Back on Track!

Miles in 2014: 93.3

Days until Nike DC Women’s Half Marathon: 89

After over a whole week of rest after the Dopey Challenge, I hopped right back on board with training!  Tuesday I opted out of the track workout and chose to do mile repeats instead to work my tired legs back into running.  Thursday we did our "hill loop" with a hill repeat thrown in.  This week we also switched our intervals from 3:1's to 4:1's.  When I first started running two and a half years ago I struggled with the 3:1. Most days I could not run an entire 3 minute interval to save my life.  It took me a very long time before I was able to complete the bulk of my training runs where I was able to run the 3:1 interval for the entire time.  As we have been training this past season we came to the realization that we are reaching a point with our running that we will be unable to run those 3 minutes much faster than we are and the only way to continue improving our times is to increase our running intervals.  After the Dopey we agreed to try and bump them up to 4:1's and then again to 5:1's by the end of the session.  While the 4's were challenging, I was able to run all of my intervals for our 2 week day workouts and our 8 mile run on Saturday.  It really seems to be a much easier transition that I had expected.

Saturday was the first weekend long run of the season and I am a group leader I had to go to the run even though I had a race the following day.  We had a great run at a comfortable pace which was great since many of us are either still recovering from recent races or just coming back to training.

First Weekend Run of Amanda & Leah's official group!

The next day was the Inaugural Celebration Half Marathon.  We had a huge group running the race and I truly loved this event.  The course was pretty and well supported.  We ran our 4:1 intervals for the first half of the race before switching back to 3:1's. At mile 10 we decided to walk it in the rest of the way to help Leah's knee which is still a little tender after her tumble at Dopey.  The after party had a great sampling of food from all of the local Celebration business.  Overall it was a great race.

What a great group!

Amy captured this classic cup toss of me!

This week it's back to work.  I need to continue cleaning up my diet for sure.  It's amazing what an important role that plays in this.  Tomorrow's track combo workout looks BRUTAL but I'm interested to try it out.  Thursday is our usual neighborhood run.  Saturday I'm headed to Safety Harbor for the Best Damn Race.  Last year this was a great event so I am definitely looking forward to running it again.  There are 6 of us running the half and another friend will be running his first 10k ever!  I'm so proud of this accomplishment and I hope I can beat him back to the finish line to see him cross (I'm gonna have to run really fast to achieve that!)  I know I have lots of other friends running the 5k and 10k so I hope to see them all there! 

Blasphemy: Sometimes Running Just Isn't Enough

Days in the Gym this month: 2

Pounds: 159

In addition to running and training for all of these half and full marathons I am determined to get consistent with heading back to the gym.  When I first started to lose weight 3 years ago I headed to the gym 4 mornings a week for several months straight.  I kept up with weights for several more months when I first started running.  I was running 3 days a week and strength training 2 days a week.  When I’d get really tired and run down the weights were always the first thing to go.  I started this fitness journey almost exactly 3 years ago and I was 234 pounds.  In the summer this year I got down to my lowest weight in about 7 years – 147 pounds.  This was after a 3 day juice fast that left me run down and tired.  I admittedly fell into some old habits and got lazy when it came to eating clean and lifting weights.  “But you run so much” or “those extra pounds must be muscle” is often what I would hear when I would say I felt lazy or “heavy.”  Sadly for me running alone is just simply not enough to get me to and keep me at the ideal weight, size, and body type that I would desperately love to have.  Looking back at my Nike Boom training app it’s no surprise that the pounds have crept back on, before Sunday I had only gone to the gym 11 times this whole year!

This weekend I weighed myself.  EEEEEEK.  I was 159 pounds – I hadn’t seen that high of a number in almost a year.  I’m terrified of seeing 160 again.  I pulled out the book (The Female Body Breakthrough) that had helped me 3 years ago when I was finally ready to be healthy.  I refreshed my memory of stuff I already knew but I had slacked off about doing.  Instead of the usual “I’ll get back on track tomorrow” that I would normally say, I drug myself out of bed, put on a cute gym ensemble, kissed the snuggly pups goodbye,  and drug myself to the gym.  I figured I would do the shorter and easier of my two typical workouts to ease myself back into this gym thing.  I did better than I had expected to do which was a relief.  From there I went straight to the grocery store and stocked up on all the right foods I need to be eating.  I didn’t stop there.  I came home and went to work in the kitchen.  I made 5 salads in a jar for my lunches this week, I cooked egg white muffins for my breakfast, and I grilled some chicken breast on the Foreman so it would be ready to toss in the salads.  My husband made spaghetti for dinner, instead of plowing through the pasta and commercial sauce, I cooked a green pepper and tossed in the ground beef and onion he was using for the spaghetti and added in some canned tomatoes, then I topped it off with a piece of Havarti cheese and melted it.  A successful and healthy alternative to what he was making.

Healthy Eats

This morning I woke up and got to my gym as it opened.  I did the harder of my 2 workouts (the metabolic acceleration) and did pretty well with it.  I also hopped on the recumbent bike and pedaled an easy 14 minutes and 3.5 miles as a cool down.  I’ve always liked the way the recumbent bike feels when my legs feel particularly tired.  It was a great start to the day and the work week.  I came home and drank my protein shake with ground flax and dark cherries blended into it.

I also set up my rewards system again.  I know it sounds like I am a five year old who needs a positive reinforcement system, but I don’t care.  I have a jar. Every time I hit the gym I put a dollar bill in it.  Last time I used this system I also put in a dollar per mile I ran.  Jason sponsored my weight loss, he contributed a ten dollar bill for every 10 pounds I lost.  So the jar has $2 in it.  I think I will wait until I hit my goal weight/size/physique and use that money to either get another tattoo, or make it the money I can blow at the Nike DC Women’s Half Expo.  The harder I work now, the more rocking that tattoo will be, or the more Nike stuff I can OD in April.

For some people losing weight or keeping yourself at a certain size is easy.  Unfortunately, for me it isn’t.  It is definitely a process that I have to continually work at.  My goal right now is to hit the gym 11 times in December – that’s right the same number of times that I have gone all year.  I’ll still be running three days a week – I mean I do have a 48.6 mile 4 day race series in month!  But it’s time to focus and reinvest in myself.