Workout: 2/28/11

I haven’t gotten much exercise in the past week, so I thought I should get some in while I was waiting for my husband to get home.  I set the treadmill to 1% incline, warmed up and got to jogging.

I wasn’t sure how well I’d do since I’m fighting off the beginnings of this cold that’s going around work.  You know the one – sore throat, coughing, trouble breathing.  It’s nasty and it’s taking awhile for me to actually catch it.

You don’t know how excited I was to jog over a mile without stopping!  I finally had to walk at the 15 minute mark because my legs were burning so much… but man!  That was awesome!  Usually it’s my breathing that’s the problem, but if my legs would have kept going I could have jogged for longer.  I walked the last 6 minutes or so and finally decided to stop when I realized that the burning in one leg was from my knee and the burning in the other leg was from my ankle.  Even still, I’m counting this as a total win and I plan on jogging some more on Wednesday!

Total time: 21:03, 1.5 miles

Exercise Update 2/21/11

I bit the bullet and signed up for a 5k.  It’s not like I can run the whole thing (more like half), but you don’t have to run the whole 5k to have completed it, right?  So, on March 13th I’ll be running the City of Dublin’s 13th annual 5k Shamrock Fun Run/Walk.

When I told DH that I was going to sign up for it, he said “You better get to running!”  Then he set up the treadmill for me while I changed out of jeans and a t-shirt.  I set the incline to 1% and got started.

A 5k is 3.1 miles and I wanted to see if I could complete it in under 45 minutes.  I did!  I went 3.11 miles in a little under 44 minutes.  Yay!  All I have to do is keep working on the time (and my ability to jog continuously) by training 3 or 4 times a week.   At least one of the jogs will be outside in my neighborhood, since the race will be outside in a hilly-ish locale.

So, yeah…  I jogged and walked and completed a 5k on my treadmill.  Go me!

Family Fitness

Awhile back I noticed a problem with my sister’s kids.  All they do when I’m there is watch TV.  Then I saw them in their underwear and noticed rolls of fat.  He’s 9 and she’s 6 (soon to be 7).  Much too young to have this kind of a problem.

Today I was there to watch them and mom while my sister and brother-in-law went out for an early Valentine’s day.  The kids were playing with the Wii and becoming winded after 5 minutes (literally) of swinging the Wii-mote like a sword.  Then they turned off the game because they were “too tired” to play any more.

Although I’m not the best model for fitness, I know that I need to do something.  I can’t let these kids get type II diabetes and all of those other problems that come with obesity.  I also know that my sister would be deeply offended if I were to bring it up with her.  So, today they “helped” me work out.  We picked out cans of food that we could use as weights.  We did jumping jacks, hops, and jogging in place.  We did upper body work.  We kicked and stretched.  Then we played hide and go seek.  We raced to see who could get their chores done fastest – my nephew had to put away his legos, my niece had to put away the silverware and bring the dirty dishes out to the kitchen and I had to make lunch.  When we were done we took turns showing off our newly made muscles.  They said they had fun with it all so I know it’s not that they don’t want to get up and move…

I think I’ll start taking them to the park or for a hike every other week.  Unfortunately, my schedule doesn’t allow me much more free time than that.  DH said that he’d teach them how to kick and throw punches too.  And, when they’re with me, I’ll make sure they have healthier meals.  That’s all I can really do, right?

Workout: 2/7/11

I haven’t jogged for over a week mostly because puking when I’m running isn’t so much fun… and anything faster than a slow walk made me feel like I was going to puke.  Since I felt much better today I thought it would be a good day to jog.

I set the incline to 1% on my treadmill and got to it.  My pace wasn’t the best I’ve run and at one point I thought I wouldn’t finish my “30 minutes and 2 miles” goal, but I did.  I feel good for meeting my goal, but I’m disappointed that it took the full 30 minutes to reach 2 miles.

Exercise 1/30/11 – My Victory-Defeat

Today’s jog was both a victory and a defeat.  It sounds weird – I know – but it was two things wrapped up into one.

I was already not feeling that great.  I had to convince myself to even get started with the jog.  Reminding myself that I’ll never be able to run a whole 5k if I don’t work at it was the trick to get me going today.

I set my incline to 1% and got started with the workout.  I’d decided to see how long I could jog all at once and make a game of it.  Here’s how it went:

• 5 minute warmup walk
• 10 minute jog (yay!  Victory!)
• 3 minute walk
• 5 minute jog (yay! Victory!)
• 2 minute walk
• 1 minute jog (defeat! Felt like I was going to puke)
• 2 minute walk
• 1 minute jog (defeat! Puke-y feeling again)
• 1 minute walk (defeat! left the treadmill to almost puke)
• 2 minute jog
• 1 minute walk

So yeah… I’ve never exercised till I almost puked before.  It was a novel experience and not one that I’d like to repeat.  I think that I’ll avoid eating Chipotle in the hours before a run in the future.

That was my victory-defeat.  My fastest pace (14:32), my longest distance (2.27 mi), my longest straight jog (10 minutes) and my first sickness.  Go me!

Exercise Update 1/28/11

My second jog of this week felt better than the first, but in some ways it was more challenging.  That might have something to do with the 3 days I spent shifting the children’s collection and all the sore muscles that went along with it.  My legs were already tired from the crouching (and getting up) that I did.  Think of it as doing lots of squats every day.  My sides were sore all along my ribcage; my shoulders and triceps were too.  It’s proof that moving 1-2 pounds over and over really adds up.

It was good though.  Today’s jog felt like my muscles were remembering how to move me a little bit better, and I didn’t feel like I was going to pass out.  I know as I keep doing this I’ll eventually be able to run the whole 30 minutes without stopping.  I might even be able to go fast!

I set the treadmill at 1% and broke my jogging up with walking again.

• 5 minute warm-up walk
• 5 minute jog
• 3 minute walk
• 5 minute jog
• 3 minute walk
• 2 minute jog
• 1 minute walk
• 4 minute jog
• 30 second walk
• 1.5 minute jog
• 2 minute walk

 

1/24/11 Exercise Check-in

It’s been about a month since I last jog/walked for exercise. I’m surprised I did as well as I did on this jog. I went for it at a 1% incline on my treadmill and basically broke my walks up with jogging at regular intervals. After a 5 minute warmup walk, I jogged for 5, walked for 3, jogged for 2, walked for 2, jogged for 3, walked for 3, jogged for 2, etc., until I hit 30 minutes. Then I cooled down for 2 minutes by going progressively slower on the treadmill.  In all, I went 2.15 miles in 32 minutes.  According to DailyMile that’s a 14.53 minute pace

At one point I felt liquid running down my leg. I knew I hadn’t peed myself, so I know it was sweat. Still a gross feeling. Somewhere in there the whole left side of my lower ribcage hurt, which really sucked. It went away after awhile. Then my knee. Then my ankle.

I can’t tell you how many times I wanted to walk during that last 3 minute jog. It was so hard to breathe. The saliva was thick in my mouth. I could tell my posture was off but I didn’t have the energy to fix it. I was relieved to see the timer turn to 30 minutes so I could walk and bring my breathing back to normal.

I’m glad I jogged today. I need to do it a lot more regularly if I’m ever going to complete a 5k in a decent amount of time.

I Listened to the Do It Now Angel…

So, after my blog post yesterday, I gave in and listened to the Do It Now Angel.  Now I’m sore.  You know, the Procrastination Angel will probably try to use that as an reason to put off exercise.  😉

But really, I am a bit sore today… like from my ribcage down to my knees.  My coworkers laughed at me whenever I needed to bend down and pick something up.  Or when I needed to sit down.

So, how did I get so sore?  I exercised for about 3 hours.  I really didn’t mean to do it that long!

I thought that since I didn’t want to argue with the treadmill I’d play with my Kinect until I was nice and sweaty.  That took about an hour.  Then I thought that since I was sweaty anyway, I might as well lift some weights.  So I did until my muscles were shaking… about an hour.  Then I remembered I got an awesome pedometer for Christmas, so I thought I’d set that up.  You know, you can’t just set up something and then not play with it… so I walked around in my neighborhood, up and down the hills for another hour.

Yes, you can laugh at me and my unintentional overdoing it.  My coworkers did, so it’s OK, you can do it too.

WOW!

So far today I’ve gotten 45 minutes of physical activity.  This morning it was 16 minutes walking at a moderate pace while working my way through Don Quixote.  Just a few minutes ago it was another 29 minutes of my normal jogging/walking mix.  I went 2.01 miles in 29 minutes!  I’m getting faster guys!

Remember how the other day I jogged for 6 minutes and was super excited?  Well… today I jogged for 9 minutes!  In a row!  I covered 0.75 miles in that 9 minutes.  I would have done more, but I started to have trouble controlling my breathing.  So, I jogged till it hurt and then walked till it didn’t and repeated that process for 29 minutes.

I can’t tell you how exciting it was to see the time keep going and the distance counter keep going and realize that I was actually going along with it!  I haven’t jogged for that long (time or distance) since high school.  That’s 15 years!

I’m gonna get back to walking (I need another 15 minutes of cardio activity) and then follow it with some stretching and resistance training.  My lower body seems to have recovered from my recent foray into resistance training.  My upper body is still a bit sore, but it’s not outright painful.  Just enough to remind me that those muscles have been worked.  I’ll focus on lower body and abs in a bit.  I just had to stop and say WOW!

Exercise in Jeans

Admittedly, exercising in jeans isn’t the best idea in the world… but here’s the thing: I knew that if I had to change clothes I wouldn’t exercise.  Sometimes that one little thing is all that stands in the way of me and meeting that daily exercise goal.  Rather than let the fact that I was wearing inappropriate workout attire stop me, I just jumped on the treadmill and got to it.

I knew that walking on the treadmill non-stop for 30 minutes would bore me out of my mind today.  I thought I’d spice things up by walking for 5 minutes at a time and then stopping to do some form of resistance training or stretching.  So here’s how it worked:

• 5 minute walk, 1.5 minute stretch
• 5 minute walk, 100 bicep curls with 2.5 lbs
• 5 minute walk, 30 reverse flys, 30 shoulder presses, 30 lawn mower things, 10 bicep curls (all with 2.5 lbs)
• 5 minute walk, 30 chest presses, 30 flys, 10 crunches (all with 2.5 lbs)
• 5 minute walk, 30 right side bends, 30 left side bends, 30 crunches (all with 2.5 lbs), 20 leg lifts
• 5 minute walk, 30 leg circles towards the front (each leg), 30 leg circles towards the back (each leg), 40 calf raises
• 5 minute walk, 1.5 minute stretch

I ended up working out for about an hour, and the constant change-ups kept me from getting bored.  Some muscle groups feel more worked than others but it was good to get up and move.  The only downside is that my jeans began to stick to me because I was sweating so much.  Oh well, better to exercise in jeans than not exercise at all, right?