After Thanksgiving Health Plan

Haven't been on this for while, but decided once again to keep up with this journal type thing. So, Thanksgiving has past and I have gained several pounds from the Thanksgiving dinner and then the grazing the days after. Before the inhaling of food this past Thursday, I was settling around the weight of 185 lbs -- not too shabby considering that it's right in between my marathon weight of 175 lbs. and my overweight-I-am-unhappy-type weight of 195 lbs. With Xmas rolling around the corner and the rich cooking of Ron's parents and mine...it's inevitable that I will eat a little more than usual. Yes I have accepted this. With my new system in hand (with the Wii board and exercise games) and canoeing training guidelines in the other....off to my new attack on my weight loss/muscle building plan.

Today I tried out a little of the Wii Fit Plus game (if you can call exercising a game or not) and looked pretty cool. They even have an incentive of, the more you are on the console working out you get this pet machine thing that will evolve over the period of time....so of course I'm like, oooooo a new pet! So I am going to try and do yoga 3 times a week (on the Wii) in the early morning hours before work and try the other exercise programs on the game in the evenings. I still have line dancing and yoga class at work (Tuesday and Thursday), so I will be keeping that going. Not to mention I have canoe practice Wednesday and Saturday but that hasn't been really consistent since it's off season. I also have a couple exercises to help with the canoe training (push ups, seated dips, crunches) which I will be doing at lunch 3x a week (Monday, Wednesday, Friday).

Yes it looks like a lot but with my butt sitting in my cubicle for 8 hours, I think it balances it out. My weight is settling at 185 lbs, but it's time to start loosing some of that extra weight. ;) I even went through my 32 GBs worth of music and made a Fit playlist since I was getting sick of all my other music. Putting that list together took an hour and a half...so much music!

I have been eating healthy before the on-going Thanksgiving feast. Actually incorporated about 2 fruit per day in my diet (apples and pears, yum!). I have given up on Strawberries...they just end up being mushy and rotten....so yay for apples and pears! I'll probably keep up with that regiment and my usual sandwich type lunch with pretzel and peanut butter "chips". I need to find a good vegetable plan to incorporate because it's hard to bring veggies to work and actually look at them with a "yum veggies" attitude. Fruit I can be like, yum sweet fruit but veggies...well it's veggies. I'll probably try to bring corn with me and start to eat that as a snack or something near the end of the work day.

Like most people, I am starting this regiment Monday since it's the "beginning" of the week. I should probably try to record my food intake... but I am not very motivated in doing that. I don't want to "count" my calories daily because I am already adding all the new exercises....one step at a time. =)

Trial of the new running shoes

So last weekend I purchased new running shoes (Nike) from the Road Runners store. When I got my shoes sized they mentioned an added insole for the shoe that would give me more support. After 2 trial runs (1 on the treadmill, 1 road) they seem to be causing more pain than before-- i.e. left knee pain, left foot big toe pain, and my achilles heel on my right foot. I then tried the run on a treadmill and the pains were gone without the insoles. I told the person at the store that I am not a big fan of them because when I had them for basketball in high school they just hurt my feet more. But being a slow learner, I decided maybe I should give them a try since it may be different...well it wasn't. haha I will probably return them tomorrow and get my $25.00 back. The shoes are definitely comfy so I am very excited and they have helped with the pain I was feeling before in my old shoes.

For running we are on the 3rd week of training which is past the 2 mile mark. For the strength training we are taking a week off to let the muscles recover from the number of weeks we have been lifting weights. Then after a week we'll be going back to the mixture of running and strength training. But so far everything has been going great. We are officially registered for the coastwisemile race in La Jolla that has a 5k for Oct. 3rd. It'll be a fun race. I may be making shirts for race day but that's a little far off.

Run run and run

So the last two workouts were really good. The one on Thursday was the mix of strength training and running, and the strength training was kicking my butt that day. I don't know why since we've been doing the same exercises before, but near the end I was gasping for air. After that day's workout I felt pretty good. Then Friday we had just a run outside. We're in the 3rd week of training and it required to jog 3/4 mile then 1/2 mile then 3/4 mile jog. Ron was able to complete it and is feeling great after the run (before the run was a whole different story =P ). Today's run will be a jog of 2 miles and we'll be doing that outside.

Also today I'm suppose to go get my new running shoes from roadrunners. When I run in my old shoes in a faster pace, the inside of my left foot near the toes starts to hurt. It's like I am pushing against the ground to run instead of my full foot. It might be compensating for my knee since I hurt it a while ago, but hopefully it'll go away once I get new shoes.

This week we'll be registering for the coastwise mile race which has a 5k for us. I'm getting excited because it'll be the first time I get to run a race with Ron. I'm glad the training is going well. =)

Running and getting stronger...

Yesterday we went to the gym and continued our workout. It was a 2 mile run from the 2nd week of training and some strength training. Ron did his 2 miles which was good and I ended up running a little over 3 miles. I was able to get down to a 10 minute pace for about a mile and a half which felt really good. Some how just had a little more energy than before. Even when I was running at the 10 minute pace, my arms kept me going and I felt a lot stronger. I think it might be thanks to the strength training program we're on. Anyways, we also did a round of the usual weights and after all of it, I felt pretty damn good. =) I was tired but I felt recovered so that's pretty cool.

Tomorrow we will probably run on the street again and take a break on the weights. I may take an early run in the morning and see how I feel. I think I will be probably need to invest in new running shoes since my big toe on my left foot is starting to feel a little pain...I think I favor the inner side of my foot causing me to put more pressure on the big toe. But overall it's going well and I shall update the blog tomorrow after the run. =)

Close to the end of the 2nd week

So the training has been going well so far. We continued with our training for running and with the weights. It was a difficult week since the running and the strength training routine increased, so definitely a lot more tiring workouts. We actually missed a day of the gym this week(Thursday) because my car had a flat tire when we parked at the gym. It took all my strength to get the lug nuts off the wheel since it's been a while since they have moved. By the time we were able to put the doughnut on the car, we were tired from the whole ordeal. It may seem silly, but seriously I was using my full body strength on the wrench to get those stubborn things off the wheel. To make a long story short the next day all my muscles were super sore-- the muscles between my shoulder blades, my legs (butt, hamstrings, calves). But besides missing that day, all the workouts were pretty good.

Yesterday, we actually went out to run on the street so that Ron can start having his body adapt to running on the street. For me running on a treadmill vs. running on the street are different things. For one, the band of the treadmill moves for you so you don't have to really move yourself forward. Plus the treadmill route is flat, while running on the street you're going to have to step over uneven parts of the sidewalk, run on a incline and decline. I had brought my garmen watch to measure the distance and in the end he was happy as a clam to have actually completed the 2 miles. In the end I think I enjoy running on the street because I can push him at the right distance and we can run together. So that run was a good one without much pain. =)

Next week I'm going to start Ron running twice a week on the street and the other 2 times will be on the treadmill. So Monday we would run at the gym, Wednesday would be street, Thursday would be gym, and Saturday would be street. In my mind it allows him to recover from the run on the street by running on the treadmill plus it works for our schedules since we would want to run when it was still light out.=)

Start of a new week-- intensity going up!

This is an update for yesterday (Monday). I wasn't able to update yesterday because I was really tired from the workout. =) Any who, we did weigh in and I still weigh 188lbs which means I didn't gain or lose any weight. I guess it's a good change because 2 weeks back I gained like 3 lbs, then I gained 1 lb the following week, now I stopped...maybe, just maybe it will start going down. *fingers crossed* I guess you can say that I kinda have given up on weigh loss as the only sign of success in my workouts. I figured if I feel like my clothes are fitting better but my weight isn't changing much then I am fine with that. It could also be gaining of muscle that can push your weigh higher as well. I'll still continue to weigh myself just to keep track but I won't get all sad about it if I don't lose too much weight. =)

So this was the beginning of a new week for the running workout and also meant a change of pace for the strength training. For running, it calls for 2 miles with alternating jogging and walking (not the same distance). Ron was able to finish his 2 miles with a nice puddle of sweat soaking into his shirt. But he completed it. While Ron was doing his 2 miles I did my 2 miles then completed the remaining of what Ron had... which meant I did about 3.25 miles total. By the end of the workout I was sweating like crazy which felt great. After the running workout, we headed to the weights.

The weights this week went up from 2 sets to 3 sets but a decrease of reps. So last week it was basically 2 sets of 12 reps of a certain routine of exercises, now we have 3 sets of 10 reps for the same exercises this week. It's actually a pretty good workout considering that the first stage of this workout we did 2 sets of 15 reps, then went 2 sets of 12 which meant less reps made you feel like you can make your weight heavier. With this in mind, when we then moved to 3 sets with 10 reps, we basically kept at the same heavier weights but are doing more sets. So we're not always doing the same things, but instead challenging the muscles as we change the sets and reps. By the end of the workout, I was ready to go home! haha 

Today is a break day so we're not going to the gym tonight. But this week we will be doing Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday for the remaining gym days. We also started drinking the protein shake last night. We mixed milk and the powder and then let it sit in with ice in a glass so when you drink it, it's super cold and the protein shake taste isn't as noticeable. Also I had gotten a hair cut recently (lady totally messed it up...*sigh*) but now my hair is shorter and I can wear it in two pig tails. I noticed that when my hair gets longer if I wear it in a single pony tail it tends to hurt my head and it feels heavy in one area since there's only 1 pony tail. So I try to keep my hair short enough so that I don't feel my hair bouncing so much on the back of my head that it might separate from my scalp. =P 

Anyways, today is break day. So I will update again tomorrow. =) 

Week 1 done....

So Saturday, me and Ron finished the last run in week 1 of the couch potato training schedule (4 days a week). We're also half way through phase 1 of the strength and conditioning workout. We're feeling great and this week we will be doing 4 days a week worth of running and 3 of those days accompanied with the strength training. Tomorrow is weigh in day, so we'll see if we have lost any thing. I have no doubt Ron has lost weight from the week. For me, well we shall see. =P Also this coming weekend we will try to jog together on a trail instead of the treadmill to see how his body reacts -- i.e. back or knee pains.

With the strength and conditioning workouts I've noticed I'm getting a lot stronger and increasing in weights which is a great motivator. We've decided on a 5k run in the beginning of October located in La Jolla, CA. The race info can be found at www.coastwisemile.com. It should be a fairly flat run so it should be great for beginners who have just got into running. And since it's in San Diego, it should be nice weather for the start of Fall. More posts tomorrow after weigh in.

Happy Running! =)