Okay. That went better.

Had a long talk with Lucho this morning about last night's blow up and a few other things.  He nailed the low heart rate/high exertion/low output problem right off the bat.  Then we talked about why I am feeling like crap all the time... well, most of the time and why running just doesn't feel easy to me anymore. 

Duh... it's the bike and apparently I don't give it enough credit (and respect) for how much it takes out of me. So that more or less solved problem number two....

We left the call with me having two options for today's run.  I could either do today's run as planned or I could try to do last nights run if it felt like it could happen.  Of course I didn't know how that would play out until I went to run.

Seeing that I had upped my carb input considerably last night out of frustration, and I was eating a lot more today as well, it seemed like I was going into today's run better fueled than yesterday.   And yesterday I apparently did not eat as much as I had thought during the day and that played into things last night too.

So I started the run and after the HRM finally settled in around mile one, it still felt like my heart rate was depressed and that I was going WAY too fast for the 136'ish bpm that I was getting.  But since I wasn't feeling that bad I decided to hang on for another mile and see how it played out.  By the end of mile two, things still felt off but I was comfortable so I decided to go for it, another stab at last night's botched run.

The goal then became to hold my heart rate above 140 avg for the first five miles, then over 150 for the next three and if at all possible over 160 for the last two.   I figured if things were going well, it would work out, if not, the last two miles wouldn't be happening at all so it was a rather binary proposition.

For the most part it all worked out just fine.  I averaged 142 bpm for the first five, 154 for the next three and then 162 for the last two. I completed the ten mile run in 1:20:53 and felt okay afterwards even.

The run still wasn't that easy and I still feel like things are still sort of off but it is nice to know why and to have a possible explanation for it and to also know why things feel so much different than I am used to. 

And thus ends January... 292 miles of cycling and 160 miles of running, or 29 hours 15 minutes of cycling and 29 hours and 30 minutes of running.

The Rainy Day

Yesterday's run was for crap.  Seriously.  The worst run in years if you don't take into account runs in extreme heat and runs where I get injured or hurt.  It started off bad and never improved after that.

First I ran up and over the mesa to the office and that is about five miles. I struggled the entire distance to just keep my heart rate above 135.  It didn't help that it was cold, pretty much dark and I was bucking a north wind the entire way.  I figured if I held on that once I caught the trail from 30th to Gossage Park, that I would be out of the wind and I would be able to move more easily.

No.

I was supposed to increase my heart rate at this time to something over 140 or so and it might have gotten there for a little bit but for the next mile I really struggled more.  Then it happened, I stopped.  Me, myself and I, the entire collective said screw it, we are walking and that is what I did for quite some time.

Now everything is hurting.  Left ankle, left shin, right knee, right IT Band, and to an extent my left knee.  Oh, yeah... my mouth is still hurting from the two hours I spent in the dentist chair Monday morning.  Add it all up and I just did not have the gumption to run at all.

So I walked some more.  I figured I would just wuss out and call Melissa to come and get me and completely admit defeat but I kept plugging away.  I'd run a bit then abruptly stop whenever the body demanded it or I would encounter a slight rise in the path.  Mostly I walked and I would say that half of the twelve miles last night were walked. Very discouraging.

Finally I got home and Melissa met me at the door.  She could see the defeat, disgust and disappointment in my face and didn't even blanch when I spoke.  I told her this was a one time good deal.  I was going to take a shower.  She was to empty the change jars on the dresser into a bag and I was going to cash them in a the change machine and we were going to get pizza.  Yes folks... Pizza.

See, as long as I can remember, I have always saved change.  Save enough and it makes for a nice extra amount of spending money on vacations.  I remember once in 1998 I had to use a change jar collection to buy groceries.  But last night... last night was when the rainy day fund came in super handy.  I got $72 bucks when all was said and done and we headed to Borriello Brothers for me to commence sinning, hard.

First of all, I got a large Moutain Dew.  I have not had a Mountain Dew since December 2.  It was awesome but not as awesome as the garlic knots that came with the salad.  BREAD!!!!  Warm bread, with butter and tons of garlic, even better.  Then the pizza came and it alone restored my belief in god.  Did I stop there?  Hell no... off to King Soopers we went and I got a big piece of red velvet cake to eat with my leftover Mtn. Dew that I left with from the pizza parlor.

So there I was sitting on the couch and watching South Park and drinking soda and eating cake.  Why the hell not?  It's what the rest of America does every night pretty much, right?  Why not me too?

So that is why I have a rainy day fund like that.  I still have like forty bucks left over in my pocket for carrying around cash and that will last me a few days.

But back to the more pressing issue... besides me caving on the pizza, and the soda and the diet... oh and the cake,  there is more afoot here.  I am not happy about where I am as a runner and I haven't been for a while I guess.  Except for the weight loss which I am pleased about, I don't think that I am in any shape at all.

I told Melissa at the pizza joint that the Salida Half Marathon is in just over a month and I guarantee that if I were to run it that I would be creamed.  Forget a sub two hour finish on that course like I am used to, it would be more like 2:30 if I were lucky and I wouldn't even be able to run it all, lots of walking.

I also told her that when I was walking through Monument Valley Park last night... yes walking, that I doubt I could beat my Fall Series times from this fall even, and that is being twenty pounds lighter to boot.

The best way for me to describe training and life and everything else right now would be that everyday feels like the last twenty miles of Rocky Raccoon last year and if you know me and know of that story then you understand the weight of that statement.  Those last twenty miles were the hardest twenty miles in my entire life.  Just hard and that is how everything feels now... not easy.  Not easy, not fun. It's all an uphill battle all the time and though the mud at that.. I don't get it though because I have trained more intensely in the past and have never felt this bad so I just understand what the difference is now.  Where is the disconnect?  That is what I need to figure out.

So for now I just wait and hope for brighter days with more hours of sunshine and warmth and try to have hope that will  motivate me and get me going again.  Hopefully then I will have a greater sense of confidence which is just lacking from everything right now.  We will see.  Right now I need to keep rolling the lacrosse ball along my ITB... that at least feels good!

When the going gets tough... screw it.  Just eat pizza. 

Things are going well!

Almost through another month of Leadman training.  This past week wasn't too bad volume-wise but the intensity of Saturday and Sunday's workouts really kicked my butt.

Speaking of my butt, I dropped the money this weekend for a new bike saddle too.  Hopefully this one will work out better for me.  The funny thing about getting the new seat was that the salesman at Pro Cycling measured me... agreed and said that I would do better with a different seat but that was where he dropped the ball.  I had to basically say in very clear language while pointing him to the wall display, to please sell me a new seat.  It was like he didn't want to or couldn't make the connection. It would have made for a funny skit.

The business is going great, lots of interest and a ton of potential clients.  The weekend was spent updating the business web page and getting it migrated to a different platform.  Of course during that migration the page was down as well as the business e-mail.  Everything came back Monday night and is working 100% normal now.

I also wrote a new blog entry for the business blog this morning.  I have taken the gloves off in a sense when it comes to sharing my views of diet, diets, and weight-loss in this country.  You can read the article here on tripeaksconsulting.blogspot.com.

And in other great news... going to Cozumel for a week at the beginning of May.  Melissa will be diving a lot... I plan for fly fish in the lagoons, read a lot and just chill.  I will be running a lot then but I know the island pretty well and I am looking forwards to running all around, over and through the jungles and jeep roads. 

Typical bonefish habitat in the lagoons on the north side of Cozumel island.  Can't wait to fish it again!

Have To Share

Apparently this graffiti is showing up in Los Angeles.  Hell, I want it on a t-shirt!

Tour De France - You're Doing It Right.  ~  Lance Armstrong

A Startling Conclusion

This is the kinda thing that freaks me out about riding a bike.  Even more so on an EXPENSIVE bike.

Opposite of what one of Lance Armstrong's books is entitled, for me, on my ride yesterday I realized that it IS about the bike.  It is a love-hate relationship and the bottom line is that I do not trust the bike.  And just like any relationship without trust, my affair with the bike is also dysfunctional.

I don't know if it is because it is a used and a demo bike that I don't trust it's soiled history.  The scratched, scarred and obviously abused frame and components, or is it because the staff at the bike shop sort of jerked me around a little, not bad but enough to make me question the integrity and the authenticity of the product?  Did I get a lemon?  And the money... holy crap, the money that I have spent on this bike and put into it really freaks me out.  I just don't see how something so expensive (and in way fragile) just won't up and break on me at the worst possible moment.

Then there is the carbon fiber frame which to me is nothing but glorified plastic.  Maybe I would have been more confident getting something with an aluminum frame AND a hard-tail.  Or if I got a carbon fiber frame, maybe I should have gotten a hard-tail.  Why?  The frame "creaks" around the joint for the lower swing arm and it isn't the hinge but the frame itself popping and pinging whenever I apply a lot of force and torque the frame.  In my mind I can just see the components there just shattering at the most inopportune time.

Tubeless wheels and tires... now there was an adventure.  When I bought the bike they couldn't tell Larry and I if the wheels were setup for tubeless tires or not.  It took some money and some time and finally Craig at Pro Cycling was able to tell me exactly what I needed.  This was after Larry and I gave it a more than gallant effort one Saturday afternoon.  And though I have been running tubeless for well over a month or two now, because of all the agitation and frustration it gave me in the beginning trying to do that conversion, again, a lack of trust and confidence arises.

And to get a little personal... my butt hurts!  I had the bike fitted professionally to me by Branden at Pro Cycling and it made a huge difference but that damned seat!  Of course it could be the seat, or the chamois in the cycling bibs and other layers I am having to wear or it could just be my skin.  Maybe a combination of it all.  But I have a blister that has been plaguing me for about three weeks now.  It isn't as bad as it has been and the shorts that I wore yesterday I think really helped, but when I look at the bike I see, think and feel, "pain in the ass," literally.

Training on a bike is not without discomfort either. It isn't just going out for a lackadaisical cruise laughing and giggling along the way.  Nope. It is hard.  For starters it is DAMNED hard to get the heart rate up on a bike because it just doesn't work the same as running.  Then there are drills, like track repeats that thrown into some rides that are dreadful.  Pedaling at max effort in the largest gear going up a hill, all out for a minute.  Holy CRAP!  I have finished quite a few of those on the edge of puking and cross eyed as hell.... almost blind.

The hours are bad too... For an outside ride the timing has to be perfect right now.  I have to time it so that I get out during the warmest part of the day and while there is good daylight to ride in.  Often I sit and watch the thermometer waiting for the temp to get above x degree for the better part of a day before I head out.  But even then I am almost guaranteed to get cold and chilled at some point.  Last week I almost took the dog poo bags out of the dispenser in a park to put over my socks in my shoes to help hold in some heat.  No joke.

Cycling has an element to it that running does not.  Wrecking.  Of course you can fall trail running and get banged up, twist and ankle, but the dangers are not quite the same on a bike.  I fear cars, unseen obstacles, other riders, and in the case of the bike and not trusting it, a mechanical failure like the brakes giving out and me sailing off the edge of the road into the scrub oak to never be seen again.

As a neophyte cyclist I have to say I have nothing but respect for anyone who has mastered the sport. And I have to add in the wake of the Lance Armstrong scandal, I know that I am getting worked by riding but I can't even begin to comprehend the betrayal those way more talented, and harder working racers who kept clean must feel.  Some people give their lives to this thing while I am merely a tourist.  I sure hope we don't see anything so drastic in the ultra running community.  I will say that.

Hopefully with more time and experience I will gain more confidence in both the bike and myself.  I sure hope so or else all of this or for naught.  I just need to keep my eye on the prize and focus on the race June 29th, then the seven weeks after that.   Just do the work.  But I can tell you that as a fish out of water this is truly an eye opening experience and an education.

On a good note... Progress! I weighed in this morning at 140.0 for the first time in I don't know how long.   Again, I just have to trust that it is all going to come together in a few months.  :)

Imagine putting these three plates in pack and running.  That is the extra weight that I was carrying all autumn until I started dropping in December.  All of it is gone now! 

Odds & Ends

Last week was a mix of a week and it was also a week that seemed to last FOREVER!  A lot of time spent training but I also announced my new business.  Tri-Peaks Consulting on Thursday.

The totals for the week play out to be 36 miles of running and 115 miles of riding, and all of the riding was outdoors, no time was spent on the trainer. That makes a grand total of seventeen hours and thirteen minutes of training volume for the week.  Leadman training is going quite well.

It was a great weekend in other ways as well.  Melissa and I went to Joseph's for dinner on Friday night.  I wanted to surprise her since life was still chaotic and upside when our anniversary rolled around on the 8th.  As usual the food was amazing and we had fun chatting with Joseph and Rick and joking around.  I did cheat on Friday night and I actually had the creme brulee for desert.  It was worth it, completely worth it.

I am working on a nutritional presentation associated with the business.  One of the biggest problems that we face today I believe is not that we are stupid, or lazy, or just pigs... most of the dietary issues in the country are founded within the choices, or lack of, that we are so constantly and easily presented with.  Now don't take me wrong, I have eaten TONS of stuff out of vending machines for years, I mean that is why they are there... but it does beg the question, why isn't higher quality food made to be more readily available in this country? 

The standard workplace vending machine.  The only two things in here that are even remotely healthy would be the peanuts and the beef jerky.  And if you are only eating Paleo fare, not even the peanuts because they are legumes.  The beef jerky would even be suspect because I would bet money that the first ingredient after beef is HFCS. 

So just trying to get a foothold onto this week.  Enjoying my day off from training and trying to get data migrated to a single platform for the business.  I really hope to get out at sometime today and enjoy the weather.

Today is the the day!

Today is the day I have been working so feverishly towards the past weeks.  Today I launched Tri Peaks Consulting, my life coaching company.

You can read more about my endeavor on the company's official blog page here at tripeaksconsulting.blogspot.com.

Also my webpage is a work in progress but the basics are there...  http://tripeaksconsulting.com

Right now my two biggest principles in finding this company and service, and making it work are  that I believe that if one does what one loves then it isn't work.  Secondly, do what you love and the rewards will follow.

I have always been most passionate about working with and helping people and it is time now that I put my years of education and training in that field to work as well!

So please take a gander at the website, check out the blog as there will lots of interesting material there and if you see my facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/TriPeaksConsulting please like is and share!

Time to go for a ride now while it is still warm!

This Explains It All

My friend Shawna sent this diagram to me this past weekend and it is a great example on how Paleo works.  The only thing that I really take exception with the the "no potato"rule.  I broke that rule this weekend at Kings Chef in a huge way!

Today's goal was to definitely be under 25 grams of carbs and I have accomplished that.  I've only had 16 g's of carbs (all veggies) and 173 g's of protein.  So far I am feeling pretty decent.  Any day that you get to eat two rib eye steaks isn't a bad day.

I've enjoyed the day off.

A Significant Week

I think that last week was my first week with considerable volume in quite some time.  9:37 of riding which includes one hour of indoor riding on Sunday, and 7:43 of running for a total time of 17 hours and 20 minutes of training.  98 miles on the bike... 40 miles running.

The highlight of the week had to be the 20 mile run on Saturday.  It was cold as hell but still fun to be out.  I ran from the house, over the mesa, through GOG, up Crystal Park Road, Inteman trail to Section 16, then down through Bear Creek Park to Monument Valley then home.   Except for two people in GOG, I didn't see anyone on the trails all day exceptf or one bobcat above Red Rocks and that was pretty net.

I am enjoying my day off today and only have a run tomorrow.  A little sore in spots from all of the biking last week so hoping that clears up soon.

I am done with the cold weather as well... too many days below freezing as far as I am concerned.  

Why Paleo?

Today is a good day to tackle this subject I think.  First of all let me reassure all my friends and family that I am not a zealous, crusading paleo fanatic,  preaching the ways of the caveman diet lest everyone die tomorrow and the world ends.  No... Trust me it is nothing like that.

First of all let's talk about what did not work for me in the past because I had tried a few things in the past as well.  Atkins... boy... that one was hard and I did that back in 2009 and 2010.  The biggest thing I learned from Atkins was how much of a carb addict I really was but the diet worked.  For me, it worked too well sorta in the other way.  See, even after I got through the initial indoctrination phase (which was miserable having less than 25g or carbs a day) of Atkins, that diet, with all of the protein consumption coupled with all of the heavy weight lifting and running I was doing worked awesome as an anabolic diet for me.  My strength and lean body mass went through the roof!  So I lost a lot of fat, was stronger than hell but the irony is that after always being a person with more of a wiry build all of my life, I finally had the physique that I always wanted but in truth did not need, especially as an ultrarunner.

Late 2009 after 3 moths of Atkins.

2010 hovering around 160.  I went to LT100 in 2010 at 158.  No kidding.  

It was nice being able to lift a ton of weight and have that confidence but was that really a healthy weight for me?  Was it an efficient weight for me?  And was I happy with that format of eating and lifting?  Really, not so much. Coach Weber said I was too big in 2010 when I ran Leadville and was in his words "built like brick shit house." I knew that if I wanted to do better in the sport that some changes would have to be made.

So to be honest I don't know what I did between Leadville 2010 and March 2011 but I had managed to lose weight.  (But I did gain a lot in the fall.) I stopped lifting altogether in hopes of losing mass but I don't recall exactly what I had done "diet-wise" to drop weight but I did.  By the time for the Salida Half Marathon in 2011 I was now "ultralight" and efficient.  Some thought perhaps too much.  But whatever it was had worked.

Salida,2011.  Probably low 140's. 

2011 was really not a bad year in regards to weight.  I still wanted to drop more but I went into the LT100 that year weighing 144.  A whole 14 lbs lighter than the year before.  Progress.  I was even able to remain lighter through the fall and throughout the Fall Series which really helped me then.

2012 though was a hard year and my weight wasn't consistent.  High, low... High, low... get stuck, get frustrated.  Somehow I managed to weigh in before Leadville at 147#  so up three from the previous year.  I wasn't too happy about that.

Trying to cut back what I eat really didn't work.  Cutting back on things I liked and enjoyed like sodas and some fast food every once in awhile... well that didn't work either.  And sometimes in frustration I would say screw it and eat and drink everything in sight.  I mean why not, I work really hard.  Regardless my 40+ year old metabolism would not collaborate with me and my efforts and as much as I wanted it to the "if the furnace is hot enough anything will burn," theory just did not work in my case.  Damnit.

After Leadville 2012... huge, huge HUGE weight gain.  I had majorly cut back on volume but definitely did not cut back on snacks, eating, drinking, etc.  Maybe more denial but the needle on the scale kept going up.   As an experiment... maybe my last one I started tracking every calorie in vs. every calorie out.  Meticulously I kept a food log in a small notebook that I carried with me most of the fall.  I didn't limit or eliminate any foods but worked hard to have a consistent calorie deficit if not daily then definitely weekly.  I was burning more calories than I was taking in but I was also gaining weight.  Rapidly.

One of the hardest things for an addict to face is the truth about their addiction.  Time to give up my hopes of having my cake and eating it too without any negative consequences.  I had proven to myself beyond the shadow of a doubt that controlling calories alone DID NOT WORK! I was faced with the truth that it didn't matter how much I ate, but what I ate or didn't eat that made the difference.  Damnit again!

I looked back historically in my life and made some observations from my past.  One... when I was a kid, I wasn't heavy, not by a long shot.  Even as a young adult I was super light.  As a kid in grade school I didn't know any "fat" kids at all.  Maybe a handful were big boned, maybe a little pudgy but even they were rare.  If I knew anyone who was obese it was more than likely due to a glandular issue.  This struck me as peculiar and strange.  Then to look at me now... and my activity level, how in the hell could I be heavy?  How?!

I focused on what I termed as the "traditional diet" looking at what people ate in the early 70's.  We didn't drink a ton of sodas.  And yeah I had cookies but maybe one or two a day if that and that wasn't all the time.  My mom would buy a 8 pack of Coke in the glass bottles that came in the cardboard carrier and that would last the family more than a week. (Hell I could drink that much in a day now and often would.)  We didn't have HFCS yet and fast food was a once a month treat if that.  We had cakes and pies and candy but those were more like "blue moon foods" rather than every day occurrences like now.   I'd never even heard of a bagel and Dunkin Donuts only existed in the "big city."  We ate three meals a day... we ate... food, real food.

So there it was again... the "what" and "not how much" concept...

Me as a skinny 16 year old.  I never skipped a meal and ate like crazy.  Why wasn't I heavy?

I read a lot this fall and I watched different movies, and as crazy as it sounds, I considered going vegan.  No shit!  I love veggies and a huge salad for dinner is one of my favorite things, so why not? Well, Prime Rib is why not!  16oz boneless rib eye steaks is why not!  Seafood is why not!  Time to search for another option.

Paleo... I had heard of it, thought is was sort of faddish and something just those crazy CF people did.  But as I studied and read about it more and more it made sense to me.  Well most of it anyway.  For starters, cut out all of the processed crap in the diet... two, cut out sugar especially HFCS which didn't really exist when I was younger.  No more bread, wheat, crackers, pasta, etc... this made sense to me for a lot of reasons which I will explain at a later time.  Cut out dairy.... WTF?  I love milk and cutting out milk meant giving up one of my favorite meals of all time, tomato soup, grilled cheese and two huge glasses of milk.  My number one comfort food gone.  Damnit... Oh, yeah, so no more pizza or milk shakes either... Really?

I gave my self time, plenty of time to think about it all and come to a decision.  I would definitely try paleo and give it an honest 100% (or as close to 100% as I could) effort.  The day that I implemented the diet was to be Monday 12/3/2012. I gave myself time to "enjoy life" for a last couple weeks... and I also gained more and more weight.  I have kept this a secret but I was 164 on the morning of Thanksgiving and I fault that (and myself) for my piss poor 5K that day as well.  I cut back on calories the following days but still had what I wanted and got back down to 157.4 when I started the Paleo diet.

For me... for right now it is working.  The weight is off, 143.6 this morning and I am used to it.  I don't have the mood/energy peaks and valleys throughout the day based on sugar anymore.  I eat a lot still and I eat a lot of good stuff and I have been recalibrating my sense of taste to appreciate an orange as much if not more than I used to like a Snickers bar. I love getting to eat all of the fresh veggies, as much as I want and quality steaks, chicken, and seafood. And I am noticing more and more that I am less hungry at times and it takes less food now to satisfy me.  But when I am hungry?  Watch out!

Is this something I will do forever?  I don't know.  Is it something that I think the world should embrace?  I can't say for certain.  I just know that for me, for the past several weeks, eating "real food" as opposed to what is marketed to us as "food" has made a huge difference in many ways and I am happy about that.  If for no other reason, I might be saving myself from the inconvenience of diabetes which is rampant in my mother's side of the family.  If not, hopefully I am limiting the damage.  Unfortunately I didn't escape the crazy gene of the Wooten/Jones clan though... can't dodge all the bullets I guess.  Anyhow...

So there you have it... why I did it and why I think it is working for me.  One last thing I will add in order to be transparent.... I still consume maltodextrin based products on long rides and runs.  Heed, Perpetuem or Carbo-pro but that is it. That is probably my only deviation and I do not plan to alter that through this training and racing season.

Mountain Dew Math

It has been 38 days since I have had a Mountain Dew.  Not a one.  I could easily drink four cans a day and that is being conservative in my estimate.  But for the sake of this example, let's say four cans a day.

Each can contains 170 calories.  So 4 x 170 = 680 additional calories a day that my body is not having to deal with on a daily basis.  On an average run I burn a touch over 100 calories per mile so essentially I had or would have had to run about seven miles EVERYDAY to counteract the sugar and calories just from the Mountain Dew consumption alone.

Throw in arguments about HFCS, sugar addiction, how sugar wrecks the production on insulin, etc... and it is even more reason for me to have kicked the habit.

Playing with the numbers some more... 680 calories per day times 365 days a year would be about 248200 calories per year just from soda.  3500 calories equals about a pound of fat, so 248200 divided by 3500 equals roughly 70 pounds of body fat that my body had to mitigate each year from drinking my favorite beverage.  Crazy, right?

And that is why even with 100 mile weeks and whatnot I still carried a lot of extra weight in my midsection, which is the exact place that fat accumulates on diet filled with excess bad carbs and sugar.

Giving up sodas is just one of the choices that I have made in my pursuit of that awesome Leadman trophy along with other changes which I might write about at another time.  Just from the math alone I am damned glad for it too!  It's something to think about...

Working With The Weather

The break in weather today allowed for a great 2:16 bike ride.  I definitely have to say that riding that Trek outside is a heck of a lot more enjoyable than riding inside.  After a few days away from the bike I was able to really appreciate just how smooth of a machine that thing really is today.  Out of curiosity, I weighed the bike today and it comes in at 25 pounds and 12 oz... not too shabby of a setup for an amateur like me.  I could probably drop the bike weight some more if I tried but I'll focus on dropping MY weight instead. 

Today's fun squiggly lines... 2:16:16 of riding, 26.04 miles with 2454 of gain and an avg HR of 138 BPM.

 

 

Tomorrow should be a nice day again and I get to run. 

Melissa is trying a new experiment... she has commandered my juicer after watching Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead.  One thing I have learned from her efforts so far is to be careful about how much ginger you put into a juice mix.  Too much yields very interesting results.

A So-So Week

Not a whole lot of volume this week due to the holiday and taking today off as well.  We also had to switch workouts during the middle of the week as the temps were too cold out to ride so instead of a long ride or two, did a couple of sessions on the trainer followed by a run.  Still for the week I got 6:38 of running in and 2:04 of riding in, of course both of those workouts were on the trainer.  Anyway, 8:42 total training time for the week.  Sounds light and easy but those two bike workouts were tough and I think I was still feeling them when I ran yesterday.

Spent the weekend up by Florissant with Melissa, Annie and the dogs.  It was good to get away.  Gave me some quiet time to think about things and what not.  Most of all being up there I was able to really observe and appreciate that the hours of daylight while still short are definitely getting longer which I am glad to see.  Also I am excited for the week of 40 degree temps that we have coming up.

Lastly, my weight is going in the right direction still.  I have gone from 157.4 on the 3rd of December to 144.8 today, the 6th of January.  I still miss and want some things from time to time but those impulses pass.  I mean really...with everything that has gone on the past three-four weeks, I think that if I were to breakdown and buy a Mountain Dew Big Gulp and a box of donuts it would have happened already I think.  :)

Need to go to the store... I have a craving for a pound of shrimp... See, Paleo eating ain't all that bad!  :)

Leadman Training (A Haiku)

It's cold all the time.
Train to ride. Training to run.
Frozen snotty gloves.