Adjusted Reality

Tag: weights Page 12 of 13

Half Marathon Training, Week 2

By Quix

On December 1, 2009

In Half Marathon Training

How did the first week go? I’ll tell ya.

About to do the chicken (turkey) dance?

Monday: 5 mile pace (let’s call it a tempo)

Check. I felt much better after completing this one. Instead of BARELY finishing under 10 min/mile pace, I came in at 46 and some change. Much closer to where I need to be. It was a little faster than normal tempo pace for the rest of the training, but more purposed towards a “test run” for my race.

Tuesday: DDR circuit (these are still kicking my butt wonderfully)

Check. This is great cross training. I need to come up with something else to do occasionally but damn it’s a nice little cardio/weights/awesome home butt kicking workout all in an hour.

Wednesday: yoga/rest

Check. I actually wanted to work out this day and felt weird resting but it was all good because then I was rested for my…

Thursday: 5 mile RACE (let’s call this my long run)

Check. I was aiming for under 45 minute, but once I ran through the course itself with it’s myriad of HILLS (there is one street on the course I hate WALKING up or BIKING up, let alone running as fast as I can up it towards the end of the 5th mile), I was perfectly happy with 45:50. A little intimidated that it’s right about the pace I’m aiming to run the half at, but hey, I’ve got 11 weeks, right? 🙂

Friday: DDR circuit

Check. Didn’t want to, but did it anyway. Felt just dandy after.

Saturday: 4×400 sprints (1 mile w/up + c/down, 400m recovery in between)

Check. Zliten and I went to the track and he got a nice jog in while I did my sprints. All sprints were between 1:50 – 1:58. It was a little harder than I remembered, but I also think I was not 100% and starting to get sick.

Sunday: rest

Oh yeah. I was pretty much in sick mode and didn’t leave the couch much at all besides some delicious chinese food.

15k people on a Thursday morning look like this.

So what’s up for this next week?

To be quite honest, I feel crappy and unsure about even calling this week 2. Mostly, because I feel crappy myself. Yesterday I started to come down with something (ok, probably Saturday but I ignored it…bad Quix) and today it’s still here. My throat is sore, my nose is a wee bit runny and plugged, and I’m going from hot to cold to hot to cold to hot in literally 5 minutes. Normally, I’m just coldcoldcold *momentofcomfort* coldcoldcold, so I know I’m out of whack.

I probably could push through and run today if my life depended on it, hell, a year or 2 ago I probably would have, but after reading up on workouts while sick, the general consensus is:

-Stick to light/moderate intensity workouts and no heavy weights. Sadly, I don’t think sprints are in this category.

-If you just have head cold symptoms, you can workout (but still lighter than normal). I don’t have any lung issues, but the fact that I sweat through 2 pairs of PJs last night and the hotcoldhotcold makes me think that perhaps it’s a sign to chillax.

-If you’re feeling tired, it’s probably best to rest (and considering I rested ALL DAY yesterday, went to sleep at 11pm, dragged myself out of bed at 9:30am, and I’m still dragging ass today – I’ll call that tired).

And this is what 15k people look like once they get going...

So the plan for this next week was:

Monday: 4×800 sprints

Tuesday: DDR circuit

Wednesday: 4 mile tempo

Thursday: DDR circuit

Friday: 6 mile run

Weekend: rest

Obviously, this is not going to happen. I expect the week to look more like this:

Monday: sleeeeeep

Tuesday: light DDR (no weights)

Wednesday: 4 mile VERY SLOW

Thursday: DDR circuit

Friday: 4×800 sprints

Saturday: 6 mile run

Sunday: rest

I normally would not do sprints and my long run back to back, but considering 6 miles isn’t THAT long, I can probably do it, as long as I’m feeling 100% by then. It’s also entirely possible that the week might look like this, depending on how long I feel crappy:

Monday: sleeeeeep

Tuesday: sleeeeeeep

Wednesday: walk around the block

Thursday: light DDR

Friday: walk around the two surrounding blocks

Weekend: rest

I am just going to play it by ear. If I feel crappy, I’m gonna rest. If I feel ok, I’m going to workout. I’m also going to remember that I have 10 more weeks after this one to make it through, and the only way to do that is to recover fully as quickly as possible. And risking injury by pushing through workouts when I feel this crappy is NOT the way to do it.

There we go. Race 6. Soon my toes are gonna have to get in on the action...

NaNoWriMo:

Fail. 30.5k words still. I might write a little tonight but I sorta quit on it this week. I threw a little temper tantrum about it and realized that the most important thing to come out of this with is a renewed sense of love for writing and the knowledge that writing a book is not nearly as daunting of a task as I thought it was. Writing everyday is daunting. Promising to do anything every day for me is daunting. Beyond waking up, brushing my teeth, eating something, reading something on the internet, and going to sleep, there is nothing I do every day. I need days off work. I need days off working out. I need days off being responsible. Writing is no different.

That’s not to say I don’t love writing (or working out, or whatnot). I just can’t spend two hours of my day every day doing it with all my other responsibilities and hobbies and need for a social life (pshaw). So, the plan going forward is to dedicate 6 hours per week – about my workout time on a normal week. 1.5 hours x2 weekdays, and 3 hours on a weekend. Once I finish, I’ll dedicate the time to editing. If that seems like a comfortable amount of time to spend per week, I’ll continue that into 2010 and start a new one.

So what’s up this week for you? What is your best cold cure? Do you work out when you’re sick?

Second Half Marathon Training, Week 1

By Quix

On November 23, 2009

In Half Marathon Training

So, let me just wrap up last week before I get on with it. It was pretty much a bust. I injured myself and couldn’t run Monday and Tuesday. Wednesday I had an event to go to and still felt a little stiff, and apparently I had something emotionally to work out as Zliten and I stayed up until 4am drinking on a weekday, so I was too exhausted Thursday after slogging through a tough day at work hungover on no sleep. Yeah. Hello, me 3 years ago. I did get up and do a 6 mile run and a killer DDR circuit Friday and Saturday, but I am still very disappointed with how much I’ve let distance running lapse this summer, and how HARD that was to just keep up a pace that was about what I’ve targeted my long run pace to be (around 9:45 per mile). Sunday, I counted 6 hours of shopping as my cardio.

Yet again this week, I am terrified of the scale. Not that I think I did that badly, it’s just this irrational thing that happens once I let go of tracking, I think I’m going to just start gaining and gaining. I don’t trust myself yet to really know what to do without the numbers. We will see. A healthy day today and a nice long run tonight, and I’ll be ready to hop on tomorrow morning so I can give a “start weight” for the half process.

While my goal is still to get down to under 150 by December 31st, I am not going to actively try to cut calories very low for the rest of the year. I reached my low weight of 150.2 a few weeks into half training last time just with increased exercise (before my appetite caught up). Maybe this will happen again! Regardless – pushing my body to run harder, better, faster, stronger is more important than losing a few lbs as of today.

So, let’s get on with it.

Basic Half Marathon Goals:

-Using the FIRST half marathon methodology (of course, an amalgamation of lots of different plans though), I’m going to be ONLY running 3 days per week. But the running days, they are killer. Most Mondays are sprints days. They vary between 4×400 to start out with (with a mile warmup and cooldown) and 5×1600 (same). Wednesdays are tempo runs, ranging from 4-8 miles before the taper. Friday/Sat/Sun (one of these days): is the long run, progressing from 5 miles this week to 12 miles before the taper.

I noticed that I am a lot better and fresher with a day off between runs and feel like I can expend more effort. I also remember feeling like slogging through some of those 4-5 mile slow pace weekday runs were pointless. I totally get the 3 quality runs per week idea and the research shows that most people PR with the training. It also means I can keep up with DDR and weights as well without feeling like I have to squeeze it in.

-I’m going to try the “lots of food/good food” type approach. Trying to limit my intake during training was like trying to ask a dragon politely not to breathe fire. So I’m going to give myself permission to snack as much as I want on APPROVED things, like veggies, jerky, pistachios… and probably find some healthy, whole grainy carb type things. I will keep my meals unchanged. This is not going to be an excuse to hit the buffet and eat 1500 calories. I will also NOT eat out of the fridge. This has to stop before it starts. If I want a modest snack of turkey pepperoni, a bowl of pistachios, and a tub of mixed greens, I need to serve it to myself and take it at least to the couch.

-My “pie in the sky” goal is sub 2 hours. My 5k time translated into half marathon time says I should be able to do it. The reality is – I’m just much better at short distance speed than I am picking up the pace beyond my “run forever” pace of about 10:30-11 minute miles once I get in the double digits. My realistic goal is to beat my time from the last one. My “the-day-is-shite” goal is just to finish without walking.

This week is a little weird as I’m doing a 5 mile race on thanksgiving. I haven’t trained for it for crap, but I think with race day jitters I can at least pull out a 45 minute (9 min mile) pace. If not, hey, I ran 5 miles Thanksgiving morning before I stuff my face with turkey, and I got a groovy shirt. Totally win. So this week is:

Monday: 5 mile pace (let’s call it a tempo)

Tuesday: DDR circuit (these are still kicking my butt wonderfully)

Wednesday: yoga/rest

Thursday: 5 mile RACE (let’s call this my long run)

Friday: DDR circuit

Saturday: 4×400 sprints (1 mile w/up + cool down, 400m recovery in between)

Sunday: rest

Normally, it would be run M/W/F, DDR circuits Tu/Th, but the race mucks this up. I already screwed up the ability to run this all outside (unless I decide tonight to hit the track for 5 miles in the dark…hmmm…didn’t think of that before) but unless the weather brings forth some icky icky clouds I’m golden for sprints at the track on Saturday.

The paces frighten me. For an approximate 9:10 goal pace, which is a 2 hour half, here is what they want me to train at:

400s – 1:58 (no problem)

800s – 4:02 (again, no problem)

1600s – 8:25 (no problem in theory, 5 of these in one workout will be KILLER though)

tempo: 8:55 per mile (err, 8 miles below 9 minute miles? sceeery!!!)

long run: 9:40 per mile (this will be pretty brutal too, but I feel more confident about this than the tempos).

Wish me luck! Anyone ever done 3 day per week running training, or at least focused on quantity over quality miles? Any suggestions on making improvements on long distance pace? My brain just seems to get intimidated and shut off the ability to really push myself above a 5k.

NaNoWriMo:
I’m about 9k words behind. I’m going to try and rally this week… but that would mean almost 2700 words per day. What I’m going to do if I *don’t* finish is to dedicate at least 1.5 hours after work 2 days per week and 3 hours on a weekend day EACH WEEK until I finish. Unless I’m really inspired to talk about it before then for some reason, I’ll let you in on how I did December 1st.

And, if you made it through this far, let me reward you with this gem. I feel greeeeeeeaaaattt! Baaaaabiiiieeesss!!!! Happy faux-Wednesday if you’ve got a short week like we have for Thanksgiving! If not, happy Monday to the lot of ya.

DDR Circuits

By Quix

On November 13, 2009

In Uncategorized

So what did I do instead? I think the title says it all. I wanted to take the awesome from the 30 day shred and convert it into something I could do sans DVD with my own twist on things.

I present to you, DDR circuits (version 1):

1 song warmup

1 song + 1 minute strength, rinse and repeat 12 times

1 more song

1 song cooldown

The exercise list:

Arms – traveling pushups, 10 lb chest flys, plank flys, lat raises

Abs – bicycles, double crunches, supermans, and plank twists

Legs/arms – squat and press, lunge and hammer curl, front rows with military press, side arm raises with calf raises.

You’ll recognize most of this from the 30 Day Shred (minus the last legs and arms exercise I concocted all on my own).

The verdict? I did about 3/4 of a normal 30 minute DDR session, burning about 3/4 of the calories. I got through a normal strength session worth of 12 exercises. It took about 50 minutes, where that workout would usually take about an hour and a quarter, minimum, so bonus. However, it felt…underwhelming. It was too easy. I’ll reserve judgment for tomorrow, but it felt like a nice light workout. Totally not on par with a shred. I’m not giving up however.

I present to you, DDR circuits (version 2):

5 song warmup

2 strength exercises – 3 mins total

2 songs

1 ab exercises for 1 minute

x 4 total

5 song cooldown

Same exercise list.

Basically, this is Jillian’s 3-2(ish)-1 ratio

Verdict: the ratio rules. I feel worked just like a shred without any of the heel pain. This will probably make up a good amount of my cross training days during half training. Its a full strength and cardio workout in less than an hour.

And on that note, I’m going to disconnect from lappy and enjoy the rest of my (pre-planned) hookey day. It’s about 75 and sunny and I think I need to find somewhere outside to soak it up.

Have a lovely weekend!

An Untimely, Shreddy, End

By Quix

On November 12, 2009

In Uncategorized

The 30 Day Shred Experiment is over.

Not because I’m a wuss (though I have to keep telling myself that). Not because the workout was too hard. It was challenging workout for sure, but I was able to get through it. Not because I hated seeing Jillian’s smug mug every day saying the same cheeseball lines about “gargling my heart” or “replacing hours phoning it in at the gym”. Not because it got boring doing the same damn thing over and over each day.

Just about the only thing that could break me did – I found myself yesterday *thisclose* to an injury. When I first started running I had a lot of heel problems. I had to take 2 weeks off (which literally almost drove me crazy) because each step doing something more poundy than just walking hurt like the dickens. Of course, I’ve gotten over this. I haven’t felt heel pain minus an odd tinge in about a year and a half. Until Jillian came into my life.

The first week wasn’t so bad. In fact, the overwhelming pain was leg muscles, and it was the “hurt-so-good” pain. So I kept on. Week 2 wasn’t too bad either. However, I think my feet started to be sensitive as by the end of it, I REQUIRED new shoes. I’ve been wearing the old ones to shred and honestly, nothing really seems wrong with them now. Week 3, I only made it through 4 days and started to feel some mild heel pain. Figure it would go away. This week didn’t start so badly, but yesterday morning, I had to quit during the WARMUP because my heels were killing me.

If you know me, I do not quit workouts. Starting sometimes is an issue but when I’m suited up, I’m just about unstoppable.

After considering the options, I decided that Jillian everyday was not going to work for me. Not with running and DDR too, and I don’t want to give those up. My heels were still mildly sore today, so I avoided running, but was able to DDR without a problem, even the super jumpy songs. This doesn’t mean I’ll never shred again, but I cannot see doing it every day. Apparently my heels aren’t tough enough.

So, my half-assed review follows:

Weight lost: Hard to say because I fluctuate so much, but I will say that when I started, my weight was between about 155-158. I’m now stabilizing around 154-155 this week with a low last week of 152.8. I would have liked to say that this was the month where I kicked the 150’s to the curb, but I just didn’t have it together.

Inches lost: I totally misplaced my measuring tape, but I found another way to tackle this problem. Huge progress here. I had one pair of jeans that were in the “a little tight but wearable-ish”, and one pair that would barely button at the beginning of the month (both size 6s). I am happy to report that both pairs are now in my regular rotation (though the too tight to button, I do have to take care which shirts I wear with them as they are suuuuper low rise).

Pictures come later – I took befores, and I am going to take afters tomorrow or on a day I don’t feel so bloated. 🙂

The good:

I feel stronger. I haven’t felt stronger like this in a while. Through my half training my weights and reps stopped increasing and I just haven’t been motivated to do a big push on this since. While I was only using 7 lb weights during most of the videos (occasionally I’d switch to my 3 lb ones on the second set if I was hurting), it definitely worked me over.

I discovered I needed to work some muscles I wasn’t. I had been neglecting the squats and lunges for a long time, and had convinced myself that running worked them just fine. Not so. The first day convinced me of that when I was having trouble sitting down and getting up the next day after a 20 minute workout.

I had been shying away from dual moves (for example, lunges with hammer curls instead of just doing hammer curls). Now I know that I’ll get worked over much faster by doing two things at the same time. I mean, duh, right? Not sure why I didn’t get this before.

I have fallen in love with circuits! I dig the idea of mixing strength, cardio, and abs into one simultaneous workout.

My short distance running has VASTLY improved. My easy 5ks have gone from 30-ish to 27-28ish and I did a 25 minute tempo run two days ago and got 3 miles under my belt. My goal was a 5k under 25 minutes and this takes me so damn close. I haven’t done a timed mile in a while but I bet I could shatter my 7:17 record. Shredding was also a fantastic warm up for running. If I had an hour, I did a shred and then immediately hit the pavement for a 5k.

I feel slimmer. I may not weigh much less than I did a month ago, but putting on those skinny jeans and having them fit felt GREAT.

Traveling pushups. ‘Nuff said.

The bad:

It just felt wrong to do the same workout 5 days in a row. If my heel hadn’t acted up, I totally would have been down for doing alternating levels, but doing the same workout 5 days in a row? Totally boring and bad for the muscles, imo.

I didn’t look forward to it at all most days. There were some mornings it took me an extra few minutes to get out of bed because I didn’t want to shred. It was definitely a “get through this” part of the workout and not a “hey cool I get to do this” part.

Anyone else just fucking hate jumping jacks?

The ugly:

As detailed above, I got really close to a heel injury. No bueno at all.

However, I really enjoyed what I did today, but you’ll have to wait until tomorrow to hear about it. Yes, I know I’m awful.

So I want to know – anyone gonna go shred after my review? Ever found a great exercise that works wonders but your body just didn’t like it? Who wants to call me a wuss for not finishing my last few days? Any shredders and runners see a huge improvement in times like I did? Hit me up.

Pictures from fukung.net, that don’t have anything to do with anything but made me laugh. 🙂

Monday, Day 8, 3 Days to Vegas

By Quix

On September 28, 2009

In Uncategorized

OMG, it’s all happening. I’m just so ready to be on the plane and have everything, for the most part, out of my hands and done. Only 3 more days of work left.

Project: Unfluffy Bride

Well, you can’t eat (or at least I can’t eat) 1200-1300 calories all the time. That’s ok. I don’t think that’s really good for one’s well being anyway. Thursday, the stress of the week got to me and I had some cocktails on the patio. Friday night, I had this INSATIABLE craving for pizza, and between dinner and breakfast/lunch on Saturday, Zliten and I polished off a medium (which is, IMO, extremely responsible pizza eating). There may have been some baked chicken wings too, but I’m not telling.

Then Saturday night was our friend’s son’s birthday dinner – and their mom (an awesome gourmet chef) was cooking. She’s only in town a few times a year, and you just don’t refuse it. It is buttery, salty love. We headed over and there was homemade appetizer “pizza” (dough brushed with olive oil and garlic, cheese, and the most amazing tomatoes and peppers). Then dinner was roasted pork shoulder, some sort of barley side dish, asparagus, and blt salad (just like it sounds – lettuce with hunks of tomato, bacon, and some sort of homemade thousand-ish dressing). Then for desert, no churn super chocolate homemade icecream with homemade whipped cream on top. And to top it off, some more whiskey.

Then, the next day, Zliten was getting angry about his taco craving so we went to mexican and split a plate of fajitas. By the end of the day, I put my foot down and made a big batch of chicken tortilla soup so I could have a nice, lo cal dinner. As horrible as it all sounds, I did watch my portions pretty well and didn’t go nuts on anything. I didn’t mention the fruits and veggies I squeezed in. Of course I could have done better but I could have done way worse so no guilt here!

I also did not exercise at all. So for those of you counting last week, it was DDR and weights on Tuesday and Thursday, and recreational dance on Wednesday. I guess you can count a ridiculous amount of running around stores doing errands Saturday, but I don’t. Oddly enough, it felt good and natural and neither my mind nor body was screaming for me to get my ass up off the couch and do things. My weight was also the lowest it’s been in months on average. Therefore, it was totally deserved and good for me.

Here’s the stats-

Calories in for the week:

1271, 1275, 1278, 1451, 1392, 2208, 1494. Average = 1481 per day

Calories out for the week:

700, 300, 700 = 1700 Average = 242 per day

Average net calories for the week: 1239.

Weight: low = 152.4, high = 155.2

Hey, hey. I felt like I did NOTHING for the week. I knew it was good for me, but I felt like a lump on a log taking 3 WHOLE DAYS OFF IN A ROW. Getting used to eating so low on weekdays was a little stressful, but the fact that I was able to let loose over the weekend and still pull those numbers – I like it.

I HAVE to do a little more with my workouts this week. Just a little. Tonight is a private dance lesson, I am doing weights again on Tuesday and Thursday, and I am going to try to do 30 mins cardio on Tues/Wed/Thurs since I plan to just not even worry about it once I get on the plane. I’m packing workout clothes and I have shoes that I could hop on the elliptical with, but I really don’t think it’s going to happen. I had great fantasies of starting my wedding day with a nice early-morning run, but now that my hair has to be at least a day old, I think I’m going to refrain from sweating that day, thxuverymuch…

When I return, I think I’m going to keep on this (1200 during the weekdays when I can stand it, a little more on the weekends, lighter on the exercise) until I start half training again.

Wedding Stuff:

I think I can ease up on the bullet points. I’m now down to just a few items left on my to-do list. Here’s the updates:

Hair and makeup are settled. I was able to find a perfect lipstick (for 7 bucks), and after much ado… I decided I’m going to wear my hair completely down, with a big orange flower poking out the side. The method to my madness is that I’m going to wash it the day before, apply mousse for volume, dry it straight, and then use the flat iron and some de frizzy stuff to tame it. Then the morning of, I’m going to flat iron and de friz again, and then use big curling iron and make some waves, and spray it so it holds.

The reason I went with it that way – I kept trying these elaborate styles that looked great from some angles and not from others, or they were REALLY prone to looking good for a little while and then they’d be in danger of falling out. I didn’t want to spend the day worrying about what my hair was doing. I did a half up do which I was somewhat happy with and showed Zliten and he liked it well enough, and then I took it all down, stuck a flower in it, and left to go party. After hitting the bathroom, I realized I really liked what was there. I asked Zliten what he thought and he said he liked my hair best right then out of anything I showed him. And really, who do I want to look pretty for on my wedding day? My groom, of course. And I can’t say that I’m unhappy that it’s low maintenance – my makeup routine takes about 10-15 minutes, and now my hair the day of should take about 20 max. I’m still going to leave myself 2 hours, but it’s nice to know that it should take me less than an hour to go from 0 to bride.

The reception timeline and music are pretty much settled. I’m going to spend the rest of the week paring down the playlists as I have about 5 hours of dinner music and 5 hours of dancing music. Considering we’ve got a 4 hour reception in total, that’s too much. Might as well pick the stuff I really like so it has a better chance of being played. The master of ceremonies has been notified with the timeline and what to do. I think we’re pretty set here!

Centerpieces have been drama but it’s all better now. We went and looked at craft stores, and I found the PERFECT 7 dollar candle holder. Then, I talked to Zliten’s mom and she offered to pick them up and bring them since they are driving. THEN, she couldn’t find them at their local store and went around looking for other things but to no avail. I was bummed. Then, I went online yesterday and found out I could order them from the website for FIVE bucks each and rush shipping was only 10 bucks more. So for 70 bucks, the centerpieces are dealt with (I even ordered 2 extra in case something broke).

Lets see, what else… The guest book and the parents gifts are taken care of. I got some REALLY SEXY dancing shoes that cost 60 bucks, but I will SO wear again. They are silver and sparkly and strappy and hawt and COMFY (ok, so they’re not tennis shoes but I walk and dance my way around the house for 10 minutes and not want to rip them off). I was going to post pictures but you will just have to wait! I did my nails and am very happy with the color (sort of an orange-y coral color – not orange enough to scream halloween, but not pink enough to make me vomit). I did the great eyebrow pluck and since I forced myself to be patient and go slow, I’m VERY happy with the results, just gonna do one more retouch one morning when I see if there are any stray hairs I missed. Our private dance lesson is today and after that I think we’ll be prepped to dance!

The only thing left really is to pack. I’ve started a list but didn’t actually get to taking stuff and putting it in bags. That’s tonight, I believe. So much stuff, so little bag space. 🙂

It is all happening. Crazy! I’m much more excited than stressed/nervous now, so I’m liking that. See you lovelies tomorrow.

Adjusted Reality

“Reality can be beaten with enough imagination.” – Mark Twain

Tag: weights Page 12 of 13

Half Marathon Training, Week 2

Second Half Marathon Training, Week 1

DDR Circuits

An Untimely, Shreddy, End

Monday, Day 8, 3 Days to Vegas

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