Coming Back from the Wooziness

Ever read one of those blogs where they haven’t posted for a while, and the blogger says stuff like “I’ve been sooooo busy” and the like.  Well, go back and read those and that’ll fit this one, too!  I have been terribly busy, but through it all I’ve been able to keep up with running.

The week before last I added in some new weight training.  Up to this point, I’ve stuck with machines, but I decided to switch over to free weights to make my workouts more effective and efficient.  Among the exercises was the highly recommended squat.  Well, the squats really thrashed my legs.  This derailed my running a bit, and I wasn’t able to put in the miles I had previously while my legs recovered.  I still got a long run of 11 miles in despite the damage.

Then on Sunday softball season started.  We had our first practice, and the first ball thrown my way I misjudged or lost in the sun or something; I don’t really know!  Anyway, it smacked me in the face, causing a nasty little cut and some pretty good bleeding.  I patched it up the best I could and got back out there.  Unfortunately, there was a little more to it than that.

My next run went okay, but not quite up to par as I seemed to be very lethargic.  This general feeling of being tired, and also feeling out of it, continued through the week.  I went back to the gym and the free weights, cut out one set (I’ll add it back in as I progress), and my body responded great without pain.  I still felt quite tired, though.  Also, loud noises really bothered my head, and I would get headaches from time to time.  The culprit?  A mild concussion!  I’m feeling better, but still not completely rid of the ailment. 

This morning, though, I had a great run.  The weather was outstanding, and I’m motivated to do the North Face Endurance Challenge 10k this weekend.  Saturday will be an off day and then the 6.2 miles the day after.  I’m not doing a long run this week because of this race.  I’ll pick them up again next week.  Might do the body some good anyway.

At packet pickup, I snapped this shot of the starting line:

This is in Kansas City, and that's the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in the background.  This is a picturesque part of the city, so it should be nice.  They are calling for mid-60's weather, too...I hope the forecast stays true!

Seems like a well-run event so far.  Nice North Face Tech t-shirt to entrants.  Dean Karnazes is the headliner; he’s running in the marathon on Saturday, but I’m not sure if he’ll still be around on Sunday when I run. 

I feel like I’m getting back into the swing of things.  Next weekend I’m going to Vegas, and while there I’m going to enjoy myself.  I might (repeat, might) do a three-miler on the Strip on Sunday; that’d be kind of fun.  I’ll be sure to do my long run on the Friday before I leave.  I’ll keep on track…still have my half to worry about!

Enjoy your progress,

Travis

From the Treadmill, a Glimpse Back

The roller coaster ride of running has continued for me lately, but I’ve been working to keep my eye on my immediate goal of the St. Louis Rock N’ Roll Half Marathon in October.  October is getting closer and closer every day!

Last weekend, I had a terrible run where I just didn’t have it in me.  In retrospect, I believe it was the culmination of negative thoughts, humidity, and hills that did me in.  Four miles in, I was spent.  Shortly after that, the heavens intervened with a fantastic thunderstorm that forced me to shelter.  I called the wife to pick me up and save me.  Luckily she was off work; she’s a school teacher and was enjoying her last Friday off of the summer.

I was irritated by the effort throughout the weekend and Sunday I thought, “Hey, I’m feeling pretty good right now.”  I decided to give my long run another go.  This time I concentrated on a slower, steady pace with the goal being to eat up miles; not set land speed records.  It went well and I made it through 12 with energy to spare. 

It has been a decent week this week as the weather has cooled.  This morning, though, the rains came again with lightning and thunder.  I decided I’d hit the home treadmill; something I haven’t done for a while.  I’ve either run outside or run at the gym’s treadmill.  My treadmill is not a terrible one, but also not a great one.  It is a middle of the road machine but gets the job done.  I figured it’d be a good way to put on some miles, but an unremarkable run.

As I was chugging along on the hamster wheel, I looked down at the treadmill and noticed the piece of paper on it.  What I found was a reminder of how far I’ve come since February.

C25k note; sorry for the poor quality cell phone shot :-)

The paper outlined a Couch to 5k run; one of the parts where the times can be confusing (particularly when you’re tired).  Today I was running a 5k on the treadmill and thinking of it as a shorter, easier run.  Back then, such a thing would have been preposterous.  It made me feel good about how far along I’ve made it, and thankful to the me of old for starting down this path.  Along the run I picked up my pace, and registered the first sub-30 minute 5k I’ve ever run.  It was on a treadmill, so an easier environment than an outdoor run, but I still felt good about it afterward.

Ready to tear into the weekend now and squeeze in a long run on Sunday!

Enjoy your progress!

Travis

Roller Coaster and a Break

It has been a while since I’ve posted, and sort of a roller coaster the last couple of weeks.  I believe I’ve found some new focus to hopefully carry me through to October and my half marathon, as well as hitting my weight loss goals.

A couple of weeks back, some frustration was setting in.  Perhaps the daily grind was just getting to me, as it can tend to do.  I probably needed a break. 

Well, I ended up taking one.  This coincided with a decision I made to alter my nutrition plan (aka diet).  Since January, I had lost about 65 lbs on “The Four Hour Body” diet.  My running started in late February.  The problem was that I had stalled and I wasn’t losing any more weight.  I have some theories about what the issue was, but it really doesn’t matter as the end product was pure frustration.  I decided to switch my diet plan to Weight Watchers and give it a try.  I thought this my kick-start me back into gear.

The results?  Disastrous!  Now, I’m not blaming Weight Watchers.  I did not follow the plan.  Partially this was due to the fact that I was ravenously hungry all of the time.  I ate, but couldn’t eat enough; particularly in the evenings.  On Four Hour Body, I would occasionally get hungry, but this wasn’t a big problem. 

For one week, I was able to keep up my running but I didn’t cross-train so much.  I ate way too much of foods that aren’t that good for me.  I was able to get in an 11 mile long run and did pretty well with it, although I had some aches and pains in the ankle afterward.  By the time this week was over with, I had put on 10 lbs and didn’t feel good at all.

So Sunday morning I started back on the Four Hour Body.  I was supposed to put in a three mile run, as well, but I was still hurting.  I think I might have to cut down on the training a bit; I’m considering 3 days a week instead of 4, or just seeing how I feel before deciding whether or not to throw a 4^th in. 

The results thus far: I have lost the 10 lbs again and I feel better.  My ankle is still bothering me a bit, but I hope it gets better with some lighter running over the next week or so.  I have a trip to Vegas planned in almost exactly one month, so I plan to be dedicated to the diet and running until that time, then take a two day break to enjoy all that Vegas has to offer (at least the legal stuff).  I think a break every once and while helps maintain the sanity.  As far as nutrition, I am going to try to consume some protein and maybe a small amount of sugar pre-long run; something like a tablespoon of peanut butter.  I’ll see how that goes.  I’m only two miles shy of a half marathon, so I think I’ll be good.

So that’s my roller coaster story for the past week.  I’m back on track and ready to push for St. Louis in October. 

Enjoy your progress! 

Travis

Sound Barrier

One of my favorite movies is “The Right Stuff,” which is all about the early Mercury space program and man’s quest to break the sound barrier and beyond.  One of the primary characters profiled is Chuck Yeager, one of America’s true heroes.  Chuck was the first to break the sound barrier after piloting a jet that everyone thought would crash like all the others before him.  The sound barrier was considered by many to be impossible to breach by man. 

What does this all have to do with running, health, etc.?  We all have our own sound barriers.  And I’ve been thinking about mine quite a bit lately.  Today I had even more time to think about it because I had a miserable run to start the day off.

So here it is publicly: my sound barrier is 200 lbs.  It has been so difficult for me to get under this weight; I relate it to that which at times can seem impossible.  About eight years back I was on a pretty good health kick, and got close to getting under 200 lbs.  I didn’t quite make it, and ballooned back up (and down, and up, and down) again.  This current period has been my most successful period to date where I’ve lost over 65 lbs., and again I’m close to it (and have been for a couple of weeks).  I’ve been stuck, though, and just can’t seem to get under.  I know with effort and time it’ll happen, it is just frustrating to see it right in front of me and not be able to get there.

I’ve switched things up this week in order to break through.  I have abandoned my slow-carb diet and have gone back to Weight Watchers.  This was not an easy thing to do.  Slow carb took me down all this weight, so moving away from it is a bit daunting.  I had stalled on slow carb, though, and I think it may be due to my body becoming accustomed to the plan and me not getting enough calories/carbs to support my running.  So I figure I’ll try WW, which has worked for me in the past, for a few weeks at least to see if it kick starts a loss. 

Day One did not go well.  Might have been something mentally, but I didn’t stick to it very well.  I didn’t eat well at all this last weekend, and this morning my run was awful.  My nutrition likely contributed to it, but the heat was also fierce.  I struggled after two miles, pushed through to four, and quit before my goal of five.  So those excuses probably contributed, but I still think a lot of it was mental more than anything.  Ugh.  That barrier. 

I’m staying positive.  It will happen.  I have no choice but to keep pushing.  Barriers are meant to be broken.  My nutrition for the next for today and tomorrow will be good, and Wednesday morning my run will be awesome.

Enjoy your progress,

Travis

Run with the Son

Last week’s worth of running was a real treat.  My son and I took a little trip out of town to Omaha, Nebraska, primarily to see the zoo and to catch a minor league baseball game.  I checked and while we were scheduled to be up there, I found a 5k (well, actually 5.8k) that we could run.  My son is nearing the end of the Couch to 5k program, so I thought it might be a good way to keep him interested in running.

Our trip was made a little more difficult from the fact that northern Missouri, western Iowa, and eastern Nebraska have been experiencing problems with flooding along the Missouri River.  Because of this, sections of our main route, Interstate 29, were closed.  This meant that we had to take some back roads to get to our destination.  This added a little over an hour more to our drive up.  I became concerned that because of this, we might miss out on a race t-shirt.  Not a huge deal, but this was my son’s first run so I thought if at all possible we should make an effort to get there early for packet pickup.  While I registered for this race super early, we were told that we couldn’t be guaranteed a t-shirt unless we got to packet pickup on Friday. 

So we rushed up there (obeying all speed limits) to make it in time on Friday for packet pickup.  We arrived with about one hour to spare.  The packet person advised that they only had one large shirt left (they had about 50 mediums and smalls; why so many?).  That’ll work for the boy.  I’ll just take a medium and, well, I don’t know what I’ll do with it. 

The race was called “Kiliismycasa,” a benefit for CASA in Omaha (court advocates for children).  The race director had climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro the previous year (a 5.8k climb) to also benefit CASA.  That explains the unusual distance.

 Being in an unfamiliar town, the next morning we got to the race site pretty early.  It was a lot of standing around for about 45 minutes, swatting an inordinate number of gnats (close to the river, I guess)?  We talked it over and he said he was going to do a run/walk, while I was confident I could run all of it (or close).  I told him I’d loop back around and help him to the finish, and the plan was established. 

The horn was sounded and we were off.  We ran together at the start and it was awesome!  I was so glad that we were able to share this experience together.  After the first half mile or so, he slipped back into his pace.  It was a pleasant morning for a run. 

After the first mile, we encountered some pretty challenging hills.  Actually, they were quite challenging.  When I hit the third significant hill, I decided I’d power walk up it.  I was surprised that Omaha had such beasts.  I was able to get through and hit the finish line at 38:10. 

I looped back around and looked for my son, and a little later saw him coming down a hill.  I jumped in with him and we went the last quarter mile together toward the finish line.  It was really cool!  High fives finished the day for us, and he seemed to really love the run.  All around, it was awesome.

We then spent the day celebrating and eating like kings; we deserved it!  Omaha is a neat town with a great zoo, and the minor league baseball game was a lot of fun.  The only sad note of the trip: he left his t-shirt in the hotel room!  Argh!

I’ll never forget the weekend.  Hopefully it won’t be our last race together, but you can’t ever duplicate the first.

Enjoy your progress!

Travis

Inspirations

I was supposed to do my long run this morning because I have a 5.8k race Saturday.  Last night, however, the wife was busy and the weather wasn’t too bad, so I decided upon a night run.  I started out at around 8:30, and all went well except that it got a bit dark on me.  At one point I run through a park without street lights.  It was extremely dark!  I cut that part of the route short and then got back to the streets and streetlights.  At 7.5 miles, I really started to struggle (the wall?).  I had to push very hard to get through the last 1.5 to make a bit over 9 miles.  This was on target for my half marathon training plan, so I’m all good with it.  And it helped me sleep in a bit the following day.  

There are lots of motivations that you have as you move toward a goal, such as weight loss or a run.  I think one of the best motivators is success.  The more weight I lose and the longer my runs are, the more motivated I become to do even more.  

I was told by someone today that what I have done was inspirational in their eyes.  I don’t think I’ve ever been told something nicer than that.  To think that my transformation may help others to do the same is humbling.  We get wrapped up in our own challenges but often don’t think about how we are seen in the eyes of others.  Perhaps that is just some additional stress that we really don’t need.  It is nice to hear, though, that you are a positive influence on someone else.  

If only some of that inspiration would help my muscles repair quicker…

Enjoy your progress!

Travis