Tag Archives: My Fitness Pal

I’m Bored…

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wpid-tumblr_n3v8hnunug1sffwkfo1_400.jpgYes, it’s taper time for me, and I find myself stagnating.  I feel kinda lazy, kinda not motivated, kinda blah… It’s weird how that works as running is not one of my most favorite things to do, but I have a goal and I feel like I’m not actively working towards my goal as I can only do so much for the next 7 days.  So what does a person who is tapering think about?  Their NEXT race, of course, and how to improve their time and fitness!!  And bread.  Freshly baked bread hot out of the oven with butter on top… OMG… that sounds heavenly.  Blame James for that last image… he’s the one who started talking about fresh baked bread which is a no-no in our house while we’re training (per me, not him).

But hey, as I’m on the subject of bread, I thought I would give an update on my weight loss.  I hit a very nasty plateau back in July.  I had lost 8 pounds or so and couldn’t get the scale to budge at all for half of June and all of July, but I managed to make it move again at the beginning of August.  A 6-week plateau is enough to kill anyone, but persistence and consistency was the key, and I never gave up.  I have now lost over 18 pounds in total.  I am meticulous about logging my food in MyFitnessPal, and, the biggie, I think my metabolism has kicked into high gear with all this silly running I’m doing.  Eh.  Just a small side note.  That’s also 18 pounds I don’t have to carry around during my race.

490 calories of sheer heaven! I will treat myself to one after my race! :)

490 calories of sheer heaven! I will treat myself to one after my race! 🙂 … or not…

 

Okay, so one thing I do when I’m not running… I read about running.  We do subscribe to Runner’s World magazine, and we fight over who gets to read the latest issue first (this is getting to be an obsession, isn’t it), but I was playing online today and I came across an article in Runner’s World online, “How Many Miles A Week Should I Run?”  If you check this article out, never mind the beginning blah-blah-blah part… skip down to the bottom where the charts are. For “mortal” people (meaning the non-elite) that are running a half-marathon, mileage should be about 30 to 40 miles per week.  Ouch.  I run between 16 to 20.

Does this mean I’m going to fail next week?  Noooo, of course not.  As I’ve said, if I have to crawl across the finish line, I will get that bling.  But this information gives me something more to strive for (and I don’t care that I ended my sentence in a preposition).  I have the Maui half coming up in January, so I can aim for 20 to 25 miles per week during that training cycle, then after that will be Kansas which I’ll aim for 25 to 30 miles per week.  Ahhh, see the slow progression?  One day, I’m going to run a half in 2 hours… maybe next year, maybe the year after, but I will never stop trying.  And don’t ever tell me that I can’t, because I can guarantee you one day I will.

Happy Running!

 

Running, Weight Loss, and Taco Tuesday!

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slow-progress-is-still-progressI did not want to get up this morning.  I did not want to run this morning.  But I did.  And I’m better off for it.  It added extra calories to My Fitness Pal for my overall consumption, to which I could then indulge tonight with… yes, you guessed it… tacos!!

However, back to the morning run… again I was filled with all sorts of negativity about my running and progress. How am I ever going to reach my goal pace by September?  I’m at a standstill and can’t seem to go any faster.  What am I going to do to get faster?  I never mentioned these nagging thoughts to my husband though.  When he came home from work tonight and we recapped our day’s events, he must have sensed I needed a little pick-me-up.  He said something that related to everything I was thinking this morning… “Don’t worry about your pace. You keep running like this, and it will eventually go down.  Even if it’s not until next year, it will go down.”  Ahhhh, good point.  Eventually it will go down.  While I wish I could run as fast as he can, I can’t, and to be honest, I don’t think I will ever be able to run that fast, but I do have hope that I will one day cross the finish line in the middle of the crowd, not in the back.  Thanks for the encouragement, hunny bunny… I needed that.

My very first half marathon, Rock and Roll Seattle, 2014

My very first half marathon, Rock and Roll Seattle, 2014

On another up note for today, I can officially say that I have beat that Stoopid Scale.  Since I began with the My Fitness Pal app back in May, as of this week, I have solidly lost 10 pounds. That’s 10 pounds in about 2-1/2 months.  Slow going, but it’s a solid loss and it ain’t coming back.  You can see how much I don’t sit on my posterior, and I take in a healthy 1300 to 1600 calories per day.  I eat rubbish like quinoa, wheatberries, flax seed, sweet potatoes, and whole wheat pasta for my carb loads, and I eat a ton of protein.  While I won’t give into the low-carb fad, I do occasionally skip carbs in the evening and just have veggies and protein.  I usually always have some type of dessert, be it a pudding pack with whip cream, a Skinny Cow Ice Cream, or a slice of pound cake with whip cream (nothing more than 100 calories), and I always have a happy hour celebration on Friday night.  I don’t and won’t miss out on anything.  Been there, done that, ain’t doing it again.  Anyway… time to move forward and focus on the next 10 pounds!!

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Training plan for Boise… OMG. Half-way through it.

 

I have just begun my 6th week of training for Boise.  Will I progress enough to hit my original goal?  Or will I have to wait until the Maui Half in January to reap the benefits of my hard work? Time will tell… but for now… it’s Taco Time!!

Week 4 training… done! Yowsa!

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I have to say, going to Boise definitely presented all kinds of challenges with the running plan this weekend!  The constant go-go-go can leave one feeling exhausted, not to mention all the mileage The Motivator talked me into running!  I ended the weekend with what was supposed to be a quick 3-miler on Sunday (the day after my 7-mile run on Saturday).  However, I only had it in me to complete 2-1/2.  The Boise heat and the sun… total energy zappers!  I was feeling pretty grim about it until The Motivator told me was having the same issues.  He did manage to run 5 miles on Sunday (the day after his long run too), but it was a very hard 5 miles thanks to the aforementioned heat and sun.

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The run on Sunday was along this greenbelt in Nampa, ID.

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A great excuse to take a walk break… ducks!!

We’re back home now at sea level in a nice normal temperature (it’s all of 64 degrees F right now, ahhhhh).  I’m looking forward to starting my week 5 training in the morning with a nice cool run in the 50s.  This next week I’ll be running 3-4-3 and then a big 8 next Sunday!  Again, at least I’ll be cool, and what doesn’t kill us (like that freaking heat) makes us stronger, right?!

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On the up note, during our quick trip down south, James and I stopped at an REI in Kennewick, WA.  Looky what he bought me!  I have a super wonderful husband indeed! After the numerous syncing and re-syncing issues we had with it, I think it’s finally working properly and living up to its hype! I have it linked to Garmin Connect, Strava, My Fitness Pal, my email, my texts, my music, my weather, and my elevation!  I also have it set for intervals!  Brilliant!  If it weren’t for this brand new watch, I’m thinking my 7-miler and 2.5-miler probably wouldn’t have happened this weekend.  One thing’s for sure… he does know how to motivate me.  🙂

My Recent Weight-Loss Plateau

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My husband and I started using the My Fitness Pal app to record our food intake on a daily basis.  It’s a well-known fact that if you’re honest and document every single little morsel that goes into your mouth, it will prompt you to make better choices if your true goal is weight loss or to eat healthier.  We are also “friends” on this app so that we can support each other in every success (or slip-up) that we may have in regards to diet and weight loss.

James wants to lose weight because he’s training for the Chicago Marathon that he’ll be running in October.  The thinner he is, the better chance he has of getting his sub-zero race time for which he’s aiming (okay, perhaps not really sub-zero, but it may as well be in my mind, hehe).  And I just plain want to lose weight, but of course losing weight will also help me with my goal to shave time off my race pace too, so it’s all win-win.  James has been doing the My Fitness Pal thing for 2 months and has already achieved his perceived race-weight goal, for which he has now made his goal an additional 5 pounds less.  I have been doing this for a month and a half and I’ve bottomed out at 8 pounds.

And they aren’t kidding when they say your metabolism changes after you hit 40.  I run faster backwards than what my metabolism runs forward!   As a matter of fact, I’m beginning to think my metabolism IS running backwards just to mess with me as it’s a constant uphill struggle!  For the past 3 weeks, my weight has teetered between the same 2 to 3 pounds… down 2, up 1, down 0.5, up 2, and so on and so forth.  You would think that a person in training who is dieting and eating healthy wouldn’t have such weight-loss problems, but oh, not so.

To keep my spirits up, I’ve decided to forgive my metabolism for running backwards for the time being.  I now like to think of my silly little weight-loss plateau as a way for my body to re-baseline itself.  My body apparently likes the weight its at for the moment for whatever reason and doesn’t want to lose any more.  At least for the moment.  But my will and patience is a lot stronger than that, and giving up is not an option.  One day very soon, I know that the scale will start going down again… and I know that I will be celebrating my 10-pound weight-loss milestone… because I know this is actually one event that I will… without a doubt… win.