Lunar Obverse

One hundred and seventy-eight and a half pounds!

Roly-poly macaroni!

To be honest, I had my doubts that I would ever get this far; this all seemed like such a distant goal. I was so used to being over two hundred pounds that I simply couldn’t imagine myself ever being in this great of shape. And, in retrospect, I haven’t really had to deprive myself of very much. The Atkins diet made the first month or two easy (and, over Christmas vacation (in sunny Puerta Vallarta) I even cheated quite a bit! The hotel had gooooooooooooood desserts…), and after I reached a plateau on Atkins, I was worried because of the horror stories I had heard about “going back” on carbs — tales of people gaining all their weight back in a short time after reintroducing bread into their diet.

But I switched to counting calories, and, lo and behold, I’m still losing weight. There’s no magic to the Atkins diet, I’m convinced; it’s just another way to limit calories. Think about it; when someone sits down and binges on food, it’s always carbs; chips, bread, candy. There’s simply no way to “binge” on pounds and pounds of steak, for example. You get the “I’m full, stop eating” signal long before you’ve taken in too many calories. Carbs don’t seem to have that effect, or have it so slow that it’s a simple matter to go overboard in a short time.

Exercise-wise, I’ve been taking the past couple of days off from formal exercise. I strained a hamstring last week, and it was still sore during the race, so “coach” says to take a few days off from running. I’m still walking a lot (had a side job last night and walked the couple of miles from there to home, for example) and taking the stairs at work (up and down the stairs in two buildings of seven and eight stories), but I’m itching to get back into the gym or onto the streets.

I’m going to take the money I made last night at my side job ($80) and use it to buy some new running shoes. I’m planning on doing one run per month through the end of summer, aiming for an 8K or 10K by the end of summer. There’s the Bridge-to-Bridge in April, the Cinco de Mayo 5K, and the Mt. Tabor Challenge in June. Which is where one of my friends did his initial training, explaining a lot of his speed! Well, that and his long legs. Nothing like training on the slopes of a volcano to help your legs get strong…

I finished the race. I have no idea what my time was; things got confusing at the end. Right before the end, I went past a guy with a stopwatch who was calling out the time, and he said something like 33 minutes or so, but then we got to the finish gates and we all slowed to a crawl. OK, we slowed to a walk, but still, it felt like a crawl. I wanted to finish, dammit!

Most important, however, I finished right behind the guy dressed as a pint of Guinness. My friend, who had been passed (on a hill, no less) by the beer guy last year, managed to finish before the beer this year. His personal best!

Sadly, I didn’t get many pictures. My friends girlfriend was going to be the photographer, but sometime last week she decided she was going to run instead of spectate, so, no pictures. Oh, well.

I am currently wearing size 34 inch waist 501s!

When I started this diet back in November I wore a 38 inch waist. And it was getting snug. At the time I thought that it would be nice to get down to a 36 inch waist, a comfortable 36 inches, where my gut wouldn’t hang over my belt and I cut my circulation off when I sat down.

Little did I realize just how much I could lose on this diet. In the store today, I actually tried on a 33 inch waist pair of jeans, just to see how they fit, and they were a bit snug but still do-able. In the mirror, I could almost see my future…

I’m still a bit amazed. I was so impressed that I bought two pairs of pants when I only intended to buy one. And in a month or two these pants will be baggy.

I’m wearing size medium shirts, and 34 inch waist pants. I’m the incredible shrinking man. Here’s hoping I don’t have to fight a spider with a sewing needle.

Consider my mind boggled.

I did it!

I ran all the way from Duniway Park up to the Charthouse, and back down again!

Today was such a glorious day anyway, I was looking forward to my run all day long. Sometimes nervous (can I do it?) and sometimes confident. The weather has been perfect all week long; warm and sunny. And it’s contributed to my mood a lot! I am so ready for this race, and everything that lies beyond it. I wish I could bottle up the past six days, as insurance against the doldrums that plagued me all fall and winter. Granted, not all of that depression was my fault. Still…

Anyway, I’ve got this great new body. I’m in the best shape of my entire life.

And I want to share…

I changed my daily calorie count to 1600 (down from 1700), in the hope that it would break the plateau I had reached, and it appears to have worked. My weight is once again dropping, and this morning I weighed in at 181. I’m so very close to my goal now…

Still training for the Shamrock Run (on Sunday! Sunday! Sunday!) Yesterday was a rest day, Tuesday I did a lower-body workout and 30 minutes on the bike. I tried to use every lower-body machine in the gym. Would you believe almost all? How about some?

I did leg curls (both pushing and pulling), squats, hip abductor and inductor, inclined stomach crunches. Hmm… that doesn’t seem like a lot. But the backs of my calves still feel sore.

Tonight I’m going running up Terwilliger, 5 miles round-trip. All the way up to the Chart House and back down to Duniway Park. Should be fun. And by “fun” I mean “painful but good for me in the long run” sense (pun intended).

I found a cool website that lists various places to run, called, subtly enough, Running Places. (The link is to the Duniway Park page) According to them, it’s 4 km from Duniway Park to the Chart House — 8 km round-trip would be 4,97 miles.

“Coach” made a change to my workout this week:

Let’s change Friday’s workout to 35 minutes with 4x 200m pick-ups. That
should be sufficient.

She also suggested a different warmup for me before the race:

To be ready to race, I think this would be a good warm-up:

• Walk briskly for 4 minutes
• Easy Jog for about 2 minutes
• Do 2x 100 meter pick ups
• Walk briskly for 2 minutes
• stretch as necessary

The entire warm-up should not exceed 10 minutes, and since the race starts at 7:45am, you should start your warm up at 7:25. This will give you some time before the race starts.

Just wanted to note the change here for my own reference.

“Coach” suggested for today:

Monday – Run around your house where it feels good. Do a run of 40 minutes, with 3 x 400m of the pick ups. *Should be a hard effort. Really try and push the pick-ups, they are what will help you in the race… TREMENDOUSLY!!!

I ran farther than I normally do, about 2.5 miles, and I did four total sprints. I can’t estimate distance (or time, for that matter) very well, so when I did the pick-ups, I ran for at least two blocks. And my total time was around 35 minutes total (I warm up by walking briskly for a couple minutes before and after). I pushed myself, and on the way back, I stopped to walk a couple of times, but for no more than half a block.

My legs felt like depleted uranium this morning, but part of it might be psychological — for some dumb reason I gained a pound and a half today, which bummed me out. Also, I went for that long (5 mile) walk yesterday. I don’t know if that’s a bad thing or not…

Oh, well, I’m continuing with the program.

I’m planning on not getting into an elevator today if I can help it; and I work on the 8th floor and have to support another 7-story building. Gotta keep moving. I’m dancing in my chair right now; I haven’t had this much energy in a long long time! I feel great!

Next week’s running schedule, courtesy of my friend the “coach”:

Monday – Run around your house where it feels good. Do a run of 40 minutes, with 3 x 400m of the pick ups. *Should be a hard effort. Really try and push the pick-ups, they are what will help you in the race…TREMENDOUSLY!!!

Tuesday- Do lower body weight workout. Like squats, leg curls, calf raises, etc. AFTER weight workout, Do 30 minutes on the bike at medium effort.

Wednesday- OFF you need the rest. Make sure and drink lots of fluids and make sure you eat a good amount of protein.

Thursday- Run Terwilliger *Goal is to go up hill 2.5 miles/down hill 2.5 Miles.

Friday- Do a 45 EASY jog, with 4 x 200m pick ups mixed in as you see fit. This should be similar to what it will be like race day!!!!!! (If you would like a race “plan” make sure and let me know how this day’s workout was. Where were the hard parts? What felt easy? What felt good?)

Saturday- Today it is NECESSARY to get a SMALL amount of exercise in. You want to do a warm-up routine very similar to what you plan to do before the race tomorrow. Again, this helps with pre-race anxiety, and avoiding OVER-warming up because you are nervous. I have done that, and it makes the race rough. Make sure and drink lots of fluids.

Sunday- RACE DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!