Retooling the schedule

This seems like something I am constantly doing...nudging my schedule here and there trying to make it fit everything I want it to fit. After another week of not being able to fit the gym into my weekend, I've decided I can no longer take Monday's off from the gym. So I hit the gym this morning to start on week eight of the C25k.

Uft.

I did it. I managed to run for 27 minutes after a five minute warm up. The last two minutes were brutal. I really had to push to keep myself running, and not drop my speed down.

My new plan is as follows, C25K workouts M-W-F, cross training/strength training T-Th, try to get exercise on the weekends whenever possible. I'm still going to be working on upping my ab strength on the T-Th strength days, and I'm going to try to add a Saturday or Sunday to that, at least for the ab work.

How often do you switch up your schedule? Is change a motivator for you or do you subscribe to consistency being the key?

Checking off another day in the plan

Yesterday was day two of sticking to the C25K plan. It's hard for me to make myself warm up for a full five minutes before starting the jog. At the end of the 25 minute jog I was feeling like I could go for a while longer, so I sped up for the last two minutes to tire myself out. I didn't want to run for longer than the plan dictates, but I do think I could have kept running at the pace I was jogging at for another five minutes.

My abs are still sore from Tuesday, making my core work hard. I struggled through the second set of my rotation, ending up falling 10 short on the "Sensei Mark Specials".

I got a few of the gear splurges that I had ordered in the mail recently, although I'm still waiting on a few more things. I ran with the New Balance Color Block Socks for the first time yesterday, and I did feel a surprising difference. I was amazed at what a difference socks could make during a run.

I also now am the proud owner of a pair of Champion Mesh Running Shorts, although I have yet to run in them. You see, I have this fear of them bunching up slowly and riding up till it looks like I'm running in scrunchy underwear. I guess the only way to get over it is to just wear them and hope for the best ^_^

Any suggestions on good cheap running gear?

Starting the Plan

One day of the C25K training under my belt. I threw caution to the wind and jumped in at week 7. Walk 5 minutes, Jog 25, Walk 5. This seems to be the point where I'm stuck at right now. It felt like a good solid run, and I was tired by the end of it.

I did however do a bad thing, and did 30 minutes of elliptical intervals. It was supposed to be an easy warm up while I killed time waiting for my S.O. to show up, but leave it to me to feel embarrassed about not working hard enough. So my easy warm up turned into a full on session of intervals, not quite H.I.I.T. levels, but close.

I also decided, whim like, to set a target for my ab work, I upped the number of each set to 25 reps. Right now I've got four different styles of crunches (well three but one is done on each side, so I count it as two - is that cheating?), and I'm aiming to do three sets of each exercise. I did two sets yesterday, and I'm feeling it today.

Any advice on cross training I can do on my days off on the C25K plan?

Looking forward to the week

This week is going to be a good one. I just got my copy of Hungry Girls 200 under 200 Cookbook, and I'm excited to try out a bunch of new healthy recipies. I've already tried a slightly modified version of one of the recipes and it even got the S.O.'s stamp of approval.

I am also going to try the Couch-to-5-K training plan. I'm jumping into the plan at week four. I'm a little nervous about the plan, even though everyone has nothing but good things to say about it. Reading the plan, it doesn't seem like I'll be doing enough work. It is, after all, only three days a week. I'm trying to come up with other cross training to do on the other days. Are elliptical machines are too close to running to be cross training?

I hope everyone out there had a great holiday weekend, or just a normal weekend for those not in the states. What are you planning this week to refresh your exercise routine?

Back on the Starting Block

Yesterday was my first day back in the gym after my vacation. It didn't go as well as I'd hoped, but I suppose I have to give myself time to work my way back up. My S.O.'s hip is still bothering him, so we opted to stick to the elliptical machines yesterday. I did arm exercises, and my full rotation of ab exercises.

Everything felt...sluggish. It was a struggle to get through each exercise, and yet I didn't feel like I was working my muscles hard enough. I'm not sore today, but I would have been hard pressed to lift any more yesterday. While on the elliptical machine, I struggled through my intervals, and yet my heart rate was never higher than 170 (it usually climbs towards 180 during that last few intervals.)

I'm going to chalk it up to working off the rust from the past two weeks. This week will be a "recovery" week, in which I attempt to get myself back up to the workouts I was doing before the vacation. I hope to put up a few miles running at some point, and I'm still toying with the idea of training for a 5k, and that Couch-to-5k plan is looking better and better.

Anyone out there doing the C25K? You like it? If not, Do you have a training plan (running or otherwise) that you swear by?

The Heavier Side of Birth Control

For a while now, I've suspected that my birth control pills were sabotaging my weight loss efforts. When I look back at my weight cycles, I can draw almost direct correlations between weight gain and going on the pill, and weight loss and going off of it. While on the pill I've struggled to loose weight, having to resort to drastically low calorie counts and punishing workouts, and seeing very little results. This has not felt healthy in the least, however when I voiced my concerns to medical professionals, I was met most often with the voiced opinion that the pill were not causing any weight gain, and that it was a myth that weight gain was a side effect of birth control pills.

No matter how much anecdotal evidence I've heard, or how much my own experience seemed to point to it, as one nurse bluntly told me "You may think your not eating a lot, or your exercising enough, but you're obviously not, since the pills do not cause weight gain."

Now a study has come out that seems to validate my thoughts. It was cited in Women's Health Magazine (although I'm having trouble finding it on their site). For those of you who are brave enough to try to untangle the scientific speak yourselves, the full article can be found here. According to the nifty chart-type graphic in WH, the average weight gain over 3 years on The Pill is 3.2 lbs. with an average increase in body fat of 1.63%.

I've been on the pill for a solid six years, this go around. If we were to just take the "average" weight gain from that chart, I'd have an additional 6.4 lbs hanging out on my hips from just the pills.

I'm going to do a little unscientific study of my own. I'm going off the pills. This terrifies me, as the idea of having my reproductive cycle out of my control scares me. But I've gotten to the point where I think that being on the pill is negatively affecting my fitness and overall health. I'm not giving up on diet and exercise, I intend to eat healthy and exercise for fitness instead of pushing myself to the point of injury and starving myself into irritability for the sake of weight loss.

I've got my fingers crossed on this one.

Still on Vacation

So far this vacation hasn't turned out to be anywhere close to the fitness filled couple of weeks that I had planned. Too many obligations and expectations leaving us running from one place to another. My S.O. injured his hip before heading here, so running has been out of the question, and until the past couple of days, the weather was prohibitive against swimming. I have managed to make it to one kickboxing class, which completely kicked my butt, and I'm planning on one last body pump class before we leave on Saturday.

I should be back to updating regularly next week, once I'm back home in NYC. I hope everyone is having a great couple of weeks, and is finding it easier than I am to fit fitness into their summer.