I'm Home!

But not for long.  Lucky and Josh greeted me at the airport on Sunday night. I was so excited to see my boys! This trip was the longest that Josh and I have been apart since before our wedding. Crazy right?  That night Josh's friend Peter and his new girlfriend came over for dinner. They are in town visiting from Minnesota.  Once they left I crashed hard. I am so exhausted in every way possible.  In fact I've had to take a nap every day after work just to get through the rest of the evening.

My training schedule is totally off. I did another hilly run in California on Saturday morning and ran a solid 5 miles on Tuesday night.  Luckily it wasn't too difficult to re-adjust to the altitude though it did slow me down. 

California Runs (3 total) Stats:

Distance: 10 miles   Time: 1:28:34   Avg. Pace: 8:51 min/miles

Stats (for Tuesday):

Distance: 5 miles    Time: 48:02    Avg. Pace: 9:38 min/miles

It's been a whirlwind since I arrive back in Colorado.  Tuesday was my downtime night for the week. Last night we enjoyed yummy food and great company with Ryan and Claire. They were nice enough to make dinner for us. Tonight my FIL Jim will be in town. We're going to eat at our favorite restaurant in Longmont, Martini's Bistro.  Mmmm...key lime cheesecake.  Tomorrow I'm partaking in a little surprise and then Saturday we're heading to Denver to celebrate Claire's birthday. Busy busy.

So glad it's almost time for vacation! We will be on our way to France a week from today. I can almost smell the cheese and taste the wine already.

Freshman Year

After a long week, it was nice to wake up at my Mom's house this morning.  I scheduled a few tweets for work and headed out for a quick run before getting back to the grind.  It was a hilly run that looked like this:

Even with the hills I was able to maintain a pretty good pace.  Gotta love the 4000 ft elevation drop. I'm totally off of my training schedule but I figure I can get in a couple good long runs before we head to Europe in 13 days!

Time: 36 mins   Distance: 4.05 miles   Avg. Pace: 8:53 min/miles

After getting cleaned up and some work done it was time to take my little brother Riley to freshman registration.  It totally brought me back to when I started high school. I vividly remember going to my registration, even what I wore.  As I watched the kids in line, unsure of themselves, with anxiety and excitement taking their school pictures, trying to open their lockers and getting their class schedules I was thankful I was all done with that.  Though I did meet two of my BFFs Sarah and Lisa that year. 

Riley is playing freshman football this year which I think is great.  It's also a great way to get to know some of the new people that he'll be going to school with and being confident heading into the new world of high school.  He is also quite the ladies man. Every time we walked somewhere on the campus there were girls waving and calling for his attention. It was so cute.

After registration I took he and Emma for a celabatory frozen yogurt treat.  We stopped by FroyoLife.  It was delicious!  I basically tried half the flavors and had fun with all of the toppings.  Between the three of us we ate 2 lbs of froyo.  Delicious.  It was awesome getting some one on one time with my Californian siblings.  They are getting so big and are just great kiddos...ok teenagers.  I will be 30 years old when Riley graduates in 2014.  Man I feel old!

We headed home and so I could get some work done before Mom and Mike got home.  We had a nice evening talking, eating a delicious chicken, caper and artichoke dinner Mike made and hanging out.  It's nice spending some time with them not in heavy duty grieving mode.  Tommorrow my Uncle Ben, his girls and my Aunt Jan's family is coming over for a little BBQ. 

Sore...throat that is

After two days of presenting at a trade show I figured my voice would be a bit on the tired side. But then I woke up yesterday morning with a pretty bad sore throat. This morning I can barely swallow.  I think I have strep...ugh. I'm going to head to the doctor and hopefully they can get my all doped up so that I can get all my work stuff done for the week and enjoy the weekend at the lake.

Last night I was bound and determined to exercise since I didn't on Tuesday night after the closing of the show.  Instead of doing a speed workout I did a tempo run. Not going to lie it was hard. Breathing hurt and my ears were ringing.  I pushed through though.

Time: 37:35  Distance: 4 miles  Avg. Pace: 9:24 min/miles

So about deodorant

Last night was busy. After another crazy busy day I headed home to get ready for my sister and brother-in-law and our niece and nephews to arrive for the night. They had a busy day at Cheyenne Frontier Days and planned to crash at our house then head back up to Cheyenne for an air show later today. Anyway, I ran into the house, opened the windows, turned on our house fan…so hot, through the sheets in the dryer, fed our little fur-baby and headed to the gym. If I was going to get in my workout I had to do it right away.

Luckily there was actually a treadmill available. It was amazing for one to be open during the after work rush. I got on and started my 1200 meter warm-up. On the schedule I had 4x1200s @ 7:51-8:13 min/mile pace. First bad sign, I forgot my water. Second bad sign, there was already condensate on the windows.

Then a nice middle-ish aged women got on the treadmill next to me. I was almost finished with the first recovery interval when it hit me…the third bad sign. It was that awful I forgot my deodorant this morning but thought I could squeak by without it even though it’s almost 100 degrees outside smell. Yikes. Now of course, we’re all working out and I’m the first one to admit after a run I am smelly. But this was overwhelming. I actually began feel nauseated. It was stifling really in the heat of the gym.

Between that and knowing I had to hurry up to meet everyone for dinner at The Pumphouse I cut my workout one interval short. So I ended up doing 3x1200 @ 8 min/mile pace. Better than nothing right!

Stats:

Time: 40:23 mins   Distance: 4.5 miles   Avg. Pace: 8:58 min/miles

I went to dinner straight from the gym. Sweat and all. I’m sure Josh was thinking man did you forget deodorant too. It all comes back around.

Tonight I’m enjoying some Indian food with Rache at our local place, Flavors of India. It’s so good. Can’t wait to catch up and eat lots of saag.

Oh yes and a big CONGRATULATIONS to Hilary and Ed Lammon! They welcomed their baby boy on Monday. He's so adorable isn't he. No name has been decided on yet, so they're still calling him bean.

I think that he definitely looks like Ed, at least for now.

Not Ready for That

I had this ingenious plan to do my 'long' run for the week last night since we'll be spending 14 hours in the car this weekend. Lucky for me, the run was only 6 miles. I'm doing two weeks of mileage build up with a week of 'taper' following the next cycle. Worked really well for Nashville so I'm doing it again.

We didn't get home from signing our new car loan until 6:30 which meant we weren't done with dinner until 7:30. If I was going to fit in an hour long run I needed to get my butt in gear and get over to the gym. Bad plan #1.

So I get to the gym and start running at a comfortable 10 min/mile pace. But one mile in I decided to make this run a tempo which is what I would normally do on one of my weekday runs.  Bad plan #2. I was not ready for a 6 mile long tempo run.

The first few miles were fine. I got to 2.5 miles though and the brat I had just eaten decided to get it's revenge. Yep, hop off the treadmill and get to the bathroom asap.  Back running again I got the next mile and a half or so down, started feeling nauseated. Awesome.

I paused the dreadmill at this point, drank some water and gave myself a little pep talk instead of telling myself I sucked at running and it's pathetic that this run is so hard for me. After all this was no problem at all a few months ago. Boo.

I finally finished the run. It felt like it took FOR-EV-ER. It was not my best plan ever to do this as a tempo run. Definitely going to hold off a little longer before doing a tempo longer than 4 miles...at least for a few more weeks.

Stats:

Time: 56:20    Distance: 6 miles    Avg. Pace: 9:23 min/mile
2 miles @ 10 min/mile pace   4 miles @ 9:05 min/mile pace*

*Yeah had I been actually thinking I'd have done 2 mile warm-up, 2 mile tempo, 2 mile cooldown.

Legs are a bit sore today but I'm pretty sure it's from my intense deep tissue tendon rub at PT yesterday morning. Yes, it made my eyes water and I winced in pain. Whatever it takes to get me back to 100%. I'm for it.

If It Walks Like a Duck...

...it must be a runner after their first speed workout. I am sore today! Yesterday I was telling Josh how I didn't think the No More Trouble Zones DVD really worked me out as much as the 30 Day Shred (which was disappointing considering it's twice as long) because I wasn't sore at all.. I don't know if it was the combo of doing the DVD on Monday night then the speed workout, or just running intervals for the first time in months, but man. I swear I'm walking like a duck today trying not to work my thigh muscles at all.

I have to say this interval workout kicked my butt!  This is what I looked like after.  According to my training plan I needed to do 8x400 meter (.25 mile) intervals at about a 7:30 min/mile pace.  Note that this was my speed interval pace and not my sprint interval pace...eek.  I didn't note however in my plan what my recovery intervals were supposed to be so I made those 400 m @ 10 min/mile pace.  I know that there is a way to program this in my Garmin, but I'm lazy and would rather just have the treadmill do it for me.  Plus I'm pretty sure I would have quit all together or slowed down significantly had I been on an actual track.

Here's how it went:

1 mile warm-up-10 min/mile
.25-7:30
.25-10
.25-7:30
.25-10
.25-7:30
.25-10
.25-7:30

Already overheated at this point I took a 2 minute break to throw some water on my face...the gym was HOTT hot.

.25-10
.25-7:30
.25-10
.25-7:30
.25-10
.25-7:30
.25-10
.25-7:30
1 mile cool down-10 min/mile

Time: 52:26 minutes    Distace: 5.75 miles    Avg. Pace: 9:07 min/miles

This was hard for me. Just reinforced why I need to do this speed work.  Overall I ran 3.75 miles at the 10 min/mile pace and 2 at the 7:30 min/mile pace. Not fast for some, but definitely fast for me since I'm just getting back into it. Can't wait until next weeks torture, I mean speed session.

Training Commencing

I ran 7 miles yesterday. Yes they were on the dreadmill only because it was already really hot out. That is officially my first long run of half marathon training. It felt pretty good though I felt like I was moving like a snail.  I did 5.5 at a 10 min/mile pace, then .5 at 9:30 min/mile with the last mile at 9 min/mile pace. I was just so tired of being inside that I wanted the run to be over. I feel pretty good about it. I did stop at 5.5 miles because I was having chest pains reminiscent of the pain I had a few years back caused by Costochondritis.  After getting some water and walking around for two minutes I felt ready to finish. My legs were a little sore after the run which I expected as it was my longest run since Nashville and the first time in months I've run that much in one week.

Last week's stats: 14.5 miles  Avg. Pace: 10 min/miles (we're going to be picking it up this week!)

I'm still having some pains today, but hopefully it's just heartburn from all the crappy food I've been eating lately.  Super excited to throw myself back into training...for real this time. I'm picking up my orthoditics tomorrow morning. Yeay! I also finished up my training plan which goes all the way up until the Rock N' Roll Marathon in Arizona this coming January. I'm not commited to the marathon yet, but the course looks pretty awesomely flat and it would be nice to go somewhere warm in January. Of course there are other expenses with traveling like that and I only have two weeks of vacation each year which I'd rather not burn right away again. Regardless, I thought having a plan intact would be a good idea.

I would really like to run a sub-2 hour half. My last half in Moab I ran just under 2:06 which was an 8 minute improvement from Denver. Pretty nice improvement I'd say.  Because I've been out of the game and am totally out of shape, speed workouts are a must and are twice a week for this training session much like last time.  I wandered over to the McMillian Running Calculator and it spit out my paces necessary to achieve my goal pending all else goes well.

I'm feeling a bit itimidated right now, but I'm sure once I get into the swing of things I'll be fine. The long run paces are no problem. We'll see how the rest goes.

Rolling with it

This week I found out my friend Heather is getting married! Yeay! She met her fiance Dan just a few months before Josh and I started dating at a house party we went to. I remember going back to the sorority house that night and talking about that cute guy she met. Last year they had their beautiful daughter Kylie and unfortunately I was unable to go to her baby shower since she lives in Boise...sad. Needless to say as soon as I got the date for her wedding I booked my flight to Boise!  I'll be heading there the weekend of Sept. 17-19th...yep the weekend after getting back from Europe. I'm going to be one tired chica.  It's also the same weekend as the Crossroads Half Marathon.  As excited as I was about the race, Heather's wedding is way more important.  So my next half won't be until October.

Last night I took to creating a training plan for myself with thoughts of training for the Arizona Rock N' Roll Marathon which is in January.  Not that I really want to go support the state of Arizona and their ridiculous, racial profiling, anti-immigration law, but it's an available winter marathon. Anyway, it's that or Vegas which is in December but I won't have vacation time until the start of the new year.  So I set out to create a training plan which is almost done. Heather just ran her first half so we'll see if I can talk her into heading to Phoenix for the race with me. My plan is based off of the Runner's World Less is More plan which has only 3 days of running. One speed workout, tempo run, and long run. It's all about quality and not quantity which works well for me. I'm also going to continue to cross-train and take a couple rest days per week.  We'll see how it goes.

Josh and I ran around our neighborhood last night. I have to say it was not my finest run.  It was only 3 miles but felt like eternity. It was my first outside run since Nashville and I could feel it. The treadmill is awesome because it keeps you at a steady pace. Last night my pace was all over the place. I ran as slow as 10 min/mile pace all the way up to 8:43 min/mile pace. Yeah, all over the place and panting the entire way. I'm not sure if Lucky's tongue or mine was hanging out further.  I felt so out of shape. Of course Josh was there to remind me that I've been injured and I'm out there doing it. It's going to take a little while for me to regain all my fitness. At least that is two runs this week for a total of 7 whole miles. Haha. I'm considering trying to get in a run early early tomorrow morning before we head to the lake but I'd have to be out the door at like 5, not sure that's going to happen.

Sad Decision Day

Well this week marks the start of July, which means the Denver Marathon is only 3.5 months away. You may say, well that’s pretty far away…ha nope. If I started training next week, I’d only have about 14 weeks of training which would need to include a 3 week taper. That means I‘d only have 11 weeks to get myself back up to 20 mile runs. That’s just 2.5 months to get from zero to 20 without injury. Even though I've been cross-training my butt off, it just seems like I'd be asking for injury.

As much as I’m desperate to train for the full marathon, I’ve come to the decision to drop from the full to the half marathon. I’ve been going over all of this in my head, on paper, trying to figure out training plans that would get me prepared enough to run a strong race, not a fast one, but a strong one. It’s just not in the cards for me. If I were up and running even just 10 miles a week right now I’d just go for it. Maybe only do one 20 miler. But without the base, I’m not going to risk injuring myself even more.

I HATE giving up which is what I feel like I’m doing. I’m trying to remind myself that I need to listen to my body and my body is telling me that I am not ready to jump into training for a full. It's not my fault mother nature robbed me of my full marathon for the year and left me injured. My plan now is to train for a fast half marathon with the goal of setting a PR. After all, a half marathon is better than no race at all. Maybe I’ll even find a winter marathon to run in November or December. That will give me more time to prepare. I’m beyond frustrated but know that you can’t make your body do something that it’s not ready to do. It’s not like there won’t be other marathons in the future right?

From two legs to two wheels

I'm considering taking up a new physical hobby...cycling. Now I'm not what you would call a cyclist. I didn't even learn how to ride a bike until I was 7. Thanks to my friend Whitney who let me practice on her bike until I could ride it on my own.  Since then I've had a couple of bikes including my pretty pink cruiser than is collecting dust in our garage.  It got a lot of use when we lived in Ft. Collins, but since we moved and there is not Old Town to ride to it's been sadly neglected.

Anyway, I've been thinking about doing a sprint tri for which I'd need a bike other than my cruiser.  Yesterday Josh and I stopped at a shop in Longmont so that I could try out a road bike.  I was really nervous about the super skinny wheels.  Once I was on and actually pedaling it wasn't so bad.  Of course it will take some getting use to but I think I can do it especially the whole leaning over and the weird braking. I will definitely not be keeping up with Josh anytime soon or using toe clips. The last thing I need to to have my feet stuck to the pedals. I'd be the person at the stop light like this:

I'm not sure if I'm going to love it so we're going to keep our eyes peeled for a used bike. No sense in spending $1000 on a bike until I know whether or not I like riding.  It will be great crosstraining exercise.

Any tips for a newbie cyclist?

By the way, running is not going great. Last week I ran twice for a total of 7 miles. I was going to run 7 on Sunday but I took a few steps and the shooting pain returned. Luckily I have PT tomorrow.  If I can't run three times a week in the next couple of weeks I'm going to have to seriously consider dropping from the full marathon to the half.  Booooooo.

Women, Food and God

Several weeks ago while Claire and I walked around MacIntosh Lake she told me about a book she had seen on Oprah, Women, Food and God. It sounded interesting to me as we had just been discussing body image issues, etc.  When my mom called and said she was reading it and love it, I thought, ok I'll give it a shot and picked it up at Target. 

I've slowly been reading it, and though it is interesting, none of it has really applied to me because I'm not overweight and I typically eat what I want. That is until we got to the chapter on indulgers and restrictors. I eat healthfully and exercise regularly, but I do tend to flip flop between the two types of eaters.  I rarely will pass up something sweet or my favorite dip because really, life's too short to not eat at least a bite or two of your favorites.  It's better than binging on it later.  I do however find myself being really selective when choosing what else I'll eat that day or the next to make up for my splurge. Just to make sure I'm not worrying anyone, I never skip meals.  Food fuels my body. I do however, choose what I put into it.

Josh and I have totally changed the food we buy. We've eliminated as many processed foods as possible. We get bread from Great Harvest (only a handful of ingredients and it tastes amazing), our chicken and meat from the Farmer's Market (raised naturally eatting better than we do), we're growing our own veggies and when we buy fruit/veggies from the store they are all organic. We're trying to take in as few pesticides, chemicals and hormones as possible.  I'm even looking at the labels when selecting condiments to avoid high fructose corn syrup. Of course we still go out to eat occasionally so we can't control what's in their food.

You'd think this would be making me feel great, but I have been struggling with my own body image lately. Between not running, traveling for work (a recipe for over indulgence) and all sorts of social events going on, I feel like my body is going soft.  Full disclosure, at the height of marathon training I weighed 126-128 lbs.  I was eating a ton (1800 calories-3800 (on long run days)) and was feeling great.  Now I'm 130-134 depending on the day. This is not a huge difference, but to me it is.  My clothes still fit but feel more snug. My once almost visable abs are fading and the light of day I saw in between my thighs is all but gone. I'd love to say it's muscle but ha, who am I kidding.  I've been trying to look in the mirror and tell myself something positive every day, but I'm still feeling heavy and disappointed in my lack of willpower.  I wish I was one of those naturally thin people, but I'm not. I have to work really hard to stay in shape.

I'm nearing the end of the book and the beginning of training again. Hopefully I can get my head on straight and stop being my own worst critic.

Bikram Challenge: Complete

Well my month of Bikram is over. I totally slacked last weekend with Friday being my only class for the entire weekend. Oh well. I did 22 or 23 classes, I can’t remember. Not bad for a newbie.

Thoughts on Bikram:

-It is hot! No, kidding right. But some days when I walked in the room the heat was like a punch in the face and I’d start to sweat instantly. The more people that were there the hotter it was. On days when I was tired after work, I almost always started to drift off to sleep while waiting for class to start. The heat was like a nice warm blanket.

-I’ve never sweat so much.

-I’m not flexible at 5 am.

-Balance, balance. The standing series of poses is an hour long. They were my favorite of the entire class. They really helped me with my balance, leg and core strength.

-I could hear my heart. Some days more than others but there were times that I would lay on the floor for savasna and could feel and hear my heart pounding. I wouldn’t say it kept my heart rate up the entire 90 minutes, but it got it up from time to time which leads to more calorie burning.

-My ankle hates some of the floor poses. Though yoga had no blunt impact to make my ankle hurt, one pose in particular made the pain flare right up every time. I had to do a modified pose to avoid the pain.

-It’s very repetitive. Bikram developed his practice so that one pose lead to the next. That means every day we did the same 26 poses, in the same order. Though it was nice to do the same poses and see improvements each time, it got kind of old. I began to learn which poses I didn’t like and began to dread them when I knew they were coming up next.

Body Changes:

No major body changes. My weight continued to have its normal fluctuations of 2-4 pounds. I do think that my leg muscles have gotten stronger as well as my shoulders and abs. I’m still not seeing a six-pack but I’ll settle for a flat stomach. The changes in my measurements were pretty small, nothing worth publishing really.

To Continue or Not to Continue:

At this point I’m taking a break. I’m heading to Tampa for several days and have a really busy June. So I thought I’d wait to use my discount until the end of June or July. I think that I’ll continue with the practice on occasion but it will not be my primary form of exercise. I think the longer I do it, the more benefits I’ll see. Plus I do like the people at the studio.

I’m considering trying out some other forms of yoga in the mean time on a drop in basis.

So there is it, a super brief review of my month.

I Ran!!!

That's right, I ignored advice of the doctor and my own better judgement and ran.  I smiled the entire time too!  Friday afternoon I was heading to the gym before yoga and decided you know what I should try it out.  The first few steps on the treadmill sent shooting pain up my calf but once I got in my groove I was ok.  I ran an easy four miles before I decided I should not push myself right out of the gate.

Time: 40 minutes    Distance: 4 miles    Avg. Pace: 10 min/miles

Not too shabby considering I haven't run in more than a month.  Now, several days later I'm still hurting though. My ankle hurts every time I walk.  I've made the executive decision to skip the MRI and just start intensive physical therapy.  I didn't really like the orthopedic surgeon at all and I don't really feel the need to work with him or spend money on the MRI if he thinks it's just tendonitis. 

Hopefully I can get into PT before I leave for Tampa on Saturday afternoon so we can get this show on the road.  My month of yoga also ended this weekend....it did not go out with a bang but more on that later.

I Miss Running

As of today, it's been 18 days since I've run. It's the longest I've gone without running since June of 2009 when I took time off to let my tendonitis in my knees heal.  Of course I knew that I needed to take time off. My calf and ankle still hurt. I'm pretty sure that my ankle hurts because of a stress fracture, otherwise it should be healed by now.  Ugh, as the weather gets nicer more people are outside hitting the pavement and I envy them. I am ready to at least have the option to run.  Not even having the option is what's really getting to me. 

Plan of action: get into PT as soon as possible. Get back into my icing and foam rolling regiment.  Continue with yoga and cross-training so I don't lose every ounce of fitness I have. I realize that it's going to be hard running again and that I've probably lost some speed. I don't even care (ok I care a little bit), I just want to run!  I want to run so badly that I'm actually seriously thinking about pool running for fun.  To answer your question, yes I may have gone crazy. 

Since I'm all registered for the Denver Marathon, I have started looking at training plans. I think I'm going to stick to a 3-4 day/week running plan with yoga, pool running and other cross-training.  I'll definitely do speed workouts at least once a week. I figure if I do a 16 week plan, I have until mid-late June to get my ankle/calf situation under control.  I've decided the Bolder Boulder is out, which totally sucks, but there are tons of other smaller and less expensive races out there this summer. 

One of these days I'd like to be able to train and get through a marathon without injury. A girl can dream right?  Here's what my workouts have looked like so far this week. Sticking with the challenge!

Saturday-20 mins bike + 25 mins Elliptical +abs
Sunday-50 mins Elliptical + Bikram
Monday-60 mins Elliptical + Bikram
Tuesday-Bikram

Oh and you should totally check out this marathon recap from Beth who also happens to live in Longmont. She had to withdrawl from a race last year because of injury. She came back from that and totally rocked the Colorado Marathon.  She'll be joining Nancy (MIL) in Boston next year.  If she can do it, I can too right?

Update: PT appointment made. Next Wednesday at 4:30 pm.  Done and done.  Hopefully I'll get some good advice on what I can do to expedite recovery and when it's safe for me to start running again.

Yoga Challenge: Week One Down

The first week of the challenge is over and I'm feeling good!  It feels so good to sweat at yoga.  It's probably the only place you'll catch me working out in tiny little shorts and my sports bra.  If women older than me and in far worse shape than me can sport it, so can I.  Plus the room has lighting that make my abs look pretty awesome...you know like existent.  Here's how the first week went:

Saturday-Bikram + 35 mins on Elliptical + weights/abs
Sunday-Bikram + 40 mins on Stationary Bike + weights/abs
Monday-Bikram
Tuesday-50 mins on Elliptical + weights/abs
Wednesday-Bikram
Thursday-Bikram
Friday-Bikram

Six classes down, 19 to go to get the biggest discount on next months membership.  I can already tell I'm becoming more flexible which is awesome.  My legs are also getting stronger because those standing balance postures are killer.  Hopefully this will help me with running as well. I'm sure it will feel amazing after runs...once I can actually run again. The ankle is still hurting. I tried a couple steps running, shooting pain plus a few days of hobbling around. Note to self: call to get an PT appointment ASAP. 

Anyway, I took before measurements to see if I lose any inches by the end of the month as well as pictures. So the pictures are awful...I'm way too pale and they just look like crap so I'm not putting those up, but I will post my pre-Bikram measurements later this week. I don't think I'll really lose any weight, I'm not really trying to, but I do think I'll be more toned than I am currently.  Toning, relaxation and injury healing are the primary goals. Though I wouldn't mind looking like this.

Jason Update: He's in stable but critical condition. They were having issues controlling his brain swelling so they did a craniotomy to give his brain room to expand.  A CT last week indicated that he does not have brain damage right now but they will be repeating those tests this week to figure out what his long term brain function may be like. Keep thinking of him.  If you're interested in checking on his condition, Rache is running this website.

Bikram Challenge

Saturday marked the start of my new challenge. Josh and I headed to The College of India Bikram Yoga Studio near out house after a trip to the Boulder County Farmers Market (so glad it's open!) and Great Harvest for our loaf of bread for the week.  We were warmly greeted by Zach who was our instructor.  He was very welcoming and made us feel comfortable right away. 

We grabbed our towels and mats and headed into the hot room.  Hot is was. As we walked by the thermometer we saw that it was 106 degrees.  I was sweating already.  We should have arrived a bit earlier as the Saturday morning class is the most popular. Poor Josh got stuck by a guy who he swear he could hear sweating.  I wouldn't be surprised, they guy looked like he'd peed his pants when he stood up. Not that I can say much because I was a sweaty beast at the end of the class.

The last time I did Bikram yoga was with Liz back when I was in high school so I wasn't sure how my body would respond. I was relived to discover my body was very happy to stretch and bend in the poses.  By the end of the 90 minutes I was drenched and so was Josh!  My body felt great, especially my calf. It was really sore when I woke up but after class I could barely feel the tightness anymore. 

I did some Googling on how many calories you burn during a 90 minute Bikram class and I found out it's anywhere from 600-1100 calories. Wow!  I used this calculator to figure out that I burn about 886 calories per 90 minutes. No wonder I was so hungry when I got home from class.  After attending class again yesterday, I'm really feeling my muscles.  The balance is a killer workout for the legs and I even feel it in my arms and shoulders from holding my arms out.  Amazing the strength it takes to hold up your own body parts.

The Beginners Challenge is in full swing.  Tonight will be my third class, third day in a row. Josh's friend from college Brenna is going to join me. She said she needs some motivation to get into some sort of exercise routine so I'm helping her out.  Plus it's really nice to have some company. Anyway, back to the challenge.  Here are the milestones and what I get:

Do: 25 Classes Get: $50 Monthly Unlimited
Do: 20 Classes Get: $60 Monthly Unlimited
Do: 15 Classes Get: $75 Monthly Unlimited

I plan on going to class at least 4 days a week for the month.  Ideally I'd  like to go every day this week to start off the month right and get my body into a routine and more used to the heat.  But of course I still need time to go to the gym so we'll see how my schedule works out.  I'm aiming to get to the 20 classes this month.

So why Bikram and what are the benefits?

Well I wanted to do something totally different.  So many runners swear by yoga for helping them improve balance, core strength and overall mental fitness. I figured it worth a shot especially since I am sidelined from any hard cardio activity because of my stupid ankle and calf.  Some of the benefits I've found online:

• Warm up the muscles for greater flexibility
• Help achieve a deeper stretch
• Reshape the body & restore flexibility
• Expands one’s capacity to breathe deeply and fully
• Flush out toxins
• Burn calories by balancing metabolism, simultaneously raising energy levels and improving the efficiency of the immune system
• Reduces levels of stress
• Increases balance, coordination, focus and discipline

Check out this interview with the 'inventor' of Bikram. Pretty cocky I'd say.

Side note, I registered for the Rock N' Roll Denver Marathon on Friday. Yes, I know I'm taking a break but it's like five months away and I had to use my discount from Nashville before it expired. 

A Whole New Attitude

Yesterday I woke up with an entirely new attitude. I finally started calming the demons in my head. I asked myself a few questions:

1. Why do you want to register for the Colfax Marathon? Because your race was cut short, because you feel like people will see you as a failure for not doing it or because you want to?

Answer: Because my race was cut short and I feel like people will think I’m a failure for not doing. Is that the right attitude to go into a race with? I think not. It’s not even healthy. I’m pretty sure that no one thinks I’m a failure (at least I hope not).

2. How does your body really feel?

Answer: Tired. I’m not sore from Saturday anymore, in fact the soreness was gone by Tuesday night. My calf however is still screaming. During a practice booth setup session yesterday I could feel my muscle pulling every time I stepped on and off the step stool. It’s not an oh the muscle is tight, it’s an owe my muscle is tearing sensation. Also not good going into a race.

I knew the answers to these questions all along, but it was hard fighting the nagging voices of self doubt in my head. My decision is not to run Colfax because I don’t really want to and my leg hurts. Is it worth tearing my calf muscle which would endanger all of my future races for? No way! Plus you know what, I may have had an act of God ruin my marathon but I still raised more than $4500 (nearly $10,000 in the past 12 months) for cancer patient. That makes me a winner regardless of race status!  Cheesey moment of self esteem boosting positive reassurances done.

Of course I cannot go without some sort of challenge or activity in the mean time while my legs heals.

Enter the Bikram yoga challenge. A local Bikram studio just a few miles from my house has a pretty awesome deal for newbies. For $65 I can get a month of unlimited classes, a yoga mat and a water bottle. This is a great deal considering monthly memberships start at like $100…ouch. During this month, I’ll be challenged to do as many classes as possible. If I can do 15 or more I’ll get a discount on my future months membership. As it happens Saturday is the first of May (aka May Day for you silly Coloradoans that haven't heard of it). No better day to get started on a new challenge than the first day of the month. It’s also the only month this summer that I don’t really have anything going on so that just works out perfectly.

Also in the mix is going to be a boot camp class offered at the Longmont Rec. Center. It’s M/W/F in the evenings. So I’m thinking that once my calf feels good, not right now, that I’ll start adding those classes to the yoga. I’ll be getting full body workouts doing both classes. I’m really excited to get started!

I think this break is just what I needed. I get to try out new exercises and really listen to what my body wants. It may also be the jolt my system needs to move past my fitness plateau, not to mention awesome cross-training for running. This being said, I am not abandoning running. I’ll add runs in there here and there to keep my running fitness as well. Again not until the calf feels better.

Anyone want to join me for some hot yoga?