a wasted week?

Due to a death in the family, a lot of travel, and sickness that spread throughout the household, i found only one workout this week. A wasted week? maybe, maybe not. Now here's something to think about, we have a finite number of workout days, no matter who you are, what you do sooner or later these days will be over. Now before you go scrambling to grab the nearest sweating to the oldies tape, remember, we as humans need stimulus and time to absorb what we've done. I think it is a good thing to break from your workout routine once a while and let our bodies( especially the bodies over 35) time to recoup. now does that mean throw down some ho-hos and lie prone for one week? no, but take yourself off the routine treadmill. go for a walk, take a swim, play with your children, and enjoy a french fry once a while. I for one am glad for this time off, and it makes me look even more forward to tomorrow's weight training session. Now the jogging? that's a different story.

ode to a callus

Anyone who's ever done anything slightly exercise worthy knows one thing, Sooner or later, your gonna either get a blister or a callus. Now blisters are yucky, I gotta pop them and they annoy me to no end, but calluses are cool. They show that you have been progressively training, and the body is building itself up to handle the workload. This is where i have found my training. I am slowly slowly seeing improvement in every aspect. My running is getting better everytime I go out, my weights go up every time i lift. Last nite my wife noticed that my knees don't quite make the snaps crackles and pops they used to, and i have found that i come back from the run feeling winded but good, and while i still don't look forward to getting out there (think its mostly the weather, if you're on the east coast, you know it ain't been jogging season), i get out there and every time push that little bit harder. Tonite I go for a run, and I'm bringing my Drill instructor. I am hoping to beat her up the hill today.
that's about it, for me, except that i have started to eat a salad a day, and i think my wife would prefer i left off the raw broccoli for gaseous reasons.
Remember in your endeavours, we want to callus, not blister. Take it easy make little gains, and soon you'll be where we need to be.

the return of the pink bike

Ok i am slowly starting to see some slight improvement on my wind in the running department. Now this doesn't mean by any stretch i am running my entire time out, but i can run for several minutes at a time and was feeling confident. Now, if you knew me you would know that confidence is something that cannot be allowed, so I decided to knock myself down a peg or two with the dreaded pigtailed drill instructor on a pink bike.
If you have read the previous post about the first excursion with this pint sized warrior of the wasteland, you would know that things didn't go well, matter of fact my feelings were down right hurt. So with a long talk about how to encourage someone, and what was to be expected, we went out into the cold dark night. Things went great!! My daughter was not only very positive, but she kept me company, and actually caused me to shave several minutes off my run!! with this done i have now made a deal with the devil, and will allow her to ride with me once a week. I have also found i have been slipping off my original running plan somewhat, but i am trying to make improvements every time i leave the house. With this in mind i have found 2 tools i couldn't live without. a stopwatch, and a pedometer. the stopwatch is key to help me kkep up with how much time i am actually jogging, and how much i am walking. with this knowledge i can make sure i run more each time, and the pedometer will help me find out the distance i am actually traveling which i am not particularly worried about now, but will become more and more important as the journey progresses.
As for the weight training, i am still adding 5 lbs to each workout, I have been concentrating on form over weight, and i am starting to feel more confidence in those workouts as well, I wonder if my daughter would mind hanging out while i lift.....................