01 September 2007

September 1

You all know how I love new beginnings. The first of every month I turn over the calendar page and it's like a fresh, clean slate just waiting to be drawn on. I love the thought of possibilities. What can be? I do believe the possibilities are endless and great things can be achieved in 30 days. That's what's going to happen this month. Starting today, I'm back into serious tri training mode.

Very shortly I'm going to hop on my bike and head out for a long ride. I haven't ridden a lot lately so I'm hoping to get about 15-20 miles in. I'm looking more for time. I want to ride for 1-1 1/2 hours. I really need to give my new bike a good test and today is it.

During my ride I'm stopping at the running store to buy a new pair of shoes. I have managed to tame my plantar (notice I didn't say it's gone!) by wearing my Asics 1120 for a few weeks now. Those shoes do not bother, and in fact help, my plantar. However, I've been unable to find them anywhere in my size. I really hate that they change running shoes so often. I bought these on closeout and had no idea they would become my lifesaver. Anyway, I'm going to talk to the folks at the running store and see what they recommend.

Tomorrow I plan on getting up early and heading out. I'm going to get a run in and then a swim at the beach. I'm looking forward to that, it will be fun. Monday it will be another long bike ride since it's a holiday :)

My general plan is; Mon, Weds, Fri mornings bike. Tues, Thurs mornings run. Every evening weights or core training. Weekends will be swimming, biking and running. The tri I'm training for is only a 400 m swim. I'm thinking ocean swimming will get me ready for that no problem. That's how I trained for it 3 years ago. Fridays will actually be optional. I'll probably take a rest day on Fridays. We'll see.

That's the tentative game plan for this month. I'm a little more heavily bike focused since the Century Ride is in 27 days. Next month I'll focus a little more on swimming since it will be closer to the tri.

So there you have it. A fresh, clean slate and the desire to color it with activity.

Changes

I'll spare you the details, but my body has been going through some changes lately. I'm getting older and changes occur. For the last few weeks I've been experiencing hot flashes like you wouldn't believe. All of sudden I'm covered in sweat where a minute ago I was totally comfortable. Weird.

I've thought about taking something for these symptoms but I don't know what. I've read that some people have had great success with progesterone to help control all kinds of hormonal imbalances. While I'm not thrilled about taking pills or anything, you can get progesterone cream. Maybe that's the way to go.

I am a cautious about anything that messes with your hormones. Hormones control every single function in your body and I do not want to screw things up. But, on the other hand, for centuries women have been using things that mimic hormones to help ease symptoms of PMS or menopause. So maybe a natural progesterone cream wouldn't be so bad. It'd be better than taking a pill I'm sure.

I'm not sure. I'm going to increase my activity level and see how that effects my hormones first.

31 August 2007

It was 10 years ago today

that Princess Diana was killed.



I have been a huge anglophile my entire life. I started reading about the royal family when I was like 12 and have been doing so every since (real books, not tabloids). I have read the histories of most of the kings and queens. I have followed the lives of the current royals with absolute fascination. When I was about 15 I used to say I was going to marry Andrew since he wasn't likely to become king, the queen might let him marry an American :)

I was fascinated with Di from her first photograph as Charles' girlfriend. I followed her story faithfully. I remember getting up at like 2 a.m. to watch their wedding live. I remember thinking, "she did it. She got the fairy tale ending Disney told us about. She absolutely got it!" Well, things didn't quite end up a fairy tale for her and her life ended all too soon.

The day she died is like the day Kennedy was shot. I remember exactly where I was what I was doing and how I found out. My sister had called me on my cell phone. I absolutely refused to believe her until I could get to a TV and see for myself. I remember seeing her boys and just aching for them. No child should lose their parent no matter who they are.

After her death I was not so interested in the royal family. I'm more interested now since the Queen is so old, Charles has remarried, and William is now of age. I'm curious to see what will happen with the monarchy. Who will inherit the throne? Charles or William. I've said for years, and I still believe, it will be William. Charles is the man who won't be king, and I think he's known that for years now. Anyway we'll find out soon. The Queen is getting older and I'm sure a decision will be made soon. Maybe she's waiting for William to marry and settle down. Who knows?

Okay, enough of that. We will resume our regular triathlon talk tonight. Tomorrow begins my new training program for my November tri. Tonight I will post my intended schedule and plan for the next month. Tomorrow is Sept 1, I love new beginnings :)

30 August 2007

Already making strides.

I just signed up for the Honolulu Century Ride on Sept 30th. I'm only planning on doing the 25 or 40 mile option, but I'm doing it. Yeah!!!

One step forward, two steps back........

Or, old habits die really hard. Or, can't see the forest for the trees. Okay, enough with the cliches and on with my point. Today I had a light bulb moment. The truth was illuminated and kicked me in the teeth. To really understand the depth of my enlightenment we need to go back a few days or months....

At the beginning of this year I had decided I would devote this year to losing weight. I took up weight lifting and interval training and Precision Nutrition. I was very excited and very motivated. I was finally going to lose this last bit of weight, get to my goal and be lean. If I lost this weight I would be faster, more competitive, able to place in my age group, a force to be reckoned with. I was off and running.

At first things went well. I did lose a little weight and could see muscles developing. I was happy. But then I wasn't so strict with my eating. A week's vacation lead to a week of eating out and lots of beer. There were parties and dinners out and this and that. While I continued to workout pretty consistently, my eating tanked. You can not lose weight if you eat with abandon unless you train 6 hours a day. I started to get discouraged.

Then I stumbled across Precision Nutrition. This was great. This was the way I trying to get my eating to be, only here it was all laid out for me. Precision Nutrition is not a "diet" it's a way of eating that optimizes your nutrition for activity. It also enhances fat burning since your body is getting all the ingredients necessary to run. Okay, I started this and was very excited. I felt great though I wasn't seeing any movement in the scale. In fact, I was feeling larger and out of shape while eating right and working out consistently. WTF??? So last week I started to really feel down about this.

For a couple of weeks the scale had not moved at all, which is very unusual for me. I was feeling bloated and flabby. I decided to cut back my calories just a little. That resulted in a headache that took days to get rid of. I realized I had fallen back into my calorie cutting mindset. I know that doesn't work anymore but it's a habit, I swear.

Monday I picked up my new bike. Tuesday I went for my first ride. I had so much fun. I realized that was missing from my routine, fun. I decided I needed to put some fun back in. Wednesday I went for a ride. The idea of doing a tri had crept into my head, Wednesday it took up permanent residency. Since my bike computer now has cadence, I realize how much I suck on the bike. I thought that working towards a tri would be great inspiration for working on my biking. Also, it would get me back into the water. These thoughts made me smile. I started toying around with how I could tweak my workout schedule to keep the weights and add all this other stuff. These thoughts really made me happy.

Then today, I read this post by GeekGirl and it was like a kick right between the eyes. It opened my eyes like none of the messages this week had. GeekGirl clearly has some of the same body issues I have and she did an Ironman. Yea!!! Way to go!!! It's really not what your body looks like, it's what it can do, and the human body can do some amazing things.

Exactly one year ago I wrote this post, and then apparently promptly forgot about it. Dieting is not a sport!! That is going to be my mantra from now on. Dieting is not a sport!!!

So, with all this new (old) found enlightenment, I have made some decisions.

First, I will continue to eat healthy and follow the Precision Nutrition way of eating. I find myself full, but never stuffed. I have no desire for junk food. Plus, I do get to cheat some meals so I'm never deprived of anything.

Second, I will NOT count calories. Once I start focusing on the numbers I get caught up in them and lose sight of everything else. If I eat good, nutritious food in moderation, counting calories is not necessary. I also will not count calories burned during a workout. It's important that I work at the proper intensity, not how many calories I burned doing it.

Third, I'm doing the triathlon on November 4th. This is the first one I ever did 3 years ago and it seems fitting to go back there as a restart so to speak. The swim is only 400 m - I can do that easy. The bike I did on my mountain bike the first time - I should totally rock that. The run, half of it is on sand - that sucks, but I can hang. When I did it 3 years ago, I did it in 1:50. My goal for this year is 1:30. I have almost exactly 8 weeks to train, I think know I can do it.

Fourth, I will only step on the scale first thing Saturday mornings. Never any other time. That thing has become such a controlling force in my life I have to break the chains.

You have no idea how excited I feel about these decisions. For the first time in months, the excitement to train is back and I'm looking forward to a challenge.

I have had these revelations before, as evidenced by my year old post. But I'm the type of person that has to learn somethings a couple of times before it sticks. I have to have these light bulb moments a couple of times before I really own the moment. I have to see it in action and working before I can claim it as mine completely.

So, if I start to dwell on calories and weight you have my permission to slap me and say, "SNAP OUT OF IT!!" This blog is once again focused on triathlons and running. Which is right where the focus should be.

28 August 2007

Food

I've been thinking about food over the weekend for a couple of reasons.

First, I started doing Precision Nutrition and Turbulence Training at the same time in the beginning of July. Since that time, although I feel awesome, I have not lost any weight and in fact my weight has creeped up a couple of pounds. That got me to thinking about my eating.

Although I've tried to keep the caloric intake within reasonable limits, I think I'm eating too much. I also think I'm not exercising enough. I was looking back over my blog and FitDay records. When I started this blog I was almost 20 lbs lighter and working out morning and evening. So there are some changes in the wind.

I am seriously going to start shopping for organic foods. I figure that, since they are getting so prevalent now, foods with lesser chemicals can only be good.

There are all kinds of organic products available now. It's really amazing. I know that the term organic doesn't necessarily mean a lot, but there are certain guidelines they meet. You can even get organic skin care products. Very cool.

I'm also going to increase my exercise. Not sure how that's going to go yet, but I'll figure it out.

A couple of random things.

I took my new bike out this morning and OMG!!! What a great bike. It's considerably lighter than my Bianchi and therefore much wobbler. I have to relearn how to steer. I really couldn't hold a straight line. I did get into aero position for a couple of minutes. Again, I will have to work on learning how to steer in that position. In the aero position everything is so close to the center that the slightest move and the bike is going that way. I will have to practice, practice, practice. But it's fun.

While I was at the bike shop yesterday I noticed they had a note on a board that said 11/4 - Sprint Tri. I was thinking maybe I'd do that one. I believe it's the Haleiwa Tri which is the very first tri I did 3 years ago. I thought that would give me enough time to train and it would probably wet my appetite for more. I went online and can't find info anywhere.

Which leads me to my next topic, what the hell happened to Active.com??? I used to like looking races up on their site cause it was easy and pretty much listed all the races. Now the search feature really sucks. I try to search for Hawaii races and get clinics in New York, Texas. It really pisses me off. They have a race listed on 11/4 that is not listed on the groups website. I don't know if the group just added it or if Active.com has it wrong. There is no registration or contact info so I don't know what the heck is going on. It's really annoying though. They took a pretty decent site and really screwed it up.

Okay, that's really all. I've found a house I'd really like to buy so I'm trying to get a hold of the mortgage person to see what the status is with my loan app. It's not Arizona luxury real estate but it will work for us. Keep your fingers crossed that we can work it out :)

27 August 2007

Don't let this happen to you!!





How exciting is a new bike???

I went to the bike shop this afternoon and got my fit. My bike is so purrrty!! It's pink and silver, with pink pedals. I love it!!! After my fit I took the bike home and took it for a little ride. It's very different from my Bianchi. It's much lighter, it steers differently, it rides differently. I was too afraid to get into the aero bars. Maybe tomorrow :)

Tomorrow morning will be my first real ride. Oh yeah, the computer has cadence!! I've never had that before, it's very exciting. I will really put it through it's paces tomorrow and see how it goes. Wish me luck.

Now that I've got the bike and am ready to do tris again, maybe I should look for some
Luminox watches for me.....

Just a quickie this morning

Having an aging, lame dog is a lot like having a small child. Nala had to go in the middle of the night and she couldn't get off the bed. I had to get up and get her out the door. She then went to the backyard, did her business, and proceeded to lay in the yard. I had to drag her back in, get her settled in bed. Finally I could go back to bed. By that time I was wide awake. After about 10 minutes I'm laying there wide awake and I could hear her snoring. Ugh!!!

Then, hubby's phone rang about 2 a.m., the alarm at the yacht club was going off. So there I was awake again. Ugh!!!

Needless to say, when the alarm went off I said no way. So I slept in a little. That's okay. This afternoon I get my bike, wheeee, and I'm working on a new training plan. I'm very excited about doing tris again and I want to get back into it. So, starting Sept 1, I'm going to embark on a new tri training program. I'm thinking of doing a month of bike focused workouts, then a month of run focused workouts, then a month of swim focused. That will take me through to the beginning of December which will start the serious tri training. March is first tri here on Oahu, I should be ready by then. I'm very excited.

Okay, I have to get to work.

Conversation with Hubby

 So yesterday morning I presented my idea of working out at home to the Hubby. Once I presented it to him, he said he was in. I told him I h...