Running

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Some running and much weight loss

I ran two days in a row.

It seemed to go well.  Yesterday evening my back was sore, but not until I went to bed.  This morning I am fine though.

So I think I am progressing past this very strange injury.  I am trying to slow down my runs and walk slower at work.  I tend to walk between 2 – 3 miles a day at work and have so much to do, I’ve learned to walk briskly.  I honestly think this is much of my problem since the pain in my back is always worse in the afternoon.  I am also making sure I get up from my chair every 20 – 30 minutes to stretch and walk some.  This has also helped.

The body is a complicated thing, especially mine.  I guess 40+ years of inactivity has caught up with me now that I am active again.

I am still losing weight.  This morning the scales weight in at 181.8 which is my lowest weight since before my marathon last Fall.  On top of that, I am wearing pants that wen’t close to fitting me 2 months ago and now they feel fine.  I’m thrilled that I finally am getting my weight under control.. and.. wait for it… yes, I attribute it to apple cider vinegar (ACV).  I started taking my 2 Tbs of unfiltered ACV twice a day a couple of months ago.  Back then I weighed in regularly in the mid to upper 190’s.  So, to be conservative, I’ve lost over 15 lbs in the past few months.  This includes pizza on fridays and burgers on Sundays.  I honestly think the key is exercise and consistency taking it.  It took well over 4 weeks for me to see a weight loss.  The only thing that kept me going was it also gave me energy for my afternoon runs.

The cool thing about ACV is that I don’t feel like I am dieting.  I do watch what I eat, but I am not hungry.  Yesterday I even turned down cake at work!  I’ve never done that before.

So I honestly can’t complain.  Even with my 5 days off running last week because of my back, I am still keeping my weight down.

Now if I could only run as fast as I want to, all would be good.

Have an awesome last half of the week!!!

Tom

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What if everybody ran?

This is an interesting campaign.

Mizuno Baton (Click here)

Simply download the app and follow the instructions:

Mizuno Batan App

Simple!

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Be kind, always!

Saw this on Twitter yesterday

Saw this on Twitter yesterday

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The Runner’s Paradox

It was a long weekend trying to rest so that my back would feel better.

I tried, but didn’t succeed.

No, I didn’t run.  That would have been a mistake and I’ve made that mistake in the past.

Unfortunately my Lovely Wife, who has had a bad back for 3 years with 2 ruptured disks, woke up Saturday morning with what seemed to be a pinched nerve in her back.  She was a trooper and went out with me to do errands all weekend.  My only issue was helping her in and out of the car, which was not easy with my own messed up back.  She was better by last night, so hopefully she is on the mend – as much as one can be on the mend with 2 ruptured disks.

Then there was the toilet that broke.  I had to try to replace the insides of this toilet that I “fixed” 3 weeks ago.  That was an hour of leaning over a toilet and without a hangover to enjoy (just kidding).

Finally, between Church Sunday morning (Catholics do a lot of kneeling) and fixing TJ’s broken deadbolt, I don’t think I am in much better shape then when the weekend began.

On a good note, I slept well and am still below 185 lbs, which after pizza on Friday night and burgers last night, I’m thrilled.

Back to running (pun intended), I may try some easy miles this afternoon.  I’ll have to see  how I feel when I get home.  I am in the runners paradox.  Do I try to run to keep in the best shape of my life, or do I keep resting even though it hasn’t done much for me?  To be honest, while I am running I don’t feel any pain.  It seems to come on me after walking all day (I average 2 – 3 miles walking a day at work).  I tend to walk fast in order to get a lot done, but today I am going to slow it way down and see if that helps.

I miss running!

Tom

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A pain in the back

After all my work not to get injured post half marathon… you guessed it… my aching back.

I’m not sure what the problem is, but I was in so much pain last night, it was hard to sleep.  Strangely, while I run the pain goes away and then by the next day it seems to get worse.

So, I am taking more time off to recuperate, per my Lovely Wife’s advice and see if I can’t nip it in the bud.  Yesterday was the first “normal” weekday in forever that I didn’t run or walk.  I’m not to happy about it, but I really don’t want to make things worse.

On the bright side, my weight is lower then it has been in 10 months.  ACV is the only thing I can attribute it to.  In fact I eat poorly last weekend, so by Monday I weighed 189 lbs.  Today I weighed below 185.

Now if I can just stop getting hurt after my races, I’ll be fine!!!

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I write to run

“I write to run.”

Hmmm.  I was thinking about this yesterday during my slow run.  I guess since I wasn’t pushing so hard that I couldn’t think, I had time to ponder of why I write this blog.

My writing has changed my running in so many ways.  I never thought it would have the affect it has had.

When I started writing this blog in January of 2013, I wrote to keep a diary of my running.  I had been running for a year before I began journaling my runs through this blog.  When I started writing, I had no followers.  I wasn’t on Twitter, Facebook or any other social media.  I’m still not on Facebook… but I digress.  Basically the only way people found this blog was pretty much by accident.

I have found that by writing my running experiences down, I remember what I have done correctly and what I have done wrong.  For instance, I wrote several times recently about altering my running after my half marathon.  This is because I wrote so much about my injures after my marathon last year that I remembered what had happened.  By writing what I was going to do this year, it cemented my plan in my head and kept me on the right path.

I don’t read much.

People make fun of me sometimes that in order to read a book, I need big words and lots of pictures.  I have never really enjoyed reading much, even as a kid.  I don’t know why.  I say that to say, I’ve learned most of the lessons in my life by experience.  That can be good, but also it can be bad.  When I started running, TJ was a HUGE help to get me going and doing the right things.  When I started this blog, I began reading other bloggers and their experiences and tips.  Also, the comments and feedback from other bloggers on my blog has helped a lot.

But…

I still learn from experience.  Thus another reason to write this blog.  As I learn a lesson, I write about it… good or bad.  If something helps me a lot, like my mountain runs or ACV, I’ll write about it more.  Of course I want to share my experiences with other runners now that I have a good following, but also I want to always remember the lessons learned.  If I write it down, I remember it!  In college I learned (rather late in my schooling) that I could take good notes in class, rewrite them in a condensed form the day before the exam.  Then that night I would read my condensed notes right before I went to bed.  The next morning I could “see” my notes in my head as if I had perfect photographic recall.  As the day went on, they faded, but talk about the perfect cheat sheet.  I went from a 2.0 average to being on the Deans List my last semester.

All this is to explain why I write this blog…  I do want to share my experiences.  I do want to get feedback and that really motivates me.  In the end though, I do it for myself.  Sorry.  I guess I’m selfish that way.

Have an awesome weekend.

Tom

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Fast slow run or Slow fast run

I decided to walk yesterday as after my run on Tuesday my back was not happy.

However, as I got about a half mile into my walk, I was feeling fine and thought that I’d try running slowly and with little pounding.

Confession: I have a hard time with a LSD (Long Slow Distance) or any slow distance.  I don’t say this to brag, but to confess a weakness.  When I run, I do run to feel, but after a bit I am running faster then I should on an easy run.  Of course I have the faster runs down, but doing a fast run everyday is bad, not only for my body, but also for my mind.  If I am running hard everyday, then I am always pushing myself and never just enjoying the run.

So my goal is to slow down, especially now that it is getting hot out.

Back to yesterday.  I achieved my goal… sort of…

I managed to run about a minute a mile slower then my normal runs have been over the past month.  It felt really good.  I wasn’t huffing and puffing.  I wasn’t tired.  In fact I received a call about 2.5 miles into my run and answered in a normal conversational voice.

I have been reading about bloggers who are going beyond the marathon.  You ultra marathon runners really impress me.  A coworker had a friend in NY who ran 50 miles last weekend.  That would be a cool goal.  If I could just run at a pace that was comfortable and run longer, that would be awesome and maybe one day I could do something beyond what I have already accomplished.

My goal for the time being is to slow down, especially for the summer.  I’ll keep running my mountains and doing faster runs and workouts, but on my normal average day, I will try to develop a running style that has much less impact and will allow me to go further with less effort.

Sounds like something I should have figured out before now… huh?

Tom

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Recovery by feel

Yesterday I had a good run.

I am trying to run to feel after my last race.  Monday I didn’t run as my heel and hip were sore from my mountain run on Sunday.

I went out yesterday and felt really good.  I got a mile and a half into my run and noticed I was at a 7:15 pace.  Not good, as the heat index was getting close to 90 and the weather had been cool lately.  By the time I got to the two mile mark, I was really feeling the fatigue.  So I walked.  I walked 3 times during my run.  I’ve decided that I’m going to work at not doing the things that have injured me in the past.

Here is my plan:

  • Run to feel.
  • Run 4 miles a day during the week and 8 on a weekend day.
  • Don’t increase my mileage until I can run 2 weeks straight without pain.
  • If I have a bad day, walk the next day.
  • Walk every day that I feel badly.
  • Have fun and don’t push it.

I don’t have another race for a month and that is a 5K, so I have time to take my race recovery slow.  It usually takes me a month or so to recover fully from a hard run race.  I think that is because I come back too quickly and I push too hard.  I have to remember that I have only been running for 26 months and though I am in the best physical condition of my life, I am over 50 years old.

Yesterday, after my run, my hip/back hurt.  I was actually hurting quite a bit, so I’ll won’t decide if I am running at all today until I see how I feel this afternoon.

Have an awesome day and I hope my musings help someone “out there”.

Tom

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The “Key” to Running Better

Over the past 20 years or so of my life, I have found out that in almost every difficult situation there is a “key” to making change happen.

What I am alluding to is that, for example, circumstances that are difficult in life can be like being in a pitch back room and continually running into walls with no way out.  The thing is that there is a door and a key to open that door near you .  All you need to know is how to get the key to turn and the door will open and things will suddenly work out.

This sounds philosophical, but honestly it is amazing how this works in everyday life, including running.

An example from my running life is the mountain I run.  I ran several times to the base of the mountain and at the left turn that went up the mountain, I turned around and went the other direction.  I got so close, but I didn’t know that the key to the door of running fast, more efficient and with less injury, was literally a left turn away from me.  It was like I was in a dark room with a door and a key, but I never unlocked that door and walked through until… one day with TJ.  We decided to see where that road went.  That left turn was the key that changed my running life in a way that nothing else has ever done!

Another example is Apple Cider Vinegar (ACV).  I wrote about this on this blog a month or two ago several times.  Not only has it helped my running in the afternoons by giving me something I had to have been missing, but over the past two months, my weight, which had plateaued at 192, has gone down 7 lbs to 185.  Even pizza night doesn’t seem to affect me much anymore.

I could go on and on.  In just about every area of my life this principle has helped.  I constantly pray for wisdom so that I can find the keys to shut doors in my life.

I guess I hope that there may be keys in your life to open doors to which you just haven’t paid attention.  It is an amazing feeling to find a key and suddenly realize there is a simple solution to a complex problem and it has been right in front of you!

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Back on top

Image (c) 278toboston 🙂

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Learning running lessons from the past

Running is the ultimate teacher.

If you want to do your best, then you have to learn from your friends, the help of other runners and your past mistakes.

I have run several hard races in the past.  After my first half marathon, I started having some hip problems.  After my marathon, I was out 3 months, off and on, with hip and foot issues.  I also got injured after running a 5K earlier this year.

Honestly, I don’t think it was the races that hurt me.  Looking back, I realize that I’ve pushed too hard AFTER the races to get back to training.  A few weeks after my marathon, I not only ran 10 days in a row, but also did a hard trail run a few weeks later.  That was the icing on the cake, that is my hip.  It was almost 6 months before I got back to a 100 mile month.

My last half marathon was last Saturday.  It was awesome.  I ran well and on a tough course.  I will look back and be excited for months about that race.

HOWEVER…

Tuesday, I decided to run my first run after the race.  It went well.  I ran 4 miles at an 8:21 pace.  Tuesday night I was in a lot of pain. My shoulder hurt and my hip was killing me.  Wednesday I concentrated on my shoulder as I was concerned that I pinched a nerve running.  That wasn’t the issue, it was just the way I slept.  I did however, ignore my hip pain.  It was in such pain I had to take medication to sleep.

Wednesday was the 30th of April and I was at 118 miles for the month.  I decided to run an easy 2 miles and walk the rest.  I didn’t.  I ran a fast two miles at my half marathon pace, but I did walk after that.

Yesterday I walked.  No running.

My hip is better.  No real pain.  Just a little pain while I drive which isn’t abnormal.  In fact I could have run yesterday.  I could run today.  I could run tomorrow.  I won’t.

I am going to learn from my mistakes in the past and come back slowly.  I have plenty of time until my next race.  I have a lot of mountains to run.  In fact my mountain running has been the one thing to help my hip more then anything else.  After several weeks of running my mountain on the weekend, I really had no pain left.  I think that strengthening my quads and all the muscles in my legs has taken the pressure off my hip.

So next Sunday will be my first run since my 2 miles on Wednesday.  I’ll run my mountain slowly and enjoy the run and take it easy.  I’ll play it by feel over the next few weeks as to how much I run.

I need to learn from my past.  Learn from friends.  Learn from other runners.  Learn from my mistakes.

If I don’t learn, I’ll never make my goal of qualifying for Boston.  I’ll run hurt, slow and probably have to stop.  I’d rather learn now and take it easy, then live with the pain of being stupid.

’nuff said.

Tom