Persistence (Week 4 Day 2)

"Never let what you can't do stop you from doing what you can do."

Wow, not sure what happened last night but I woke up so tired and my legs were just dead. Regardless, I knew I had to go run... giving up one day makes it too easy to give up the next day.

The 5-minute warm-up walk went well, and the first 3 minute run breezed by pretty quickly. After that though... I knew I was in trouble. The first 5-minute run interval was rough... I tried to talk myself into quitting about halfway through it but pushed through and finished the full 5-minutes.

The second 3rd minute run interval was soooo hard, and at the end of it I almost gave up for the day and went home. Thankfully, at that time, "Big Pimpin" by Jay-Z came on the iPod and motivated me to at least walk out the remaining time.

I just didn't have the last 5 minute run in me... my legs were dead today, I was physically exhausted going in and knew if I pushed too hard I was going to hurt something because I could feel my running form being altered by the soreness in my legs.

I know I'm entitled to bad days, and I'm not disheartened by it. I'm going to take an extra rest day tomorrow and not go to the gym at all. I plan on absolutely smashing W4D3 on Friday.

Side note: To the exceptionally beautiful girl who was on the elliptical when I went into the cardio room... Hi! :-)

Week 3 Day 3

Thursday was an "off" (i.e. non-running) day, but I still hit the gym and put in two miles walking... I'm going to do this on Tuesdays and Thursdays and allow my body to rest over the weekends to prepare for the next week. I'm doing this for cross-training purposes and also to promote weight loss to make running even easier still.

Someone made a comment to me Thursday afternoon that I seemed to be walking better and my posture was more normal (I was slouching a bit compensating for a back I couldn't keep straight due to a pulled muscle). It hadn't dawned on me, but at some point on Thursday my back felt a lot better! It was a bit stiff this morning, but nothing terrible and it got worked lose within a few minutes of activity.

Soooo... week 3 day 3 met a 95% healthy me and didn't stand a Siamese cat's chance at a pitbull convention. Even after not finishing the full last interval on W3D2, I decided to go for it today... and my last 3 minute run I stretched into a 4 minute run.

I figured I'd try some of the advice I've given to some of the people I know who have picked up C25K now (I've got 8 friends I know of who have started this after I did... go friends!). The advice? If you slow down a little, you can run further. So, I slowed my roll just a bit and easily completed the 3-minute runs. The last run, as mentioned, I pushed a little harder and went 4 minutes.

I'll consider Week 3 in the books, ready to start smashing week 4 on Monday!

My big announcement for the week? I accepted a position with my company in another one of our call centers in Monroe, Louisiana. My last day in Hot Springs will be 10/2 and I will report to Monroe on 10/5. The Spa 5K is November 21st (not the 28th as I previously thought) and I will still be coming back for it.

Another positive... there are several 5Ks and other running events in the Monroe area per year and only one in Hot Springs.

Week 3 Day 2

I've had a couple of runs since my last update.

A slight setback over the weekend. On Saturday I was helping some friends move and at one point felt something pull between my shoulder blades (my unprofessional opinion is it is a pulled muscle). It's been hurting ever since, especially if I sit still for any period of time more than 5 minutes.

My runs this week go as follows: 5 minute warm-up walk, 90 second jog/90 second walk, 3 minute jog/3 minute walk, 90/90, 3/3, cool-down walk.

Monday I managed to finish, the cardio was a little stretched at the end of the second 3 minute jog, but the legs felt fine. What has hurt is my back up where the (presumably) pulled muscle is.

This morning it hurt bad enough I couldn't finish the 2nd 3 minute run and had to finish the last minute and a half walking (though I did keep a brisk 4.2mph pace while walking).

It's frustrating to know that my legs and cardio are okay to handle it, but there's another injury which is keeping me from accomplishing my goal for the week.

I'm considering taking Friday off from running (would just do a brisk walk instead) and giving myself over the weekend to hopefully heal. I'll make that call on Friday depending on how my back feels when I wake up.

Couch to 5K - Week 2 Day 3

Wow... what a great finish to the week. Wednesday I finished 1.91 miles (my best distance to date) followed up today by a 2.02 mile effort. This is the first time I have ever completed a distance like that with any type of running.

The progress has been good. I weighed myself on Wednesday and found that in 2.5 weeks I have dropped a total of ten pounds.

As I did last week, I tried to push Day 3 a little harder. I sustained a run of 7MPH during part of the last interval which felt really good and got the heart rate pumping.

Still, the most amazing part for me is the fact I'm actually enjoying this. My old philosophy was I would only run if someone (and he'd better be extremely large) was chasing me. My energy is higher than it has been in years... on to week 3 Monday which looks like this:

Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then do two repetitions of the following:
• Jog 90 seconds
• Walk 90 seconds
• Jog 3 minutes
• Walk 3 minutes

I Almost Quit Today (Week 2 Day 1)

Today is one of those days which would have been really easy to just quit and go home... at least for the day. In all likelihood, that would've started a spiral downward because once you can quit once... it gets easier to do again.

I got to my gym at 5:35am as it opens at 5:30. The problem was... there was nobody there. Well, correction, there were no employees there. My running partner and one other member were outside waiting. Then 2 more members showed up. At 5:45am my running partner left and went home. I decided to wait a few more minutes because I knew the potential downfall of going home even once. At 5:54 (24 minutes late) the girl who opens the gym showed up. No apologies, no good morning, just shuffling in and sitting down behind the desk.

Anyhow, today was the beginning of Week 2 in the Couch to 5k Program - an interval training program to take you from inactive to running 3.1 miles (or 30 minutes) in 9 weeks. Week 2 breaks down like this:

5 minute warm-up walk
1.5 minutes running/2 minutes walking for 20 minutes.

Day 1 of this felt pretty good. A little burning in the front/side of the calves during the 2nd run interval, but nothing terrible. Pushed through it.

I knew I could run 90 seconds straight as I finished up Friday's run with a 90 second jog, I just didn't know if I could keep it up repeatedly for 20 minutes in intervals. I was very happy to say I made it through each of them. The last 90 second run was starting to stretch the cardio a little (that's kinda the point I think) but I finished strong and did a 3 minute cool down walk.

1.85 miles today. Felt great. Looking forward to Wednesday and (hopefully) starting at 5:30am and not 6am. Hoping my running partner doesn't give up based on this 1 bad experience.

Week 1(b) Day 3

I run on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Yesterday (Thursday) I decided to go to the gym and do some light cardio. I decided to take my first venture on the elliptical machine. Big mistake.

I think the elliptical machine is the most evil thing ever invented. It is completely unnatural movement to me and I don't know if it's because of my height or what is normal for me, but this thing hurt! It wasn't the good kind of hurt either. Not the "oh, I'm getting some new muscles worked our here that feels good", but rather "crap, I think this think is shredding my quads and my knee apart".

Being stubborn, not wanting to be the fat guy in the room who got on the elliptical for 30 seconds and got off beacuse he was tired, I kept it up for 5 minutes before moving to the treadmill for another 20 minutes of a 4MPH walk. My knee hurt slightly the entire time.

I spent the rest of Thursday with my knee hurting. I took about 30 minutes before bed last night thorougly icing it and slept with it elevated. It felt good when I woke up this morning, but I was really nervous how it would feel when I got on the treadmill this morning.

Well, I got through it with no pain. I finished 1.81 miles today putting my total cardio for the week at 6.47 miles. I also weighed myself on Thursday and I've dropped 5.5 pounds in 9 days. My fitness level feels a lot better already and the weight loss is a huge added bonus. Feeling great!

Today, I even did my last running interval for 90 seconds instead of 60 just to see how it felt since next week is all 90 second runs. It felt good. I'm fired up for Week 2! Now for 2 days off from cardio to rest the legs so I can go bigger on Monday...

Week 1(b) Day 2

Wow... best day so far. Easily.

First, my running partner not only showed up for Day 2, he actually showed up BEFORE me and I was 2 minutes early. Way to go running partner!

Due to the calves being set on fire during the last workout, I was much more dedicated to stretching my calves in addition to my quads before I started on the treadmill today. It was probably a combination of this and just getting back into shape, but I had no muscle burning/cramping during my workout at all. A very welcome change!

I actually found today pretty easy. Easy enough, in fact, that I found myself pushing a little harder during some of the intervals. My cardio felt good doing my normal speeds so I decided to go a little harder and still handled it pretty easily. I ended up covering 1/10 of a mile more (up to 1.85 miles now) and even hit a max running speed of 7MPH. Admittedly, the 7MPH was a bit much but I managed it for 30 seconds and then dropped down to 6.5MPH for the other half of that interval (it was my last interval and I just wanted to finish strong).

Still, it felt GOOD to know I could go 7MPH without my legs killing me. It was the cardio that wasn't keeping up at that pace very well. Still, I did most of my intervals at 5.5MPH but did several at 6MPH and felt great doing it. Recovery time was still good and I feel great.

I also did some light weightlifting for about 25 minutes at the end as well (shoulders, pecs, shins, calves, and quads).

Today was the first day in a long time I actually felt somewhat athletic again. I didn't feel like some fat guy huffing it out on a treadmill.

My favorite things so far is still the feeling I get when I first finish and I walk but feel like I'm still running. Love that.