I Can Run Too

Another run ticked off

2010-10-19T19:52:00.000+11:00

I'm definitely on the road to recovery, which is such a fantastic feeling. This morning I ran 6.5 km with Krissi. After about 2 km my back started complaining, so we slowed it down a tad. That seemed to do the trick and I felt fine during the day. Fine enough to spend 15 mins in the garden, digging up weeds.

I'm off to the gym again tomorrow morning. Back to day 1 of my program, so it will be a warm up on the bike, followed by mainly arms work. The other cardio segments are rowing and boxing. On Thursday I am doing a day trip to Melbourne so there won't be time for the gym or a run. Friday morning I see Krissi. Friday evening it's back to the physio. By the way Andrew, you made your comment on the iPad, didn't you? It keeps correcting physio to physic. (Thanks for the comments by the way.)

One thing is for certain, it's such a relief to be out running again.

Real running

2010-10-17T22:05:00.000+11:00

I'm feeling really pleased because I got out there and ran a slow 5 km. I was dreading it. Complete paranoia has set in. If running caused me pain the last time I ran, then it might cause pain again. I came incredibly close to calling Lola and cancelling. I even had a completely reasonable excuse prepared. I had to finish my uni assignment and I wasn't going to be able to do that if I was too crippled to sit at the computer.

Anyway, I managed to get myself dressed in my running gear without using my prepared excuse. Lola kindly put up with my paranoia, walking for a while before we ventured off to run. She was under strict instructions to crash-tackle me if I stupidly developed an "I'm indestructible" mindset after a few km of running, as the plan was to run for 5 km and no further. We stuck to plan, I went home, sat at the pc for a marathon "I wish I'd written my assignment up earlier" session, and I'm feeling amazingly good. A little stiff and sore, which makes perfectly good sense as I haven't done any real running for four weeks, but nothing to worry about.

Hopefully I'll feel just as good tomorrow morning when the alarm goes off at 5:30 am for the gym.

The plan is to run with Krissi on Tuesday and Friday, go to the gym Mon, Wed and Sat, and get completely back to normal. Fingers crossed.

PS I had no idea that going to the physio was so much like being hit by a truck! Sheesh! No wonder I've avoided it all these years. I don't know how the real runners (JoJo, Emma, Sara, Andrew and co) manage to keep going back to the physio.

Back to the gym

2010-10-09T21:05:00.000+11:00

I made it back to the gym on Wednesday morning and again on Friday. It's the start of a new 12 week program at Flames Fitness, the gym at the end of the street. The way the gym works is that there is a team of gym staff who each look after a handful of clients. You book in for your session so that there are enough staff to go around. If you don't show up for your session and don't ring them, they ring you. You can avoid the phone call by not booking, but if you don't show up for a few days they call to book you back in.

When you start a program you get a little more face to face time as they take you through the exercises to be sure you know how to do them. Áfter that, they set you up, keep a general eye on you, and off you go. Graham and I have been going together, which is great for me. I'd be all too tempted to stay in bed and skip the gym if he wasn't going.

Mind you, he's in China at the moment (work trip for four weeks) so I'm having to dig up my own motivation. I'd been struggling with it for a few weeks before my back went into melt down. After my first session back I realised that maybe my lack of motivation was really a sign that I was overdoing it. Mind you, I'd been in denial about some of the early warning signs, so that would make sense. Anyway, I really enjoyed myself on Wednesday.

What I did find was that, rather than ensuring that I didn't work so hard that I ended up injured again, I had to work at not wrapping myself up in so much cotton wool that I may as well have stayed in bed. Fortunately I was pretty sure that day 1 would focus on arms. It did. As for any exercises that involved using my legs, I told myself that I'd managed my short run the night before without any adverse effect. The session finished with a boxing circuit, that involved 10 wall to walls with 5 body weight squats after each one. I thought about leaving the squats out completely, decided to give them a go and stop if they hurt and ended up doing all 50. I also really enjoyed the w2w's for the first time in months. (Light bulb moment: my body had been trying to tell me something but I hadn't been listening.)

That day I felt like I was my old self. I'd done my morning exercise and felt terrific, which made me all bright and cheery at work.

I had been booked in to the gym on Thursday. I woke up tired, decided to switch sessions to Friday, and was grateful for the decision when later in the day I suffered a sor back followed by a little hip pain. I didn't feel the squats in my legs at all, which I think means that my leg muscles are still so tight that the pain is being referred straight to my back and hips. I'll have to run that theory past the physio.

Speaking of the physio, I have to reschedule my appointment as she went home with a migraine. I'm keen to see what sort of difference the "lift" that she's organising for me will make. On her advice I've put the innersole of one runner into the other shoe, but it's too soon to tell if it's doing anything. I want the answer to be that simple, so I'm hoping that it does.

As for the Friday session, I enjoyed the program that Jonno had written for me. After my hips hurting the day before I exercised my patience during the 1.5 km treadmill "fast as you can" run. I wanted to run the whole distance, but I did the "chi running" body check, paying attention to how my legs were feeling during the warmup. I started off walking, built up to a run, realised after 2 mins that my left knee was hurting, went back to walking as another warm up, then went to a jog 1 min, walk 2 min pattern which got me through the distance.

Later in the session I had to do leg curls. My paranoia started to kick in, and I seriously considered asking the PT to let me skip them. Fortunately I noticed he had the weight on about half of my usual weight so I decided to give them a go. I was able to manage them safely. In between sets my program had me scheduled to use the vibration machine. I had that exercise changed to an iso-squat, which I managed better than I expected.

I seem to have pulled up ok from that session as well, which is comforting. I've booked myself in for three gym sessions next week. Krissi is off in WA, competing in a mountain bike event. I've two running sessions booked with her the following week. I'm planning to do some walking sessions next week, as preparation. The dog will love that. :-)

Tiny run

2010-10-05T18:09:00.000+11:00

I have been feeling so much better after my physio appt on Friday. For the last couple of days I tested out my back by pulling a few weeds in the garden. Today, I took Floyd for a short walk. It was only meant to be a walk, but I saw someone out running and had the urge to run home. Not very far - probably only 500 metres, but I ran. :-)

All I have to do now is see how it goes. I have discovered that small movements can cause huge pain when your back is complaining, so I am taking baby steps. Fingers crossed, I haven't done any harm.

Tomorrow morning I'm back in the gym for the first time in what seems like simply ages. I am so looking forward to it. Tomorrow evening I have a physio appointment, so if I do "overdo" things, at least I'm booked in for treatment.

Not running

2010-10-01T20:35:00.000+10:00

Oh my goodness. I had no idea how much pain I was in for. As the back pain disappeared all these other pains appeared. Talk about one step forward and two steps backward. Last Friday I power walked instead of running with Krissi. Did my stretches. Did my physio stretches. Went to work. Lasted an hour, just, then went home to spend the rest of the day in bed. On Saturday less back pain, but incredible shin pain. On Sunday a pinched nerve. I nearly threw up from the pain. Trust me to have extreme pain on a long weekend and to have gone to a physio who was spending a week at the coast. After that my right hip started to hurt. I was thinking all sorts of disastrous thoughts.

Slowly things improved. I had a sore butt from the pinched nerve and my hip was still hurting, but my back was ok. I was able to stop taking pain killers at last, but I was super cautious about doing anything that might set it all off again. I cancelled all my running sessions with Krissi, paused my gym membership and basically went into my cave. Today I saw the physio again to have a look at the underlying cause. She had one look at my shoes, said "just as I thought", did a few checks, and told me that one of my legs is shorter than the other.

I'm feeling a little silly, as so much "starting to run" advice says "go see a podiatrist", who would probably have noticed this. Anyway, I now know so I'll be able to do something about it. Not only that, the physio says that once my short leg is working properly I'll probably run better. How cool is that?

A few more treatments, but I should be running again in a few weeks.

Still running

2010-09-25T06:26:00.000+10:00

I started this blog to help me stay motivated to run. I always thought that not blogging would probably mean I wasn't running. Instead, running has become a habit and my blogging has fallen by the wayside.

Today, though, I'm inspired to blog. I'm not sure if it's because of my new iPad or because I'm "injured". I guess time will tell.

The new iPad is likely to make it easier for me to keep up to date with all my favorite blogs, but I'm not that keen on typing lots on it. (advantage: succinct blog entries!)

The "injury" is a very sore lower back, from tight hammies and glutes. Never having suffered from backpain like this before, I hadn't appreciated just how debilitating it is. I have developed a world of sympathy for sufferers over the past few weeks.

I'm on the mend. The physio has given me stretches to do, I'm booked in for another session and there's light at the end of the tunnel, thank goodness.

What I hadn't expected was how worried I would be about not running. At the moment I'm running 7 km three times a week. The other week I did a 10 km fun run and made my goal time easily. I ran my usual Tuesday and Friday runs, feeling a little more sore than usual, applied anti-inflammatory cream, had a hot bath or two, skipped my Sunday run because my back hurt, and then wasn't able to do my shoelaces up on Monday morning. What a horrible realization that was!

Fortunately, I was able to book into a physio that morning. A new experience for me, which had me feeling quite apprehensive. Fortunately, Gina gave me confidence that I would be able to manage the pain of the treatment. Even better, the treatment has helped, as have the anti-inflammatory tablets that one of my friends recommended. I'd like to heal faster, but I guess that I'm also being given a chance to work on my patience. (Who knew that back pain caused crankiness?)

I'm also discovering that improvements can end up feeling like backward steps. I suffer through the physio stretches after warming up, manage to do better, feel really pleased by my progress, then can't sit down at work because it hurts too much. I'm definitely going to be much more sympathetic to people who are recovering from injury in future! Oh, and more disciplined when it comes to stretching! Really I will.

Relay for Life 2010

2010-03-28T17:20:00.000+11:00

I decided yesterday, while running around the AIS track at this year's Relay for Life, to update my blog for the first time in ages.

Running round and round the track, I realised some amazing things.

Number 1 - I've been running all year since last Relay for Life. While I might have only made it out once a week at times, I've been out there consistently. Funnily enough, I haven't been blogging about it. I think that's because, when I first started running, writing about it was one of my motivators. Now I don't need the writing to inspire me to run.

Number 2 - I'm definitely a runner. I was wondering was I a runner or a jogger recently. At Relay for Life I realised that it doesn't matter how slowly I go, I'm running not jogging.

Number 3 - I am running so much better now than I did in the past. Last year I did a "run a few, walk a few" combination, that had nothing to do with how fit I was and everything to do with the mental challenge of running round and round in circles. This weekend, I struggled with the first few laps, then relaxed into it and started to enjoy myself. I was scoping out the crowds, listening to conversations as I passed groups of spectators, enjoying the colour and movement and having a great time.

Number 4 - I achieved my goal, set a few years ago, of running the whole of my relay stint. Woohoo! I'm glad I realised it while I was achieving it, because I was able to enjoy it.

I totally stuffed up my plans for the day, by managing to double book myself. I was supposed to run for an hour, then walk with my injured running buddy, Lola. Fortunately, my hairdresser sends a text to remind you about the appointment you made weeks earlier. Yep, it was right when my relay shift ended. Because I run with an old work group, I have to rely on email to organise my times. Unfortunately, that's not as efficient as wandering down to the organiser's office. I ended up with a split shift - half an hour before my hair appt and half an hour immediately afterwards.

I decided I'd run for an hour beforehand, so I headed off early. Roadworks killed that idea. Who builds a bridge on a weekend? Oh, of course it's a good time, but why the one on my direct route to the AIS track? I ended up getting to the track late, so I only managed a 45 minute run before my hair appt.

A quick wash before heading off to the hairdressers (Emma didn't need to be inhaling eau de relay all morning), no product or fancy blow wave (why bother?) and a dash back to the arena (what were they thinking, blocking off all the parking areas near the track?) to do my second shift. I wasn't at all sure that I'd run the second one, because of cooling down. When I started, I told myself that all I had to do was get through the first two laps (they'd been hard the first time) and then I'd be ok. It worked.

The first shift passed in a happy blur of taking in everything that surrounded me. There was an awkward moment where two girls (well built ladies like me, only twenty years younger) from another team passed me ät a fast shuffle. I was a little embarrassed to be left standing by two semi-runners but I passed them a mere 100 m later as they had exhausted themselves. They were in a team that was relaying properly (one runner would do a lap, then the two of them, then the other runner, etc). I saw them a couple of times during my shift. When they were leaving the track, I was running past them. I tapped them both on the shoulder and told them that they'd done a great job. The smiles on their faces were fantastic. Mind you, a tall leggy runner had told me "you're doing a great job" as she powered past me earlier. I love that running camaraderie that you experience in events.

On my second shift, one of the people from the team the two ladies were from called out to me "great job, how many laps?" My reply "no idea". I was letting my team mates do the counting, with my Garmin as a trusty backup. Three laps later, as I was about to finish, the same lady offered to count my laps for me. Again, that sense of camaraderie was really special.

I'm already looking forward to next year's event.

Running 2010

2010-01-11T20:44:00.000+11:00

I realised this morning that I'd run four times this week for a total of 24 km. I'm starting to feel like I've got my "running mojo" back. For a while I've only been managing to get out there once or twice a week and I've been struggling. This week it seemed really easy. I was looking forward to Tuesday's run with Krissi, which has been the session that's kept me feeling that I have running credentials even though I haven't been out there much. Over the Christmas break I only did one PT session a week - that run. On Thursday I met up with Lola for bridge to bridge. It had seemed ages since we'd managed to run together, so it was good to catch up on the news. Lola has been doing the same run with Krissi, who has been amused that each week we manage to run within seconds of each other's time. No wonder we're such good running partners.

On Saturday, we met up with Fontessa for a run at the base of Mt Ainslie. There were so many cars there when I arrived. It seems quite a few people have made exercise one of their New Year's resolutions. It was lovely to be out there with all the walkers, runners, cyclists, etc, although it did mean that we didn't see the usual kangaroos and possums. It also meant that we didn't have to worry about snakes. They were all in hiding! We had plenty of time to enjoy the scenery as we didn't try to go fast. Fontessa hasn't been running much lately, my legs were tired from an intense workout at PT on Friday morning and Lola's right Achilles tendon was playing up towards the end of the run. I had just read the stretching article in Runner's World, so I pointed her to it and she's trying it out. Hopefully it helps.

This morning Lola and I met up for a fairly flat short run. We're going to use this session as our "cough cough" speed session. As neither of us has ever really worked on building up our speed I'm not sure what that will end up involving. Whatever eventuates, it's sure to be amusing. We're planning to get into proper training for the Canberra Half Marathon in February, so I guess we'll have it sorted out by then. At the moment we're focussing on getting back into a routine and making sure we spend time on our feet.

My main goal at the moment is to get serious about my "The Last Twenty" challenge. I collected all those sponsors to help motivate me to lose weight and I managed to put weight on! It wasn't meant to work that way. A key reason for losing the weight by Mother's Day is that I'll handle the Canberra Half Marathon so much better if I'm lighter. I think that I'm much less likely to get injured if I'm carrying less weight around with me.

One thing for sure - at least I'm not trying to run in the pressure cooker temperatures that Adelaide and Melbourne are experiencing at the moment.

Fast run Tuesday, tough run today

2009-10-08T20:55:00.000+11:00

On Tuesday, I ran with Krissi. Now, I really should have known better. I'm the dill who told Krissi that I ran faster with Fontessa on Thursday than I did with Krissi the previous Tuesday. Only 7 seconds per minute faster, but it was definitely faster.

Who in their right mind tells their personal trainer that they can run faster? Who in their right mind inadvertently implies to their personal trainer that said PT could perhaps be pushing them a little harder? Who in their right mind would make such a blunder?

Nobody, that's who. Which means that I must not have been in my right mind when I mentioned in passing in an email to Krissi how pleased I was with my faster pace on Thursday.

On Tuesday we headed out for a run. I kept up fine for the warm up. I kept up fine for the first few km's. I started to develop a sneaking suspicion that we might be going a bit quickly when I glanced at my Garmin to see how long we'd been running and Krissi told me not to worry about the pace. I hadn't even thought about the pace at that stage. Krissi then told me that she was determined that we were going to break the 8 mins/km barrier. She didn't care by how much but we were going under. I thought, I only have to find 4 seconds per km to achieve that. I can do that.

I worked hard not to ease down too much, especially on the hills. I wasn't sure that I'd last the whole way. Fortunately, when we got to the big long hill on the way up to the top of the dam, Krissi pointed out that it was all down hill back to her place. If I'd had any breath I probably would have pointed out that there were still some hills on the way back, but as (a) the big long hill was definitely the worst of the remaining ones and (b) I was incapable of talking and puffing at the same time, I just gritted my teeth and kept on running. It did give me some heart though, which was much needed at that stage.

When we got back to Krissi's we'd run 7.75 km in an hour. My Garmin had our pace at 7:47 mins/km while Krissi's said 7:51 and slightly less distance. I'm sticking with mine as it sounds so much better.

The real bonus was that I had the runner's high well into the afternoon. :-)

This morning was a different story. It was much colder. I got to the lake 20 mins earlier than Lola and Fontessa, because of dropping Graham's son at work at stupid o'clock. Fortunately, I'd thought it through and decided that the smart thing to do would be to run the lake clockwise, meeting them coming in the other direction.

It seemed like a good idea until I got started. Actually, the first km wasn't too bad. I ran it at 7:42 mins/km then eased up, mainly because I got down to the lakeside where the wind was freezing. My legs felt like they were twice as heavy as usual, I was cold and I was miserable. I got slower and slower, thinking "why didn't sitting in the car waiting for 20 mins sound like a good idea yesterday?" At one stage I was feeling so bad that I dropped to a walk - the first time in ages. I only allowed myself a maximum of a minute walking, then shuffled off again.

I was doing the maths in my head - I thought I'd meet the others after about 30 mins. I was determined to be across the bridge and on the other side of the lake by then. I was hoping to have run at least 4 km by the time I met them. From somewhere I managed to rustle up some momentum. The breeze wasn't so bad crossing the bridge and then I had it behind me. I jogged along, hoping to see the girls at every turn. Finally I recognised them running towards me. They looked fantastic. I glanced at my Garmin and I was past the 4 km mark. Even better.

I turned around and headed back with them. They'd been struggling with the cold too, but they were running at a faster pace than me. I tried to keep up, then finally accepted that I was going to be behind them. I ran along, back into the breeze again, half hoping that the traffic would hold them up when we crossed the road and half hoping that they would go off and leave me to my misery.

Fortunately, the traffic held them up. Catching them up gave me a new lease of life and I managed to run along with them the rest of the way. Fontessa likes to run in front, so I tucked in beside Lola. We weren't chatting much, until we made it over the bridge and back to the flat. The breeze seemed to die. We all felt warmer and I started to enjoy the run.

Funnily enough, the day before I'd been talking to a workmate about how the bad runs made you appreciate the good runs even more and there I was, having a bad run the very next day. When I was struggling at the start of the run I took comfort in remembering the conversation, knowing that my run was something I'd be pleased about later, even if I was suffering now.

When we finished we compared times and distances. The girls had done a great job, running 6 km at approx 7:45 mins/km. Their extra pace meant that I ended up running 8.33 km at approx 8:00 mins/km. A good result for everyone.

I didn't have quite the runner's high of Tuesday but I did have a feel good buzz all day. You've got to love that.

Complete aside: Andrew, you asked about the Urban Polaris. It's a bike ride around Canberra in December. You ride around in pairs with a map for 7 hours, collecting points. It sounds like a fun way to learn a few new things about Canberra.

Three runs this week

2009-10-04T14:25:00.000+11:00

This week I managed to meet my goal of running three times in a week. I haven't managed to do that since the half marathon back in May.

On Tuesday I ran with Krissi, 7.85 km in just over an hour (8:10 mins/km). We took the warm up a little faster than usual, on purpose, as I'm trying to work on my lactic acid threshhold. I was struggling with feeling sick but managed to survive. I was relieved when we were able to ease back though. It was a lovely day in Canberra, which made the run even more enjoyable.

On Thursday, Fontessa and I ran bridge to bridge, 6.18 km is just under 50 mins (8:03 mins/km). Fontessa runs faster than me. My plan was to encourage her to go on ahead and come back for me at regular intervals, while I aimed to stay reasonably close to her. After a couple of kms I was ready to ease right back. Fortunately, I looked at my Garmin and realised that I'd probably already eased back. I stuck with it and found that I was able to stay in touch. At the end I suggested that we take it home quickly, which was a great idea, up until the point where I lost some of my breakfast on the pedestrian bridge. I felt terrible, particularly as there would be more foot traffic there than usual because Floriade is on. It was also the first time in ages that no rain was forecast! Oh well, as Fontessa said, "Food for the ants!".

On Friday I had a mini run, doing my warmup on the treadmill before my PT session. It was only 15 mins, 5 of which were walking. Krissi was pushing me to go a little faster than usual. Only a couple of decimal points but it seemed a lot more.

I was supposed to meet Krissi and Fiona for their warmup on Saturday morning. It rained overnight (good for the pedestrian bridge at least) and was still raining half an hour after I got up. Not heavily but I was running on Sunday as well, so I gave it a miss. Later that day Fiona called to ask if she could come along with Lola and me as she'd not been well that morning. As Fiona is training for the Melb marathon she didn't want to miss this weekend's scheduled run. Her plan was to run with us around East basin then do a loop of Central basin.

On Sunday I didn't even notice the weather when I woke up. I was focussed on losing my hour's sleep. I am one of the "hate the start of daylight saving with a passion" brigade. It seems to take me a week to settle into the change.

On my way out the door it occurred to me that I didn't know how to drive to our meeting place at the Hospice. I've run there and cycled there, but never tried to drive there. I'm glad I realised it before I was on my way. Graham kindly gave me directions and I made it there on time.

The three of us headed off clockwise, which had us running through the wetlands before we got to Kingston. Lola and I had discussed that during the week. Neither of us was confident of the path going the other way so we decided to stick with what we knew. It was a lovely run. The first 4 km were part of the route my first Mother's Day Classic had taken. I remembered it as much more of a struggle on race day. Mind you, I weighed a lot less and ran faster back then.

Running through the wetlands was enjoyable, although I didn't really try to spot any birdlife. I was too busy watching my footing on the pathway, which was covered in puddles every so often. We made it to suburbia, which was a little dull, then back to the lake again. Fiona decided to do a figure 8 which meant that she ran back across King Edward Ave bridge with us. We turned back towards the car while she headed on around central basin.

I was tempted to go with her, but I'd told Graham I would be back early enough to go to the Hall Markets. As it happened, we decided not to go because of the weather. I'm glad I didn't go with her though, as I found myself struggling along back to the car. I realised that it was the longest run I'd done in months. Lola and I were out there for 1 hr 20 mins, running 9.5 km at an average pace of 8:27 mins/km. We were both pretty happy with that.

All up, I ended up running 23.5 km this week. It doesn't sound like much compared to a lot of people, but I'm proud of myself. If I can keep this up over summer, I'll have a great fitness base for next year's half marathon.

Next week, Lola and I are planning to run bridge to bridge on Thursday and then do a run out at Mt Ainslie on Saturday morning. The weather forecast for Tuesday is good, so Krissi and I will probably run then as well. My friend, Alex, is going to walk up Mt Ainslie with me on Wednesday evenings during daylight saving, which is part of my training for my goal of being able to run up it in March.

All I have to do now is get the eating part right and I'll be on track to lose my last 20 kilos. More of that on "The Last Twenty".

Lots of fun running

2009-09-27T13:29:00.000+10:00

Woohoo! I am enjoying my running so much at the moment.

I was trying to work out why the other day. I'm not running any faster, I'm only getting out a couple of days a week, I'm running well within my comfort zone, I nearly always run with someone else so I don't think it's the social aspect. Then I ran somewhere unexpectedly. I wanted to get there quickly. I don't remember why. What I do remember is that I realised that it was easy. I was running. I wasn't out of breath. I felt like I could keep going for ages. I was comfortable in what I was wearing. Suddenly it clicked. It's the 15 min warm up I've been doing for my PT sessions on the treadmill at Krissi's new gym.

Such a small thing but it's made an enormous difference. It's not even as though I'm running for the whole 15 mins. I walk for the first 4 at 6 km/h, then I run for a while at 7.5 km/h then Krissi ups it to 7.8 km/h until I stop. When Krissi first moved locations I dreaded that treadmill session. It seemed as though 15 mins was forever. Now, it's familiar territory. We don't always do it but I know I can do it easily.

How has this transferred out to my runs? Well, the first 10 mins of every run was the hardest for me. That's when my mind was saying "Kathy, what are you thinking? Why are you doing this to yourself?" Now, I head off on my run, and I'm straight into "this is fun" mode. How cool is that?

I've been meeting Kelly, who is doing "The Last Twenty" challenge with me, on Thursday mornings at 7 am. We've been doing a fairly easy run around Central Basin, Lake Burley Griffin. I emailed a few people to let them know that we were running, and now I'm meeting up with Lola, Fontessa, Sally, Kelly and whoever else wants to come along for a run. It's been great fun and some of us are meeting up to run longer on the weekends. It has taken us a few weeks to get any sort of routine going, but we're there now, so I think this will take us through the next few months at least.

My last twenty challenge is keeping me motivated, as running is a great way to burn calories. I've also set a few running goals, such as running Ben Donohoe in November. On top of that, Fontessa asked me if I would run City to Surf with her next year. I decided I'll give it a go. Sally has a hilly run that she's going to show us, to help us prepare for Heartbreak Hill. It sounds like we're going to have a lot of fun as a group. :-)

I've also got us organised to manage the different fitness levels and running goals of the group. It took some thinking, but we're going to try a combination of things. For instance, on longer runs, some people might ride their bikes while others might meet us for part of the run.

Thinking about that made me realise that today's run with Sally wasn't going to be long enough for me. At PT on Friday, I told Krissi that I had been thinking about running another half hour on top of the run with Sally. Now, telling Krissi you're thinking about exercising is the same as committing to it. Next thing you know, she'd organised for me to run the warm up with her and Fiona before meeting Sally. They are training for the half-mara at the Melbourne Marathon. I ran with them for 15 mins, then headed back to the ferry terminal to meet Sally. She ran out to meet me, so I was only running on my own for about 10 mins. It was easy to organise, I had fun running with three friends, I got my longer run, and I'm feeling terrific now.

I've been thinking about cycling to work now that the weather is not so cold but I haven't had any real motivation to get started. Krissi came to the rescue again. Fiona and I are teaming up to do the Urban Polaris in December. If I'm going to be on my bike all day I'd better get some practice in between now and then!

What a lovely day for a run

2009-09-06T20:12:00.000+10:00

Kelly and I met up to run bridge to bridge this morning. For those of you who aren't familiar with Canberra, this is a run around the central basin of Lake Burley Griffin. You cross two bridges, which is where it gets its name. You're kind of running through postcard country the whole time you're doing it. Lots of people are out sightseeing or just walking around the lake.

Kel wanted to meet up at 10 am, which is way later than I usually run. I figured it would be good practice for next Sunday's Canberra Times fun run though, as that starts at 9:45 am, so I donned a hat, lathered up with sunscreen and enjoyed heading out without long sleeves for the first time in ages.

I wasn't sure what sort of run it would be. Kel hasn't run for ages, so I was quite prepared to take it slowly, and to cut the run down to half an hour if that was all that Kel wanted to do. We had a chat about what she wanted to achieve before we headed out. I told her that I wanted her to want to come back and run with me again, not to push herself so hard that she dreaded the thought of going for a run. Kel aimed for running B2B without stopping. It's about 5 kms. Kel runs a bit faster than me, although she doesn't think she does, so I was pretty sure that if I ran it at a steady pace, she would be quite comfortable.

We headed off with Kel talking nineteen to the dozen. That's pretty normal for Kel and it let me know that she was coping well with the pace. After a while she got quieter, so I knew to ease up a little. I took over the chat. We were talking about our "The Last Twenty" challenge. I got all excited about an idea we had and started running faster, then I realised and eased back again. Poor Kel!

We made it the whole way around, which is an absolute credit to Kelly. It took us 41 minutes, which we were both happy with. It was cool enough not to cook us, and sunny enough to make everything look fantastic. We didn't get tripped up by any dogs, kids or prams. We enjoyed it so much that we're going to meet up on Thursday at 7 am to do it all over again.

Running memories

2009-09-01T20:40:00.000+10:00

I was updating my "The Last Twenty" blog today, and ended up doing a bit of a running retrospective. I've been running for over three years now. I'm really excited by that. I still feel like a complete newbie compared to so many people. It's good to look back and realise that I'm not.

I know that because I never seem to blog here that it seems as though I've stopped running. That's not the case. I ran 8 km with Krissi this morning, enjoying every minute of it. I've signed up for the 10 km Canberra Times fun run on 13th September. I'm doing that because of Fontessa, the girl who helped get me home in the half marathon. Krissi told me that Fontessa was going to run it, and was thinking of asking me to join her, so I jumped in ahead, signed up, and gave her a call. Then I thought, "oh my goodness, 10 km, can I do it?" After a minor panic I realised "of course I can" but I'm making sure that I get out there a little more than I have been lately. I've got a 5 km run organised for Sunday and I'll try to get my backside out there on Thursday morning this week too.

You've got to love the added incentive that signing up for an event gives you.

Launching "The Last Twenty"

2009-08-24T19:04:00.002+10:00

It's been quiet here on the "I Can Run Too" front. That doesn't mean that there hasn't been plenty going on. Instead, I've been busy doing other stuff.

However, I'm here to ask you all for help. I've really been struggling to lose weight. I've managed to regain 18 kilos of the 43 I originally lost and I want to turn that around.

To that end, I've come up with a plan, that's all explained on my new blog - The Last Twenty. I hope you'll read the plan and come to my aid.

Thanks in advance. Your help is much appreciated.

Half Marathon Report

2009-05-23T14:13:00.007+10:00

The most important part of this post is "Yay! I did it!"

On Sunday, 17 May 2009, I managed to finish the 40th Canberra Half Marathon, with a gun time of 3:01:20. Considering my pre-race goals were to (a) finish it and (b) get there in approx 3 hours I'm pretty happy with that result. Mind you, it took me a while to realised that I'd achieved my goals. Even after all the training I managed to crash and burn at the 15 km mark. The last six kms were simply horrendous at the time. Funnily enough, when I look back on it, they're the six kms that make me proud because I got through them.

Lots of great things happened on my journey to that finish line. Realising that I could run the distance after I made it around West Basin the first time was a wonderful moment. Knowing that TB was cooking me pasta on Friday and Saturday night to help me fuel up for the race made me grateful again for having such a wonderful partner. He remembered that we'd gone to a pasta night the year before, when Jess and Nicole ran the half marathon, and decided to make sure that I had plenty of carbohydrates before I ran. I made some new running friends too, which is always a bonus.

On the morning of the race I was keen to get there. TB offered to drop me at Lennox Gardens, but I assured him that I'd be able to find parking without any trouble. I told him I'd be home around one and headed off in his ute, after checking that he didn't need it. Driving to a half marathon in a V8 is quite motivational. All that power under the bonnet!

Parking wasn't as easy as I expected. There were people and cars everywhere. I found a park and was on my way out through a gate when somebody warned me that they were locking the gate shortly. Thank goodness I was still there and could move the car. I relocated myself to the other side of Commonwealth Avenue and walked a bit further than I'd planned. I was on my way to meet the other five (Krissi, Lola, Julie, Amy and Laura) when I passed the queue to the toilets. I reconsidered, joined the queue, and finally got myself to the meeting point with a few minutes to spare. Krissi had been starting to panic that I'd decided to pull out. I have to admit, when I saw the crowd the thought did cross my mind. "What am I doing?" I thought. "Why don't I just run 21.1 km another day when there's nobody around?"

Lola, Julie and I were running together. This is us before the race. Don't we look fresh and happy?

The other three were planning to run much faster than us. While they moved off into the crowd of runners waiting for the start we found ourselves a position at the back of the field. I think we enjoyed the start much more than they did because we had a lot more room to move. It was hard to hold back when the crowd of over 800 runners headed off into the distance, but we managed to run the first section quite sensibly. Here's us at the start. Lola is leading the way.

We were running a bit ahead of schedule but we were soon left well behind everyone else. There were a few people just in front of us and a couple of ladies who were walk/running who kept passing us briefly and then catching us up. A race medic on a bike came to check out how we were going at about the 3 km mark. He encouraged us to keep a steady pace and told us he'd check up on us again about half way.

At the 5 km mark we were still ahead of schedule. We expected to run about 8:30 mins/km over the race but we were averaging at about 7:45 mins/km at that stage. We were averaging around 8 mins/km at the 10 km mark which surprised all three of us. After the half way point I started to fall behind but I was still feeling good at the 12 km mark where I was pleasantly surprised to see TB waiting for me. I really hadn't expected him to be there so it was a huge morale boost. He jogged along beside me in his jeans for a short while, then headed off home to hang out some washing, with the promise that he'd be there to meet me at 12 pm, which is when I expected to cross the line. At that stage I had started to have visions of being there 10 minutes earlier.

I was starting to feel the run but I was still confident of managing to run the whole way around. I stopped for a badly needed toilet break, which took me 90 seconds, and then headed off again. Fontessa, a new running friend I met through Krissi, had offered to run part of the way with me. I met her at about the 14.5 km mark. I was struggling up that hill, which wasn't all that big a hill, so I was delighted to see her. Then I don't know what happened. I saw the 15 km marker and I broke. I just couldn't run past it. I dropped to a walk. I managed to get myself running again, but only for a short distance.

Mentally I was a mess. I didn't say much to Fontessa about it, because I didn't want to ruin her day, but I was in the depths of despair. For some reason I decided that I wasn't going to be able to run another step. I worked out that it would take me an hour to walk 6 km to the finish at my fast walking pace. Then my maths brain went to mush and I decided that I wouldn't be able to finish in anything under 3.5 hours. In fact, I was sure it was going to take me 4 hours. I just wanted to curl up into a ball and cry. In fact, if Fontessa hadn't been there, I think I would have.

I came up with all sorts of solutions. Maybe I could call TB and he could pick me up. Maybe I could suggest to Fontessa that we run back to her car and drive around to the finish line. Maybe I could ask one of the officials to give me a ride back with them when they packed up. In the meantime, Fontessa was coming up with all sorts of encouraging suggestions. Perhaps setting a goal ahead to run to would help. "I don't think so," I would reply in what I thought of as a sad pathetic voice, suitable for a loser who couldn't run any further than 15 km. She'd jog along beside me as I walked. I'd try to run again, thinking darker and more desperate thoughts. I felt guilty because I was ruining Fontessa's run. I felt guilty because I was going to be late to the finish line. I felt guilty because I was letting everyone down by failing to run the whole way. I felt guilty because those walk/run ladies were now out of sight somewhere ahead of me.

I realised that I was last as there was an official riding a bike just behind me. I'd been so sure that I was going to finish ahead of the walk/run ladies.

Then a light dawned. I used to be one of those walk/run ladies. I used to push myself through walk/run intervals. Maybe I could do it again. After all, my goal was to finish the half marathon. I'd vowed I'd get across the line even if I had to walk the last few kms.

I started running for a minute and then walking for a minute. Fontessa kept encouraging me and trying to distract me with general chatter. Somewhere I changed from running a minute at a time to running to a tree or a signpost. I told Fontessa that her goal idea was working for me and she started setting the goals for me, a little further than I would have set them, but I dug deep and headed for her goals. After a couple of kms of this I tried to run a bit further than the goal each time. I made it past the point where we used to meet to start our long runs and I came to a halt again. "I can't run any more," I said. "I'll walk from here."

Fontessa stopped jogging and started walking with me. We turned a bend and I saw a lovely long flat stretch of bike path beside the lake. I started to run again, telling Fontessa I was going to make it to the official at the foot of the Commonwealth Bridge. She started jogging with me again, encouraging me all the way. On that stretch I decided that I was going to walk up to the highest point on the bridge and then try to run the rest of the way. I managed to get myself going again. Fontessa chatted away, distracting me, and I kept running.

I saw TB sitting on a bench a short distance before the finish line. I was so glad to see him. I just wanted to run over to him, hug him and burst into tears, but I wanted to finish the run more. I knew he'd be disappointed if I stopped so close to the finish line so I said a quick hello and kept going.

On my way to the finish line I saw another running friend, Michael. He was yelling out encouragement. I didn't say anything to him. I had my eyes on that finish line. Fontessa stopped running with me and let me run towards it by myself. As I ran up the grass I could hear my name being called out by other running friends. Even crowd members were yelling "Go Kathy". I could hear the announcer encouraging me. I heard a squeal and then saw Krissi tearing down beside the ropes to scream encouragement at me. On the inside I would have loved to do the whole arms in the air and enjoy the moment thing but I just put my head down and ran to that line. I was never so glad to stop running in my life.

That's me, a moment after I crossed the line. I'm amazed that I don't look like I'm about to collapse. I saw the 3 hours on the clock and I heard people yelling "Three hours, well done!" as I passed them, but it didn't register that I'd made it in the time I'd hoped until about half an hour later.

I found all the girls I'd trained with and congratulated them. I said hi to the running girls who'd come out to the finish to congratulate Lola and I on our first half marathon. I found Fontessa to thank her and TB found me and gave me a huge hug. I did all that in a daze of disappointment. I was trying so hard not to let people know that I was miserable. I was smiling and thanking people for their support and being pleased with their times and all I could feel was an overwhelming sense of failure. I really couldn't leave there fast enough.

I was dropping Fontessa back at her car before heading home. TB had magically managed to park next to me, so we walked over to the cars together. I'm glad I didn't park further away! He offered to drive Fontessa back for me, but I wanted to thank her again for all her encouragement so I took her. It was something Fontessa said, although I don't remember what, that made me realise that I had indeed achieved exactly what I'd set out to achieve. I think maybe that the sugar from the fruit juice they handed me with my participant's medal had kicked in to, and that my brain was finally starting to process information again. I suddenly snapped out of it and realised that I had done it!

It wasn't until much later in the day that I finally asked TB if he thought I'd come last. I was pretty sure I had but I needed to check. He laughed and assured me that I had. I asked him how he knew. There might have been a runner another five minutes behind me. "The fire truck took off when they saw you were ok." I hadn't realised that the firemen had also been keeping an eye on me. Fontessa had remarked that she hoped they were cute but I didn't have enough energy to check them out when we went past them.

The provisional results are out now and I definitely was last. I came 843rd and I'm so proud that I achieved a placing instead of a DNF.

All the training paid off. I was a little sore after the run but I recovered even faster than I did after the last long run before the race. The next morning, when I was driving to work, I decided that I'd run in next year's half marathon. This time I'm going to cross the line in less than 3 hours!

Training update

2009-05-02T16:35:00.003+10:00

I realised a couple of weeks ago that I achieved my running goals. As you will see in the side bar, my current running goals are: 1. Have fun 2. Run without injury 3. Run three times a week, including a long run 4. Run outside at least once a week 5. Run for longer.

Now that I'm training for the Canberra Half Marathon, on 17th May, I've managed to achieve all of these goals. I'm running on Tuesdays with Krissi, my trainer, and Lola, who is sharing Tuesday's PT session with me as we both train for the half mara. On Thursdays I'm running on my own, to work when I'm in Canberra, and in the general vicinity of the hotel when I'm working in Melbourne, and on Saturdays I usually do my long run with Lola and Julie.

When I first started running I would think up my blog entry as I ran. I still do that, but I don't get online often enough to spend time updating my blog lately. At most, I change my facebook status to mark achievements like this morning's run of 17.7 km, and then I read all the blogs that have provided me inspiration over the years.

Seeing that I am online today, I thought I'd try to capture the key changes in my running.

- The first few km are still the hardest, but I am running them with much more confidence in being able to keep going. Most of my "what am I doing? why am I out here when I could be in bed?" conversations happen before I get to the 3 km mark. Nowadays I seem to be able to ignore the voice that says "stop" more easily, although there are occasions when it still wins.

- I've learned that I'm more likely to run when I either (a) have someone to run with or (b) have a purpose to the run like getting to work.

- I'm getting better at ignoring things like the weather. I know I'll warm up after a few km, that I can survive running into a head wind for a while, and that light rain is my friend.

- I don't worry so much about minor problems such as blisters. I tape them and run again. Minor niggles such as stone bruises might hurt but they can be ignored for km at a time.

- I recover really well, particularly after a long run. I've realised that I'm extremely lucky in that regard. To my absolute delight my dodgy knee is holding up well. All that strengthening work I've done with Krissi has paid off.

With regards to other training, I haven't been doing much. I have my regular Friday PT sessions with Krissi. We've been concentrating on leg exercises - squats, lunges, hamstring curls, calf raises, leg raises, etc. For a change of pace yesterday we did boxing. I'd forgotten how much I loved it. I'm feeling it in my back today. I did have quite an amusing moment yesterday; when Krissi complained about how hard I was punching I reminded her that she was the one who'd helped me build up my upper body strength. She laughed and stopped complaining.

My workmates are doing another six week bootcamp and have inspired me to get myself back into the gym. I'm not going to renew my Fernwood membership. The Civic gym worked really well for me when I lived a couple of blocks away but I don't get myself there since I moved away. I thought about it and have decided to see what sort of programs they have at the gym at the bottom of my street. It was closed for a while because of a fire but it's re-opened recently. I was going to stagger down there this afternoon after my post-run hot bath but TB saved me the trip - they open Saturday mornings. I'll have to call in one evening next week.

I'll be sure to find the time to post an entry on the half marathon. Hmm, I wonder - will I need to find myself some new running goals?

Weekly update

2009-03-13T20:33:00.002+11:00

Well, it's been a great exercise week, even if I have been recovering from my wonderful holiday in China. We arrived home at 1:30 pm on Monday and I was out running at 7:30 am the next day. It sounded like a good idea at the time, when I organised it with Krissi a few days earlier, but it certainly did not seem sensible when the alarm went off on Tuesday morning. I was really tempted to pike out on my first half marathon training session. Fortunately I thought about (1) how good I'd feel after getting out there and running; (2) how one more hour's sleep wasn't going to make that much difference; and (3) how guilty I'd feel if I missed out on the run. After I finished running I felt great!

Although I was up in plenty of time, I ended up being late for the run. Everything seemed to be moving in slow motion. I think it was me who was moving slowly! Krissi and Lola were just about to leave when I arrived. We ran along the bike path towards Lyneham. It's a familiar run, which made it a lot easier for me. I was able to chat away about China as we went. I think people will find that my China trip improves their running speed, as they frantically try to get away from me!

I wasn't too worried about the time, which is just as well. We ran about 5.3 km in just over 45 mins. As we went, Krissi chatted about our half marathon training program. My personal goals for the half are to enjoy the run, to complete the distance and to run as much of the way as I can manage. I'm not too fussed about time. I know I can run 8 min kms fairly consistently, so I'm expecting to get around in under 3 hours. How much under, I don't know or care at the moment. I guess I'll have a better idea after we've done some longer runs.

Lola had arranged to run with her friend, Julie, on Thursday. She kindly invited me along, which solved my "get out of bed and run on your own" problem. I met up with them at Lake Ginnenderra at 7 am. It was weird. I felt like we were running so slowly. In fact, I was wondering if running with the others was such a good idea, as it was a major effort for me to keep back with them. When we finished, I realised we'd covered 6.3 km in 49 mins. We'd actually run a little faster than we'd run on Tuesday. I must have been tired on Tuesday morning!

It was a pleasant chatty run. I've run around the lake a few times, doing the ABS fun run and the Ben Donohoe fun run. It was good to run it again. The last time I did it I really struggled to get around. This time it seemed easy.

I don't remember when I've looked forward to a run so much. Lately it's been a real struggle to get my butt out there, but this morning I was keen to go. I bounded out of bed enthusiastically.

One thing about running with other people, the time just flies. I also find that it's easier to stop and stretch properly as I'm still chatting away at the end.

We're running again on Sunday - 10 km. We're going out and back along the lake. I'm pretty sure the route has been chosen so that we are running up University Hill at the end, when we're tired.

This morning (Friday) was my usual PT session with Krissi. It was good to be back to normal. After 15 mins on the stationary bike (a great way to catch up on all the news) and some stretching we moved on to squats. Normally I do three sets and then move on to something else. Today I did 12 squats (30 kg on the bar), then 12 lunges on the step, then 12 hamstring curls, then repeated the set. I remembered Lola saying that Krissi had caned her legs on Wednesday at her PT session so I figured she was doing it to mine too. After that we did some floor exercises that had my legs crying! My abs got a workout too. Some upper body work and then some side bridges. I suck at those. I have a feeling that Krissi is going to make sure that I don't suck at them soon.

I'm in the middle of decision mode at the moment, working out whether or not I'll play hockey this year. My club isn't fielding a grass team. The advantages for me of playing grass are (1) it's social, so you don't have to train; (2) it's grass so it's slower than turf; and (3) I don't have turf stick skills as I never played on turf back in the old days. If I decide to play turf I'll have to train. Mind you, because I'm going to be running more I'll be the fittest I've ever been for a hockey season. That would be novel. Tomorrow is grading but I have been invited to a friend's wedding ceremony at that time. I'd like to do both. I guess that grading is really only important if you're trying to get into the 1sts. I'm pretty sure that they can grade me within 5 minutes of my showing up at training. My other option is to play with a different team in the grass competition. Decisions, decisions! I'm leaning towards playing turf except for fitting training and playing into my schedule.

One thing for sure, much as I loved my holiday in China, it's good to be home and getting back into my exercise routine!

Two good exercise sessions

2009-02-14T21:29:00.002+11:00

On Friday I did weights with Krissi in the morning and then weights with Allan in the evening. I'm not planning to do that on a regular basis. I just didn't manage to sort out a schedule before my holiday. I thought about cancelling Allan's session, realised that I'd be missing my PT for three weeks and decided to chance the DOMS.

I love the session with Krissi each week. It was pretty much the usual session, a warm up on the bike, squats, hamstring curls, chest presses and abs work. I am squatting a little more weight now, my hamstring curls are getting better (yes, there is always another form improvement available) and my chest presses were fantastic! Yay me. LOL. I worked out that I've been chest pressing 32.5 kg, as the collars weigh 2.5 kg. On Friday morning I managed to do three sets of 12 presses. That's the best I've ever done. Mind you, it was really 11 and a half on the third set, but Krissi told me that she thought I could count it. I was amazed to make 12 the first set let along the second and third.

For abs work, it was crunches, standard, oblique then reverse, followed by a 1 minute bridge. I remember when I couldn't manage to get a single set of 10 crunches done, let alone hold my legs up in the air for 12 crunches. I managed the 1 minute bridge quite well. We're now going to work on my form. It's better than it was but my backside could still come down a bit.

After work I headed off to Elite Physique for my session with Allan. I told him what I'd already done, and he modified my program for me. We started off with shoulder presses. He had me pressing 15 lbs, which is more than I've ever done. I managed the three sets ok. Then he took me off to a machine for more shoulder presses. I was hopeless. There was nothing left. I gathered, although I might be guessing, that we went to the machine to squeeze out as many presses as possible. Because the machine holds your form for you, my arms weren't going to be wobbling all over the place and Allan could work out how much I had left. Mind you, as I said, I could be wrong about the motivation.

We then headed off to do dead lifts. I figured I was up for them. We did the first set with 35 kg on the bar, then we did three sets with 45 kg. I was expecting just two more sets. On the last set, I had to set, then take up the tension and then power up. It was really different to what I'm used to doing.

After that we did leg presses in a machine, then biceps work in a machine, then more walking lunges. It was a good workout.

I'm not sure how much exercise I'll be doing in China. I expect we'll be doing lots of walking. I gather the Wall might be a challenge. Should be fun.

I'm not expecting to get my blog updated over the next three weeks. All the best to you all. Happy running, exercising, and enjoying life in general.

Running and PT

2009-02-11T19:07:00.004+11:00

Yesterday was one of those days when I felt like I was back to being the 'old' me, as in the 'I love to exercise' me, not the 'I've been sitting on a couch for the last 10 years me'. I love the way I feel after a good exercise day.

In the morning I went for a run with Krissi. She wasn't feeling too well, so I was doing most of the chatting, to keep her distracted from her upset tummy. I felt like I worked really hard, but I managed the run and the chatter. Mind you, the few times we sped up to catch a pedestrian light, Krissi was still running much faster than me. I think she'd have to be a lot sicker before I had any chance of keeping up!

I had my usual 'feel good all day' feeling after the run. You've got to love endorphins.

In the evening I had PT with Allan. I realised that one of the reasons I'm enjoying this so much is the rapid improvement that you get whenever you do something new. It will be interesting to see if it's as much fun when the gains are smaller. Mind you, I'm determined to enjoy it!

It was pretty much the usual session. I started with dead lifts. A warmup set of half a dozen reps with 10 kg on the bar (35 kg total), then three sets of 12 reps with 20 kg on the bar. It felt really comfortable. I knew what I was doing, I was setting myself up for each lift properly and I didn't need to keep looking down at the bar. Mind you, I was glad we didn't add more weight, as I was struggling to hold the form by the end. My arms were tired and I was finding it hard to concentrate.

After that we did squats to the box. I did the first set without a mirror to watch. It seemed a lot harder, but it made me realise how much I needed to concentrate on how the exercise felt. I was getting up off the box much more easily, particularly when he suggested I concentrate on the bar and lifting through that with my upper body rather than on my legs. It sounded silly but it was much easier when I was doing that. Weird.

More chest presses. I was pleased with how those went. We skipped the lat pulldown and headed off to do walking lunges. Three sets of those holding 10lb weights. The technique is easier. Allan explained some of the science of it to me, which I really enjoyed. I don't care what the muscle is called, but I do like to know what's going on that makes doing it this way feel stable and doing it that way hard work.

I've got that kind of tired but good feeling today. My muscles know they worked. My legs are tired. All I really need now is a nap!

Oh, I went to the doctor today. No drama, just a routine test. Sonia checked my blood pressure while I was there. It was bang on 120/80. You've got to love it.

I picked up our visas today. Woohoo! Only three days to go now.

Weekly update

2009-02-08T13:03:00.002+11:00

Another weekly update. It's been so hot in Canberra that I really haven't been outside much this week. On Tuesday I had double PT, Krissi in the morning and Allan in the evening.

I went for a run with Krissi. I had absolutely dreaded it. I was tense before I started. I was telling myself that I wouldn't automatically get a migraine every time I ran, particularly as I now knew to hydrate properly. I also had a protein drink before I went, which was a good idea when I was drinking it but felt like a really bad idea when I continued to taste it. That problem was solved by brushing my teeth again.

Krissi had lots to tell me about her trip to Japan, which was distracting. It was a slow run but at least we were out there. My running form was all over the place, probably because I'd been so tense when I started. I didn't realise for a while - I just thought I'd forgotten how to run. On the return trip I could see my shadow. I looked like an old lady shuffling along. After a conscious effort to relax my upper body I seemed to run a bit better. Of course, the added incentive of needing a toilet break after my protein drink probably helped.

My Garmin knew I wasn't running all that hard. My calorie burn was down to about 2/3 of the usual amount. It seems technology doesn't take mental fatigue into account. Funnily enough, even though I suffered through the run I felt fabulous all day.

It was a hectic day. TB and I were dropping off our visa applications for China and the ute was going in for a service. I dashed home, showered, and then we headed off to the Consulate. Our invitation letter didn't quite cut it, so we weren't able to submit our applications. TB dropped me at work, then headed off to his work. Meetings all day, and then a taxi to the service station. Yep, I got to drive the ute! I don't get the opportunity that often any more. V8's are a lot of fun after driving around in a granny-mobile. I dashed back home to send an email to China, asking for a more formal letter of invitation, then hurried off to the gym. Of course, in the ute it felt as though I cruised over there.

Allan took me through my routine. It was busier at 6 pm on a Tuesday than it is at 5 pm on Fridays. Lots of people in classes, kids waiting to be picked up after martial arts etc. There was a real buzz in the air. We still managed to get whatever equipment we needed. That's an advantage of having your PT with you.

The difference with this session was that Allan was starting to increase the weights I was lifting. He was really happy with my form (I've been well taught) and I'm happy too with the way he describes what he wants me to do. I learned that the bar weight 20 kgs and the collars weigh 5 kgs. I'm squatting with just the bar at the moment. Allan is making squats more difficult for me by lowering the box height rather than by adding weight. With the deadlifts, I was lifting 35 kg, which we increased to 45 kg for the last set. I was really able to feel that I was using my legs with the additional weight on the bar.

We moved to the 'light' gym, where I did chest presses. I warmed up with just the bar, then Allan added small weights. I really struggled with those, so he removed the collars. Much easier. After that some lat pulldowns. They were easy. He increased the weight a couple of times. I think he's realised that I'm stronger than I look.

Walking lunges were next on the agenda. We had to do them in the hallway, which seemed so much longer than the class room. Probably because it was. I was still able to do walking lunges so we concentrated on my form. I hadn't realised just how much I was favouring my left knee, even though it's so much stronger than it was. I can see that this exercise is going to be so good for my overall lifestyle.

I didn't exercise on Wednesday or Thursday. Friday morning was my usual weights session with Krissi. I warmed up on the bike and told her about seeing Allan. She was really cool with it. We did the usual workout. I hadn't done this workout since before Christmas. It was good to get back into it. As ever, I really enjoyed the session.

Next week I have two sessions with both PT's and then I'm off to China. I'm hoping to do lots of walking there and we're planning to use the gyms in those hotels that have them. I'm not so sure about running while I'm there. I did notice that some hotels advertised jogging tracks. Not any of the ones we're staying at, but I did wonder why the hotels felt the need to advertise them. I guess I'll know in a few weeks. :-)

Weekly update

2009-01-31T17:23:00.002+11:00

I made it to the gym three times this week, which I was pleased about. I'm just about back into my normal weekly routine after Christmas and the holiday period. Of course, we head off to China in two weeks, but at least I'll be getting my exercise done for two weeks.

On Tuesday I went to Fernwood and tried to do the weights routine that I'd done with Allan at Elite Physique. I had thought about driving over there, but I was a little intimidated by some of the equipment. I had to modify a few things. For example, Fernwood doesn't have the box gadget that I was squatting down to, and the benches were too high. I'm not complaining - if Fernwood had all that hard core weight lifting stuff I would never have walked in the door in the first place.

I was able to practise a lot of things. With the dead lifts, I used a 25 kg bar. The key difference was that it was a pretty little thing that had small compact weights on the end whereas the other one used large 5 kg weights. Not an issue, although the tip Allan gave me to stand a certain distance and then set my starting position so my shins were leaning on the bar just did not work with the Fernwood bar. Still, I was pracitising, which is what the session was all about.

For the squats I didn't try to do a similar weight on my own. Instead, I grabbed a 7.5 kg bar and practised holding it in the new position I'd been shown. My upper arms were quite tired, but it gradually felt more comfortable. I was particularly glad I'd done that one when I trained with Allan this Friday, as the whole position felt much more natural.

It was funny trying to do the lateral pulldown. We use Nautilus equipment at the Fernwood gym I go to. The lateral pulldown machine is usually set up with two grips. There are a couple of bars, one short one and one longer, that lie on the floor beside the machine. I think I've seen someone use them once before. Anyway, I wanted the longer bar, so I picked it up and then was left wondering how to attach it. I finally worked out something. I don't know if I set it up right but it seemed to work ok. I pulled it all apart and put it back to its usual setting when I finished. Otherwise, I wouldn't have been at all surprised if nobody had used it for a while.

I did the chest presses and overhead presses without any trouble, and I did one set of walking lunges. I figured that we'd only done one set on Friday so one set was enough. I hate walking lunges.

I wanted to go for a run during the week but it was just so hot. Not as hot as Melbourne or Adelaide, but still hot. Instead I went to the gym and did cardio. I did 20 mins on the treadmill and 10 mins on the bike. I was dripping sweat by the time I finished and the gym was airconditioned! I had intended to run for the whole half hour, but I caught sight of my face before I started. I was bright red, just from the drive to the gym and walking a couple of blocks. I decided discretion was probably the better part of valour in this case. I did a walk 1 min, run 1 min, to make sure I was able to drink while I was on the treadmill. I really haven't mastered the art of running and drinking at the same time. I managed to do a 6 km/hr, 7.5 km/hr pattern, with a few 9 km/hr minutes thrown in. Not many, but a few.

On Friday it was my PT session with Allan. I arrived in a rush. The gym is 20 mins from work, which really means 25 mins door to door. The car I'm driving doesn't have airconditioning, so I was pretty hot by the time I got there. We skipped the warm up and went straight into the 'heavy' gym. Squatting onto the box was the order of the day. I was lifting the bar without any weights added, so it was 20 kg. The box seemed a long way down.

(Late edit: This post has been sitting in draft for the past week. It's not that I've not been online. I've just been busy.)

Since it's been so long, I'll add a summary and skip to the part of the session that I was most excited about.

After the squats, more deadlifts. With and without shoes on for both squats and deadlifts, which was interesting. It's easier without shoes. Chest presses and something called a mid-row. A chat about nutrition. The exciting bit was that I finally got walking lunges. I've been doing them for nearly three years at the gym, at bootcamp etc, and it's been a struggle every time. Allan mentioned centre of gravity, I put it together with something Billy said which helped me do hip flexor stretches better, and all of a sudden I was "walking and lunging" instead of stepping, lunging, stepping, lunging. I was so excited that I came home to show TB, but I'd cooled down by then and couldn't make myself do them. He was rather amused but kindly took my word for it that I knew how to do them.

Out for a run

2009-01-24T19:08:00.003+11:00

I made it out the door this morning for a run. I nearly piked. I'd managed to get up, but TB was up before I was dressed. I hadn't told him I was going. It was so tempting to put my clothes back in the closet and pretend that I'd never even thought about running. Even after I was dressed I procrastinated. I had half a cup of coffee with TB, who realised that if he'd stayed in bed five minutes longer I'd have been gone. I assured him that it's not his fault that I'm suffering major running avoidance.

Eventually I headed outside. Someone was out running at the top of the street, which was encouraging. It had rained heavily overnight, so everything was shiny and new. I love the way the streets look so clean after a decent rain. I jogged off down the road, telling myself that I'd only planned a short run. I've planned to do my longer run on Monday morning instead of Tuesday, as Monday is a holiday.

I just wasn't enjoying it. My breathing was fine but my legs were heavy. I guess that was partly yesterday's gym session. It was a horrible run. I walked nearly half the way, but at least I stayed out there for half an hour and burned 300 calories. I've been feeling good all day, so the run paid off in a big way. I managed to make myself run up a hill on the way home too, although I did walk after I'd run past the top and down the other side. I'm trying not to do the automatic "stop-at-the-top" thing that Krissi is trying to cure me of.

Now all I have to do is get out there again. I can do that! I will do that.

Oh, I bought some Thorlo socks with a gift voucher my Mum got me and I wore them for the first time today. I didn't bother strapping my "blister" area, and my feet were in much better shape than usual when I got home. Money well spent. I must remember to tell Mum!

And, I am so sore this afternoon. I even took some BCAA's, which I haven't done for ages. Ouch. Ouch and ouch. I am hurting in muscles I didn't know I had. I'm going to complain bitterly to TB but I'm really pleased to have proof positive that yesterday's workout was a hard one. Fortunately TB knows that and doesn't actually listen to me when I whinge about sore muscles.

Accountability

2009-01-23T21:08:00.002+11:00

I haven't been blogging lately, mainly because my blog keeps me accountable for the healthy decisions I make around food and exercise. Lately I haven't wanted to be accountable.

Today was the beginning of the new accountable me, so expect to hear from me a little more often. What's different about today? I started a new exercise regime with Alan, a new personal trainer.

There's a whole story here. Alan works with Billy, the guy who ran the bootcamp I did at work. During bootcamp, Billy quietly mentioned to me one day that he'd had great results with one of his clients who wanted to lose weight. They'd achieved their goal through doing weights, not through doing massive amounts of cardio.

I didn't do anything about it at the time, but the conversation has stayed in my mind for months. Finally I decided to do something about it. I figured that I was saving PT money while Krissi was away in Japan, so I could afford to get a few sessions over at Billy's gym. I went over to see him and Alan a couple of weeks ago. What they said really resonated with me and I decided to give it a go. I wanted to start straight away, as I was concerned that I wouldn't exercise while Krissi was away, but it's taken a few weeks to get going. Anyway, to cut a long story short, today was the first PT session with Alan.

I was right - I haven't done much exercise while Krissi has been away. I got to the gym a couple of times, but I haven't made it out for a run for the past two weeks and I haven't been to the gym for over a week. I've had all sorts of seemingly legitimate reasons - visitors, work trips to Melbourne, general busy-ness - but I've known that I needed a kick up the butt.

Alan asked me to write down what I was eating and how I was feeling. I managed it for a couple of days. I didn't like what I was seeing so I stopped. Today, I realised that I was supposed to be bringing him a week's worth of food diary. I plugged the last five days into Calorie King. Amazingly, my food habits weren't at all bad - definitely maintenance level eating. My exercise habits were non-existent. If I'd been exercising I would have been losing weight. Doh!

It was a good wake up call. I realised that by avoiding writing my blog and my food diary I was making it harder for me to achieve my health goals. This week I've been going to bed earlier too, and I've felt much better for it. I think I need to pay some attention to my mantra: "I'm a fit and active person who makes healthy lifestyle choices."

Today's been a good food day and I was at the gym for a PT session. All I have to do is keep making healthy choices, one day at a time.

The PT session was really interesting. I've been having all sorts of guilt feelings about doing weight sessions with someone else, particularly when I love working with Krissi so much. I have two reasons for going to somebody else though. The main one is the weight loss idea that Billy put in my head. Much as I love working with her, Krissi is this gorgeous slim woman who has never had a weight problem in her life. I just don't think that she would be able to relate to me on the weight issues, even though I know that she's able to work with me whether I'm fat or thin. The second one is my knee. Krissi knows that I'm paranoid about it, and it's bound to affect her when she's training with me. I realised that I was working harder on squats with Billy, simply because he didn't know about my knee. I figured that I'd see what sort of difference it made working with someone who wasn't so aware of my history. I don't know if it will make any difference, but it will be interesting to see if it does.

Today we started off with a warm up on the treadmill. Alan didn't have me going very fast. We started at 4km/h and then he moved me up to 5km/h. He went off for a few minutes so I cranked it up to 6 km/h. He was back sooner than I expected and led me off to the "heavy" weights room. There were a few interesting contraptions, including a tool that held the bar off the floor while the weights were added. I guess I'll be learning how to load the bar that way.

We started off with dead lifts. I've always struggled with the form on these, but Alan explained it really simply. After the intro, and checking that I could do them (do 1, do 3) I did three sets of 10, with 10 kgs on the 20 kg bar originally. He added some more weight for the last two sets but I forgot to ask how much.

After that, we moved on to squats with the bar. He unloaded it completely and grabbed a "box". It was a small square bench. When I squatted, I was sitting on the bench and then standing up again. He was taking my technique back to basics, but with an added level of difficulty. I was to squat back on the box as far as I could go. If I'd just been asked to squat down to the box I would have gone to the edge of it. Having to go back as far as possible meant that I was using my hips and glutes much more. I found myself "collapsing" onto the box. (TB told me when I got home that I "collapse" onto the couch too, so this is not a new thing.)

To keep control while lowering myself to the box I had to push my knees and feet out. I was imagining a sumo squat when he said this, but I had to keep them facing straight ahead while pushing them out sideways. I'd never have been able to do this without the mirror. I didn't get the squats completely right, but I did start to gain a lot of control while I was doing them.

We then headed off to the "not so heavy" weights room. This has the weights machines in it too. Lateral pulldowns were the way to go. I was able to do these really well, but Alan still managed to find me some form improvements. I told him that Krissi does that too. There's always something to work on. He assured me that it would still happen to me after I'd been lifting weights for ten years.

Chest presses were next, using dumbbells. When I do this on my own at the gym I stick to 8 kg, with 9 kg being the most I've lifted. Alan was cautious with the weights. I warmed up with 4 kg weights, which seemed ridiculously easy. It gave him a chance to check my form though. I moved on to 7.5 kg weights, then did another set with differently shaped 4 kg weights, then finished with 9.5 kg weights. He told me that he was finding it a different first session with a client, as my form was already good. I explained that I'd been going to the gym for four years, but that I'd really developed confidence with weights in the last twelve months with Krissi. I didn't actually have to tell him that I was loving the session, because I was smiling away.

Overhead presses with a bar came next. It's a long time since I did any overhead presses. In fact, I haven't done too many of these. I think he was glad to have something that he really needed to work on my technique. We finished up with walking lunges. Again, I learned something new. I think it was a smart move, trying out another trainer.

My short term goal is to work really hard for three weeks, on my diet and on my weights program, and see if I start to shift some weight. If it works well, and I decide to continue with Alan, my plan is to focus on the cardio work with Krissi, particularly as we're going to train for the Canberra half marathon, and do weights work with Alan. I have to work out just how much PT I can afford! I can manage two sessions a week, but I might be able to justify three sessions for a quarter to get my weight back under control. I'll just have to give something else up.

I have to get my butt out there and run too. I have a plan for that, but I'm not quite ready to be accountable with my running. Blush!

By the way, I've been reading all the usual blogs and a few new ones, but I've been keeping a low profile as part of my "ostrich-head-in-the-sand" approach to not blogging. I've been really impressed with all your achievements though. Well done.

Weights session

2009-01-03T13:32:00.002+11:00

I made it to the gym on Friday. I didn't mention going to the gym to anybody, in case I piked out. Instead, I packed some gym gear into a bag and took it with me when I went shopping. Even I didn't know if I'd make it there. In fact, I didn't know if the gym would even be open.

Because I haven't been going to the gym much lately it feels quite different walking in. I don't know the staff any more. I had to try to remember where in my purse I store my membership card. Fortunately, once I'd made it into the change room I felt back at home again.

I'd decided that this would be a weights session with a 15 minute running warmup. It's a long time since I ran on the treadmill. It's not as much fun as running outside. It didn't take long before I remembered why I didn't like these treadmills. They have the tv screens. If the tv is off, as mine was, you can see yourself running. Now, that's not such a bad thing, but seeing my bouncing chest reminds me that it is bouncing which makes me think about discomfort. If the tv is on, you have to wear earphones to listen. I'm klutzy enough to be pulling the earphones out as I run.

I had the pace a little faster than I usually run, and swapped between running and walking. At the end I cranked up the pace to start the cool down at a higher speed and surprised myself by managing a fast minute. I thought about continuing to run on the treadmill but remembered that I'd planned a weights session.

One thing I find amusing about Fernwood is how few women use the weights. When I arrived there were lots of people in class and a few people using the cardio equipment. There was one person in the weights room. It took me half an hour to do my workout. During that time a few people came in, did a couple of exercises, and left again. Nobody was there for more than 10 minutes. The only time the room ever seems to be busy is when the trainers have clients or there's a small class in there.

Because I haven't done any weights for a couple of weeks I went through my workout using smaller weights and I only did two sets. I was wondering if I'd been a little too conservative during the session as I was handling the exercises with ease. I was a little sore later in the day so it was probably a good decision.

Just for my own record, I did two sets of 12 fitball squats with 5 kg weights, 12 chest presses with 7 kg, 12 arm raises with 5 kg, 15 hip adductors and abductors with 30 kg and 15 seated rows with 23 kg. I made sure to spend some time stretching, particularly my hip flexors, as my right knee (not my 'bad' knee) started reminding me it exists the last time I ran.

While I was at the gym it occurred to me that I hadn't blogged my last run with Krissi. I found that particularly amusing, as it was a pretty hard core run for me as we'd run in the rain. Anyway, it will be a while before I forget it, so I'll skip adding the details here.

As for my 2009 plans on the eating / exercise / weight loss front, I have decided that I'll work on getting one thing right each week. This week, I want to get my gym habit back. I've picked up the class timetable. I might even do a cycle class. My goal for the week is to get to the gym three times. The following week I'll try to add in another good habit, etc etc. That feels achievable.

Happy New Year

2009-01-01T23:20:00.002+11:00

A new year - time to reflect on the past and think about all the exciting things that are going to happen in the future. 2008 was good to me and I'm looking forward to 2009.

There are a few challenges ahead this year. I have to stop being so comfortable with myself and work on maintaining my weight loss. Unfortunately, I have to once more lose all too many of those hard fought kilos I lost a couple of years ago to be back in maintenance mode. While I'm running again, I want to get myself out there more often. I've targetted the Canberra Half Marathon as a goal to give myself something to work towards. Other exercise goals include being fit enough to play hockey on turf next season. On the work front, I have to decide what I want my next job to be. My contract is coming to an end in May. It would be all too easy to renew, but I feel ready for a new challenge professionally.

Over Christmas I've been taking it easy on the exercise front. It's time to get back into a regular routine. I just have to decide what that's going to be. :-)

I'm really looking forward to our trip to China. TB and I head overseas on 15th February. Later in the year, TB turns 50 and my baby sister turns 40. Two major events to celebrate on top of all the usual family occasions. It looks like 2009 is going to be a lot of fun.

Did I really climb all those stairs?

2008-12-17T18:54:00.002+11:00

My calves have gone on strike! I've been hobbling around like a little old lady. Ouch! Ouch! Ouch!

I nearly rang Krissi on Monday night to suggest we did weights on Tuesday morning. Instead I decided that an extra night's sleep would make all the difference. It didn't. Going up the stairs at Krissi's was torture, but there was no way I was catching the lift! Practically before I said "good morning" I said "my calves hurt, I don't know if I can run". I explained that I was telling her now to prepare her for the inevitable moaning and groaning that would accompany any attempt to move my legs that was faster than a hobble.

One thing you have to admire about Krissi - she doesn't waste sympathy. I "ouched" all the way down the stairs. It made no difference. As soon as we hit the footpath we were running.

We headed off in a different direction to our usual run from her place. Now, I really don't like new runs. I like them even less when I don't think I can run. We started off slowly so that my calves had a chance to warm up. Between my misery about my sore legs and my misery about not knowing where we were going I was a sad and sorry specimen of a runner. Fortunately for Krissi, I moan a lot less in real life than I do when I'm recounting the run. Well, I moan less out loud. Krissi chats away to distract me while I have an internal dialogue along the lines of "I hate this. My breathing is fine. I hate this. My legs are warming up and don't hurt so much now. I hate this. I'm running quite well really. I hate this. I don't really have any reason to stop. I hate this. Oh, this is quite an interesting route. I hate this."

Finally we crossed suburbia to the running path that we usually start behind the War Memorial. It took us just over 15 minutes to get there. I didn't know how far along we'd go, but I knew we wouldn't turn around until we'd been out for half an hour. By then my legs were fine and I'd stopped complaining to myself every step of the way. In fact, I was thoroughly enjoying myself.

At the half hour mark I was ready to turn around, but Krissi reminded me that we'd run up a long 'false hill' on the way, so we'd be faster on the way back. She suggested that we run to the turnoff just past the start of the horrible hill. Up I went, thinking "I'm never faster on the way back" but knowing better than to mention it. I was also looking forward to running down the long hill. It was every bit as good as I'd hoped.

We ran for a little more than an hour, which was a fantastic effort on legs that hadn't wanted to get out of the car.

Later that day I was back to hobbling like a little old lady, thinking to myself in amusement "I do this for my health!" The world is a crazy place!

Plan - Complete a blog entry

2008-12-09T18:57:00.004+11:00

I nearly got through the whole of the first paragraph of my exciting tale about my morning run last Tuesday. I don't remember what it was that interrupted me but it's taken me until today to get back to it.

Normally I run with Krissi on Tuesday morning, but this week I had a meeting in Melbourne to attend. There was no way known I could fit in my usual PT session and get to the airport on time. I was all set to skip it when I realised that if I got out of bed a little earlier than usual I'd be able to squeeze in an hour's run. I told Krissi and TB the plan. I find that if I tell someone that I'm running I then feel obliged to get out there and do it. Given that I've been really struggling to run on my own lately, I needed to know that they were expecting me to run as extra motivation.

It worked. I was out running just after 6 am. I headed off towards the Kaleen shops, as that's the direction I went when I first started running again. I figured it would be a good measurement of my improvement. Now, if I'd written this on Tuesday, as originally intended, there'd be a lot more detail about the run, but this is definitely going to be the condensed version.

I ran most of the way, which I was really pleased about. I stopped for a brief walk three times on the way out and only once on the way back. The 7.5 km run took me a few minutes under an hour. I quite enjoyed it, even if it was suburbia for part of the way. I prefer running on bike tracks or trails, but footpaths are ok when there's not a lot of people backing out of their driveways. There were quite a few people walking or riding their bikes but I was the only runner out that morning.

The moment I was proudest of occurred at the top of a hill. I had enough breath to say goodmorning to a woman who was waiting for her dog. Normally Krissi is in charge of greeting people. I do this kind of puff, pant, look anguished thing and, if I have enough energy, a feeble wave. Saying goodmorning after running up a hill was quite an improvement.

I was also pleased that on the way home I took the tough route up around the road to my house instead of cutting across the park. There's a hill both ways, but one is much harder than the other. Mind you, I asked myself "What would Krissi choose?" which made the choice easier. I could have asked "What would TB choose?" but he's already dragged me up along the road because it's tougher.

On Thursday I had bootcamp at lunch time. It was the last session, and it was as tough as ever. We started off with the skipping, followed by the starjumps, power squats, half burpees and pushups. I was exhausted! Then Billy had the weight plates out for us to carry. My shoulder is still sore, so I begged off this one. While the others were running back and forth carrying weight plates, I was using the resistance band, and pulling Billy across the lawn. I realised that I'd only thought I was exhausted earlier.

After that, the whole crew did the resistance band stuff. They were different variations. I was teamed up with Billy again. Not easy, let me tell you. Usually your partner takes pity on you and lessens the resistance. I think Billy was probably taking pity on me but he still worked me harder than anyone else has for that session. To finish we did squats. And we did squats. And again. Sheesh! A few stretches, and we were done. I think I'll sign up for this again next year. It's been great working out with my team mates, and it's a good break from my desk.

I was going to go to Circuit at the War Memorial with Brad after work, but I got caught up there and didn't make it. I think it's probably just as well, as I was a bit stiff and sore later in the day.

On Friday I wasn't feeling the best but I made it to PT. Krissi regularly says she'll work with whatever I have left and that she's happy if I give 100%. I thought, you never know, I might feel better after exercising. In fact I did. It's amazing how that works out.

It was pretty much the usual session. 25 mins on the bike. Today we just built resistance for 1 min intervals after the warmup. I think Krissi was being kind to me because I had told her I wasn't feeling well. It was still a good workout. After that we did squats. I handled the weight comfortably, which means my knee is in good shape. I'm really happy about that. We did the weird back exercise. I was having form problems with this one, because I had it in my head that I had to lift the weight higher. Now that I'm concentrating on lifting with my back and on raising my elbows rather than my hands, it's working a lot better.

I am constantly amazed by how the human body adjusts to what it is doing. With chest presses I've been doing three sets of 10 for some time now. Sometimes I only get to 8 on the second or third set, but 10 is the goal. During the first set on Friday I was lifting really well. As I got to about 8 Krissi told me that my goal was 12. I was feeling good, so I expected that I'd be able to lift the 11th and 12th time without any trouble. No way. My body was used to 10 and that's all it let me do. I squeezed them out with Krissi's assistance, but there was no way I was going to do them on my own.

We did 2 sets instead of 3 as we were running out of time. I didn't make the 10th at all on the second set. It just wasn't there. Krissi stretched me and I headed off to work. Another good PT session.

I had been going to run on Saturday morning but it was raining heavily so I skipped it. I didn't even bother to think about it today as we were moving furniture for a friend of TB's. I was mainly carrying light stuff while the guys did the heavy lifting. TB's friend lives up three sets of stairs. That was 48 stairs in each direction. I must have been up and down them about 25 times. By the end I was really having to make myself go upstairs. There was a steep driveway as well. I was glad that I wasn't pushing the trolley with the fridge on it or carrying the lounge.

Normally I would have avoided helping, but I figured it would be a good workout and I'd be saving TB some hard work on his weekend. There were four guys there, one who mainly packed the truck and three who carried. I figure I saved each of the three guys about five or six trips, given that they would have carried more stuff down at a time than me. While TB and the guys drove over to unload the stuff I headed home and collapsed!

I'm hoping TB has enough energy to cook dinner tonight!

Quiet week

2008-12-06T07:31:00.004+11:00

It's been a quiet week on the exercise front. My morning bootcamp finished last week, I missed the midday bootcamp because of a work trip, and hockey is over until next year. My regular six hours of "booked" exercise has come down to two PT sessions, one bootcamp and a circuit session. I'm going to have to find some self-motivation and get my backside out there. Mind you, I did enjoy spending most of the week without the aches and pains that accompany bootcamp.

On Friday a week ago I had my usual weights session with Krissi. To my relief she had her new exercise bike. It's more like the cycles used in spin class at the gym. Krissi cranked up some RPM tracks and we were away. It was a really different session to the old bike. I certainly ended up dripping with sweat. I don't think I'm fit enough to do an RPM class as I was dying after 20 minutes. Krissi regularly ends up training a ghost for the second half of our sessions.

This week I got on the bike and the seat was broken. Yes, you guessed it. Stairs. I was running up and down stairs like they were going out of fashion. On the down side of the equation, my run is kind of a quicker version of walking, as I'm convinced I'm going to fall. I am starting to pick my feet up faster though, so I'm getting more confident.

The first set of reps involved running up two flights of stairs, doing squats at the top, then repeating. I was puffing away like a steam train as I did my 20, 15, 10 squats. It was such a relief to have the rest break. The second set of reps was similar, only it was 10, 8 and 5 pushups. The third set seemed harder, as Krissi had me coming up the steps two at a time on the second flight of stairs. I struggle with two stairs at a time. My explanation is that I'm short, although I think it's really that I never do it. The first time I didn't know what to do with my hands and had to fight to keep myself from grabbing the rails. I realised that if I used my arms the way I did for single stairs at least I wouldn't be grabbing out. It made such a difference. I found it so much easier to do the two steps at a time.

I don't know what to call the exercise at the top of the third set, so I'm going to try describing it. Basically I did a "run, run, run, run, run" on the spot, then got down flat on the ground when Krissi said "drop". The first time I got to my knees and then down. Krissi showed me how to do it without kneeling, as that was better for my knees. It was a struggle not to kneel first so we both had the giggles at some of my contortions. The third time Krissi wanted me to stop leaning on my leg as I stood up, which introduced a new set of contortions and giggles.

Minor aside: TB is reading an article about a Carlton Football Club bootcamp to me while I'm typing, which is making it hard to concentrate. It certainly sounds a lot tougher than the bootcamp we've been doing. I suggested he send it to Krissi and Brad as they might get some ideas for us. "No way!"

Now he's looking at Princess Park renovation photos ... this is sad. I've just had it explained to me that it's "Visy Park" and I'm being given the opportunity to solve the "Who am I?" Why do I suddenly have the urge to go to the Western Bulldogs website?

Back to business.

I had meant to go to the gym regularly to do weights, but I haven't managed it lately. Fortunately, I've been doing upper body work at bootcamp, so I am still seeing improvement from week to week with my chest presses. I've found this particular exercise quite educational over the past twelve months and I'm glad we've gone back to it with this particular program. It's the first exercise I ever reached failure with. It's also the exercise where I've learnt that I still have more left even when I think I don't. I seem to be able to mentally dig a bit deeper and push a little more than I could before, and I'm seeing the benefit of this in my running. I've also learned that the body recovers its strength amazingly during the rest between sets. That helps a lot between uphills.

I didn't exercise at all last weekend, unless you count shopping and gardening as exercise. Actually, weeding the garden involves a lot of bending and squatting so I think you probably can count gardening. I had a long day on Monday, as I worked in the morning and then went in the truck with TB from Canberra to Sydney and back. I asked a while ago if I could go with him one day, as I had never driven that road before. TB thought I was crazy to suggest it, however, after several weeks of "Where are you? How far away is that? How long will it be before you get home?" he realised that it might save him a lot of explanation.

I really enjoyed the trip. The view from the truck is great. In case any of my readers know anything about trucks, TB is driving a heavy rigid truck. It takes a bit of climbing up into the passenger seat. TB was quite amused to see me struggle my way in and out of the truck. I did find that my lower back got quite tired with all the sitting. Thank goodness for having learnt at the gym that your back starts to "help" when you're getting tired. I was able to turn on my abs and straighten up my posture to take the pressure off my lower back, so I didn't end up too stiff and sore.

On Tuesday Krissi and I went for a run from Braddon to Lyneham and back. It was amusing to be running back towards home after driving to Braddon. I was tempted to call in on TB but I didn't think Krissi would let me stop long enough to have a coffee. It was a good run. We covered about 7.5 km in just under an hour.

On Wednesday I was up at stupid o'clock to catch the first flight to Melbourne and I was out until stupid o'clock having dinner with workmates. Somehow on Thursday morning I managed to head out at 6 am for a run along the Yarra. At least I didn't have a hangover to contend with as I'd used the "I'm running" reason for drinking water all night. The other benefit of the "I'm running" reason is that I then feel obligated to back up the claim by actually going for a run. It was another good run. I enjoy all the activity along the river. I found myself running rather than jogging, so when I got to the "do I do another loop" decision point I decided to skip the loop and see if I could keep the pace up all the way back to the hotel. It wasn't much faster than my jogging pace but it felt quite different to be running.

Next week I'll have my usual PT sessions, lunchtime bootcamp, a 'circuit' at the War Memorial, and whatever running I manage to get out there and do. I'll have to try to organise myself to get to the gym as well. With all the Christmas lunches and dinners coming up, I'll have to be exercising to make up for the celebrations.

Weekly update

2008-11-27T18:37:00.004+11:00

I keep meaning to write up my blog but then I get intrigued by Facebook or distracted by The Age. Sometimes real life interrupts me. Fortunately, there's the quick update option instead of the "capture every second of the day" option.

Last Sunday was our last game of twilight hockey for the year. We don't start again until mid-January. The Blue Geckos decided to celebrate the end of our spring fitness activity in style with pizza and beer. Fortunately I did a bit of running during the game! I was well outclassed skill-wise on the field, which added motivation to my current plan to train next year. Let's hope that idea lasts across the summer break.

On Tuesday I had my bootcamp followed by PT run combination. I should just call it my "I'm going to need an afternoon nap" combo, as I was exhausted at work. We had a boxing cardio session for bootcamp. It was like the run along, stop, choose a card, do the activity session, except that the activities all involved boxing.

It was a good fun session but it was maybe not the best preparation for an hour run. I really didn't want to run. Ten minutes in, legs moving even if they were tired, breathing fine, mind completely out of it. Krissi was chatting away to me, but the distraction wasn't enough. I simply didn't want to run. I proposed a quick walk instead. Ha! As if!

Krissi kept me going, along past the sailing club and all the way up one of the long hills. She then completely amazed me by telling me I could walk after the top of the next hill. Before I could express my surprise, she then added a condition - if I really really needed to walk, then I could. We made it to the top of the hill and kept going. I don't know how it worked. Somehow having permission to stop made it ok to continue.

It was tough though, for the whole run. I was amazed how my mind would keep noticing how tired my legs were. My lower back started to ache. My shoulders were tense. Every time I conquered one problem, my brain would sneak in a new one. Fortunately Krissi was there with me. When I'm having a day like that I don't know whether or not I'm really hurting. I kept checking my breathing, which was fine. My legs kept turning over. If I didn't think about it, my back and shoulders were ok.

I was hoping Krissi would turn around sooner than usual. Of course not. Mind you, she didn't make me run any further than I have before. We turned around just past the nursery. It seemed like a long way back to the car, but we made it. All up, I managed to run for just over an hour even though I didn't want to run. That's got to be good for me when I eventually run a half marathon. (Shh: I'm not quite admitting this to myself yet. I'm planning to give the Canberra Half a go next year.)

Even though I was exhausted on Tuesday at work I managed to spend half an hour weeding the garden and I vacuumed! Yes, for those of you who missed the Facebook update, I bought a Dyson on the weekend. Wow!

I gave myself Wednesday off exercise, apart from a little walking. Today I had the double bootcamp. This morning we had our final session, so it was the fitness assessment. I was less apprehensive about the beep test, but I only made it one level past my starting point. I thought I couldn't go any further, but I didn't actually throw up when I stopped, so I think maybe I could have managed another level. I did more pushups and situps, ran the time trial 3 seconds faster, and was slower in the agility. Overall, it was a good result.

The one I was most pleased with was the 1 km run (almost 1 km, but let's not be precious). Last time I went out too fast and had to stop to walk a couple of times. This time I managed my pace a lot better, which made for a much better run. I can't say that I was enjoying it. In fact, I would have stopped half way if I hadn't had to face Krissi and TB afterwards. I was surviving it though, which makes me realise that I can run faster. It's all about managing my pace.

I was quite tired at lunchtime, which surprised me. Maybe I went out a bit harder this morning than I thought. With Billy, we did the usual skipping, three sets of 2 minute intervals today, followed by star jumps (I am so good at them!), power squats (not so good), bottom half of burpees (hopeless) and pushups (not as many as this morning, but still respectable). After that we did pulling people with the resistance bands. That's a lot harder than it looks. We finished off with two sets of boxing. It was a great workout.

I'm feeling really good right now. I just have to keep up the exercise now that one of my bootcamps has finished. Time to get my backside out running on my own I think.

PT session, ten pin bowling, housework and gardening

2008-11-21T20:01:00.005+11:00

I hate being late, which means that I'm often early. This morning I was too early for PT, so I ended up filing my nails in the car. That's one of those "I really should do it more but I don't" things that takes no time but seems way too much trouble. Once it's done though, I find myself wondering why I don't do it more often.

When I got to Krissi's she was in the doorway waiting for me. She was checking that I hadn't used the lift! Sometimes I think "I'll play with her head - I'll call the lift and take the stairs" but I get over the impulse quickly enough. Mind you, I like to catch my breath before I go in - no chance of that this morning.

Instead of going up to the studio, Krissi told me to leave my stuff on the dining table and take my water with me. I was immediately apprehensive. What was she up to? I noticed that she didn't have her shoes on, so we weren't going for a run. We wouldn't normally take water bottles with us either. Krissi led the way down the corridor to the stairs! You guessed it. I was running up and down stairs.

Now, I have a fear of falling and stairs bring it out in me. I believe I have a perfectly good reason for this. My brother, when he was a toddler and I wasn't much bigger, helped me when I said "Watch me Mum, I can jump down the stairs" by giving me a push. I landed three steps from the bottom of our Queenslander house. Ouch! Fortunately, Krissi didn't push me to run fast down the stairs. I have been noticing lately that I can slowly run down stairs where before I used to have to step carefully. I've been quietly pleased by this, as it's a sign that I'm trusting my balance more and more.

Running up was a different matter. Krissi encouraged me to lift my knees, to drive my feet off the stairs, to use my arms and to think "fast feet". I flew up those stairs. If I'd known that five pushups were waiting for me at the top, I might have gone more slowly. Three reps and a rest, followed by stairs with dips, a rest and stairs with squats. What a warm up.

I know who to thank for it. The exercise bike broke when Peter was using it. I'll have a word with him at bootcamp on Tuesday. Grrr!

After the warm up it was up to the studio and squats with the bar. I was up to 8 in the first set when Krissi stopped me and switched me over to lunges. I'm not at all sure that this squat/lunge combo is a good thing, but I managed three sets. The next exercise was hamstring curls. For once I could really feel my quads when I was doing them. I think my legs were worn out!

We moved on the chest press. I got through the first set of 10 on my own. Krissi didn't even touch the bar lightly. Three sets of those of course. I struggle more with the second set than the third, which always amuses me. Then we did the weird back exercise. Krissi told me that Peter was pleased nobody was watching him when he did it. I so know what he means. It must work though, as my back has been feeling tired all afternoon.

Finally we got to the stretching. I was taking my time getting down on the mat because I was expecting abs work. If I'd realised it was stretching I would have been down there a lot faster.

Later in the day we went ten pin bowling with work. It was a lot of fun. I've also mentioned housework and gardening as I'm counting calories. I've discovered that I can eat more if I count my housework and my gardening. LOL.

Bootcamp and Mandarin podcasts

2008-11-20T20:51:00.002+11:00

This morning it was raining and the alarm didn't go off. Not that the alarm not going off was a problem as I am trained into getting up early now. It was waking TB that made me feel slightly guilty, particularly as I knew the rain was pouring down. He had expressed less than his usual enthusiasm for bootcamp the night before because of the weather. He'd also had quite a stressful day, with a major family issue being sorted out at long last.

You did note the word "slightly" in the middle of that rambling paragraph. Yes, I woke him up. He complained about me waking him when it was raining, but I was over the whole guilt trip by then. I did think about going without him, but I decided that harmony at home was more important than exercising in the rain street cred. I also decided that getting up was a better option than keeping TB from his much needed sleep. Of course, the rain out our way stopped right on 6:30 am. Ouch! Fortunately, half way through the day I looked at the weather radar and saw that the weather was moving across Canberra from my side of town. Hopefully, it was still pouring at 6:30 am at Lennox Gardens. I guess I'll hear all about it from Krissi tomorrow morning.

I took my bootcamp gear to work for my lunchtime session, but I was hoping it would continue to pour rain all day. No such luck! At 11 am, Billy called to see what the weather was like out our way. Enough people wanted to do bootcamp, so it was on. That's when I checked the weather radar, as a last ditch effort to avoid any exercise today. No such luck. All the weather was missing us, until after lunchtime.

With everyone else in, I had to get my act together. Wouldn't you know it? It was a fantastic session. It started with the usual skipping and jumping warmup. I can skip for two minutes now, which I'm really pleased about. We did two sessions of skipping followed by two sessions of jumping. I think we did 2 mins followed by 1.5 mins of jumping. I am able to jump back and forth across the rope for the whole 2 mins now. How cool is that?

We then did a 2 mins on, 1 min rest set, starting with star jumps, followed by power squats, the bottom half of burpees and pushups. I killed the star jumps. Everyone else was way impressed but I knew it was all down to being able to run. Not that I let anyone in to my secret. The power squats are a challenge, but I kept on going through them. I was a disaster in the burpees. My tummy was in the way, so I did little jumps. I also found my arms tired really quickly. I did the best pushups I've done for some time.

Then we did some running. I was last, as ever, but I handled it fine. We had to slow jog or fast jog, depending on the instruction. In the middle we did a few power squats, then finished with a "burst". I was "bursting" away, miles behind everyone else.

After that, we put on the gloves and boxed. I boxed first, and my arms were simply dying. Usually, we swap over in the middle, but we did two sets of boxing before swapping. When it was my turn to hold the pads, my arms were still dying. I could certainly feel the burn! I somehow survived, mainly because Kirsty doesn't hit that hard. Thank goodness.

After that we did another set of starjumps etc, 30 secs of each without stopping. It seemed much easier than the 2 mins, even though we weren't having a break. It was a fantastic bootcamp session. We were all really pleased with how we did. The whole group tries hard. I thanked Lisa for getting me there after the session, as I had so much not wanted to do it.

When I got home tonight I did another half hour in the garden. I find the squatting to weed is really good for me.

I've discovered some free Mandarin podcasts on iTunes. I had already booked some cd's from the library, but I'm on a waiting list. Isn't it great that there's so much stuff out there for free?

Now for my next challenge. Learning to speak with inflection. I get so confused. It's just as well that so many people around the world speak English!

Bootcamp intervals and PT run

2008-11-18T19:05:00.002+11:00

This will be a quick update. This morning we had an intervals session at bootcamp. This was the session with the cones that are apart different distances, smaller to bigger. You run up and back, dropping down a distance each time. You get to rest until the next interval starts.

The first interval was 40 seconds. I could make the longest distance in 26 seconds, so that was a comfortable set. The next time, because the faster runners were waiting so long, the intervals were 30 seconds. I was able to survive the longer distances, but we dropped to 25 seconds on the third set. I was starting at the long end, so I really struggled through the first three intervals, without managing a break. I skipped the fourth, then joined back in and finished the set.

After that we used the harnesses, and did the running against our partner's resistance. We had to run hard for 10 seconds, then they let us go and we sprinted 20 metres. That was a lot of fun. We had four turns each before doing our cool down. Oh, I managed the warm up better than usual today too, which I was happy about.

Once bootcamp was over, I headed across to the War Memorial while Krissi packed up. I had an ulterior motive as I wanted to go to the toilet before we set off on our run. I scared the poor cleaner again ... poor man.

Krissi and I headed off on our usual run around the base of Mt Ainslie. I wasn't at all sure how I'd manage, particularly after an interval session. Krissi has this "I'll work with 100% of what you've got left" approach, so I figured I'd see what I could do. My legs were tired, but we managed to run for just over an hour. It was a slow 7.75 km, but I was pleased with it. I really had to struggle to keep my legs turning over during the second half of the run. I ran the whole way, without stopping!

I was so tired afterwards that walking to the car was a major effort. An excellent day's exercise.

Morning run and trip to China

2008-11-16T19:05:00.002+11:00

This morning I made it out on my own for a run. Yay me!

I nearly didn't go. The devil that sits on my shoulder reminded me that I hadn't mentioned it to anyone at home in Deer Park. TB thought I should wait a week to let my blister heal properly, so he wouldn't criticise me. Nobody would know I didn't go. The angel on my other shoulder reminded me that I'd mentioned it here in my blog. The devil piped up, "You've done that before - they won't be surprised that you didn't get out there." It really was teetering there in the balance.

Add into all this that I've been working hard on managing my food consumption all week. I've been faithfully writing everything down, good and bad, as a baseline against which to assess my progress. I really want to lose the weight I've regained over the past eighteen months. I really love to eat. If I'm going to have it both ways I have to get out there and run.

I stopped listening to the angel and the devil and started listening to me. What did I want to do? I wanted to run.

It was just a little run, half an hour around Kororoit Creek. It was an important run though, as this is where I first ran for half an hour without stopping. This is where I used to think I was going to die before I made it to the bridge, five minutes into the run. I was remembering all that as I jogged around the course. I noticed how much easier it was to run up the hill on the far side of the bridge, how the temptation to turn off at the other bridge instead of doing the big loop wasn't there today, how I didn't even notice that I was running along Station Road instead of burning with embarrassment that people driving past could see me lumbering along.

I decided that I'd only do one loop this morning, another baseline. I didn't even check the distance when I turned off my Garmin. I'll see that when I load it up onto the pc. For today, it doesn't matter. I got myself out there, I ran and I enjoyed myself. I didn't notice any blisters. I stretched properly when I got home. I was really proud of myself.

My other exciting news today is that TB and I are going to China in February next year. We booked the tickets this evening. You've got to love the Internet. I'm so excited!

Weights session

2008-11-15T07:10:00.004+11:00

Yesterday I had my usual Friday morning session with Krissi. I am sure that part of the reason that I enjoy this so much is that I expect to enjoy it. It's certainly not because of the way I struggle during the session or my muscles hurt afterwards.

Krissi's home studio is up two flights of stairs. I'm not game to catch the lift up unless I have my bike with me, so I dutifully struggle up the stairs each week. Usually I have a few creaks and aches on the way up, but yesterday everything felt fine. Why then, was I struggling for breath when I got to Krissi's door? A similar thing happened to me at work the other day, but that was three flights of stairs. I was puffing away as I went past all these people's workstations, trying to regain my breath and stop blushing at the same time.

To add insult to injury, there's another flight of stairs to get to the actual studio. I followed Krissi up, listening to her complain about how hard the stairs are some mornings. I had a little inward chuckle as I followed this amazingly fit woman up the final flight of stairs. Mind you, Krissi had competed with a team in a 12 hour mountain bike race over the weekend, so I think she had a valid reason to complain yesterday.

I started off on the exercise bike, as we discussed the benefits of those amazing bandaids for blisters. For the first ten minutes, which is meant to be a warm up, I'm able to talk. Once we get to the intervals I rely on Krissi to do the talking while I do the sweating. Krissi told me all about the bootcamp session that I missed. I'd heard TB's version of the scavenger hunt as well. It sounded like a lot of fun.

I sweated so much that I figured I could finish PT after the cycling. I suggested it to Krissi. Her solution was to turn on the fan. Trainers!

For a change I did dead lifts. Getting the form right was quite a struggle. When Krissi demonstrated her back was like a lever, dead straight. My shoulders went over straight away. Krissi gave me a few tips on technique and I managed to keep my back a lot straighter. It helps that Krissi has a picture of the perfect guy on the wall for me to look at. When I started, the bar felt quite light, but I had to put it down after six reps. I did two sets of 12 reps altogether, before moving on to chest presses. Same bar, same weight, 10, 8 and 10. A couple of sets of jack-knifes, one minute plank and I was done. Phew!

I've packed my running gear for Melbourne .. just have to get out there tomorrow morning. :-)

Bootcamp and blister

2008-11-13T19:14:00.002+11:00

I only made it to one of my two Thursday bootcamps today. Yesterday, on my rest day, I managed to get a huge enormous blister on my heel. OK, it was a little one, but it hurt like a huge .. you get the idea.

When I got up this morning I put a bandaid on my heel and taped it. No joy. It still hurt once I put my shoes and socks on. I even tried two pairs of socks. TB, who managed to survive me with blisters at the Queen Vic Markets in Melbourne, suggested that I stay home. As it was meant to be a cardio session, I decided that I would take his advice. Of course, it was a scavenger hunt, which is one of my absolute favourite sessions. Oh well. Another time.

I nearly left my gear at home however I'd packed it the night before so I took it to work with me. I wasn't feeling at all confident about being able to wear my runners at lunchtime. Two of my workmates were looking for a can of harden up for me. Yep, I was getting lots of sympathy. I decided to try my shoes on about half an hour before bootcamp. To my amazement, I couldn't feel the blister. Now, it may have healed dramatically in the five hours between bootcamps, but I'm giving all the credit to the magic bandaid I put on when I got to work. I invested in some of those "healing" bandaids a few weeks ago. I haven't been at all convinced that they work up until now.

It was 30 degrees today, so we were all wearing our sunscreen and hats. We also made sure we had plenty to drink before we headed outside. It's fun doing this with the people at work as there's a lot of mutual encouragement before and after bootcamp sessions.

We started off with our usual skipping warmup. We seem to be skipping for longer, which has got to be good. We then jumped over the rope for a while. It seemed like quite a while but it was probably only two sessions of one minute.

After that we did some boxing. The person with the pads called a number between 1 and 8, the other person punched that many times and then shuffled around in the direction of the last hand they used. It was a good workout. I'm not sure how long each turn was, but we got to box twice. I was encouraging my partner to hit through the focus mitt instead of aiming for the front of it. She was doing a pretty good job by the end.

We then did the running against the resistance band. That's quite an exercise. We normally run all the laps, but Billy encouraged us to power walk the last lap. He didn't say so, but I think he was paying attention to the heat. We each took two turns at that, then we were back to squats. Phew! Billy loves his squats. I've got to admit, I can stay down longer and go down further now.

What I have noticed, and this has come from running and not stopping, is that I have more stickability with the different exercises now. It's as though I've realised I've got another gear that I can get into, and I can do more for longer no matter what it is I'm doing. When I was powering along with the resistance band I could tell I was in the same headspace as I was when I was running up those hills around Mt Ainslie and it kicked in again when I was struggling to stay down in the squats.

Tomorrow I have PT with Krissi. I so enjoy my weights session with her. I'm in Melbourne on the weekend, so I won't be playing hockey. I'm going to take my running gear down with me and go for a run around Kororoit Creek. That's a plan!

Hockey, gym, boxing and running

2008-11-12T18:48:00.005+11:00

If I updated my blog more frequently it wouldn't sound like so much exercise!

On Sunday night I played twilight hockey. It's a mixed comp, with a max of 5 men on the team. Fortunately we had 7 men and 8 women, so we were able to sub regularly. I started on and played the first half, so I was glad of a break at the start of the second half. When I went back on, I played inner, which was fun for a change, as I'm usually a defender.

During the game I had one of those "Wow, all this exercise is paying off!" moments. I took off after someone, sprinting as fast as I could. Now, normally this means that I'm trailing the other player and getting further behind, but I actually caught up with them and then stayed with them! I didn't make the tackle, but gee I put her under pressure. I was going to tell her how excited I was that I kept up, but my sensitive side stopped me when I realised she was 20 years or more younger and might not appreciate an "old lady" making that comment.

On the way home I had another of those "WATEIPO" moments. I may have mentioned before that there is a hill on the way to my house from the hockey centre. It's always a struggle to walk up it after a game of hockey. I plod along, lifting up my feet, which feel like lead in my hockey boots, asking myself "What on earth do you think you're doing, running around on a hockey field? Why didn't you drive over to the hockey centre?" etc. This Sunday I was walking up the hill realising that it was much easier than it had been before. I was so stoked I forgot to show TB my injuries. Don't worry, I showed him a couple of days later when the bruising looked impressive.

I didn't check the bootcamp timetable before I went to the gym on Monday night. If I had, I might not have been so enthusiastic about doing an upper body workout. It's been quite a while since I made it to the gym, so I was determined to get there on Monday. There were new faces everywhere, behind the counter and around the gym. After being a regular there for so long it was quite strange to be anonymous. Fortunately I soon ran into a few people that I knew and the place started to feel like "my" gym.

I pretty much did my old workout, cutting the leg work right back to one set of walking lunges and one set of hip abductor exercises. My right shoulder has been sore since carrying the 20kg weight plates and dragging the tyre, so I paid attention to it to make sure I didn't make it any worse. I only had to cut one set of one exercise back from 12 reps to 8 reps, as it was getting tired. I managed to get quite a sweat up while I was working, which was a good sign that I was pushing myself hard enough. I find it all too easy to slack off a little when I don't have a trainer watching me.

On the way out of the gym I had a huge smile on my face. I was feeling so happy. You've got to love that exercise high.

On Tuesday morning we had a cardio-boxing session at Lennox Gardens. After our warmup we were put into groups of three, one punching, one holding the pads and one doing a shuttle run. We went through a series of one minute each doing four different punches, jabs, hooks, uppercuts and jab/hook combinations before our first real break and then did another series of one minute doing crosses, uppercuts, and a four punch combination. It was hilarious trying to do the four punch combination. I couldn't get the pads right for my poor punching partner, although I was trying hard. She was punching faster than I could move them.

After the cooldown, Krissi and I went off on our run. My legs felt like lead from the beginning. Krissi was taking me off somewhere new too, which meant that I didn't know what to expect. The first run somewhere I'm always a little anxious. We headed off towards Parliament House so I had seen the first part of the run before. That helped me to relax. Mind you, I was feeling whingey. Luckily Krissi has a complete lack of sympathy for minor whinges. I was able to moan "My legs don't want to do this" without her saying "Oh you poor thing, we'd better stop now."

As we jogged along I was paying attention to the fact that I'd never managed to do this part of the run before without stopping to walk. I didn't think it was worth mentioning to Krissi, as we're both over the "Oh my goodness, you haven't walked" commentary now, but I was internally telling myself how great it was. I don't think I'm ever going to get over the fact that I can run now. And, when I think about it, why should I?

The first part of the run is a bike path which turns into a pathway as it nears Parliament House. Even though we were shaded by trees most of the way through this section, it's a lot hotter when we run now. I was wishing I'd drunk more water before we started. Fortunately, there was a bubbler at the top of the hill when we reached the road immediately around Parliament House. We ran around the back of the building on paths, through a car park and over a bridge before reaching another path to run on. It almost felt like we were out in the country, except there we'd just crossed a large intersection and there were people walking along on their way to work. We made our way towards the front and then ran down towards Old Parliament House. It was as though we were doing a tourist route.

It was amazingly pretty. We were in among the trees, running on beautifully kept paths, and then we were running beside and around attractive well-maintained buildings. We ran across the park, on the far side from the tent embassy, down across reconciliation place and through the middle of the flags, facing across the lake towards Anzac Parade and the War Memorial. It was like running in the middle of a set of post cards. We ran along the edge of the lake back to Lennox Gardens.

When we got back to our stopping place we were ten minutes early, so we did another lap of Lennox Gardens, which was a bonus as it meant we got to see the cute duck family again. Once my legs would have said, "Stopping place means you have to stop" but they have the ability to go a little further now. When we did finally stop we'd been running for 55 minutes. It was such a lovely run.

Personal Training

2008-11-07T18:59:00.002+11:00

It was one of those "just five minutes more" mornings today that make me realise why I have a personal trainer. It would have been all too easy to roll over and go back to sleep, except that Krissi was waiting for me. I'd gotten all my gear ready the night before too, which seems to make it so much easier in the morning.

I was in surprisingly good shape after yesterday's double bootcamp effort. My calves were reminding me they were there and I felt tired all over, but I wasn't in pain. When I arrived at Krissi's I told her I was feeling like spaghetti. She laughed, that evil personal trainer laugh that they must teach them at the start of their course, and said that she'd work with whatever was left in me.

My legs felt really tired when I started warming up on the bike but they were working ok after five minutes. Maybe they weren't going as well as I thought though. Once I'm warmed up I usually do six sets of intervals, but Krissi let me off after four sets. I wasn't expecting that, but I didn't argue.

My absolutely favourite part of PT is the stretching. Krissi gave me a good stretch today. Usually I feel the stretch but I don't feel that it's painful. My left hamstring had me almost gritting my teeth today - not because of pain but because it was a strain to stretch it. Fortunately that was the worst of the stretches, either because I relaxed or because my other muscles weren't so tight.

Krissi had me do some squats with a light weight and some calf raises before getting me to get myself into a strange position for some flys. She had the bench set up on an incline. I was behind it, with my head leaning against the end of the seat, my knees bent and with my arms down straight with elbows slightly bent, holding 3 kg weights. From there I was to lift the weights by squeezing my shoulder blades together. I gave it a go, and it was a good thing that my head was leaning on the bench, as my legs ended up shaking away. Krissi told me that she'd given me this exercise because she figured out that the only part of me that I hadn't exhausted the day before was my back. (Exhausted is my word!) When I did the second set I was shaking so much that we were both giggling when I tried to get the 12th rep out. Some jack-knives and I was finished. Thank goodness.

At work today we were all comparing pains. Just as Billy had promised, people could feel their shoulders. My gluteus hurteus muscle was making itself known today too. I can't work out why my butt ends up sore - I exercise it all the time by sitting on it! I'm starting to feel a few other aches and pains. Nothing that a good night's sleep won't cure I hope. Thank goodness tomorrow is Saturday and I can sleep in!

Double bootcamp

2008-11-06T18:21:00.002+11:00

This morning's bootcamp was a hike up Mt Ainslie. I quite enjoy this particular session, even though it's always hard work. TB was pretty sure we'd be working harder than usual, as we have two trainers for this bootcamp. His theory was that one of them could be harrassing the people at the front of the group, that is, him, while the other could be looking after the people at the rear, like me.

We all gathered in the car park behind the War Memorial. I was wearing my warm hoodie as it was cool again, but all the others decided to brave the elements. Water bottles in hand, we headed off across the road as Krissi explained what we would be doing. We were walking up the first section as a group. Once we got past the steepest part we were running the rest. It all sounded quite achievable. I had no idea if I'd be able to run that far, but I knew that I could do better than I had the last time I tried running on the mountain back in August. Mind you, looking back at that blog entry, I did better then than I remembered.

I found I handled the steep part better as well. I'm clearly a lot fitter this time around. All that running has made a difference. It got a bit hot, so I had my hoodie around my waist by the time I got to the point where we were stretching before we started running, a view station on the way up the hill. It had a stone wall around the edge, behind which I left my hoodie. I made an emphatic mental note to pick it up on the way down, reminding myself that I'd have to climb the steep part again if I forgot it. (Actually, I thought TB would have to climb it for me ... blush.)

Heading off for the run, I was surprised at how easy it seemed after Tuesday. I ran for a couple of sections before I stopped for a work. My competitive nature kicked in, as I made sure I ran further than the girls in front of me before I stopped to walk. I told myself that I might be slower but I could run uphill for longer. I got myself back running again quickly, and only stopped a couple more times on the way. I walked the long set of stairs near the top and told myself I'd run the last path after the stairs finished. I realised that there was a section of path before the last stairs of that section and decided that I'd run that bit too. I was really proud of those few metres as they were an extra I hadn't planned to do.

In my mind I was going to stop when I got to the final set of stairs, but Brad was there so the vanity effect kicked in and I ran them. I stopped at the lookout but Brad encouraged me to walk up to the car park, then run across and run up the final flight of stairs to the next lookout. It was such a relief to finally stand still. I have to admit that I didn't really look at the view. I was too busy catching my breath to appreciate it.

On the way down I picked up my hoodie, so I saved TB the extra run. I must see how he reacts to my dastardly plan. It should be amusing. I was walking down the mountain with Peter. He inspires me so much as he has arthritis and yet still runs up mountains. He's not steady going downhill and neither am I, so we've developed a habit of walking down together. After a while Krissi came along with Fiona and said "Kathy, you want to jog the rest of it, don't you?" I said, "No, I'm fine" before I realised that Krissi wanted me to jog the rest of the way down. I decided that it was easier to jog than to protest, so off I went with Krissi, while Fiona kept Peter company the rest of the way down. It was good to jog some of the way, however once we got to the bridge we had to turn around and jog back up until we met the last group. I was pleased to see that I managed the jog on the steep bit. I'm thinking that it's time that I tried running the whole way up the mountain. I'm sure that I can make it if I take it one small stretch at a time.

While I was running up the hill I was thinking, "There's no way I can survive bootcamp at lunchtime after doing this," however I turned up anyway. Billy had warned us that it would be a hard session, suggested we all make sure we ate something a couple of hours beforehand (never a problem for me) and that we bring along a sports drink. We were dragging tyres. When we got there I went to help with bringing the equipment over. Billy asked me how I was feeling. "Apprehensive!" He laughed. What is it with personal trainers? They always smile more when you tell them it's hurting!

I carried a 20 kg weight plate over from the car. I brought it over with two hands and rested it on my tummy. Imagine my reaction when the first serious exercise we did, after the skipping and jumping warmup, was carry two 20 kg weights across the lawn and back again. While jogging!

Billy had us using our arms like levers, explaining that this would help us to strengthen our grip. With the right posture and tight abs, our bodies would do the work instead of our arms. Amazingly, he was right. I was able to carry the weights across and back, while jogging. Mind you, I was by far the slowest in the group. Still, I was doing it. I had to make myself take my last turn as I was exhausted.

After that we dragged the tyres around. Each tyre had a 20 kg weight on it. Dragging them was as hard as it looks. At one stage my arms and legs were going but my tyre wasn't. We did one lap, then Billy let us do a lap without the weight. I asked him to put it on again for my third lap as I really wanted to do it the hard way one more time. I felt like I had something to prove. It was an internal thing that surprised even me. I guess I needed to know I didn't have to have the weight taken away. Afterwards Billy came up to me and complimented me for doing that, which I appreciated, but I'd really done it for myself and nobody else. As I said, I don't know where it came from.

A few squats, which I handled better than last week, even after all the hill work, a few stretches, and bootcamp was over. We helped carry the equipment over to the car. Billy always seems surprised that we do that, but the whole group just gets in and helps. We've never even discussed it - we just do it. I work with some lovely people.

This evening I have a sore butt and my shoulders are feeling pumped. I'm off to have a warm bath after I water the garden. Fortunately TB suggested leftovers for tea, so I won't have to cook dinner. Apparently he liked my pasta bake!

Personal training tomorrow morning and then the weekend. I'll have hockey on Sunday and I'm hoping to find the willpower to go out for a run on either Saturday or Sunday morning. Fingers crossed.

Bootcamp and long run

2008-11-05T18:30:00.002+11:00

Even though Tuesday was a public holiday in Canberra TB and I were up bright and early for bootcamp. The schedule said interval training, which had me feeling quite apprehensive as Krissi and I were going for a run straight afterwards. Knowing how hard an interval training session is, I was wondering if I'd be able to run for an hour afterwards.

It was a chilly morning - you'd never know it was meant to be Spring. I braved the elements in a nice warm hoodie and I had a long sleeved top for my run later. We went for a warmup run around the oval. I was struggling immediately to keep up with the others. I felt even more worried about my PT session, particularly as I'd been so stiff and sore on Sunday evening. When I stood up after I finished blogging I was hobbling like a little old lady.

After the warmup run and stretches, we jogged as a group around the outside of the marked oval, which was about 300m long. The purpose of this lap is to check out the ground to make sure we're aware of any trouble patches. After running on the Campbell High School oval during the last bootcamp, this place looked like heaven. They play AFL on Reid Oval during the winter, so it's kept in good condition. As we jogged around Krissi told me that it was up to me whether or not I took the interval session a little easy as we were going for a long run afterwards. I didn't pay much attention to the word "long" as all my runs with Krissi seem long to me.

We ran a second lap around the oval at our own pace. TB ran off ahead of the group while I dutifully brought up the rear. As we finished we were given numbers, which were used to divide us into teams. I ended up in the same team as TB, which I was pleased about. Krissi explained the concept of the intervals session, and I was suddenly glad that I was the slowest runner in the group. We were doing a velodrome session, where the team would run around the oval as a group, dropping the slowest runners off at the end of the second lap, then the next slowest etc, until the fastest runner ran a lap on their own. While the others were still running, the people who had dropped off would be doing exercises in the middle of the oval.

I ran my two laps, then did a lap of crunches, a lap of pushups, a lap of squats and another lap of crunches. After the faster runners had some time to recover, we did the session in reverse, picking up a runner each lap, then finishing with two laps for me. More crunches, pushups and squats for me, but I was feeling a lot more confident about my run afterwards. As for TB, he did a lot of running. That's what you get for being fast!

We stretched and chatted at the end of the session. I was keen to head off and so was Krissi. She suggested I eat something, but I didn't want to after my experience at the fun run on Sunday. We drove over to the other side of the War Memorial, which surprised me, as it's a five minute walk. I thought Krissi must have another appointment after me, but I soon found out why we were putting the cars near our finishing spot. Krissi was taking me for a "long" run.

Because it was a public holiday, I didn't have to be at work and Krissi's next client had moved their session to Thursday, Krissi was taking the opportunity to take me for a run right around the base of Mt Ainslie. Now this is a run that my running buddies have spoken about with awe and fear. Krissi herself had told me that she cried the first time she went up one of the hills. I think she is probably exaggerating, but even the thought that she might feel like crying is enough to impress me with the magnitude of the task. Mind you, she's been preparing me mentally for this over the past few weeks, as she's been telling me about the various sections and how they are all achievable. We've even run nearly one third of the way up the horrendous hill. I have to admit that I've dropped to a walk the two times we've done that, but at least I knew what it looked like.

Krissi told me that the run was just under 10 km. We'd been running just under 7 km along there in approximately an hour. Krissi thought we would be out there for about an hour and a half, which seemed like a long time to me.

I felt absolutely fine when we started the run. I was warmed up from bootcamp. I checked out how I was feeling, just as my Chi Running book advises. No aches and pains anywhere. Still, as I ran along beside Krissi I was thinking up all the reasons why I couldn't do the full run. My knee would hurt afterwards, I would have to walk all the hills, etc, etc. I didn't want to embarrass myself by giving up immediately, so I thought I'd see how I went on the way to the turnaround point.

I chatted away to Krissi while this was all going on in my head. Before I knew it, we'd come to the part of run where there's a high, middle and low road. We've been taking the middle road. I threw up half way up the hill the first time we did that, and I stopped the walk the time after that. To my amazement I was running up the hill and chatting. I figured I'd shut up, relatively speaking that is, and try making it to the top without stopping. I succeeded! I shared my milestone with Krissi, who was keenly aware of what was happening. We had a mini celebration in the way you do when you're running. (Me: "Pant, pant, that was an achievement." Krissi: "Well done Kathy.". Me: "Pant, pant")

I was still thinking that I'd make up my mind about turning around at a particular point on the run when, all of a sudden, we were there. I hadn't realised we were so far along. I knew I was feeling great so I really didn't have any excuse to turn around. The run was so much easier than Sunday's had been. I was really enjoying myself. I figured that I'd keep on going.

The horrible hill was pretty much there. Krissi gave me a pep talk about how to get up the hill. The plan was not to look up, as the top of the hill seemed so far away. The part I'd already run was as steep as it got, and there were a few "flat" bits that would give us a rest along the way. I was to take it slowly but steadily. We made it to our furthest turn around point and I hadn't stopped to walk. I was really proud of myself but it was pretty hard work. The temptation to stop and walk was so strong. Then Krissi said the magic words, "Xxx didn't make it all the way to the top the first time she attempted it." I decided that I would attempt to get further than Xxx before stopping. I just forgot to ask where it was she stopped, so I ended up running all the way to the top.

I asked Krissi about stopping for a water break at the top. She kindly told me that I was going to have to drink my water while I was catching my breath on the downhill. We've been talking about that, as so many people, me included, feel as though they must stop at the top of the hill. Krissi is intent on curing me of the habit!

We got to what I thought was the top, just behind some people who were walking their dogs. They took the path that veered to the right, which went up again. I thought "Oh no, it keeps on going" but fortunately Krissi was quick to reassure me that we weren't going the same way. She had carried our water on her running belt, so she handed me my bottle and fed me a sports bean. Now, I've never had sports beans on a run before. They are fantastic! In retrospect, I'm a little amused that I became so excited by an orange jelly bean. It tasted so good and it was so refreshing. Krissi only had four sports beans and she kindly gave me three of them on the way around the mountain. In fact, she would have given me her fourth bean too, if I'd asked for it. How lovely is that?

Once we got over the top of the horrible hill, Krissi warned me about another part of the run that was psychologically difficult, a series of hills that looked tougher than they really were. After that was a section where you were in what looked like the middle of nowhere, reached a recognisable landmark, and then kept thinking you should be back at the War Memorial.

After the horrible hill there was a lovely long downhill to run, with fantastic country views. It's hard to believe that you're in the middle of Australia's capital city when you're running through bushland with not a building in sight. I settled in and enjoyed that stretch, particularly as I knew there was more hard work to come.

I was glad Krissi had warned me about the deceptive hills, as the sight of them would have convinced me that I was done. By this stage I really wanted to make it the whole way around the mountain without stopping. I gritted my teeth, took the hills slowly and made it up all of them. The next section didn't worry me so much as I worked in the building that was the recognisable landmark and I'd been running on some of the tracks in the past. What bothered me was that my legs felt like lead.

It was quite understandable. I haven't run for more than an hour for about 18 months. My longest recent run was 8.67 km on much flatter ground. I'd just done an hour of bootcamp (even if it was an easy session). No wonder my legs were tired.

That was the whole point of the run, to take me past what I'd been doing already. Krissi wanted to move me further from my comfort zone. She certainly succeeded!

As we wended our way along a few different tracks on our way back to our starting point, Krissi told me that the finish would appear sooner than I expected. I thought she was being extra encouraging, but she was right. Before I knew it, we were there. I was so glad! I went to turn off my Garmin and realised that I hadn't turned it on properly at the start of the run. My amazing run, complete with impressive elevation profile and I didn't have a record of it. I had to laugh. Oh well. It looks like I'll have to run it again so that I get one. (Krissi sent me hers. I just have to work out how to load it into SportsTracks. Don't worry, I'm an IT consultant - I'll figure it out eventually.)

I am so proud of myself for doing that run. The thing that I'm most proud of is that I ran the whole way. That's a major achievement as I used to be one of those run/walkers. It's taken me a long time to be able to just run as my legs seem to make the decision before my brain gets involved. I even stopped to walk a couple of times on Sunday.

I was exhausted all day on Tuesday though. Thank goodness it was a public holiday!

Bootcamp, personal training, fun run and hockey

2008-11-01T19:24:00.006+11:00

Bootcamp is going to be pretty much a theme for my blog over the next few weeks. TB and I have signed up for six weeks of 6:30 am starts on Tuesday and Thursday mornings. I'm also doing a Thursday lunchtime bootcamp for 10 weeks at work. It's keeping me fairly busy.

This Thursday we had a circuit session at Reid Oval in the morning. While I love doing bootcamp at the War Memorial or at Lennox Gardens, Reid Oval is so much better for running activities. The even ground is a real bonus with agility work as well.

This is a session I've done a few times now. There was a new station (a recovery jog) and a minor change to one of the activities (a sprint at the end of the plyometric jumps). I really enjoy this session and I love seeing how much I've improved over time. For example, there's an activity with five cones in a pentagon around you. You start in the middle and jump between the cones and back to the middle, going one way around and then the other. I used to struggle with this one, pausing between each jump, landing heavily, and squashing the cones more often than not. Now I rarely squash a cone, I land lightly on my feet and I can complete the jumps in both directions without stopping.

There are other signs of improvement. During the warmup, which involved a lot of jogging around in a circle, Brad had us bending over to touch the ground with the appropriate hand, when he called out 'right' or 'left'. I didn't realise that some of the others weren't touching the ground until TB and I were chatting afterwards. I was too busy making sure I didn't fall over as I bent over to notice what the others were doing. I was pleased though, knowing that I'd managed to do something relatively easily that other people struggled with. I know that sounds as though I am competing with them, which I am a little, but I'm mainly pleased because it's a sign that I'm more flexible and that my balance has improved. Back before I lost weight, if I dropped something on the ground it was a major struggle to pick it up. In fact, I used to be intensely embarrassed if anyone was around to see me as I levered myself down and back up again.

There's a ladder exercise that we do, where we step into each rung with both feet as fast as we can. I realised on Thursday that it was a great abs workout. I hadn't noticed that before, probably because I was concentrating on coordinating my feet and swinging my arms (trust me, it helps). I found that if I wanted to go faster I had to tighten my core.

After bootcamp I headed off to work. I like getting there early after exercise, as that means I can used the shower in the disabled toilet. It's so much more pleasant than the shower down in the basement, but we're asked not to use it between 8:30 am and 3:30 pm.

Lunchtime bootcamp was a lot of fun too. Billy had medicine balls with him, that had me worried, but the exercise we did with those was quite achievable. We started off with some skipping and some jumping across the rope. My knee was fine so I was able to skip the usual way. We then swung the medicine ball over our heads and threw it down on the ground to bounce it, catching it on the way up, then swung the ball in the other direction. It was more fun than it sounds. I liked the big thud as I drove that ball into the ground. Mind you, I thought I was doing the exercise properly but Billy managed to find an improvement for me. Isn't it always the way with personal trainers?

We then did the running with the bands that we did last week. I teamed up with Kirsty again and we powered away. It seemed easier this week, probably because I knew what I was doing and I knew when to expect to get a rest. We then went and found a gutter and did some jumping. I thought 'oh no, my poor knees will never survive more jumping' but they were fine (and still are). It was hard work though. We also did squats. Billy loves his squats. This time we held the skipping rope above our heads while we squatted. It certainly keeps you upright. I'm enjoying the change of pace with this second bootcamp but I'm a little apprehensive about next week. Billy is bringing tyres / sleds. It sounds a little too boot for me. Still, I'll have a go. You never can tell.

On Friday I had my usual PT session with Krissi. My legs were so tired when I did the bike warm up, but I got through it. I've gone a little backwards with the chest press - I have only been doing one weights session a week lately, with work trips to Melbourne, boot camp starting and so on. After talking it over with Krissi, I've decided that I'm going to try to get to the gym at least once a week to get my other weights session in. I'll be focussing on arm work when I'm there.

I sometimes wonder am I enjoying personal training too much. I certainly work up a sweat, so I figure I must be working hard. I feel great all day afterwards. It's just that I enjoy it at the time. Isn't it supposed to be hard work that you dread? Have I got this all wrong?

This blog post was going to stop here, but I lost my internet connection, and half the post last night, just after I wrote that I was going in a fun run and hoped to run 6 km in 45 mins. Well, the run is over. I managed to get around in 43:54, which I was really happy with. I also managed to run along behind a group of Canberra Raiders for a short while. You have to love eye candy.

Krissi did the run with me. She wanted to push me a little harder than when we run on Tuesdays and I enjoyed the company and motivation. Mind you, the only time I voluntarilty accelerated and started to run past people, I immediately got back into the pack. Yes, there were a couple of people between us and the Raiders, obstructing my view. I'd told Krissi about my valiant attempt to run faster last year when the Raiders went past, so she was quietly laughing at me. We managed to stay with them a short while - it's probably where I picked up the minute that I ended up under my goal time.

I found the run a bit hard today, but I still enjoyed it. Krissi pushed me along and encouraged me to keep a steady pace, which really helped. Krissi and Brad didn't sign up for the run, so they left me just before the finish. I tried to run faster up the straight, even though my legs didn't think they could. It's amazing how having all those people there helps you find something more though. At the end of the run I got through the finish line and a few steps away before I started to feel as though I simply had to throw up. I lost some of my breakfast, found that I desperately had to go to the loo, and headed straight over to the gym without telling the others where I was going. A kind lady grabbed me a cup of water when she saw me throwing up, and another gentleman offered to get me one. I was incredibly grateful to them both, but I didn't actually look up to see their faces when I thanked them. I hope they have lots of good things happen to them both this week. They certainly deserve it.

After my emergency dash to the loo I felt a lot better and found the others. Lola and her friend Julie had finished a few minutes behind us. Jess and Fiona both did the walk. Normally they would run the 6 km, but Jess is expecting her first child in early December and Fiona carried her two year old in a backpack. We had arranged to have morning tea after the run, while the announcements were happening. I'm glad we did that, as it was a pleasant and relaxing way to finish the event.

Today's event was special to us, as it's a year ago since Lola was diagnosed with Breast Cancer. In fact, she wasn't able to do this run with us last year, as she had just had surgery, but she did come out to encourage us. It was fantastic to have her run with us at this particular event. She's finished all her treatment, her hair has grown back curly to her disgust, except that it could have grown back patchy so she's not complaining, and it's just a matter now of keeping an eye on it all. Which reminds me, it's twelve months since I last did a proper breast check. All you women out there reading this blog ... self-examination this week!

I got home to find TB working on the garden. I grabbed a mattock and gave him a hand to plant our brand new row of thujas. These are conifers that are going to form a privacy screen between us and the neighbour. We went for the cheap 10 for $60 option, so they are tiny. It will take a few years before they form any sort of screen. Still, it's the beginning of our front garden, which also has a magnolia and a lilac planted in it. We have two daphne bushes and six azaleas in pots under the tree ferns out the back. They are destined to be in the front garden when the thujas are forming some shade.

After that, I had hockey. I walk over to the hockey centre. It's about a kilometre, which is a good warm up. Usually I run around one of the fields before I play but my legs didn't think that was a good idea. I did plenty of running though - the other team were fast! Well, everyone else is fast compared to me. Still, it's a lot of fun. I staggered home - the hill up to our place seems to grow while I'm away - and now I'm contemplating a good night's sleep.

Lots of exercise today

2008-10-28T19:04:00.002+11:00

It was a hectic day today. Bootcamp this morning, followed by PT and a lunchtime walk. I'm feeling really tired now.

Bootcamp was at Lennox Gardens, which is a picturesque location, right beside Lake Burley Griffin. A popular meeting place for people heading off on runs with the ACT Cross Country Club or FIT (Females in Training) as well as for cyclists, it's also a great spot for bootcamp. This morning we had boxing, which I really enjoy. There's something about hitting things that is incredibly satisfying.

We warmed up, then did a series of box, exercise, hold the pads, exercise. The boxing sessions involved crosses, hooks, uppercuts and then a combo. The exercises were jumping lunges (small lunges, small jump, not as easy as it sounds), squats and starjumps. I still get the old "oh no, star jumps, I'm no good at them" feeling, but I managed the twenty star jumps each time without any trouble. Isn't it funny how your head plays with you? You'd think my mind would have caught up with the fact that I'm fit and healthy and well able to do a few starjumps.

After that we played ambush, which I love. It involves one person doing the boxing and the others taking it in turns to tag the person, run away, turn around and choose a pad position for the person to box. Anna, new to boxing with Krissi and Brad, was boxing first. She was in fits of giggles as she was running around and then boxing. I enjoyed seeing her have such a good time as I always feel like that when we play ambush.

After boxing I had my PT session with Krissi. Last week's run was a bit of a disaster as my knee was sore and we ended walking. This week we headed off on a flatter course and my knee was fine. We ran for 1:05 and I managed comfortably. That's the longest run I've been on so far. I really got into it today. The start was a little tough as my legs felt like lead, but I was breathing easily and my upper body was relaxed. I told my legs that it was ok to be tired but that we weren't stopping.

Krissi and I chatted away as we ran. I was also doing quite a bit of sightseeing. It was a beautiful morning. The sky was blue, the trees look so lovely with their new leaves, and there was no wind. It was picture perfect.

I got to work to find out that Lisa and Kirsty were keen to go for a walk at lunchtime. I didn't think I'd be up for it, but I decided to go with them when I realised that I was a bit stiff and sore. I figured that the walk would help me loosen up. We ended up walking briskly for 15 mins until we reached the top of a hill and then turned around and went back. I'm really glad that I went. The girls are good company and it's always good to have a proper break from work at lunchtime.

I'm waiting for TB to arrive home from work now. He was not at all keen to get up this morning for bootcamp, so it will be interesting to hear how he pulled up. I'm going to have a rest day tomorrow as I have the double bootcamp session on Thursday. I'm quite looking forward to sleeping in!

More bootcamp, PT and family photos

2008-10-26T20:30:00.003+11:00

On Thursday I did bootcamp twice! I was so hungry all day. Oh, and tired too.

In the morning TB and I headed off to Lennox Gardens for bootcamp with Krissi. It was a cardio session. It was the session with the medicine ball, where we head off in a line of pairs. The pair at the back carries the medicine ball until the trainer blows a whistle. At that point they hand it to the pair in front of them and run to the front of the line. On a double whistle, the whole group runs to the trainer. The first one there takes a card and the group then does the exercise. We ended up doing a variety of exercises, including pushups, walking lunges and crunches. There were a few "run to x" type selections and a couple of other group activities (overhead medicine ball relay for example).

I remember that I used to think this session was much harder. The difference for me is that the running isn't such a chore. I was enjoying myself this morning, so much at one stage that the people behind me were trying to get my attention to pass me the ball. Instead of paying attention I was running along, checking out the people rowing on the lake.

My knee held up fairly well. I looked after it when we did the walking lunges, so they (the lunges) didn't really hurt until the second half. We were running on the flat today too, which helped.

After bootcamp I headed off to work where I had a second bootcamp session lined up for lunchtime. I told the instructor, Billy, about my knee and he immediately diagnosed that it was an ITB problem. It always amuses me when people are so sure what your knee problem is, but his diagnosis matched with what I was thinking. I really can't remember hurting my knee. Given how much tender care I take of it I am sure that I would have noticed. Referred pain seems like the probable cause.

Anyway, it was smart telling Billy that my knee was sore, as he modified a few exercises for me. We started off with a skipping warmup. After checking whether or not I was feeling any pain when skipping, he got me to jump and turn the rope, rather than jump over the rope. I still got a workout and my knee didn't hurt as much.

We then used bands to pull each other along. Well, the person in the band tried to run while the other person held them back. Wow! What a workout. I was exhausted after my turn. A few turns of this was followed by boxing, another turn at the bands and squats. Billy likes his squats. At the end of the session, after we stretched, he massaged my ITB for me a little. It really hurt!

It was a great workout, and there's a real feeling of teamwork amongst the participants. In fact, I went walking at lunchtime on Friday with a couple of the girls who are doing the bootcamp. I could have gone for a run with a couple of the guys, but I was too too tired.

On Friday I had a weight session with Krissi. It was a fantastic session. We started off on the bike. Normally I warm up on level 6, then we dial it back to level 4 for me to do my intervals (one minute hard, one minute easy). On Friday I did the interval work at 6. It certainly felt a lot harder. I was sweating away in no time.

I talked to Krissi about the ITB suggestion. It made sense, given that I'd increased my running but hadn't really stretched last week. We discussed that the underlying problem was probably one of the poor muscles that I hadn't stretched. Krissi gave my legs a good stretch after my warmup and another at the end of the session. I am really pleased to announce that my knee is hurting a lot less!

Mind you, having a sore knee doesn't mean that you get an easy session from Krissi. I did three sets of fitball lunges with 7.5 kg weights. My arms felt like they were going to stretch to the floor during the first set. I didn't notice them in the second and third sets as my legs were shaking like jelly. I also did a couple of sets of calf raises. I love doing calf exercises at the time, as I am a little vain (cough) about how great my legs are, but I wish I hadn't done them for the next few days. Ouch!

I was exhausted when I got to work but I'd told Lisa I'd go walking with her at lunchtime. She and Kirsty were planning on a serious walk. I hadn't taken a change of clothes with me, so I got back into my sweaty PT gear. I promised to walk down wind from them! We headed off to the Campbell Shops. It took us 25 mins to get there, so it was a pretty decent walk by the time we got back to the office.

I slept so well on Friday night!

On Saturday TB and I were in Melbourne. We went to the Vic Markets via Southbank. I walked across town in sandals rather than in runners. More blisters. Breaking new shoes in is definitely no fun. I ended up buying some daggy thongs to wear back to the car. Thank goodness for the thongs though, as I haven't been able to wear shoes for the rest of the weekend.

On Sunday the whole family got together for a family portrait. It took a bit of organising, but it's done now. I'm looking forward to seeing the results. The photographer was fantastic. I'll post the photos in Facebook once we get them from her.

Boot camp, PT and a sore knee

2008-10-21T19:20:00.002+11:00

This morning I had boot camp. I'm now doing two boot camps, one with 1-2-1 Personal Training (Krissi and Brad) two mornings a week, and one with the people from work (one day a week). I also have two PT sessions a week and twilight hockey, so I should have a base of six hours exercise a week plus extras for the next six weeks. Good going, hey?

This morning was the fitness assessment with 1-2-1. During the warm up jog my knee was a little sore. I haven't done anything to it recently, so I'm a little at a loss as to why it's hurting. It seemed ok after the warm up so I got stuck into the assessment activities. I made it to 4-1 on the beep test. I felt like throwing up when I finished, so I didn't feel as though I'd piked too early. I may have been able to push for one or two more levels but I don't think I would have lasted any longer. I managed 20 pushups on my toes and 31 on my knees in two minutes. I also managed 37 situps in two minutes. I have no idea what time I did for the agility test but I did the km time trial in about 6:22.

After boot camp I had my PT session. I was supposed to be going for a run. We ran the first part, but my knee was hurting on the uphills. We persisted a bit, but when it started hurting on the downhills we dropped back to a walk. I don't remember hurting it. Maybe it's referred pain from something else. I hope it sorts itself out.

I have boot camp twice on Thursday, which should be fun if my knee isn't still hurting. I'll keep it iced and see how it goes.

Gardening and running

2008-10-19T18:25:00.002+11:00

I've discovered gardening. I hadn't realised just how much fun it was until recently, when TB asked me if I'd like part of the garden to grow vegetables. I enthusiastically said "show me a shovel" and I've been spending time in the garden ever since.

I find it all amazingly relaxing. Every morning and evening I go outside and examine my garden closely, checking to see that my plants have made it safely through the day or night, without being eaten by snails or succumbing to frosts. I've developed a warrior-like approach to insects and weeds. I talk away to the various plants, telling them that they'll thrive in their new location and admiring their sturdy growth. It's all a hoot. TB is a little taken aback by the gardening monster he has managed to unleash.

We're going to landscape the front garden shortly. There are some trees that are the wrong type for suburbia, with roots clogging drains. They are coming out soon. TB is drawing up plans and we've started to buy the larger plants. So far we have a magnolia, a lilac and a row of thujas sitting in the midst of my vegetable garden in pots. There are also a couple of daphnes in the fernery out of the sun. We've been looking at paving and at garden seats. It's all new to me, but TB has worked as a landscaper and as a paving contractor. I had no idea of the cost of building a garden from scratch. It's also interesting to watch TB plan it all out. At the moment we have some poles in the back yard, representing the heights of the various trees. We've been watching with interest to see where the shade is at what time of day, so that we can be sure that we don't end up planting sun-loving plants in full shade or vice versa.

As for running, I've been out several times with Krissi now. I imagine my blog while I'm running but I'm just not finding enough hours in the day to write them up. Most weeks I've only run the one time but I made it out twice this week, once with Krissi and once on my own. The run on my own was in Melbourne on Friday morning. I was there for work with a group of people. We stayed at the Travelodge at Southbank. I headed out at six am and ran around the Yarra for 50 mins. It was a lovely run. I've really been struggling to get out there without someone else, so I was particularly pleased by this run.

I had brunch with some of the running girls this morning at a nursery. How's that - combining gardening and running? :-)

I've been reading all your blogs but I haven't been commenting much. I'm enjoying hearing all your news. Keep it up everyone!

More running

2008-09-18T19:56:00.002+10:00

On Tuesday morning Krissi and I met behind the War Memorial. We'd had a contingency plan in place, in case the stormy weather continued, but the morning was lovely and clear. Chilly, mind you.

We walked up to the path where we were going to run. I was quite relieved by that. I felt anxious about the run, as it was going to be a little hilly, but I shouldn't have worried so much. It was hilly in places, but nothing I couldn't actually manage. I was soon enjoying the scenery. It's lovely running through the bush on a well maintained dirt track (thank goodness so many Canberrans use all these trails) with blue sky overhead.

At one stage we saw a couple of kangaroos right beside the path and Krissi started waxing lyrical about how lucky we were. I found myself thinking "TB would love this" but when I checked in with him later in the day he assured me that he'd been perfectly happy in bed while I was out running.

At one stage on the way back I found myself having to walk up a hill. I just couldn't get my feet to keep going. Krissi tried to encourage me to run, but they were in charge. Fortunately, that only lasted for a short while. All up, we were out running for just over 50 minutes. We travelled about 6.7 km during that time.

The last part of the run was up a steep hill. Krissi assured me that I'd be able to run up it quickly because I'd be able to stop at the top. I don't think I was quick exactly, but I did make it up. I was really pleased by that.

I had the usual "I feel good" feeling all day. :-)

Tomorrow morning I think we're going for another run. I'll dress for it any way. It's best to be prepared for anything where Krissi is concerned.

Last night I went to the gym and did some weight training. Pretty much the routine I was doing with Julia.

As for the month of me, I went to a birthday party I wanted to go to, even though my parents were visiting. I only went for an hour, but I did go. I also went to work late on Monday - I saw Mum and Dad off instead of rushing in to work. It was a great way to start the week. On Tuesday I forgot to do anything for me! How could I forget? I had a perfectly enjoyable day but it was pretty much business as usual. Mind you, it's a good feeling, knowing that a 'BAU' day is so good that I didn't realise I hadn't spoiled myself.

Yesterday was a great 'month of me' celebration - the new Ecuador Dark magnum. I treated TB to the Colombia Cappucino magnum. That looked pretty good too, so I think we have to swap flavours another day. Today I treated myself to lunch away from work. I decided that the person I'd most like to have lunch with was TB. Fortunately, he agreed with the idea, and was prepared to make me lunch, so we had a steak sandwich at home. Sigh, you know you're getting close to 50 years old when your idea of a good time is lunch at home. LOL.

I'm off to a fashion parade tomorrow evening. One of my girl friends was literally stopped in Myers and asked to be a model. They are even giving her $120. How cool is that! Mind you, she's a bit stressed. I am sure she'll enjoy it once it's happening.

Yum, TB has just shown up with chocolate icecream. That's more than enough to distract me from thoughts of running. :-)

Month of me

2008-09-12T20:54:00.002+10:00

I ran today, so my post was going to be all about my run, but I realised that I hadn't posted since August. Rather than tell you all about my run (7 km) I thought I'd tell you about this fabulous idea that I unashamedly stole from Kathryn.

Basically, the idea is that I have to do something special for myself every day during my birthday month. I teamed up with a friend at work, whose birthday is the day before mine, and we're celebrating the "month of us". It's been great fun, doing this with someone else.

So far, in no particular order, I've managed to:
1) moisturise my dry arms and legs
2) wear my night time perfume, which I love, to work during the day
3) walk around in my runners all day at work instead of swapping to my work shoes
4) share the Koko Black chocolate "spoil" for two with my friend - we loved it
5) have a luxurious bath
6) plant a vegetable garden
7) put flowers in my vegetable garden
8) drink better quality red wine than usual
9) buy myself a trashy mag
10) buy someone else an indulgent farewell gift without thinking about the price
11) cook a lasagne
12) get my eyebrows shaped

Tomorrow's my birthday. I love having a fuss made, and today I was fortunate enough to arrive at work to find balloons, flowers and champagne. There was also a chocolate birthday cake for afternoon tea.

I made it quite clear to TB that I like a fuss made for my birthday. I figure that you've only got yourself to blame if other people don't know that something is important to you. I may have made more of it than it is, because TB invited my parents up for the weekend. I think he is worried about the level of fuss required, and is relying on them to help him provide it. Personally, I'm delighted that he has invited them.

On the running front, Krissi took me out for a run this morning. I haven't run since the last time I posted. For someone doing a Running Challenge, that's a pretty abysmal effort. I'm not counting hockey the other Saturday, although I do think I ran pretty well during the game. In fact, I was still running at the end, which was a major achievement. We lost, so hockey is over until the twilight competition starts, but that's ok with me. I don't know how I would have managed hockey this weekend.

Krissi had her work cut out for her this morning. I'm struggling mentally to get out there. Physically I'm fine. In fact, I felt quite guilty, as Krissi is recovering from a bad chest infection. She was coughing and spluttering while I was complaining! Still, she got me running for over 50 minutes. On Tuesday, we're going for a run around the base of Mt Ainslie.

We had a bit of a heart to heart on the way back home today. I told her that I was fine running with someone else but that I was really struggling to get out there on my own. Krissi suggested that we run for the next few PT sessions, to rebuild my confidence. I'm delighted with the idea, as I love how I feel after a run. All day today I was so proud of myself. I had a blister and the ball of my foot was sore, but I didn't care. They were badges of success. Mind you, I was pink all day. I wish my skin wasn't quite so fair.

I'm not quite sure what to do about the blisters. I've been getting a blister in the same spot lately. Maybe my shoe is too tight. I'll try relacing it and see how it goes.

Hopefully I'll be posting again soon!

Hockey, Bootcamp, PT and a run

2008-08-27T19:26:00.003+10:00

First of all, TB came out running with me tonight. That's awesome. I am so pleased. My goal is to get out there running but it's not as easy as it sounds when you're out of practice and it's cold outside. I came up with a plan to overcome the "it's easier to stay inside where it's warm" factor this evening. I phoned TB before I came home from work to tell him that I planned to go for a run. My reasoning behind the phone call was that if I told someone else my plans it made it much harder for me to change them. I never expected him to join me.

I arrived home, prepared some stuffed mushrooms (yum) and then got myself changed into my running gear. I invited TB to walk with me as I know it's hard for him to run at my pace. He decided to run with me though, which was terrific for me, as it meant that I kept running the whole way. I also didn't have to think about where we were going. I told TB I wanted to run for 30 mins so he chose the route.

We went along a route that we'd walked in the past so I knew what to expect in terms of hills. We were a little faster than he'd expected, although it was a slow run overall. We were out for 25 mins and covered 3.25 km, including a few long hills. We've stored the run in Sports Tracks so that we can do better next time. I have a feeling I have my own personal cheer squad for running now. At least for a while I hope. :-)

As for hockey, I played on Saturday. The woman I was marking was so much faster than me! I just couldn't keep up. After struggling for a while I was moved over to the other side of the field. The girl who took over my job managed much better. I was feeling a little disheartened until I realised that I was 28 years older than her! Mind you, the fast chick was older than me. Sigh. We were beaten 4-0. Still, it was a good workout. There's one more game this season, unless we accidentally manage to get into the finals. It's possible (we win, someone else loses) but not likely. After that, I'm planning to play social hockey on turf over summer.

It was the last bootcamp for a while. We did the fitness assessment. I crashed and burned on the beep test. I was running along and suddenly felt sick. I pulled out much earlier than I expected rather than throw up. I was quite miserable about it, as I'd really looked forward to seeing how much I'd improved. Anyway, once it had happened it had happened. I guess it was a 'suck it up princess' moment. Most of my other measurements were lower, because my form has improved so much. For example, at the first session my pushup count was 20 on toes, 18 on knees. On Monday I managed 15/15, but they were much better pushups. I did manage to improve on the agility test, which is something I always like to see.

As for PT on Tuesday, it was my second last session with Julia. My knee was a little sore from Monday night (walking lunges after the fitness assessment) and I was really tempted to ask for a free pass on the leg work, but I decided to tough it out. I survived the squats and walking lunges (so much easier indoors). The chest superset seemed easier too. Julia had a sore back so I tried to make sure I collected the weights instead of her. Easier said than done, as she has the habit of looking after her clients instead of the other way around.

Now that bootcamp is finished I'm trying to work out what I'm going to do to keep my activity level up. If TB will run with me a couple of times a week, that's going to be a big help. Fingers crossed.

Personal Training with Krissi

2008-08-22T19:08:00.002+10:00

I had an awesome PT session this morning. I don't know what it is, but sometimes I am just so strong when it's that time of the month. I was smoking hot!

After getting myself there without being too early (it's no fun sitting in the car when it's cold) or too late (I hate being late!) I climbed the two flights of stairs to Krissi's apartment. My knee was grumbling slightly on the stairs but didn't make any noise at all on the flat, which delighted me, particularly the day after Mt Ainslie. Mind you, I was puffing by the time I got to the second floor. I waited at Krissi's door, subtly catching my breath, and trying to look like I'd just arrived. I don't know if I fooled her at all, but I felt better pretending that I wasn't a beached whale.

The session started with the now fairly usual 10 mins warmup on the bike followed by 10 mins of intervals. I have the resistance at a higher level during the warm up, then it gets knocked back a couple of levels while I go fast for a minute, recover for a minute. The 21st minute is meant to be flat out, and Krissi had me changing my grip today. I had to admit to her (when will I learn? when will I learn?) that I found today's session easy, so she's going to crank it up a level next week. Sigh.

We then moved on to squats. I've been doing my squats with 40 kg on the bar, so that's where we started. It was easy, so we upped the ante to 45 kg for the next two sets. Usually I wobble all over the place getting used to an increase in weight, but I didn't wobble at all today. The last few reps were hard, I was panting and I was sweating, but my form was good. Yay me!

We followed this up with hamstring curls. Apparently my form was good, which is always nice to know, but I was finding them hard work. My hammies and glutes were a bit tight from yesterday's hill climb. I got through the three sets and Krissi had me straight over to chest presses. All I really wanted to do was lie there, flat on the floor, for the rest of the session.

Once I was on the bench though, I was into the chest presses. I did the first set without any trouble. I expected to, because we hadn't done any arm work the night before. On the second set the weirdest thing happened. I pretty much failed on the 8th rep, then did the 9th rep without any trouble at all. It's not at all what you expect to have happen. I struggled through the rest of the set making it to 12 with a mixture of assistance from Krissi and sheer determination. The third set followed pretty much the same pattern, although I didn't manage any reps on my own after I started needing help at 8.

Then it was abs work. Krissi has me doing these crunches, pushing a small pink ball up into the air (20) followed by oblique crunches, pushing the ball towards her hands while keeping my butt on the floor (20). They sound harmless but it's a good workout. I then did a lousy bridge. My form is much better but my abs were exhausted. Still, it's all progress. I staggered down the stairs, jumped into my little car and tootled off to work, feeling incredibly virtuous and amazingly strong all day.

I'm completely knackered now though. I'll be tucked up in bed in no time.

Personal training and Mt Ainslie

2008-08-21T19:17:00.003+10:00

On Tuesday night I had PT with Julia. We've been working on a new program for the last few weeks. It involves fitball squats with 8 kg weights, walking lunges with 5 kg weights, a superset for my chest consisting of flys - 4 kg and press - 10/9 kg, seated row - 25 kg, and hip abductors with 34/32 kg. We're working through two sets of 15 reps for most things at the moment. Just 12 reps for the chest though thank goodness. I struggled to get eight reps out with 10 kgs in the first set of chest presses this week, then finished the set with 9 kgs. I didn't even consider 10 in the second set.

I'm coming to the end of my PT sessions with Fernwood. I looked into buying some new sessions, but I realised that the cheapest way I could get an hour session was probably going to cost me a minimum of $70/hr. If I buy sessions in bulk from Krissi I get a better rate, so that's what I'm going to do once bootcamp finishes. I'll miss the sessions with Julia, but I've figured out that I can catch a cycle class with her once a week. That will give me the motivation to go to the class.

I'm working out how to keep up the same amount of exercise once bootcamp is over. The cycle class covers one session and my squash partner has recovered from injury so that takes care of the other. I've asked TB what his plans are after bootcamp and he's talking about going to the gym. I don't want to count on that though, as we've hardly used our Club Lime gym membership.

Today was bootcamp - the second last one for TB and I. We're missing the last session as TB has booked us into a networking session. He's developing a business plan and is keen to go to this, so I'm going along for moral support. I guess I'll be exercising my talking muscles!

Brad always has a first aid kit with him. The size of the first aid kit usually indicates the type of activity. This one fit into a bum belt, so we were out and about. Tonight we were headed up Mt Ainslie. The last few times we've walked up as fast as we were able. That's a pretty good workout. I'm always a bit sore the next day because my knee doesn't appreciate the downhill part of the walk. I'm finding that I recover faster each time though, which is reaassuring. It also means that all the work that I'm doing on strengthening the muscles around my knee is paying off. It's good to know that it's worth the effort.

Brad managed to add a twist tonight. We were running part of the way up the hill. He suggested a minute of running followed by thirty seconds recovery. I did the first minute but it took me a minute to get my breath back. I managed a grand total of nine or ten running intervals. I was exhausted! Still, as ever, it was a great workout.

Hopefully 1-2-1 Personal Training will be running another bootcamp soon. :-)

More running

2008-08-18T20:09:00.002+10:00

Two posts in one day! This will be a short one though. At bootcamp tonight we did more running. How my legs complained when we started the warmup. "What?" they said. "What? What?" I think they would have said a lot more if they could have managed it.

Tonight's bootcamp session was a circuit. The only problem with Brad's idea of a circuit is that he likes to include a lot of cardio. We were split into two groups, one doing the exercise and one doing a shuttle run. Once we'd swapped, then we all did abs work. Exercises included a shoulder press, squats, walking lunges, bicep curls, pushups, lateral raises, and forward raises. Abs work included planks (twice!), side planks, partner situps, crunches, crunches and more crunches. By the end of it I was ready to stay exactly where I was, lying on the ground with a weight on my tummy as my arms couldn't hold it any more. Thank goodness TB was driving.

It was pretty chilly out there too, even though we were running every 4-5 mins. I enjoyed my long hot shower when I got home.

One benefit of taking time off - I got to see Emma Snowsill and Emma Moffatt compete in the triathlon. What a great result.

Em, hockey at my grade is nothing like what you see on tv. Mind you, there was an ambulance at the field when we arrived last week. No blood though.

Hockey and running

2008-08-18T10:56:00.002+10:00

This morning I made it out for a run. Considering that I signed up for the Run it Off challenge on Friday it's about time. I thought about running on Saturday morning Thinking about it was as far as it got. Snug and warm in my cosy bed, I was easily able to convince myself that I'd do plenty of running at hockey that afternoon. On Sunday morning I was too sore to contemplate going for a run but at least I had been right about hockey. I also bought myself a new pair of running shoes. :-)

I've been finding it really hard to get up and go running. There's the cold factor. The radio announcer mentions the negative temperature and I'm convinced that another half an hour in bed is a better option. There's the "it's dark outside" factor, which is rapidly becoming a non-starter. There's the "it's been so long since I went running that I can't run anymore" factor. I'd like to blame the radio announcer but that one is strictly in my own head. There's the "I'm so fat that none of my running clothes will fit me anymore" factor, which, according to the scales, is not at all true but it sounds fair and reasonable at 6 am.

I was lying in bed this morning, working out a way to eliminate the various factors, when the obvious answer jumped into my head. Run later in the day. That eliminates the dark factor and adds more than a few degrees to the temperature. I'm having a few days off work at the moment, so I decided that I'd go running after all the kids had been dropped at school.

What a great idea. The sun was shining, the sky was blue, I'd looked up my weight at the start of the year and reassured myself that I'd only put on 1.5 kg since January, and I reminded myself that I'd run pretty well at hockey on Saturday. I set a realistic goal of heading out for 30 mins and I told myself that the real achievement was to get my backside out there. It didn't matter how far I went or how fast I ran as long as I was running.

TB was incredibly helpful. I'd planned a nice flat route along the bikepath towards town. He suggested that I run in the opposite direction as there were some good hills that way. Instead of punching him, I followed his advice. To my surprise I didn't do too badly on the hills, although I have to admit that I did walk part of the way. My "trusty Garmin" showed that I climbed a little over 60 m. I managed to go down even further, ending up 7 m lower than when I started. I'm not exactly sure how I managed that. I kind of expect the house to be at the same elevation when I get home as it was when I left. Maybe it's the earth's rotation.

I ran 4 km in 30 mins, which wasn't too bad. 7.5 mins/km in fact. It was a comfortable run and I am feeling terrific. I got out there, I survived, and I'm keen to do it again. Aren't these challenges wonderful?

Mind you, TB has been given the job of chief motivator and Kathy-out-of-bed pusher. We'll have to see how that goes. My secret goal is to get him out there with me. Shhh.

Well, I did it

2008-08-15T19:28:00.002+10:00

I've thought about doing this all year and I've finally done it. I've signed up for the Runner's World Run it Off challenge.

Krissi took my photo and measurements this morning. I didn't have to go to any trouble to have a bad before photo. I had 'bed hair' and it was one of 'those' days when any photo is just going to look awful. Mind you, Krissi still had instructions for me to make the photo look worse. It was all quite entertaining and I was struggling not to laugh. Fortunately, the only way that any of you are going to see the photo is if I end up in the magazine. Phew!

You know what this means of course. I have to get out there and run. I have been agonising over whether or not I would try to use one of the "Spring into Shape" runs as my run, but I really don't have the desire to travel to Melbourne as often as I did. That's partly because I'd rather be with TB and partly because I'm doing a fair amount of travel for work. There really is a limit to how many times you can enjoy waiting for a plane that's been delayed.

This decision ended up being a big one. I'm now officially a resident of Canberra. I've been a Melbourne commuter all this time so it feels a bit strange. It feels like a good decision though.

I just looked at the title of this blog entry, and well, I did a couple of things, didn't I?

PT and Hockey

2008-08-03T14:22:00.003+10:00

On Friday morning I had my weekly torture session with Krissi. I got ready the night before, telling TB that I wasn't going to take my running jacket with me as there was no way I was going to run with Krissi after interval training. TB told me I was "soft" so I packed the running jacket and prayed for rain. The rain came during the night, so it was a warm 7 degrees when I arrived at Krissi's. Fortunately she'd decided against running, so it was off upstairs to the studio for the usual workout.

Lately we've been starting off with ten minutes on the stationary bike, followed by ten minutes of 1 minute fast, 1 minute recovery, then a final "flat out" minute just to make sure that I'm completely exhausted. I hated the workout the first time I did it. Fortunately, I described it to TB, who made me realise that I really hadn't tried that hard during the fast minutes. Since then I've tried to do less talking and more puffing. I still seem to have something left in the tank for the final minute, but I'm certainly working harder. Strangely enough, I'm enjoying the session more now that I'm trying. (I hope that the lack of entries lately means that Krissi has stopped reading my blog. Otherwise, I'm in big trouble next week.)

I've been doing squats with a barbell. I always thought I'd never do those, as they (a) don't look all that safe when you see people doing them at the gym and (b) looked way too hardcore for a princess like me. Doing them with Krissi spotting makes them seem much safer and I've learned that it's ok for a princess to be hardcore. It was quite amusing when we first started. I had trouble holding the bar straight. Krissi started me on a lower weight so that I could get the technique under control and so that she could check that my dodgy knee was tracking properly. I'm now doing them with 25 kg on the bar (approx 40 kg). I managed three sets without any trouble on Friday so I'm sure that the weight will be going up next time.

After the squats it was time to do hamstring curls. I do these with both trainers, so they are looking pretty good at the moment. I then did chest presses. I managed the first set of 12 by myself, the second set I got to about 10 on my own, and I faded out completely at 8 in the third set. I was disappointed in these a few weeks ago, but Krissi pointed out that I'd been doing upper body work at boot camp on Thursdays and so it was reasonable that I'd gone backwards. I can see the improvement happening again, but I'll be really pleased when I get three sets out without failing.

I had a bit of a laugh, as I told Krissi that I used to aim to get to six on my own in the second set and now I aim for eight. While I was telling her I could feel my face screw itself up into this determined expression that I'm pretty sure she doesn't normally see. I explained that the expression was how I looked on the inside when I was driving myself to reach the target. I realised that I didn't actually pull the face on the outside as all my concentration was focussed on lifting the bar.

Oh, Krissi gave me a tip for getting one or two more lifts out after I think I can't do any more. I do the chest press lying on the bench with my feet in the air. The idea is to keep my back flat and to stop me from arching my back to lift. When it gets tough, locking on my abs to lift my legs a little seems to give me the extra "oomph" to raise the bar. Sounds odd, but it definitely works.

I did three sets of lat pulldowns, concentrating on using my back and keeping my shoulders down. Then it was abs work. Instead of letting me off today, Krissi was picking on my form when I was doing the plank. I had to concentrate on keeping my butt down. My abs were burning. I'd already worked them hard and they did not want to cooperate. I was so glad to hear the timer go off after a minute. 24 crunches later (ordinary and oblique) I was hoping we'd finish but we repeated the combination one more time. It was a great session.

On Saturday afternoon I had a hockey match. The last time I played I drove over to the ground instead of walking. I realised that it meant that I'd missed out on my warmup. I live about 1 km from the ground, and the walk is just enough to loosen my muscles up. I've also started jogging around the ground before the game. There's only one other woman on the team who does this. We don't even go out for a hit up. We're pretty slack.

It was a good game. I got to do plenty of running as we were in attack a lot and then they would get a break so it was all systems go, sprinting back to the circle. We managed to win, which is always good. The weather held up for us too. The forecast had been for rain, but it held off, and it wasn't as cold as the last few games have been.

I had a relaxing Radox bath when I got home, then fell asleep on the couch. I was exhausted!

Today we wandered off to the Hall Markets. Not quite the Vic Markets, but enjoyable for all that. The rest of the weekend should be pretty quiet.

Oh, I've set myself a target to get to the gym three times a week to do cardio. I've been pretty slack about going to the gym. I figure I may as well make use of my membership. We'll see how it goes.

Interval running

2008-07-31T18:59:00.002+10:00

Another night at boot camp and another weary, yet happy, blogger. Tonight it was interval running. That's one session that I love in a kind of 'it's going to hurt but I'll be really glad I did it' way. In fact, during the session one of the girls said "I hate running" and I wasn't able to say "I love it" because of the 'it's hurting' factor. I was able to say "I love what running does for me" in between desperate gasps for breath.

We started off with a warm up that would have killed me when I first did interval training. We ran around the school footy oval, with side steps, grapevines, high knees and boots to glutes at various stages, then we did it again. I remember when I first did interval training I couldn't run the whole way around the oval without stopping to walk. Now I can do it twice!! (Did you notice that twice required two exclamation marks?)

A bit of stretching then we were into the the actual intervals. The first session required us to run a lap then recover while our partner ran a lap. I think I managed to run my laps faster than I ever have before. Five laps later and I was amazed that I hadn't melted into a puddle of 'I can't do this' goo.

Fortunately we went to half laps which seemed so much achievable, except for the 'it's a shorter distance so it requires a quicker pace' factor. I hate that factor. Mind you, I was really pleased that I managed to find another gear. I think having TB at boot camp helps a lot, as I want to impress him with how hard I'm working. Hearing him say "Well done Kathy" encourages me to keep on going when all I really want to do is stop.

We finished off the interval training with third laps, which again needed to be quicker. I remember only having two running paces - a fast wobble and a slow lurch. Now I have an 80%, a 90% and an 'I think I'm going flat out' pace. Well, I like to kid myself that I have those paces.

It started to get too dark to run fast, so we switched over to a circuit type of activity - a reverse pyramid of modified sit ups, a short run, push ups, and run back. We started off at 10 and the group finished when I got to 1. I was glad I wasn't faster than me as those lucky souls started the pyramid in reverse. The whole group did 1 with me at the end though and they were all delighted when I did that last push up.

An aside: TB and I went to Melbourne on the weekend, where he was lucky enough to meet the rest of my family, including my parents. I'm clearly going to have to rent myself a normal family. On Saturday night we were supposed to be having dinner with Mum and Dad and two of my sisters. Instead it turned into a "National Nanna's Day" party, with various grandchildren, a couple of Nannas, the Nanna's day costume of purple wigs, pink rubber gloves and purple slippers, and purple balloons everywhere. TB survived the occasion and I'm not suddenly single again, so I guess the evening went well.

We went to the Vic Markets on Sunday followed by the Carlton vs Footscray game at Telstra Dome. I'm a Doggies supporter and TB is a Blues supporter. He was delighted in the result. Dinner in Little Bourke Street at Kun Ming's (an old favourite of mine) and Monday off work. It was a great weekend.

Exercise update

2008-07-24T19:17:00.002+10:00

I'm just home from boot camp. TB and I are still going strong - Mondays and Thursdays at 5 pm. I thought the early start would be a struggle, getting away from work, but I just leave at 4:30 and nobody complains. Well, not to my face. The sessions will get moved to a later time slot as the days get longer.

I'm really proud of TB. He is the only person who has made every session since boot camp started. He works really hard at the sessions too, which has definitely inspired me to put in more effort.

Tonight's session was circuit training. We did a running drills warmup, which I quite enjoy, then a rotation of three leg exercises (shuttle run, squats, lunges), three abs exercises (side bends, plank, crunches) and three upper body exercises (military press, pushups, lateral raises). We did them for 1 min each, then twice through for 45 secs a time, then 30 secs each. By the end it was such an effort to lift my arms. It was too dark to run safely for the third rotation so we replaced the shuttle run with a theraband abductor exercise.

I really like training at the War Memorial. It's a lovely setting and it has a whole "this national monument is my space" kind of feeling. We end up having our photos taken by Japanese tourists a lot though, which is quite amusing.

As for the rest of the week, I played hockey on Saturday, went to boot camp on Monday (we walked up Mt Ainslie really fast - that's hard work) and had PT at the gym on Tuesday. Wednesday was a rest day, which is just as well as I was in Melbourne for work. Tomorrow I have PT with Krissi, which is always a challenge, and then TB and I are off to Melbourne for the weekend. We're going to the Footscray vs Carlton match on Sunday and TB is getting the added bonus of meeting the in-laws. It should be fun.

I went running today

2008-07-18T19:39:00.002+10:00

This morning I went for a run with my personal trainer, Krissi. It's been so long since I've been out for a run. Last week at PT I told Krissi that I was ready to start running again and that all I needed to do was get out there. Well, she got me out there.

Now, when I go to PT I always wear my running bra and shoes 'just in case'. It's been so long since Krissi has taken me out running that I have stopped bringing my running jacket. I was about to head out in short sleeves (hey, it was 2 degrees, that's a heat wave in Canberra at this time of year) when Krissi magicked me up a long sleeved running top that actually fit me and a pair of gloves. I'm glad she did.

Last night at boot camp we did running drills, so I was already a little sore. Krissi's partner, Brad, is my boot camp instructor, and when he heard that Krissi was taking me out for a run he cautioned that I might be sore. "Sore?" Krissi tells me she scoffed. "Kathy's never sore." Silly me, I realised. In my weekly chats with Krissi while she tortures me for an hour with chest presses and planks and other assorted exercises, I've let it slip that I don't feel sore for long after exercise. Mind you, when she suggested a run she checked how I was feeling and if I thought I'd be up for it. To my horror, "Sure I will" came out of my mouth instead of the more sensible "I'm playing two hockey games tomorrow and my knee is a little sore, maybe I should file my nails or something" that should have come out. I think I have to get my brain to mouth interface checked out. It's clearly not working properly.

In fact, I was delighted to go for a run with Krissi. It was exactly the motivation I needed. I knew Krissi would drag me out further than I wanted to run, and I knew that she wouldn't push me too fast. The "I've got to keep running because I'm with someone" pride factor would also kick into operation. Mind you, I had in mind a gentle little run with walk breaks, although there was no way that I'd admit that to Krissi. Out we went, along a familiar running trail. I knew exactly what to expect and I knew that I could make the distance. Mind you, that didn't stop my brain from wanting my legs to stop. The beauty of it is that I was able to ignore the impulse and keep going.

All up, we covered around 6.5 km. Krissi thinks I was running better than when we did a similar run several months ago. All I can put that down to is that I've been working hard at boot camp to improve my pace, the cycling had kept my cardio fitness up (although I haven't done much lately), and the hockey had kept me running (even if it was in short bursts followed by severe and lengthy panting sessions).

I was stiff and sore at work today, but I'm feeling pretty good now. Mind you, that's because I'm going to head to bed early! I'm exhausted.

Oh, and an added bonus of being out there running this morning - I felt virtuous all day. I love that feeling.

As for my blogging - I haven't blogged for a while because I felt like a bit of a fraud. All I've been doing is boot camp a couple of times a week, PT twice a week and hockey on the weekends I'm in Canberra. It's all pretty easy and well within my comfort zone. I haven't been cycling because of the fog (TB worries about me) and the cold (I worry about me). I haven't been running. In general I feel like I've been pretty slack.

So today was doubly good. I'm back out there running! Yay, I'm a runner again. And I'm back blogging about my running. Hi everyone. It's great to be here again.

Fortnightly update

2008-06-15T11:51:00.002+10:00

Where does the time go? That's what I want to know.

First of all, I'm going to record my exercise, just to get it captured while I can remember it. Then I'm going to have a massive whinge about my totally self-inflicted weight gain. It will be totally self-indulgent and annoying. If you read that far, remember, you were warned.

As it's been a fortnight, that means four bootcamp sessions. The first one involved a bit of power walking or slow jogging, interrupted by exercises chosen at random from a set of cards - 2 mins of squats, 2 mins of running up steps and walking down, lunges, dips, tunnel ball, etc. Apart from the whole 'this is hard work' aspect of the session, it was fun running up the steps in front of the War Memorial. We also jogged right around the building. I'd only ever approached it from the visitor's car park or the front entrance, so that was interesting. The second session was the agility session, where we do lots of jumping. I could really feel it in the muscles around my knees the next day, but my left knee wasn't painful. This is the third or fourth time I've done this particular session and I found the jumping easier than in the past. We met up an hour earlier on the Queen's Birthday holiday so that we'd have the light. That session was interval running. I haven't been doing much running lately, so I was looking forward to getting out and doing this session. I worked really hard. TB loves running and he put in a huge effort, which was rewarded with sore muscles all week. I pulled up much better so the regular exercise is clearly paying off. The last session was boxing with a difference. I really enjoyed the format.

I missed one of my Tuesday PT sessions due to having to go to Melbourne for work. It felt like ages since I'd seen Julia. The session was fun and it got me into the gym. I'm hardly ever there these days. On both Fridays I had my usual session with Krissi. The most exciting thing for me at the moment with those sessions is the chest bench press. Two weeks ago I managed two sets, with 4 and then 7 unassisted 30kg presses. Last week I managed three sets, with 10, 8 and 6 respectively and this week I managed the whole three sets. I struggled with the last few but I got them out. Krissi is going to wait until I manage to do the three sets of 10 comfortably and then we're aiming for three sets of 12 before she increases the weight.

I've only ridden to work once in the last two weeks. It's been a combination of bad weather, late starts, holidays and work trips that has stopped me. Hopefully the weather will be a bit better this week. My walking hasn't been too good, although I did walk for 4 km one morning and then catch the bus the rest of the way to work.

On to my second topic.

I've been maintaining my weight for the last three months but I have been losing the battle over the past few weeks. I guess I've known that for a while but I've been in denial. The time has come to stop pretending to myself that things are ok on the weight front. Seeing how few steps I was really doing was an eye opener.

Anyway, I've decided I'm not going to whinge about it, as planned when I started writing this blog. I know what I have to do. I know how to do it. I know TB would appreciate a healthier lifestyle. All I have to do now is implement it!

Bootcamp, PT, cycling, walking and hockey

2008-06-01T13:40:00.000+10:00

It's been a busy week. I started beginner's bootcamp on Monday with TB. We're going twice a week, at 5pm Mondays and Thursdays. Monday's session was the fitness assessment. I really needed to go to the toilet before the beep test, but it was on the far side of the War Memorial and I knew I wouldn't be back in time. I made it to level 3-6, which wasn't too bad considering the state of my bladder. Mind you, when Brad asked me what level I got to I practically threw up, so maybe I was trying harder than I thought. I headed off to the public toilets while TB continued with the beep test. He was the last to finish (it is a beginner's bootcamp) so he decided to stop when he got to level 6-0 rather than keep everyone else waiting. He used to run a lot when he was younger so running is just something he does. He really doesn't get the whole 'run for fun' idea though.

By the time I got back (it was a long way and uphill .. ok, it was about 800 m away and I got to run downhill all the way back) they had done the agility test and were on to the abdominal strength tests. After doing pushups (20 on toes, 18 on knees) and situps (20) I did the agility test. It was a little slower (23.3) than in the past. My theory is that I was being more careful because it was dark. TB did the fastest time (18.5), which he was pretty chuffed about.

We finished off with the plank. I did a really good time on this one, mainly because my backside was well in the air. I didn't realise at first, but I was soon aware of it once I passed the 90 second mark. I was going to try and lower my butt however my abs started to tremble so I figured I'd stay where I was. For some reason nobody chipped me on my fantastic bridge position. I realised they weren't going to and bailed out at 3:15. At least it will give me a hard target to aim at for the next fitness test. At the moment I'm doing two sets of 1 minute with a minute's rest easily with Krissi, and I managed two sets of 1:30 the other day with her. You never know, I might make it to 2 minutes with proper form next time.

On Tuesday I had PT with Julia. It was a good workout, as ever, but I find I'm much preferring the one hour sessions now. I might have to organise for the remainder of my Fernwood PT sessions to go for the hour.

On Wednesday I had a rest day. It was an eye opener for me. I'm back to wearing my pedometer because of the walking challenge that I'm doing. It hadn't occurred to me how little I was walking nowadays. In fact, I've been assuming that I've kept up at least half the amount of incidental exercise I was doing when I was living in Braddon. I knew that I wasn't getting the same amount of exercise walking to the bus, but I underestimated the effect that was having on the number of steps I was walking. No wonder my weight is staying constant even though I'm doing lots of exercise. Anyway, no more complete rest days for me while I'm doing the challenge! At the very least I'll be out for a lunchtime walk.

Thursday was meant to be bootcamp but Brad had to move it to Friday. TB and I went for an evening walk. I am really enjoying those walks. As well as the obvious health benefit we get to talk to each other without the distractions of television, housework and phone calls.

On Friday I cycled to Krissi's for PT. There had been fog all week, which kept me from cycling to work, but it was a lovely morning on Friday. I have been joking with TB and with the guys at work that I can benchpress 30 kg (twice) and I managed it four times without assistance on the first set. I was telling Krissi about the joke, the 'benchpress 30 kg' said in a menacing tone, and then the 'twice' said even more menacingly, so she challenged me to get to five on the second set. Well, I got to seven. I was stoked. My sets are getting longer too. I got to 11 the first set and 10 the second set. I love seeing the improvement.

We had work drinks on Friday afternoon, conveniently at Olim's Hotel, which is just past the War Memorial. I parked my bike in the beer garden, had a drink (soda water) with the team, then met TB on his way to bootcamp. We congregated near an outdoor Airforce memorial then proceeded to do a boxing session. There were still sightseers going past. In my mind I was imagining them being impressed that we were out exercising on a Friday afternoon in such a wonderful location, but they were probably glad it was us and not them.

TB and I rode home after bootcamp. I figured out that I'd managed to do 3 hrs and 20 mins exercise for the day. I was a little sore on Saturday morning and completely did not want to go to hockey. TB guilted me into going by reminding me that there were only 12 people on the list, so I walked across to the hockey centre. It's about 1 km from my place to the grass fields, so it was a good warm up. I played left half, which is not my usual position. Now that there's no offside rule you really have to keep an eye on your winger. I did a fair bit of running, which I was pleased about. I played ok too. My skills are so rusty and I don't train, so ok is about as good as it gets.

By the time I got home I was stiff and sore. I was all set to have a bath and then settle in for the night but TB talked me into going for a walk to the supermarket with him. My Garmin got completely confused in the two supermarkets we visited, which makes for an entertaining map. It claimed 7.2 km for the trip but my step count was about 8000, which means it was closer to 4.5 km than 7. My bath felt soooo good.

This morning we've been for another walk. I think TB is getting into this walking challenge more than I am! Still, it will be good for both of us. We have another walk planned for this evening, if he's able to get me away from the heater and the tv. I have Season 3 of Dr Who to watch, so it could be a battle.

I bought a new bike!

2008-05-24T20:24:00.002+10:00

I bought myself a bike here in Melbourne today. I had to order it in, so I couldn't take it to my brother-in-law's today, but it will be here next time in Melbourne. Pat is a darling, and he's going to pick it up for me, along with all the paraphenalia. Amazingly, the bike + stuff cost $15 less than the same model a couple of years ago. How cool is that?

I'm going to have to commit to riding it lots while I'm here. It's a bit of an expensive sometimes toy otherwise. Oh, and I was so good about not buying every accessory in sight. I figured I should work out which bike I liked best for the Great Victorian Bike Ride before I go buying more stuff.

Rang TB, who is in Canberra, who said "you'll never guess what I'm doing". It took me a while - he went for a walk. I am such a good influence!

Which reminds me of something I'm really proud of. Two years ago I got a group of seven people together to walk in the GCC. Last year, the company I worked for had a handful of teams entered. I don't work there any more, but I had a quick look to see if they had entered this year. There are 36 company teams entered. How fabulous is that? Ironically, the first year the team was made up of contractors. Last year they subsidised the original team, even though we were contractors. This year they decided contractors weren't welcome. What a shame. Still, there are 36 x 7 = 252 people walking in the challenge who weren't doing it two years ago.

Survey surprises me

2008-05-24T09:05:00.002+10:00

I had to fill in a survey the other day when I logged into the GCC website. It was a simple survey. How many days do you exercise each week? For how long? How many pieces of fruit do you eat a day? How many serves of vegetables? I asked TB how often he thought I exercised. Six or seven days a week, he replied. Don't you mean four or maybe five at a stretch? I asked. No way! he insisted. At least six days a week. I thought about it and realised he was right. What I'd failed to take into account was that TB and I have started going for evening walks. Those former rest days have turned into gentle exercise days.

I didn't bother to think about the time I exercise. I just picked the 60 mins+ option. Even on a low exercise day I do at least that much walking. One of the benefits of being a public transport user. As for fruit and vegetables, this is usually where I do badly. TB has been a great influence on me. I easily eat 5+ serves of vegetables a day now. I've been working on increasing my fruit intake and I was able to put down 2 serves of fruit.

I finished the survey and realised that I'd ticked all the boxes for a healthy lifestyle. How great is that! On my phone I have a mantra that I try to read / think about each time I turn the phone on. "I am a fit and active person who makes healthy lifestyle choices." It looks like it's working!

As for my recent exercise efforts, here goes. I haven't blogged for a couple of weeks so it looks like a lot more than it really is.

Week 1 - rode my bike to and from work twice, went for four walks with TB, PT with Julia and with Krissi
Week 2 - rode my bike to and from work once, went for two walks with TB, a two day trip to Melb with walking on Tuesday and a 3 km run on Wednesday, no PT at all (good to have a rest but I'm missing it like crazy - just haven't managed to get to the gym), and more walking planned for today and tomorrow. (Yes, the walking challenge is back on!)

Now, riding my bike is excellent exercise. It's 10 km each way, which takes me about 40-45 mins (that includes waiting to cross roads safely, but I definitely ride slower than some people run). If I catch the bus to work the trip takes me about an hour. When you add showering or changing to the bike trip I end up getting my exercise for about the same amount of travel + shower time that I'd be spending anyway. I figure as I get better at cycling I'll end up cutting down the travel time, which will be a bonus.

Cycling when it's cold has amazing credibility too. It's funny hearing people be impressed. I find myself buying in to the mystique of it all. The other day in the lift someone said to me "it must be cold out there" and I casually said "you soon warm up". I just didn't mention "after freezing your backside off for the first 15 minutes!" The other day it was so cold that my finger tips were incredibly painful in my winter cycling gloves. Instead of thinking "don't do this you crazy woman" I was riding along thinking "if I wear my white cotton gloves under my cycle gloves that might be enough to fix it".

I don't know if this happens to other people when it's cold outside, but my tummy is always freezing when I get to work. Lately it's been going bright red when I shower - so red that it's actually itchy and painful. It must be the circulation starting up again. I have to really resist the impulse to scratch it, however it settles down within half an hour. Unfortunately I'm bright pink for several hours after exercising, but they are used to it at work now. I prefer to refer to the pink glow as "my translucent skin". It sounds so much better.

I'm off to do some serious shopping today which will involve more walking. I'm back to counting steps for the walking challenge. I'm really looking forward to it this year. Bye for now.

Mother's Day Classic - 5 km

2008-05-11T13:18:00.003+10:00

I really don't know where my head is at. I wasn't going to run at all today because I haven't done much running lately. For some reason I was thinking that if I couldn't run a decent time I shouldn't run at all. Considering that my running goals don't include running fast, it made absolutely no sense that I should be bothered by time.

On Friday Krissi asked me if I was doing the run in Melbourne. I had intended to run the 8 km event with my nephew but the combination of Mother's Day and his father's birthday had him deciding he didn't want to miss out on any of the morning's festivities. I was secretly relieved as I had the whole I-shouldn't-be-running thing going on in my head already. I told Krissi why I wasn't going to run and she suggested that I give Lola a call to see if I could run/walk with her. Lola is having radiation treatment for breast cancer at the moment.

Straight away that took away any concern I had about the time. I called Lola on Friday and arranged to do the run with her. She had run the course the day before with a workmate who would also do the MDC with her. We arranged that Lola would pick me up on the Sunday morning. Just as well, as it was a real effort to get out of bed this morning. If I'd been getting there under my own steam I may well have given it a miss.

This year the MDC had relocated and we were effectively running bridge-to-bridge. This is a regular run around the central basin of Lake Burley Griffin for many Canberrans. Being a familiar course, I knew exactly what I was in for .. a couple of hills going up to the two bridges, lovely scenery, and an enjoyable run. I had to fill in my entry form at the event. I hadn't realised there was a $3 fee for the timing tags. I'd brought the exact money with me. Luckily for me, it wasn't a drama as they'd run out of timing tags. Phew!

I ran into so many people that I knew. I expected to meet the running girls but it was lovely to bump into people from the gym and from work. I'm one of these people who doesn't expect to see anyone they know so it's a pleasant surprise every time I do bump into someone.

The organisers had the walkers starting off 5 minutes after the runners and were directing traffic at the start line. Fortunately for me, the girls were happy to start near the back of the runners, so I was able to smuggle myself in with them. There were plenty of other people with pink numbers who were running. The start wasn't as much of a shemozzle as other fun runs I've been to, partly because there was plenty of space and partly because most of the walkers were back at their start.

Lola headed off at a steady pace and Julia and I kept up with her. Julia's a beginning runner so she's still at the stage where the first km feels as though it's a mountain. She did an excellent job though, only dropping back to a walk on a few occasions. After we'd gone about 2 km it was clear that Lola was really struggling to stay back with Julia. I could tell that Lola was concerned that if she held back she wouldn't last the distance, so I suggested that she head off at her own speed and I'd run with Julia. I was wondering what this poor woman would think, having a total stranger jog along beside her, encouraging her around the lake. Anyway, I know it helps me to have someone distract me, so I blathered on regardless. We ended up getting to the finish line in 40 minutes. On the way through I was handed a spot prize, which I was pleased about.

When I'd registered there was a sign up saying that there weren't enough showbags or medals. When we finished, I queued up with Julia anyway. I figured that the worst thing that would happen was they'd see my number and say I couldn't have a showbag. Luckily that didn't happen and I got my showbag. I was really pleased to see the lunchbox. It's the perfect size to take with me when I ride to work.

It was a fabulous day. I really enjoyed myself.

Cycling and PT

2008-05-10T18:30:00.000+10:00

This week I managed to ride to work three times. It's 10 km each way, so it's great exercise. I've been working at motivating myself to start cycling before the weather gets too cold. I figure that if I can get into the habit now, it will be easier to tough it out through winter. That's the plan at least.

On Wednesday and Thursday I left home about 7:30 am. Well, I started to leave home at 7:30. For some reason it takes me a while to actually get out the door and started. There's the Garmin to organise, the panniers to put on the bike, the various essential accessories, etc etc. The ride is taking me about 40 minutes at the moment.

The first five km is along the bike path, which is lovely and flat and safe. There are other people out and about, walking their dogs or cycling to work. There's even the occasional runner. The path follows the old creek bed, now a storm water drain, so there are long sweeping curves which are fun to ride.

The next km is across town. Now Civic is not exactly metropolitan Melbourne, so that's not as daunting as it sounds. On Wednesday I was brave and headed along the bike lane on Barry Drive. I was quite proud of myself for a few moments then the bike lane ran out, my lane was closed to traffic, I was intimidated by the traffic and ended up on the footpath (temporarily closed to pedestrians but I was desperate). It's just as well that I don't ride a mountain bike as my bike would have hung its head in shame when I dismounted to walk it across a gutter.

The last few km are pretty much uphill most of the way. I rode along a few streets and then was up on the footpath along the road to the War Memorial. I decided the footpath was a much safer option the other day when I was watching a cyclist from a taxi. There's not much room along that road at all. Oh, in the ACT cyclists are allowed on the footpath.

The really really big hill (I could put a few more reallys in there for emphasis - just imagine my arms as wide apart as they can go - it's big) starts just after the War Memorial. It's definitely a granny gear hill. The feeling of achievement once you get to the top is amazing. There's a second little hill to climb after that, but it's a doddle once you've done the first. Then there's this amazing coast down to the turn off to work. It's great fun, particularly as you know you have completely earned it.

Locking the bike up and taking the bits and pieces off it is getting to be a regular routine. Mind you, I did all that on Thursday and then forgot to actually lock the bike up. I didn't realise until I was getting changed to go home. You can imagine how I felt until I got down to the bike rack and saw my trusty bicycle still there.

On Wednesday afternoon I discovered an unpleasant side of commuting the extra distance to work. Yes, my cycle gear was kind of .. well .. yuck! I left the bag open on Thursday and aired out my top layer and on Friday, as I did an hour of PT on the way to work, I brought a change of clothes for the trip home.

Commuting every day has another logistical problem to overcome - clean cycle gear. It's getting so cold in the mornings now that long leggings are the way to go. I have the great knicks that I bought for the Yass ride, which I wore on Wednesday. On Thursday I resorted to a pair of long leggings over cycle shorts, but I was in trouble on Friday. I called in at the LBS on Thursday evening and bought myself a pair of leg warmers. On my way out I remembered that my neck had been quite cold in the morning, so I ended up buying a tube scarf thing that can be worn several different ways, including pulled up over my nose on freezing mornings. I tested it out on Friday and it was great. So were the leggings. In fact, the coldest part of me ended up being my butt. I think I'll have to work it so that I wear the really great cycle knicks on Fridays, as I leave an hour earlier to get to my PT session.

The ride home starts off with a logistical problem - how to get safely across the road when everyone is tearing off home. There's a road down to a large roundabout on a major road. There's a bike lane on the major road, so technically once you're around the roundabout you're ok. Alternatively, you can cross the road and travel on the footpath on the other side of the road. Crossing the road is the problem. I've tried crossing at a few different places. There was so much homeward bound traffic on Wednesday that I ended up getting off my bike and walking across the road. On Thursday I got into the right lane at the roundabout and then managed to cross the street to the footpath as there wasn't much traffic. On Friday I went around the large roundabout (yes, I am getting brave). I was doing really well, although one driver entering the roundabout from the other side waited until I was almost past him and going into the bike lane when he decided to turn left as though I wasn't there. I had to hit the brakes to avoid him. It seems right of way may be a myth when you're a cyclist.

On the way home I've found that it's easiest to cross a number of roads at the lights. All I have to do now is work out a safe route between the lights. Crossing Civic in the evenings is harder than in the mornings. Again, it's roundabouts that cause the problem. I've always laughed at how badly Canberra drivers manage roundabouts, but I'm finding myself less and less amused these days. Once I'm on the bike path though it's a fabulous ride home.

I've got guests arriving for dinner shortly, so I'll blog about my PT sessions another time.

Tired, sore and happy

2008-05-02T21:09:00.003+10:00

This morning I had my PT session with Krissi. I rode my bike there. It was a little chilly but not freezing, thank goodness. I headed off in daylight, which is a good thing. A few weeks ago I needed my lights at 6:30 am and I know that I will need them again soon, so I'm making sure I enjoy the daylight while it lasts. I hadn't ridden my bike for a week, but I was quickly back into the swing of things, changing gears whenever there was a slight bump in the road. It was a beautiful morning, apart from the cold.

We had the usual 10 mins on the bike, followed by stretching and then we got into it. I'm trying to remember what we did, but I can only recall bits and pieces. I think that's because I'm tired (and sore). I mentioned dead lifts to Krissi the other day. I've been doing them with Julia, and one of the other PT's at the gym mentioned to Julia that we were doing them wrong. She wasn't able to explain what the problem was, so Julia and I figured that she may have been concerned because I stick to the 30 degree thing with bending my knees. Even though I wasn't all that concerned, Krissi thought it would be a good idea to check my form. I really appreciated that Krissi would do that for me.

I've been doing them 'ok' but I find Krissi always takes me to a new level. I feel like I can do them even better now. I certainly felt them in my hamstrings more. I get a better explanation of the exercise from Krissi - experience really does make a difference.

After we did that, Krissi had me doing an exercise that involved balancing on one leg, holding a 5 kg weight and lifting the other leg. I've done it with her before. It's really difficult. I saw it in a magazine the other day as a 'great exercise', but I can't remember what they called it. I like giving it a go, as it's one of those exercises that you can see that you'll be able to measure your improvement.

I did the chest presses again with the same weight as last week. I managed a whole two in the first set before Krissi felt the need to spot me. She told me that I was doing the lifting for all 8 reps, but I know I felt more secure with her touching the bar. I managed four reps in the second set before needing actual assistance from Krissi. Getting the 8th rep out was a major struggle but she talked me into it.

I did some upright rows with the uneven bar. Krissi had me concentrating on lifting my elbows and keeping my scapula down. I thought it was pretty cool that I was able to actually concentrate on my scapula. Of course, that didn't mean it stayed down. *chuckle*

Krissi had me doing some ridiculous jumping from leg to leg thing with a resistance band. I'm glad I couldn't see myself. I could feel my abductors though, so the idea was good.

I'm having a quiet chuckle with my "I could feel my abductors" comment, as I have no idea if that's what the muscles are called. I just know I work them when I use the hip abductor machine at the gym. I'm referring to the outside of my thighs. I was trying to explain to Krissi where I hurt last week. She was kind enough not to laugh, but I did get told the names of the muscle groups in my upper back region.

We did some good abs work. A couple of 60 second planks (grr) and some fitball crunches that were harder than expected. A bit of a chat, and then I was off to work on my bike. I was really pleased with the ride. Instead of going the back way to avoid (a) the bicycle lane and (b) the really really really big hill, I figured that I'd give it a go. I made it up the hill. Mind you, after my Yass ride I knew that I could manage this hill. I felt safe in the bike lane. An added bonus was that I was at work, showered and changed, a good 15 minutes earlier than usual.

I rode home too. It's 10 km from work to my new home. The first part is hilly, but the last 5 km is pretty flat. I was really tired when I got home. I'm starting to feel the effects of today's PT session. I know I'll be fine tomorrow, but at the moment I could do with a massage.

As for the rest of the week, I managed to get the boyfriend (TB) to the gym on Monday morning. That was a major achievement. I'm hoping to get him there again over the weekend, but I'm not holding my breath. I did my PT with Julia on Tuesday. That was a great session. We managed to increase the weights on a number of my exercises. On Wednesday I was in Melbourne for work. It was an exhausting day. I left home at 5:30 am and arrived home at 8:30 pm, so I didn't get any exercise in. On Thursday I went to the pub with the gym girls for the WOW program. I figure that counts as almost exercise. :-)

As for the weekend, I'm playing hockey on Saturday and I'm having a massage on Sunday. It will be a relaxation massage as I'm a total wimp where pain is concerned. I'm looking forward to it though.

Running and PT

2008-04-25T15:35:00.003+10:00

It's been a quiet week on the exercise front. I went running with the two Andrews on Sunday morning at Altona Beach, which was fun. They'd forgotten all about it, so I was really tempted to cancel, but I knew I'd skip the run if I didn't go and collect them.

I parked the car near a water fountain, which was convenient. We then headed off towards the pier. The boys jogged along with me for the first section, then I told them they could go off ahead. We turned around at 1.6 km. I explained that they could run to the car without worrying where I was. I thought I'd explained that they could then either run back to me or run on ahead but they'd need to check back with me, but apparently they heard "run as fast as you can back to the car and sprint flat out for the last bit". When I finally got there, the two of them were sitting on the wall waiting for me, looking exhausted. I didn't have the heart to start them running again, although I did take them for a short recovery jog complete with stretches. I ended up covering about 3.5 km all up.

It was a lovely run. The weather was cool, the sun was up, there were other people around, and the beach view was a pleasant change from my usual runs. One Andrew was in his footy gear and the other was wearing his Run For The Kids top, as was I. It felt good, being out in the event t-shirts - as though we were real runners. I know we're real runners, but there's this extra bit of credibility when you're wearing an event t-shirt. Red's my favourite colour too. I scored well that weekend, because the Relay for Life shirt is also red.

During the week I didn't get to the gym much. So much for the costume jewellery I was going to buy if I got TB there three times. I made it to PT on Tuesday night, where I did more of the same with Julia. She increased the weights on me a few times on my second or third set of reps. With the shoulder presses we went from 5 kg to 6 kg on the third set and I was pretty sure I wouldn't manage a whole set, but I did it easily. I thought that was cool. Because of the time we skipped abs and went straight to stretching. I don't like this new Fernwood template for PT - I can stretch myself and the abs work is something I will always skip on my own, so I figure that my PT should make me do it. Unfortunately, it's noticed if they don't do the stretching component.

I had great plans of cycling to work a couple of times during the week, but stuff kept getting in the way, like going to the pub last night for drinks after work. I didn't fancy riding home in the dark after having a few beverages. I'll be riding on Fridays from now on though, as I ride to my PT session with Krissi (no buses that early).

I had my PT session this morning and it rocked, as ever. I simply love those sessions. I was stuck with the 10 mins on the stationary bike. I told Krissi today that I kept hoping she'd skip it, seeing that I'd cycled in. Apparently she thought I was riding to her place from my apartment rather than from TB's, because she would go to the trouble of getting her bike out to ride a couple of blocks. No wonder I wasn't getting brownie points for a 5 km warmup. I don't think she's going to cut back on the bike though.

After stretching we did a few exercises with resistance bands. I was imagining writing the first one up in my blog while I was doing it. Mind you, it didn't occur to me that I'd actually be writing it up today. You've got to love public holidays.

The exercise went like this. Krissi and I were back to back, with interlocked resistance bands. We squatted and then jumped away from each other, landing in a squat. We did this several times. Krissi said it was a good heart rate one. I was surprised to discover she was right. I liked it as I don't do nearly enough plyometric type stuff. I didn't mind this squat-jump thing at all.

In between I was doing a hip abductor exercise, balancing on one leg and moving the other against the band. I was meant to feel it in my butt on the leg I was balancing on and in the side of my thigh in the other leg. It took me a little while, but I eventually got it. The secret was to focus on balancing and not on lifting my leg really high.

I then did chest presses with the bar. Krissi loaded it up with more weight than I've ever pressed before. I asked her for the total so I could mention it here. There was 15kg on the bar, the bar is about 15kg and there were the end pieces holding the weights on the bar. With Krissi spotting for me I managed 9 presses and then 8. Mind you, I can really feel it now, mainly in my upper back. I think I'll feel it in my chest tomorrow.

A couple of sets of shoulder presses followed with 4kg weights. Even though I'd managed 6kg on Tuesday, I don't think I would have been able to lift them today. Planks and cruches to follow. I struggled with the first set of the plank, but it was my left arm that was the problem, not my core. I'm managing two lots of 60 secs quite comfortably now. As for crunches, Krissi introduced me to a mean set last week. 12 basic crunches, 12 with legs raised, then 12 lowering legs. I collapsed in a heap this morning when I started the last lot of 12. My abs were seriously complaining. Krissi wouldn't let me get away with that. She held my toes on the raised leg and I managed them. I was relieved that I only had to do one set of them today.

I rode my bike there and back. It was a lovely morning. Being Anzac Day, there was next to no traffic either, so I rode back on the bike lane down Northbourne Avenue. I'm getting so much braver now. Oh, and I caught up with a cyclist at one set of lights and cruised along behind him. I thought about passing him, but I was in no hurry. What I didn't realise was that he'd know I was there. He started looking over his shoulder to see where I was. I'm not sure what the etiquette is in that situation. I guess I should have gone around him. Luckily he turned off so I didn't have to worry about it any more.

I've sorted myself out a coffee on Sunday that I have to ride to. I'm trying to make sure I keep up the bike riding so that I'm fit for the GVBR in November. My bro-in-law is keen to train with me when I'm in Melbourne, so that part is sorted.

We've signed up for the Global Corporate Challenge again this year. Last year I did it with people I used to work with, and I just didn't get into it. This year I'm doing it with my family members. Some of them did it last year and so we decided to put our own team in this year. (Being a contractor, I have my own company so we figure we're corporate enough!) Jim, Debbie, Pat, Janet, Trish, Dad and I are going to start walking in May. We've made Deb team captain and she's already practising her nagging. I knew it was the right choice!

General fitness stuff

2008-04-20T00:02:00.002+10:00

It's been so long since I did any consistent blogging that I don't know where to start. I've been keeping a manual fitness diary - the pen and paper kind. I bought myself an exercise book because it's easy to carry around. Mind you, I find that if I don't write down what I did in a PT session straight away I have absolutely no idea what it was a few days later.

Personal Training
My Friday sessions with Krissi are fantastic. Working out for the hour is so much better than a half hour session. We always start with the dreaded 10 minute warmup on the stationary bike. As I now ride to Krissi's from TB's I keep hoping that she'll drop the warmup on the grounds that it's already happened but I'm disappointed every week. One morning it was 0 degrees out there. I froze my poor calves. That day I bought myself full length cycle knicks. I also froze my poor throat but, even though I'm willing to wear lycra in public, I just can't see myself in a polo neck. Fortunately it hasn't been that cold since. I'll have to come up with a solution before winter though.

We go through a regular routine, with changes thrown in every once in a while. I love seeing the improvements. I managed some 10kg chest presses the other day. Not a lot, but I'm doing more and more on my own. When I'm at the gym on my own I use the 8kg weights. Last Wednesday I managed two full sets of 15 and a set of 10. I was sore for the next few days, but I was really pleased with myself. I'm back doing lunges and squats, although I don't go down too deep. The doctor said 30 degrees, which I stuck to for quite a while, but with Krissi there to keep an eye on my form I feel confident to go a bit lower. One thing I have learned over the past few months is that I was overcompensating for my dodgy knee so much that my good leg was becoming my bad leg. Weird, huh? Mind you, fixing my form up has put a stop to that (I hope). One benefit is that I finally "get" lunges. I now "drop" the back leg down and I "feel" the effort in what I think are the right places now.

I've had to reschedule a few sessions with Julia due to work commitments so I've ended up with Amber, the girl who is our team leader in the WOW challenge. We stick to the program Julia gave me though, so I don't really know what training with Amber would be like. This week I managed to reschedule a session to another time with Julia (easier said than done - she's very popular at the gym) and ended up doing two PT sessions on Friday. I would have cancelled the session with Julia, except that it was worth 50 points for my WOW team. I was a very reluctant trainee as I had quite a tough session with Krissi that morning and I was a little out of sorts because I've been packing up my apartment. Luckily Julia knew exactly how to get me out of the doldrums. Boxing!

I love boxing. We had a fantastic time and "only here because I feel like I have to be here" Kathy turned into "let me hit something else" Kathy in no time. It was great fun.

Speaking of boxing, my brother and his family came to visit me over the Easter weekend, and I lined up a boxing session for Jim, his wife Debbie and myself with Krissi. Jim and Deb are thinking about buying some boxing gear for their home gym, and I knew that they'd get good advice from Krissi about how to use it. Well, the session was great fun. Krissi brought her partner, Brad, along so she was able to concentrate on what we were doing while the rest of us boxed. Jim and Deb loved it.

Hockey
I've signed up to play "grass" this season. I explained the "I'm hardly ever here" arrangement to the team organiser, and she told me that would be fine. I've managed to play one week in the first four. I had a blast, although I was quite stiff and sore for a few days afterwards. I did a lot of running. It's great being fit but I didn't expect to be fitter than so many of the others. I think I'll be having a season at half back rather than full back. I'm really pleased I've managed to get myself into a team. All I have to do now is get myself along to training.

Squash
Unfortunately my squash partner has injured himself. We've been waiting for him to recover but we finally bit the bullet this week and accepted that squash was off the agenda for the near future. It's a blow, but it does make it easier for me to get along to hockey training.

Cycling
I expected that getting back on the bike after the Yass trip would be really difficult, but it was easier than I expected. I haven't done a lot of riding, but that's been due to other circumstances. I'm hoping that once my life settles into a new routine that I will be riding to work a couple of days a week. It's 10 km each way, which is a good distance. I'm so much more confident on the roads, which is just as well now that daylight saving has ended. I cycled home the other night along a busy road in a bike lane because it was well lit and I felt perfectly safe.

Running
I haven't managed to get out there very much. After the Yass ride I was in Melbourne on Monday and Wednesday morning, so I went for a walk on Monday (I didn't trust my legs to work) and I ran on the Wednesday (it was easier than I expected). I didn't run far but I was pleased I managed to get myself out there. I haven't run outside since, but I did manage a treadmill run at Club Lime one day as well. I have a running date with two of my nephews tomorrow morning. I like making these commitments as I feel that I have to keep them.

Gym
I mentioned the whole Club Lime arrangement. I wasn't able to convince TB that exercise was a good idea last week. As chief motivator I feel as though I've got some improving to do. I decided that I'd reward myself next week if I manage to get him to the gym three times. There's a piece of costume jewellery on the line if I succeed! Yes, shopping is a great incentive. Mind you, after packing all my belongings over the past week or so I'm a little appalled at how much stuff I have. Time to declutter I think.

Anyway, what I'm planning to do at Club Lime is cardio and swimming. I'm going to do my weights at Fernwood or with my trainers. I'll be a lot happier in that environment. I'm delighted about the pool though. That triathlon early next year is looking more and more likely.

Revised goals
At the start of the year all my goals were focussed on running, but I've not managed to do the necessary work to achieve them. I also had plans of repeating a number of runs I did the previous year, but I haven't been able to work them into my schedule. The Yass ride clashed with the Women and Girls fun run (my first fun run) and the one hockey match I've managed to play clashed with the Canberra Marathon Eve fun run (my first 10k). I haven't done the training to do the Canberra Half Marathon (new relationship didn't mix with early morning starts on top of everything else I was doing).

I've one long term goal at the moment and it's not at all running related. I'd like to do the Great Victorian Bike ride. My short term goals are to (a) get to Club Lime a minimum of three times a week, (b) get a long cycle in on the weeks I'm in Canberra, (c) ride to work a couple of days a week, (d) do weights at least three times a week and (e) keep up the PT and the hockey.

Other stuff
My weight is going nowhere. At least it's not still going up.

I've found the WOW program at Fernwood really boring this time. I don't know how much that's down to me and my interest in outdoor exercise and how much it's due to them. It's nowhere near as engaging this time though.

Work's good.

Homelife's better. Thanks for the positive comments. As you can probably tell, apart from being incredibly busy I'm also really happy.

I've got to get rid of some of the stuff I seem to have. But how can I possibly get part with sports gear (I'll use that Reebok step one day, really I will), workout dvd's (some of which I haven't tried yet) or my running magazines (faithfully read cover to cover more than once)? I did manage to give away a pair of cycling knicks that are now too big for me - surely that counts!

Fitness assessment

2008-04-19T16:12:00.002+10:00

I had the funniest experience last week at Club Lime, the gym I've just joined with my boyfriend. Hey, as a total aside, how hardcore am I? I'm a member of, count them, not one but two gyms. My Fernwood membership runs out in May however I have a zillion and one personal training sessions to go (ok, about 20) so at renewal time I'm going to drop my membership level down to basics and finish off the PT sessions. In the meantime, TB (the boyfriend) asked me if I'd go to the gym with him. I'm meant to be his motivator. I'd been a little concerned that my new lifestyle (I've recently moved in with TB) would mean that I'd end up cutting back on my activity level. As you can imagine, I was absolutely delighted by his suggestion. I had him down the gym and signing up before he could change his mind!

Anyway, back on topic. Gyms like to do 'fitness assessments' on new members, so I dutifully signed up for one at 6:30 am on Monday morning. I then had to promptly cancel it, as I had to go to Melbourne for work. Fortunately, this gym seems to be open all hours, so I rescheduled for lunchtime on the following Sunday. I was keen to go, however a dinner invitation on Saturday night resulted in some missing brain cells and a minor headache the following day. I wasn't at my most energetic when I showed up for my 12:30 appointment. On top of that, a particularly energetic game of hockey on Saturday afternoon had me feeling rather stiff and sore.

A young gentleman, Brent, showed up to assess me. He was unfailingly polite. He also looked perfect for his job - tanned, fit, muscular, cheerful and goodlooking. As for the initial impression I was giving - let's not go there.

I was handed the obligatory forms to fill out - had I ever had any of a zillion things (muscle strain .. what sort of stupid question is that? broken bones .. yeah, when I was four I broke my collarbone, I'm sure that's important .. flesh-eating virus .. ok, they didn't ask that one .. just as well really as I probably would have ticked yes). Along with the "are you too unhealthy to be here" questions there was the "what are you hoping to get out of this" question and the "what physical activity do you currently do" question.

I circled a few goals - being fit, losing weight, social fun, strength training - and I listed my current activities - gym 2-3 times a week, running 1-3 times a week, cycling 2-3 times a week (just to work), hockey once a week, squash once a week. Brent was clearly able to read, as he picked up the social goal and promptly suggested classes to me. I told him I wasn't really into classes, but he enthused about body pump and body attack, got the timetable out, and circled all the suitable times for me. In conversation I'd mentioned that I'd joined the gym with my partner so he quickly dobbed TB in for pump classes too. I had a quiet internal chuckle, imagining TB's face when I dragged him along to pump.

Brent then got into designing a program for me. This is where it got really amusing. Now, remember that I was feeling slightly hungover, so I was in the sort of mood where I just wanted the fitness assessment over and done with. I could see that Brent had decided that I'd misinterpreted the question about my current activity level. He was sure that I'd put down what I'd LIKE to be able to do, rather than what I was doing. I had mentioned that I was currently a gym member but he skipped over that. I never got a chance to tell him that I did PT twice a week, or that I considered myself a runner.

Having established, through his careful attention to our conversation along with his keen understanding of the information I provided on the form, that I was a complete novice, Brent patiently explained each item to me as he added it to my card. He also kindly wrote extra notes to help me out later and gave me pictures of the stretches he wanted me to do.

Here's the program, along with snippets of conversation.

B: "Have you ever used a rowing machine?"
K: "Yes. I don't like them."
B: "Why not?"
K: "They are hard work."
B: "Ok, we'll put you down for 5 minutes - just take it really slowly - they are a great warm up."
****
B: "Now it's important to stretch after you've warmed up." Brent draws circles around a number of stretches and promises to show me how to do them later. Kathy wishes her headache would go away. All the stretches are basic.
****
B: "Have you seen the cardio equipment in the gym?"
K: "Yes."
B: "Well, I think we'll start you off on the manual program so that you get used to the equipment. We'll pick a few different machines so you can work out what you like. Don't put yourself at a level you find too hard. You want to be able to exercise for the full ten minutes. Have a two minute break between each machine. When you get used to them you can start on some of the other programs." Brent writes down treadmill, crosstrainer and bicycle. Kathy thinks it's a shame Brent didn't pay attention to her earlier. Kathy also thinks it's a shame that Brent didn't ask her if she'd used the cardio equipment before. Kathy contemplates telling Brent that she can run for an hour at a time. Kathy also thinks about mentioning that she's not a novice but the brain cells that survived Saturday night decide that it's all incredibly amusing.
****
B: "We'll give you some strength work to do too. Now, you only have to do this once a week, along with your two pump classes. We'll start you off on the machines as you need to have really good balance to use free weights. Once you get used to the machines we can do you another fitness assessment and show you how to use the free weights." Brent writes down shoulder press, leg press and overhead lateral pulldown.
B: "We'll do three sets of reps, 12/12/10. You won't get too muscly with this program." Kathy thinks about telling him that she already does two free weight sessions a week with her personal trainers. Kathy remembers that the leg press machines in the gym looked different to the ones she's used to, so decides to get shown how to use the machines. Kathy realises that she's going to have a lot of fun telling Krissi and Julia that she needs to work up to using free weights.
****
B: "Now for your abs work." Brent writes down crunches and back extensions, 4 - 5 sets of 20 - 25 reps. Kathy thinks that sounds like a lot for a beginner, then remembers she isn't a beginner, even if she's being treated like one. Kathy still thinks it sounds like a lot. After a moment of panic, Kathy remembers that she will probably run out of time before she gets to the 3rd set.
****
B: "You'll need to do a warm down. 5 minutes on your favourite piece of cardio equipment." Kathy thinks "ha, bloody ha, as if that's likely".
B: "Then you'll have to stretch again." Kathy thinks "ok, stretching I can manage".
****
B: "Let's weigh you." Kathy jumps on the scale. Weight pretty much as expected, with shoes on. Kathy expects to be measured because TB was measured. Obviously Brent is of the "don't measure fat people" school of training. Kathy is a little peeved, as TB didn't do the flexibility test because he expected to fail. Kathy was looking forward to telling him her result. (Ok, I'm a little competitive!)
B: "Let's show you how to do these exercises." Kathy levers herself out of the chair, adding to the overall impression of unfit person that Brent already has. The moving slowly to avoid rattling brain cells doesn't help.
****
B: "Here's the cardio machine. Here's how to push the buttons. Got that. Ok." Kathy's sore legs are glad that she doesn't have to demonstrate that she won't fall off the crosstrainer. Kathy also notes that the rowing machine was skipped entirely. Kathy doesn't complain as she doesn't think she'll be able to get up again if she gets down onto the rower.
B: "Here's the shoulder press. Here's how you do it. Here, have a go." Kathy suggests that 30 kg might be too heavy for her. (Doh!) Brent adjusts it to 10 kg. Kathy starts to do the shoulder press and Brent immediately starts spotting her.
B: "Your partner will be able to help you with this." Kathy isn't sure whether to be insulted (at least let me try the 10 kg before you help me) or amused (imagining TB being asked to help her with 10 kg). Kathy does three shoulder presses then stops. Brent looks around the area, isn't able to find a leg press, so demonstrates leg curls and leg extensions. Kathy thinks about calling him on it, then decides she really wants to know how to set the incremental weights just in case she ever does use any of the machines at Club Lime (remember the Fernwood membership people) and does a few assisted leg curls and leg extensions.
B: "Here's the lat pull down machine." Brent demonstrates. Kathy reaches up forever, just manages to grab the bar, does a few pull downs (assisted of course - but why assist her with reaching the bar?) then just manages to let the bar up without letting it go. Maybe TB will help her with this one - clearly the machine is meant for tall people.
****
B: "Here's how you do a crunch. Here, you try." Kathy does eight crunches. Brent makes sure that she thinks she'll be able to do them. Kathy wonders Brent doesn't notice that it's the first time she's done more than three of anything. Oh well.
B: "Here's how you do a back extension." Kathy does them, remembering that Krissi would tell her about hyperextending her back. Kathy makes a mental note to check the technique with Krissi. (Lock your abs on and you can't lift up as high. Thanks Krissi.)
B: "Here's how you do the basic stretches."
****
At least now I have a program. Apart from making an assumption about me based on my age and size, and not listening to me when we were talking, Brent actually didn't do too bad a job. Mind you, if I really was a novice, I'd think leg curls/extensions were leg presses.
Oh, and I'm feeling much better now than I did last Sunday. :-)

Cycle course graduation - 130 km road trip

2008-04-07T18:42:00.005+10:00

I did it! I rode from Canberra to Yass and back again on the weekend. Not only that, I wasn't nearly as tired and sore as I expected to be. I didn't have to walk up any hills. I didn't get any punctures. I didn't fall off the bike. Nobody ran me over. It was a roaring success.

The New Horizons course for women that I've been doing has been wonderful. I feel so much more confident on the bike. Because of that I'm riding more often and I'm enjoying myself while I'm out there. There was even a moment when I thought about trying the cleats again. (Note to self: Relax Kathy. Breathe. Breathe again. It was only a moment.)

When we started the course and I heard that the last ride was a weekend trip to Yass I was sure that there was no way that I could do it. However, if there's one thing I've learned during this fitness journey of mine it's that I can do a lot more than I think I can. Mind you, this weekend I surprised myself by being able to do even more than I expected.

The weekend started on Tuesday night, at the info session. I arrived late, doing my usual mad dash from the gym. Over the nine weeks of the course I've managed to get faster on my bike, so I didn't miss much. Once I settled in and caught up with the program, I realised that I'd pretty much forgotten to think about the logistics of the weekend. I'd signed up for the Yass ride, saying that I was happy to share but I hadn't thought about what that meant - a night in a room with people I didn't know. I discovered that many of the women had booked themselves hotel rooms, but I decided to stick with the cabin option. After all, I was already so far out of my comfort zone that a night spent with strangers didn't seem like an insurmountable challenge.

After saying that I was going to be in a cabin I realised that it meant I'd have to bring my own bed linen and towel. I really had to struggle with my customary laziness - spending money on a hotel room would save me the trouble but it would also mean wimping out on the cabin sharing arrangement. The deciding factor was realising that I could put a bag in one of the support vehicles. I had thought we'd be carrying all our stuff ourselves, but I realised that the organisers, quite rightly, realised that some of us weren't up to that level of effort. A major advantage of taking a bag was that I could fit in an extra warm jacket! I really feel the cold so that was a major incentive for me.

The next thing that caused me concern was discovering that the Yass Soldiers Club, where we were having dinner, had a 'no athletic clothes' rule. Now, nearly all my casual clothes are gym clothes, the only jeans that fit me are in Melbourne, and I didn't feel like having to iron my trousers at the other end. I was saved by sudden inspiration, and tossed a dress and sandals in my bag. Needless to say, I was the only person who wore a dress. Not only that, but I discovered that I could have worn a polo shirt and runners (aren't they athletic?) without being tossed out of the club.

Fortunately, the Tuesday session included a reminder about nutrition and hydration. Yes, I was able to plan snacks - dark chocolate (no justification for that one but I like it), some protein bars, sultanas, bananas and jellybeans. I also took three bottles of water with me, which I was extremely glad about on the Sunday. It also meant that I had a lovely smoked salmon pasta for dinner on Friday night. Thank you to TNB who read the information sheet more closely than I did and paid attention to the "before you ride" suggestions.

I had planned to ride to the meeting place, out at the George Harcourt Inn, but after looking at my bike map I realised that maybe I was being a little ambitious. Fortunately TNB offered to drive me out there. Of course, we didn't rehearse the whole 'take the bike apart and get it into the car' activity, but we only broke my rear light holder so it wasn't too catastrophic. Oh, and we managed to discover why the brake light in the rear window wasn't working after one of my pedals caught on the wiring.

It was terrific to drive up to the inn and see so many people with their bikes. It was like going on a school excursion, only better. We even had to line up for the obligatory photos. I'm looking forward to getting the cd with all the photos from the various rides. There were 20 women from the course doing the ride, along with the helpers and various partners and family members. I didn't actually count them, but I think we had at least 40 cyclists. We split into two groups, with 10 women in each group. The plan was for us to ride in single file, to stop to regroup at various times, to meet up with the other group for lunch in Murrumbatemen and afternoon tea just outside Yass, and arrive in Yass by 4 pm.

We eventually headed off - 9 km down the Barton Highway and then turned off onto a back road. I'd list the route here, but it's really only interesting to people who know the area. Suffice it to say that I had no idea how close some of the places I'd been in the past were to Canberra. (If I can ride there, they are close!) I found myself thinking things like "Hey, I could ride to Hall Markets next time they are on" and "a bike tour of the wineries would be fun". I wonder if I'd get done for cycling under the influence. I'm also working out who I can talk into doing these things with me. I'm sure there'll be someone.

Riding on the highway was much safer than I'd expected it to be but riding on the back roads was much more fun. Not having to be so alert about staying to the left meant that it was possible to look around and enjoy the views. We went through some lovely countryside. I have a new appreciation for why people live out that way and drive into Canberra for work each day. I wouldn't do it myself, but I can see why they make that choice.

As for the ride, I settled myself into the middle of my group. Even though I wasn't talking to the man in front of me while we were riding, I grew quite attached to him. I'd fall behind going downhill (still some work to do on being afraid of going too fast) and then catch him up again on an uphill. He was riding with his wife, so we were really going at her pace. I gradually got more confident going down the hills and realised that it's quite fun to ride fast when you don't think you're going to come crashing down into a heap at the bottom of the hill.

We'd been warned about a rickety bridge during the info session. You should have seen this bridge in my imagination. Think Indiana Jones and swinging suspension bridges with huge gaps between wooden boards and a deep chasm beneath and you'll be somewhere close. Maybe I exaggerate slightly, but I certainly had it up there with bridges I'd be scared to walk across. When we finally got to the bridge it was about 3 metres long and wasn't at all difficult to ride across. Well, not compared to what I'd been anticipating.

There were roadworks as well. Not a problem, you'd think, on a Saturday in the country, however the water truck had just watered the road. Yes, we were splattered with mud. I never actually checked my knicks to see if I got the dreaded road stripe because I was wearing them back again the next day and I didn't want to feel obliged to wash them.

Oh, this is a too much information section for the guys - so skip ahead a paragraph or two. The guys are gone? Good. On the Tuesday night we debated the "do you take two pairs of knicks or not" question. I'd never realised until I did the triathlon training that you were supposed to wear your knicks without underwear. Once I got over the ewww factor and tried it, I realised that it's a lot more comfy that way. We were advised that we could manage with one pair of knicks, particularly if we took the sanitary pad option. I tried that and I'm not going to bother again. I got away without chafing because I also tried the nappy rash cream option but I reckon two pairs is the way to go in future.

Guys, this part of the knicks discussion is safe. The best advice I got about this trip was from Krissi. She suggested that I go out and buy myself a really good pair of knicks. Apparently, with the chamois, you really do get what you pay for. I didn't get myself organised on the knicks front until Friday evening. I'm glad of that, as I froze my poor legs on Friday morning, riding to my PT session in 3/4 knicks when the temperature was 0 degrees. I walked into the local bike shop (LBS) and told the young guy who served me that I wanted long knicks. Amusingly, he was embarrassed to be helping me with knicks. Not that long ago I would have been embarrassed asking for them, but I've hardened up. Fortunately they only had two styles, one with a decent chamois, so my decision was made for me. Poor LBS guy was a little confused when I didn't bother to try them on. I had heard that when you have a choice of chamois that you really should try the knicks on as you may be better suited by one brand than another, however that's not relevant when you have left your purchase to the last minute. I paid $140 for the knicks, which is nearly three times the cost of my other knicks, and I was completely glad I spent the money on them.

I got to see leg and arm warmers in operation on the trip. I didn't try these myself as I wasn't convinced that the leg warmers would stay up for me. Now that I've seen how easy they are to put on and take off I'm going to give them a go over winter. They'll be really useful when I ride to PT or to boot camp, as I'll already be in my running gear and I won't have to take my shoes off when it's freezing out there. Oh, unless I go the cleats option. (Breathe Kathy!)

Another thing I learned on the course (this is obvious but sometimes it takes me a while to catch on) is that it's ok to stop every now and then and take a layer off. I've had this whole "get on the bike and get to where you're going without stopping" attitude. This touring approach is a lot more relaxed.

Back to the trip. We arrived at Murrumbateman two hours after we set off, which was earlier than expected, and stopped for a break at the recreation grounds. I didn't realise it was our lunch break until I'd eaten (inhaled really) my morning snacks, by which time I was at the back of the queue at the local shop. On the basis that it would be a while until we had afternoon tea I wandered over to the service station and bought myself a powerade and a bag of s&v chips. I rationalised the treat on the grounds that I'd already burned over 1000 calories but I regretted it later. It was a real effort to start riding again after the break, and my body was telling me that it didn't appreciate being loaded up with fat just before I asked it to work hard again.

We rode through Murrumbatemen, which didn't take long, and then we were on some back roads. Eventually we hit a long section of gravel road, complete with corrugations. That was exhausting. I was riding along thinking "I've had enough. I want to go home now." If I could have magicked myself home by wrinkling my nose like Samantha I would have. When we finally stopped I discovered we'd travelled 46 km, which is further than I'd ever ridden before. I know some people were talking me during the break but I was answering them on autopilot, telling them I was fine when really I wasn't. I'm not 100% sure of the sequence of events, but I remember telling myself as I went up a hill "Guts and determination, Kathy, that's what you need, guts and determination". It was like I had Krissi on my shoulder encouraging me to get there. The ride helpers were encouraging. They were riding up and down the line, chatting to us as we went along, making sure we were okay. All of a sudden I was fine. I was riding along, looking around, enjoying the view, enjoying the ride and really glad that I was there. I don't know what made the difference - Krissi says that maybe some food I'd eaten finally kicked in. Whatever it was, I'm glad it happened.

We rode up quite a few hills during this stage of the ride. I was coping with them really well and passed a few people, but they kept going past me again on the downhill. Not that I minded as the downhills were the best part of the ride. At one stage we were on top of a ridge with a great view on one side and a hazy view on the other due to some burning off. I'd love to go back there on a clear day.

We arrived at Cooma Cottages for afternoon tea. There was a bridal party there, and for some strange reason, they didn't seem to want a whole lot of brightly hued cyclists in their wedding photos. The organisers had arranged for our group to arrive, and we were served pikelets and fruit along with coffee, tea and lots of water. The cottage owners had gone to a lot of trouble to look after us. The pikelets were delicious and the fruit and water were much appreciated.

From the cottages to Yass was 5 km along a busy road. We headed off after a decent rest and arrived at our accommodation at about 3 pm, an hour ahead of schedule. The cabin was really clean, with a double bed and bunks. I organised us into the beds. Valetta is tall and it didn't look to me as though she'd be comfortable with a bunk bed, so I put Karen in the top bunk on the basis she was the youngest, and took the bottom bunk for myself. It worked out really well for us all. There was room for all our bikes inside, which meant that we didn't have to find something to lock them up to or worry about them when we were out to dinner.

The three of us enjoyed chatting for a while, then wandered off to the supermarket, which was across town. We bought some healthy food for lunch the next day, which I thought might be a good choice compared to the s&v chips. The walk stretched our legs and we all felt better for it.

The ride organisers had booked us in for a lasagne dinner at the Yass Soldiers Club. It was delicious and the room was abuzz with the happy sound of achievement. There was a blue light disco on next door, but I think we were well able to talk over the music. After dinner my group headed home for an early night. I'd skipped drinking any alcohol, on the grounds that I figured the ride would be hard enough with sore muscles the next day. I don't know if it mattered, but it was one less thing for me to worry about.

I wore my skins to bed. I've never done that before. I'm sure they helped because I was a lot less sore in the morning than I expected to be. I slept quite well, considering, and was awake bright and early the next morning. Thank goodness for daylight saving, as we got an extra hour in bed. I think we all needed it.

The ride organisers who stayed at the caravan park cooked breakfast - pancakes, eggs and bacon. It was much appreciated the next morning as it was one less thing for us to concern ourselves with. The plan had been for us to make our own way back to Cooma Cottages and assemble there, but many of the group wanted to assemble at the caravan park. I went with the flow and joined the larger group. One of the helpers was offering to check tyres. I overcame my reluctance to put him out, and asked him to do mine. The tyre pressure was down a bit so I was glad I asked him. I'm sure he was regretting his offer by the time the tenth person got their tyres checked but he was unfailingly kind. The helpers did a great job over the weekend and over the course. I've decided that I'd like to do the trip as a helper next year as a thank you. I think I'll volunteer to help for the whole course.

On the way out of town there was a monster hill. Because we were riding in single file it seemed harder, as one of the people in front of me was really struggling. I didn't feel that it would be kind to go past her, so I dropped a gear and stayed behind. Eventually she got off her bike and walked, so it was ok to pass her then. Quite a few people walked up that hill so I was really pleased to find that I was able to ride the whole thing.

There was a bit of a water crisis. People didn't like the taste of the Yass water. I thought it was ok luckily. Di, the main organiser and driver of the sag wagon (no idea why it's called sag - something for me to investigate later), went and bought some water at the supermarket so the crisis was averted. I figured I'd drink the Yass water before refilling, which was probably a good idea as the decent water ran out at Murrambateman, which apparently also has awful tasting water. It was interesting to watch how people behaved about the water. With limited supplies clearly evident at Murrumbateman, some people brought up multiple bottles to fill. Yes, it was all about them. Fortunately I was able to manage with the water I'd brought with me and a top up of one bottle earlier in the day from Di.

On the Sunday we went back a hillier route. According to my Garmin it was about 70m more elevation. I really came into my own on Sunday. I mentioned earlier that I'd managed to achieve even more than I expected. Well, on Saturday I realised that I was a lot stronger physically than many of the women in my group. On Sunday it became even clearer. I was powering up hills that other people were walking. I was enjoying the ride when other people were struggling. I became more confident going down hill and people stopped passing me.

The day before, whenever we had a break, the helpers were offering lollies. I hadn't bothered to take any as I wasn't hungry. On Sunday I got smarter and made sure I ate something at every break, even if it was just a handful of sultanas. It really helped. I also rode closer to the front of the group, as I realised that I'd get a longer break every time the group reformed if I was near the front. The extra rest made a big difference. By the time my group got to Murrumbateman, three hours after we started, I ended up leading us into town. Our ride leader got off her bike to encourage people along the last part of the ride and told me to go on ahead. I was thrilled to be the first person back in my group. The other group had arrived before us and I was actually applauded as I rode into town. It was the best feeling. My own personal Tour De France leader's moment!

The rest of the ride was simply fun. My backside was a little sore at times, but that was just a matter of settling into the seat comfortably and stretching. At various times on both days my hands and feet had pins and needles. I learned to shake my hands out while I was riding. As an indication of how much more confident I was by the end of the ride, I was able to do that when we were on the corrugated sections of the road and when I was riding up or down hill. I also learned to stamp my feet a few times on the breaks to get the feeling back, and I did a few stretches on the bike to get the feeling back in my toes.

We rode along the highway towards the George Harcourt Inn. Our ride leader was going to take us through Gold Creek Village as there's a bit of a hill on the way into the Inn, but one of the helpers convinced her that we'd have more fun if we got to ride the whole way down the big hill we'd had to start on the previous day. I think he was right. It was a great feeling, and we'd earned it!

It was fantastic to get back. The group were planning to head to the inn for a few beers, but all I wanted to do was get home and have a nice relaxing bath. TNB picked me up. It was such a relief to see him arrive.

I'm sure I nearly fell asleep in the bath. I had to travel to Melbourne for work that evening and I was sure I was going to sleep on the plane, but I managed to stay awake. I slept in my skins again, and went for a walk along the Yarra the next morning. I felt fine. I was delighted that I recovered so well from the ride and I was bubbling with the excitement of having achieved it.

I'm inspired to do more touring cycling. It's so much fun!

Placeholder - Relay for Life and Run For the Kids

2008-04-07T18:34:00.003+10:00

Sorry to those of you with readers - I'm saving a place for my write up of my charity weekend however I want to write up my cycling adventures while it's all fresh in my mind.
I promise to come back and fill in the details. :-)
PS Wasn't R4TK great fun?

Getting back into it slowly

2008-03-18T16:36:00.003+11:00

On Monday I went to the gym and collected my 25 points for my WOW team. It was a gentle workout but it was all I really felt like doing. I did a leg workout - 3 sets of leg presses, leg extensions, and calf raises, 2 sets of hip abductions (x2) and one set of seated rows while I was waiting to use one of the machines. I put the weights up slightly on the leg extensions and hip abductions. Once I got to the 30 minutes I headed off home. It wasn't the world's best workout but at least I was there. On the basis that I need some time on the bike before I ride to Yass, I rode to and from G's place to mine. That's 10 km (40 mins) of cycling in as well.

At work yesterday one of my workmates pointed out that my cough sounded terrible. I was feeling so much better that it surprised me, but I realised that I was still coughing up gunk. I thought about it and decided I was sick of being sick, so I booked an appointment to see the doctor. I couldn't get in to see my regular doctor until April, so I took the first available appointment. Luckily for me, that was today and I am now the proud owner of a short course of antibiotics. Hopefully that will knock the last of the bugs over for me.

I was going to see how I went running this morning but I had a work breakfast in Kingston. I arranged for a lift for me and my bike from Kingston to work, so I rode there this morning. My Garmin battery was flat so I'm not sure of the exact distance but it would have been about 12-13 km. It was a lovely ride, along the bike path to Lake Burley Griffin then around to Kingston.

I rode from work to town to see the doctor, who was rather impressed with my blood pressure after that effort. 130/85. I like meeting people who see me as a fit person rather than as a fat person. :-)

I was planning to ride to the bike course after the gym, but luckily I jumped online and checked my emails. There is no bike course tonight. That means I can go to the Group Slim session this evening and collect 50 points. Not that I'll enjoy the session, but I've been feeling bad for my team about my low points tallies over the past two weeks.

Tomorrow morning we're going to walk up Mt Ainslie as a group PT session. I have to get myself over there by 6:20 am so it's going to be a really early start. Still, I'll feel virtuous all day so it will be worth it. I'll ride on to work from there so I'll be getting more time on the bike, which has got to be a good thing.

Another quiet week

2008-03-16T18:24:00.002+11:00

It was another quiet week this week, because I was sick. I caught a nasty cold and have been coughing and spluttering my way through the week. I cancelled my run with Kathryn and Andrew on Monday. On Tuesday, after taking the day off work, I managed to get to my PT session with Julia, After resting all day I was able to cope with doing weights but I gave the bike course afterwards a miss. I was sorry about that, as it was bike maintenance part 2, but I just couldn't face the ride to the course venue.

I made it to the gym for group PT on Wednesday. I was tempted to stay at the gym for a nice quiet treadmill session, but I went out with the group to City Hill for more boxing and running. I walked. I really had to battle with my competitive nature. I found myself wanting to run just so I wouldn't finish the warmup last. After giving myself a stern talking to, I managed to resist the impulse. On the way home I felt a bit lightheaded, so I think it was just as well.

I realised that I still needed some rest so I cancelled squash on Thursday. That hurt. It also meant that I didn't go to hockey training. I did go for a short cycle. Funnily enough, once I was on the bike I was fine, but it was really hard to get on it. I even passed another cyclist. I love doing that. :-)

On Friday morning I had my usual PT session with Krissi. As ever, it was an excellent workout. We did the usual stuff. When Krissi gave me the 10 kg weights I managed 4 chest presses on my own, did a very dodgy 5th one and then just couldn't pick the weights up off my tummy to start the 6th. It was amusing in a "dammit" kind of way. Krissi then gave me the 7.5 kg weights and I did 15 of those, although I needed help towards the end.

I kind of 'got' the side plank on Friday, in a very 'just barely but getting there' kind of way. I can see that's going to be a major improvement area for me over the next few weeks. There's so much room for improvement.

On Saturday I had great plans. I was feeling a lot better and I was going to go on the bike ride in the morning then play hockey in the afternoon. The ride was 30-35 km and I was riding in from G's place, another 6.5 km each way. Well, fortunately for me, the ride came past G's place on the way home, so I just did the loop once. We rode from Lake Burley Griffin out to Gold Creek Village. I've been out there a few times and never imagined I'd ride out there. It was terrific.

There was an accident on the way though. One of the people riding in my group fell off, going head first over her handlebars down a steep hill. It was a sickening thud when she hit the ground. I was ahead of her, and kept going, knowing that there were people behind to help her. It's really hard to do that though. We stopped further along and waited for the people behind to catch up with the news. It took a while, so we knew she was hurt. The ambulance was called and we've since heard that she has a badly bruised face but otherwise doesn't have any major injuries. Thank goodness for bike helmets. What people think happened is that she braked with her front brake. I'm glad I didn't actually see the accident. One of the women in our group is a doctor and another is a nurse, which was fortunate for her. On the way back there were a few punctures too. Fortunately, I didn't have any.

It was a great ride, but I ended up being exhausted and piking out of the hockey. There were three subs so I didn't feel too bad. I went along today (it was a Vets carnival) and played a game, but there were 5 subs for that one so I only played the one game.

I am feeling lots better after all the rest. I'll be back into my usual routine this week I hope. I'm going to start riding to work again, as I need to get some miles up on the bike before we ride to Yass.

A quiet week

2008-03-09T21:12:00.002+11:00

This week I travelled to Melbourne a couple of times. Instead of trying to squeeze all my activities in around my travel time, I decided that I'd make it a rest week. What a great idea! Instead of fretting over not running on Tuesday or having my PT session at the gym, I found myself thinking positively about rest and relaxation. I also managed to cut back on my eating to match my activity level - not as easy as it sounds.

Lately I haven't been blogging as much so I'm recording my exercise in a note book. I started just writing down facts like "Monday, cross-trainer, level 6, 15 mins + cooldown" but now I'm starting to keep notes of how I was feeling, what got in the way of exercise, etc. For example, I'd planned a 45 minute workout at the gym on Monday evening (weights + cardio) but had to change the program to 30 mins of cardio (15 mins cross-trainer, 10 mins treadmill + cooldown) because my landlord was finally replacing the carpet in my bedroom after the flood back at the beginning of December. My apartment's in the middle of being sold so I've had way too many requests for access at very short notice lately. Still, it's done now. I'd not use the carpet layers myself. They left a mess behind them and I wasn't at all impressed with the quality of the job but, hey, it's not my money and the landlord may have deliberately gone with the "Shoddy Jobs R Us" quote.

I travelled to Melbourne for two days of training that I had to have to be able to use a database that it would have taken me 15 mins tops to figure out how to use. The bonus was that the other work people couldn't attend so I was able to stay at home instead of doing the team bonding thing which involved way too much drinking and eating last time. I walked across town to get a lift home with my sister after work, and then walked back the next morning.

I noticed that my knee was a little sore on Tuesday. I had been going to run early on Wednesday morning but it was still sore when I woke up so I decided to officially call the week a rest week. I was on an earlier flight back to Canberra than expected but I decided to give the gym a miss. I called in for my Slim session on Thursday before heading off to play squash with Murali. I hate the Slim sessions with a passion, but it was measurement day. My clothes are definitely getting looser but I'd only lost a few cm since the challenge began. Still, every cm lost is a bonus. I put on 2.5 kg after the challenge started and it's finally come back off. I've managed to lose a grand total of 800g net in four weeks.

Poor Murali was in the wars on Thursday and so we only played for a little over half an hour. He hurt his calf muscle but he was doing that "I'm a guy, I play through pain and suffer later" thing. We were 1-1 when we had the "you should stop", "I'm not going to" discussion, so we compromised with a decider game, which I won. He may have been injured but that doesn't mean I have to show any mercy!

Given that I'd been counting on a good calorie burn from squash, I decided that I'd better cycle over to TNB's place after squash. It also meant that I'd be able to cycle to PT with Krissi in the morning, instead of dragging TNB out of bed to drive me to my 7 am session.

It was a great workout as ever. Even though I'd cycled over, Krissi had me do my regular 10 minutes on the stationary cycle. I find that a real drag but it is definitely getting easier to survive it. Krissi then stretched me, which I love. We followed that up with lunges with 4 kg weights. I had my back foot up on the step behind me. Krissi has been working on my technique and I am now dropping down better than I used to. I feel safer on my dodgy knee when my form is good, so I'm working hard to improve it. By the time we'd got to the second set of 15 reps on my stronger leg I was shaking, so I'm glad I started with my weaker leg first. I used to start with the good one first, but I've learned over time to do it the other way around.

We followed this up with hamstring curls on the fitball. I have been doing these for ages, with incremental improvements. Each time it starts getting easy Krissi works on my technique. Friday was another improvement day, which means my hamstrings were definitely feeling it by the end of the second set.

Krissi started me on 10kg with the chest press. It was difficult enough just to hold the weights, let alone lift them. Amazingly, with a featherlight touch on my elbows, Krissi got my arms moving enough to start. I managed to do eight presses altogether, with progressively more help towards the end. I then did a set with the 7.5 kg weights, which felt incredibly light. When we got to the 12th rep I was all set to stop but Krissi asked me for three more. I managed them, but it was hard hard work. My mind had stopped at the usual 12 and then had to restart again. Funnily enough, I've been a little sore in my strong arm since then. I would have expected it to be my left arm but it hasn't worked out that way. Weird, huh?

We followed that up with the lateral pull down. My technique has really improved on this one. I am getting the second set out pretty well, although the last few are still a bit hard. Triceps dips came next. I'm not at all keen on these, but at least I can do them now. I remember being really scared of them this time last year, so it's good to know that I can do them now. (I had this idea that I was going to fall and hurt my tailbone.)

After that Krissi dragged out a new instrument of torture, a half-ball with a resistance band attached. I did a normal plank on the ball for the usual one minute. I struggled my way through this as I was breathing more quickly than usual. Then Krissi upped the ante - a side plank, front plank, side plank for 10 seconds each. Now I have the worst side plank in the world. Trust me on this. I can see that I'll be working on the technique for this one for a while. We finished with 10 situps and then I was done.

After work I went to the gym to collect some WOW points (cross-trainer / treadmill combo). It's been a dreadful week for me with WOW points. I'm not all that interested in the challenge this year. I realised though that I'm in a team and I'll have to get my act into gear for them even if I'm not that concerned for myself. I figure that if I do the average then at least I'm not dragging them down. I just have to work out what the average is now.

I started a sore throat on Friday night and now I have a cold. I am not a good patient as I'm rarely sick. I am indulging in Lemsip in between bouts of coughing and spluttering. I am meeting Kathryn for a run tomorrow. I've left her a message to let her know that it might be a pretty sorry excuse for a run. I'm going anyway though, as I'm taking my nephew Andrew with me. He's a mad keen Carlton supporter and we're off to Princes Park. I figure that he can bring a footy and run around pretending to be Chris Judd.

Oh, hilarious sequel to my puncture story. I'm going to have to learn when to keep quiet about newly acquired skills. Sandra's boys haven't been riding their bikes as much as usual lately. She finally figured out why. Andrew has a flat tyre. He thinks that means he needs a new bike. Sandra thinks that Aunty Kathy might just be able to teach Andrew how to fix a puncture. Anyway, after the run we're off to the local bike shop (LBS) to buy a puncture kit and then we're going to fix his bike. I never imagined the day would come when I would be teaching my nephew how to mend a puncture.

I'm thinking of buying a bike down here in Melbourne so I can go riding with my brother-in-law. He's the only person in my family who's likely to go riding with me! He's quite keen. I suspect if we start cycling, my brother and sister-in-law might join us, which would be good fun. There is a great bike path from Werribee to Williamstown that I'd like to try out. Who knows, one of these days we might end up doing the Great Victorian Bike Ride.

General Exercise update

2008-03-02T20:10:00.002+11:00

Hockey
I've been playing hockey once a week when I'm in Canberra. I played a really good game last Sunday and followed it up with another one today. It was the last of the social season. I've decided to play the winter comp and it looks like I'll be a regular in the grass team and fill in for the turf comp. The grass team don't train, but I've decided to go along to turf training as my skills are incredibly rusty.

I bit the bullet and bought myself a new stick today. I've been borrowing a stick but it's about time I had my own. These new composite sticks are so different to the old wooden stick I used to have and to the one my friend lent me. The guy in the shop told me I'd hit the ball much harder. I love his optimism! I checked out the shoes, but I decided I'd wait until the grass season started before I bought them. On my way home I realised that I'm playing a Vet's carnival in a couple of weeks and so I guess I'll be buying them sooner than I thought.

Personal Training
I'm still training with Julia on Tuesdays and Krissi on Fridays. I am absolutely loving it. I ended up buying myself a book to record what I'm doing because I'm not getting to update my blog enough. I love measuring my progress. For example, I did one and a half sets of 12 Chest Presses using 9 kg weights the other day with Julia. When I'm on my own I don't trust myself with that weight, so I tried 8 kg weights and managed to get three sets out comfortably. I was really pleased. I've been working hard on them. With Krissi, I do the chest presses with 7.5 kg weights, but we do them after she's already tired my arms out. It's great to see all the hard work paying off.

WOW program
This one is up and down. I'm not getting to the gym as often as I did with the Biggest Loser Challenge, as I'm doing the bike program (Tuesday evening and Saturday morning) and playing squash (Thursday evening) and playing hockey (various times on Sunday). I'm still managing to get there once a day on weekdays. The Group Slim session is on Tuesdays, so I miss out on that 50 points. I've been going to Trivia late to get to the Group PT session but I'm not enjoying that at all. I don't have much confidence in the instructor. She's a fairly new PT and just doesn't have the presence or experience to run a group session.

We had some drama there last week too, with one of the ladies having what appeared to be a mild fit. We ended up calling an ambulance (that's the first time I've spoken to 000) and she had recovered her senses by the time I left (half of us went back to the gym instead of all hanging around the poor woman). I haven't heard how she's doing as yet, which I am hoping is a case of 'no news is good news'.

Squash
This is my favourite activity of the week. Murali beat me in three the other week, so this week I was determined that wouldn't happen again. It was a real relief to win the first game. I ended up winning 3-1 and then we played two more games so I was ahead 4-2. We are both getting a much better workout as Murali is much fitter. He has been doing a lot of treadmill walking and it's really made a difference.

General Cycling
I'm trying to ride my bike more to toughen up my backside for Yass. I'm nearly ready to ride to work again. My knee is feeling much better and is handling all my various activities really well. I tried out the paniers the other day. They make the bike a lot heavier to handle, but it's great to be able to take so much stuff with me! No excuses like not having work clothes to change into now though.

Overall health and fitness
We have a new guy at work and he was telling me after a couple of days that I'm a really active person. I looked at him in surprise, because I think of all the things I don't do, like missing this morning's run. I also know that while I get to the gym I'm only there for a workout. I don't do these back to back classes or work myself into a lather of sweat like some of the women. Anyway, I thought about it and realised that from his perspective I was a really active person. So I agreed with him!

I've put on weight lately but I've obviously lost size. I was at a wedding yesterday, so I got to wear my black dress again. The first time I wore it the style consultant helped me to zip it up. There was no way I could have zipped it up on my own. I tried it on yesterday, feeling all sorts of trepidation. I knew I'd changed shape but I also knew I was a few kilos heavier than when I wore it before. Well, the zip just did itself up. The dress looked even better on me. I was so pleased.

I think that the WOW program is probably what makes the difference. Because I'm going to the gym so much more to collect my points, I'm doing more different types of cardio so I don't get bored. I'm also managing to do weights at least three times a week, which is great for toning. I just have to remember to keep it up.

Oh, and someone at hockey today remarked on how much faster I've become lately. That's a combination of getting out there and doing some real running and the cardio work I've been doing at the gym. I don't think I'll ever be a fan of the cross trainer, but I think I'll try to work it into my schedule on a regular basis from now on.

All I really need to do now is find some time to go swimming! (That was a joke!)

Another long bike ride - and puncture stories

2008-03-02T19:34:00.003+11:00

I'm posting about last week's exercise backwards so please bear with me .. with luck you'll get a few posts tonight. One of the advantages of the cricket .. which I'm not watching.

On Saturday morning I went on a long bike ride with the Pedal Power group. The New Horizons course took us along, so that we'd know about this regular Saturday morning ride. I got there early (it wasn't where I thought it was going to be, which meant I didn't have to ride as far to get there) and had a chat with a few of the women before we started. I like that part, as I'm making new friends.

There ended up being about 55 people on the ride, 35 of us, about a dozen people who'd come along to help us, and some usual Saturday cyclists. The ride leader told us where she was taking us, which was around the lake clockwise, which would take us to our morning tea venue at Yarralumla Gallery. We'd collected money and booked ahead as hordes of riders descending on them without warning would be enough to send most baristas crazy.

It was an interesting experience. We didn't ride as fast as I expected, which is probably a good thing. I think that we were probably going at about 12 km/h for the first part and then 14 km/h for the second part. We were out there for about 2:15 hours, not counting morning tea. We were on the bike path almost the whole way and we rode in single file. When we came to hills or to something a little challenging like gravel, we pulled up, got given some advice, and then proceeded on our way.

I practised my gear changing, didn't run into anyone, made it up the big hills, didn't crash when the woman overtaking me up a steep hill fell off her bike and the one in front of me was unable to handle the hill and stopped at the same time. Instead I went around on the left and kept going, hoping that the helpers who were nearby would pick up the pieces. I felt a bit mean doing that, but I figured that it was probably better for me to stay out of the way than it was for me to add to the potential pileup.

We ended up covering a little over 30 km and I had a 2 km ride there and back, so it was a big day for me. I enjoyed myself and I'll do it again, but my backside is definitely voting for a gel seat cover! Someone said our ride to Yass in six weeks will be twice as long plus 10 km, so my seat bones need some padding under them.

Puncture update:
It took me a few days to fix the puncture in my front tyre. I meant to do it Wednesday night, but it was really late by the time I got to TNB's place (TNB = the new boyfriend, also known as the main reason I've been extra busy lately) so I skipped it. I arrived at TNB's place after squash on Thursday night, planning to fix the puncture before dinner.

He was really good and didn't give into the temptation of fixing it for me, but he did have the bike upside down ready for me. That really threw me at first, as we'd learned how to do them with the bike upright. I worked out how to disengage the brake upside down, popped the wheel out, took the tyre and tube off, found a hole and was about to patch it, when TNB put the tube in the sink. Yes, there were three holes. You may be very sure that I carefully examined the tyre for more thorns once I realised that there were several holes in my tube. I patched all three, put the bike back together and felt the back tyre, just to be sure of my good work on Tuesday. It was much softer than I would have expected. I realised that I probably hadn't found all the holes in that one the other night. Sigh.

Off came the back wheel. This is the hard one where your hands get dirty. TNB had dinner ready, but he patiently waited while I tried to find the new puncture. I wasn't having much luck so he encouraged me to put a lot more air in the tyre. It looked so odd, but we found the second puncture, and reopened the first one. I fixed these too. We ended up eating dinner about two hours after I arrived! Still, my tyres stayed up overnight and I was able to ride home in the cold for my PT session the following morning. I was wondering about the wisdom of fixing the tyre in time for a chilly Friday morning, but I really wanted my bike in one piece for my Saturday morning ride.

Pump stuff:
Sara, I love my pump. It's a Bontrager Turbo Charger, and has FIT on the foot piece. It's blue and silver, and the handle is curved slightly. The guy in the local bike shop told me it was specifically designed for women and I have to say it's easier to use than the ones they had at the bike course, which had straight handles. I think the curved handle makes allowances for my tummy. :-)

Andrew, yes it is one of those up and down pumps. I fell in love with those the first time I saw them. I actually brought it over to TNB's to fix the punctures, which I was very glad I'd done when I realised I had two tyres to pump up.

TNB stuff:
It's taken me a while to mention TNB on my blog. I've started doing regular cycling commutes and running commutes from his place to mine, so there'll be the occasional mention from time to time. Fortuitously, he lives 5 km from me along the bikepath, which is a really handy distance.

I'm still a runner

2008-03-01T16:52:00.002+11:00

I don't know if this happens to other people, but every once in a while I find myself wondering if I should be calling myself a runner. A couple of weeks ago I had a disaster run and then a week and a half went by before I went back out for a run. In fact, when I bought Runner's World the other day I was thinking that I really needed the motivation of reading it to get myself out of bed in the mornings.

Well, it worked. On Tuesday morning I got myself up for a 5 km running commute along the bikepath. I really enjoyed the run. There were bits that weren't easy, like actually going through the door and getting started. There were bits that were hard, like not stopping after 3 km even though my legs felt like lead. However, overall it was fantastic. I was really pleased to be out there. I made it to my destination without stopping. My form was good at the end of the run. I felt like a runner!

I've had this goal for a while of running a half marathon this year. I looked at joining a running group, but I couldn't see how I could make the training sessions work for me. I'm doing so many other activities that it's hard to commit to being there. I realised that if I was going to meet my goal I was going to have to make the commitment to do the training around my other stuff. I decided Tuesday and Thursday mornings were the go, with a long run on Sunday while the bike course is on. I made the Tuesday run and crash-landed with Thursday. I didn't have my running bra with me. I ended up catching the bus instead.

Well, I decided to see if Krissi would run with me for my PT session on Friday. She agreed and we headed out for 7 km. I had a really good time. Again there were tough bits but it makes a difference running with a partner. Now all I have to do is keep it up.

Later (Sunday evening):
I didn't make it out for my long run this morning. I was at a wedding yesterday and decided that staying in bed instead was a really good idea.

Talk about good timing!

2008-02-28T08:09:00.002+11:00

This bike skills course I'm doing is fantastic!

On Tuesday night we were learning how to change a tyre and fix a puncture. I went and bought myself two spare tubes on Monday, just in case they wanted to see what sort of repair kit we had. I have the tyre levers and the puncture repair kit, but I didn't have the recommended spare tubes. I also bought myself a whiz bang pump that lets you know how much air you have in your tyres. Not enough it seemed, when I got it home. I pumped my tyres up from the measly 20 psi to the recommended 80 psi - so much easier with my new pump.

I rode to the course venue after my PT session with Julia - I was in a little bit of a hurry so I took a short cut instead of travelling on the bike path. I rode on the road most of the way and on the footpath the rest. Near Antill Street I did venture out onto the grass to pass a lady who was walking quite slowly on the footpath. Not such a good idea it seems, but more on that later.

When I arrived we had the initial talk and then were split into two groups for the practical session. I spread my sheet on the ground, laid my bike down, and then joined the group gathered around the bike mechanic to see how to take off the rear wheel. We were doing that one because it's harder. We were shown how to do it - put the chain on the smallest sprocket at the back (I think it's a sprocket), undo the brake, undo some clip whose name I can't remember even after hearing it all night, and then drop the tyre out. This is all done with the bike upright. You then lay your bike back down, and take the tyre off.

We were shown how to do this, and it looked really easy. So easy in fact that I managed to take off the tape that covered the ends of the spokes as well. I wasn't supposed to do that. Anyway, it wasn't the end of the world. I was able to replace this safely. We were shown how to find a puncture, how to check our tube and tyre, and had a bit of a chat about various types of punctures (glass, thorns, etc). Being from Melbourne I imagined the thorns as enormous. I was soon to discover that they are pesky little things.

After letting down my tyre (how painful that was after pumping it up properly the day before) I got out my tyre levers, which are a weird shape that makes sense once you've seen them in action, and took off the tyre and tube (and the tape). I quickly put the tape back on. Then I put my tube and tyre back on the wheel, got it back on the bike, realised that my brakes weren't even, got the nice man to fix that up, cleaned the grease from my hands, and was happily wheeling my bike to lean it against the wall for a quick getaway, when my front tyre went down.

I was all set to check it out and fix the puncture, but I was talked into pumping it up first to see what happened. It stayed up. Then I discovered my back tyre was down. I was all set to pump it up too after what had just happened, but one of the instructors suggested that I look for the puncture. I did that, with help, and ended up fixing my first ever puncture instead of practising, like everyone else, on a scrap of tube. One of the bike mechanics then checked my tyre for me and found several thorns in it, which he kindly removed.

I got the bike reassembled, with a bit of help from a couple of the nice men who were there to assist us. I realised that my front tyre probably had thorns in it and I really wanted to check out my front tyre with all that assistance around, however it was still pumped up. All those kind men wanted to get home rather than look for a puncture they hoped I didn't have and so I headed off, hoping it would stay pumped up for me while I was riding home. When I did get home it was still pumped up, but I found a few thorns in it. I wasn't at all surprised to find it was flat this morning. I get to fix my second puncture now, while all the info is fresh in my brain. I also guess that I should have been a bit more patient with the slow lady, instead of heading off the path into the grass.

How lucky am I though? I haven't had a puncture with this bike, and when I did finally get one it was when I was surrounded by people who could help me. Not only that, I get an opportunity to practise straight away. If only I could change a tyre without getting dirty though!

Still more cycling

2008-02-23T11:41:00.002+11:00

I've just arrived home from a bike skills session. It started at 8:30 and went until around 11. With riding there and home again I've been out on the bike for a little over three and a half hours. We covered about 13 km all up on the cycling course, and I travelled another 18 km to get there and home again, so I've ridden more this morning than I would normally ride in a couple of weeks. Needless to say, I'm feeling it!

We met up in a car park and worked on basic skills for the first part of the session, like stopping, gears and riding with one hand off the bike. We then went for a short ride to a public toilet - I guess showing us the public toilets is a pretty handy part of the course. This was followed by morning tea and then we ventured out onto the road. We were in the parliamentary triangle, which is fairly quiet on weekends. We rode "around the block" for a while, turning left each time. When we're on the road we're in single file - none of this bunch stuff for us yet. It's hard enough trying to stay close to the bike in front without having to worry about riding beside someone.

We finally did a right hand turn. There was absolutely no traffic which helped. We then did a different block with a bit of a hill, to see how the gears would help, then we rode up a "big" hill to Parliament House. I was expecting to struggle up the hill but it wasn't all that big. It was long but nothing like the ones I ride up when I do manage to ride to work. We then rode around Parliament House then headed back to the car park. A few stretches, a chat about next week's ride (around the lake and involving scones!) and then I headed home to my place. I was riding on familiar turf but I could see a definite improvement in my confidence. That's what I'm after from the course so I'm pretty pleased with how it's going.

As for the weekly exercise update - I've ridden my bike a couple of times since Tuesday, went to the group PT session for the WOW program on Wednesday, visited the gym and played squash with Murali on Thursday, and had PT with Krissi, did a gym session and went to a balance class on Friday. I really should try to make the effort to go to the gym now, but I am going to skip it today. The bike riding feels like enough.

The group PT session was not at all fun, yet it was a great workout calorie-wise. I was feeling cranky at the beginning, and when we got to the outdoor venue I realised we were going to do lots of stairs. I should have spoken up about my knee but I didn't want to be the "difficult one" in the group, so I kept quiet and did the stairs. And did the stairs. And did the stairs.

There were three flights of stairs, a total or 37 steps all up. We ran up them and walked down them four times as a warm up. Then we went up two and back down, up four and back down, etc doing 10 pushups each time after we did four steps. That's a hell of a lot of pushups. I did the first four sets on my toes, then dropped to my knees to find that the concrete had a crushed, pebbled surface. I managed a few sets before giving up and moving to wall pushups. I was even more cranky by then. I decided to suck it up and kept on going. I even did the final set of pushups on my toes, but they were pretty much baby pushups. It was 170 pushups all up.

After that we moved over to the fountain to do step ups. I did speak up about my knee then, and found a place on the fountain to do small step ups. Back up the stairs to do our abs work, which involved crunches and the plank and then we headed back to the gym. I've been feeling the effects ever since. I have such sore calves. Fortunately my knee wasn't too bad after all those stairs. I could feel a twinge on the Thursday but it wasn't bad enough to stop me playing squash.

On Thursday morning I concentrated on upper body but I also did the hip abductor (3 sets of 12 reps x 2 at 30 kg) as I figured the stairs didn't really test those muscles. I could be wrong of course. For my back I did the seated row - 3 sets of 12 reps at 23 kg, and the bent over row - 3 sets of 12 reps at 15 kg. I then did the chest press using 9 kg. I managed to get out 1 sets of 12 reps but I only got to 8 on the second set. Room for improvement. I then did a shoulder press - 2 sets of 12 reps at 4 kg and a triceps exercise that I don't know the name of - 2 sets of 12 reps with 5 kg.

Murali beat me in 3 on Thursday at squash. That's a first and he was delighted. I won the next two at least.

PT with Krissi was great. After the obligatory ten minute warm up on the bike and stretching we did boxing. It's such fun. Two minutes on, two minutes off - crosses, hooks, uppercuts, and then a couple of combos. We finished off the session with some leg work, lunges and hamstring curls. In the evening I did some more arm work and then did a balance class with Marjorie. All in all, it's been a pretty good week of exercise.

Quick update and more cycling than usual

2008-02-20T07:17:00.002+11:00

Life's still proceeding at a rush, which I'm enjoying. Here's a quick update on the exercise front.

On Sunday the plan was to run with Kathryn. It was a great plan and lasted about a kilometre and a half. I was fine at the start but once we'd stopped a couple of times for Kathryn to stretch her sore calves I was done. I just couldn't get the momentum up again to run. I don't know if it was the temperature or the fact that I've put on weight lately (grr) but it seemed like such an effort. We ended up walking the rest of the way (7 km all up) so at least it was time on my feet. Oh, and the real benefit was the chance to chat with Kathryn, who is even more interesting in real life than she is in her blog.

On Monday I dashed into the gym, did a quick interval run (6km/9km) and then dashed back out to catch a bus. I enjoyed the run, burned lots of calories, earned my 25 points for the WOW program and caught the bus. I think I catapulted into the seat but I may be exaggerating.

On Tuesday I went for a short ride in the morning. Now this would have been a long ride 12 months ago and I've realised that I really can't count 5 km as exercise any more. I think I managed to burn a whole 80 calories. Mind you, it all counts on calorie king. I had a work breakfast meeting so I didn't make the gym in the morning. After work I had a slim session (grr - I hate these, but my weight was lower) and a PT session at the gym, then I had to speed off to the bike course I'm doing.

For PT I did a very short warmup on the bike, then 3 sets of 15 leg presses (50 kg), 3 sets of 12 seated rows (23 kg), 2 sets of 12 hip abductors x 2 (30 kg and grr), 2 sets of 12 bent over rows (15 kg), 1 set of 12 chest presses (9 kg with help at the end) and 1 set of 12 leg extensions (each leg then both) before being stretched.

I hurried home, picked up my bike stuff, and headed off on the bike path. I had 20 minutes to get there and it took me over 25 door to door. I forgot to turn my Garmin on at first, but I managed to capture most of the ride. I noticed that I'm definitely turning my legs over more when I'm riding, which is great. I think this 'riding under pressure' makes a big difference. It's pretty flat from my place to the course venue and I'm on a bike path most of the way. I did do something exciting. I rode in the bike lane on Northbourne Avenue for the last little bit. There's a major intersection so the bike lane goes green in between the through traffic and the left turn lane. I stuck on the green and had cars on either side of me. It was scary but there were other riders out there so I sucked it in and gave it a go. Fortunately I survived to blog another day!

The lecture last night was about stretching and we learned a number of stretches especially for cyclists. The lady who gave the talk is a physiotherapist who was an elite cyclist herself, worked with the AIS for years and sets up bikes for people. She had great advice and I'm glad I didn't skip this session. I learned a great stretch for my ITB too. Not that I have ITB problems, but it's handy to know about the stretch. It's a combination stretch that works the quad too. All I have to do now is actually do it. There was a simple PF stretch too.

Oh, we were told that we should do the stretches for two minutes each. With glutes, quads, hammies, calf, achilles, ITB and PF that's at least a quarter of an hour of stretching a couple of times a week, not counting any other stretches like neck or back. The two minutes can be made up of 12 lots of 10 seconds or 3 lots of 40. It's up to us. Mind you, yoga, which I'm missing at the moment to go to the bike course, covers all the stretches so I'll be doing one session each week once the course is over. I will just have to try to fit it in. Maybe when I do my leg sessions at the gym. I'll end up with a reputation - that lady who spends half her gym session lying down.

I rode my bike again this morning - another short ride, but at least I'm out there and building my confidence. I was working on some of the stuff that was mentioned last night, like trying not to have a death grip on the handlebars and holding a neutral spine. It will happen!

I'm writing my blog today instead of being at the gym as I am really struggling to keep up with my washing at the moment. Tonight I have the group PT session at the gym followed by the second half of trivia and tomorrow night I'm off to the Theatre to see "Menopause the Musical" after playing squash. Oh, and will you all stop blogging so much? (tongue in cheek) I caught up on my blog reading over the weekend and now there are 17 unread entries there. Sheesh! I wonder if I can talk them into setting aside a blog reading hour a day for me at work? Sigh, probably not.

What's news?

2008-02-16T14:16:00.003+11:00

Well, it's been a while since I blogged. Fortunately, that doesn't reflect a corresponding lack of exercise. The WOW program started up at the gym on 4th February, so I've been getting myself along to the gym most days since then. It's pretty much like last year's Biggest Loser challenge, with a few minor modifications. Our gym has managed to sign up two teams. I don't know any of the other participants as yet, but I'm sure that will change over the next 12 weeks.

Because I'm at the gym so much I'm trying to mix up what I'm doing. I have actually used cardio equipment that isn't a treadmill. I've even managed to last on the cross-trainer for longer than 15 minutes. That's quite an effort for me as I find that machine particularly boring. I've made the effort and warmed up on the stationary bike too - another machine that I don't much like. Oh, and I tried out a couple of the programs on the treadmill, to discover that I much prefer doing my own thing and running.

I've also been getting back into my weights program. One thing I've missed with the "new" PT way is having my own program card. I've filled up the last one that I got from Krissi, so I'll have to organise myself and ask for one. They used to leave them on the filing cabinet, but that doesn't seem to be the case now. Of course, I could just buy myself a training diary and do my own thing. In fact, I might do that, as I'm not getting to update my blog with my training lately. I like keeping track of it, as I enjoy seeing how I'm progressing.

Some good news on the knee front. I worked hard to rest it, doing squats to a max of 30 degrees, catching the lift at work instead of walking down the stairs etc, and it's much much better. Funnily enough, it was Yoga that helped me to realise how much it had improved. There's a pose you do where you lie on the floor with your feet flopped out sideways. I've heard it called the corpse pose, which isn't exactly confidence inspiring. Anyway, when I was doing that, my left leg always felt under tension but the other day it was completely relaxed. Of course, I immediately decided that meant I could go back to normal, so I did. My knee wasn't exactly 100% happy but my mind is in charge of my knee and not the other way around!

PT with Krissi has been every bit as much fun as ever. The last two sessions have been fairly similar. They started off with 10 mins on the bike (yep, I hate it as much as ever) and then Krissi stretched me while I was warm. I've been feeling really tight so that's been better than ever. Last week it was my hammies that were making sure I knew I'd been working hard and this week it was my quads. I guess they figure they'll take turns.

After that I did squats while holding a medicine ball. The first time I did this I was imagining how I was going to describe this on my blog. Now this was the first day I felt good on my knee so I was a little apprehensive about doing full squats. The medicine ball immediately took my mind off my legs. Instead I was fascinated by the 5.46 kg sign on it. I was holding the ball by the handles straight out in front of me. It seemed easy enough for all of the time it took me to read that 5.46 kg.

The first time I think we did three sets of 15 squats, holding on the fifth squat each time but yesterday we did three sets of 20. I have to admit that my arms had definitely improved during the week. The couple of extra sessions at the gym made a huge difference and it took longer for me to hug the ball to my tummy instead of holding it out straight in front of me.

I'm getting better at hamstring curls. It amazes me that the exercise never seems to get any easier even though I do it so much better now. Mind you, I feel it in my butt now instead of in my calves. I seem to get myself off line somehow so Krissi is now going to work on getting me to do it in a straight line. It looks like I'm using my stronger leg more so I'm going to try concentrating on pulling the ball back with both legs. I tried to focus on my left leg for the last few yesterday and ended up with the giggles as I fell off the ball. We did three sets of 15 of those too.

I like that I've progressed to doing three sets. I feel so much stronger. Also, when I'm working on my own I know I can start off with two sets while I'm struggling with an exercise and then progress to three when it starts getting easy.

The other week Krissi had me do shoulder presses with 4 kg weights and then chest presses with 7.5 kg weights after I had already exhausted my poor old arms with that massive medicine ball. Well, by the time we got to the chest presses I was done. Krissi had to help me through two wobbly sets of 10 reps. I don't think I managed even one press unassisted. This week she swapped the order around and I got through two sets of 12 chest presses with just a little help for my left arm. I was really pleased as I've been working on this one at the gym. I then did the two sets of 12 shoulder presses, and again I only needed a little help with my left arm in the second set.

I then did the wide grip lateral pull down (yep, I did eventually find out the name of the exercise). Two sets of 12 reps with 20 kg I think. The way I count though, it could have been something else. I've discovered that when I start to lose the action of squeezing my shoulder blades together that pushing my chest forward helps. When Krissi was telling me this I was quite amused. All those years of trying to de-emphasise my chest and now I'm pushing it out there. Still, it makes the exercise so much easier.

We've been working on my plank and I'm managing 60 seconds comfortably now. Well, relatively comfortably. Yesterday I did it twice in a row with a 60 second rest in between. The week before I alternated it with the lat pulldown.

Krissi now has me doing situps where she holds my feet down and I slide my hands along my legs until my wrists reach the end of my knees, and then roll myself back down under control. Well, yesterday I may have rushed down rather than rolled down, but I'm getting better at this one too. I do so love seeing steady improvement.

I went for my first outdoor run in ages last weekend. I headed out to run 5 km on Saturday morning. Because I hadn't been out there for a while I decided I wasn't going to worry about time. Instead I planned to enjoy myself and I did. I ran past a little old lady pushing a pram with a poodle walking along beside her. I was thinking "oh, isn't that sweet, granny with her grandchild". When I reached her she had a spaniel in the pram. Just as sweet but rather amusing.

I played hockey again on Sunday. It wasn't nearly as much fun as the previous week because my quads were complaining about having to run fast. Despite the pain I was glad to be there. I guess I'll eventually get used to playing. The Chinese Women's hockey team were there training when we played. Wow. Were they ever impressive?!?

This week I've had a slightly quieter week as I was in Melbourne for work on Wednesday and Thursday and I travelled back again this weekend. I'm planning to run with Kathryn tomorrow, which should be a lot of fun.

Hockey! Wow!

2008-02-04T21:08:00.000+11:00

On Sunday night I played hockey for the first time in years. I was really excited to be playing - it's wonderful to feel fit enough to be able to run for a match. I first played hockey when I was 7, back in 1969, and I played through into my late 20's. When I stopped playing, I coached and umpired for a few years, which kept my hand in but the only time I played a match over the last 15 years was when I played a season of corporate cup hockey in Darwin about ten years ago. I nearly played last year but I just didn't get myself organised. Fortunately, I was chatting to Julia during PT the other week and the next thing I knew I was signed up to play social hockey.

I was quite nervous about it, as I didn't know if I was up to playing on astroturf. I was playing in country Vic when astroturf was coming into use in Melbourne, and so I pretty much missed it. The game is a lot faster on that surface, and it's played differently.

On Sunday morning I was watching the Women and Girls Triathlon when I mentioned to Lola that I was going to buy a hockey stick. She kindly offered to lend me a few of her old sticks so that I could work out what I wanted. She also lent me a pair of socks in ANU colours, which was pretty impressive as she plays for Central. I bought myself shinpads and a mouth guard, and I was set to play. I quickly discovered that I will have to practise wearing the mouth guard. I was nearly throwing up when I did wear it, so it spent the game stuffed down my bra. I will have to go to the dentist and get one fitted. Sigh. This health and fitness lark costs a lot of money.

The competition I'm playing in is a social comp, so the team was a mixture of abilities, with both men and women playing. They were really welcoming, and I found myself playing right fullback, which is one of my favourite positions. There were modified rules but it felt just like playing used to feel. I was running all over the place, hoping like hell that I wasn't stuffing up too much. I managed to get my feet in the way a few times, but the shinpads did their job. Fortunately the old skills came back quite quickly. I can see that I'll need to develop a few new ones, but I'm going to be playing on turf with the veterans when the season proper starts.

I was having dinner with a friend after the match. Their house is in walking distance from the hockey centre, so I walked there and back. On the way there I followed the path but on the way back I was walking in the straightest line possible. I didn't have the energy to take the longer way. It was such a relief to get there.

I mentioned the triathlon earlier. I thought I'd feel terrible, watching Kelly and the other WTTP participants doing the triathlon, but I wasn't at all upset or disappointed. I was relieved about that. I found the whole thing really interesting. Kelly was so nervous, but she participated and got around safely. She looked so determined through all the transitions. It was inspiring to watch her. Krissi and Jess participated in a team triathlon with a friend of Krissi's doing the swim leg. They were the first team in for the longer course. I was really impressed that five solo competitors beat them in. Not by far, but they still beat them. I expected the teams to come in well before the other competitors. It goes to show how fit some of these women are.

I've signed up for War on Waistlines at the gym. It will run over the next 12 weeks and looks similar to the Biggest Loser challenge Fernwood ran last year. The rules seem better thought through. It's going to clash with the bike skills program but them's the breaks. My personal training is also stuffed up because there's a group session that clashes. I've rescheduled to Thursday this week, which inteferes with Squash. Sometimes I think I just try to do too much! Still, I'm having fun, which is the important thing.

More stuff to come

2008-02-01T17:35:00.000+11:00

Since Tuesday I've had PT with Krissi (Wed) and played squash with Murali (Thu). I'll find time to write about them, but first I want to catch up with what you've all been doing. Have a great weekend.

Oh, Mum's doing really well. She's had four good days in a row, so it looks like she's on the mend. Thanks again for all the positive thoughts.

Squash, PT, and not much else

2008-02-01T17:30:00.000+11:00

I've hardly been online lately. Lots has been going on in my non-blogging life. I tend to keep this blog focussed on exercise so I won't go into details here. I'm happy with the situation, even if it is interrupting my internet time. It's amazing how much I miss catching up with all my usual blogs though. Here I am, late at night, reading blogs and wishing I had time to make comments.

**Edit** In fact, I was so tired writing this that I didn't post it and now it's three days later. Just as well that I didn't post it as the last paragraph ended up being total rubbish. Blogging while falling asleep is not to be recommended. Thanks for your comment Andrew. I am fine - just busy with life in general. **End Edit**

On the exercise front, I played squash with Murali on Thursday. On the night I was planning my blog entry. I won the first two games and Murali won the next two. I was thinking that I was in danger of his winning three in a row, but I managed to keep my game together and take out the decider. It's amazing what a difference being fit makes. Murali has it all over me when it comes to strength, but I can usually hang in there long enough to wear him down. Murali is as competitive as me, so he's workign on his fitness. I just have to hope my game stays ahead of his for a little while longer. (Thanks for the offer of squash tips JoJo. I'll take you up on it.)

I had a lazy weekend. I was away from home, which was good, as my landlord is selling. At least I wasn't stuck in the "be away for this period of time" situation, and I did get a lovely arrangement of flowers out of it. I'm hoping the new owner wants a tenant, as I am too lazy to want to move. I thought about making an offer for the apartment myself, but it flooded on the weekend of the Elton John concert. It seems a little silly to be making an offer on an apartment that I know floods.

This evening I had PT with Julia. I had a great session, working hard and managing to break into a sweat. I'm always pleased when I feel that I work that hard.

Tonight I did three sets of 15 on the leg press (43 kg), followed by 2 sets of 15 pushups and 12 pullups. I'm finding the pullups really hard. Julia is delighted as she says it's hard to find something to challenge me. I smiled internally as Krissi is always managing to push me a little futher. I think Julia is going to make a Krissi-style PT in the next few years, so I don't want to put her off.

After the pushups/pullups we moved on to the seated row. I put the weight up to 18.3kg, which ended up being more of a stretch than I anticipated. I could feel my back muscles burning. After that we did some hamstring curls, 2 sets of 15, followed by a set of abs exercises and stretching.

I then dashed off to farewell drinks for my pool-running buddy Sally, who is moving to Darwin. I'm going to really miss Sally while she's away. After that, another mad dash back home to meet my visitors from Ireland, my second cousin Liz and her husband Phil. It was a hectic evening!

Treadmill Run, PT and more PT

2008-01-23T20:50:00.001+11:00

Before I get started, my Mum's home from hospital and recovering well. Thanks for all the positive thoughts and prayers. We're very happy and relieved to have her home.

On Monday night I went for a run at the gym. I really enjoyed myself. Some days it just seems easier than others. I ran 4 km before cooling down. It took me just over 35 minutes all up. I had my headphones and was watching Channel V. I don't really like running with headphones. I seem to get myself all tangled up and the earpieces don't always want to stay in my ears. The volume never seems to be right with the treadmill screen. It's all seems too hard but I persist. At least juggling the wires and adjusting the volume keeps me occupied.

I've been working on my cadence. I realised that I was running slower because I was taking few steps per minute. Only 10 actual steps less, but that's a fair bit of ground to be losing over a 40 minute run. I'm having trouble getting it back up. I have a theory that it's related to my breathing. It all makes perfect sense to me and it's something to think about while I'm running. My theory is this: I breathe in for two steps and out for for. As a result of Yoga I breathe more deeply, which means it takes me longer to breathe in and out. My feet have slowed down to compensate. My alternative theory is: I put on weight over the course of last year which has slowed me down. I prefer to ignore that one.

Anyway, it's given me something definite to work on. I'd gotten a bit slack with working on various aspects of my form. I'll have to make a conscious effort to read my Chi Running book again.

On Tuesday I had PT with Julia. I made myself do my cardio warmup on the bike. I really don't like the stationary bike but I figured it would be kinder to my knee. Also, I have a philosophy that I should do stuff I don't like occasionally as it makes me appreciate the stuff I do like even more. Oh no, that line of thinking is saying "Kathy, do a cycle class!" I think I need to develop selective deafness.

I was due for a program change so this week we started off on the leg press machine that you don't need to load the weights onto. I did the top third of the action. My knee was fine, although I could feel that it had been working. I don't know if I'm imagining that or if I'm really feeling it. I guess time will tell if it's paranoia. I did two (or three) sets of 15 reps at 50 kg. That's a problem with not blogging on the day - my mind leaks the details. At least Julia wrote it down. After that we did hamstring curls. I am starting to like these. I'd better not mention that to either trainer or they'll get scratched from my program. I did two sets of 15. I then did two sets of 15 reps at 16 kg on the seated row machine. I'll be able to increase the weight on that soon, but it's a while since I've done them so I wanted to get my form checked again.

We moved over to the Smith machine where I did pushups - two sets of 15. It's strange doing them on an angle. It was easier to actually bend my arms though. When I'm trying to do real pushups I hesitate to really bend my arms in case I can't get back up. We alternated the pushups with pullups. Julia had me doing them at an easier angle than I've done these before but I didn't want to encourage her to make it harder. It was still hard work when I got to 12 on the first set and I only made it to 10 on the second set.

We then did some abs work. I was pleased about this as abs work seems to have fallen out of the "Fernwood" program. We did a set of 15 crunches with the fitball. Julia asked me how I felt and I told her they were easy. Me and my big mouth. I was then doing reverse crunches. I only had to do one set of 10 and then it was time to stretch. I really enjoy the stretching.

I normally do Yoga on Tuesdays, but I reorganised my evening because my sister was coming to stay for a couple of nights. She's up here for work. It is great to see her. I see her every time I go to Melbourne, but it's fun for me to have her here. It's also an excuse to go to "Sammy's Kitchen", which is a fabulous Chinese restaurant a few minutes walk from my place.

This morning I had my PT with Krissi. I love this session, although I was feeling a little trepidation as I hadn't spoken to her about my decision to pull out of the tri. I really appreciated that she didn't immediately try to talk me back into it, and I told her so. Well, the flood gates opened. She'd exercised massive self-control to not say anything. It was good to talk to her about it. She gave me a new perspective on the whole thing. I'm not saying that I'll do the triathlon but I'm seriously thinking about getting my backside to the cycling training on Friday - without cleats.

At this morning's session we started off with a warmup on the bike. I may have mentioned (ok, I know I did) that I hate this. I lasted the ten minutes. Krissi cranked up the resistance for the last 90 seconds which was typical PT sadism. I mean that in the nicest way - it's good to have the challenge but I don't have to like it. Then came my favourite part of the session - the stretching. All the stretches are great but there one stretch in particular that I find wonderful, where Krissi leans on the bottom of my foot. I know that's a lousy description, but I'm not going to try to explain how it works. It's enough that my calves love the stretch.

Now this session was only today, but I'm probably going to forget the order / no of reps etc. We started off with hamstring curls. We did three sets of 15. I mentioned that I was really feeling them in my calves and Krissi explained to me where I was going wrong. I don't know why I waited until the end to mention it instead of saying something in the first set. After that we did calf raises, which really burned after the second set. We then did chest presses. I managed 15 reps at 7.5 kg for the first set but I kind of crumbled at 10 reps in the second set. My left arm stopped coping. I have an impressive bruise on my left wrist from falling off my bike last week but I don't know if it was that or if it would have happened anyway. Krissi assisted me through another 5 reps but they were pretty much spaghetti.

After that I did an exercise but I didn't think to find out its name. It was using the wide bar, sitting down, leaning back and pulling the bar down to my chest while keeping my shoulders down. It's probably got some blindingly obvious name. I'll have to ask Krissi next time. Anyway, I did two sets of 12 or 15 reps at some weight or the other. Yep, I was paying close attention. After each set Krissi had me doing the plank for 1 minute. It's good when Krissi is timing me - on my own I give up much sooner.

For abs exercises Krissi had me starting off with situps. My legs were bent and my feet were together. Krissi held my toes down while I started off with my hands on my quads. I was to slide them up my legs as I sat up. At first I was all back and shoulders, but Krissi gave me a tip. Instead of thinking about sitting up with my abs she got me to think about moving my hands smoothly along my legs. That worked really well. Once I managed that she got me to think about rolling back down one vertebrae at a time instead of flopping. I think we did 12 of these the first time and 10 the second time. I was definitely struggling towards the end of the set the second time.

After the situps I was doing crunches, with my legs closer to my backside and my arms straight up in the air holding a 3 kg medicine ball. To do the crunches I was raising the ball. It was a small movement that resulted in quite an effective crunch. I don't remember how many of these we did. After that I did reverse crunches. Krissi had me concentrating on lifting with my abs and not worrying about how far my feet moved. Again, a small movement but effective. I felt absolutely great when I was walking home.

On the bike confidence front, I've applied to join a course run by Pedal Power ACT. It's called "New Horizons for Women - 2008", aims to improve cycling skills, and is run over nine weeks, starting in mid-February. I hear that places go fast, so I'll have to wait to hear if they have room for me.

On the half marathon front, I've just discovered that the ACT Cross Country Club runs a training group aimed at novices. There's an info session on that in mid-February too.

Squash and postponed triathlon

2008-01-20T20:52:00.000+11:00

Last Thursday night I played squash with Murali. I was so organised. I had my racket out on the kitchen bench, ready to go. I got my gear together, packed my contact lenses, made sure I had my knee bandage and headed out the door - minus squash racket. When I got to the court I changed, hired a racket, and headed out to play - minus contacts and knee bandage. This week I'm just going to leave it all to chance and see what happens.

We had a much better game this week. The two of us managed to hit the ball more often. It was our typical epic contest, being decided in five. This time Murali won. He got quite excited early on as he won two games in a row. He claims it's the first time he's managed that. I'm taking his word for it as I haven't been paying that kind of attention to our results. I'm not looking forward to the day that he wipes me out in three. I'm going to have to hit my brother-in-law up for some coaching to make sure that I delay that day as long as possible.

On the triathlon front, I've decided to postpone my triathlon debut. I'm not going to enter the one I've been training for. I've managed to get myself into quite a state over riding my bicycle. I couldn't sleep on Thursday night because I was so worried about going to the cycling training on Friday morning. I was ok about the whole thing the day before, even after falling off, but then I had time to think about what happened. I fell off because I hadn't coped with the steep driveway. I realised that there were plenty of situations out there when I didn't cope very well (I'm a nervous bike rider) and so there were lots of times when I would be in danger of falling off. I figure I have to build up my general riding skills before I go riding in bunches on the road. At the moment I'm a danger to myself and to anyone unlucky enough to be riding anywhere near me.

It was really hard to tell people that I was going to pull the pin on this triathlon. I was grumpy as anything at work on Friday. Mind you, that might have been the broken night's sleep rather than the triathlon decision.

I ended up not exercising on Friday (I skipped cycling training) or Saturday (it rained). I went for a 4 km walk with Alex today and then to brunch with the running girls. I'll get back into it properly this week.

**Edit**

My mum's back in hospital. She's not been well. She kept saying she thought she'd be better than she was. We all reassured her by telling her that she was recovering from major surgery and that it would take time. Even her doctor, who is wonderful, told her that. Anyway, last week she saw her doctor again and was taken straight to hospital. She has fluid on her lungs. They are trying to determine the cause at the moment. She's in a queue for a test that will examine her new heart valve to see if it's leaking. Hopefully that will happen in the next couple of days. If her heart valve is the problem then she will have to have the operation all over again. That's the worst case scenario. Needless to say, we're all hoping that's not the case.

I'm a great believer in the power of positive thinking. If you have good thoughts you can send her way, then I'm sure they will help her recovery. Those of you who pray - we'd really appreciate your prayers at this time.

It sounded like a great idea at the time

2008-01-16T21:56:00.001+11:00

You may have noticed that I haven't been riding my bike much. That's going to be a problem when I'm doing the cycling leg of the triathlon. I've been agonising between trying to ride with cleats and giving up on the idea completely. In the meantime I haven't been out on the bike.

Krissi sent me an email, suggesting that we use this morning's PT session to check out how I get on and off the bike while I was wearing ordinary shoes and then make the transition to cleats. I thought it was a great idea, even though I was as nervous as anything. I was so tense when I got to her place that I was sure my heart must be beating at 100 miles a second. Great for calorie burning of course.

We headed over to the park on our bikes. Krissi explained that she wanted me to pretend I was wearing cleats. I was to do the click out action, brake, step off the bike, and then dismount. She observed me a few times and worked out what I need to do to survive cleats. Even without the cleats it took concentration. I've recently realised that I was very sloppy about getting off the bike. I had all sorts of bad habits. Anyway, I now have a "method". After we rode for about 20 minutes, which seemed much longer, I finally worked up the courage to try the cleats. I was still incredibly stressed but I figured I was getting a great opportunity to make the switch and that I should take advantage of it.

Well, I managed it. I think I was hyperventilating but I was trying to do it in a really "I'm cool with all this" sort of way that wasn't fooling anyone. Krissi mentioned the look of terror on my face a few times. Still, I clicked in, clicked out, braked, stepped down, and dismounted over and over again. We decided that I'm going to dismount onto the right side of the bike as a way of avoiding pancaking to the left. I couldn't see how this would work in traffic. Krissi looked at me with confusion and then started to laugh before asking "Why would you want to dismount in traffic?" It was a pretty good point.

After I'd conquered the park, Krissi took me on a ride around the block. We managed fine. I did some practising getting on and off the bike and I was feeling pretty pleased with myself. We rode up the driveway to her building and that's when it happened. I hadn't dropped the gear for the hill and I got myself into an awful mess. I had time to say "I'm in trouble" and then I was falling down. I managed to hit myself in the face with the handlebars and I collected my wrist on the way. I scrambled to my feet and picked up my bike with Krissi's help. As we were doing this a car came out of the garage, swerved around us (we were in the middle of the driveway) and kept going. I was pretty unimpressed that the driver wasn't able to wait for me to get to my feet but she was busy talking on a mobile phone. She did hesitate for a moment, looked annoyed that we were in her way, and then kept going.

I was really shaken by the fall. I had that whole adrenaline rush going, then a few minutes later I was faint and felt like I needed to sit down. I got over it, but I wouldn't get back on the bike to ride with the cleats. I was too rattled. I'll get back another time. I did ride home using my normal shoes. I figured cleats and pedestrians were too much for me, but there weren't too many pedestrians as it happened. I was so glad to get home though.

Krissi was great. I'm sure she was disappointed that I crashed after such a positive session, but she kept being as encouraging as ever. If she hadn't made the offer to help me today I'm sure I would have changed the pedals back over. Now I've gotten some confidence back. I guess I'll fall over a few more times, but hey, apparently everybody does it. Well, almost everybody.

At the very least I won't be changing the pedals back before the triathlon. I know I can ride the bike in ordinary shoes with the new pedals. There goes my excuse for not being out there practising. I'd better get serious about working on my bike fitness.

Tomorrow I have squash, which is my favourite activity of all.

Lots to catch up on

2008-01-16T21:27:00.000+11:00

On Monday I was at the swim training session for the triathlon. This was our last session in the pool. There seemed to be a lot of people in our lane. I think some of the women who were at the first session and then disappeared have made New Year's resolutions that involved showing up again.

I wore contact lenses in the pool today. I decided to try them out as I had visions of coming out of the water and not being able to find my bike. I hadn't realised that I'd walk out of the store with trial lenses. Well, it certainly added to the experience. There are all sorts of marks on the bottom of the pool. It makes it easier when you can see people. There's chicken wire on the roof.

We were swimming along when I got promoted to the second lane. I figured there really must be a lot of people in the lane for me to get promoted. Anyway, I wasn't too pleased as I've observed that the usual trainer for that lane is pretty ordinary. (Yep, she's a volunteer and I'm criticising, but hey, who wouldn't be disappointed going from a good trainer to a not as good trainer.) Luckily for me there was a second trainer and she really helped me improve my stroke. By the end of the session I was swimming much better than I had been.

After we'd warmed up those of us doing the short triathlon (200 m swim) were asked to swim 300 m without stopping. It's a 25 m pool, so that meant I had to swim 12 laps non-stop. I managed it and decided to try for 400 m. I managed that too. Yay me! It was good to know that I could do it. I'm going to have to try to do the same thing in a 50 m pool.

On Tuesday I was at the gym. I really should have gotten up in the morning to run, but I decided to squeeze a short run in between Personal Training and Yoga. I was at the gym for two and a half hours and had a great time. It was my first PT session back with Julia. She'd had a great holiday in Tasmania and has her parents on fitness programs now.

We did the same session we'd been doing before Christmas. I did the squats to 30 degrees and held each fifth one for ages. It seems really easy to do the squats but I started to feel it in my abs and back. I then did the chest press - 12 reps at 9 kgs and triceps push backs - 15 reps at 4 kg. Two sets of each. I struggled with the chest press but made it. I followed that up with the bent over row - two sets of 15 reps at 12.5 kg. I keep thinking I'm ready for the next weight, but by the 10th row my back is letting me know that I still have a way to go. We then did some abs exercises - that twist thing with the medicine ball - 2 sets of 20 reps with a 4 kg medicine ball with a set of leg extensions in the middle - one leg, then the other, then both. I managed 10 of them. Ouch. The second set of twists was hard work after that. Some stretching and we were done. Normally we wouldn't have done so much abs work but Julia gave me a 45 min session as she had a free half hour between clients. It was a nice bonus for me.

I had planned to do a longer run, but I only had half an hour before yoga. I started off at 7.5 km/h for 10 mins and then did three sets of 1 min intervals (9/6) followed by running until I made 3 km, and then a cool down. All up about 25 mins. I then changed my top for yoga. Fortunately it was on, which I was really pleased to discover.

It was a dynamic yoga session and we spent most of the time on our feet. I really enjoyed it. I felt like I handled the poses pretty well. I'm still having difficulty with some of the transitions, but I'm getting closer all the time. There was only one thing I had to skip because of my knee and I can't manage that one anyway. It's the duck waddle. I felt like I "got" the side bend today. That's the one from Warrior 2, for those of you that know something about yoga. It was a geat session and I felt so good after all the stretching.

This morning I had PT with Krissi. I'm going to blog about that separately as it was rather amusing.

Walking, running and yoga

2008-01-13T12:12:00.001+11:00

Yesterday my exercise didn't go to plan at all, yet I had a lovely day. I went for a walk with my mother and sister on Altona Beach. Well, let me clarify that. We went to Altona Beach. Janet and Mum went for a walk on the pier while I headed off along the path beside the beach. I didn't actually step onto the beach at any stage and I didn't walk with the other two.

Mum has to walk each day as part of her recovery from her heart operation, so Janet has been accompanying her on her slow progressions from seat to seat at various locations. They invited me along, but told me that I could go off at my pace while they watched the fishermen, the boats, the waves, etc. I felt like I'd be disappointing them if I didn't head off into the distance. I took my trusty ipod and my phone, so my walk was really a ramble. I ended up being out there for an hour all up. I have a little sunburn. This incidental exercise can be dangerous!

This morning I met up with Kathryn for a run at Princess Park followed by Yoga in the Park. I'm really enjoying these runs. Apart from the great company, there's the added incentive of keeping up! I run a little faster with Kathryn than I do on my own, which has got to be good for me. Not that this morning's run was anything to write home about. It's that time of month, and I get the feeling that it's going to be one of those "drain every ounce of energy out of you" experiences instead of an "I'm so strong I can do anything" one. I usually get the second type so I'm a pathetic wuss when it's the first kind. I kept dropping back to a walk. I burnt 510 calories covering 6.35 km in 53 minutes though, so it was a great run from a calorie counting point of view.

We followed the run up with a yoga session. It was lovely, doing yoga in the park. I have only ever done it inside before. I'm glad I had this experience. Being barefoot on the ground, hearing birds, seeing blue skies and trees, and feeling the rain (yes, it rained but only lightly a few times) all made for a wonderful class. I'll definitely do that again when I'm next in Melbourne. Apparently the class will be there until mid-March.

I'm in negative calories for the day at the moment on Calorie King. Kathryn and I were chatting about it as we ran, but I hadn't expected that today's effort would get me there. I like being this far ahead for the day as it means I can think about having pizza or something else that usually doesn't make it onto the daily menu. I probably won't, but it's nice to have the option.

Kathryn and I were also talking about how hard it is to get enough protein. She's done the sensible thing and bought herself some protein powder. I really should think about that too. I might just think about it for a while though.

Squash at last!

2008-01-11T07:39:00.000+11:00

Who knew the queue to change a daycare session could be so long? Mihir just isn't happy to be upstairs while Murali is down on the court playing. It doesn't matter how much he likes the person looking after him as he's Daddy's boy. At long last Murali rang me with the news that the child care situation is sorted and booked me in for squash on Thursday for the next twelve months. Murali is as keen to play as I am!

I was so excited that I left my racquet out with my house keys so that I wouldn't forget it. I normally don't get my stuff ready the night before but squash is different. There was a moment when I was thinking "should I do this with my knee?" but then I thought "this is squash, the pain will be worth it". (JoJo, I so understand why you want to be back out there playing.) We even had a hot day in Canberra yesterday, which meant that the courts were going to be stinking hot. Just our luck but it wasn't going to deter us either.

Of course, neither of us has practised during our break, so we had the usual complete misses, shots off the wood, returns that managed to hit three walls out of court, balls bouncing off the lights etc. There was plenty of opportunity to giggle. At one stage Murali managed to hit himself with his racquet. I apologised for laughing when he'd hurt himself but then told him quite seriously that I had to laugh because it was so funny. He stopped laughing long enough to accept my apology. At least neither of us managed to clobber the other. We also didn't crash into each other, mainly because neither of us was match fit enough to run after the ball with that level of commitment.

We managed to play four games before completely expiring. I am so looking forward to next week's game. Oh, and my knee is fine. I wore the support bandage, which was meant to remind me to be careful. I'm not sure that it succeeded, but I didn't manage to twist it or do anything silly like that.

I skipped the other exercise for the day as I figured I'd burn enough calories playing squash. (I'd forgotten how much it makes you sweat!) I'm having to keep an eye on my calorie intake as I didn't eat enough on Tuesday. How's that? Amazing! I was so busy and I didn't write down my food intake on the day. It wasn't until I filled it in on Thursday that I realised. No wonder I was obsessing about food! It always catches up with you.

On the weight loss front, I've lost a kg. Yay me! Only 25 to go. I won't update my ticker until I weigh myself in Melbourne, as the scales there is my gospel scales.

Today I'm having a rest day and I'm running on Saturday and Sunday. I'll try to get to the pool and find an exercise bike. Hmm, I think Fernwood in Altona have both. There's a plan.

I found out yesterday that the Women and Girl's triathlon course has changed and that the short option is now 200m swim / 9km ride / 2 km run instead of the 400/14/4 I was expecting. I feel a lot more confident about getting through the swim leg without drowning. That's got to be good.

Well, I'd better head off to work now. I keep missing the morning bus lately so I want to actually catch one this week!