The Life Ledger

Fitness is a way of life.

Well you haven’t been hearing much from me this week. I large part of that is because I pulled back on my exercise. This past Saturday, I tried to do a little bit of speed work. Nothing crazy, just moving my feet faster on the treadmill. And about 10 minutes into the run, my knee started hurting. And was located where most runners blanch - in the IT Band, or otherwise known as Runner’s Knee.

Since the run was 14 days away, I cut back. Way back. In fact didn’t run on Monday specifically, so was able to have a 3 day break. Around comes Wednesday, strapped on my shoes and sweated out another 3.5 miles no problems. Mentally wiping my brow, I worked through the different machines for weight lifting. When I hit something called Thigh Adductor, there was enlightenment. And boy howdy was it sharp, right in my knee. Or more specifically, where I was hurting before. Apparently I’m just to tall for that machine to use properly. Keeping my feet on its rest it induces me to use my knees instead of my legs.

While this story shows my foolishness, its perfect for demonstrating what happens as you get into shape. Part of the whole process is breaking down your muscles to rebuild them stronger. So as you do things : run, walk, lift, bike, whatever, except to be sore. Heck even be ready to be hurt! But it’s important to listen where you hurt. There are two criteria I use. First if you have any pain in your joints, you’re doing something wrong. Using a machine wrong or putting tension where you shouldn’t it doesn’t matter. Stop. Ask a doctor or trainer. Look for more information on the internet. So being sore in your muscles are to be expected. But at the same time it should be a general sore, about the size of the heel of your hand. If its a sharp pain and the size of a finger tip, again get to the doctor. Most likely you’ve over exerted and torn something.

Becoming healthy is an important thing, but a gradual thing. Any attempts to instantly be there can cause lots of pain. And your body will know when you are pushing to hard, so listen. It will prevent you from getting hurt and keep you on the healthy path.

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I have accepted an invitation to run as part of a team in a 5k race with my coworkers in June. It’s a little frightening - although I used to run cross-country competitively in high school, as Dave can attest (he ran for a different school’s team) I wasn’t that good then, and 17 years later I haven’t aged like wine or fine cheese. Dave assures me two months is enough time to get used to the 5k distance - we’ll see. I’ll measure out 5k somewhere in my neighborhood and give it a go tomorrow morning. I haven’t committed yet, but I likely will.

I have finally had time to start messing with the look of The Life Ledger. I have probably one more day’s worth of tinkering to do, then we’ll be creating some original tools for our readers - charts, nutrition info, calculators and more. I’m looking forward to rolling it out over the next few weeks.

Oh, and I keep forgetting to mention - Dave and I got interviewed by the crew at Weight Loss Tips - you can read my interview here, and I expect Dave’s will get posted soon. Here’s an excerpt:

-Do you think it will be easy to fall back into your old lifestyle pattern? How do you prevent this from happening?

It took years to develop the habits that led to my weight-gain; I expect it will take a while to replace them with healthy habits. Some are easy, like no longer eating fast food (I pack my meals or find healthier alternatives); some are harder, like not snacking during meal preparation or grazing at gatherings. To prevent slipping back into old unhealthy habits, I practice awareness in two different ways:

1) I weigh daily. I don’t freak when my weight fluctuates from day to day, but I do watch for trends. I set an alarm weight of 5 lbs over my current weight; when I reach my alarm weight, I know I’m slipping back.

2) I count every calorie every day. Over time, I learn how to judge a meal’s caloric content without looking it up. Also, if I have to write down every bite I take while grazing at a party, I’m much less likely to eat it in the first place.

Read the full interview at wltips.com.

Oh, and one more thing - the wraps at Jersey Mike’s taste a whole lot better than Subway’s. I’ll have to look into the nutrition info.

So to get ready for my race on the 21th, I decided to put in a long distance run last night. Got home from work, laced up my shoes, grabbed the ipod, and out the door I went.

And about killed myself.

I ended up sweating out 2 pounds and decided to walk the quarter of the mile back to the house. All because I had forgotten a cardinal rule for running : Only increase your distance about 10% each week. While my record on here shows a progression of 2.5 miles and 3.4 miles, but I’ve been running the 5k distance, or 3.11 miles, before my karate classes. That gives me about 9 and half I’ve been running weekly for the past few weeks. By running 4.25, I need to keep right at 3 miles for my other 2 days this week.

The reason for this rule is to prevent a hard shock on the body. By increasing your distance by more 10%, a runner doesn’t usually get enough to time to properly recover. Heck by increasing your distance or exercising to hard you can actually end up losing whatever benefit you were attempting to gain. If your exercise drains you so much you can’t do your normal activities later, you’ve reduced the overall amount of calories you could have burnt for that day.

So for myself, I’ve got to re-learn old skills and not be an idiot. For our readers, push yourself to sensible limits. By flirting with those boundaries you are able to expand to do and accomplish. Waddle on.

My run today was great. I wandered off the Greenway’s a ways, and followed a dirt trail for about 10 minutes. There is something to be said for running trails. Besides the feeling being alone with your thoughts, the uncertainty of the ground can strengthen your ankles. Flowing over the ground lost in the music on your player. I love running to ska or punk. For those would like to try trail running, I would suggest taking a partner for safety. It’s something that takes abit to get used to, and in my case I would only have to push through 50 yards of woods tops to get help. If you do decide to run some trails there are some tools that can help you track where you go.

In fact this run wasn’t for getting ready for my race. I specifically kept it slow in order to get loose, and warm up my body for sparing that I knew was coming in karate. After 15 minutes of bull in the ring, I am officially a brown belt. Boy am I tired… Time to soak the feet and relax for awhile. Not that I mind, it’s a beautiful Spring day here.

And spring is here in full force. New green as far as the eye can see. And Yellow. As if a huge bag of cornmeal had burst open, dusting everything. On the cars, windows, roads. This past Tuesday oak pollen created clouds so dense they looked like smog hanging over the highway. While my white running shoes are bit yellow after today, my sinuses amazingly don’t seem to mind.

One of the most noticeable benefits brought on by my weight loss is the change in allergies. Before I used to be congested from March to May then September through October. Weather changes meant breaking out the sudafed or other drugs, buying so much bet their stock went up a tick. And even then the drugs didn’t do what was expected. What should have wired me, knocked me out. Nyquil seemed like sugar water.

So allergies was one of the primary reasons I started my running in winter. Contrary to what my wife may think, winters here aren’t that bad. Hat, gloves, and decent sweatshirt take care of most days when running. Only a few required me to break out a ski mask. And I had been able to get about 3 months under my belt before the seasons changed and the yellow dust started to replace the snow. I can remember running up a hill, realizing I was following a 2 inch wide bare spot in the trail and surrounded by pine pollen. 20 minutes later I was home, and still no reaction. It was great motivation to keep it up.

I still get hit a little now and then. Rapid weather changes for instance and one tree that I haven’t tracked down yet. But it’s no where as bad as it has been. Walking to the car, I don’t flinch seeing it yellow tinted. I just smile and think about when I should wash it. Waddle on friends.

No real change, in neither weight, nor eating habits nor exercise. I’ve gone biking a couple of times, but nothing real consistent. Dave has gotten me interested in running again - it’s been my dream for a while to run in a Disney marathon. Maybe I’ll make that happen in 2008.

It’s interesting, it appears my appetite is linked to the amount of sleep I get - the less I get, the more ravenous I am the next day. Dave figures it’s my body trying to overcompensate for my low energy by seeking energy elsewhere, and that makes sense. It’s tough on those days to remind myself I’m not actually hungry. I actually go against the grain a little - where most people swear by not eating anything after a certain time (usually between 6 and 8), I usually eat my last snackish meal between 8 and 10. People forget that we burn calories even while we sleep - eating something small that late at night helps me not be hungry first thing in the morning. Works for me, won’t work for everyone.

A little site news - the Traineo review is almost complete; I’m hoping to post it tomorrow. I didn’t realize how much effort goes into writing reviews. It’s fun, but it takes a lot more time than I thought. I’ll have more reviews sometime soon-ish, continue the getting started series, and we’ve been working on some actual tools and resources unique to Life Ledger that will start going live hopefully in the next couple of weeks. Stay tuned!