Holy Cow!

Holy Smokes, it's May!

I weighed in last Wednesday. I am officially 5 pounds overweight. On the plus side, that's a lot better than I thought I would do. I guess the running is paying off after all. I hope so. I can already tell that I'm going to need new shoes when I get home. And, PJ, I am NOT talking about those squared off brown shoes you always try to get me to buy. :-)

I've been working my arms and shoulders on T/Th to compliment the running and break up the routine. I've actually been able to run a couple of simulated 10K races out here. Granted, they were on the treadmill at the gym, but the computer says I picked up my feet enough times to simulate running over 6 miles at a time. Wow! I'm trying to get up to a 1/2 marathon by the time I get home. I want to run the Horno Ridge Run when I get home. That's a 10K, but then maybe I could consider the Rock 'n Roll marathon next year. Hmmmmm...

I must be doing something right

Okay, I've had two people in the last week tell me that my face looks thinner. I guess that means I really am on the right track. I am usually able to best notice differences in my weight by looking at my face as well. I know the bigger target is my gut, but no matter how much (or how little) I weigh, it always looks the same to me. I graduated boot camp at 180 pounds and I thought my stomach was big. I've been as heavy as 230 and I KNEW my stomach was big, but it didn't look to me like it was 50 pounds bigger. Is that a perspective problem? Have I just become so used to my flabby sides that I just assume I'll always have this body image? Well, I have 20 weeks left before I put my workout regimen to the ultimate test: what will SHE think about it?

I think I'm off a bit

Okay, so I just updated my ticker but I don't think it's accurate. I added in 9 1/2 miles for the last two days and then I just noticed that I hadn't posted an entry in over a week. I'll leave it where it is for now and just try to be better at keeping my stats updated. Speaking of stats... I've somehow become the book keeper at our softball games. So now it's up to me to make sure everyone's averages are accurate. That's fine, but if the book says you went 1 for 4 with a fielder's choice, don't tell me you went 2 for 4. It's not the same thing.

Just keep running... Just keep running...

whew!

It's been an interesting week for PT out here. We had a good sand blast early this week and then today I ran to the gym through the rain. Huh?! I thought I was in a desert! Then I remembered that a desert is any region that receives less than 10 inches of rain in a year. Well, that means there could be some rain, just not very much.

I've also decided that my shoes are too small. My toes push against the toe of my shoe from the moment I put them on. This does not leave any room for my feet to swell while I'm running. I guess that would explain the MASSIVE blisters I've been getting on my toes while I run. I'll just have to remember to use my foot powder (thank you, community grab box) and try to air out my feet as much as I can, which isn't very much.

Still, I managed to put some miles on my feet four times this week, including two "monster cardio" days. I think it's starting to work because my belt has more of a "tail" on it than it did when I came over here.

Have a good weekend! We have three softball games scheduled. I don't know if the weather will allow us to play though. We'll see.

modified plan of attack

Okay, so I've been trying to do a little bit every day. I haven't gotten up to a full six days a week yet, but I'm getting there. Yesterday I ran on a treadmill for about 3.5 miles and then hit the bike for another 8 miles. That was 30 minutes each machine. I added that to the miles I ran last week and came up with the total of 25 miles so far this deployment.

I'm going to try something new this week. I did pure cario yesterday. Today I'll try to do all three workouts (upper body, lower body, abs) and try that for a couple of weeks. That'll give me three cardio workouts a week (M/W/F) and two weight training days (T/Th) and leave the weekend open for softball, swimming, or whatever. If this works, it'll be more sustainable as it will allow me to continue the cycle after I get home and keep the weekends open for the family, like they should be.

on your marks... get set... here we go!

I brought a book/magazine with me out here to help with the LG4J plan. I read it again yesterday and decided that since I have the time, now would be a good time to get started on their 8 week program. It's published by Men's Health and what they did was get several of their staff of various body types, ages, workout habits, etc. and give them personalized training for 8 weeks. Well, as luck has it they have a guy who started the program at 222 pounds and ended at 204. He's 6' 2" and 32 years old. I decided to follow his regimen for 8 weeks to see if I could achieve similar results. I started that today with an upper body workout followed by a run on a treadmill. Suprisingly, I actually feel pretty good so far. We'll see how I feel when I wake up tomorrow. Anyway, since I didn't run yesterday there's no credit for miles but since I went to the gym on Tuesday and it's about a mile from my living space, I've added that distance in to the tracker. We're off and running. We'll see what happens over the next 8 weeks.

I've been eating pretty good at the DFAC. The last thing I want to do is waste my physical activity by eating junk, right?

BTW, Jen and I have talked about it and since she wants to be surprised by my 'new' physique when I get home I probably won't be posting many pictures of myself during this deployment... at least, not in PT gear. Since cammies aren't exactly flattering, I'll probably have some shots on my main blog. We'll see.

It's gettin' hot (out) here...

It's already starting to get warm, but I stuck to my plan and hit the bricks this morning. I've logged in my first three miles on this tour. My plan is to run on M/W/Sa and lift weights/do abs on T/Th and then swim on Friday. We'll see how that works out. In the mean time, I'm going to try and get one of those weather pixies so you can see what kind of weather I'm dealing with while I'm on the path to a slimmer, trimmer, more Marine-looking self.

Hydrate, hydrate, hydrate!

Nope. Didn't like that one either

Okay, so the whole New Year’s resolution is still going… sort of. I haven’t been running EVERY day, but I have been out a lot more than what’s been documented here on this blog, so I’m starting over (again).

Since I’m deployed this time, which means I don’t have my family around, I can waste some time each day keeping this blog updated. I’ll start the counter at zero for “miles run” and I’ll just see how many miles I can log before I go home. I’m glad I brought my good shoes and I’m also glad I brought some of my civilian shorts, because the traditional strict “green on green” rule doesn’t seem to hold much weight out here.

Speaking of weight, I’m hoping to lose an average of a pound a week while I’m here. If that is successful, I should be just under 200# by the time I get home. Of course, in an ideal world, I’ll be either less than 200#, or my BF% will be a lot lower by the time I get home. I’m on the LGN plan from now until whenever…

Let's try this again

Since the last post was almost a year ago, I thought I'd try to bring an update. This is more like a fitness journal for myself anyway, so I can say whatever I want, right?

One of my new year's resolutions is to run at least one mile every day. Of course, I will (hopefully) run more than one mile most days, but I want to do SOMEthing every day.

So how am I doing so far?

Well, yesterday (1/2/08) I ran to the park near my house and back home for a round trip of about four miles. Today, I was planning to go to a "cardio challenge" class at the gym, but the aerobics room is being resurfaced so class was cancelled. I figured since it was a cardio class then a long run would qualify right? I ran from my office to the West Gate on base, and back, which is about five miles I think. I'll double check with the odometer in the car on the way home tonight, but the stopwatch I was wearing says that's about right. In all, I've already run 9 miles this year and haven't missed a day yet! Cool!

I'm going to try and make up a ticker for the top of the page and let's see how far I go in 2008.