I'd have to say the main reason why I haven't been updating my blog is due to my motivation. I keep telling myself that I'll continue a good eating pattern and that I'll increase my workouts in order to lose more weight, but it just never happens. I'm not sure why, but something has been hindering me.
I decided to write this blog because I've had a really tough day, and just want to write about things (not to do with my day, just life in general). So, my knee hasn't gotten better, and in fact, it may have gotten worse. I have a doctor's appointment scheduled for next week, and I really hope that we can figure out something in order to make my knee better. My left knee is starting to get kind of bad, I assume due to having to compensate for my hurt right knee. It's not horrible, but it definitely gets uncomfortable sometimes when I exercise. Nonetheless, my right knee has been bad, and I'm really starting to worry at this point, since it's been over a year and has only gotten worse. Hopefully we'll learn something next week.
Other than that, I was running some, then decided to take some time off again. Instead, after Thanksgiving, I spent some time workin stength training at my apartment with resistance bands, which was a nice change of things. Also was going to Dixon recently to be able to do some cardio without ending up running on pavement. Running on a treadmill has been nice. It's been much easier on my knees, and I really do prefer running for my cardio. I feel as if it gives me the best cardio workout.
However, no weight has been lost. I've just been maintaining. But now I'm home for the holidays, and I'm hoping that will help control my snacking, which has been my biggest flaw in my eating habits. Grabbing a bag of chips or some candy while in Corvallis, and quite frequently, has been a big problem. So like I said, being home might change that. Definitely have some healthier snacks around the house, and at least so far, I haven't been eating tons while here. But, I'll need to make sure to keep exercising, otherwise, what's the point of trying if I'm not working on both a healthy diet and regular exercise? But, I think I will keep things fairly mild until I see the doctor. Maybe after that, I'll have a better idea of what I can and should be doing.
Other than that, not much is going on. I'll be working in camp again this winter (Tiger Camp, or 1st graders), and I'm excited for that. I'm also glad it's the holidays. As I mentioned earlier, I've had a really rough day, but I'm hoping it won't be like this for most of the break. I really just want to be able to enjoy myself during the break. Not to mention things can be a bit tough for me around this time. It's great to have a lot of family now around this time, but knowing everyone I've lost can make things hard.
I feel like I'm rambling. I'm not really myself today, and I've just been needing to keep myself busy today to keep my mind preoccupied. I really should get some sleep, as I will be needing to wake up fairly early tomorrow morning. So until next time, stay fancy.
Friday, December 7, 2012
Saturday, October 27, 2012
Back in Action
I keep telling myself that I'll update my blog more frequently. The problem as of recently is that I haven't had much to talk about. I haven't been as active as I'd like due to my knee, and I've found myself making occasional mistakes with my snacking habits which set me back a bit. In reality, I haven't done much to lose weight - it's been primarily to maintain my weight. Luckily, that has been the case, and my weight has been fluctuating between 205 and 209 pounds, which is fine by me. But, I'd like to change that.
The last week or two, I have found myself making it to Dixon more often - the only times that I ended up flaking out on going, was just because I decided to rest my knee rather than putting stress on it. I've been spending a lot of time on the ellipticals, because really, it's the only thing that I can do without making my knee uncomfortable. I can ride a bike, but for a maximum of 20 minutes, maybe 30 if I'm taking it easy. I shot hoops one day for 20 minutes and the jumping really got to my knee and I had a lot of knee pain for an hour or so. And of course, running is out of the question at the moment. Even more than 30 minutes on an elliptical can be stressful on my knee. But usually it's just uncomfortable during the exercise, and doesn't really affect me by the time I'm back home from the gym.
So, I'm trying to be more proactive about making it to the gym, even for half an hour. I need to be more active, and one problem is when I rest, I end up doing nothing during the day. Just getting to the gym for a bit will really improve my activity. But I'm also working on eating a bit better.
I've had a problem with snacking. One example is buying a bag of chips, and eating nearly all of it in one sitting. It's disgusting, but I've just been getting cravings lately. Because of that, I'm focusing on redirecting my attention towards healthy snacks, that I can just continuously chew on, that way, I'm not ingesting tons of calories. Part of my snacking is late at night, I just want to eat, even if I'm not hungry. So finding healthy and low calorie alternatives will be a good move for me. That will be a big focus for me, is just watching what I snack on, and making better choices.
Since I've been just maintaining my weight, and not really losing any, I've decided I need to set another goal. My goal last year, to hit 200 (which of course I'm now just barely above) by my birthday, really motivated me to work harder, especially when I saw the number on the scale dropping every week. Because of that, I figured it would be a smart decision to start up another numerical goal for my weight. And for that, I've decided to set a goal to weigh 183, by my birthday again. That would put my BMI at 24.8, or just in the range of Normal Weight according to BMI standards. Easy, right? I'm keeping this goal much simpler, for two big reasons. One, I weigh less than I did a year ago, and as I lose more and more weight, it obviously becomes harder to lose a pound. Second, I'm not running anymore. That was the ignition behind my massive weight loss last spring, was just running. It helped so much, motivation to become a better runner, and also that it was giving me amazing results. But that's not a viable option for now, and I've found that I lose weight slower when I'm working out at the gym, instead of running. 25 pounds is still a lot of weight, especially at my current weight and height, and it will still be a tough challenge. I am also creating an optimistic goal to weigh 175 by my birthday. Similar to last year, I had both a realistic goal, and an optimistic goal. One I knew I could reach as long as I kept up the effort, and another that I was hoping I'd reach, but knew it'd be tough to accomplish. 175 seems like a nice number for me, and I would be pleasantly happy weighing that much for the rest of my life. I also chose my birthday for my goal mainly because I have no idea how long this will take me.
So there you have it. Trying to crack down on my snacking habits, and still making it to the gym a little bit more frequently. And also having another numerical goal for my weight - 183 to be considered Normal Weight by BMI standards, and 175 as an optimistic goal, by my birthday in June.
I plan to post more often, I just need to make sure I have something to talk about. Until then, stay fancy.
The last week or two, I have found myself making it to Dixon more often - the only times that I ended up flaking out on going, was just because I decided to rest my knee rather than putting stress on it. I've been spending a lot of time on the ellipticals, because really, it's the only thing that I can do without making my knee uncomfortable. I can ride a bike, but for a maximum of 20 minutes, maybe 30 if I'm taking it easy. I shot hoops one day for 20 minutes and the jumping really got to my knee and I had a lot of knee pain for an hour or so. And of course, running is out of the question at the moment. Even more than 30 minutes on an elliptical can be stressful on my knee. But usually it's just uncomfortable during the exercise, and doesn't really affect me by the time I'm back home from the gym.
So, I'm trying to be more proactive about making it to the gym, even for half an hour. I need to be more active, and one problem is when I rest, I end up doing nothing during the day. Just getting to the gym for a bit will really improve my activity. But I'm also working on eating a bit better.
I've had a problem with snacking. One example is buying a bag of chips, and eating nearly all of it in one sitting. It's disgusting, but I've just been getting cravings lately. Because of that, I'm focusing on redirecting my attention towards healthy snacks, that I can just continuously chew on, that way, I'm not ingesting tons of calories. Part of my snacking is late at night, I just want to eat, even if I'm not hungry. So finding healthy and low calorie alternatives will be a good move for me. That will be a big focus for me, is just watching what I snack on, and making better choices.
Since I've been just maintaining my weight, and not really losing any, I've decided I need to set another goal. My goal last year, to hit 200 (which of course I'm now just barely above) by my birthday, really motivated me to work harder, especially when I saw the number on the scale dropping every week. Because of that, I figured it would be a smart decision to start up another numerical goal for my weight. And for that, I've decided to set a goal to weigh 183, by my birthday again. That would put my BMI at 24.8, or just in the range of Normal Weight according to BMI standards. Easy, right? I'm keeping this goal much simpler, for two big reasons. One, I weigh less than I did a year ago, and as I lose more and more weight, it obviously becomes harder to lose a pound. Second, I'm not running anymore. That was the ignition behind my massive weight loss last spring, was just running. It helped so much, motivation to become a better runner, and also that it was giving me amazing results. But that's not a viable option for now, and I've found that I lose weight slower when I'm working out at the gym, instead of running. 25 pounds is still a lot of weight, especially at my current weight and height, and it will still be a tough challenge. I am also creating an optimistic goal to weigh 175 by my birthday. Similar to last year, I had both a realistic goal, and an optimistic goal. One I knew I could reach as long as I kept up the effort, and another that I was hoping I'd reach, but knew it'd be tough to accomplish. 175 seems like a nice number for me, and I would be pleasantly happy weighing that much for the rest of my life. I also chose my birthday for my goal mainly because I have no idea how long this will take me.
So there you have it. Trying to crack down on my snacking habits, and still making it to the gym a little bit more frequently. And also having another numerical goal for my weight - 183 to be considered Normal Weight by BMI standards, and 175 as an optimistic goal, by my birthday in June.
I plan to post more often, I just need to make sure I have something to talk about. Until then, stay fancy.
Thursday, October 4, 2012
Better Off Than I Thought
A week and a half later, I've been resting my knee quite a bit. Since I last posted, I think I didn't do any sort of strenuous exercise - the closest thing has been biking to and from campus - until yesterday. Finally, I made it to Dixon, and I really didn't do much there, but I needed to start. I wanted to stick to a bike, mainly because I shouldn't be doing any running, and the elipticals (which would probably be the best on my knee) were full. So I hopped on a bike, started at a fairly hard pace for 10 minutes, slowed down just a bit for another 10 minutes, and finished with a very intense 5 minutes (my maximum heart beat was just over 200 BPM at the end, which is the highest I've seen while on a cardio machine), and of course a 5 minute cool down. The whole purpose of it was to test out my knee on some strenuous exercise and see how it would handle. I iced it afterwards, and I really didn't notice much of a problem, so I know that as long as I'm not biking too much or too hard, I should be fine. I was thinking of going back to Dixon today, but I tweaked my other knee (left) and it was difficult to walk on. It's better now, so I'll probably be going back tomorrow after classes.
So regarding my knee, I will not be running unless I can't make it to the gym, in which case I'll be very careful about it. Nonetheless, I'll be turning most of my attention towards the gym, to keep to low impact exercises. I've been reading about what could be the problem, and some solutions to help. So far it just looks like icing regularly, taking things such as ibuprofen to help with any inflammation when it's acting up, and also exercising the muscles around my knee. But that last part can be tough considering that my knee hurts whenever I do things such as lunges and squats. So instead, I need to modify exercises, and work on things like 1/2 squats and such. After a little while working on some cardio, I'll probably transition into some leg exercises to strengthen those muscles a bit.
Oh, the reason behind the title? I weighed myself while at Dixon, and I weighed in at 205, which means that I'm only 5 pounds behind my absolute lightest. So with just a little bit of work, I'll be back at the point soon enough, and should continue to drop. I've been eating pretty well, not perfectly, but a lot better than when I'm back home in Lake Oswego. Mainly because of the control that I have over what I eat. And when I do end up eating a lot, I try to stick to healthier, or lower calories foods so I'm not over-endulging. I thoroughly look forward to weighing under 200 pounds.
I think that's all I will say for now, this post has taken me about two hours now, just because I've been distracted from the television in front of me. I don't have much else to say, so I'll end it. Until next time, stay fancy.
So regarding my knee, I will not be running unless I can't make it to the gym, in which case I'll be very careful about it. Nonetheless, I'll be turning most of my attention towards the gym, to keep to low impact exercises. I've been reading about what could be the problem, and some solutions to help. So far it just looks like icing regularly, taking things such as ibuprofen to help with any inflammation when it's acting up, and also exercising the muscles around my knee. But that last part can be tough considering that my knee hurts whenever I do things such as lunges and squats. So instead, I need to modify exercises, and work on things like 1/2 squats and such. After a little while working on some cardio, I'll probably transition into some leg exercises to strengthen those muscles a bit.
Oh, the reason behind the title? I weighed myself while at Dixon, and I weighed in at 205, which means that I'm only 5 pounds behind my absolute lightest. So with just a little bit of work, I'll be back at the point soon enough, and should continue to drop. I've been eating pretty well, not perfectly, but a lot better than when I'm back home in Lake Oswego. Mainly because of the control that I have over what I eat. And when I do end up eating a lot, I try to stick to healthier, or lower calories foods so I'm not over-endulging. I thoroughly look forward to weighing under 200 pounds.
I think that's all I will say for now, this post has taken me about two hours now, just because I've been distracted from the television in front of me. I don't have much else to say, so I'll end it. Until next time, stay fancy.
Monday, September 24, 2012
Where to Start...
If it's not already obvious, I haven't been putting any effort into updating my blog. Is it a huge deal? Not really, however, I'm really disappointed in the lack of updates. Yeah, I had a busy summer, typical. But even then, I should have been updating over the last few weeks. The main reason is that I haven't had much to talk about, health wise. Well, nothing good at least. But let's move on.
Currently, I'm back in Corvegas, and I just had my first day of classes today. So far, all I've had is Ecology, which seems like an okay class, nothing too special, but better than a lot of other classes I've taken, and then Vertebrate Biology, which seems like a really fun class. I like the course material, and it's my kind of area when it comes to Zoology - I enjoyed Invertebrate Biology last year quite a bit, so this looks promising. Plus the professors seem really good/friendly/humorous, so that's good in my book. Tomorrow, I'm looking forward to Insect Physiology, which sounds really interesting. I'm excited for that. I also have a Geography class and choir. It should be an easy enough schedule, but I've had so much trouble last year to get motivation to go to class and do the work, that I can't be risking a super difficult course load. I have to get my head back in the game.
But I'm here with my two roommates, Ryan and Nick, and it'll be a good year. We're all 21 now, which enables things to be a bit more enjoyable - no more age restrictions. Hell, we bought a 24 pack of Rogue Dead Guy Ales for $25, and that's considering that a 6 pack goes for about $11. Moving on, I ended up buying a 40" LED Samsung HDTV for the apartment, for $500 at the end of summer, so we've got a good television to play games and watch tv on. And now we have the Xbox, PS3, and Wii for the apartment, plus a SNES and NES for the nostalgia. It's a great set up. We ended up getting cable on top of our internet, at least for the 6 months (while it's cheaper), since the price split three ways isn't that much more than what Ryan and I paid last year, split two ways.
On the topic of big purchases, about two months ago, I decided to start buying computer components to build my own desktop computer. So ~$1500 later, I ended up successfully building a great computer, with a very fast processor and terrific graphics card (yes, for video games mainly), with a 24" LED monitor and wonderful THX certified Logitech speakers that I got for $115 (which was on sale). The subwoofer on it is MASSIVE. The motto of my summer was go big or go home, so that's what I did. I went big on my computer and tv. Spent a lot of money, but it was worth it in my opinion.
Basically my summer consisted of just Zoo Camp, my exhausting Wednesdays (run + ultimate frisbee after work), and building a computer. Well, and then on Labor Day weekend, I went to PAX Prime, which is basically a video game convention. It was so amazing. Went with my friend Jake, and his friend Alex, and it was up in Seattle. One of the best things I've ever done to be honest. Played and watched demos, and got to see exclusive content, plus got a lot of free stuff and met a lot of really cool people. Met some people that run big Youtube channels, such as FPS Russia, who has a big channel dedicated to showing off guns. Best free stuff I got was for completing a challenge (was easy to me) on Modern Warfare 3 and got $45 worth of free desktop RAM. Coincidently, it was the same exact RAM that was in my computer that I built, so I ended up adding it to go from 8 Gb to 16 Gb. Not a huge difference in performance, but I wanted it, rather than selling it.
Last thing I will touch on is my injuries. During the summer, I sprained my left ankle twice, in two different spots (a lower sprain and then a higher sprain, the latter was worse, and the day before my last day of camp). It hasn't affected me much, but it ocasionally bugged me at camp (in which case a simple ankle wrap fixed that), but it has meant that it's been difficult to go out running, especially during a tiring week of camp. And then after camp ended, I realized that my knee, which had bugged me last year, seems to have gotten worse. Basically, at this point, every time I put stress on my knee by running, leg exercises, or strenuous biking, it gets uncomfortable and can really bug me sometimes. The first time I ran back in Corvegas, it was bugging me the next day, still. So I'm icing it every day, whether I'm active or not, and I refuse to exercise two days in a row, just to be safe. I'll be cautious like this for a couple weeks and see how things go. If it gets worse, I'll see someone about it right away, otherwise, I'll be waiting until Winter break to see my doctor. But at least for now, since I'm back in Corvegas, it's easier to manage my eating. So even if I'm not exercising quite as much as last year, I'm still eating less. And I'll be commuting via walking or biking to and from campus, which means I'm not completely stationary throughout the day.
That should be it for now, I'll make sure to put more effort into updating this blog. I want to continue it, as it really helps me, and people have really enjoyed reading it. I can't let you guys down! So on that note, stay fancy.
Currently, I'm back in Corvegas, and I just had my first day of classes today. So far, all I've had is Ecology, which seems like an okay class, nothing too special, but better than a lot of other classes I've taken, and then Vertebrate Biology, which seems like a really fun class. I like the course material, and it's my kind of area when it comes to Zoology - I enjoyed Invertebrate Biology last year quite a bit, so this looks promising. Plus the professors seem really good/friendly/humorous, so that's good in my book. Tomorrow, I'm looking forward to Insect Physiology, which sounds really interesting. I'm excited for that. I also have a Geography class and choir. It should be an easy enough schedule, but I've had so much trouble last year to get motivation to go to class and do the work, that I can't be risking a super difficult course load. I have to get my head back in the game.
But I'm here with my two roommates, Ryan and Nick, and it'll be a good year. We're all 21 now, which enables things to be a bit more enjoyable - no more age restrictions. Hell, we bought a 24 pack of Rogue Dead Guy Ales for $25, and that's considering that a 6 pack goes for about $11. Moving on, I ended up buying a 40" LED Samsung HDTV for the apartment, for $500 at the end of summer, so we've got a good television to play games and watch tv on. And now we have the Xbox, PS3, and Wii for the apartment, plus a SNES and NES for the nostalgia. It's a great set up. We ended up getting cable on top of our internet, at least for the 6 months (while it's cheaper), since the price split three ways isn't that much more than what Ryan and I paid last year, split two ways.
On the topic of big purchases, about two months ago, I decided to start buying computer components to build my own desktop computer. So ~$1500 later, I ended up successfully building a great computer, with a very fast processor and terrific graphics card (yes, for video games mainly), with a 24" LED monitor and wonderful THX certified Logitech speakers that I got for $115 (which was on sale). The subwoofer on it is MASSIVE. The motto of my summer was go big or go home, so that's what I did. I went big on my computer and tv. Spent a lot of money, but it was worth it in my opinion.
Basically my summer consisted of just Zoo Camp, my exhausting Wednesdays (run + ultimate frisbee after work), and building a computer. Well, and then on Labor Day weekend, I went to PAX Prime, which is basically a video game convention. It was so amazing. Went with my friend Jake, and his friend Alex, and it was up in Seattle. One of the best things I've ever done to be honest. Played and watched demos, and got to see exclusive content, plus got a lot of free stuff and met a lot of really cool people. Met some people that run big Youtube channels, such as FPS Russia, who has a big channel dedicated to showing off guns. Best free stuff I got was for completing a challenge (was easy to me) on Modern Warfare 3 and got $45 worth of free desktop RAM. Coincidently, it was the same exact RAM that was in my computer that I built, so I ended up adding it to go from 8 Gb to 16 Gb. Not a huge difference in performance, but I wanted it, rather than selling it.
Last thing I will touch on is my injuries. During the summer, I sprained my left ankle twice, in two different spots (a lower sprain and then a higher sprain, the latter was worse, and the day before my last day of camp). It hasn't affected me much, but it ocasionally bugged me at camp (in which case a simple ankle wrap fixed that), but it has meant that it's been difficult to go out running, especially during a tiring week of camp. And then after camp ended, I realized that my knee, which had bugged me last year, seems to have gotten worse. Basically, at this point, every time I put stress on my knee by running, leg exercises, or strenuous biking, it gets uncomfortable and can really bug me sometimes. The first time I ran back in Corvegas, it was bugging me the next day, still. So I'm icing it every day, whether I'm active or not, and I refuse to exercise two days in a row, just to be safe. I'll be cautious like this for a couple weeks and see how things go. If it gets worse, I'll see someone about it right away, otherwise, I'll be waiting until Winter break to see my doctor. But at least for now, since I'm back in Corvegas, it's easier to manage my eating. So even if I'm not exercising quite as much as last year, I'm still eating less. And I'll be commuting via walking or biking to and from campus, which means I'm not completely stationary throughout the day.
That should be it for now, I'll make sure to put more effort into updating this blog. I want to continue it, as it really helps me, and people have really enjoyed reading it. I can't let you guys down! So on that note, stay fancy.
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
Never Late Than Never
For those of you who have been a pretty consistent reader of my blog, well, obviously, I haven't posted recently. In fact, it's been about 10 weeks, sadly. The reason? I started up with Zoo Camp, and let me tell you, it's exhausting. I just haven't gotten around to taking care of a blog post, even though I have had plenty to talk about. In terms of the main parts of this blog (exercise and health), I haven't been doing quite so well, so regarding that department, there hasn't been much going on unfortunately. But oh well, let's get started. I'll probably have two blog posts to cover this summer, one more about my health, and another to talk about how the summer has gone in general. This one will be about my health, and my next blog post (which will be soon) will be about non-health things like camp, my new computer, etc.
So I left off two days prior to my 21st birthday back in mid-June, so I've got a fair amount to cover. At first, I was running a bit consistently, not necessarily long runs, but at least getting outside and getting some exercise. But then camp started. I love camp, but it's so damn exhausting. My time to run is always right after work, before I eat dinner, at about 5:30. Unfortunately by that time, I'm done for. I've used up all my energy at camp, and all my body wants to do it rest in order to prepare for the next day. So the frequency of my runs quickly diminished, so that I was only getting a couple runs in a week. Bummer.
The good news is that Wednesdays (Frisbee day) is when I'm most active. Not only am I running around at frisbee, being the fact that we have 10-16 people playing ultimate (and I can actually run with some stamina during the game, considering that I've gotten into considerably better shape in the last half year), but I'm also running down to the field, which is about 2 miles. It's a pretty easy run along the road, but I generally push the pace for some of the runners, making it quicker than it normally would be for some of us. So it's quite an intensive hour of running and playing ultimate. Let's just say that by the end of the night on Wednesdays, I am WIPED. My first week, I literally came home and crashed by about 9:00, which is so crazy for me.
But like I mentioned, my running has become less frequent, and when I do go out for a run, it's usually just a quick mile run to get moving and my heart pumping. And because of it, I've put some weight back on. I really hate that I've let myself go some, but it's just the way it is. It also doesn't help that I don't eat all that well when I'm back home, partially because I don't have 100% control over all the food that is in the house, but also because I use up so much energy at the zoo with the campers, that I need more food to bring my energy levels up. The problem with that is that I'm burning less calories than I'm ingesting, just because I'm not really burning that many while working (definitely staying active by doing lots of walking), however, it's hard to keep your energy levels high while working with 5-6 year old campers all day. I hope that makes sense. Nonetheless, I'm eating more than I should, and I'm not exercising nearly as much as I should be, or as much as I was prior to camp.
So this is where I hope to change things up. Starting today, I'll be running more, and getting out for exercise more, to focus on losing back this weight that I've gained this summer. Oh, and within the first week of summer, I went back up to 205 just because of lots of eating and drinking due to birthday celebrations and what not. And since then, I'm probably between 210-215. It's hard to guess, since my scale is not even remotely accurate. I'd love to be back to 205 by my doctor's appointment (it's not set up, but I will be setting it up, to see how I'm doing, get a blood test, etc. in a few weeks). I don't know if that's too optimistic or not, since I'm not 100% on my current weight. But I'd like to lose 5 pounds before then at least. The idea behind having my appointment at the end of the summer was that I was hoping to lose more weight during the summer, thinking that I'd continue a good eating pattern, and be working out more as well, plus lots of walking at the zoo. Obviously that kind of backfired on me, which is something I was worried about.
Today, I did go for a run. It was short, just one mile. My time was 7:05 which is pretty quick for me. I had a PR a few weeks ago that was 6:58 which is nice to get a sub seven minute mile. The first 1/2 mile was great, but due to my energy levels this week (haven't been sleeping much) I wasn't able to finish strong. Otherwise I probably could have gone for a 6:45 or so mile if I could have finished strong. My plan to continue running is to keep doing mile runs, and every so often add in a longer run, until I've built up my stamina. Plus camp is done next Friday, so after that, I should be able to run much more often and for longer periods of time due to not being fatigued as much from camp. But tomorrow is frisbee day, so that's 2 miles (downhill mostly). Thursday I'll do another 1 mile (and when I say 1 mile, it's always going for a PR, so it's quick), Friday a break since we often eat food right after work. Then on Saturday 2 miles, and I'm unsure about Sunday - just depends on how I'm doing. But that's my tentative schedule for this week.
That's all for now. I'm hoping to write my next blog post this weekend. Not sure when, maybe Friday just because it's Fancy Friday after all, but more likely Saturday or Sunday would be my guess. Until then, I'd appreciate it if you stayed fancy.
So I left off two days prior to my 21st birthday back in mid-June, so I've got a fair amount to cover. At first, I was running a bit consistently, not necessarily long runs, but at least getting outside and getting some exercise. But then camp started. I love camp, but it's so damn exhausting. My time to run is always right after work, before I eat dinner, at about 5:30. Unfortunately by that time, I'm done for. I've used up all my energy at camp, and all my body wants to do it rest in order to prepare for the next day. So the frequency of my runs quickly diminished, so that I was only getting a couple runs in a week. Bummer.
The good news is that Wednesdays (Frisbee day) is when I'm most active. Not only am I running around at frisbee, being the fact that we have 10-16 people playing ultimate (and I can actually run with some stamina during the game, considering that I've gotten into considerably better shape in the last half year), but I'm also running down to the field, which is about 2 miles. It's a pretty easy run along the road, but I generally push the pace for some of the runners, making it quicker than it normally would be for some of us. So it's quite an intensive hour of running and playing ultimate. Let's just say that by the end of the night on Wednesdays, I am WIPED. My first week, I literally came home and crashed by about 9:00, which is so crazy for me.
But like I mentioned, my running has become less frequent, and when I do go out for a run, it's usually just a quick mile run to get moving and my heart pumping. And because of it, I've put some weight back on. I really hate that I've let myself go some, but it's just the way it is. It also doesn't help that I don't eat all that well when I'm back home, partially because I don't have 100% control over all the food that is in the house, but also because I use up so much energy at the zoo with the campers, that I need more food to bring my energy levels up. The problem with that is that I'm burning less calories than I'm ingesting, just because I'm not really burning that many while working (definitely staying active by doing lots of walking), however, it's hard to keep your energy levels high while working with 5-6 year old campers all day. I hope that makes sense. Nonetheless, I'm eating more than I should, and I'm not exercising nearly as much as I should be, or as much as I was prior to camp.
So this is where I hope to change things up. Starting today, I'll be running more, and getting out for exercise more, to focus on losing back this weight that I've gained this summer. Oh, and within the first week of summer, I went back up to 205 just because of lots of eating and drinking due to birthday celebrations and what not. And since then, I'm probably between 210-215. It's hard to guess, since my scale is not even remotely accurate. I'd love to be back to 205 by my doctor's appointment (it's not set up, but I will be setting it up, to see how I'm doing, get a blood test, etc. in a few weeks). I don't know if that's too optimistic or not, since I'm not 100% on my current weight. But I'd like to lose 5 pounds before then at least. The idea behind having my appointment at the end of the summer was that I was hoping to lose more weight during the summer, thinking that I'd continue a good eating pattern, and be working out more as well, plus lots of walking at the zoo. Obviously that kind of backfired on me, which is something I was worried about.
Today, I did go for a run. It was short, just one mile. My time was 7:05 which is pretty quick for me. I had a PR a few weeks ago that was 6:58 which is nice to get a sub seven minute mile. The first 1/2 mile was great, but due to my energy levels this week (haven't been sleeping much) I wasn't able to finish strong. Otherwise I probably could have gone for a 6:45 or so mile if I could have finished strong. My plan to continue running is to keep doing mile runs, and every so often add in a longer run, until I've built up my stamina. Plus camp is done next Friday, so after that, I should be able to run much more often and for longer periods of time due to not being fatigued as much from camp. But tomorrow is frisbee day, so that's 2 miles (downhill mostly). Thursday I'll do another 1 mile (and when I say 1 mile, it's always going for a PR, so it's quick), Friday a break since we often eat food right after work. Then on Saturday 2 miles, and I'm unsure about Sunday - just depends on how I'm doing. But that's my tentative schedule for this week.
That's all for now. I'm hoping to write my next blog post this weekend. Not sure when, maybe Friday just because it's Fancy Friday after all, but more likely Saturday or Sunday would be my guess. Until then, I'd appreciate it if you stayed fancy.
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
YOLO
You Only Live Once.
Commence the eye rolling. So for anyone that isn't aware, a recent phrase - YOLO - has become quite popular. It's typically used by people who are about to do something stupid and defend their next action by saying that you only live once; so you should enjoy yourself while it lasts. However, I view it differently. You only live once, which means you better damn well take care of your body, or else your one life is going to last a hell of a lot shorter than it could. You only live once, so you should take the best care possible of yourself. And you know what? I've been doing that. And for a matter of fact, I've drastically changed my life during this school year. The day that started it all? October 15, 2011. This was the day of my very first blog post, and let me tell you, being able to put all my thoughts down in this blog, plus being able to communicate to many of my friends and family has been a great way to get motivation. I constantly get questsions and comments about how my weight loss is going, and how I look so great now. Just yesterday, my dad said to me, "Hey Skinny" as he was going to ask me a question. Skinny? Not yet, but it I am significantly thinner than October.
I can't thank those who have supported me this whole time enough. Do you know what it feels like to hear the words, "Wow you look so great! How much weight have you lost?!" I just feel so much better, not just physically, but emotionally and socially as well. And to top it off, it's now my summer break, which is my favorite time of the year. AND my birthday is on Friday. This week is awesome.
But there's more to it than just that. As of Tuesday afternoon, I weighed in at 199.5 pounds!
I reached my goal by my birthday, in less than 4 months!
October 15, 2011 Starting weight: 255
February 19, 2012 Weight: 250
June 12, 2012 Weight: 199.5
Want to know the last time I weighed under 200 pounds? Well, 5 years ago, I was 5'9" and weighed ~228 (medical record). The previous year I was probably around 200, but was a bit shorter, and I also played a fair amount of Soccer so I stayed active. So basically, the last time I weighed this much, I was probably about 5 or 6 inches shorter. I'd say that's a big difference.
As I mentioned, I'm back at the Zoo as of today for Zoo Camp training, and camp begins on Monday. I finished my finals on Monday and Tuesday and my summer break has begun. I'll be working with 1st graders (Tiger Camp) and I'm stoked, as usual. Our camp crew will be amazing as well, to top it off. But something truly amazing happened today. On top of the numerous people mentioned that I looked great from my weight loss, I decided to try on a Large camp shirt (rather than XL) to see how it would fit. And let me tell you, it fit. That was honestly one of the best feelings of my life, right there. I have XXL shirts in my dresser (that I barely wear). I wore XL for quite a while, but some shirts that were of lesser quality, I would prefer XXL to make it a bit baggier (on purpose) as well as in case it shrunk. But now? Large. This weekend I need to go clothes shopping, because basically everything I own is too big for me now. I'd say that one day, maybe I could wear a medium, but I doubt it would have the length due to my height. Nonetheless - Large. So amazing. Maybe I can start to wear shirts that have always been too small for me now!
I think that's all I will say for now. It will be a busy weekend with my birthday on Friday, and celebrating it with different people throughout the weekend. Plus with camp starting up on Monday. Stay fancy everyone. I expect it on my birthday.
Commence the eye rolling. So for anyone that isn't aware, a recent phrase - YOLO - has become quite popular. It's typically used by people who are about to do something stupid and defend their next action by saying that you only live once; so you should enjoy yourself while it lasts. However, I view it differently. You only live once, which means you better damn well take care of your body, or else your one life is going to last a hell of a lot shorter than it could. You only live once, so you should take the best care possible of yourself. And you know what? I've been doing that. And for a matter of fact, I've drastically changed my life during this school year. The day that started it all? October 15, 2011. This was the day of my very first blog post, and let me tell you, being able to put all my thoughts down in this blog, plus being able to communicate to many of my friends and family has been a great way to get motivation. I constantly get questsions and comments about how my weight loss is going, and how I look so great now. Just yesterday, my dad said to me, "Hey Skinny" as he was going to ask me a question. Skinny? Not yet, but it I am significantly thinner than October.
I can't thank those who have supported me this whole time enough. Do you know what it feels like to hear the words, "Wow you look so great! How much weight have you lost?!" I just feel so much better, not just physically, but emotionally and socially as well. And to top it off, it's now my summer break, which is my favorite time of the year. AND my birthday is on Friday. This week is awesome.
But there's more to it than just that. As of Tuesday afternoon, I weighed in at 199.5 pounds!
October 15, 2011 Starting weight: 255
February 19, 2012 Weight: 250
June 12, 2012 Weight: 199.5
Want to know the last time I weighed under 200 pounds? Well, 5 years ago, I was 5'9" and weighed ~228 (medical record). The previous year I was probably around 200, but was a bit shorter, and I also played a fair amount of Soccer so I stayed active. So basically, the last time I weighed this much, I was probably about 5 or 6 inches shorter. I'd say that's a big difference.
As I mentioned, I'm back at the Zoo as of today for Zoo Camp training, and camp begins on Monday. I finished my finals on Monday and Tuesday and my summer break has begun. I'll be working with 1st graders (Tiger Camp) and I'm stoked, as usual. Our camp crew will be amazing as well, to top it off. But something truly amazing happened today. On top of the numerous people mentioned that I looked great from my weight loss, I decided to try on a Large camp shirt (rather than XL) to see how it would fit. And let me tell you, it fit. That was honestly one of the best feelings of my life, right there. I have XXL shirts in my dresser (that I barely wear). I wore XL for quite a while, but some shirts that were of lesser quality, I would prefer XXL to make it a bit baggier (on purpose) as well as in case it shrunk. But now? Large. This weekend I need to go clothes shopping, because basically everything I own is too big for me now. I'd say that one day, maybe I could wear a medium, but I doubt it would have the length due to my height. Nonetheless - Large. So amazing. Maybe I can start to wear shirts that have always been too small for me now!
I think that's all I will say for now. It will be a busy weekend with my birthday on Friday, and celebrating it with different people throughout the weekend. Plus with camp starting up on Monday. Stay fancy everyone. I expect it on my birthday.
Friday, June 8, 2012
It's Been a Little While - One Week to Go!
I had totally meant to post an update before now, but I never felt like I had much to say. Oh well, now I have a lot to talk about!
So, unfortunately, my running hit a roadblock. I just couldn't seem to get the energy and stamina to last any longer than 2 miles. Who knows why, but that's just the way it was. So I decided to cross train for a while, and basically, I've only run a few times since my last post. I can say I won't be hitting 5 miles by my birthday, but that's okay. My main goal is my weight right now. I'd rather hit my weight goal, than my running goal if I had to choose one. I will be focusing more on running this Summer, as I won't have a gym to go to, and I won't have my bike with me either. So no worries in that department. However, since I've had a problem with my running progress, I decided I won't be running the July 4th 5k. I'll get to a 5k when I'm ready for it.
Well, last I mentioned, I weighed in at 210. And with 7 days before my birthday, I am now 202 pounds. Whew, so close! And being only 2 pounds off my goal, I can easily achieve this in a week. However, a problem that has arisen: I leave Corvallis on Tuesday to go back home, which means my last chance to weigh myself is Tuesday, and that only leaves me 4 days until my last official weigh in. But, I'm going to see if I can acquire an accurate scale on the 15th, so I can do a last weigh in, in case I don't hit 200 by Tuesday. Even if I don't quite hit 200, that will still be 53 pounds that I've lost since the beginning of this blog; 48 of which in the last 4 months. I'm pretty damn proud of myself. And I still have more weight to lose!
Now because I haven't been running, I've been spending a lot of time at the gym. And typically, I've spent my time on stationary bikes, a bit of time on elipticals and treadmills, as well as shooting hoops. But I generally do at least 45 minutes of fairly intense cardio, unless I'm lacking energy that day. I've also done a few short runs, 2 miles or less, and walking a bit on days when I have very little energy, or on rest days. Also, one day last week, I ran sprints. Wow, that was tough. It was basically 15 seconds of a maximum sprint, followed by 45 seconds of walking. After 15 minutes of that, I was DONE. I can see the benefit of sprints though, and will definitely incorporate them into my running this summer. I've also tried to do a bit more work on my core, but I can't say I've done that much. Just more than usual.
I've also been very strict with my diet. Usually I've been keeping to less than 1500 calories a day, and my BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) for a day is about 2,100 calories I believe. So that's a deficit of about 600 calories just from diet. Add in an extra 500 calories burned just from working out (on average), then that's about a 1,00 calorie deficit each day - 7,700 each week.That's at least a rough estimate. It might be a bit more, especially considering that often I'm losing 3 pounds in a week and that only accounts for about 2.2 pounds. Nonetheless, I cracked down on my diet a bit more in the last couple of weeks, in order to be able to reach 200 by my birthday. It'll be a close call, but well deserved if I reach it.
And not much else has been happening lately. I got sick on Saturday, the same day I went to the Prefontaine Classic (track and field meet in Eugene) with my brother Adam and Hannah. So I didn't do much in terms of exercise from Saturday to Tuesday, which is a big reason why I included walking as part of my exercise, since that's about all I could do for a few days.
I have finals on Monday and Tuesday, and then I'll be doing my final weigh in at the gym, and then head home basically. Wednesday-Friday I have training for Zoo Camp (I'll be working in Giraffe B Camp! Which is 2nd grade for those who don't know). Technically it's Monday-Friday, but I can't get out of taking finals those first two days. And of course, on Friday, I'll be 21. What a great week this will be!
I plan up writing up a post either Friday or Saturday (preferably Friday) about how the week went, my birthday, and of course, what my final weight is. I look forward to our next meeting, and until then, stay fancy.
So, unfortunately, my running hit a roadblock. I just couldn't seem to get the energy and stamina to last any longer than 2 miles. Who knows why, but that's just the way it was. So I decided to cross train for a while, and basically, I've only run a few times since my last post. I can say I won't be hitting 5 miles by my birthday, but that's okay. My main goal is my weight right now. I'd rather hit my weight goal, than my running goal if I had to choose one. I will be focusing more on running this Summer, as I won't have a gym to go to, and I won't have my bike with me either. So no worries in that department. However, since I've had a problem with my running progress, I decided I won't be running the July 4th 5k. I'll get to a 5k when I'm ready for it.
Well, last I mentioned, I weighed in at 210. And with 7 days before my birthday, I am now 202 pounds. Whew, so close! And being only 2 pounds off my goal, I can easily achieve this in a week. However, a problem that has arisen: I leave Corvallis on Tuesday to go back home, which means my last chance to weigh myself is Tuesday, and that only leaves me 4 days until my last official weigh in. But, I'm going to see if I can acquire an accurate scale on the 15th, so I can do a last weigh in, in case I don't hit 200 by Tuesday. Even if I don't quite hit 200, that will still be 53 pounds that I've lost since the beginning of this blog; 48 of which in the last 4 months. I'm pretty damn proud of myself. And I still have more weight to lose!
Now because I haven't been running, I've been spending a lot of time at the gym. And typically, I've spent my time on stationary bikes, a bit of time on elipticals and treadmills, as well as shooting hoops. But I generally do at least 45 minutes of fairly intense cardio, unless I'm lacking energy that day. I've also done a few short runs, 2 miles or less, and walking a bit on days when I have very little energy, or on rest days. Also, one day last week, I ran sprints. Wow, that was tough. It was basically 15 seconds of a maximum sprint, followed by 45 seconds of walking. After 15 minutes of that, I was DONE. I can see the benefit of sprints though, and will definitely incorporate them into my running this summer. I've also tried to do a bit more work on my core, but I can't say I've done that much. Just more than usual.
I've also been very strict with my diet. Usually I've been keeping to less than 1500 calories a day, and my BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) for a day is about 2,100 calories I believe. So that's a deficit of about 600 calories just from diet. Add in an extra 500 calories burned just from working out (on average), then that's about a 1,00 calorie deficit each day - 7,700 each week.That's at least a rough estimate. It might be a bit more, especially considering that often I'm losing 3 pounds in a week and that only accounts for about 2.2 pounds. Nonetheless, I cracked down on my diet a bit more in the last couple of weeks, in order to be able to reach 200 by my birthday. It'll be a close call, but well deserved if I reach it.
And not much else has been happening lately. I got sick on Saturday, the same day I went to the Prefontaine Classic (track and field meet in Eugene) with my brother Adam and Hannah. So I didn't do much in terms of exercise from Saturday to Tuesday, which is a big reason why I included walking as part of my exercise, since that's about all I could do for a few days.
I have finals on Monday and Tuesday, and then I'll be doing my final weigh in at the gym, and then head home basically. Wednesday-Friday I have training for Zoo Camp (I'll be working in Giraffe B Camp! Which is 2nd grade for those who don't know). Technically it's Monday-Friday, but I can't get out of taking finals those first two days. And of course, on Friday, I'll be 21. What a great week this will be!
I plan up writing up a post either Friday or Saturday (preferably Friday) about how the week went, my birthday, and of course, what my final weight is. I look forward to our next meeting, and until then, stay fancy.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Twenty Six Days Left
Most people would just assume I'm counting down the days until I can legally drink, but I really don't care much about that. But I'd have to say I care a hell of a lot more about reaching my goals. Twenty six days, that's 3 weeks and 5 days, or approximately 4 weeks. I can do this... Not much time left, but I can do this.
Friday, I had planned on attempting a 3.5 mile run, again. My previous attempt only got me to 2 miles, so after a late night workout at Dixon, Thursday night, I didn't have much confidence that day. However, some how, I managed to finish 3.5 miles. Phew, that was tough. And I felt great that I finished, albeit really sore legs for the next 24 hours. I ran it in 40 minutes, which isn't great, but once again, I really don't care about my pace. I just want to complete the distances that I set for myself for now. Once I hit 5 miles, I'll start working on pace more. Anyways, the first 15 minutes were fine, and then I started feeling like I wouldn't hit my goal for the day. But I kept pressing on, and tried to keep my mind preoccupied, so that I didn't think about how exhausted I was getting. By 25 minutes, I doubted I would make it, but once I hit 30, I knew I was so close, there wasn't a reason to stop. Then finished it, and now my next step is 4 miles. I might attempt 4 miles tomorrow, as I kept today's workout pretty light, but no promises. I will definitely be doing no less than 2.5 miles.
Saturday, saw The Avengers, and then went to a BBQ. Ended up being busy all day, so never got a chance to go to Dixon as I had hoped to in the evening. I was, however, able to go to Dixon today. So I kept it light, as I had mentioned, and just shot hoops for a bit, and then did 30 minutes on a bike. Still some good cardio, but wasn't much strain on my body. The great news though, is I weighed in at 210 pounds. Whew!
Remember, I originally weighed 255 pounds back in October, and was at 250 back in February when I started losing weight quickly. My original goal that I set back in February, was 220 pounds, and I easily crushed that. So I decided to set 210 as my realistic goal, and 200 as the ultimate challenge for myself, by June 15th. Well, with 26 days to go still, I hit my realistic goal of 210. Just 10 pounds in 26 days to go! It should be tough still, but it's nice knowing that it's a bit more realistic than say, two weeks ago when I was losing 2 pounds per week.
Well, that's all I have to say for now. Stay fancy.
Friday, I had planned on attempting a 3.5 mile run, again. My previous attempt only got me to 2 miles, so after a late night workout at Dixon, Thursday night, I didn't have much confidence that day. However, some how, I managed to finish 3.5 miles. Phew, that was tough. And I felt great that I finished, albeit really sore legs for the next 24 hours. I ran it in 40 minutes, which isn't great, but once again, I really don't care about my pace. I just want to complete the distances that I set for myself for now. Once I hit 5 miles, I'll start working on pace more. Anyways, the first 15 minutes were fine, and then I started feeling like I wouldn't hit my goal for the day. But I kept pressing on, and tried to keep my mind preoccupied, so that I didn't think about how exhausted I was getting. By 25 minutes, I doubted I would make it, but once I hit 30, I knew I was so close, there wasn't a reason to stop. Then finished it, and now my next step is 4 miles. I might attempt 4 miles tomorrow, as I kept today's workout pretty light, but no promises. I will definitely be doing no less than 2.5 miles.
Saturday, saw The Avengers, and then went to a BBQ. Ended up being busy all day, so never got a chance to go to Dixon as I had hoped to in the evening. I was, however, able to go to Dixon today. So I kept it light, as I had mentioned, and just shot hoops for a bit, and then did 30 minutes on a bike. Still some good cardio, but wasn't much strain on my body. The great news though, is I weighed in at 210 pounds. Whew!
Remember, I originally weighed 255 pounds back in October, and was at 250 back in February when I started losing weight quickly. My original goal that I set back in February, was 220 pounds, and I easily crushed that. So I decided to set 210 as my realistic goal, and 200 as the ultimate challenge for myself, by June 15th. Well, with 26 days to go still, I hit my realistic goal of 210. Just 10 pounds in 26 days to go! It should be tough still, but it's nice knowing that it's a bit more realistic than say, two weeks ago when I was losing 2 pounds per week.
Well, that's all I have to say for now. Stay fancy.
Thursday, May 17, 2012
Long Term Goals
So Sunday, I had finished my last 5k101 podcast run while in Lake Oswego, and then after a wonderful dinner, in honor of my brother's and aunt's birthdays, I went back to Corvallis. Monday, I wanted to do a 2 mile run, nothing special, but something to keep me active, since I knew I wouldn't be up to a long run. I started, and quickly realized that I was not going to do so well that day; I decided to quicken my pace and just go for 1 mile instead. I made it 2/3 of a mile and gave up. Was just too tired and couldn't manage anything else. Well, shucks. I made sure to do very little on Tuesday, in order to rest as much as possible. Wednesday rolls along, and I decide to go for my longest run yet, 3.5 miles, without walking (none of my runs from now on will involve walking, unless I can't manage to keep up my pace on a run, or if I'm purposefully doing intervals for more anaerobic training).
Three and a half miles, just keep a steady pace, and it shouldn't be a problem. First mile, perfect. Pretty decent pace. 1.5 miles in, starting to feel it, but still doing well. I noticed my pace slowed down a lot after my first mile, a little slower than I had hoped. And then I'm just a minute or two away from 2 miles, and I realize all my energy and strength has been depleted. So I finish up 2 miles, and walk the rest of the way home, saddened by the fact that I failed pretty badly at my attempt of 3.5 miles. Oh well. Friday then!
I wasn't planning on anything today (Thursday), but Nick asked me if I wanted to go to Dixon tonight. We weren't sure if we really wanted to go, but with my lazy Tuesday, I didn't really want to have another lazy day this week. So we ended up going. I spent 30 minutes on a bike, doing an "aerobic" workout as they call it (pre-set workout). But it was basically like doing hills. Was pretty good, although I wouldn't be surprised if my legs are too tired for a 3.5 mile attempt tomorrow... But who knows. I'll just have to try my best. We then took a bit of a break, in hopes to get a basketball and a basketball hoop, but we finally resorted to ping pong until something opened up. Then shot a few hoops, and we called it an evening. Minus the biking, was pretty relaxed. I weighed myself at 212, but I don't know how accurate it is, considering I've eaten today, it was at night, with clothes on, and after my workout. So we'll just have to wait until Sunday (busy Saturday, so will do my weigh in on Sunday morning instead) and see where I am. I think if I do a long run tomorrow, workout Saturday evening, and control what I eat pretty well, I could end up at 210 by Sunday, which would make 200 possible in ~4 weeks.
Whew, I expected to talk about my week much quicker than that. Nonetheless, my long term goals. So these last few months, I've been only focusing on losing weight. And the best way to do that is by minimal muscle gain, and lots of fat loss, since muscle weighs more than fat. But I want muscle. So ultimately, I want to weigh as low as my body can handle (basically a plateau), while still building up muscle. Now, most would think just do a combination of weight lifting, as well as cardio, and you'll achieve your goal. But the problem is that when you're gaining weight back with weight training, you don't see as much weight loss, which can be discouraging (even if your body is doing terrific), and it's hard to judge just how much muscle you're gaining, besides by doing regular body composition tests. So I want to focus solely on fat/weight loss first. This way, I can regularly keep track of my weight and see how well I am progressing, but also, if I have the motivation, and the momentum of losing so much weight, why not keep it up? If I were to start throwing in weight training, it'd deter me a bit, since I wouldn't lose as much, as fast as I am now. So I'm figuring that once I hit a comfortable point in my weight, I'll start transitioning over to weight training. Maybe gradually work into it by doing something like, 25% weight training, 75% cardio, then work to 50-50, then eventually up to 75% weight training, 25% cardio. Something like that.
However, that's not all the details. I've decided I'm first going to continue to run and workout, and eat healthy, until I plateau. And when I say that, I mean that I hit a point where just losing 1 pound is difficult. Where using my current plan, that losing weight seems nearly impossible. But once I hit this point (I'm guessing it'll be around the beginning of next school year, in the fall, but who knows), I will then increase my efforts in order to lose another 5-10 pounds (depending on where I plateau). This means I'd have to really pay attention to how much I eat, and be very strict, as well as doing a lot more cardio than I usually do, in order to burn more calories. I don't know any exact numbers, since it completely depends on when and where I plateau, but after I've lost just a bit more weight (and this could take months and months to do, who knows, just for 5-10 pounds), I then turn my attention to weight training. My goal will then to basically gain back the weight that I had just lost, but with muscle. I'll have to still be on a strict diet during the first little while, so that my weight gain is primarily through muscle, and not through fat gain. But I figure this way, I'll be at a point where my body is a comfortable weight, but with a low body fat percentage, plus I'll have the motivation to keep losing weight until I plateau, and then I can take my time to build up the muscle that I want.
So that's the basic idea behind my long term goals. If I were to give a hopefuly timeline, I'd say that I'm hoping that by the end of next school year, so about 12-13 months from now, I'll be at that point. But you never know, these are just estimates. And I could always change my thinking behind all of this. At least, these are my preliminary thoughts on how I'll accomplish my long term goals. Until Sunday, stay fancy. Then after Sunday, I don't care how fancy you stay.
Three and a half miles, just keep a steady pace, and it shouldn't be a problem. First mile, perfect. Pretty decent pace. 1.5 miles in, starting to feel it, but still doing well. I noticed my pace slowed down a lot after my first mile, a little slower than I had hoped. And then I'm just a minute or two away from 2 miles, and I realize all my energy and strength has been depleted. So I finish up 2 miles, and walk the rest of the way home, saddened by the fact that I failed pretty badly at my attempt of 3.5 miles. Oh well. Friday then!
I wasn't planning on anything today (Thursday), but Nick asked me if I wanted to go to Dixon tonight. We weren't sure if we really wanted to go, but with my lazy Tuesday, I didn't really want to have another lazy day this week. So we ended up going. I spent 30 minutes on a bike, doing an "aerobic" workout as they call it (pre-set workout). But it was basically like doing hills. Was pretty good, although I wouldn't be surprised if my legs are too tired for a 3.5 mile attempt tomorrow... But who knows. I'll just have to try my best. We then took a bit of a break, in hopes to get a basketball and a basketball hoop, but we finally resorted to ping pong until something opened up. Then shot a few hoops, and we called it an evening. Minus the biking, was pretty relaxed. I weighed myself at 212, but I don't know how accurate it is, considering I've eaten today, it was at night, with clothes on, and after my workout. So we'll just have to wait until Sunday (busy Saturday, so will do my weigh in on Sunday morning instead) and see where I am. I think if I do a long run tomorrow, workout Saturday evening, and control what I eat pretty well, I could end up at 210 by Sunday, which would make 200 possible in ~4 weeks.
Whew, I expected to talk about my week much quicker than that. Nonetheless, my long term goals. So these last few months, I've been only focusing on losing weight. And the best way to do that is by minimal muscle gain, and lots of fat loss, since muscle weighs more than fat. But I want muscle. So ultimately, I want to weigh as low as my body can handle (basically a plateau), while still building up muscle. Now, most would think just do a combination of weight lifting, as well as cardio, and you'll achieve your goal. But the problem is that when you're gaining weight back with weight training, you don't see as much weight loss, which can be discouraging (even if your body is doing terrific), and it's hard to judge just how much muscle you're gaining, besides by doing regular body composition tests. So I want to focus solely on fat/weight loss first. This way, I can regularly keep track of my weight and see how well I am progressing, but also, if I have the motivation, and the momentum of losing so much weight, why not keep it up? If I were to start throwing in weight training, it'd deter me a bit, since I wouldn't lose as much, as fast as I am now. So I'm figuring that once I hit a comfortable point in my weight, I'll start transitioning over to weight training. Maybe gradually work into it by doing something like, 25% weight training, 75% cardio, then work to 50-50, then eventually up to 75% weight training, 25% cardio. Something like that.
However, that's not all the details. I've decided I'm first going to continue to run and workout, and eat healthy, until I plateau. And when I say that, I mean that I hit a point where just losing 1 pound is difficult. Where using my current plan, that losing weight seems nearly impossible. But once I hit this point (I'm guessing it'll be around the beginning of next school year, in the fall, but who knows), I will then increase my efforts in order to lose another 5-10 pounds (depending on where I plateau). This means I'd have to really pay attention to how much I eat, and be very strict, as well as doing a lot more cardio than I usually do, in order to burn more calories. I don't know any exact numbers, since it completely depends on when and where I plateau, but after I've lost just a bit more weight (and this could take months and months to do, who knows, just for 5-10 pounds), I then turn my attention to weight training. My goal will then to basically gain back the weight that I had just lost, but with muscle. I'll have to still be on a strict diet during the first little while, so that my weight gain is primarily through muscle, and not through fat gain. But I figure this way, I'll be at a point where my body is a comfortable weight, but with a low body fat percentage, plus I'll have the motivation to keep losing weight until I plateau, and then I can take my time to build up the muscle that I want.
So that's the basic idea behind my long term goals. If I were to give a hopefuly timeline, I'd say that I'm hoping that by the end of next school year, so about 12-13 months from now, I'll be at that point. But you never know, these are just estimates. And I could always change my thinking behind all of this. At least, these are my preliminary thoughts on how I'll accomplish my long term goals. Until Sunday, stay fancy. Then after Sunday, I don't care how fancy you stay.
Sunday, May 13, 2012
5k101 Podcast Graduation!
Ah, finally. I'm done. It only took 12 weeks to finish an 8 week podcast (due to illnesses setting me back), but I'm done. And I feel wonderful. Starting tomorrow, I will begin my own schedule, to work towards running 5 miles without walking. It'll be tough to complete, but I'm looking foward to the challenge.
To cover the last week, on Tuesday I went to Dixon with Nick for a light workout. Just did 20 minutes on a bike, and then lifted weights for a bit. It was more of to relax, hang out, and still be a bit active. Wednesday, completed the first day of my Week 8 podcast, which is 30 minutes without walking. Thursday, I went to Dixon again, and weighed myself. And in 5 days, I had only lost 1 pound, and I began to panic a bit. It meant that my weight loss is finally starting to slow down. I knew this would happen, but I thought I'd easily hit 200 by my birthday. Now, I'm hoping for 205. So due to my panic, it meant that I ended up doing 80 minutes of fairly intense cardio on bikes and a bit on an eliptical. I was pretty exhausted, but I managed. Friday, I did the second day of my Week 8 podcast, and then went on a bike ride to Philomath with Nick, Maddie, and Maggie, the ol' freshman crew (group of friends from Freshman year). Ended up being about 12 miles, which was pretty tiring after my run, but I was doing pretty well. We ended up at Flat Tail Brewery in downtown Corvallis, and I got a massive burger (I had only eaten about 300 calories prior, and had 2 workouts - I deserved it). It had a 1/3 pound patty, grilled onions, bacon, peppered turkey, a fried egg, and avocado. Wow, so good.
Saturday morning, went to Dixon, weighed in at 214, so 2 pounds from the previous week (meant that I lost 1 pound from Thursday to Saturday), and did about 70 minutes on a recumbant bike (was too sore for an upright bike), but was not doing an intense workout. Just wanted to keep myself a bit active. Went home that afternoon to Lake Oswego, to celebrate my brother's and my aunt's birthdays this evening (Sunday), so I stayed the night. Went for my final 5k101 run this morning, and it went pretty well. Was beautiful, and I got to run along the riverfront, and encountered a lot of people out and about. And the day couldn't have gone any better.
Tomorrow, I think I'm going to run 2 miles to help my body recover some from the last few days, and Tuesday, I either won't workout, or will do something very light at Dixon. I might instead do a small workout in my apartment on Tuesday. Either way, on Wednesday, I'm hoping to pull off 3.5 miles, so I can start working on my 5 mile goal.
I have 5 weeks now, to lose 14 pounds... Bit unpractical at this point, if I'm struggling with just 2 pounds per week. It's still possible, but unlikely. Luckily, I'll be happy no matter what, as I will for sure be under 210, and will be at least very close to hitting 200.
Weight loss since Februrary 19th, 2012: 36 pounds
Weight loss since the beginning of Junior year: 41 pounds
Total weight loss since Senior year of high school: 56 pounds
I've pretty much decided what my future plans will be, through the summer and during next school year, but I'll talk about that in my next blog post. Until then, stay fancy.
To cover the last week, on Tuesday I went to Dixon with Nick for a light workout. Just did 20 minutes on a bike, and then lifted weights for a bit. It was more of to relax, hang out, and still be a bit active. Wednesday, completed the first day of my Week 8 podcast, which is 30 minutes without walking. Thursday, I went to Dixon again, and weighed myself. And in 5 days, I had only lost 1 pound, and I began to panic a bit. It meant that my weight loss is finally starting to slow down. I knew this would happen, but I thought I'd easily hit 200 by my birthday. Now, I'm hoping for 205. So due to my panic, it meant that I ended up doing 80 minutes of fairly intense cardio on bikes and a bit on an eliptical. I was pretty exhausted, but I managed. Friday, I did the second day of my Week 8 podcast, and then went on a bike ride to Philomath with Nick, Maddie, and Maggie, the ol' freshman crew (group of friends from Freshman year). Ended up being about 12 miles, which was pretty tiring after my run, but I was doing pretty well. We ended up at Flat Tail Brewery in downtown Corvallis, and I got a massive burger (I had only eaten about 300 calories prior, and had 2 workouts - I deserved it). It had a 1/3 pound patty, grilled onions, bacon, peppered turkey, a fried egg, and avocado. Wow, so good.
Saturday morning, went to Dixon, weighed in at 214, so 2 pounds from the previous week (meant that I lost 1 pound from Thursday to Saturday), and did about 70 minutes on a recumbant bike (was too sore for an upright bike), but was not doing an intense workout. Just wanted to keep myself a bit active. Went home that afternoon to Lake Oswego, to celebrate my brother's and my aunt's birthdays this evening (Sunday), so I stayed the night. Went for my final 5k101 run this morning, and it went pretty well. Was beautiful, and I got to run along the riverfront, and encountered a lot of people out and about. And the day couldn't have gone any better.
Tomorrow, I think I'm going to run 2 miles to help my body recover some from the last few days, and Tuesday, I either won't workout, or will do something very light at Dixon. I might instead do a small workout in my apartment on Tuesday. Either way, on Wednesday, I'm hoping to pull off 3.5 miles, so I can start working on my 5 mile goal.
I have 5 weeks now, to lose 14 pounds... Bit unpractical at this point, if I'm struggling with just 2 pounds per week. It's still possible, but unlikely. Luckily, I'll be happy no matter what, as I will for sure be under 210, and will be at least very close to hitting 200.
Weight loss since Februrary 19th, 2012: 36 pounds
Weight loss since the beginning of Junior year: 41 pounds
Total weight loss since Senior year of high school: 56 pounds
I've pretty much decided what my future plans will be, through the summer and during next school year, but I'll talk about that in my next blog post. Until then, stay fancy.
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
New Running Record
Without walking or stopping, my new record is a 32 minute run that I accomplished today. I've been struggling with moving on in my runs, and improving, and I realized that during my intervals, I lose lots of momentum whenever I walk. For example, last week I started a week 7 run, and did the first 12 minutes no problem, then 3 minutes of walking, and as soon as I started to run again, my entire body just hit the wall. My legs got super stiff, it felt as if I had never gotten a break after all, and I just lost all the motivation to keep going, being as uncomfortable as I was. So I decided that I wanted to change up my running, and steer away from the intervals, since the recovery intervals were hindering my progress.
Friday (May 4th) I ran a fairly easy 2 mile run without any breaks, at a 9:45 pace (started at my regular 9:30 pace and slowed down to a 10 minute pace by the end of it). Then went to Dixon on Saturday to just shoot hoops for a bit, and do my weekly weigh in. Sunday, I had meant to run, but I never had a decent oppertunity to do so due to a baseball game, and eating at certain times of the day, as well as when I woke up (woke up at 11, rather than 9, as I hoped for). Nonetheless, I got out there this morning, and wanted to try something longer than 2 miles, in hopes that one of these days I'll be ready to consistantly run 30 minutes without breaks. I wouldn't settle for less than 2.5 miles, but I was really going for 3, and just push myself extremely hard to finish it. And let me tell you, physically, I was done at 2.5 miles, as I got extremely exhausted by that time (right around 26 minutes or so). But mentally, I wanted to finish at least 30 minutes. And if I was going to do 30 minutes, why not just run the extra minute or two and finish off 3 miles (since my pace slowed down to about 11 minutes by the end, was 10:34 overall)? So, barely, I managed to finish, but I did it. Just over 3 miles in a little more than 32 minutes. Toughest run, BY FAR, that I've ever completed. I was afraid that if I didn't stop a couple minutes prior to 3 miles, that I might collapse - somehow I got through it though. It was actually funny, with about 3 minutes left, I crossed paths with an older man, and he gave me this look of pity, it seemed like. Almost as if he knew just what I was going through, and gave a bit of a smile. It was the look of, I'm sorry you're struggling this much, but you can do it. I know, that was a lot to interpret just from a look, but it really felt that way.
I'm thinking that I'll continue this, and start doing the week 8 podcasts until I'm ready to step up my game more. It's 30 minutes straight, but Wednesday, when I run next, I'll probably start my pace a bit slower, around 10 minutes, to make sure I don't overexert myself too much. I can see 5 miles without breaks in my future, and hopefully before my birthday, but it will sure be difficult to reach that point. I'll probably be asking my brother to help build a running schedule for me, to increase my mileage to 5 miles, in the next week or two.
I had mentioned my weigh in at Dixon. Down 3 more pounds to 216. 16 more pounds to go, in just 7 weeks! That's averaging 2.3 pounds per week, and so far over the last 11 weeks, I've lost 34, which is an average of about 3.1 pounds. Very doable. And as my birthday approaches, I will probably crack down more, to ensure that I reach my goal. Nonetheless, I'm positive that I'll reach 210 by my birthday, which was the realistic goal that I set (after making 220 my original goal). It'll be interesting to see where I'm at by the end of the summer, assuming I'm around 200 at my birthday, and then working and continuing to work out and eat better throughout the summer.
Besides all that, nothing really happened last week, and this weekend I'm going home to celebrate my brother's and aun't birthday on Sunday, but I'm still going to Dixon on Saturday morning for my weigh in and be a bit productive as well. Also, Wednesday will be making a vegetarian chili recipe that I found. Pretty easy, few cans of beans, few cans of diced tomatoes, bit of produce like carrots/celery/onion, and a bit of seasoning. I've always wanted to make chili, but some of the recipes can be quite complicated, or require plenty of ingredients. This one is quite simple. Also I'll be making some minestroni soup at some point, and found a good looking recipe for a cajun dirty rice dish. All vegetarian, but I don't mind. Trying to slowly reduce my meat intake, specifically with red meats anyways. Oh and I've recently been making some stir frys, just a pack of frozen stir fry vegetables, add in some cooking teriyaki sauce and sriracha hot sauce, and quite a good, low calorie dish.
I guess that's about it. 'til next time, stay fancy.
Friday (May 4th) I ran a fairly easy 2 mile run without any breaks, at a 9:45 pace (started at my regular 9:30 pace and slowed down to a 10 minute pace by the end of it). Then went to Dixon on Saturday to just shoot hoops for a bit, and do my weekly weigh in. Sunday, I had meant to run, but I never had a decent oppertunity to do so due to a baseball game, and eating at certain times of the day, as well as when I woke up (woke up at 11, rather than 9, as I hoped for). Nonetheless, I got out there this morning, and wanted to try something longer than 2 miles, in hopes that one of these days I'll be ready to consistantly run 30 minutes without breaks. I wouldn't settle for less than 2.5 miles, but I was really going for 3, and just push myself extremely hard to finish it. And let me tell you, physically, I was done at 2.5 miles, as I got extremely exhausted by that time (right around 26 minutes or so). But mentally, I wanted to finish at least 30 minutes. And if I was going to do 30 minutes, why not just run the extra minute or two and finish off 3 miles (since my pace slowed down to about 11 minutes by the end, was 10:34 overall)? So, barely, I managed to finish, but I did it. Just over 3 miles in a little more than 32 minutes. Toughest run, BY FAR, that I've ever completed. I was afraid that if I didn't stop a couple minutes prior to 3 miles, that I might collapse - somehow I got through it though. It was actually funny, with about 3 minutes left, I crossed paths with an older man, and he gave me this look of pity, it seemed like. Almost as if he knew just what I was going through, and gave a bit of a smile. It was the look of, I'm sorry you're struggling this much, but you can do it. I know, that was a lot to interpret just from a look, but it really felt that way.
I'm thinking that I'll continue this, and start doing the week 8 podcasts until I'm ready to step up my game more. It's 30 minutes straight, but Wednesday, when I run next, I'll probably start my pace a bit slower, around 10 minutes, to make sure I don't overexert myself too much. I can see 5 miles without breaks in my future, and hopefully before my birthday, but it will sure be difficult to reach that point. I'll probably be asking my brother to help build a running schedule for me, to increase my mileage to 5 miles, in the next week or two.
I had mentioned my weigh in at Dixon. Down 3 more pounds to 216. 16 more pounds to go, in just 7 weeks! That's averaging 2.3 pounds per week, and so far over the last 11 weeks, I've lost 34, which is an average of about 3.1 pounds. Very doable. And as my birthday approaches, I will probably crack down more, to ensure that I reach my goal. Nonetheless, I'm positive that I'll reach 210 by my birthday, which was the realistic goal that I set (after making 220 my original goal). It'll be interesting to see where I'm at by the end of the summer, assuming I'm around 200 at my birthday, and then working and continuing to work out and eat better throughout the summer.
Besides all that, nothing really happened last week, and this weekend I'm going home to celebrate my brother's and aun't birthday on Sunday, but I'm still going to Dixon on Saturday morning for my weigh in and be a bit productive as well. Also, Wednesday will be making a vegetarian chili recipe that I found. Pretty easy, few cans of beans, few cans of diced tomatoes, bit of produce like carrots/celery/onion, and a bit of seasoning. I've always wanted to make chili, but some of the recipes can be quite complicated, or require plenty of ingredients. This one is quite simple. Also I'll be making some minestroni soup at some point, and found a good looking recipe for a cajun dirty rice dish. All vegetarian, but I don't mind. Trying to slowly reduce my meat intake, specifically with red meats anyways. Oh and I've recently been making some stir frys, just a pack of frozen stir fry vegetables, add in some cooking teriyaki sauce and sriracha hot sauce, and quite a good, low calorie dish.
Monday, April 30, 2012
Time to Slow Things Down
I cannot believe the title of this post.
Basically, I've been trying too hard to improve my running. For example, Wednesday, I ran my scheduled week 7 run. Thursday I went for a 2 mile run without walking. Friday, I attempted the same thing, but was too tired, and only managed 1 mile. Saturday, I went to Dixon and did a fairly intensive bike workout, including some HIITs. Sunday I tried to get back to a week 7 run, but only managed to do the first interval before tiring out. Today, I went for another 2 mile run, and only managed 1.5 miles. I've been trying to do consecutive running days, and it's just been getting too tiring for me. So tomorrow, I won't be doing any running, so I can fully rest for Wednesday's run. I need to realize that I shouldn't do anymore than 4 runs a week, or any intensive cardio (such as the biking that I did - although I'm not against a lower intense bike workout). Hopefully this will help, as I just have not had enough energy or stamina to complete some of these runs.
On the other hand, I was afraid that I wouldn't lose any weight since the 14th (the last time I weighed myself, at 223), but I weighed in at 219, which is great that I had actually lost some weight. I figured with the way I ate last weekend (Olive Garden, Killer Burger, half a pizza, and bit of a barbeque), that the number wouldn't look so pretty. Now, there's something special about weighing in at 219. Firstly, I surpassed my first goal of 220 pounds, and am only 9 pounds away from my realistic goal, and 19 away from my challenging goal by June 15. But more importantly is that I am no longer considered obese, by BMI standards. BMI, or Body Mass Index, only plays in two factors, your height and your weight. So it's a horrible representation of whether you're under or overweight. However, it still exists, and I've always hated being considered obese by BMI standards, and well finally, that is no longer true. Saturday was a glorious day when I found that out. And speaking of weight, June 15 is just around the corner, and from Saturday, I had about 7 weeks until my birthday, meaning that I've got 7 weeks to lose the last 19 pounds. Possible, but difficult. I managed to lose 31 pounds in just 9 weeks, but my metabolism is slowing down as I lose weight.
Other than that, I don't really have anything to discuss. Oh, I guess that today I had to put a 6th hole in my belts. Always a great feeling. Definitely going to be needing lots of new clothes at the beginning of summer. And speaking of clothes, I cannot find one of my running smartwool socks, which really sucks. I've looked all around my room, so I've ruled out it being lost in my room, and the last time I thought I had it was doing laundry at my house when I went back home last weekend. So I'm certain it's somewhere around there. But they're about $5 per sock, which sucks to lose one.
So to finish things off, stay fancy, each and every one of you.
Basically, I've been trying too hard to improve my running. For example, Wednesday, I ran my scheduled week 7 run. Thursday I went for a 2 mile run without walking. Friday, I attempted the same thing, but was too tired, and only managed 1 mile. Saturday, I went to Dixon and did a fairly intensive bike workout, including some HIITs. Sunday I tried to get back to a week 7 run, but only managed to do the first interval before tiring out. Today, I went for another 2 mile run, and only managed 1.5 miles. I've been trying to do consecutive running days, and it's just been getting too tiring for me. So tomorrow, I won't be doing any running, so I can fully rest for Wednesday's run. I need to realize that I shouldn't do anymore than 4 runs a week, or any intensive cardio (such as the biking that I did - although I'm not against a lower intense bike workout). Hopefully this will help, as I just have not had enough energy or stamina to complete some of these runs.
On the other hand, I was afraid that I wouldn't lose any weight since the 14th (the last time I weighed myself, at 223), but I weighed in at 219, which is great that I had actually lost some weight. I figured with the way I ate last weekend (Olive Garden, Killer Burger, half a pizza, and bit of a barbeque), that the number wouldn't look so pretty. Now, there's something special about weighing in at 219. Firstly, I surpassed my first goal of 220 pounds, and am only 9 pounds away from my realistic goal, and 19 away from my challenging goal by June 15. But more importantly is that I am no longer considered obese, by BMI standards. BMI, or Body Mass Index, only plays in two factors, your height and your weight. So it's a horrible representation of whether you're under or overweight. However, it still exists, and I've always hated being considered obese by BMI standards, and well finally, that is no longer true. Saturday was a glorious day when I found that out. And speaking of weight, June 15 is just around the corner, and from Saturday, I had about 7 weeks until my birthday, meaning that I've got 7 weeks to lose the last 19 pounds. Possible, but difficult. I managed to lose 31 pounds in just 9 weeks, but my metabolism is slowing down as I lose weight.
Other than that, I don't really have anything to discuss. Oh, I guess that today I had to put a 6th hole in my belts. Always a great feeling. Definitely going to be needing lots of new clothes at the beginning of summer. And speaking of clothes, I cannot find one of my running smartwool socks, which really sucks. I've looked all around my room, so I've ruled out it being lost in my room, and the last time I thought I had it was doing laundry at my house when I went back home last weekend. So I'm certain it's somewhere around there. But they're about $5 per sock, which sucks to lose one.
So to finish things off, stay fancy, each and every one of you.
Thursday, April 26, 2012
FASTEST MILE I HAVE EVER RUN
First, sorry to my readers about the delay in this post. It's now been about 11 days since I last posted. I got laryngitis last week, so things changed. That week 6 run I had said I was going to do last Monday, turned into just a mile. So from there, I decided to just pace a mile for my runs until I could handle the farther distances better. Except my last few runs where I've tried to run a week 6 or week 7 workout (either 2 or 3 intervals of 12 minutes), my body could only handle 1 interval. So now I'm a bit on track, as I just finished a week 7 run yesterday.
The title says it all. On saturday I ran a 6:22 mile, and on Sunday a 5:42 mile. Okay, the title doesn't say it all... They were downhill miles, meaning there was a negative net gain on the elevation. It was about half downhill, and the other half was either flat or slightly uphill. Nonetheless, it's where I would start my runs in Lake Oswego. Now, I could say that I broke the 6 minute mile now, and I'm happy, but it was downhill. Instead, I'm going to continue a goal of 7 minutes for a mile (I realized 6 minutes was a bit too ambitious for a flat course, since my previous estimates had been off the downhill in Lake Oswego), and maybe shoot for a 6 minute by the end of summer, just to make it slightly easier on me. I already have a goal of 5 straight miles without walking before my birthday, and that'll be a bit tough. I want to push myself, but I also want to make sure I can realistically accomplish these goals without overexerting myself too much.
Luckily, even with laryngitis, I was at least getting out for a run of 1-1.5 miles, just to get something done. And I did a few weight lifting workouts as well, since I want to continue that. I really want to stay active enough that I'm doing some kind of workout, everyday. Even if it's a 20-30 minute weight lifting routine.
I ran my week 7 workout yesterday, and barely finished it. Well, not really, as I ran an extra 3.5 minutes on my last interval... But once I was done running - I was DONE running. Probably the most exhausted I've been from a run. Then again, it was technically the most I've run - 39.5 minutes total, with 6 minutes of walking as well for my two walk intervals. Speaking of which, I used to count my warm up and cool down walks (5 minutes each) into my distance traveled, mainly since before I was walking at least half of my workout, so it seemed reasonable to count it (slowed down my pace a bit though). But now, I'm barely walking at all, and I want to pay more attention to my overall pace, so once the running portion actually started after the warm up, that's when I'll be turning on my running app (Runkeeper). I did that yesterday, and I really wanted to break 4 miles (my previous week 7 run was 4.35 miles, but that was with the warm up and cool down) so I just kept going until I broke 4, and then had a block or two left in me, as I ended up at 4.11 miles. I'm pretty happy about that, especially after not being able to run long distances over the last week and a half (long as in more than a mile).
Two more things, then I'm done, I swear.
So today I want to run again, but I won't be up to another week 7 run like yesterday, but I still want to challenge myself a bit. I think I've decided that I'll run 2 miles straight. Which shouldn't be a problem. But then again, I've never run more than a mile and a half straight without walking. So it'll be something new to me. I want to do this, so I can get more used to these intervals, since I'm always exhausted after each 12 minute interval, and the only way I can continue is with the help of the walk intervals. That's my biggest problem right now, and if I don't improve, then there's no way I'll be able to run 30 minutes straight. Let alone 5 miles without walking. But now I'm looking outside my window, and it just got very windy and gloomy, yet it was a bit sunny out just an hour ago. I'll wait up to an hour, hoping the weather turns out a bit better before heading out the door.
And now I'm done with the fitness part of my blog... I got a new game! Well I pirated it, so I could try it out. It's Skyrim. And it might be the best game ever. I've already put in 20 hours in 3 days - that's how awesome it is. But I don't like keeping pirated games, so I'll buy it once it goes on sale, as the price of it is still fairly steep. Until then, I'll just continue doing quests and killing dragons and such. One reason I want to run today is so I'm not inside playing the game all day long. Oh, Skyrim...
Anyways, glad to have finally posted this, as it's been a while. Until next time, stay fancy.
P.S. Really? It's now sunny out, but also raining...
The title says it all. On saturday I ran a 6:22 mile, and on Sunday a 5:42 mile. Okay, the title doesn't say it all... They were downhill miles, meaning there was a negative net gain on the elevation. It was about half downhill, and the other half was either flat or slightly uphill. Nonetheless, it's where I would start my runs in Lake Oswego. Now, I could say that I broke the 6 minute mile now, and I'm happy, but it was downhill. Instead, I'm going to continue a goal of 7 minutes for a mile (I realized 6 minutes was a bit too ambitious for a flat course, since my previous estimates had been off the downhill in Lake Oswego), and maybe shoot for a 6 minute by the end of summer, just to make it slightly easier on me. I already have a goal of 5 straight miles without walking before my birthday, and that'll be a bit tough. I want to push myself, but I also want to make sure I can realistically accomplish these goals without overexerting myself too much.
Luckily, even with laryngitis, I was at least getting out for a run of 1-1.5 miles, just to get something done. And I did a few weight lifting workouts as well, since I want to continue that. I really want to stay active enough that I'm doing some kind of workout, everyday. Even if it's a 20-30 minute weight lifting routine.
I ran my week 7 workout yesterday, and barely finished it. Well, not really, as I ran an extra 3.5 minutes on my last interval... But once I was done running - I was DONE running. Probably the most exhausted I've been from a run. Then again, it was technically the most I've run - 39.5 minutes total, with 6 minutes of walking as well for my two walk intervals. Speaking of which, I used to count my warm up and cool down walks (5 minutes each) into my distance traveled, mainly since before I was walking at least half of my workout, so it seemed reasonable to count it (slowed down my pace a bit though). But now, I'm barely walking at all, and I want to pay more attention to my overall pace, so once the running portion actually started after the warm up, that's when I'll be turning on my running app (Runkeeper). I did that yesterday, and I really wanted to break 4 miles (my previous week 7 run was 4.35 miles, but that was with the warm up and cool down) so I just kept going until I broke 4, and then had a block or two left in me, as I ended up at 4.11 miles. I'm pretty happy about that, especially after not being able to run long distances over the last week and a half (long as in more than a mile).
Two more things, then I'm done, I swear.
So today I want to run again, but I won't be up to another week 7 run like yesterday, but I still want to challenge myself a bit. I think I've decided that I'll run 2 miles straight. Which shouldn't be a problem. But then again, I've never run more than a mile and a half straight without walking. So it'll be something new to me. I want to do this, so I can get more used to these intervals, since I'm always exhausted after each 12 minute interval, and the only way I can continue is with the help of the walk intervals. That's my biggest problem right now, and if I don't improve, then there's no way I'll be able to run 30 minutes straight. Let alone 5 miles without walking. But now I'm looking outside my window, and it just got very windy and gloomy, yet it was a bit sunny out just an hour ago. I'll wait up to an hour, hoping the weather turns out a bit better before heading out the door.
And now I'm done with the fitness part of my blog... I got a new game! Well I pirated it, so I could try it out. It's Skyrim. And it might be the best game ever. I've already put in 20 hours in 3 days - that's how awesome it is. But I don't like keeping pirated games, so I'll buy it once it goes on sale, as the price of it is still fairly steep. Until then, I'll just continue doing quests and killing dragons and such. One reason I want to run today is so I'm not inside playing the game all day long. Oh, Skyrim...
Anyways, glad to have finally posted this, as it's been a while. Until next time, stay fancy.
P.S. Really? It's now sunny out, but also raining...
Monday, April 16, 2012
Stepping Up My Running Game
The only way to improve something is to step it up a notch!
I had discussed with my brother during Spring Break of how to improve my running (both distance and pace) and one suggestion he gave me was to get used to running two days in a row, which will build up general stamina in terms of just running more, but also build me up to the point where I can run almost every day (eventually). Over the course of running the Week 6 schedule (2 intervals of 12 minutes), I noticed I really wasn't making much improvement. Ultimately it came down to how much energy I had the day (as well as the time) of the run. Not to mention I'm still recovering from being sick (from the cold, not the stomach flu), so that's been affecting my running. Nonetheless, I decided I wanted to change things up, and do something to see some improvement. I've barely been able to finish these Week 6 runs, and I'm going to be moving to 30 minute runs soon enough that I really should be able to handle 12 minutes much better than I have been doing. So I decided that I would run today (Sunday - note that I'm still considering it Sunday evening right now) as well as do a run tomorrow morning prior to classes. Firstly, Monday/Wednesday/Friday all work very well for my class schedule, so it's easiest to run on those days. Secondly, this allows for a schedule of 4 runs per week, which is perfect, considering I have been doing 7 runs every 2 weeks.
Today's run went quite well actually, after just saying that I've been struggling a bit. Which is funny, because I moved to Week 7 today, which is 3 intervals of 12 minutes. Let me say, going from 24 minutes of running to 36 minutes of running is a huge leap, and I definitely noticed the difference. But I started my run in the late afternoon (4:30) and I don't know if that played a factor, but I just ended up with a lot more energy overall, which was great. I completed each interval without walking (which once again, is funny, because my last run on Friday, I had to walk part of, and that was only 2 intervals) and made it to 4.35 miles, which is my new distance record for a run. My pace was one of my slower ones of the last few weeks, but that is expected, considering that I had to run for much longer. But I did keep the same pace for the entire run, which is fantastic; this means I'm doing a much better job of pacing myself, which is something I've always struggled with. Oh and since I had a longer run today and I'm planning to run tomorrow, I decided I will repeat a Week 6 run, to make it an easier transition for my body.
Saturday morning, I went to Dixon with Ryan (Nick was on a stupid field trip and couldn't go). We rode a bike for about 10 minutes (my legs were killing me for whatever reason, so I didn't feel the need to go any longer) and then we hit the basketball court up, shot for a bit, and then got started with some basketball games (5v5 for most of it, 4v4 in one game). I had a hard time finding my niche in the game, considering that the last time I played a game of basketball with a team was back in fifth grade. I really did a poor job of communicating to my teammates at first, just due to my inexperience with a team, but after the first game, I really stepped it up. I played all my offense in the key basically, and I had a ton of offensive rebounds. Made 2 baskets total, and in the third game, I couldn't make a single shot. Was probably 0 for 8 shots (all right by the basket); someone told me the rim must be greased because the ball just did not want to go in for me. But hell, with a bit of practice, I bet I could be a powerhouse. If I even made half the shots I took, we would have won each game so easily.
While at Dixon, I also weighed myself, as usual. Ended up at 223, which is another loss of 2 pounds since last week. That's great, because it's a healthy weight to lose per week, and that's also considering eating a lot of Easter candy. So that's good. I haven't been using my food journal since the beginning of Spring Break, but I do keep a pretty accurate mental note of how much I've eaten (including the calories), so at the end of the day, I'll just give myself a mental note of whether I should eat food number 1, or food number 2, based off the nutritional value. On top of nutrition, I've decided to start limiting the amount of red meat that I eat. I'll still eat it for now, if it's either made for me, or I'm at a restaurant or whatever, and it's calling my name (I mean, burgers are like my favorite food...), but I just want to cut down the amount I eat. I never mentioned this, but I stopped buying hot dogs (just horrible for you anyways), and haven't had bacon in a while, and eating more poultry rather than pork for example. Only thing I eat is black forest ham lunch meat for sandwiches, and I have had a couple of pork chops in the last couple of months (in terms of the food I've bought and made for myself). I was tempted to buy some canadian bacon yesterday, but the limitation of red meat made me decide not to buy it, which ultimately is probably a good decision. Eventually, I want to go without eating any red meat for a period, which will then hopefully lead to trying out being vegetarian for a little while. Mainly just to try it out, and challenge myself to it. But also to just aid towards my overall health - making me think of more health conscious foods over fatty meats.
And my last thing to talk about. I keep mentioning and coming up with new goals (hah like those push ups? Haven't even tried continuing, although I really should, as well as doing some weight training. Maybe this week...) but I've got something to throw in about running. All of my goals lately have been to accomplish it by my birthday, such as my big goal of weighing 210 pounds (or 200 if 210 is accomplished early enough), so I wanted to give myself a running goal. First, I want to be able to run 5 miles without walking (at any pace, just have to finish it), as well as be able to run a 6 minute mile. Simple enough. Within the next couple of weeks I should be able to run 30 minutes straight, and from there, it's just building up my stamina to last that long on a run.With the mile time, I wonder if I could do that by now. I'm sure I could get down to a 7 minute mile easily, but we'll know when I start timing myself. There are a couple of tracks around town that I could use that are close by. I want to use a track because it'll be more accurate than my phone's GPS, which wouldn't be a great representation of my distance and pace, in comparison to a track. Once I finish the running podcasts that I've been using (which will be in the next 2 weeks if everything is on schedule) then I will time my mile to see where I'm at now, and then will work on getting down to a faster mile by the end of Summer. Combining a faster mile as well as the endurance to run longer, should help me towards a decent 5k time.
I realized that was a lot that I just talked about, but it was all on my mind, and nothing else has really been happening this week/weekend, so I thought I'd share. Oh and I'm 2/3 through The Fellowship of the Ring, some of these chapters are just so damn long. Anyways, stay fancy.
I had discussed with my brother during Spring Break of how to improve my running (both distance and pace) and one suggestion he gave me was to get used to running two days in a row, which will build up general stamina in terms of just running more, but also build me up to the point where I can run almost every day (eventually). Over the course of running the Week 6 schedule (2 intervals of 12 minutes), I noticed I really wasn't making much improvement. Ultimately it came down to how much energy I had the day (as well as the time) of the run. Not to mention I'm still recovering from being sick (from the cold, not the stomach flu), so that's been affecting my running. Nonetheless, I decided I wanted to change things up, and do something to see some improvement. I've barely been able to finish these Week 6 runs, and I'm going to be moving to 30 minute runs soon enough that I really should be able to handle 12 minutes much better than I have been doing. So I decided that I would run today (Sunday - note that I'm still considering it Sunday evening right now) as well as do a run tomorrow morning prior to classes. Firstly, Monday/Wednesday/Friday all work very well for my class schedule, so it's easiest to run on those days. Secondly, this allows for a schedule of 4 runs per week, which is perfect, considering I have been doing 7 runs every 2 weeks.
Today's run went quite well actually, after just saying that I've been struggling a bit. Which is funny, because I moved to Week 7 today, which is 3 intervals of 12 minutes. Let me say, going from 24 minutes of running to 36 minutes of running is a huge leap, and I definitely noticed the difference. But I started my run in the late afternoon (4:30) and I don't know if that played a factor, but I just ended up with a lot more energy overall, which was great. I completed each interval without walking (which once again, is funny, because my last run on Friday, I had to walk part of, and that was only 2 intervals) and made it to 4.35 miles, which is my new distance record for a run. My pace was one of my slower ones of the last few weeks, but that is expected, considering that I had to run for much longer. But I did keep the same pace for the entire run, which is fantastic; this means I'm doing a much better job of pacing myself, which is something I've always struggled with. Oh and since I had a longer run today and I'm planning to run tomorrow, I decided I will repeat a Week 6 run, to make it an easier transition for my body.
Saturday morning, I went to Dixon with Ryan (Nick was on a stupid field trip and couldn't go). We rode a bike for about 10 minutes (my legs were killing me for whatever reason, so I didn't feel the need to go any longer) and then we hit the basketball court up, shot for a bit, and then got started with some basketball games (5v5 for most of it, 4v4 in one game). I had a hard time finding my niche in the game, considering that the last time I played a game of basketball with a team was back in fifth grade. I really did a poor job of communicating to my teammates at first, just due to my inexperience with a team, but after the first game, I really stepped it up. I played all my offense in the key basically, and I had a ton of offensive rebounds. Made 2 baskets total, and in the third game, I couldn't make a single shot. Was probably 0 for 8 shots (all right by the basket); someone told me the rim must be greased because the ball just did not want to go in for me. But hell, with a bit of practice, I bet I could be a powerhouse. If I even made half the shots I took, we would have won each game so easily.
While at Dixon, I also weighed myself, as usual. Ended up at 223, which is another loss of 2 pounds since last week. That's great, because it's a healthy weight to lose per week, and that's also considering eating a lot of Easter candy. So that's good. I haven't been using my food journal since the beginning of Spring Break, but I do keep a pretty accurate mental note of how much I've eaten (including the calories), so at the end of the day, I'll just give myself a mental note of whether I should eat food number 1, or food number 2, based off the nutritional value. On top of nutrition, I've decided to start limiting the amount of red meat that I eat. I'll still eat it for now, if it's either made for me, or I'm at a restaurant or whatever, and it's calling my name (I mean, burgers are like my favorite food...), but I just want to cut down the amount I eat. I never mentioned this, but I stopped buying hot dogs (just horrible for you anyways), and haven't had bacon in a while, and eating more poultry rather than pork for example. Only thing I eat is black forest ham lunch meat for sandwiches, and I have had a couple of pork chops in the last couple of months (in terms of the food I've bought and made for myself). I was tempted to buy some canadian bacon yesterday, but the limitation of red meat made me decide not to buy it, which ultimately is probably a good decision. Eventually, I want to go without eating any red meat for a period, which will then hopefully lead to trying out being vegetarian for a little while. Mainly just to try it out, and challenge myself to it. But also to just aid towards my overall health - making me think of more health conscious foods over fatty meats.
And my last thing to talk about. I keep mentioning and coming up with new goals (hah like those push ups? Haven't even tried continuing, although I really should, as well as doing some weight training. Maybe this week...) but I've got something to throw in about running. All of my goals lately have been to accomplish it by my birthday, such as my big goal of weighing 210 pounds (or 200 if 210 is accomplished early enough), so I wanted to give myself a running goal. First, I want to be able to run 5 miles without walking (at any pace, just have to finish it), as well as be able to run a 6 minute mile. Simple enough. Within the next couple of weeks I should be able to run 30 minutes straight, and from there, it's just building up my stamina to last that long on a run.With the mile time, I wonder if I could do that by now. I'm sure I could get down to a 7 minute mile easily, but we'll know when I start timing myself. There are a couple of tracks around town that I could use that are close by. I want to use a track because it'll be more accurate than my phone's GPS, which wouldn't be a great representation of my distance and pace, in comparison to a track. Once I finish the running podcasts that I've been using (which will be in the next 2 weeks if everything is on schedule) then I will time my mile to see where I'm at now, and then will work on getting down to a faster mile by the end of Summer. Combining a faster mile as well as the endurance to run longer, should help me towards a decent 5k time.
I realized that was a lot that I just talked about, but it was all on my mind, and nothing else has really been happening this week/weekend, so I thought I'd share. Oh and I'm 2/3 through The Fellowship of the Ring, some of these chapters are just so damn long. Anyways, stay fancy.
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
An Uneventful Week
Wednesday night at the moment, and it's a pretty "chill" week.
Monday I attempted to run, and it went... not great. I got going for almost a mile at a pretty fast pace (I thought I'd manage it but before I knew it, my body died) and then had to walk for a couple minutes, ran for a bit more to finish off the first 12 minute interval, and then walked for a recovery. Then ran for maybe 4 more minutes of the next interval, maybe 6, and that was all I could really manage at the time. Nonetheless, it was better than I faired last Monday when I first started feeling ill.
Today's run went much smoother, as I was able to completely finish each running interval (of 12 minutes). It was tough, and I had to take it at a pretty slow pace (slower than I ran it in Lake Oswego, which contains hills), but I finished it, and that's what is important. I'll do this run one more time on Friday, and then if I managed alright, then I'll move on to Week 7 on Sunday. Week 7 is still 12 minute intervals, however instead of just 2, it moves up to 3, so it becomes 36 minutes of running rather than the 24 I've been doing. It's just about building up endurance, so that third interval will sure be tough.
School has been going well so far. I've got a two hour break from 12-2 on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so I'll be spending that time in the library, finishing up homework, so that I can spend more time at home, doing whatever the hell I want to. I usually have a couple math assignments due each week, as well as weekly genetics, and with 3-4 hours of time each week, that will cut down the work that I have to do back at home, which is always nice. Plus, I'm trying to create better studying/work habits, so I'll be trying to get things done earlier than I usually do. For instance, I have math homework due Saturday, so naturally, I'll work on it tomorrow, to free up my weekend. In terms of how my classes are going, they're not too bad. I wish I had a more fun class, but I need to focus on my academics at the moment, which is far more important than a fun class. However, I'm really enjoying my Invertebrate Biology class, just because I finally get to learn about animals, and nothing but animals. Something I thoroughly enjoy. Not that I'm too fond of invertebrates, but it's better than stupid plants.
Sunday was Easter, which naturally means, I now have Easter candy. Sweets that my dad gave me, as well as some candy that I bought for 25% from Fred Meyer. Luckily it's been alright to eat the candy, since I still haven't been eating all that much, although my eating habits have become a bit more normal in comparison to my constant 1200 calorie days like before. Today has been about 1500 calories, but that's because I only had a banana for breakfast, as I was trying to get out on my run as soon as possible in the morning, and then had pasta and a small protein shake afterwards which has kept me pretty full for the majority of the day. However, even though I have been eating less, even with the extra sugar, I don't like how much sugar I'm taking in. So after my sweet supply is gone, I'll be lowering my sugar intake greatly, and that way, if I still need extra calories, I can get them from better, or more natural sources rather than just chocolate.
I'd say that's it for now, so stay fancy.
Monday I attempted to run, and it went... not great. I got going for almost a mile at a pretty fast pace (I thought I'd manage it but before I knew it, my body died) and then had to walk for a couple minutes, ran for a bit more to finish off the first 12 minute interval, and then walked for a recovery. Then ran for maybe 4 more minutes of the next interval, maybe 6, and that was all I could really manage at the time. Nonetheless, it was better than I faired last Monday when I first started feeling ill.
Today's run went much smoother, as I was able to completely finish each running interval (of 12 minutes). It was tough, and I had to take it at a pretty slow pace (slower than I ran it in Lake Oswego, which contains hills), but I finished it, and that's what is important. I'll do this run one more time on Friday, and then if I managed alright, then I'll move on to Week 7 on Sunday. Week 7 is still 12 minute intervals, however instead of just 2, it moves up to 3, so it becomes 36 minutes of running rather than the 24 I've been doing. It's just about building up endurance, so that third interval will sure be tough.
School has been going well so far. I've got a two hour break from 12-2 on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so I'll be spending that time in the library, finishing up homework, so that I can spend more time at home, doing whatever the hell I want to. I usually have a couple math assignments due each week, as well as weekly genetics, and with 3-4 hours of time each week, that will cut down the work that I have to do back at home, which is always nice. Plus, I'm trying to create better studying/work habits, so I'll be trying to get things done earlier than I usually do. For instance, I have math homework due Saturday, so naturally, I'll work on it tomorrow, to free up my weekend. In terms of how my classes are going, they're not too bad. I wish I had a more fun class, but I need to focus on my academics at the moment, which is far more important than a fun class. However, I'm really enjoying my Invertebrate Biology class, just because I finally get to learn about animals, and nothing but animals. Something I thoroughly enjoy. Not that I'm too fond of invertebrates, but it's better than stupid plants.
Sunday was Easter, which naturally means, I now have Easter candy. Sweets that my dad gave me, as well as some candy that I bought for 25% from Fred Meyer. Luckily it's been alright to eat the candy, since I still haven't been eating all that much, although my eating habits have become a bit more normal in comparison to my constant 1200 calorie days like before. Today has been about 1500 calories, but that's because I only had a banana for breakfast, as I was trying to get out on my run as soon as possible in the morning, and then had pasta and a small protein shake afterwards which has kept me pretty full for the majority of the day. However, even though I have been eating less, even with the extra sugar, I don't like how much sugar I'm taking in. So after my sweet supply is gone, I'll be lowering my sugar intake greatly, and that way, if I still need extra calories, I can get them from better, or more natural sources rather than just chocolate.
I'd say that's it for now, so stay fancy.
Sunday, April 8, 2012
Second Week of the Term - Now it's Time to Start
To explain the title of this post, I didn't make it to class at all last week, which sucked, big time. I was getting ready to go to class Monday morning, and then bam, my stomach hit me bad, and there was no way I'd be making it to class, and then I got really sick throughout the week (combination of the stomach flu and my cold). Now, it's time to get back into classes. My last couple of terms have been awful, and I haven't been proud of them at all; rather ashamed to be honest. And I hate myself for it. I really dislike using the word hate, but in this case, it really does apply. So I'm really going to apply myself this term - who knows, it could be my first 4.0 term of college! Hah, yeah right. But hell, I'll try. I need this bad, because I've been on a slippery slope for a while now. Just need to get some momentum going again! So tomorrow is a big day for me, as it's finally get back into school, and taking things very seriously. I can't afford to make any mistakes now. And I figured out my finals schedule, which is important since I'll have Zoo Camp training that week (probably Friday/Saturday of that week - June 15/16) as well as my birthday being on that Friday (June 15). So I've got 1 final on Monday morning at 9:30, then on Tuesday, a final at 7:30 AM (UGH) and then at 9:30 AM (MORE UGH), and finally one at 9:30 AM on Wednesday. An interesting schedule! I don't mind the 9:30 finals, but I don't really like the 7:30 followed by another right afterwards. But that means that I'll be back in time for training (assuming it is on the 15) and I'll be able to be back home for my birthday (probably for June 15, get the Zoo crew to go to Sylvan Saloon or McMenamins after training is done for that day - remember, it'll be my 21st birthday). Anyways, moving on.
I'm going to attempt to run tomorrow morning, prior to classes. If I can't do the two intervals of 12 minutes, then I'll just do what I can without killing myself, and try to at least get 30+ minutes of activity in. We'll see what happens, but I would love to get back into a running routine again, I just don't know if my lung capacity can handle it while still having a bit of a cold. If I don't do very well, I might throw in some weights in the evening, and continue that until I can run 100% of my intervals, slowly building up to it again. Whatever.
I forgot to mention! I got new running shoes! My brother and I went to Foot Traffic (in LO) to get me some new, good running shoes. Tried out quite a few, tested them out for a bit, and it came down to a pair of Asics for $140, that have a very nice gel cushion in the shoe. I decided to go with this shoe because of my weak ankles (from my many, many sprains), I need to lessen the impact if possible when landing on my foot, so the gel helps support it better, and also will last longer. And since my brother used to work at Foot Traffic, he got me 30% off, so it came out to be $98 which is awesome. Of course, I only got to run in them for 1 mile last Monday, and then a mile and a half of walking. A shame, but hopefully tomorrow will be different. (Note: The following picture is what my shoes look like)
On Saturday morning, I went to Dixon with Ryan and Nick, and the only real reason I went was to get out of the apartment finally, as well as get a weigh in after Spring Break/working and then being sick. I weighed in at 225 prior to working out, and 223 afterwards (which is usually when I've been weighing myself, but I'd rather consider myself 225, especially coming off of the stomach flu, so it's possible I might gain some weight back actually). So there's another 5 pounds off, and I'm now on my last notch of my big belt, so soon enough at this rate, I'll be making a new notch! While at Dixon, spent 25 minutes on a bike at a medium intensity, and then watched Nick and Ryan play some basketball (definitely wasn't up to playing). Then afterwards just shot hoops with them. After a couple hours at Dixon, went to the covered bridge with Nick to look at some native plants for a project of his. While there found 2 garter snakes (one of which he picked up, and then dropped because he got freaked out), and also found tons of deer tracks by the creek. Apparently today he went again and saw 3 deer. What a lucky duck he is. I ended the day at 20.8k steps on my pedometer, always nice after being inside all week.
And on a completely unhealthy sidenote, I went to this French bakery at about Circle and Highland (right next to Market of Choice) in Corvallis with Hannah, and wow, what a meal. I had a chicken crepe that was delicious, and even better was a vegetarian hot sandwich and salad - the sandwich had bell peppers cooked in garlic and olive oil, with melted brie cheese and some basalmic vinigar dressing on it as well. It cost $12.50 but it basically filled me up all day long. I'll be going back to try out one of their sweet crepes for breakfast sometime - nutella and cream with banana. I can't wait. (Note: My crepe looked nothing like the picture)
It's funny how easily I get filled up now, as well as how long I'm satisfied for. For breakfast today I had probably around 200 calories of greek yogurt and granola with tea, then lunch (which was a ton, and I was so stuffed I barely could drink any water after the meal). Then some chocolate in the early evening, some tea, a slice of French bread, and a cup of juice throughout the evening. And that's it. And I've been full all day long. Most of my days have been 1200-1400 calories once my stomach stopped aching from the stomach flu. Crazy. I've even personally been eating more sugar, just because I haven't been able to eat as many calories from filling up so easily. We'll see if this continues at all once I start routinely running and working out again.
I think that's about it for now, I swear I had one more thing to talk about, but oh well. I at least covered quite a bit. Well until next time, stay fancy.
I'm going to attempt to run tomorrow morning, prior to classes. If I can't do the two intervals of 12 minutes, then I'll just do what I can without killing myself, and try to at least get 30+ minutes of activity in. We'll see what happens, but I would love to get back into a running routine again, I just don't know if my lung capacity can handle it while still having a bit of a cold. If I don't do very well, I might throw in some weights in the evening, and continue that until I can run 100% of my intervals, slowly building up to it again. Whatever.
I forgot to mention! I got new running shoes! My brother and I went to Foot Traffic (in LO) to get me some new, good running shoes. Tried out quite a few, tested them out for a bit, and it came down to a pair of Asics for $140, that have a very nice gel cushion in the shoe. I decided to go with this shoe because of my weak ankles (from my many, many sprains), I need to lessen the impact if possible when landing on my foot, so the gel helps support it better, and also will last longer. And since my brother used to work at Foot Traffic, he got me 30% off, so it came out to be $98 which is awesome. Of course, I only got to run in them for 1 mile last Monday, and then a mile and a half of walking. A shame, but hopefully tomorrow will be different. (Note: The following picture is what my shoes look like)
On Saturday morning, I went to Dixon with Ryan and Nick, and the only real reason I went was to get out of the apartment finally, as well as get a weigh in after Spring Break/working and then being sick. I weighed in at 225 prior to working out, and 223 afterwards (which is usually when I've been weighing myself, but I'd rather consider myself 225, especially coming off of the stomach flu, so it's possible I might gain some weight back actually). So there's another 5 pounds off, and I'm now on my last notch of my big belt, so soon enough at this rate, I'll be making a new notch! While at Dixon, spent 25 minutes on a bike at a medium intensity, and then watched Nick and Ryan play some basketball (definitely wasn't up to playing). Then afterwards just shot hoops with them. After a couple hours at Dixon, went to the covered bridge with Nick to look at some native plants for a project of his. While there found 2 garter snakes (one of which he picked up, and then dropped because he got freaked out), and also found tons of deer tracks by the creek. Apparently today he went again and saw 3 deer. What a lucky duck he is. I ended the day at 20.8k steps on my pedometer, always nice after being inside all week.
And on a completely unhealthy sidenote, I went to this French bakery at about Circle and Highland (right next to Market of Choice) in Corvallis with Hannah, and wow, what a meal. I had a chicken crepe that was delicious, and even better was a vegetarian hot sandwich and salad - the sandwich had bell peppers cooked in garlic and olive oil, with melted brie cheese and some basalmic vinigar dressing on it as well. It cost $12.50 but it basically filled me up all day long. I'll be going back to try out one of their sweet crepes for breakfast sometime - nutella and cream with banana. I can't wait. (Note: My crepe looked nothing like the picture)
It's funny how easily I get filled up now, as well as how long I'm satisfied for. For breakfast today I had probably around 200 calories of greek yogurt and granola with tea, then lunch (which was a ton, and I was so stuffed I barely could drink any water after the meal). Then some chocolate in the early evening, some tea, a slice of French bread, and a cup of juice throughout the evening. And that's it. And I've been full all day long. Most of my days have been 1200-1400 calories once my stomach stopped aching from the stomach flu. Crazy. I've even personally been eating more sugar, just because I haven't been able to eat as many calories from filling up so easily. We'll see if this continues at all once I start routinely running and working out again.
I think that's about it for now, I swear I had one more thing to talk about, but oh well. I at least covered quite a bit. Well until next time, stay fancy.
Wednesday, April 4, 2012
Back in the Game
There's a perfectly good reason why I haven't been posting... Well... Erm... I was working! For whatever reason, and I don't know if other people that were working Spring camp experienced this, but it was the most tiring week of my life. Three summers, a winter camp, and this being my second spring camp, and this was the most tiring of them all. It may have been partially due to my whole camp staff were feeling sick by the end of the week, but who knows. Well on top of that, I started feeling quite sick on Sunday night, and even worse Monday morning. I still wanted to tough it out and go for a run, but afterwards, my stomach started to really bother me. And then later in the night, I realized I had the stomach flu, which sucks. So now Wednesday afternoon, and I'm still recovering from it. It hasn't been awful to me, but mainly just lots of stomach aches and it's been hard to eat much. Like yesterday I ate a sandwich, an apple, some ginger ale, and jello, and I was STUFFED the entire day. This morning? I had a cup of juice and once again, I felt as if I just ate a huge meal. And it's been making me feel bloated as well. My stomach has just not been doing so well the last few days.
Since my last post, I went on a few runs, my second 8 minute interval run was pretty tough, but my final 8 minute interval run went pretty well. And my first 12 minute interval run (Week 6 Day 1) was also quite tough, but that was Tuesday after work, and that was after training on Friday/Saturday, run on Sunday, Monday plus overtime doing aftercare (7:45 AM - 6:15PM roughly) and then naturally work on Tuesday as I mentioned. So it wasn't my breathing and cardiovascular system that was giving up, it was actually my legs, because my legs were just so damned tired. So because of that, I then ended up taking Thursday off from running, and decided to continue on Saturday. Finished up the week of camp, was a blast. Also worked aftercare 3 times, which got me some nice overtime, since I need the money at the moment. Ran on Saturday and wow, what a run. That was Week 6 Day 2, two intervals of 12 minutes with a 3 minute walk break in between. I'm not really sure what pace my run intervals were at, I ended up traveling 3.57 miles with an average pace of 10:44 which is my longest run and fastest pace as well. My overall running pace was probably between 9-9:30 per mile. That's pretty awesome considering my fastest mile was back in Freshman year of HS at 7:58, and if my running pace of ~3 miles is just a little slower than that, I could I could do so much better now. I did figure out on one of my week 5 runs that my first mile that I ran was about 8 minute mile pace, so I bet I could hit 7 minutes no problem by now. I'll test that out after this podcast series is done though.
Now on Monday, I started to run, but only made it out about a mile, and walked back, as I just felt way too crummy to go on a serious run. And boy am I glad I didn't continue, because the rest of my day was pretty shitty. It consisted of stomach aches, a bad fever with chills, a day long headache, and more. I'm just glad to be recovering from it all now. I would have been scheduled to run today, but I'm obviously not quite well enough, but hopefully by Friday. I'm interested to see what my weight is like now, after the stomach flu, and also a week and a half of being at home (I naturally eat a bit more when I'm back home, but I did better this time) while working and keeping up my running, as well as a few jump rope workouts.
Oh and if you were wondering at all, I finished P90X a while back, just forgot to mention it. It was only a couple last workouts though, so no big deal. One of these days this week I'll be starting up some weights, whether it's following the routine of P90X or not, I just want to include some weights, and stay a bit active as soon as my body can handle it.
And I apoloize if some of this post was me just rambling, that's what happens when I'm not feeling too well. Going to walk downtown now to go deposit a check, and hopefully the activity will make me feel a bit better; I just need to do something. Stay fancy.
Since my last post, I went on a few runs, my second 8 minute interval run was pretty tough, but my final 8 minute interval run went pretty well. And my first 12 minute interval run (Week 6 Day 1) was also quite tough, but that was Tuesday after work, and that was after training on Friday/Saturday, run on Sunday, Monday plus overtime doing aftercare (7:45 AM - 6:15PM roughly) and then naturally work on Tuesday as I mentioned. So it wasn't my breathing and cardiovascular system that was giving up, it was actually my legs, because my legs were just so damned tired. So because of that, I then ended up taking Thursday off from running, and decided to continue on Saturday. Finished up the week of camp, was a blast. Also worked aftercare 3 times, which got me some nice overtime, since I need the money at the moment. Ran on Saturday and wow, what a run. That was Week 6 Day 2, two intervals of 12 minutes with a 3 minute walk break in between. I'm not really sure what pace my run intervals were at, I ended up traveling 3.57 miles with an average pace of 10:44 which is my longest run and fastest pace as well. My overall running pace was probably between 9-9:30 per mile. That's pretty awesome considering my fastest mile was back in Freshman year of HS at 7:58, and if my running pace of ~3 miles is just a little slower than that, I could I could do so much better now. I did figure out on one of my week 5 runs that my first mile that I ran was about 8 minute mile pace, so I bet I could hit 7 minutes no problem by now. I'll test that out after this podcast series is done though.
Now on Monday, I started to run, but only made it out about a mile, and walked back, as I just felt way too crummy to go on a serious run. And boy am I glad I didn't continue, because the rest of my day was pretty shitty. It consisted of stomach aches, a bad fever with chills, a day long headache, and more. I'm just glad to be recovering from it all now. I would have been scheduled to run today, but I'm obviously not quite well enough, but hopefully by Friday. I'm interested to see what my weight is like now, after the stomach flu, and also a week and a half of being at home (I naturally eat a bit more when I'm back home, but I did better this time) while working and keeping up my running, as well as a few jump rope workouts.
Oh and if you were wondering at all, I finished P90X a while back, just forgot to mention it. It was only a couple last workouts though, so no big deal. One of these days this week I'll be starting up some weights, whether it's following the routine of P90X or not, I just want to include some weights, and stay a bit active as soon as my body can handle it.
And I apoloize if some of this post was me just rambling, that's what happens when I'm not feeling too well. Going to walk downtown now to go deposit a check, and hopefully the activity will make me feel a bit better; I just need to do something. Stay fancy.
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Spring Has Begun! And There's Snow Outside...
Totally meant to post this last night, but completely forgot until I was already in bed, trying to sleep.
Oh and it snowed yesterday.
So let's see, Sunday I did nothing, since I was wiped from the 5k still. Monday I went for my 12th run, which was the last run of Week 4, so still on the 4 minute run, 1 minute walk schedule. I paced myself much better, but I didn't have any leftover energy, still being a little tired from Saturday, so I didn't have the energy to run any extra during my cool down, like my previous runs. So my pace and distance were slightly worse than what I had done before. But no big deal, it was still a pretty good run. And Monday evening I went to the CBI tournament game between TCU and OSU, and we smashed them by about 20 points. Very good game.
Tuesday I went to Dixon in the morning, for my last weigh in prior to Spring Break, and I came in at 231, which is another 4 pounds lost since the last time I weighed myself, which was... about a week and a half prior to Tuesday. Now, that's great news, but the best part is that this is the first time I've weighed this much since Sophomore or the beginning of Junior year in HS, meaning 4-5 years. I weighed 235 at the end of Summer 2010 which was fantastic and the best until now since back then in HS. Needless to say, I'm pretty happy. I've lost 20 pounds since about February 12th, a rough estimate, but that was the last time some of my family saw me, and they've already noticed the slimming down. It's a marginal victory so far, but it's something, and I look forward to everytime someone notices I look thinner. Also remember, I weighed as much as 270 during the summer prior to and most of Senior year in HS, so my health is considerably better than just a few years ago.
On the topic of my weight, I've decided since I've made a lot of progress so far, and pretty quickly as well (been 4.5 weeks since I buckled down - Februrary 19th) and have lost about 20 pounds, that I will be changing my current weight goal a bit. So by my birthday, June 15, I plan on weighing 210 or less (originally was 220), and I will shoot for 200 pounds. That's a big goal to do in 12-13 weeks (31 pounds) but that's why I made 2 goals. One that I know I can make, and one that I really want to reach, but won't be disappointed if I fall short. I'll know by May what I should be looking at in terms of how possible 200 will be.
In other news, I'm back home for Spring Break, and will be working Spring Camp next week Monday-Friday, as well as trainings tomorrow evening and all day Saturday. I also will be seeing The Hunger Games tonight, at the midnight showing in Portland at the Roseway Theater. Should hopefully be a good movie, but you never know. Oh and I had bought a jump rope a little while back, and I don't really have a space in Corvallis to use it, so I tried a little workout for the first time today out in my driveway, and I had forgotten how intense jump roping can be. I'm figuring out a good routine for myself, since I can't do long workouts with it, as it's more anaerobic. I think for now, I'll do 10 minute workouts, with a warm up and cool down, so that it comes out to be around 20 minutes. And then for now I think I'll do 1 minute jumping, with a 30 second break and walk a bit, to keep myself moving a bit. I'll do these workouts whenever I feel up to it as it isn't too demanding on the body in terms of exhausting energy or making me too sore. If I keep this up, I want to put some variety into the jumping as well as increase the time I'm jumping for to 15 or 20 minutes, and longer intervals. But for now, this will do.
Okay, I think that's about it, and I've got a hankering to play some Xbox, which seems about right since I haven't played any in a few days. Stay fancy.
Oh and it snowed yesterday.
So let's see, Sunday I did nothing, since I was wiped from the 5k still. Monday I went for my 12th run, which was the last run of Week 4, so still on the 4 minute run, 1 minute walk schedule. I paced myself much better, but I didn't have any leftover energy, still being a little tired from Saturday, so I didn't have the energy to run any extra during my cool down, like my previous runs. So my pace and distance were slightly worse than what I had done before. But no big deal, it was still a pretty good run. And Monday evening I went to the CBI tournament game between TCU and OSU, and we smashed them by about 20 points. Very good game.
Tuesday I went to Dixon in the morning, for my last weigh in prior to Spring Break, and I came in at 231, which is another 4 pounds lost since the last time I weighed myself, which was... about a week and a half prior to Tuesday. Now, that's great news, but the best part is that this is the first time I've weighed this much since Sophomore or the beginning of Junior year in HS, meaning 4-5 years. I weighed 235 at the end of Summer 2010 which was fantastic and the best until now since back then in HS. Needless to say, I'm pretty happy. I've lost 20 pounds since about February 12th, a rough estimate, but that was the last time some of my family saw me, and they've already noticed the slimming down. It's a marginal victory so far, but it's something, and I look forward to everytime someone notices I look thinner. Also remember, I weighed as much as 270 during the summer prior to and most of Senior year in HS, so my health is considerably better than just a few years ago.
On the topic of my weight, I've decided since I've made a lot of progress so far, and pretty quickly as well (been 4.5 weeks since I buckled down - Februrary 19th) and have lost about 20 pounds, that I will be changing my current weight goal a bit. So by my birthday, June 15, I plan on weighing 210 or less (originally was 220), and I will shoot for 200 pounds. That's a big goal to do in 12-13 weeks (31 pounds) but that's why I made 2 goals. One that I know I can make, and one that I really want to reach, but won't be disappointed if I fall short. I'll know by May what I should be looking at in terms of how possible 200 will be.
In other news, I'm back home for Spring Break, and will be working Spring Camp next week Monday-Friday, as well as trainings tomorrow evening and all day Saturday. I also will be seeing The Hunger Games tonight, at the midnight showing in Portland at the Roseway Theater. Should hopefully be a good movie, but you never know. Oh and I had bought a jump rope a little while back, and I don't really have a space in Corvallis to use it, so I tried a little workout for the first time today out in my driveway, and I had forgotten how intense jump roping can be. I'm figuring out a good routine for myself, since I can't do long workouts with it, as it's more anaerobic. I think for now, I'll do 10 minute workouts, with a warm up and cool down, so that it comes out to be around 20 minutes. And then for now I think I'll do 1 minute jumping, with a 30 second break and walk a bit, to keep myself moving a bit. I'll do these workouts whenever I feel up to it as it isn't too demanding on the body in terms of exhausting energy or making me too sore. If I keep this up, I want to put some variety into the jumping as well as increase the time I'm jumping for to 15 or 20 minutes, and longer intervals. But for now, this will do.
Okay, I think that's about it, and I've got a hankering to play some Xbox, which seems about right since I haven't played any in a few days. Stay fancy.
Saturday, March 17, 2012
St. Patricks Day
Thursday's run went pretty well. I felt more comfortable, and had a slightly stronger pace. Overall, I ended up with a little less energy than Tuesday's run, so I ran a couple minutes during my cool down, but ended up at 3.18 miles, and kept a pace of 11:12, which is what I did on Tuesday as well. However, my running intervals were faster, which was great. The main reason my overall pace didn't increase was because on Tuesday's run, not only did I run an extra 3 minutes, but I ran it at a pretty hard pace (probably close to twice as fast as my normal pace) so that got my time much lower than it should have been for the first 34 minutes or so. I kept Friday a very lazy day, so I would have plenty of energy for this morning's 5k in Albany. I was invited to go to Dixon last night, but I knew if I went, I'd have a tough run.
Today was awesome. So I woke up at 6:23 (before my alarm... But when I have something important scheduled in the morning that I'm anxious for, I usually keep waking up accidentally), and ate at 6:45. Left the apartment about 7:30 and got to the 5k area at about 7:45-7:50. Picked up my packet with my number and what not, and got my chip ready (it was a chip timed race, to accurately time your race, for those who aren't race savvy). Out of the group that I was with (all of which were Malika's family/friends), I was the only one in nothing but shorts and a t-shirt. Classy. But I was plenty warm as soon as I started running. So the race started at 8:15, and off I went, running with Malika and her aunt Laurie. My plan was to run with Malika the whole way, but after about half a mile, she kept telling me to go on since I was slowing myself down a bit. So I ended up taking off, but I didn't feel so bad because Laurie was still with her. I ran at a pretty hard and fast pace. I was actually shocked at the rate I was going. But then it hit me, my food hadn't digested enough, and I began to get horrible stomach cramps. So unfortunately, I had to stop to walk far more often than I had hoped to (knowing I can't run a whole 5k yet without walking). I kept trudging along though, and with about half a mile left, I felt like I was going to be sick for a bit there, but I relaxed myself with a bit more walking, and was able to get going a bit more. I finished at 32'43", which is a good start. I probably would have broken 30 minutes had I run it a bit more seriously, and hadn't gotten the stomach cramps, but I'm still happy with what I got. I was also the first person finished out of the group that I ran with. My official goal (should be pretty easy in 3 and a half months) is to get sub 25 minutes for the July 4th 5k. Will keep it simple for now. When June comes around, if I'm able to run a 5k (just on my own, not necessarily a race) quite a bit faster than 25 minutes, than I'll create a goal at that point - give myself sometime to aim for when it comes down to crunch time. I still really enjoyed the run, and am glad that I did it, to see how far I've gone come July.
After the 5k, I went out for breakfast with Malika and her mother and aunt, and after that point, went home to be lazy for the rest of the day. It's 11 PM, my body has been exhausted all day (on top of about 6 hours of sleep, which if I've learned anything about myself, I can't do shit without 8-10 hours of sleep), and I'm going to bed now. Stay fancy. Today, I did not stay fancy, but rather athletic shorts and a green t-shirt - it's tough to be fancy on St. Patricks Day when you have a 5k to run.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
What Goes Up, Must Come Down
And vise versa, at least in this case.
So I had previously complained about my poor day on Friday, due to a few different factors (running). Well Sunday, as well as today were my two best days of running yet! It's funny how that works. On Saturday I got a nice rest by just going to Monmouth, although Greg and I did end up walking over to where he works and shooting some hoops for a bit, but that wasn't much, and just recreational. Sunday, I went on my Week 3 Day 3 run (still 3 min run, 2 min walk) and I had kept to a much better and steady pace, while still retaining some energy at the end, so I ended up running a little extra at the end and finally, FINALLY broke the 3 mile barrier that I've been hoping to cross for a while. I finished at 3.05 miles (0.13 miles farther than my previous best) while also improving my pace by a whopping 35 seconds per mile! That's incredible. I felt great, and it was a wonderful day on top of that. So then Monday I got set back a bit, health wise, as I had a total "vegging out" sort of day. Just lots of food. It wasn't too much over what my body burns in a day, about 450 more than I should be eating, but it was only one day luckily. And good thing that I had my next run today, which involved more running, to help the fact that I had a "fat" day yesterday. So today. Whew, today. My run was even better (although the weather on Sunday was far superior). It was Week 4 Day 1 of my podcast, which meant that it was 5 intervals of 4 minute jogging, with only 1 minute breaks in between. The 4 minute intervals weren't too difficult, because I went into the first one with a pretty decent pace, something that I kept up pretty well. But damn, those 1 minute walking intervals were tough on me, because before I knew it, I was back and running again. I know it's better that I only do the 1 minute of walking, but you don't even know how much I'd want an extra 30 seconds to recover my breathing. Nonetheless, I did fantastic. And I even had extra energy at the end once again, so I ran an extra 3 minutes on top of the podcast, so I ended up at 3.4 miles, and increased my overall pace by another 18 seconds (that's an improvement of 53 seconds over 2 runs), which puts me at 11:12 minutes per mile. Remember, that includes the 10 minutes of walking as a warm up and cool down. I can definitely see quite a bit of improvement, especially now that I have more endurance in terms of intervals (so I can do more than 5 now), and built up a fair amount of endurance of just pure running time. Doubled it in fact (from 2 to 4 minutes).
Other than that, not much else has happened that I haven't discussed already. I filled out my NCAA tournament bracket as usual, and of course, the first two games today (play in games to get into the normal 64 team bracket) I lost both of. But to be fair, they were teams that should have won (as in the teams that lost) but they had horrible second halves. Iona was beating BYU by 25 points, and BYU came back to win it by 6 (Iona was scoreless for 12 straight minutes!), which is the largest comeback in NCAA tournament history. I also went to Dixon this evening with Nick, to get a bit of biking in. Biked down, did 10 minutes on a bike at a moderate intensity due to still digesting some food, and then with a 5 minute warm up and cool down, I did a 15 minute HIIT on a bike. I was going for 20, but my legs were dying at 15 and I decided to call it quits, since I did have a long run today.
I've got my 5k on Saturday in Albany, which I actually just signed up for about an hour ago. I just kept putting it off, mainly due to monetary reasons. But I'm excited for that. Hoping for under 30 minutes (considering I won't spend 10 minutes as a warm up/cool down, I feel as if that's pretty reasonable), but who cares. Just going to go at the pace that Malika and I are comfortable with. I've got a slightly faster pace than hers (although I wouldn't be surprised if she has more endurance than me) so I'll motivate her to work at it, but at the same time, I don't want to push myself too hard, since this is just for fun; I think it'll work out perfectly.
Not much else to discuss. One of my new favorite foods is cajun shrimp (thanks to Greg). Put butter in skillet, put shrimp in skillit, sprinkle plenty of cajun seasoning over it, and cook. I also threw in some chipotle flakes (like crushed red pepper, but it's jalepeno with that strong chipotle/smoky flavoring). Also had some pasta with some Newman's Own red sauce added, but I put in some Sriracha hot sauce into it, and it was soooooo good.
Stay fancy.
So I had previously complained about my poor day on Friday, due to a few different factors (running). Well Sunday, as well as today were my two best days of running yet! It's funny how that works. On Saturday I got a nice rest by just going to Monmouth, although Greg and I did end up walking over to where he works and shooting some hoops for a bit, but that wasn't much, and just recreational. Sunday, I went on my Week 3 Day 3 run (still 3 min run, 2 min walk) and I had kept to a much better and steady pace, while still retaining some energy at the end, so I ended up running a little extra at the end and finally, FINALLY broke the 3 mile barrier that I've been hoping to cross for a while. I finished at 3.05 miles (0.13 miles farther than my previous best) while also improving my pace by a whopping 35 seconds per mile! That's incredible. I felt great, and it was a wonderful day on top of that. So then Monday I got set back a bit, health wise, as I had a total "vegging out" sort of day. Just lots of food. It wasn't too much over what my body burns in a day, about 450 more than I should be eating, but it was only one day luckily. And good thing that I had my next run today, which involved more running, to help the fact that I had a "fat" day yesterday. So today. Whew, today. My run was even better (although the weather on Sunday was far superior). It was Week 4 Day 1 of my podcast, which meant that it was 5 intervals of 4 minute jogging, with only 1 minute breaks in between. The 4 minute intervals weren't too difficult, because I went into the first one with a pretty decent pace, something that I kept up pretty well. But damn, those 1 minute walking intervals were tough on me, because before I knew it, I was back and running again. I know it's better that I only do the 1 minute of walking, but you don't even know how much I'd want an extra 30 seconds to recover my breathing. Nonetheless, I did fantastic. And I even had extra energy at the end once again, so I ran an extra 3 minutes on top of the podcast, so I ended up at 3.4 miles, and increased my overall pace by another 18 seconds (that's an improvement of 53 seconds over 2 runs), which puts me at 11:12 minutes per mile. Remember, that includes the 10 minutes of walking as a warm up and cool down. I can definitely see quite a bit of improvement, especially now that I have more endurance in terms of intervals (so I can do more than 5 now), and built up a fair amount of endurance of just pure running time. Doubled it in fact (from 2 to 4 minutes).
Other than that, not much else has happened that I haven't discussed already. I filled out my NCAA tournament bracket as usual, and of course, the first two games today (play in games to get into the normal 64 team bracket) I lost both of. But to be fair, they were teams that should have won (as in the teams that lost) but they had horrible second halves. Iona was beating BYU by 25 points, and BYU came back to win it by 6 (Iona was scoreless for 12 straight minutes!), which is the largest comeback in NCAA tournament history. I also went to Dixon this evening with Nick, to get a bit of biking in. Biked down, did 10 minutes on a bike at a moderate intensity due to still digesting some food, and then with a 5 minute warm up and cool down, I did a 15 minute HIIT on a bike. I was going for 20, but my legs were dying at 15 and I decided to call it quits, since I did have a long run today.
I've got my 5k on Saturday in Albany, which I actually just signed up for about an hour ago. I just kept putting it off, mainly due to monetary reasons. But I'm excited for that. Hoping for under 30 minutes (considering I won't spend 10 minutes as a warm up/cool down, I feel as if that's pretty reasonable), but who cares. Just going to go at the pace that Malika and I are comfortable with. I've got a slightly faster pace than hers (although I wouldn't be surprised if she has more endurance than me) so I'll motivate her to work at it, but at the same time, I don't want to push myself too hard, since this is just for fun; I think it'll work out perfectly.
Not much else to discuss. One of my new favorite foods is cajun shrimp (thanks to Greg). Put butter in skillet, put shrimp in skillit, sprinkle plenty of cajun seasoning over it, and cook. I also threw in some chipotle flakes (like crushed red pepper, but it's jalepeno with that strong chipotle/smoky flavoring). Also had some pasta with some Newman's Own red sauce added, but I put in some Sriracha hot sauce into it, and it was soooooo good.
Stay fancy.
Saturday, March 10, 2012
What a Rough Day (Friday)
So as I had posted on Facebook, I delayed my blog from last night to this morning/early afternoon because I was just so exhausted. And this is how things went.
So went to bed pretty early Tuesday night as my last blog post indicated, before midnight. Amazing for me. Wednesday I went out for my Week 3 Day 1 run, which is 3 minute jogging, 5 intervals, with 2 minutes in between. I was aiming for 3 miles, but the this week is proving to be tough on me, and I managed 2.92 miles. It probably doesn't help that Tuesday I was at Dixon for 2 hours on Tuesday, so my legs were fairly fatigued from that still. Now, I got some running Smartwool socks Tuesday night, so I tried them on for my run on Wednesday, and dear lord they were amazing. My shoes don't fit me perfectly (will be getting a nice pair of running shoes during Spring Break) and after the basketball on Tuesday, I noticed that my heels got pretty beat up, so I was afraid I might develop a blister on my left heel from my run. Luckily, the Smartwool socks did their job, and they cushioned my feet perfectly. Will be buying more of these things!
But then on Thursday I went to Dixon again, with Nick, and we played basketball for a bit, but then ended up on bikes while watching the last 10 minutes of the OSU/UW basketball game (quarterfinals of the Pac-12 Tournament). And naturally, those 10 minutes lasted 40 minutes, so that was 40 minutes on the bike. Exhausted me more than I thought, and I got back home 3 hours after leaving to go to the gym, so once again, I was pretty fatigued again. But my run yesterday was weird. I felt as if I had plenty of energy as I was doing my warm up (5 minute walk) so I went a bit harder on my first interval. BIG mistake. I really screwed myself over, and I struggled for the rest of the run. On my last interval, with 1 minute left, I actually had to start walking, because I just couldn't run another step. Then the first minute of my cool down, I ended up running to make up for it, but still. It was a huge struggle. And I ended up at 2.81 miles, which went down from Wednesday. However, I also didn't walk as long for my cool down (I keep up my Runkeeper app until I make it back to my apt, so if I'm a block away and my podcast finishes, then I walk that extra block, etc.). So I ended up improving my average pace by 2 seconds I think (not much, but it technically was an improvement). I guess there was some good news from that run - but I sure as hell had a rough time out there, considering I actually had to stop running at the end.
Then after some rest, doing some laundry, reading more Fellowship (about 110 pages in already, I really love this book), I went to Dixon to watch the OSU/Arizona game in the semifinals on a tv there (by the way, we lost horribly. Lead by 7 at half time, and then one of the worst second halves ever. We were 1/16 for field goals at one point) with Ryan and Nick, and got there about 20 minutes prior to tip off. So I decided to do a bit of interval training on a bike. Got in about 12 minutes of 2-2 minute intervals. Definitely felt the workout, but I had to stop for the game. After the game, I then did an extra 25 minutes of intervals + cool down, but I did 1-2 this time (being 1 minute intense, 2 minutes moderate) which I prefer as it's been a while since I did lots of cardio. But let me tell you, I was so tired and exhausted last night, I just never got around to the blog, and just went to sleep. So here I am, writing it at 1:00 PM, still fatigued as hell. But it was worth it.
In other news, I'll be returning back to the Zoo for work, which is always good to know that I've got my job back. And in about an hour, I'm leaving for Monmouth and going to hang out with my good friend Greg (which I know via the Zoo)! Very excited. And luckily, I can just relax all day, because my body sure as hell needs it before my run tomorrow. I should be wrapping up, so I can prepare to venture over to Monmouth. Stay fancy everybody, each and every one of you.
So went to bed pretty early Tuesday night as my last blog post indicated, before midnight. Amazing for me. Wednesday I went out for my Week 3 Day 1 run, which is 3 minute jogging, 5 intervals, with 2 minutes in between. I was aiming for 3 miles, but the this week is proving to be tough on me, and I managed 2.92 miles. It probably doesn't help that Tuesday I was at Dixon for 2 hours on Tuesday, so my legs were fairly fatigued from that still. Now, I got some running Smartwool socks Tuesday night, so I tried them on for my run on Wednesday, and dear lord they were amazing. My shoes don't fit me perfectly (will be getting a nice pair of running shoes during Spring Break) and after the basketball on Tuesday, I noticed that my heels got pretty beat up, so I was afraid I might develop a blister on my left heel from my run. Luckily, the Smartwool socks did their job, and they cushioned my feet perfectly. Will be buying more of these things!
But then on Thursday I went to Dixon again, with Nick, and we played basketball for a bit, but then ended up on bikes while watching the last 10 minutes of the OSU/UW basketball game (quarterfinals of the Pac-12 Tournament). And naturally, those 10 minutes lasted 40 minutes, so that was 40 minutes on the bike. Exhausted me more than I thought, and I got back home 3 hours after leaving to go to the gym, so once again, I was pretty fatigued again. But my run yesterday was weird. I felt as if I had plenty of energy as I was doing my warm up (5 minute walk) so I went a bit harder on my first interval. BIG mistake. I really screwed myself over, and I struggled for the rest of the run. On my last interval, with 1 minute left, I actually had to start walking, because I just couldn't run another step. Then the first minute of my cool down, I ended up running to make up for it, but still. It was a huge struggle. And I ended up at 2.81 miles, which went down from Wednesday. However, I also didn't walk as long for my cool down (I keep up my Runkeeper app until I make it back to my apt, so if I'm a block away and my podcast finishes, then I walk that extra block, etc.). So I ended up improving my average pace by 2 seconds I think (not much, but it technically was an improvement). I guess there was some good news from that run - but I sure as hell had a rough time out there, considering I actually had to stop running at the end.
Then after some rest, doing some laundry, reading more Fellowship (about 110 pages in already, I really love this book), I went to Dixon to watch the OSU/Arizona game in the semifinals on a tv there (by the way, we lost horribly. Lead by 7 at half time, and then one of the worst second halves ever. We were 1/16 for field goals at one point) with Ryan and Nick, and got there about 20 minutes prior to tip off. So I decided to do a bit of interval training on a bike. Got in about 12 minutes of 2-2 minute intervals. Definitely felt the workout, but I had to stop for the game. After the game, I then did an extra 25 minutes of intervals + cool down, but I did 1-2 this time (being 1 minute intense, 2 minutes moderate) which I prefer as it's been a while since I did lots of cardio. But let me tell you, I was so tired and exhausted last night, I just never got around to the blog, and just went to sleep. So here I am, writing it at 1:00 PM, still fatigued as hell. But it was worth it.
In other news, I'll be returning back to the Zoo for work, which is always good to know that I've got my job back. And in about an hour, I'm leaving for Monmouth and going to hang out with my good friend Greg (which I know via the Zoo)! Very excited. And luckily, I can just relax all day, because my body sure as hell needs it before my run tomorrow. I should be wrapping up, so I can prepare to venture over to Monmouth. Stay fancy everybody, each and every one of you.
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Phew, Almost Forgot
I was just about to head to bed, and remembered I had to write up this blog. Almost forgot, but got me right at the end of my night. However, I've been tired ALL day long, so I'm going to keep this brief, so I can get to sleep.
I didn't make it to Dixon on Sunday or Monday, as I had hoped, but I just didn't have enough energy at the times I'd prefer to go. But I was able to go today luckily. Was able to get a half court all to myself and just shoot hoops for a while. I was originally planning on doing some biking intervals when I first got there, but there was only 1 basketball left, so I thought I'd shoot first. But I ended up shooting for about 2 hours, so I was wiped, and went on home (at least I biked to and from the gym, getting a bit of biking in, but no intervals as I had hoped to do, for something a bit different). I'm hoping to improve my shot a lot by next year, as both Ryan and Nick want to play IM basketball with me being their center/forward. And well, yeah I'm only 6'0", maybe up to 6'1" with the right shoes, but I've got a lot of body mass, making me an inside kind of guy. So I literally, all 2 hours, just worked on my inside shots, and let me tell you, I improved on those kind of shots a lot in just that short amount of time. One problem is that I haven't played competitively in years and years, so a lot of my shots are without jumping (that are free throw or closer). But if I play on a team, up close especially, I'll need to jump to avoid getting blocked, so I was practicing close jump shots. I have to say, the first 10 shots or so I completely missed because I'd be overshooting, and then undershooting due to undercompensating for the jump. But I got in a nice rhythm finally, and ended up shooting 70% free throws at the end, which isn't too shabby for me. Like I said, never made it to the bikes, but I was tired enough, and hadn't had too much food prior to going to Dixon, so I needed to go home and eat some lunch.
Oh and speaking of Dixon, right before leaving, I weighed myself at 235, so I've lost another 5 pounds in the last 10 days. Of course I did weigh myself right after shooting hoops for 2 hours, but I didn't lose all that much water from just shooting, and I also had eaten a little bit before hand, plus a water bottle worth of water in me, plus my clothes (no shoes). I'd say that's pretty close to what I'd weigh in the morning after waking up. But what's important is keeping the time of my weigh ins consistent, so if I stick to after a workout in the late morning/early afternoon, should be a good way to tell how much I lose. Nonetheless, it feels great to have seen my weight continue to drop. I can see 220 pretty close already. My goal is to reach that weight by my birthday, but I bet I could be that weight by May. Once I reach my target weight, I'll evaluate where I'm at and see if I can create a new goal for my birthday in June, even if it's just an extra 5 pounds or so, anything would be great.
Haven't finished up those P90X workouts yet, but it'll happen when it happens. I'm still staying pretty active with running, as well as other ways of exercise, that I'm not concerned. It's the staying idle for 2 months that's dangerous, not postponing a couple workouts due to being tired from running and going to the gym.
Tomorrow I start up my third week of running, which will be similar to before, but now it'll be 5 intervals of 3 minute jogging, with 2 minute walking breaks. My last run ended up going for 2.86 miles, so I figure I can break 3 tomorrow. I've gradually increased my mileage on every single run, even by just 0.1 mile or so, which is great. Obviously if I increase my time running, I'll be traveling farther, but even throughout the week, I'll increase each run's distance. So I'll have my week 3 runs tomorrow, Friday, and Sunday, and then will have week 4 runs (days 1 and 2) on Tuesday and Thursday, and will then have my 5k run in albany on that Saturday, the 17th. Definitely won't be ready to run it all, but I'm sure we'll figure out a good running/walking pattern to finish it off. I'd love to finish it in under 30 minutes, which I think is possible, but I really don't know right now. I'm hoping by summer to be able to do the July 4th 5k in around 20 minutes. I'd love to say sub 20, but I'm positive that that'll be a little too ambitious for now. But hey, who knows, we'll just have to see. But I've got a 5k in 11 days, and I'm looking forward to, and will be able to see where I really am with a 5k, and able to see how far I've come when it's July.
Banana chips, the bane of my existence. I bought some at Trader Joes the other day, and they're soooo addicting. 160 calories for a 1/4 cup of them, which is a ton of calories for so little. Luckily I have them in a closed container, and only eat a couple at a time, so I actually have to work to get into them. But I've been doing well with my food log, usually 1800-2400 calories, which is where I should be. But when I get to that upper range, I definitely feel like I should eat less. So I'm working on finding foods that fill me the best, and I think foods high in protein usually make me feel the most full (while keeping less calories going into my body). So tuna, eggs, and cottage cheese have entered my diet a bit more.
And to finish things off, I finished Mossflower (second book in the Redwall series, prelude to Redwall), and I started The Fellowship of the Ring tonight. And that's it - I'm tired and going to bed, at 11 pm. Stay fancy; please, stay fancy.
I didn't make it to Dixon on Sunday or Monday, as I had hoped, but I just didn't have enough energy at the times I'd prefer to go. But I was able to go today luckily. Was able to get a half court all to myself and just shoot hoops for a while. I was originally planning on doing some biking intervals when I first got there, but there was only 1 basketball left, so I thought I'd shoot first. But I ended up shooting for about 2 hours, so I was wiped, and went on home (at least I biked to and from the gym, getting a bit of biking in, but no intervals as I had hoped to do, for something a bit different). I'm hoping to improve my shot a lot by next year, as both Ryan and Nick want to play IM basketball with me being their center/forward. And well, yeah I'm only 6'0", maybe up to 6'1" with the right shoes, but I've got a lot of body mass, making me an inside kind of guy. So I literally, all 2 hours, just worked on my inside shots, and let me tell you, I improved on those kind of shots a lot in just that short amount of time. One problem is that I haven't played competitively in years and years, so a lot of my shots are without jumping (that are free throw or closer). But if I play on a team, up close especially, I'll need to jump to avoid getting blocked, so I was practicing close jump shots. I have to say, the first 10 shots or so I completely missed because I'd be overshooting, and then undershooting due to undercompensating for the jump. But I got in a nice rhythm finally, and ended up shooting 70% free throws at the end, which isn't too shabby for me. Like I said, never made it to the bikes, but I was tired enough, and hadn't had too much food prior to going to Dixon, so I needed to go home and eat some lunch.
Oh and speaking of Dixon, right before leaving, I weighed myself at 235, so I've lost another 5 pounds in the last 10 days. Of course I did weigh myself right after shooting hoops for 2 hours, but I didn't lose all that much water from just shooting, and I also had eaten a little bit before hand, plus a water bottle worth of water in me, plus my clothes (no shoes). I'd say that's pretty close to what I'd weigh in the morning after waking up. But what's important is keeping the time of my weigh ins consistent, so if I stick to after a workout in the late morning/early afternoon, should be a good way to tell how much I lose. Nonetheless, it feels great to have seen my weight continue to drop. I can see 220 pretty close already. My goal is to reach that weight by my birthday, but I bet I could be that weight by May. Once I reach my target weight, I'll evaluate where I'm at and see if I can create a new goal for my birthday in June, even if it's just an extra 5 pounds or so, anything would be great.
Haven't finished up those P90X workouts yet, but it'll happen when it happens. I'm still staying pretty active with running, as well as other ways of exercise, that I'm not concerned. It's the staying idle for 2 months that's dangerous, not postponing a couple workouts due to being tired from running and going to the gym.
Tomorrow I start up my third week of running, which will be similar to before, but now it'll be 5 intervals of 3 minute jogging, with 2 minute walking breaks. My last run ended up going for 2.86 miles, so I figure I can break 3 tomorrow. I've gradually increased my mileage on every single run, even by just 0.1 mile or so, which is great. Obviously if I increase my time running, I'll be traveling farther, but even throughout the week, I'll increase each run's distance. So I'll have my week 3 runs tomorrow, Friday, and Sunday, and then will have week 4 runs (days 1 and 2) on Tuesday and Thursday, and will then have my 5k run in albany on that Saturday, the 17th. Definitely won't be ready to run it all, but I'm sure we'll figure out a good running/walking pattern to finish it off. I'd love to finish it in under 30 minutes, which I think is possible, but I really don't know right now. I'm hoping by summer to be able to do the July 4th 5k in around 20 minutes. I'd love to say sub 20, but I'm positive that that'll be a little too ambitious for now. But hey, who knows, we'll just have to see. But I've got a 5k in 11 days, and I'm looking forward to, and will be able to see where I really am with a 5k, and able to see how far I've come when it's July.
Banana chips, the bane of my existence. I bought some at Trader Joes the other day, and they're soooo addicting. 160 calories for a 1/4 cup of them, which is a ton of calories for so little. Luckily I have them in a closed container, and only eat a couple at a time, so I actually have to work to get into them. But I've been doing well with my food log, usually 1800-2400 calories, which is where I should be. But when I get to that upper range, I definitely feel like I should eat less. So I'm working on finding foods that fill me the best, and I think foods high in protein usually make me feel the most full (while keeping less calories going into my body). So tuna, eggs, and cottage cheese have entered my diet a bit more.
And to finish things off, I finished Mossflower (second book in the Redwall series, prelude to Redwall), and I started The Fellowship of the Ring tonight. And that's it - I'm tired and going to bed, at 11 pm. Stay fancy; please, stay fancy.
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