The Life Ledger

Fitness is a way of life.

I ran a 5k race today. Well, run is a little generous - I ran parts and walked parts. All in all, I finished with a time of 38-something - not bad for my first run in 15 years. I couldn’t have done that without losing the 75lbs. First the hills were killer, then the flats were killer, then the entire process was a killer. At least I saved a sprint for the last.

I don’t know - I might try a couple more before I give up on running. I definitely enjoy biking, and volleyball season starts Monday, so there’s lots to keep me active. I sure do like the idea of running through the backlots of Disney though, and I don’t know that I’m ready to give up on that dream just yet.

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Well I’m dropping something down to let y’all know how it went. Don’t worry I’ll try to give more details in another post, as well as a picture of my number. But ya, I broke 24 minutes. That wasn’t an official goal I set for myself, but the fact is I usually run my normal runsat about an 8 minute mile.

Few quick things I can mention though…. And it’s probably good for other people to think about. For all my talk about running being a solo activity and testing yourself, it’s damn harder to do in person. Looking around there were lots of people in quality gear all appearing to be in great shape. It’s hard not to compare yourself to others. For all my noncompetitivenature, I was getting nervous. In fact I about psyched my self out with all the tension building up without a focus .

And I think that affects a lot of people. Whether it’s your first time or first in a long time, there is that sense of public scrutiny. How you handle that anxiety is another matter : raw self-confidence, pride, vanity, frugality, or whatever. Something that will get you to toe the line, waiting for the gun. For me, it was a little pride and vanity. I had brought along my cheerleader, my beautiful wife, and there was no way I was going to back down in front of her. Especially for fears that seem silly even in my own mind.

Pacing around at the line, I jockeyed for position. Didn’t want to get too far in front or too far back. Once the race started, all the built-up tension was focused and flowed out of me into my running. Sadly, it left a little present behind. Lactic acid in my arms. People may not think your arms get much of a work out while running, but proper and more efficient form uses the movement of your arms. By a mile and a half, my arms and shoulders were killing me. I had kept them so tense waiting for the race to startthat they were worthless. They hurt so bad I’ll even admit I walked 4 times, for about 5 seconds each time, because of the pain.

As is obvious from my numbers (60 out of ~250 and 7:43 min miles) it goes to show that you should NEVER go on appearances. You, and they, might be surprised as you pass them by before the end of the race.

Hey all. So tomorrow is the race.

I’ve got to say, I’m getting excited. Nervous ya, cause I haven’t raced in a long time. But excited too. When I ran yesterday to keep loose, per the Ipod I was hitting 1:50 quarter miles. I have no idea how that’s happening. But its encouraging to say the least. And I’m pretty much as prepared as I’m going to be. It’s more going to be a matter of running smart.

Running smart. Bet that sounds a little strange. If you’ve never done it before, running in a race is completely different than anything you can do on a treadmill or by yourself. Sounds like a good article for next week.

Just wanted to give a shout out to Adam Hansen of the Yippie Show and Marcel Janus of bone187 for marking us as a favorite on Technorati. If you haven’t done so yet, go a head and get it in tonight. I’ll check in the morning before I go out the door. And in case you forgot, the deal is I’m donating 5 $’s for each person who tags us as a favorite before the race. I’m glad to be donating 10 dollars so far but my wallet’s bigger than that. And two names aren’t going to cover much space on my number.

And I’ll describe more tomorrow or Sunday after the race, as well as posting a picture of my number. While I don’t need beauty sleep (wonderful side effect of being married), I do need sleep for the race. Waddle on.

Given what I was discussing about Karas I figured I’d ask how often ya’ll do cardio.

I was getting ready for work this morning, with the TV on in the background for noise. Good Morning America in fact. While I was listening, Diane Sawyer interviewed Jim Karas about his new book. I admit I didn’t give it my full attention, but what I heard kept catching my attention. Especially how he wrapped things up by promising fast results. This made me inherently wary. But I wandered by ABC News to give him a fair shake, and my full attention. Mind you these aren’t in any particular order, just fleshed out after listening a few times.

Karas referenced a study where 16 very fit women were told to cardio for 45 minutes 5 days a week. Low and behold these women didn’t loose any weight. My god! They even gained a pound! Horror of horrors. Gained a single pound. Given what’s known about water weight and daily fluctuation that’s easily explained away by statistics. But that alone doesn’t bug me.

What gets me is word choice he used - “…16 very fit women…” Very fit huh? That puts me in mind of women who already fit within current BMI standards of healthy weight. And even then, I would expect people who are already doing some sort of exercise to maintain that condition. Don’t stack your test subjects Karas to get the results you want.

And then came the great myth about knee problems. You know its funny he brought that up, considering it was weight machines that were causing me problems the other day. This isn’t to say injuries won’t happen, there is potential for that to happen no matter what you do. This is where education as well as proper equipment comes in.

What does that consist of for cardio? For running obviously a good pair of shoes that take care of pronation and ankle support for your running surface. other cardio machines or classes I would believe a good set of tennis or running shoes for similar reasons. But we can’t forget education. When it comes to running there are ways to improve the quality of your run. You can definitely get benefits Forby just putting one foot in front of the other, but you can improve your efficiency and effectiveness by learning to run “correctly”.

Does he expect people not to hurt themselves when doing weight machines? Probably not, but Karas would expect people to take a class or get educated in how to properly use everything. And from what I’ve learned so far from my lifting buddy you have to focus to do it right. Focus on pinching your shoulder blades. Or keeping your core tight. It’s kinda ironic that Karas thinks that running or cardio can be completely mindless as well. While I can’t comment on cardio classes, I know for running I have my form, stride, pace, and more I can focus on to make sure I’m doing properly. If I want to turn off my mind, sure it’s possible. Let the body move through habit and I can still work up a good sweat. But it won’t be as beneficial as if I was paying attention. But what to focus on takes education.

And education doesn’t include just the exercise. Karas brings up as fact that doing cardio makes people more hungry. Doing a straw poll, 5 of 5 disagreed with that. Personally it kills my appetite for the rest of the day, almost to the point I need to force myself to eat. At the same time, one of the reason I do run is to eat what I want. And I’m sure there are many others that do the same. So what’s wrong with trying to balance your increased intake with cardio?

Karas excellently hits on this point, specifically that most people aren’t aware of how much they are eating. The only way to counter this is by counting calories. Hurray! Something I can agree with. Only by counting everything can you get an honest assessment of your intake, which leads to controlling overeating.That’s the standard Point of Awareness like we talk about here, focused on food.

In fact I will say that part of Karas’s song and dance routine was a nice classic mantra. Weight loss is an equation of calories in minus calories out. The only thing that matters is how you modify those numbers. Eat less to reduce your intake. Exercise more in whatever fashion to increase how much you burn. I think Karas is trying to get known by being contrarian. Shock the status quo to get your name in the newspaper. But when comes to overall effectiveness, I’d be much more interested in long term results from a very different starting point than he indicates.