I Endured!

My blog has been pretty quiet for a few weeks – September has been a chaotic month. On a sad note, Jason’s grandma passed away two weeks ago. As I know quite well from when I lost my father, a death in the family really throws life into a tailspin. In a way, I’m glad that it does – it serves as a valuable reminder of what’s really important in life.

On a much more positive note, I have had one crazy busy beginning to the fall semester at work. While I’ve been working longer hours, it’s all for good stuff. However, I won’t be too upset when October comes around 🙂 .

Today, Jason and I completed The North Face Endurance Challenge 5K. Due to the chaos of the last few weeks, we had fallen behind on our training schedule. This definitely worried me before today’s run, but I figured I’d walk if needed and do my best.

I did much better than I expected to do. I finished with a time of 36:44, which I didn’t feel to badly about seeing that I took a few walk breaks. About one mile of the run was on the Ice Age Trail. I knew that trail running would be different and would pose a new challenge, but I really liked it! Don’t get me wrong – it wasn’t easy, especially given the wet and muddy ground. But it’s definitely something I’d like to do more of.

Beautiful day for a run??

A last minute downpour as we arrived at Ottawa Lake.

Crowd around the finish line.

Ottawa Lake

The North Face put on an excellent event! We received an Endurance Challenge string backpack and an awesome Flight Series tee. At the finish line, we got water bottles courtesy of Gore-Tex. There were booths for The North Face, Leave No Trace, and Gore-Tex, among others, plus food and beer. Even though the Endurance Challenge’s two days included a 50K, a marathon, marathon relay, half marathon, 10K and kids’ runs on top of the 5K, we felt just as supported as the more hardcore distance athletes. Not even the rain could put a damper on the event.

So now what? Well, I want to run more! I’m planning to backtrack a little and follow the original Couch to 5K training plan. By the end of November, I hope to have completed the program and can start running 9-10 miles a week. Next summer, in addition to more hiking, I would like to run a few more 5K’s. When I hit next fall, I might consider training for a 10K. We’ll see how it goes…

My Backpacking Quest: Getting Started

Shortly upon returning from our Yosemite vacation, I decided that I want to work towards taking a backpacking trip. There are many guided trip options out there for the unexperienced beginner – in other words, ME 🙂 . However, this doesn’t mean that I don’t have to prepare.

So I am now officially declaring that I’m starting my Backpacking Quest!

Backpacking for Beginners: Getting Started

I found a decent guide on The Lightweight Backpacker. My Getting Started steps include:

1. Acquiring backpacking knowledge through reading
2. Acquiring knowledge and experience through courses and backcountry organizations
3. Getting in shape – and staying in shape

I think it’s pretty obvious which of these three steps I’m starting with 🙂 . It’s time to kick it into gear and get in shape!

5K Training

I believe I mentioned in an earlier post that Jason and I are going to participate in a 5K run in late September. While both of us have run 5K’s before, it’s been over 10 years since for both of us.

We had our first long running stretch in our walk/run training program yesterday – 1 minute of walking followed by 10 minutes of running. Up until now, our longest running stretches had been 5 minutes – and we thought that was tough.

Honestly, I felt pretty good during the run. The return of the humidity wasn’t welcome, but it didn’t take too great a toll on me. I am finding that the first half of my running portions are the roughest, but the second half feels great.

I have given some thought to going beyond a 5K in the future. Maybe I’ll take on a 10K in the future, or maybe even a half marathon. I’m keeping focused on the immediate goal, but I’m enjoying that focus so much that I’m wondering what goal I can aim for later down the road.

SparkPeople

Unfortunately, weight loss and getting into shape is only partially about exercise. Diet plays an important role – a larger role – in the process. I am now actively using SparkPeople and will be attempting to follow the Spark “Diet.”

I would be super happy to have any of you join me in this part of my journey. Learn more about SparkPeople and become one of my SparkFriends.

Ultimate New York Body Plan: Day 2

Stick to a regular exercise time every day. Make exercise ritualistic – like brushing your teeth.
– David Kirsch

Today’s Meals

Breakfast was once again a DK Protein Shake.

Once I got to work, I also had some green tea. I needed a little extra boost.

I had been planning on having lunch on campus today. My lunch buddy is, unfortunately, getting over a nasty bug, so I was on my own. I went over to the only restaurant open in our student center for the summer: Graham Street Cafe. They have soups, sandwiches, and to-go salads – and as I expected (but was hoping to be wrong), it’s nearly impossible for me to eat healthy there 😦 . I wound up getting one of the shaker salads – Spinach and Chicken. I had to pick out the shredded cheddar buried deep in the spinach leaves – fun – and had no other salad dressing option but the balsamic vinaigrette included in the container. Technically, I should be staying away from balsamic vinegar right now as it has more sugar in it than the better choices of red or white wine vinegar.

It’s definitely disappointing to work on a college campus and be so limited in healthy dining options. Even during the school year, it’s super hard to find anything really healthy…or cheap for that matter. I was hoping the soup today would be something alright for me to have – tomato for example – but it was, of course, potato. I read through the different sandwiches, hoping to find one that I could easily dissect, but my main options for that to be worthwhile were paninis – hello necessary cheese. Needless to say, it was frustrating.

Later in the afternoon, I enjoyed another cup of green tea along with DK’s Tuna Salad with Whole Grain Mustard and Water Chestnuts.

Finally, dinner was another protein shake.

Jason did better with his dinner tonight, but not by much:

I am so proud of myself for not even attempting to steal a french fry – you have no idea how hard that is for me 😉 .

Today’s Workout

Today was an ab/core toning routine day. This routine includes more exercises for the lower and upper back. I’m realizing that my back must be in bad shape – those exercises are tough!

I followed my ab/core workout with a 5K training run with Jason. It was super humid out again, which is making the process of getting back into running much more challenging. Today’s workout was 15 minutes, with 5 circuits of 2 minutes walking and 1 minute running. This easy run is in advance of a nasty Thursday – 1 minute walking followed by 10 minutes running! Luckily, we only have to go for 10 (to 25) minutes 🙂 .

Other Thoughts on the Day

My biggest challenge today was energy. From past attempts at detoxing from carbs and sugars, I know that the second day is a bad one. I had a couple of boosts from the green tea. I honestly thought that my workouts would drain me even more, but they really left me feeling more energized. I faced the challenge head on by reminding myself that Day 2 is bad, but Day 3 gets better 🙂 .