time and I think its great. So you should try it... go on... you know you wanna... shake it up a bit!

I need simple carbs now.

I'm going to count yesterday as a loss because the small ammt of cardio I did really isn't worth anything and I ended up going to the dr. at 10:30 am which just totally threw off my whole routine and I didn't suck it up and get it back on track afterward... life happens... move on.

Tomorrow is LEG DAY!!! YIPPEE!!!

Have I mentioned that Alissa belongs to another gym so that she doesn't have to workout at the gym she manages? Did I also mention that she's comming in 3 mornings a week to the gym she manages so she can workout with me even tho she would rather workout away from here? She's da bombdiggity... (and yes, you can laugh at me saying that because I am just that much of a goof).

In other un-fitness-related news, I have the best husband ever. I have a long-term goal of going back to school to become a midwife... and as the years pass the term is getting shorter and shorter and I am getting more and more motivated to move forward toward that goal. Its will be difficult for our family to get by financially without my income for the 3 years it will take me to finish the schooling I need and I've felt, for a long time, that my husband didn't support me in my goal for that one reason alone. I was wrong... and I publicly apologize for assuming that. He wants me to do what will make me happy in the long run... and for our anniversary he got me a wonderful tool that will help me along that path... an ibook. He's a very good man. I've never (despite living the IT life) owned a new computer before. Sure I have frankensteined together parts and pieces into workable PCs but I've never owned one new from the factory. This is my first and its pretty freakin sweet if I do say so myself.

So there you have it... my husband is not a selfish lout... he still wishes I trusted his driving... but that's going to take some effort... so we'll just have to see.

6 weeks

So the plan below is currently on deck for a 6 week challenge. If its going well we'll repeat it or re-evaluate and keep pressing on... potentially for another 6 weeks after that.

I think (know) its really important to change things up every now and then. Yes I've been hinting that I've got some big plans in the works, and I do, but I really can't talk about them right now because nothing is set in stone yet. When I get things finalized I will definitely share them here and you will all be let into another dark little corner of my life.

I'm excited about the workout plan below, this is higher volume training than I have EVER done before (EVER!) and it is a bit intimidating on paper. I am, however, confident that it will shock my body a little bit (or a lot bit) and really push me forward in my fitness.

Life right now is steady, stable and good. I still hate my job, I still don't have an anniversary gift from my hubby and I'm just about ready to tell him to forget about it because at this point its just about meaningless, and my kids are doing well. Crises will come and go... the ups and downs are to be expected... right now I'm pretty up... lets see how long I can maintain it.

Details

OK... so WYSIWYG... This is a weekly plan with a LOT of strength training (many many many reps) midweek and cardio/yoga the rest of the time. I'll be doing my strength training workouts mostly with Alissa in the mornings... cardio days are on our own.

I am excited about a new plan... its always fun to start somthing new! What do you think?

Monday
Cardio--on our own unless we plan something
Yoga

Tuesday
6 am- Upper Body Blast & Core*
Starting Jan. 11th--2 sets of 15 each
Elevate to 3 sets in 2-3 weeks

*Upper Body Blast & Core
Push Ups/ Asst.Pull Ups 10-8-6 reps
Incline DB Press/ DB Row 15 reps
Overhead Press/ Lateral Raise 15 reps
EZ Bar Curl/ Lying French Press 15 reps
Standing DB Curl/Dips 15 reps
Knee Ups/ Hip Thrust 20 reps

Wednesday
6 am- Lower Body Hell**
Starting Jan. 12th--3 sets of each exercise
All supersets
Core work

**Lower Body Hell
Reverse Lunge/ DB Squat (Alt.Wall Sit) 15-20-25 reps
Plie' Squat/ Deadlift 20-30-40/ 15-15-15 reps
Leg Extension/ Walking Lunge 30-30-30 reps
Calf Raise 20-20-20-20 reps
Bicycles 20-20-20 reps
Asst. Leg Raise 20-20-20 reps
Plank
Side Plank

Thursday
6 am- Upper Body Blast & Core*
Starting Jan. 11th--2 sets of 15 each
Elevate to 3 sets in 2-3 weeks

Friday
Yoga/Cardio Day- individual

Weekend
Optional Cardio, stretch, yoga also

I love Alissa.

Its so AWESOME to have a woman who is at a very similar fitness level to me (tho much much younger) who has resources and knowledge and motivation to help me take leaps and bounds forward.

I love Alissa.

Ok... enough mushy stuff. Only 5 of the Livestrong bracelets were snatched up yesterday (all are enveloped up to be sent out today) so if you wanted one but thought you were too late... you are NOT! Email me and yours will be in the mail too!

Yesterdays cardio was 40 minutes of hills on the TM. I really had a good time because Alissa spent the whole time talking to me and we are working out a plan to get us both moving on the weights and endurance. A is going to train for the Portland Marathon this year, but before she starts running again she needs to get her knee healthy and really strengthen her large muscle groups. She's going to join P-fit (so Hollumns... please look after her for me, m'kay?) this year and really wants to have a better marathon experience than she did in Honolulu (which, I might add, she finished in just about 5:30! AHEAD of her father).

I met up with her again this morning and we did 20 minutes of intervals (I ran, she did eliptical) and chatted more about the plan. I'll post details tomorrow after we go over them together, but I'm excited about the change... endurance training is new to me (not that I am planning to run a marathon, because I'm not... but strength training for muscle endurance could be just what I need over the next year... (2006 is the year that the body builder in me is born... but that's another story for another time).

Oh... and just an aside... if you work where I do (and aren't disabled), you have no excuses left... the gym this month started handing out FREE exercise/food journals... they're just xeroxed books spiral bound, but they're easy, organized and they work... and they're FREE... and you don't need a computer. No excuses. None.

As Juju Said:

today is back to basics day.

I return to the real world and to this blog a bit bloated from sugar and salt... having not gone to the gym in a week, and a bit worn down from the holidays in general.

And yet today... it was back to basics day and it was up at 5:15, to the gym at 6 for an awesome workout with Alissa (Push). I will be focusing on Veggies and fruit and lean protein today and foregoing any dairy because I don't think my colon can take any more cheese.

I also remembered this morning as I hit the snooze why I love working out in the morning... I love working out in the morning because then its done... and I have the whole rest of the day to not think about how or when I'm going to get to the gym, because I already did... I'm done... for today at least.

I want to say a couple of things about Christmas this year... I know a LOT of people who are rejecting (all out) the mass consumerism that has overtaken the holidays, and having kids who are bombarded with advertising (even when the TV is OFF) for the latest everything, my hubby and I decided that this year each boy got one present... and that's what they got. Santa brought the requisite candy and some puzzles and a slinkey and some glow-sticks each... but I am really proud of how we didn't go overboard on the crap this year.

What baffled me tho... is how we ended up $400 lighter in the bank account than we'd expected... and then I remembered the food.

Ah well... it was a DAMNED good ham (and it still is damned good as leftovers) and its' not that big a deal that I used single-malt scotch in the glaze rather than burbon right? (I didn't have burbon... I DID have single-malt scotch).

But really... how does one spend that much cash on food? You buy alcohol, that's what you do. A few bottles of wine a case of beer, some champagne and a bottle of hard liquor and you've easily eaten up half that budget alone (mind you this is for consumption by family + guests!)

So one thing I've done the last couple of years is stop drinking for at least a month come New Years. Its on my list this year as well. Starting Jan 1 I am off the sauce for at least the month of January... and if things go well I may push for a while longer, we shal see.

Hope everyone had a happy holiday weekend... now get back to basics... you know you want to.

mmmmtea and english muffin with PBmmmmm (breakfast of champions!)

food:

Tea, english muffin w/pb, pineapple+peaches (1.5c chunks total), chicken breast on whole wheat, lettuce, tom, pickle, .25 tsp mustard, .5 tsp mayo. 1.5c broccoli, coffee w/ ff milk (yeah, I said no dairy... but I can't drink it black anymore).

workout update

Was going to push and cardio but with my right-wrist acting up decided to pull instead.

Lat pull 3x12@60#
seated row 3x10@60#
Hypes - 3x10 unweighted
Upright Row - 3x10@10#
Bi/Tri cable superset - 2x10@30#, 1x10@40#
hammercurl to failure - 20+15@10#
Lat stretch down - 3@60#
25 minutes of HIIT on the eliptical - 269 cal.

Fan freakin tastic... tho I doubt I'll be able to straighten my arms tomorrow.

a song...

sung to the tune of "Oh Holy Night"

Oh holy hell
My thighs are truly Screaming.
this is the day after leg punnishment.
Sore are my calves, my glutes and quads complaining
I can not sit, stand or walk without pain.

A thrill of hope, I'll someday press the full stack.
For yonder breaks, the seal of advil bottles.

Fall on my knees, but now I can not get up
Oh pain devine, oh pain from waist to floor.
Oh pain devine, oh pain, oh pain devine.

-lexysmash

Happy Friday - Pull and HIIT on tap for lunch time... ie... right freakin now.

Wish me luck!

Couldn't Skip Leg Day

Kept the weights the same this week as last except for the Leg-press. I started at 175 (instead of 155) banged out 27 and then did a 10 rep dropset from there. I also took some time to shake out the poor leggies whilst still sitting on the sled before standing up and was MUCH more successfull in supporting my own weight with my VERY beat jello legs.

I will be doing Pull + HIIT tomorrow (thanks Rach!)

Today is going to be interesting. I'm forcing the hubby and kids (and dog) to get a family portrait done. We're going to see Jen Brinkman and hopefully it will go well... final results will be posted.

Also have a Dr. appt for my oldest... luckily those tend to be fairly short and painless. I may have to bribe the whole family with dinner out just to get them to cooperate this afternoon... we'll see.

wish me luck!

You'd think I was 90 years old or somthing.

I forgot my shoes.

I know... I know...

but DAGNABBITALL today is LEG DAY for cripessake!!!

and you all know how I *heart* leg day.

I may have to do a combo leg+push day tomorrow... what say ye?

what is WRONG with people?

Seriously!

I am so freaking sick to death of hearing people talk about "cardio-cardio-cardio" to burn fat and loose weight... gotta be thin thin thin ya know... make sure you can fit those size 6s or 4s or 2s and constantly drop scale weight till you reach your "GOAL NUMBER" or whateverthe fuck.

Well sure... if you want to do "cardio cardio cardio" for the rest of your freakin life and subsist on salads and poached chicken breasts. because you've lost so much lean tissue that your metabolism has tanked and your body is in starvation mode any "slip up" in your diet or skipped workout equals instantaious creation of fat stores and weight gain.

I'm sorry... but you can take your, "cardio cardio cardio" advice and stuff it right back up that pinched ass from whence it came and leave me to my iron.

YES it is important to have a healthy cardiovascular system!!! ABSOLUTELY it is! YES cardio is an important part of any ballanced excercise habit.
YES YES YES you should get your heart rate up and sustain it there to improve your overall HEALTH...

But if you're spending HOURS on the Dreadmill every week for the SOLE purpose of loosing that last bit of belly fat, or fitting into the next smaller size, or dropping another (meaningless) pound, there is somthing VERY VERY VERY wrong and you've left a HUGE (and I do mean HUGE) hole in your routine and in your psyche (which ALSO needs to be healthy when you're questing for self improvement).

MUSCLE is metabolically ACTIVE tissue... it EATS to LIVE... which means it BURNS calories even when its not working for you... even when you're passed out dead to the world asleep under your comfy flannel sheets and big fat down comforter. Build muscle and you can EAT MORE without gaining fat... You'll have a tight firm ass and yes, you'll probably fit in those next-size smaller jeans... but the bonus is that you won't have to live on egg-whites to stay there.

FAT is not... FAT is hormonally active (it produces estrogen... yes, even in men... why do you think the morbidly obese end up with gynecomastia?) but it is metabolically pretty much inert. You can cardio all you want but if you don't build muscle you'll be a smaller version of your flabby fat self and over time it will become HARDER and HARDER to continue your downward (healthward?) trend.

So cardio your ass off... because if you do, you will end up with no ass... just some baggy skin and fat that is STILL dimpled from celulite and flabby because there is no muscle behind that adipose tissue to hold it up. And you won't be able to eat anything without bloating right up and filling those fat cells with every morsel of energy they can grab from your metabolically compromised self.

Is being skinny really worth diet lemonade and clear broth the rest of your life?

Fuck no.

So please stop preaching to me or anyone else that "cardio cardio cardio" will burn the fat... because I don't fucking CARE. I want to be FIRM and healthy and fabulous with the appetite to feed my muscles anything they want... not weak and gaunt and flabby and living off non-fat cottage cheese to maintain my pathetic figure.

Fuck that.

/rant

*Sir Mix-a-Lot is in my head now... "I like big butts and I can not lie..."

push

whew... I thought I was supposed to do another HIIT session on the rowing machine today, but it turns out the schedule called for PUSH... which was MUCH better in my opinion! Walking today has been a bit... uh... challenging. Especially stairs. Mostly the going down, but the up hurts too. I'm really really hoping that tomorrow won't be worse than today. I did some warming and stretching while at the gym to help work out the acid, but I think I'll need to do more later on tonight.

Speaking of tonight... Tonight I have a date! We are going on a date and we have a baby-sitter for the kids and we're going to have dinner and drinks at a very popular spot in down-town Portland called Saucebox. I am stoked! I am firmly of the opinion that mommies and daddies need date nights away from the kids as frequently as possible (which usually works out to once or twice a year, but once or twice a month would probably be better).

As for todays workout... it was good.

Shoulder Press - 3x10@15#
Bench Press - 3x10@45# (empty bar... *sigh*)
decline flyes (yeah, I switched it up... gotaproblem?) 3x10@15# (last set was VERY VERY difficult)
Shoulder Death - 3x9@5#
Pushups to Failure - 30+10
Flye Stretchdown - 5@5#
Swissball crunches - many many many (straight and oblique)
A little bit of self-indulgent posing in the yoga room

All in all a solid session, but slightly less satisfying than falling on the floor because my legs won't support me post workout.

to megan (and anyone else interested):

Ok... when I transfered over to MT I lost the first month or so of entries I'd created in blogger... (holy crap that was TWO YEARS AGO now!!!) back then I talked a lot more about the nitty gritty of why I decided to get fit and how I was going to do it. I wish I had been able to save all of those entries because they were really important to understanding that I started SLOW... and when I mean slow I mean VERY VERY SLOW.

I bought some SUPER cheep 3, 5 and 8# dumbells at the local "play-it-again-sports" store (re-cycled athletic equipment fairly cheep)... and began the most beginner weight training routine 3 times a week. I got the workout from Krista over at KristaSmash (who is also the inspiration for and namesake of this site). Jim (vw) pointed me to her a long time ago and after reading her site I realized that I didn't just want to lose weight, I wanted to completely and permanently change the shape of my body... and if I wanted to do that, I had to lift heavy things repeatedly... and that's mostly what I've been doing (with some stints of cardio in the form of running, spinning, and eliptical training thrown in for good measure).

Anyway, so that's where I started, with Krista's absolute beginner workouts. Then I picked up Tami Lee Webb's DVD "I want that body"... which I think is a great at-home weight workout for the average jane and can be made more challengins by simply adding weight.

I'm not sure where my lifting skill level puts me in the beginner/intermediate/advanced range... I know I have good form. I know I am pretty strong (tho have lost some ground there in the last few months, but it will return quickly), but I'm certainly no power lifter, and I still can't do more than one chin up... If you want to see what just about ANY lift looks like go to EXRX.NET and look at all of their animations.

Diet and cardio will help you loose weight... but the ONLY way to PERMANENTLY improve your metabolism so you can eat more without gaining fat (which I enjoy) is to build muscle. Period. End of story.

Hope that helps, Megan!!!

*grunt*

I love leg day.

Have I said that before? I'm pretty sure I have... just the sheer MASS a person is able to move with their legs is pretty damned amazing. I have jello legs and I am CERTAIN they will be ouchey tomorrow... and that's ok...

The challenge is going strong, and I feel like I'm getting back into the groove (which is a very pleasant side effect of a challenge!) Unfortunately, due to mitigating circumstances, I am not allowed to be on a reduced calorie diet starting next monday. I'll be taking some medication and doing some procedures that require I'm healthy and well-fed... so calories will have to jump up to maintenance levels. I'm ok with it... its really more important to me that I'm healthy, fit, building muscle and staying strong and active... so I'll live with a few extra lbs of bodyfat as I go thru this phase.

Ok... on to the nitty gritty:
Warmup - 6 minutes on TM - walking+inclines up to 15
Smith Squat - 3x10@70#
Calf Raise - 3x20@35#
SLDL - 3x10@30#dbs (so that would make 60# total weight... but you know that)
Leg Extension - 3x10@60#
Seated Leg Press - ok... this one was a doozy... 155#x40 (was supposed to be to failure, but I should have started heavier) 135#x10, 115#x10, 95#x10, 75#x10, 55#x10, 35#x10, 15#x10, unweightedx10.

then I tried to get up.

and promptly collapsed onto my knees.

HA!

So that has seriously never happened to me before. And all I could do was sit there and laugh. I sat on the floor and shook my legs out a bit, stretched a little and was then able to stand up. I did some Lunge Stretchdowns and a LOT of other leg stretching... then for good measure busted out about 100 swissball crunches... and then I was so done it wasn't even funny.

I'm hoping, actually... that when I am ready to go to the bathroom... I'll be able to get up out of my chair... it's a long shot tho.

lack-luster workout...

It wasn't a bad workout... but it just didn't blow my skirt up either.

Jumped rope for a few minutes to warm up Then we Pulled -
Lat Pull - 3x10@60#
Seated Row - 3x10@60#
Hypes - 3x10@no-weight (I'll add weight next week)
HammerCurl to failure - 35+14@#
Lat Stretch down - 60#x3
Swissball Crunches - 40, 50oblique, 20, 20oblique

I broke down this morning and decided to clip my nails. Lifting and fingernails just don't make a happy combination... I mean... I certainly wish I could keep my lovely long (NATURAL) nails, but having ripped one off while dismounting the seated-rowing machine this morning, the truth of the situation became abundantly clear to me.

I went all day yesterday with no coffee

I only have two weeks of Anatomy and Physiology class left.

I am hungry... toast with pb and whey this morning... banana and whey now. Somthing else in two hours... we'll see.

the snooze she is my mistress...

and she calls to me like crack rock to the adict... whispering in my ear... "its ok, you only have to do 25 minutes of hiit on the rower today... its no big deal... snooze a little..."

You will notice that the above whisper contains the words "only, HIIT and rower" all in a row... and the lucidracy of the sentence hit me as the alarm went off the second time and I realized that if anyone (other than the voices in my head) had said those words aloud to me I would have bitch-slapped 'em to next tuesday.

So up it was, and english muffin with pb, and whey-protein were on the menu. Out the door, down the road and the gym was dead (hooray!) I'll post my HIIT intervals below. I wasn't going to fitday my food, but I got worried after I scarfed down a dungeness crab for dinner (yes, the whole thing) so I slammed it into fitday... I'll probably keep doing that. No promises tho.

I am annoyed that the calorie counter on the rower said 260 after my HIIT... I'm not sure I believe it, but still...

Concept II Rowing - HIIT
5m warmup
2m sprint
2m recovery (faster than warmup but still pretty damned slow)
2m sprint
2m recovery
30s sprint
30s recovery
30s sprint
30s recovery
30s sprint
30s recovery
30s sprint
30s recovery
1m sprint
1:15 recovery
45s sprint
5m cool down
3m extra pull (to get to 5000 meters)

Let me just say that Rowing HIIT after PUSH day is a bit... challenging to say the least. I think I hurt somthing... or maybe everything. (ok, not really... its just the happy day after a good workout soreness... but it's awfully noticeable after the above).

Cobb salad for lunch... mmmmmm.

my trigger... and some external motivation

When I first wanted to get in shape my trigger was developing the roll of film in which I found my before picture. I was mortified.

As I sit here in total apathy I am not sure what I need to trigger me this time... but its GOT to be better than that damned before picture. And then there's always shame. When I started working out I had a sticker on my computer monitor that said, "Shame Based Motivation." People in general didn't get it... but what it meant to me was that someone out there didn't think I could do it and it was worth it for me to prove them wrong and prove myself right... I was answering to myself and also to that misguided opinion of me that was out there. Shame is not necessarily the best motivator in the world... but having someone else to answer to can help even the most apathetic sot.

So now... as I continue to sit on my ever-expanding ass... a challenge has been issued and I've been told, "bet you can't..." and even tho I know that the challenge is only half-hearted and the challenger really bets that I can... I will take up that challenge and for the next two weeks this will be my plan... (its under Continue Reading... if you're interested) and I shal not waver from it as the potential blow to my psyche could be too much.

Thursday: Push
Friday: Cardio--HIIT Row
Sat: off
Sun: off (weenie)
Monday: Pull
Tuesday: Cardio (elliptical)
Wednesday: Legs
Thursday: Push
Friday: Cardio: HIIT Row
Sat: off (well deserved)
Sun: off
Monday: Pull
Tuesday: Cardio (elliptical)
Wednesday: Legs
Thursday: Push
Friday: Cardio: HIIT Row

Push:
shoulder press, 3x10
Bench press, 3x10
incline flyes, 3x10
shoulder death 3x?!
pushups to failure
flye weighted stretchdown (light weights...lower to a count of 8,
hold to a count of 8 at max stretch...repeat)
Swissball crunches

Pull:
Lat pull: 3x10
Seated row or one-arm row 3x10
Hypes, if you've got the tools
upright row: 3x10
hammer curls to failure
Latpull stretchdown
Swiss ball crunches

Legs:
Smith squats 3x10 (free squats optimal)
calf raises 3x20
Stiff-leg deadlifts
Leg extensions
Legpress to failure, then drop the weight, and bang out another 3-5
reps, drop the weight, repeat until you're just pushng the
platform...I usually feel like puking right afterwards.
Lunge stretchdowns

Cardio should be HIIT in nature, and ~300-400 cals.

Basic dietary outline:

Morning meal: (home)
bread product
protein powder
lean meat

Post-workout:
protein powder
fruit

Lunch:
If you can manage to bring a salad from home, great (w/chicken breast
or shrimp)...otherwise, try to go low/slow carb plus protein

Afternoon: yogurt, or string cheese or peanut butter/nuts

All day: Celery or carrots or bell pepper (this is boredomfood)

Dinner:
lean meat
sweet potatoes or brown rice (slow carbs)
fibrous veggies, with a little dressing

Bedtime:
cottage cheese

Double Post Friday!

Sometimes its good to get back to basics.

When I first started lifting I was fat.

I had no energy.

I had no form.

I had absolutely NO idea what I was doing...

... and then I found KRISTA... and Krista showed me the light and the path and the way... and the way was GOOOD.

Today, as I sat here eating my turkey and applesauce and sipping my afternoon joe I decided to go back and take a look at all of the articles I'd devoured and digested not two years ago as I sat in my nearly 200lb body hating everything about it. And there amongst the amazing stores of information was a return. A return to the simple, a return to the ordinary... a return to what got me here in the first place... Krista.

Krista Bicep
Krista Double Bicep

I also found her intermediate 3 day split workout plan... which I LOVE... and have decided to begin using starting Monday (yes I know I said I wouldn't be working out on Monday... but what am I if I'm not a contradicting connundrum of an enigma all wrapped up in fugue?)

*I put the workout plan below... just in case you want to see it... just click "continue reading..."

day 1 - legs

squat 3 sets x 6-10 reps
split squat or lunge 3 x 8-10
stiff-legged deadlift 3 x 8-10
calf raise 3 x 6-10

day 2 - chest, shoulders, triceps (or "push")

bench press or dumbbell press 3 x 6-10
standing shoulder press 3 x 6-10
dips OR assisted dips (if you are able to do these) 3 x 6-8
lying triceps press 2 x 8-10
ab crunches or swissball crunches 3 x 8-10

day 3 - back, biceps (or "pull")

deadlift 3 x 6-8
pullups OR lat pulldowns
3 sets of as many as you can do for pullups (if you can do more than 6-8 pullups at once, put a 5-lb plate between your knees and do them), 3 sets of 6-10 reps for lat pulldowns
dumbbell row or ROBO row 3 x 8-10
biceps curl 2 x 8-10
back hyperextension 3 x 8-10

I love this feeling

Workout today was sublime... went heavy (er). Legs plus cardio and all was right with the world.

Smith Squat
50#x12, 70#x10, 90#x10, 50#x12
Barbell Lunge, not alternating... all reps of each set on one side, then on the other: (crooked bar=20#)
20#x10, 30#x10, 35#x10
Leg Press (slide)
155#x10, 175#x10, 195#x10 (195# is half the stack boys)
SLDL with dumbells (weights are per db)
25#x12, 30#x10, 35#x10
20 minutes of 150bpm average hr cardio on the eliptical.

I should have done a real warmup before I started, I know... I just walked briskly around the gym a couple of times, but it seemed to work out ok and I won't let it happen again (especially on a heavy leg day).

If the weather stays nice this weekend I will go for a long walk with the kids, if not... I'll be re-organizing my house so at least I won't be sitting on my butt all day.

I'm pretty proud of myself for getting 2.5 solid workouts in this week (even if they were all at the end of the week... next week I'll try to double that... it's a plan.

have a great weekend!

holy hell, batman.

So HIIT on the rower is HARD.

Here was my cycle - 5 minute warmup, 2min sprint, 2min recover, 2min sprint, 2min recover, 2min sprint (at this point I was dieing), 2min recover, 1min sprint, 1min recover, 1min sprint, 5 minutes cool down... for a grand total of 25 agonizing minutes on the Concept 2 rowing machine from hell. Felt all wobbly in the legs when I got up, so I think I was rowing fairly well. BD - I will read the rowing-form article you posted in my comments just to be sure, but I am defintely using legs for primary driving force.

Then I went downstairs and threw some dbs around to make myself feel a little better about the whole fiasco.

bicep curl - 8lb dbs, 3x10
Recline curl - 8lb dbs, 3x10
French press - 8lb dbs, 3x10
abs work on ball and bicycles on the matt to extreme pain and failure.

Now... I probably could have done more arms/shoulders work today, but I did do some last night at 10pm (so I can still say my name is Lexy Smash without hanging my bitch-head in shame).

I did 3 cycles at 10 reps for each move, no breaks between moves, 1 minute between sets, 10lb dbs:

Bicep curl, Shoulder Press, Tricep Kickback, Upright Row.

And I did 'em topless... in front of the mirror... and yeah, it was pretty damned cool. I have (in my estimation) a pretty muscular upper-body... theres just still a bit of flab over top of it... when I did my shoulder presses my lats flaired out giving me a definite triangular shape and I have quite the trap-bulge (like swimmers have) across my shoulders and up into my neck. Being able to SEE your muscles while you work them is an awesome thing and I encourage anyone with some privacy and a mirror to do it at some point.

I lov3 lifting... I want to do it every single day... don't you?

this is not working

what the hell is up with this week?

Monday was great (but no exercise).

Tuesday was fun (but no exercise).

Today I woke up with a headache when I was going to go to the gym this morning so I slept in instead and thus no exercise.

ARGH!

What was so different this time last year that I was able to get up at 5 every morning to go to the gym and I am just NOT this year? I do NOT like this. It is frustrating as hell.

The only good in the midst of all of this non-excersise related news is that my diet has been pretty damned spot on (despite the glass and a half of red wine last night) for the last two weeks and I'm feeling very good about that...

I'm still being spotty in my recording of food in fit day... but like Jim I'm pretty damned anal and can estimate my calories for the day give or take 100 in my head most of the time. Fitday is a great tool to help you learn the nutritional value of stuff tho... I fully endorse it.

Oh man... I just realized I have my dbs in my closet (that I cleaned out this weekend)... I WILL get some upper body in tonight or my name is not LEXY SMASH!!!

chest/back/row

Nice workout today... I feel like maybe I'm going to easy when I'm lifting but I'm really trying to EASE back into it and not completely kill myself in the first two weeks. That said, I again used lighter weights than I probably could have, but oh well.

5min warmup - treadmill
Bench Press (dbs)
10#x12, 15#x10, 20#x8, 25#x6, 15#x12
Seated Row (machine)
30#x12, 37.5#x10, 45#x8, 60#x6, 37.5#x12
DB Fly on physio-ball
10#x12, 12#x10, 15#x8, 20#x6, 10#x12
Lat Pull (machine)
30#x12, 37.5#x10, 45#x10, 60#x6, 37.5#x12
Low back extension
(unweightedx12, 5lb plate behind headx12)x2
Abs -
3count up and 3count down crunches on physio ball for the entire duration of "Mister Bright Side" Oblique crunches (also on ball) until I couldn't move.
10 minute baby HIIT on rower - 2 minute warmup, 1 minute sprint, 2 minute rest, 1 minute sprint, 2 minute rest, 1 minute sprint, 1 minute cool down. (this session leads me to believe that BD's rowing HIIT on Tuesday next is gonna suck!).
Stretch

I feel almost TOO good right now... my legs are a little wobbly from the rowing and my lowback is pissed about the roman-chair... but otherwise I'm in pretty high spirits.

I am SO glad I'm back to lifting!!!

She's baaaaaAaaaaAAaack.

Took it easy, but still got the sweat on. hip hip hooray!

6minute warmup on the treadmill
Smith Squat (slightly wide stance... but not sumo)
12x40#, 10x50#, 8x60#, 6x65#, 12x40#
Leg Press (slide)
12x115#, 10x135#, 8x155#, 6x175#, 12x115#
SLDL (dbs)
12x15#, 10x20#, 8x25#, 6x30#, 12x15#
Leg Extension
12x45#, 10x52.5#, 8x60#, 6x67.5#, 12x45#
Calf Raise
(12x35#)x4
Abs - bicycle fast 25countsx3, Oblique crunches 30x3
10 minute on the eliptical at 2 minute intervals... then my lungs started to tighten up so I stopped.

I can't WAIT for tomorrow.

*glee*

10 miles

The human body is an amasing thing... I honestly can not believe I just ran 10 miles... seriously...

can

not

believe

it.

But I did. And I'm still alive... no blisters that I've found yet... bit sore, VERY hungry... but overall, feeling really good. My lungs were fine... no coughing during or now after the run... hopefully that means I've kicked it for good. I was supposed to run this morning with the beautiful and fabulous Alissa... but she came down with the funk (probably from me) last night and there was no way in HELL she should have been running today, so it was a solo run for me. I was a little freaked about that... I tend to either push WAY TOO HARD or not push enough when I run alone, so I had resigned myself to another 11:30+ average pace run. I am happy to say that did not happen. It was cool and breezy, I wore tights, long sleeves and a knit hat and only had to unzip my collar once to cool off. There were a few sprinkles here and there, but overall, it was a PERFECT morning for a run.

So here's the details:

10 Miles in 1:46:03 - avg pace 10:36/mile - 1289 calories burned

Mile 1 - 9:34 - good start, warming up.
Mile 2 - 10:57 - oh great, if my legs already feel like lead how the hell am I gonna make it 8 more miles?
Mile 3 - 10:38 - loosening up now... had an interesting thought... on most days I'd be finishing or almost finished by now, but today I've only just started... whoah.
Mile 4 - 10:40 - enjoying this fuel-belt thing... filled two flasks with water and two with gatorade... next time I'm gonna water down the gatorade, its just TOO sweet.
Mile 5 - 10:32 - new territory now, haven't run this direction before, lots of traffic, kids on the sidewalk that just sort of stare as I go by.
Mile 6 - 10:42 - kinda got lost, took a wrong turn, but figured out how to get where I wanted to go so all is well... wow, I only have 4 miles left!!! That's cool!
Mile 7 - 10:36 - This is where my foot hurt last time (8 miler) but this time it's fine, knees are starting to whine, but not bad... hooray for orthotics!
Mile 8 - 11:08 - CRAP!!! This is the LONG hill up the pedestrian overpass over the highway... I walked for about 30-45 seconds and then convinced myself that the point of this whole thing was to RUN the 10 miles, not walk them, so I started running again and ran to the top.
Mile 9 - 10:36 - I really can't believe how good I feel! Want to finish strong... lets go.
Mile 10 - 10:36 - OW OW OW!!! When the mile-alarm went off I pretty much stopped dead in my tracks... the hardest part of this run was litterally the last two tenths of a mile. My brain did NOT want to keep going, but it did, and I did and now I'm done!

And Rachel... I don't think I got you're whole comment earlier, I read it with my fingers in my ears, so I might have missed somthing... ;)

Inspiration...

If my experiences today weren't inspiring, I don't know what is.

Today I ran the last 5 miles of the Portland Marathon with Hollie Teal and it was probably the most amazing 5 miles I've ever run. Hollie was like a SOLDIER keeping her 10:20 average pace CONSISTANTLY thru those last 5 miles, she was strong, sure, emotional, humerous and probably the most fabulous running partner a person could have at the end of a marathon.

I mean come on! LOOK AT THAT SMILE!!!

So we ran with Hollie... six of us in total, looking like a secret service brigade with the president of the United States of America... but all for Hollie.

She is TRULY an amazing, awesome woman!!! Way to go Hollie, thank you for letting me join you and ride the adrenaline rush that was YOUR RACE and YOUR SUCCESS!!! You SMASH!!! RAWR!!!!

Nothing exciting from me...

So I want to send a shout out to HOLLIE!!! Who will be running the Portland Marathon for the SECOND time on Sunday... she is strong, she is fit, she is AMAZING and she has very cute braids! I think I may want to be Hollie in my next life... yeah... I think so!

Look for me out there babe, because I'll be there!!!

good ride.

So from the park-n-ride just across the river to work is about 7 miles... we went really easy (read slow) and it took just about 30 minutes so right around 14mph average. Going over the I-5 bridge sucked ass for me tho. We had to stop to let another biker by and between the traffic on one side and the sheer drop off beyond the rail down to the river on the other it was all I could do to stave off a panic attack. I hope I don't get lost going back... and hopefully I can do it faster. To work there is a lot of up... going home, a LOT of down!!! :D

For my first ride on this bike I have to say I'm impressed. I've never been a road-biker so the brakes and shifting (as I mentioned yesterday) to a bit of getting used to... I don't like not being able to brake from the top bar... but the benefits of the bike outweigh that issue for sure. First of all, this bike is LIGHT!!! It took nearly no extra effort to go up hills. I am not used to the stiffness of the ride tho... big soft tires absorb a lot more of the road imperfections than skinny high-pressure ones do. I am glad I went with the carbon fork and seat post tho... they do soften the ride a bit and absorb some of that. I need to swap out the pedals still (I'm not a clip-less rider), but my headlight (cat eye) and tail-blinker served me well. I may also need a reflective vest for these morning rides, so I'll be lookin' for one of those soon.

I'm performing a wedding today as well, so thank GOD for the gym showers!!! I am wearing a skirt... I did my hair and I EVEN shaved my legs! The whole ceremony will take 5-10 minutes, but hey... I can't be all disheveled at my first wedding ya know? I'm not going to have time to run today (thus the bike) so I'm hoping I can get a 4-5 miler in tomorrow. This schedule is STILL not situated properly... but hopefully it will settle in soon.

*sigh*

8 mile

Just finished my 8 miler. My knees are a bit annoyed, but otherwise I feel pretty damned good. I need to update the software on my Forerunner as I've heard the new version is pretty sweet... but since I'm hungry, it will have to wait.

Here's the low down: 8 miles in 1:29:57 (timer auto paused for 3 traffic lights)

Mile 1 - 10:38 - settled right in after about .5 miles... no real issues, cardiovascular system is good.
Mile 2 - 11:15 - Little Maceo Parker funk to keep the spirits up
Mile 3 - 11:25 - I think my distance pace is just going to be 11:30 or so, I can accept that, feelin fine.
Mile 4 - 11:35 - First hill of the course... fairly short tho and no real issues... lots of traffic on this leg kinda makes me self conscious sometimes.
Mile 5 - 11:17 - and after the up-hill... a down.
Mile 6 - 11:36 - Second hill of the course... its the one up over the pedestrian bridge over the highway.
Mile 7 - 11:36 - Man... I wanna be done now.
Mile 8 - 10:34 - gotta finnish strong.

I was happy that the "man I wanna be done now." feeling held off about a mile longer than it usually does. My breathing was great thru the whole run. I didn't push myself (obviously) but I did try to make sure my HR was in the 130-140 range. Had a few aches and pains around mile 7 in my feet... but I think that's because I didn't use my orthotics this time (I know... BAD BRENNA!!!) so I won't make that mistake again.

So there you have it... my longest run ever in my life.

:D

Time for corn-dogs (meatless!) and gatorade!

700 calorie workout

Mmmmmm I like the eliptical mmmmmm....

60 minutes, 700 calories, and a damned good sweat session put me right over the top today. I had sushi for lunch (sushi? I LOVE SUSHI!) with miso soup and salad and damnit if I don't feel like a rockstar. And my ankle doesn't even hurt!

I wonder what the nutritional breakdown of miso soup is...

I did well on my A&P test yesterday tho I can think of at least two (of the 50+) questions that I probably got wrong... *sigh* I was, however, the first one done... which puts me right back into the swing of testing that I left behind when I graduated from OSU 8 years ago. I am a very intuitive tester. I read each question twice, answer and move on. I do not check my work, I do not second guess the answer that first comes to my mind/pen because I have found thru experience that generally (more often than not) my first answer is the right one or the rightest one I'm going to be able to come up with.

So I'll know next week how I did "oficially" on my first test. This week will be a bit tougher tho because we are looking at cells and tissues on a more in-depth level and theres a LOT more to... uh... KNOW... ya know?

Thanks for all the advice below, by the way... I do need to get into a nightly "little bit every day" routine with the homework or I will be screwed in a couple of weeks.

Maybe tomorrow I'll post my list of "official titles" that I came up with this week. Right now my official title is pooped network professional... time for COFFEE!!!

I am a great big dork

who will soon (by Oct 1) have this sitting in her garage:

so if you know anyone who wants a size small Specialized FSR-XC Stumpjumper Full Suspension MT bike (year 2000, less than 200 miles)... let me know!

Lets talk about Shoes

Hollie and DW and I were all talking about shoes after PtP on Sunday. Hollie wears shoes (I think they're asics) that a lot of her running pals HATE, but she swears by them... DW recently went to a local running shop armed with all the technical knowledge he could find and shoe reviews up the wazoo knowing "exactly" what shoe he wanted... until he tried it on... and it sucked. So they put him on a treadmill, evaluated his stride, pulled out a totally DIFFERENT pair of shoes which he tried on and loved!!!

I have never been to a running store to try on shoes... I really should tho... my problem is that I work (indirectly, but directly) for the second largest athletic shoe company in the US... you know which one I'm talking about... the one with the three stripes... and All Day I Dream About S*x? Yeah, that's the one. SO working here has many advantages, but also some disadvantages... the advantage is that I have easy and inexpensive access to a LOT of shoes... and let me tell ya... I never believed I would EVER own as many shoes as I now own... but that's beside the point. The good thing about having that access is getting to trade in/up shoes on a very regular basis... the bad thing about it is that I haven't been able to find a SINGLE PAIR of @did@s running shoes that fits my feet well enough that I can run any distance in them.

I got a new pair today tho, that I have more hope for. They are Supernova Cushions and when I tried them in the store the toe box felt wide enough, the orthotics I wear everywhere fit and provided good arch support and the heel was nice and snug to my heel. I am HOPING that I have finally found my company sanctioned pair of running shoes, because wearing anyone elses shoes during the work day is LITERALLY a fireable offense.

I still have my Rykas that I wear for my long runs (they're marathon shoes, very tough, cushy, I like em) on the weekends... and that's what I wore this weekend for the race, but hopefully I won't have to smuggle them in and out of the gym any longer.

I'll report back after my four miles in a couple of hours!

Edited to add:

Ok... that was harder than I expected BUT my knees and feet felt fabulous. The heels of the Supernovas are still too wide for my feet but MAN are these shoes CUSHY... I like cushy! I've been focusing a lot on my pronation and plantar fasciitis to the detriment of cush... but no more!

The hard part was that it was HOT and MUGGY and about 2.2 miles in I got a freakin STITCH IN MY SIDE!!! I haven't had a stitch in my side in ages... but there it was and no matter what I did (short of walking) it would not go away. I know I am still dehydrated a bit from Sunday (I didn't drink nearly enough water that afternoon or yesterday) and I think I probably ate too close to running but I stuck it out (tho slowly) and finished the four miles.

Such fun!

Ok, despite the lack of actual "PASTA" at the end of Pints to Pasta this year, and the fact that the t-shirts were down-graded from cool-ass cool-max technical long sleeved adidas tops to plain old cotton ts, PtP is really one of the best run races I've ever participated in. Both years have been great... this year I had a BLAST.

My friends Alissa, Leah, Jen, her friend Laura and DW were all there. It was SO much warmer this year at the start, so I dumped my tights for shorts, and threw everything into the clothes check and we headed to the start line. I was a bit back from the start and we didn't take off until about 8:04 am, but no one cared. I was SUPPOSED to find Hollie at the start handing out Widmer temporary tatoos, but she was no-where to be found. It turns out she had to drive down to the finish line to pick up race-numbers for a few dork-butts (including DW) who decided not to read the instructions and drove directly to the start without picking up their numbers.

I grabbed about 1/2 a cup of coffee... used the portapotty and we assmbled for the start. Alissa told me that I HAD to run my own pace because she'd hurt herself and Leah said she'd be running with Alissa so after a little debate and being pissed that I'd forgotten the ear-buds for my i-pod I decided to run it for myself. I stuck with A and L for the first half mile and then I took off. I was bound and determined to cross the finish line faster than I did last time(1:01:02). My fore-runner kept my pace in check... showed me when I needed to speed my butt up really!

I flew down Greeley toward the first aid station (mile two) in front of the Widmir Brewery and as I'm comming down the stretch I see a crazy woman with braids in her hair. She looks at me, we lock eyes and she SCREAMS "BRENNA" at the top of her lungs!!!! I GRIN and SCREAM "HOLLIE" right back at her! We screamed a few more times as I approached her and she had me give her a high-five as I passed... it was an AWESOME energy boost to have someone scream my actual NAME during a race. I walked about 15 paces thru the first aid station and gulped down a powerade... I was PUMPED so I kicked it up and headed over the steel bridge and down to the waterfront. I am SO on the Hollie Teal Cheering Squad for the marathon this year!!!

Mile 5 is always a tough mile for me mentally during a race and true-to form my right foot started cramping in the arch as I passed the 4mile marker. The second aid station was at mile 5 and I walked thru it as well because I simply can not drink and run at the same time. Another poweraid down and the mental fog lifted and it was on to the finish line.

And then she started talking to me... a very nice woman on the course started pacing right next to me and asking me questions... and I think it slowed me down... I didn't look at my forerunner enough, but I know I should have... ah well... as we closed in on the old spaghetti factory I lengthened my pace and really pushed it across the finish line... and as I crossed I looked at the official race clock and shouted "FUCK!" as I saw the time tick over to 1:01:11. NINE SECONDS SLOWER than last year. FUCK FUCK FUCK!!! Hollie and DW ran up to me and screamed and gave me high-fives! DW finished in about 51minutes (awesome!).

I stopped the timer on my forerunner as I crossed the line tho and it said 1:00:56... DAMNIT!!! I grabbed a couple of cups of water, and ran back to the finish line to cheer in Alissa and Leah who came in around the 1:07:00... very very cool, especially since Alissa had said she wasn't going to run the whole thing (the big liar!)!!

Overall I'm pretty contented with my performance... I know I could have gone faster if I'd found DW to run with but he's MUCH faster than I am, and probably would have held him back... I might have gone a little faster if I'd had my iPod to carry me... but again, no luck. I did get to hang and chat with Hollie and DW and the girls after the race, had some soup and a couple of beers, heard the awards and then drove DW back to his car at the start line. I am going to try to hook up with Hollie to do some of the "stay-fit" stuff with the "portland-fit" club over the winter... I know it will be good for me to keep the running thru the winter (which I didn't really do last year), so I'm looking forward to that too.

I didn't run all week due to stress and emotional turmoil, but I feel good today... feel like I accomplished somthing today. One of these days I'll hit a sub-hour 10k... but I guess it'll have to wait till next year.

I'm back on track. I'm starting an eating challenge tomorrow (no white sugar, white flour or cheese) and it WILL get better from there... because it has to, I have no where to go but up.

:D

There's more than one answer to these questions

and they're pointing me in a crooked line.

Depression does bad things for a training program. Friday was rest day (hooray), Saturday and Sunday were wallow in self-pitty over why I can't just have a normal child and stressing about school starting on Tuesday. But today I pulled it together, so to speak and got my 7 miler done. I was feeling pretty glum about even being able to do the run today. I've been feeling crappy the last couple of days and energy was definitely low... but I got out, stashed my bottle of gatorade, and headed off. I decided to do my 3m loop twice and then add the extra mile in my neighborhood. The plan allowed me to stash the bottle (like I said) and also gauge really well how much further I had to run without looking at my forerunner.

7m in 1:14:56
mile 1 - 10:48 - this is gonna suck
mile 2 - 11:03 - right pace but its still gonna suck
mile 3 - 11:03 - I'm nothing if not consistant
at about 3.2m I stopped and picked up my gatorade... drank about 1/2 and then took off again. I really didn't want to run whilst carrying a water bottle, so I figured one hydration stop would have to do me.
mile 4 - 11:07 - its definitely starting to suck.
mile 5 - 10:55 - but I can still keep going
mile 6 - 9:44 - HOORAY FOR THE INDIGO GIRLS!!! And my apologies to all those who passed by me as I was singing along to the music you could not hear.
mile 7 - 10:14 - I made it!!! WOOHOO!!!

So that is officially the furthest I've ever run, and every Sunday from here on out will be more of the same... each week beating my personal best distance... and building on the last pb.

Off to pack up school supplies and get the kitchen/house ready for the first day of school tomorrow!

dagnabit

well Jen had to bail on our run today because he boss desperately needed her to keep an interview candidate busy for half an hour while he finished up a meeting. Joy... so she got to pretend to do an interview and I got to run alone, with no music. 3.5 miles in about 35 minutes, so that was right on in terms of pace. It was sprinkling a bit... not enough to make a person wet, but enough to keep the air cool and the skin a tad less dry than you'd expect.

I'm actually really annoyed about the no-music thing because the reason for it is that my arm-band that I just bought for my iPod completely TORE apart when I was taking it off on Tuesday. I am SO pissed!!! It is totally unfixable and now I have to figure out how to get it exchanged or whatever.

Oh, and lucky me... today I get to have my annual cervix scrape! TMI??? Tough... at least you're not the one who has to lay on the table with your feet in the stirrups as it happens.

I think I'm in a pissy mood because of that... I need to mellow out.

side crow

side crow (Parsvavakrasana) pose makes me feel very weak and un-ballanced. I just can't get it, it's all about ballance and getting your hips WAY up in the air, but today my arms and shoulders just couldn't take it... sometimes I wonder how good that could possibly be for your wrists as well, but hey, I'm a beginner so what the hell do I know?

I do know that Yoga today helped loosen up my hips which have been tightening up quite a lot lately, and my low-back feels MUCH better as well. It's hard for me to consider yoga or stretching to be a "real" workout. I'm trying to convince my brain that they are VERY important parts of a distance running training program, but it's very hard to wrap my brain around that fact even when I feel better after a yoga session than I have the rest of the week prior. (see above)

Lots to do this evening, hoping to get my bike into the shop to get a new fork (I want to get rid of my suspension fork because it's heavy and I don't need it because I don't go off road) ordered... or just say fuck it and decide to buy a road bike which my mt. bike will never be despite my modifying it extensively (by extensively I mean I put on road-slicks, clipless pedals and am getting a fixed (non-suspension) fork to save weight) in that direction... I should just get a road-bike, shouldn't I?

I also need to buy some pants. I hate to say it but I have 3 pairs of pants that fit me as my two pairs of khakis are really WAY beyond their serviceable life and it's getting a bit too chilly for skirts anymore, so its time to buy some more pants. I imagine I'll be buying 10s, which is fine... my brief stint in the land of the 8 was very satisfying, but right now all I want is pants that fit... not pants that will fit 6 months from now... maybe... if I'm really really good... you get the idea... and for some reason I really want a new pair of boots... but we'll see if the budget allows for that since I also need to buy "back-to-school" clothes for the rugrat.

alright, back to work... later!

no more wire hangers!

and no more daytime running. UGH! What a HORRIBLE run today. It was hot, it was muggy, I felt like a brick with concrete legs trying to run thru jello. Did my four miles and went inside to do some abs and stretching.

The smartest thing I did, tho, was brining some fresh strawberries with me to eat right after I came in from the run... they may well have been the very best strawberries I've ever had ever.

Thank GOD it's supposed to rain tomorrow.

In other news... well... there isn't much other news. I'm still not recording my food, but I really don't feel the need to right now. I'm eating pretty well and keeping track on paper rather than online which right now is just easier to do. I also decided that my 2 miles on wednesday will be done on the precor from now on to protect my knees... I just don't think that running 3 days in a row (even tho the middle day is only 2 miles) is doing me any favors... so that's where its at.

oh, and as a little aside.... ACK!!!! MY BABY STARTS FIRST GRADE IN 6 (that's SIX!!!) DAYS!!!! NO NO NO NO!!!

Ok... must practice letting go... its ok... he will be fine... all will be well... he will succeed... (can you hear me trembling in fear and anticipation???)

I am capable of a lot more...

than I give myself credit for.

6 miles today and I feel great. Ran this evening, air was cool, light breeze... got a little darker than I'm comfortable with at the end, but that's just because the streetlights were so few and far between. I felt like I could have gone another 2 miles easily, and possibly another 3 or 4 with some nutrition and effort.

6.27 miles in 1:03:40 - average pace 10:09 - 752 calories
mile 1 - 9:25 - WHOAH nelly, slow it down a bit lady!
mile 2 - 10:21 - That's better, nice and easy... waved at a couple of kids in their yard.
mile 3 - 10:23 - Nice and consistant, feeling good, lots of traffic tho.
mile 4 - 10:25 - Good good... starting to get a little dark, but hey, here's Allanis to keep me motivated!
mile 5 - 10:21 - Damn I'm consistant... only one lap left, I could keep going for hours... lets push it a bit!
mile 6 - 9:46 - Hell yeah!!! The mile alarm on my Forerunner went off just as I entered my neighborhood... I stopped briefly to look at my stats and then started the timer back up and jogged the rest of the way home.
mile 6.25 - 2:49 - took it easy, waved at the neighbors. pace was 10:39.

My knees are a bit angry at me... I'm icing them and I popped a couple ibuprofen with my first glass of water when I came inside.

I seriously feel like I could have gone another mile or two... Total running milage for this week is 12.75, but it should have been 14.5m. I skipped 3 workouts this week and that pisses me off. I missed mondays weights, the 2 mile run on Wednesday, and my cross-training yesterday, that sucks ass!!! Next week should be fun tho because my goal is to not miss any workouts!!! Here's the plan:

Monday - full body weights (low weight, high rep)
Tuesday - 3.5m (in the morning)
Wednesday - 2m (in the morning) + Yoga
Thursday - 3.5m (in the morning) + Legs/knee strenghtening(squats, lunges, ham curls, etc)
Friday - REST
Saturday - 45 minutes biking
Sunday - 7 miles

Now I need to charge Lauren and Millie (my Forerunner and Mini iPod) to prep for the week... nighty night!

its rest day and I'm antsy

I've been antsy all day.

fidgeting, tapping my foot, checking the clock... feeling like there is somthing I should be doing, am late for, am missing. Its rest day and my body does NOT want to rest.

my brain, on the other hand, is ready for shut down mode. Honestly I am so mentally and emotionally tired today that I'm surprised I am able to remain upright at this point. School starts on the 7th... so do swimming lessons! Val has unfortunately been missing a lot of TKD lately to spend time with his father, which I know is important... but it still bothers me.

Its been a good week tho. Runs were good, I feel good about the 6 miler on Sunday, but any further than that and I think I'm really going to have to evaluate my hydration/energy options. I've never used the "gu" type products, but I suppose its time to give 'em a shot... water and gatorade bottles will probably do me for the 7-9 mile distances... but over that it could get a little dicey.

One thing I really appreciated at the Cascade Classic 10k was that they handed out gummy bears at the water stops and those were AWESOME for a quick hit of sugar. Certainly not the electrolyte boost that a "gu" type product would give, but it worked at the time.

If anyone has any favorite flavors or brands let me know... I'll give some a try in the next few weeks.

3 miles and legs

Decided to stick to the treadmill again today despite the fact that it wasn't raining out. Its nicer to my knees and once again, with a long run on the schedule for Sunday... well... I just want to be nice to my knees as much as possible. They did ache a bit yesterday, probably fromt he lack of padding in the non-running shoes I ran in on Tuesday.

I kept my pace right around 10m/m (6mph) jumping up to 6.2 and 6.5 for some pushes. My iPod kept me company straped firmly, but comfortably, to my arm. After I was done running I went downstairs did some squats, wall-squats on the physio ball, lunges and abs work. My legs were BURNING and I imagine I'll feel it tomorrow.

Dinner last night was FABULOUS, we shared 2 appetizers (4 people) seared bacon wrapped scallops and an heirloom tomato and motzarella salad (YUM to both) then we all shared a caesar salad that was made with whole spears of romaine so we ate it with our fingers! (FUN!) I had wasabi crusted salmon (MELTED in my mouth) and topped it off with coffee and a chocolate torte so rich I could only eat a couple of bites.

I love restaurants in Portland... no matter how "fancy" they are, they are hardly ever pretentious. Ah well, dinner was on the house as we were dining with the owner, and it doesn't get any better than that!

FORGOT MY SHOES!!!

I ran in my Salomon Tech Amphibians today... and ya know what? I survived.

I can not believe I forgot my running shoes, but I did. Luckily I was wearing the Amphibians and since it was POURING out we (my friend Jen and I) decided to kick it on the treadmills today and go the distance inside. We had a great time running and talking and it was a good workout. I did slow down to a walk twice due to concerns about rubbing in odd places on my toes, but I decided I was going the distance and kicked it back up to 6mph and continued on. We followed it up with some abs work and stretching and I feel great despite having non-running shoes. I picked it up to 6.5 and 6.6 for the last mile and that always leaves me feeling on top of the world.

I am hoping that as my runs get longer I'll get more of that runners high that comes after a good hard run. The euphoria is a pretty nice lift and seems to last a while after I'm done running as well. Did have some chaffing on the inner thighs this time tho, so I really need to USE that body-glide I bought from now on.

Life is good. Going to dinner at Bluehour tomorrow... should be fabulous!

I feel hardcore.

5 miles in the rain done. I even managed some negative splits (can you imagine?) and can I just say I am SO glad I got the armband for my mini i-pod. Music whilst running is awesome! Every time I started to get tired a great song would come on and pick me right back up... and its so easy to skip the songs that are too slow that I didn't even have to try to look at the ipod to do so.

I wore my long tights that are waterproof on the front and my Pints-to-Pasta long-sleeved shirt (half-zip, microfiber, breathable, very nice!) I also wore a baseball cap and sunglasses (even tho there was no sun) to keep the rain out of my eyes. The good thing is that I didn't get cold at all, but I did get drenched. I may need to look at getting some real rain-gear for running since it looks like I may be doing quite a bit of rain-running in the next couple of months. *sigh*

Here's the specifics: 5.0 miles in 52:45
mile 1 - 10:58 (started slow and easy)
mile 2 - 10:56 (not bad since this is the mile that includes the 1 hill on the course)
mile 3 - 10:20 (couple of great songs on this one)
mile 4 - 10:35 (always my toughest mile mentally)
mile 5 - 9:55 (HA! No freakin' way... again the music carried me)

oh and the whole "hardcore" thing is said with tongue firmly in cheek tho I didn't see a single other runner out on the road today. ;)

RAIN!!!

All I can do is laugh.

I am drenched head to toe... completely soaked to the bone.

It started innocently enough. I decided to take the cross-training option today and take the littlest boy for a ride in the bike-trailer for a half an hour... but, well... all I can say is I'm DAMNED glad the trailer has a full cover on it. About 15 minutes out (the apex of the trip) the heavens opened up and pissed rain down uppon us... tho pissed isn't really the best description... I mean, sure the rain was warm so I didn't get cold as I rode my ass off toward home... but the QUANTITY of rain was much more than a little piss... it was more like the air became liquid and I was riding the bike thru a swimming pool.

But it was certainly a fun ride. :D

5 miles tomorrow. I will take Dani's advice (and everyone else... THANKS EVERYONE!) and focus on one week at a time. I've run 5 miles before I will run it tomorrow with no problems. I will not think about next week or any week there-after... the only run I have to complete is the one right in front of me, the next one will work itself out when I get to it.

Time to dry off!

boy am I tired

I am glad tomorrow is a full rest day.

I did my 3 miles this morning around 5:30 and again it was lovely. I need to find a nicer route tho as the one I've been running forever is getting pretty boring. It's an out-and-back along a bike path that runs along a pretty major road, so while it's a good safe path (plenty of room between me and cars and good lighting and plenty of spectators) it's also BORING. Saw the great-blue heron again, tho he didn't take off overhead this time... also heard what could have been his/her offspring making some really WILD low, honks from the bushes.

I'm a bit sore from yoga yesterday. It was a great class tho and I've retained more flexibility than I'd thought. My legs were shaking during some of the asanas tho, so I know they're a bit tired. I've run 6 miles so far this week and there are 8 in the plan for this weekend (3 sat, 5 sun). Next week marks a pretty large jump in milage tho as I'll be adding a short 2 miler on wednesday before yoga and the long run on sunday goes up to 6.

I'm thinking I might pick up some glucosamine (to add to all my OTHER supplements) this weekend because while my knees don't hurt now... I imagine they may start in a couple of weeks.

Must remember to stretch after running... legs today are stiff (not sore, just stiff). *sigh*

I suppose I should eat some lunch now, so I'll catch y'all later.

doward dog

Today is yoga. It was supposed to be 2 miles plus yoga... but somehow my running shoes did not make it into my bag, so it will be yoga... and maybe 2 miles later on this evening. I have missed yoga. I definitely will benefit from the stretching and balance that I will be practicing once a week. I just wish I had more time for it... more yoga time... peaceful time... meditative time.

Check out Krista's Rant for August if you haven't already. She's right on the money talking about how we overschedule ours and our childrens' lives. Too many lessons and activities and clubs and such... and its all (most of it) completely unnecessary. What the HELL is wrong with us that we think that we MUST work until 8pm so we can afford some bright and shiny new THING? A thing that will inevitably be obsolete in 2 months (tops) anyway? Freaky it is... but I'm living it. Living in a job I hate with every fiber of my being so that my family can maintain the lifestyle we've built for ourselves. And the best part? Our only real debt is the house and two cars. No credit debt, we save and pay cash for most things... but very little savings either (which scares the crap outta me).

But here I am... plugging away. How am I going to make the whole "quit-work, go back to school" thing work anyway? I am a horrible budget maker/keeper... and I have zero idea how to find good part-time work to help carry us thru the school years (at least 3, but could be up to 5)... *sigh* Maybe my brain will open up and the solution will flow thru it some time in the next year or so... I hope it does, I truly do.

3 miles in the wee hours.

Running this morning was really great... well... everything was great except the hauling my fat ass outta bed at 5:30 in the am. I ran slow and steady, breathing was calm and heart-rate was never above 70% of max. I saw a lot of ducks, several bunny rabbits and one great-blue heron that took off over my head as I was running by. I averaged just over a 10 minute/mile pace. I guess there isn't much interesting to say about running... especially when you're going to be doing so very much of it every week, so I won't bore you with any more.

I think Alissa convinced me to go with a more beginner schedule for the half-marathon training... I think the intermediate schedule would have gotten a bit overwhelming around the mid point. So I've got my calendar mostly set up and I'll try to figure out how to get it posted as a chart that I can use to check off my runs and other workouts on a daily basis. Thanks everyone for all of the information and support in the comments as well... it's been so VALUABLE to me as I move into this completely new area of fitness training.

In other news, I hate shots... I hate even more when my kids get shots. Val HATES shots and luckily today was the very last shot he needs to get until he's 12+ years old. HOORAY! We had to hold him down tho, and that sucked... he screamed, cried, got some stickers and promptly got over it. We've got him ramped up to his full dose of concerta again as well and I thought I'd mention that my hubbys parents were AMAZED at the difference in his behavior with the full dose on board. Honestly it is like night and day. He's NOT zonked out, or sedated at all... he's just more easy-going. Doesn't get freaked out about every little thing... doesn't harass his brother, lets things go more easily... can follow more than one instruction in sequence and will focus on his toys and play for more than 30 seconds at a time... its like he's a normal kid. Don't get me wrong... he'll still throw a tantrum or snag a toy from his brother if he thinks he can get away with it (which he can't)... but otherwise, he's a pretty awesome child.

10k Results are FINALLY up!

my time is almost exactly what the GPS said... but I'm sticking with the pace/distance the GPS gave me because and extra half mile... is an EXTRA half mile, damnit!

I placed 13th of 26 in my age group of 24-29 year old women (dead center) but if I'd been racing 2 days later (Hypothetically putting me into the 30-34 category) I'd have placed 9th of 21... DAMN! I also placed 107 out of 241 total runners, so that's not to shabby either. Top half of the class in both categories.

Name, location, bib number, sex, age, time, pace, age group rank, overall rank

13. Brenna Palmer Vancouver, WA 2536 F 29 1:00:32 9:45 13 / 26 107 / 241

Had a thought this morning...

I think it's pretty darned cool that I can say yes to an invitation to run a 10k with a friend on 2 days notice. I mean... 10k is not a long race in a distance runners mind, but for me... well... I've only done it once before, but I know that I can do it without too much effort and come out fine on the other end... and I think that's pretty neat.

I'm back at work this morning (hooray.) and trying to get caught up on my 200+ emails. I need to meet with a few people and get some updates on things that happened in my projects over the last week.

My plan for the next few weeks will be solidified over the next couple of days... I imagine I will start with a 10 day colon cleanse, continue it while I do a 3 day kidney cleanse, and then do a 3 day liver flush routine after which I will continue on my merry way all clean and detoxified and such... and then... it's lean out time baby... cardio cardio cardio and low-weight/high-rep weights. I don't expect to exercise much during the cleanse... it's just very hard to maintain energy levels when your diet consists of a lot of fruit and veggies and vegitable sources of protein (read beans) and not a whole hell of a lot else.

Once I'm done with my cleanse my diet will go back to about 150-200g protein per day, 100-140g of carbs and 30-50g fat. I'll be takin' my suplements (omega-3, magnesium, b-complex, multi-vit) drinkin my water (100+ oz per day) and livin the life of the athlete.

I'm sad about the triathlon... I think I need to find another to do before the summer is over... and maybe next year we'll all go to Alaska for the Gold-Nugget All Women's or the Valdez - Gold-Rush-Days Tris. What will be will be.

Its good to be back!

Cheers!

Break on thru...

Doug invited me to run the Columbia Classic with him in a couple of days... Thursday night in fact. I registered right away. 10k, mostly down hill, in the dark on a historic highway on the Columbia River Gorge... sounds FABULOUS to me, so there is my step one back into the realm of the running and fitness fabulousness.

Hmmm... so I'll take it easy and just hit the cardio tomorrow... eliptical for an hour or so I suppose.

I need to find more info on doing my cleanse (colon, kidney, liver) which I want to start asap after my birthday on the first... so if anyone has good info I would love to hear it.

Ok... I'm gonna drink the last coors light in the house and put the last load of guest-related dishes in the washer and call it a night.

I'm still recovering from my vacation, work tomorrow should be a BLAST!

3.5 miles... slowly

I wanted to go for one last run this week, just in case there actually IS a triathlon this weekend. I decided to go this morning so on the off chance the thing happens, I'll have 4 full days of rest before the race.

I headed out around 8, it was fairly cool and humid... it had just stopped sprinkling and my muscles were kinda tight and angry for the first mile. I ran my regular course only backwards, and at the half-way point (at the top of the overpass over the highway) I stopped stretched for about 5 minutes. It felt good to do that, I think I really needed it and then I continued on for the rest of the run. 3.5 miles went fairly uneventfully until the last .5 miles when the outside of both of my knees began to ache. It isn't a sharp stabing pain, it's a dull ache, and as soon as I stopped it went away... but it's a new pain, and somthing to pay attention to, so that's annoying.

As if I needed more sports-injuries... UGH!

I am feeling like I'm ready to do a colon/kidney/liver cleanse series next month and then really put myself into a cutter... probably for 6-12 weeks... with only 2 days of total body lifting (low weights, high reps... think 4sets of 20reps per exercise) per week and lots and lots of cardio. I want to make my plan, have a log/chart to check off my workouts... and just go for it. I know if I put in 6-12 SOLID weeks of cutting I'll get myself under that magic 20% number and finally feel like I've met that goal (end weight be damned!).

So there ya have it... now back to cleaning!!!

Vindi-FUCKING-cation!!!

Ok... so I know I'm paranoid and a total freak about statistics and weight and numbers and shit like that... which is why when somthing CHANGES and I don't know quite what's going on because I don't have the statistics that tell me one way or the other what is going on, I freak right the fuck out...

So lately I've been freaking right the fuck out.

By the records I could find the last time I had my bodyfat tested was in March... March 11th in fact... (I think there was another test round the end of April, but I can't find my printout from it, so I'm going to pretend it didn't happen) 4 (or even 3) months is TOOOOOOOO long for me to go without having this test done. Especially since I'm used to having it every 6 weeks or so.

So I found Dave Ryan Sr. (since Dave Ryan Jr. was being wholly unresponsive) and went to see him today. Here are the results:

On March 11th I weighted approximately 152 lbs, had 38.55 lbs of fat weight and 113.45 lbs of lean weight giving me a body fat percentage of 25.36%

Today I weighed approximately 156 lbs (by his scale), had 35.54 lbs of fat weight and 120.46 lbs of lean weight giving me a body fat percentage of 22.78%.

SO - in those 4 (or 3) months I've LOST 3.01 pounds of FAT, have GAINED 7.01 pounds of LEAN (muscle, glycogen, water, etc), and have dropped my bodyfat percentage by 2.58%

Just keep swimming, right?

So I'm bulking up a bit... no worries... I wanted to butch up, didn't I? (can you tell I'm smiling right now?)

I'm sure my 8's will fit again soon... I'm cyclic, I know it... up and down up and down... and right now, even tho the weight is up the fat is down and that's all I care about... AND... the little program estimated that if I get down to 142 lbs and maintain my current lean body mass (not to mention putting on more muscle) I'll be aproximately 15% body fat... DAYUM... makes the 140lb goal look a little silly now, don't it?

I'm gonna go skip.

see ya!

ARGH!!!

I just completed what may have been the most PAINFUL 2.5 mile run in my LIFE!!!

Freakin' boot camp anyway!

I feel a shift in the balance of the force

Today was leg day.

Most people hate leg day.

I, on the other hand, LOVE LOVE LOVE leg day... you KNOW you wanna know what I did... I know you do...

Unfortunately I have no idea what I did because it has all left my brain now that I'm done... I know it involved HIGH reps and some friendly competition with a guy in the class who always CHECKS my db weights to make sure he's lifting more than I am, and at one point he was doing stiff-legged deadlifts with the 30s so I walked over, grabbed the 35s and did the full set of 20 with bigger weights than he had, standing right next to him, lookin' in the mirror at him as I did each one! I think that ticked him off a little bit, but in a friendly competative, "I've gotta be stronger than that girl" kinda way... but OH BOY did that KILL my ass!!! I still don't have the grip strength I really need either, so the last few reps I was worried the DBs were going to slip right out of my fingers and fall on the floor. But I made it, and all was right with the world.

Gonna do another 4 miles with Alissa tomorrow, and hopefully if I am not up till 3 am working on servers again (god I HATE on-call week) I will swim in the morning too. My motivation is up, my body image is up, I feel strong and capable and I wonder sometimes if I'm mildly bi-polar or if its just the normal hormonal fluctuations that swing me back and forth on this pendulum... cause when I go down... I hit bottom hard and feel pretty miserable while I'm there, but it doesn't seem to last very long and I'm right back up to where I am now... flying high and feeling good, and ready to conquer the world.

Maybe I just need more consistant sleep and more frequent sex.

;)

9 miles in 2 days

Ran 4 with the fabulous Alissa today, it was HOT and MUGGY and horrible, but we made it, and in a decent time too - 41:50.

Oh... and official weigh in today (because yesterday was a holiday) came up at 155, so I maintained over the holiday (fabulous!)

and thanks * for the homophone correction... I don't usually mess up the easy homophones and homonyms like "to, too and two; or there, their and they're" but hey, shit happens... right?

Weekend Report

Ya know, I'd planned to do absolutely no exercise this weekend... I was ok with it, I didn't think I'd have time and I didn't want to feel guilty if I ended up really not having time and not getting anything in... so I figured, eh, whatever.

But ya know what? I did have time! And Saturday I went for an HOUR AND 40 MINUTE walk with Nate in the stroller and my legs LOVED it... we probably only covered about 4 miles, but it was fun and gorgeous and I sweated and kept a good pace and it felt GOOD. And just now, on a holiday monday night... I just ran what had to be 5 miles... it took me 55:18, so it had to be around 5 miles (my forerunner is charging, so I don't have an accurate route/distance) but man... I had only planned to go for 30 minutes, and when I got to the point where I figured I'd turn around I just didn't... I just kept going, and when I got to 30 minutes I figured what the hell, I'd run this far, I may as well run back... I ended up doing a brand new loop for me and it was dusk/sunset, there was a breeze cutting down on the updrafting heat from the pavement... and I felt like a runner, a real live runner! (whodathunkit?)

Running any distance over 3 miles for me allows me time to crawl into my head and do some analysis as well and this run was no exception... I decided that I really needed to look closely at how I had failed myself in June... and why... and I came up with a bit of a list:

How I failed myself and my fitness goals in the month of June (analysis by b. palmer with the intention of finding a way to keep it from happening again).

1. I let myself get out of my morning routine. It was a slow transition, but I went back to afternoon only workouts which means I end up skipping more workouts than I should due to work/family schedule conflicts.

2. I rebelled against healthy eating and stuffed my face full of anything sugar/fat/salt laden that sounded pleasing to the palate at the time.

3. I stopped cooking for myself and my family.

4. I let my pantry become barren of healthy foods.

5. I let my focus drift from fitness to fashion (ie... how I look).

There are more little tangents but most of it comes back to those five points... and number 5 is probably the most significant of all of them, because as soon as I forgot to focus on fitness and got caught up in how I was going to look in that bikini the depression set in and hopelessness, and fear, and self-loathing are tough demons to fight... especially when you're in FULL ON DENIAL of their existance. (lucky me!)

I am glad I really thought about that stuff, and I think I'm going to be better for having written it all down. My morning routine MUST come back and so I will force it to do so... happy 5th of July... its time for another revolution... mine.

motivation of a drunk slug

What is wrong with me?

I mean... I know what's wrong with me... it's summer and its hot and I would rather sunbathe with a glass of iced tea than go for a run or bike ride or swim at the pool. I'm full of sunshine and smiles and in the mood for relaxation. Sangria at sunset... a white whine spritzer by the pool... margaritas and carne-asada on the grill. Food, friends, conversation, fun. *sigh*

Reality bites, don't it?

Thru the winter I successfully fought off the apathy for exercise that came with the holidays and cold rain. Thru the spring I fought it off... but now its summer again, and damnit I haven't had a real vacation in YEARS!!! I want to take off on a road trip with the kids to somewhere fun and sunny... I want beach sand and amusement parks and brats on buns.

But that's not in the cards for this summer... this summer its inlaws, family, a new deck and patio (HOORAY!) planting shrubs and flowers and building raised beds for veggie gardening next year... it will all pay off, I know it... its trade offs and right now I am trading travel for a fabulous home environment and back yard and improved performance in the triathlon this year... at least I hope so.

Guess I'd better go for a run now, eh?

heh!

155 and don't forget about walking!

Had a good weekend... went for a LONG walk with the baby in the stroller on Sunday and got a bit pink on the shoulders from the sun. It's been a long time since I've gone for a walk. I'd forgotten what good extended cardio exercise walking can be (espeically when pushing a toddler in a stroller up hills). I wish I'd been wearing more sensible shoes but the walk was an impulse while daddy was sleeping and with me in my flip-flops and Nate in his sandals we took off. We walked for just about an hour, and I was sweating the whole time. Yes it was hot, but my HR was elevated a bit, and my breathing was deep and focused so I knew I was exercising... it was good. Not the bike/run I'd wanted to get in, but hey, shit happens.

As for the diet... Friday remained pretty good despite my later evening indiscretions and Saturday was my day off so I didn't think about it... strangely enough tho, I didn't gorge myself and actually probably came out within my calorie range and pretty good with the carb/protein/fat ratios I wanted. Sunday started out with a fabulous vanilla-strawberry protein smoothie and while I know I didn't drink enough water, and I didn't log my food as I should have, I'm certain it wasn't horrific.

Which brings me to my first ever monday weigh in. I specifically went into the gym this morning to use their scale and stripped down before eating or drinking anything and voila 155. Now most people would look at that and say, AWESOME 2lb loss!!! Way to go!!! What I see is the truth in the fact that I did not gain 9lbs of water and that quite a lot of what I gained in my 3 weeks of emotional gluttony was probably fat... (I can pray for muscle, but since I don't believe in God, I don't know who I'd be praying to, and since I have NO idea when I'll see Dave Ryan again to test my bodyfat I don't see a lot of point in belabouring the obvious). Yes kiddies... fat.

But ya know what? Fuck it.

Life goes on... I am an imperfect, and yet still fabulous, human being. I knew (instinctively) that at some point I'd regain some fat... you just have to... especially when you've been restricting yourself for a long time. Life goes on.

I need some veggies. :D

Today I loved my body

I wore a fitted light green tank (with built in shelf bra) and my grey vollyball shorts (yes, the ones from the pictures)... it was the very first time I have ever worn those shorts out in public... much less in the gym... and it was upper body day in Bootcamp... and it was VERY weights focused (some weeks are more interval/cardio focused with some weights thrown in... this was the exact oposite... all weights with a few brief cardio bursts thrown in). My arms fucking ROCK... there was definition in my biceps and triceps and that happy little teardrop muscle that caps the top of your shoulder... and when doing standing shoulder presses my back flares out behind my boobs and I can only IMAGINE what it must look like from behind because it sure makes my waist and hips look narrow from the front! (hooray for triangles!) My legs FELT slim and muscular, and my stomach FINALLY didn't feel bloated and fat. I kept my abs TIGHT thru the whole thing... did my plate crunches with a 25 POUND plate and damnit if I didn't feel like a rockstar... now if only my hair would cooperate. ;)

Yeah yeah yeah... pictures will come once I get back under 150... promise.

EDITED TO ADD:
1. Clean kitchen last night.
2. Clean eating except for the 1/2 kk donut today, not worried about it.
3. Boot Camp rocked
4. Not sure what to do on this one yet... he works tonight, but we'll see.
5. Subscribed to Midwifery Today.

Hump day already?

Wow this week is going fast... but I guess that's what happens when you take Monday off... Boot Camp was BRUTAL today... lots of cardio outside in the sun... sprints, running lines on the soccer field, and lots and lots of stairs. The resistance part was all upper body with pushups(incline/flat/decline), bar pulls(close grip and wide grip both over and underhand), bicep curls, rows, wheelbarrows, shoulder presses, more pushups, etc... It was a fun class tho, and now Linn is off for a week and a half in Jamaica!!! (bastard). I asked him in class if he'd packed yet, and his response was "not really, but come on, what do I need? A pair of shorts and a tank top and I'm set!" (bastard).

I can't wait till the boys are old enough to go on real vacations... I know they'd love Disney (of course) and Yellow Stone and such... but I really want to take them to Hawaii and other places tropical as well... some of my fondest memories are of family vacations.

*sigh*

In any case the dietary planning is in full force and while I am able to ditch the alcohol for four good weeks, I can't impose that restriction on my young (24) single (and hot!) friend who spends many a friday and saturday night carousing with her other young (early 20s) single (and hot!) friends. The dietary changes will be based around a protein/carb ballance with a low fat intake (hey, its the only thing I HAVEN'T tried, so why not, right?) but I will be making sure to get my fats from FABULOUS sources like olive oil, nuts, nut butters and the like. Details on Sunday as I said before.

I know that I just have to keep going.

It is my life now... I LOVE LOVE LOVE working out, running, exercising, etc... I do! Its the constant dietary dilligence (because there is so much readily available CRAP to consume that it comes at you at every moment and from every angle and makes even the strongest of wills crack once in a while) that tires me out more than anything.

But hey... I'm an 8... I'm a happy, healthy, fabulous size 8 and that's good enough for me!

3.02 with two hot babes!

Alissa, Jen and I went for a run today. It was GORGEOUS! 3.02 miles in just over 31 minutes (31:11 I believe was the official time)

It was sunny, we chatted, our pace was comfortable but not too slow and not too fast. It was a glorious run which we will repeat on Thursday (tho hopefully a little earlier in the day as its supposed to hit 90 degrees on Thursday!)

I really need to get back to my morning swimming tho... only 5 weeks left to the Triathlon!!! Again, I'm not worried about it, but I do want to feel like I've done some training in all of the events so I'm not dieing in any one of them.

Which brings me to what I really need... I really need another plan! That's right its plannin' time again folks and if you step right up here and pay your quarter you will have the divine privlege of watchin LexySmash put herself thru another dietary experiment!

Am I ready to reveal the plan yet? Nope... that will wait till Sunday... but I'm moving myself in the right direction (increasing water and protein intake... etc...) and I've got another partner in crime (Alissa) to challenge with, and when the last 4 weeks before my family sees me skinny for the first time rolls around I will be ready to put the plan into action... and yes it will involve no alcohol for the month again... (I know, I'm a glutton)

:D

Mother Nature Smiled

Oh my lord it was gorgeous! A little humid for my taste due to the prior rain, but the sun was out (partly cloudy) there was a slight breeze and we chatted thru the whole run... it was FABULOUS! Running with someone is so much fun when you're generally at the same pace... which we were! The 3 miles just flew by (but my fore-runner battery was dead because I left it on, so we're not sure it was 3 miles... coulda been less) and we're gonna run again soon... hopefully thursday.

I feel so zen today... mellow, centered... calm.

I am eating well, already had one super protein powder shake (2 scoops!) and I have another one for my afternoon snack. Had a wholewheat english muffin with pb for breakfast (and coffee of course) and chicken and mushroom soup for lunch (with a couple of ry-krisp crackers). I think next monday I'll start recording in Fit-Day again. Taking this break has been nice.

I am content right now... waiting for my bikini bottoms to arrive... relaxing into my routines... feeling flexy and bendy like a reed in the rivers current.

Now... if I could just quit my job I'd be one super happy camper.

oh well!

:D

runnin' in the rain.

Alissa is supposed to go for a 3 miler with me today. Trouble is that it is raining and she's trying to pussy out...

Now I'm not a huge fan of running in the rain, heck... I'm not a huge fan of running in the sun either, but if you're going to train for a marathon in October (which Alissa is doing) you pretty much need to be willing to run in just about any weather to get there.

So in a couple of hours we'll go for our run. I'll report back post haste (promise)

I did a bad bad thing

I just ran 5.14m in 85 degree sun.

I did not bring water.

I only walked .5 miles at the 2.25 mile mark.

I am dehydrated, my legs are pissed and I'm certainly low on electrolytes. I gulped down about 2 quarts of water as soon as I got inside the gym... and I'm drinking a pint of "Well Being" by Naked Food-Juice. I will consume a banana next.

its not that the run was too long for me, but I just did it wrong. Not being well hydrated before I went out... eating too soon before I exercised (which caused the stitch in my side that necessitated the .5 mile walk in the middle) and doing a full upper body lifting session before an hours worth of cardio under the blazing mid-day sun just didn't add up to a good running experience.

I'm glad its over.

And I was slow too. 58:19 for 5.14 miles is SLOW... seriously slow. Not that there is anything wrong with slow. Slow is fine really, its just depressing when you wonder if you're wasting your time because you run so damned slow. I hesitate to even call it running when I'm that slow. More like leisurely jogging... only it didn't FEEL leisurely, it felt hard, and hot and crappy.

Oh, and I think my shoulders might be a tad pink. DAMNED SUN!

It was a good reminder, tho, that I really shouldn't run in the middle of the damed day when its 85 degrees out!!! Summer is a fine time for BEING outside, its a hellofa time for exercising outside. So morning runs when its gonna be a scorcher will become the will of the weather... and of my delicate and as yet non-cancerous skin.

4.14m

It seems that my "5m" loop is in fact 4.14m in length (I had suspected as much) but I have information on a loop that should be closer to 5 actual real live miles that I plan to run on Thursday to measure with my handy dandy new toy and report back. Today's run felt good... a little aching here and there (shins, knees, right arch), but nothing bad and nothing lasting. I'm definitely working the kinks out of my running legs and it feels good.

I really want to swim tomorrow... but that means actually getting my ass up and out of bed in the morning (which I haven't done in more than 2 weeks now which has REALLY improved my sleep schedule, but not my fitness level) so we'll see how it goes.

I'm finding it interesting that even when I'm not thinking about what I am eating, I think about what I am eating. I mean... over the weekend I made a pledge to myself to eat whatever I wanted and not worry about it... and I did. I ate whatever I wanted, and I didn't worry about it... but that doesn't mean I didn't think about it. Because I did. I thought about every bite that went in my mouth and I could NOT, for the life of me, turn it off.

But I'm not sure I want to.

I mean... for 28 odd years I thought "hmm... this is probably not very good for me, oh well!" when I was eating somthing... I didn't think about the fat/carb/protein ratios, or calorie and vitamin content, or whether it was laden with transfats or HFCS or whatever, but look where that got me... fat and miserable.

Now, even when I'm not worrying about what I eat, I still think about all of those things and more. I can still enjoy "naughty" foods, but I'm fully educated on what I'm deciding to put in my body and I do have to make a conscious decision to do so... like this home-made 3-cheese macaroni and cheese I'm eating right this very moment.

It's freaking FABULOUS... YUM... but I know it's seriously NOT on the eating plan I'm starting tomorrow, so while I'm enjoying it today I'm planning for tomorrow and realizing that indulgences like this every now and then are no big deal.

I used to repeat a phrase when ever someone I knew (or read online) would slip, binge, fall off the wagon, or otherwise feel guilty about somthing they ate.. that phrase is this:

"It's what you do MOST of the time that matters." Today's slip up is not a failure... its a choice. I choose everything I eat, I choose every activity I do... today I choose to eat yummy rich mac-n-cheese... and every other day this week I will choose to eat a ballance of carbs and protein and all of my vitamins and suplements and fruits and veggies and lots and lots of water. No biggie.

So yeah, I guess I don't want to stop thinking about what I eat. Thinking is empowering. Thinking gives ME the control over the food and not the other way around. Thinking will serve me well, I think... :)

5m

Todays run started in my head. "Self," I said, "I want you to go for a run today, but I realize your legs are tired and sore from yesterday's workout... so I think I will only ask you to run the 3 mile, rather than the 5 mile loop today." I responded positively to the idea and got up from my desk and headed toward the gym to change. As I was walking outside it was such a nice, cool running temperature with fresh rain on the ground I changed my mind... "Self," I said again, "It is such a lovely day it would be a shame to waste it on a short run... why don't we do the 5 mile loop but we can alternate walking and running as we se fit." I agreed with myself and grabbed my bag out of my car and went inside...

In the locker room myself and I bantered back and forth about how nice it would be to take a nice easy run thru the streets of North Portland today and how it would work the lactic acid out of our muscles and how fabulous we would feel afterward and we got suited up, tied our shoes and strapped on our brand new BLUE MINI iPOD and headed out the door! (Hey, Kat can't be the only one getting rewards these days!!!).

I started at a brisk walk to warm up the achy leg muscles and after a couple of blocks the beat of the electronic house music kicked in and the legs just started pumping! "Hooray, this feels great!" I told myself... to which I responded, "It sure does and these are some kickin' tunes!" "Hey!" I continued... "Lets run to the first turn and then we'll see how we feel and maybe walk for a while." "Sounds GREAT!" I responded enthusiastically.

And so I ran... and at the first turn I was still feeling pretty good, so I kept on running... and at the second turn (about half way thru) I was starting to get fatigued, but still didn't think I needed to walk yet... and hey, I was almost half way thru anyway, so I might as well see how far I could go without walking at all, right?

And I kept running... and while I was a bit tired, my knees weren't sore and my legs were not screaming and my breathing was not labored and the tunes really were kickin, and so I kept on running.

And when I came to the final turn before I headed back down the hill to the gym I told myself, "Hey, you've done a really great job today... this run was supposed to be a walk-run, but you've run the whole thing... WAY TO GO!!" to which I replied, "Oh yeah? You ain't seen nuttin' yet, sistah!" And suddenly my legs were moving faster and my arms were pumping hard and I sprinted at top speed the last quarter mile of the run all the way back to the gym!

And when I was done and had caught my breath I said slyly to myself, "well, well, well. I'll know better than to offer you an easy run next time, won't I?" and I gulped and smiled and directed myself to the stretching room to cool down.

5m

according to the route map it's 5m anyway... but I'm skeptical considering I finished in about 42minutes making for 8.5minute miles which is faster than I've ever run in my life... but hey... I'll take it!

I wish I had THIS, cause then I'd know for SURE how fast and how far I was running.

Had a little bit of pain under my knees by the end so I made sure to stretch out REALLY well, but overall I think it had the effect I was going for. I feel good... beat but good. I wonder how far I could run if I really tried. ;)

so... posing is hard...

like seriously sweaty breathin' heavy heart poundin skin and face turnin red HARD!

Linn showed me the back pose, chest pose, double bicep, tricep (from the side) and quads... and we practiced them, and they're hard... holding that much tension in your muscles for 30-60 seconds at a time seriously hurts (especially after a killer upper body workout!)

He also filled my head with knowledge about EFAs (essential fatty acids), protein shakes... and the like. He's going to email me the details later because by the end of the little lesson I was feeling rather overwhelmed.

It seems that not only am I an athlete... he believes that I have the dedication and focus and will power to really get into this... to REALY lean out the way fitness models and such do... and well, being told that (by a fitness professional) feels kinda freaky... I mean, that is DEFINITELY somthing I want (like I mentioned before... my subconscious goal really is to look like a fitness model or small end female body builder) But, I've never really considered that a realistic goal.

But ya know... maybe it is?

It seems (I am slowly realizing) that most people just don't do what I do.

It seems that the workout schedules I put myself thru... and the dietary routines I maintain are just not normal for most people.

Which seems really weird to me... because after a while, it really doesn't seem like all that big a deal to eat right and I think just about anyone I know could do this. A CKD isn't hard, really... its just another routine... just a change... and pretty adaptable too... and its short term... I mean really... what's 4 weeks?

And the exercising regularly is hard sometimes when you're in the moment... but the hardest part I think is just getting out of bed to do it every day... and I've got that pretty well down by now... anyone can do that if they just make the decision.

So what's the deal? I mean... I don't WANT to be a career fitness professional... this is just somthing I do to make me feel good about myself and about my body and what I can accomplish with it... so what is it about me that seems so unrealistic to the rest of the world?

I'm still a mommy. I'm still a full time professional... my workouts happen in the early morning and on my lunch hour so that I can spend lots of time with my family after work... anyone could do that too if they wanted to.

So... like body image re-evaluations I've got some more self-analysis to do I suppose. I don't want to be different from the rest of the world... I just want to be fit and lean... isn't that what most people want? Am I getting in over my head? Am I taking this whole thing too far? maybe... maybe not.

pump pump pump

Man! I love love love upper body workouts on mondays after re-feed.

My arms and shoulders are so pumped up right now its freakin' fabulous... and I imagine that my traps are pretty puffed up too! Lots of upper body work in boot-camp today and it felt GREAT. I didn't skip any reps or cardio intervals, and now I just want to go spend half an hour in the bathroom wtih the door locked flexing my arms... (narcisism is not attractive tho... so I will refrain).

Swimming this morning was pretty great... did my 400yds off the bat and came in at 9:45 which is not too bad for a cold start 400... but since that's what I'll be doing in the tri, I figured I'd better see how it would be in real life. I continued swimming for another 20 minutes and probably got in another 800yds or so, and practiced breathing on my weak side (left) a bunch... don't know if I'll ever feel comfortable doing that, but I may as well practice in the pool where there isn't as much wake to deal with.

My high weight for this morning was 151, which was a nice surprise (I was figuring 152-3 with the lack of loss on the low end this week)... so I have renewed hope that this CKD will continue to slowly allow me to peel back the layers of bodyfat to reveal the ripped muscles that I'm just about positive are lurking beneath. ;)

For now, I must consume mass quantities of water before I go get my vitals taken and blood/urine sampled for my life-insurance policy... joy... needles are fun.

Back to the Grindstone...

I have 8 workouts planned for this comming week. After my 9 workout week I took a couple of weeks off (well, not really "off" but I focused on getting my CKD going and just did the minimum workouts each week). So I'm in the groove, feeling healthy, and I want to get back to the pool this week. Here's the schedule:

Monday - Swimming and BootCamp
Tuesday - Dawn Patrol
Wednesday - Swimming and BootCamp
Thursday - Dawn Patrol
Friday - Swimming and BootCamp
Saturday - Off
Sunday - optional long ride or 4m run

My low weight this week was 149 which is a little discouraging... but indicates that I may be going a little overboard on the carb-re-feeds. I didn't worry about it this week because I KNOW I'm burning fat due to the ketones present in my urine on a daily basis starting Tuesday night and going thru Saturday morning... never HEAVY ketones (but that is GOOD, it means I'm staying hydrated) but always in the 10+ range, so I know its doing somthing for me.

I am dedicated to the plan for at least 4 weeks anyway... I should probably give it 6 tho to make it until the next body-fat test... but we'll see.

I realized this weekend that despite the fact that I have no desire to compete... I really want to LOOK like a fitness model at least once in my life and to get pictures of myself at that state so I can remember it always. I don't know if that will ever happen (15% body fat seems SO far off to me... I mean... I took me 18 months to loose the first 10% of my bodyfat... imagine how long it would take to get those next 10% off??? ARGH!!!)... but I had to admit to myself that I really do want it and I aspire to it.

my goal of getting under 20% this year seemed realistic at the beginning of the year... I mean, heck... I had a WHOLE YEAR to loose a measly 5% body fat... anyone could do that. But as May ticks by and I realize I'm almost 1/2 way thru the year the goal is feeling further and further off... so is the goal of doing a pullup... but I've lost a lot of focus on that one already. I am fairly sure I will be able to do the 30 boy pushups (mostly because when I'm fresh I already can)... its just the other two goals that seem to be slipping further and further out of my grasp.

Ah well... maybe the weren't realistic in the first place.

I, like Lee, believe in changing things up as often as possible... but I also realize that when I don't give one workout or eating plan a chance to work I short-change myself and the opportunity the plan may be giving me... so... four more weeks isn't that long...

how long is one supposed to be in a "cutting" phase anyway? 6 weeks? 12 weeks? Until you get where you want to be? If you think my moods are swinging now... just wait... :D

A little late in the game

I realize now, that I should have been keeping better records... charts of weight progress... graphs of workout intensity... pretty GPS maps of my ever increasing distances when I run.

But I didn't... and honestly, I probably never will.

I can go back to week one in this blog tho (or I will be able to when I get those last few entries ported over) and I can see that the 3 and 5 pound dumbells were my friends... that jog-walking around the block left me pooped... that I was at least 40% bodyfat, nearly 60lbs overweight and I was determined to keep putting one foot in front of the other and never look back.

I still don't have pretty charts and graphs... and someone said to me not too long ago, "Well, hey! You gave birth, this must be MUCH easier than that!" or somthing to that effect and I've sort of been mulling that over in my brain for a while...

because you know what?

She was so very very very wrong. Labor ends with the birth of a baby... once the baby is out, you are done (potentially forever unless you decide to have another child)... You don't have to count contractions and breathe thru the pain for an hour every day for the rest of your life to give birth. In fact, I'd hazard to say that if birth were as much work as losing weight is... very few people would EVER make it thru it, and our maternal mortality rate would be right up there with the death rates from every obesity related disease and disorder out there.

Imagine, if you will... that you're a pregnant mother... and that for an hour or so every single day for an undetermined number of days, weeks, months or even years you have to labor toward the birth of your baby. But you don't know when it begins how many consecutive days of laboring it will take you to get to your goal... for some it may be a few weeks... for others more than a year... and during this laboring time you must feed yourself perfectly, maintain proper hydration, get adequate sleep and GO ABOUT YOUR DAILY LIFE in-between bouts of labor... make you want to have kids? HA! GOOD FREAKIN LUCK!

Getting fit, for me, has been a lot harder than giving birth ever was... even my first son's 18 hour back labor... its a never ending process... and not having a finish line can be really discouraging sometimes.

so there you have it.

Bootcamp was legs today, lots of squats, lunges, squat jumps, high knees, stairs, etc... etc... etc... My glycogen is noticeably depleated... keto is back as of the test this morning...

I'm tired... and I'm trying to figure out where my next pit-stop is because without a finish line, those are what I have to look forward to.

massage

I am a huge (let me emphasize that... ) HUGE advocate of regular therapeutic massage for the maintenance of general health. Yesterday I had a WONDERFUL 30 minute massage from Jeremy Manalis whom I would hapily and heartily recommend to anyone needing a bit of relaxation, work on tight or painful joints, muscles or nerve pinches... or to anyone at all, really. He does a lot of cranio-sacral work too, which for me is fabulous because I hold so much of my stress in my neck.

In fact I hold SO much stress in my neck that I have had recurring bouts of torticolis over the last 10 years or so. It doesn't happen very often, but when it does... the pain is so severe that I have no choice but to take the vicodin given me and pop the muscle relaxers and hope it loosens up enough for my chiro to get things back in place. (I'm sure I've mentioned this before!).

In any case, massage helps keep me loose and relaxed and out of spasmodic danger (hooray!)

This morning was cardio and it went well, tho I didn't feel I pushed myself as hard as I could have. I felt fabulous... I still feel fabulous... and my arms are STILL all pumped up from yesterday (*grin*). In fact, today I did my hair in the locker room after workout without my shirt on (other girls do it too!) so I could check out my arms and shoulders.

My second line of abdominal muscles is starting to poke thru too. I will take pictures of all of this, I promise, but give me another couple of weeks to really feel like I'm making progress on this lean-out and the progress will be noticeable.

My calories were WAY WAY WAY too low yesterday because the hydroxycut completely killed my appetite in the afternoon (I take 2 in the am uppon waking and 2 after lunch), I plan to seriously go over the top today... pushing 1800 if I can, to attempt to disuade my body from thinking I need to horde fat right now. People have asked (Hi Laura) if the Hydroxycut makes me feel weird, and honestly its no different (for me) from a couple of cups of coffee. A lot of whats in most thermogenic supplements these days is caffeine, and since I refuse to take effedra products (especially now that they're illegal... but I had my own effedra experience way back when and don't care to repeat it) this is a good option for me. I like that my appetite is less, I like that I have more energy despite the low-carb diet... so I'll stick with it for now... and for anyone whose keeping track of all of my little data points... I'm already down 2lbs from my weekend re-feed high of 152.5... not bad for 1 day. :D

Hydroxy-update

Boot camp today felt REALLY good... I had energy to spare, it was rad. One of the cardio spurts was running lines across the gym tho... think "highschool basket ball practice" Sprint from basket to free throw, touch the line, sprint back, touch the bounds line, sprint to mid court, touch, back touch, far free throw, touch, back, touch, far bounds line, touch, back... its the sprint drill from hell... and we did it twice (with a short break in the middle THANK GOD!!)

oh boy was the pump of the arms fun to look at too.

One interesting thing is that I started taking the hydroxy cut this morning again and whoah... I can SERIOUSLY tell the difference now. The reduction of overall caffeine intake has definitely had an effect on how much the stuff affects me. I had zero appetite today... in fact I just ate my dinner and I hadn't eaten since 3pm. I pretty much had to force myself to eat too because I seriously wasn't hungry. I am WAY low on calories today but I'm now stuffed full of taco salad and just don't want to eat anything else.

The good news is that I'm SUPER low on carbs too (surprise, surprise) so I should be dumping myself back into ketosis pretty quickly.

Oh... and Jim... I HAVE SEPARATION IN MY CALVES NOW!!!!! And I'm noticing a lot more vascularity in the hands and fore-arms... not that I want vascularity, mind you... its just a sign of reducing body fat, so in a way... it's good.

The calf muscle thing I have been waiting for. I have nicely shaped calves, but it all looked like one muscle back there for a very long time... finally I'm getting some separation, and while I will never have FABULOUS calves like Lee... they're certainly on the upswing!

Massochism

I am a massochist. I love the day after a brutal workout. I love the ache, the burning, the pain... it makes me feel like I've really done somthing to permanently alter the physiology of my body. I LOVE that! Also, I nearly stopped to pick up a dozzen hot-n-fresh krispy kreme donuts to bring in to my co-workers, fully confident that I wouldn't touch the things... but I decided that it was hypocritical to work this hard for my own health only to sabotage that of the people I work with every day... so I skipped it.

Swimming did not happen this week. This head cold/allergy thing is really pissing me off, but with kids in school I have to expect to get everything. It really isn't a bad one, its just annoying enough to make it necessary to keep tissues next to me at all times and I figured I didn't need to share my phlegm with the rest of the swimming community... it just doesn't seem right, despite the chlorination, to possibly spread these germs any further than is necessary.

I finally registered some ketones this morning about the +10 if anyone is interested... I will weigh myself tomorrow morning before I begin my re-feed (mmmBuckwheatPancakesmmmm) and then on sunday night to see the fluid fluctuation. I'm not thrilled with this week's downward progress... but I know I'm burning fat at this point, so that is good.

Congratulations to my friend Donna who is kicking ass and taking names again! She registered a 4lb loss in the last couple of weeks and that just blows my mind!!! She's gonna catch and surpass me in no time at that rate... I just LOVE how positive she is all the time, she has a LOT going on in her life: husband, school, four AWESOME kids, a brand new puppy... and yet, to me, she always seems so centered in who she is, and what she wants and what is important to her (obviously her family is key!). I really admire the mother and wife that she is, and I aspire to be like her in many ways!

Ok... enough sappage for now... just one more thought:

Sunday is Mother's day... will your mom know you remembered???