TandemHearts

Lots of people at work asked me if I was doing anything special for my birthday.  They all looked a little askance when I answered, ‘No, but my trainer has a special workout planned.”  Of course I wouldn’t pass up a trainer session, just because it’s my birthday.   We did lots of fun things though.  I dragged a sled with weights on it.  The first round was with a hundred pounds, second set was at 145 pounds and the third was 201 pounds.  That extra one pound made it really hard. 

Next I  jumped rope with the weighted jump rope.  That thing only weighs a pound, but it’s killer!  I can consistently do over 200 jumps in a minute with a regular rope.  The best I can get with the weighted is 154 jumps.  It’s my wrists that get really tired.  I did some pliometric jumps, mountain climbers and push ups.   I used push up bars for the push ups.  The first set of twenty I just came down even to the bar.  The second set I tried to go a little lower and Shawna commented that eventually I’d be touching the floor with these.    I, of course, took that as a challenge and the third set I was touching my nose to the floor.  I whipped out the first set of twenty with no problem and the second set wasn’t too bad.  But going all to the floor on the third set?   OUCH!

And yes, it was fun!

I had an absolute blast on the Tarantula Run, and it convinced me that I have the potential to be a decent runner.  However, all that steep descending injured my right knee.  I can’t put a name to what I did, since I did not go to the doctor.  At first it hurt enough to keep me awake at night and it REALLY hurt when I did a certain yoga pose, squatted or jogged.  I have spent the last six weeks doing very little of those things.  I have still been going to see Shawna, my trainer, and we have been working around all my knee problems.  If an exercise  hurt at all, we switched to some other exercise.  Six weeks of babying it and icing after every workout and it is just about better.   Yoga and squatting are absolutely pain free now.  A chest cold has kept me from running the last two weeks.  I miss it.

Amazingly, my weight has been stable through all of this in spite of my lack of cardio in the last six weeks. I’m proof that muscle really does burn more calories than fat.    At first I did not want to bike since the injury felt a lot like my overuse injury in 2007.    I’ve started doing some of the easier Spinervals videos and that has not bothered my knee. I haven’t been swimming since the indoor pool at the gym always give me sinusitis.  In fact, I’ve quit my gym membership and when the outside city pool reopens in February I’ll start swimming  there.  BRRRRR!

January third I officially begin training for my first Half Ironman of the year.  I’ve decided to do the Auburn Tri on May 23.  It has a pretty tough bike course with 6,000 feet of climbing in its fifty-six miles.   I also plan on doing Barb’s Race again this year on July 31.  I may do a few local tris in between, just for fun.  I’m really excited about what I have planned.  I printed out my first week’s training plan a few weeks ago and I keep looking at it longingly.  I know, what a dork!

And just for laughs – here are our Christmas babies.

Click on the images to see the full size pictures.

In order to improve my running I’ve decided to sign up for a local trail run, the Tarantula Run,  which will be held in late October at Los Vaqueros Reservoir.   Today was the first time I went out and ran the 10 K (6 mile)  course.  WOW!  Trail running is hard!  The hills are much steeper and longer than anything I have done on the road.  There are two significant climbs, the paved one goes to the top of the dam and I have ridden up it many times on my bike.  It  is tough on  a bike, it’s even harder to run.    My Garmin GPS says the average grade is 8%.   I’d say it’s pretty close to that and I can see me being able to run all the way up it at some point.  The second climb is steeper and unpaved.    The Garmin said that this averaged 16%.  I’m always a little leery about believing these numbers, but it was pretty darn steep since I  stopped three times to rest my hips as I walked it.  It is followed by a very steep downhill that I was too chicken to even think about running down today.     

There are also numerous little hills in there like this one.  Of course the backside of this hill looks about the same, going up.  My Garmin showed the total climbing to be a little over 1,100 feet.

It is also very dry out there and not a lot of shade.  I had also  forgotten how windy it is out at the reservoir.  That really threw me off a bit at the start as I had a headwind for the first half of the the run.    Even with a tailwind, the second half  of the run is much harder than the first.  I  had the misfortune of disturbing some hornets as I was closing one of the cattle gates.  I got stung on the top of my right ear OUCH! and on the back of my right calf.  I  still had about a mile and a half to go when that happened.  I walked slowly and rubbed my owies for about half a mile and then tried to pick up the pace for the last mile.  I was happy to get back to the truck and drink the cold ice water that Thom had waiting for me.  My overall pace wasn’t great, but it’s a start.  Training out there is definitely going to make me a better runner.

Scary hair.

Clicking on each picture will give you a larger version.

I was finally well enough Week 18 to start running again. (more…)

We’ve been looking through some of our older photos.  I thought it would be interesting to do a similar photo shoot.

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