Binge and Purge

Did no one report in today? Well, I am pleased to report I lost four pounds since last week - five since yesterday... or something like that. This was really needed considering I ate fast food THREE TIMES over the weekend; breakfast and dinner from drive through and then pizza on Saturday into Sunday. I did NOT go to IHOP on Sunday morning, even though Katie met Charles and Lex there.

Monday I did a clear liquid diet. This was doctor ordered in preparation of the colonoscopy I had today. I could do a clear liquid diet once in a while. It didn't bother me really. I had fruit juice, jello, garlic soup broth (although, not much of that because I was worried it wasn't actually clear enough) iced tea and a cup of coffee with just sugar (yuck, but not so bad poured over ice...). If I were to do a clear liquid diet on a semi-regular basis I would probably allow soft boiled eggs - or possibly egg drop soup - just for the protein.

Then beginning at 4:30pm last night I drank a gallon (really though, I only managed to get down about three liters) of bleach. Think gatorade without the flavor... just the salty sweat taste. Ick! Anyway, that served to liquify and purge anything in me. I have to say, I was a little disappointed in what I produced. I heard stories of how much stuff actually comes out of your body... but really, I have done much more impressive purges all on my own. The only thing that is bugging me about it is IT IS STILL GOING ON! Everything is still being liquified. Grrrr. I wonder how long this will last, because, I am running out of toilet paper!

But I did lose four pounds. 8-)

Where is everybody?

Are we only able to keep up with one group activity at a time? I'm just getting around to posting at 10 pm and nobody else has posted today, either. It is Tuesday today, right? My weight was 142.5 today -- same as the last couple of weeks. I'm back to exercising, at least some; I did a 4 mile run on Saturday without any real problems. I took it very easy, first doing a minute running/one minute walking until that got too boring, and I switched to two minutes running/one walking. I had no pain, but my legs were tired when I was done, and my stamina was definitely down. But it was also hot.

Today I went out again, just for 30 minutes (not quite 3 miles -- I'm sloowww right now) and did 3 minutes running/one walking. This evening my legs are very tired and achy all over, but at least my knees aren't complaining. I think my whole lower half has just been stretched almost to the breaking point and is on strike. I still have six and a half weeks to go so I think I'm OK yet. I'm going to try my 23-mile run this weekend; I discovered we have a rail trail like NCR, only 50+ miles long, (the New River Trail) that begins about 30 minutes from here. It's unpaved, so it will be easier on my legs, theoretically. And it's relatively flat (well, 11 1/2 miles slightly uphill, 11 1/2 miles down). I'll also run on Thursday, and I have a gym appointment tomorrow. (Which ends at 5:15, and then I have to be at church from 6-9 -- overkill by our new music director who forgets what it's like to have children, apparently -- so I'm not quite sure how I'm going to eat, what with getting home, getting changed, and getting there.)

After this I'm not sure what to do -- if I manage this run, I'm behind schedule by exactly one week. I can either do my next long run 3 weeks before the marathon instead of 4, or I can do it two weeks after this run, which is a little tight; alternatively, I can try to figure out how to do a long run mid-week, and split the difference, but I really don't know how to work that, considering that finding 30 minutes to escape for an outdoor run is tricky enough as it is. (OTOH, the kids were better behaved and accomplished more during my run this morning than the rest of the day. Maybe I should disappear for five hours after all?)

Exercise

I managed to get a gym appointment for yesterday -- Tuesday they were full, today I have to deliver dinner to a friend at that time, and tomorrow we have an event at the new performing arts school the kids' piano teacher is running. But at least I got one day in. I ran on the treadmill at 6 mph for 4 minutes, walked at 4 for 1, ran at 6.1 for 4, walked at 4.1 for 1. At the end of ten minutes I had no knee discomfort at all. But somewhere during the second mile I started noticing IT-band fatigue, so I slowed way down to under 6 until I finished 2 miles, and then I walked a quarter mile or so. After that I switched to the elliptical and had a much more intense workout but no-impact, and I had no more pain. So I'm not fully healed but I can bear a little more than I could a week or so ago. Last night it was just achy and not very localized, so I took some ibuprofen and stretched it out, and I'm feeling good today. MAYBE I'm on the road to recovery!

Totally off the subject, I find myself glad today that I keep light margarine on hand -- I let Cecilia butter her own bread just now (yummy Panera baguette -- totally nutritionally useless), and not only did she slather a full 1/8" of it on the surface, but she also filled up a large gaping hole in the middle of the slice with more margarine all the way through. This same child absolutely loves cheese. She doesn't have nearly as much of a sweet tooth as the rest of us -- she abandons Halloween and Easter candy entirely after a few days, and gives up on cupcakes after a few bites -- but I suspect her vice is just as bad for her heart (and waistline) in the long run!

142.5

But I didn't deserve to maintain my weight this week, because I didn't eat very well a lot of the time (I probably had a couple of days on target, but I wasn't tracking any of the days because I knew the rest were bad) and I haven't exercised properly all week. It wouldn't kill me to call the gym and make an appointment, now, would it? I hate calling -- if I have an appointment I'm happy to schedule a bunch of others while I'm there. Why do I hate making phone calls to get me started?

I haven't felt anything from my knee in several days -- I'm hoping that's a good sign! My plan at present is to try a workout at the gym, and if it hurts, I'll call the doctor. But I need to do step one!!

147.2

Hmmm. A bit high. OTOH, I ate like it was going out of style yesterday. I gave myself one day of overindulgence and today I'm back to good habits.

I have this small problem. I'm competitive with myself in a way that is probably unhealthy. I suspect that if Connor's birth had dragged on or required medical intervention or was in any way worse than Claire's birth, I'd probably have nine kids by now trying to GET IT RIGHT and BEAT MY LAST TIME at childbirth.

If I had been two and a half minutes faster on Sunday, I'd be content now. I'd be searching the web for century rides that look like fun and researching proper ways to train for riding 100 miles in a day. Instead I'm sitting here thinking "if I had just started the swim to the outside and front, I could have gotten a clear line. If I had pinned my timing chip on instead of relying on the velcro, I wouldn't have had to stop to reattach it. If I hadn't stopped to cheer for Barb Van Winkle in T2 I would have been five seconds faster there. If I had taken Powerade on the bike instead of Nuun, I would have had more energy going into the run. If I had ignored the pain on the run and just kept running no matter what, I could have been faster. If the car hadn't broken down in Pennsylvania, I would have had more time to train in advance. If I hadn't been taking my kid to an oncologist three days before the race, I would have been more mentally prepared."

And then I think "if I only swim once a week I can keep up my level of fitness without hating it so much. Everything else I can stand. Everything else I kind of enjoy (when the weather is perfect and I'm well rested)."

And then: "If I signed up for MORE races, I wouldn't feel so much pressure to do well at this one and wouldn't obsess so much about comparing my times one year to the next. I could do the Bethesda super sprint in April pretty easily, and the Celebration Tri on the same course in June, and maybe find one on a different course in July to do, maybe the Hagerstown tri with a pool swim (that's nice), and oh, heck, I could do the Patriot's triathlon THIS year with no problem--750 meter swim? Easy."

Dammit, triathlon, I just can't quit you! What the hell is wrong with me?

Sitting on my ass report

I am doing really well. I think I have beat my personal best - but it is so hard to quantify it...

My weight was up again this week - but by less than a pound - .8 to be exact. I am surprised it wasn't more. Katie and I went to IHOP after Iron Girl on Sunday and then yesterday Suzanne and I got greasy fat pizza for lunch (and I had leftovers for dinner). It is still sitting like a lump in my belly. Katie is back to school effective today - but they had breakfast for the teachers, so I had a muffin and coffee from Caribou. I intend to have a salad for lunch in the hopes that the lettuce will push the remaining pizza out of the way!!

Speaking of - I have an appointment with the GI doctor tomorrow. I think that is who my appointment is with... I am mildly nervous about this. I don't like the idea of how they gather information. UGH.

I have my heater running here at work today. This isn't entirely unusual. I often have to run it during the summers because of the cold AC - but today feels colder than normal - I think it is the damp air.

So - Katie and I are doing another knitting challenge... I can't remember if I mentioned this one also... We are doing the SKA (Sock Knitters Annon) challenge. That is knitting a pair of socks a month. Each month there is a different specific technique or desinger that everyone works from and whoever finishes their socks and posts the results by the end of two months (you have two months to finish - but you have to cast on by the end of month one, so if you take the full two months you will end up overlapping - so it is best to finish in one month) is eligible for prizes. The new year starts in September. The challenge for that is Black and/or White. Not grey. Katie thinks she wants to do the Mystery Sock (which is also an option every other month) but I think I want to do a fair isle pattern. Part of this challenge is to help us all de-stash, however, neither Katie nor I have ANY black or white (or black and white) yarn. I just ordered some. So much for destashing!!!!

Race report

This is just copied and pasted from the report I posted on my cycling board:

We had unexpected rain this morning, which threw a lot of us for a loop. The rain had been predicted for this afternoon, so people were changing the lenses on their glasses and trying to figure out how to keep stuff dry in transition. I figured I'd be so wet after the swim that it wasn't worth bothering over! And I actually like cycling in the rain, as long as it's not cold. Running in the rain makes me nervous--I'm far more likely to wipe out while running than while cycling.

The swim was o.k. I seeded myself in the middle of my wave since that's pretty much where I finished last year, but being in with the biggest scrum was irritating. I couldn't break away from them and swim more than a few strokes before running into someone. This went on the whole distance. Just before the first turn someone whacking into me caught my timing chip and pulled it most of the way off, so I had to hang onto it while swimming over to a kayak to hold on while I reattached it. I wished I had started off to the side like I did last year--much more clear swimming, even if you cover slightly more distance in the process.

TI went like clockwork. I don't yet have my times but it felt faster than last year.

The bike was just fun. I love this route. People complain about the hills, but this is my home territory and it just feels familiar to me. I held back on the downhills a bit since it was pretty slippery out, and I had ditched my glasses (not literally, although some people did--I saw at least four pairs on them on the road) so occasionally the rain blinded me a bit. But overall it was just fun and I wished it was longer.

T2 - uneventful. A bit slow taking off wet gloves and putting on wet socks and shoes, but overall fine.

And then the run. I started out feeling fine and after about 100 feet realized I just had no more energy. I couldn't pull from any reserves and couldn't muscle through it. It was awful. I'd try to run but never found a comfortable pace and ended up walking long portions of the run. I have no idea what went wrong, other than just not caring anymore and being tired to start. I had eaten well, and I've done the bike/run section of this race at least a dozen times and am usually fine on all but the top bits of the worst hills, but I didn't manage to run ANY of the hills today. I just wanted it to be over. I was so irritated by this--the run was the one thing I really trained for this year, and I've managed to cut my average pace by a full minute per mile (although after the bike it's more like just 30 seconds faster per mile). But I didn't have it in me today.

When I got to the finish Amy and Katie and Claire were there to welcome me, which was nice. But we took off quickly since the rain was starting up once again (it was starting and stopping all morning). I since heard that if I had stuck around I would have gotten one of the random prizes, but being home and showered and fed is better IMO! Unless it was a really cool prize. Don't know about that.

And that was it. No more triathlons for me. I'm going to focus my energies next year on doing a century ride instead. I'm burning my bathing suit and throwing out my goggles. If I never see another lap lane again it'll be too soon!

Unless, of course, someone wants to do the swim for me.

ETA results: I ended up about two minutes behind last year's time. My swim was (grrrr) about 15 seconds slower at 28:45, T1 only about 25 seconds faster, the bike was nearly exactly the same as last year (five seconds faster - 1:10:16), T2 about 30 seconds slower, and the run about a minute and a half slower (35:50 - I was expecting a greater discrepancy there). The funny thing is my placement--I finished 886 overall Out of 1780). I should have gone just slightly slower--my bib number was 887 and I like nice coincidences like that (last year my bib number was 998, so next time around I expect to be 776). Age group placement was 169 (out of 374 finishers; 6 places below last year).

Just an update

I've been back swimming a few times for my new undertaking. Tonight I need to get some goggles that fit properly. I have a tough time with my breathing; I honestly think it is the years I spent playing brass instruments where you breathe in through your nose and out your mouth. I just can't suck enough air in through my nose when I am swimming, and then I feel suffocated. I am working on it though.

We spent some time at the beach this past weekend and I think walking in the sand has significantly helped my plantar fasciitis. I can hardly believe it, but my right foot is still pain free and my left only has a little bit of pain left in the heel. Looks like I need to find some nearby sand... I am afraid to test running though; I don't want to make them hurt again. These last two years have been so miserable.

This weekend i s a busy one, but I hope to swim Saturday and Sunday.

Good luck Sunday, Sarah!!!! I'll be rooting for you.

In Training

I forgot to post on Tuesday. My weight was up 1 pound from last week. 8-( BUT that is still down 8 pounds from where I was at the beginning of June. I just hope that one pound up was the fluke and I will start going down again soon.

I think it is the salads. Bulky, crunchy water, nutritionally positive and it goes RIGHT through me. I haven't had one this week - but I have two current - one for lunch today and one for dinner last night (which, obviously, I didn't eat). I will have number two for dinner either tonight or tomorrow.

NOTE TO SELF - I don't LIKE chef salads. I keep forgetting that. Also - I REALLY don't like fat free ranch dressing. YUCK! Lunch was a disappointment.

My stomach has been a mess lately. I have gone beyond reflux at this point to a very burny acidy stomach. I hate it. I can't remember if I said this before, but I wonder how long I have had this going on. I know I talked to Shea (accupuncturist) about it LAST month. I told her that I was aware recently of a lot of pain in my stomach. What troubles me is that I can't tell if the pain has always been there and I have gotten so good at ignoring it that I don't notice it anymore - or if it is new. I am inclined to think it has always been there to a degree, mostly because that would TOTALLY explain how it is that I don't feel hunger. It would also explain why I can do a lot of sit ups with minimal pain... 8-) The acidy feeling is new though...

The trouble with an unstatisfying salad for lunch is that now I want to eat cookies or cake or something.

Anyway - I wanted to let you all know that I am training now for a MAJOR EVENT! I want to knit a sock in a day. Many people post this as a challenge periodically and I think I may have to set myself up for it. Unlike a marathon or triathelon this event actually often takes the BETTER PART of 24 hours. The sock must be cast on and completed in a consecutive 24 hour period. I know some people do lace patterns because they cover more territory - but I like the simplicity of a straight stockinette sock. Who's with me???!!!

146.4

Well, there's a surprise. Not. Actually I'm pretty pleased that my weight is staying so solidly where it has been for months--it means, at least, that I'm burning off what I'm taking in consistently, and considering that I've been eating junk like it's going out of style (which I'm told it is. Did you all see that white bread sales have been consistently slipping and were finally surpassed by whole wheat sales?) I'm glad that my weight is steady.

So the race is this Sunday and I'm just not into it. Not even sure I'll make it through reasonably. My last several workouts have been crap, and my heart rate is running 20 points higher than normal while resting. I can't run anymore--I have to walk no matter what the weather or terrain or distance. Yesterday I did a short, easy taper-week run and I couldn't even make it through that without walking portions of it (although, to be fair, my speed was pretty good for all that--9:39 per mile). Oh, and my bicycle computer chose this week to break so I have NO IDEA what my speeds are on that. I'm thinking of doing the whole race without even a watch or a HRM (and last year my monitor didn't work--too much interference from other monitors).

I was supposed to get out for a ride today and didn't. Tomorrow is supposed to be my last light workout before the race--another two mile run, but if I do it at all I'll have to get up early and apparently go out in a deluge. Yuck. I just want this to be over so I can get on with eating Cheeze Doodles and staring into space for a while!

142.5

My weight finally budged again late last week, and I saw a lovely low number for several days, even though I ate atrociously all weekend -- many cookies and chips. Ugh. Today I'm back on the diet but I was rewarded for my weekend binge with a pound upswing -- at least it was only a pound!

Exercise is not going so well. I went to the gym several days last week. When I used the recumbent bike, things were fine, and I made sure to do my I-T band stretches several times a day. But I tried the elliptical one day, and after maybe a half hour (maybe less, even) my knee started to twinge, so I slowed way down and took it easy for the remainder of my 40-minute workout. I took Friday and Saturday off, and then on Sunday I tried to do my scheduled six-mile run. After three minutes I had to take a walk break (and stretch break), because I was already feeling it in my knee. Then it got worse from there. Finally, at the end of a mile, I had to concede that I wasn't ready for running yet. I walked a good portion of the way back home (only 0.7 miles by the direct route) and managed to run, gently, only the distance from one house to the next, then walked to the next, then ran again, and so on.

From what I've read online, the healing should be underway after 3-5 days (after the original injury), and if you're careful about stretching you can get back to running gently then. I gave it 8 and still wasn't up to it. This is very frustrating. All the reading I've done says you SHOULD be exercising and stretching, but I have to wonder if in my case that's making matters worse and I should be taking a week (or two or three) off entirely. I don't need twice-daily ibuprofen as I did when this started, but it hasn't felt especially good since I first pulled it. I'm worried that I'm going to lose four months' conditioning in no time if I can't get past this -- or even worse, that all this might be for nothing, and I won't be able to run the marathon at all! (I may WALK the dang thing if it comes to that!) Sigh...

And then I feel like a selfish idiot for even caring. So many worse things are going on right now that I have no right to be worried about a minor knee injury. It's just so much easier to worry about the stupid things than the real things.

Pedaling squares

That's what you call it when you get on the bike and every pedal stroke is a huge effort and the whole ride is miserable from the get-go. You're pedaling squares.

I don't know what the equivalent is for running, but that's the run I had just now. Every step was an effort and I just couldn't do it. I covered my usual run from work, but it took 41 minutes instead of 33 or 34. Obviously, I walked large sections of it. Going DOWNHILL my heart rate was in the 180s if I was running. So I walked.

Obviously it's the heat, and the lack of sleep (three hours a night for each of the last three nights), and the stress of dealing with Brian and the broken-down car in Pennsylvania again. Three days without exercise wouldn't do this to me--my runs at Pennsic were good, and my swim/run just before Pennsic was great. So I need to get some sleep, do some deep breathing, and generally just figure out how to calm down. I can't believe I'm having a week like this on my final week of training, but it's not like I have a lot of choice in the matter. I was hoping to do better in the race this year than I did last year, but if that doesn't happen, it's not the end of the world. Just the end of my triathlon career, which it was going to be anyway!

147? Maybe?

I forgot to weigh myself this morning. 147 was yesterday's weight, and I don't imagine that it's changed today. Usually I'll go down a bit between Monday and Tuesday, but I ate way more than usual yesterday since I had two meals at our work retreat (really yummy food, too). I did the same today. And to make matters worse, on this one last week that I have to get in some good training before the race, I'm stuck doing nothing for the moment. Because of the retreat today and yesterday I haven't been able to get to the gym at lunch, and because Brian isn't yet home from Pennsic I can't go out in the morning or evening. And even if I could, I couldn't because I've got Connor all to myself, and naturally he hasn't slept well the past two nights so I'm working on three hours of sleep each night. This sucks.

And it's probably not going to get much better--I just got a call from Brian and he's having car problems. What a shocker! I told him this would happen and that the Subaru wasn't up to the trip to Pennsic and back. I don't know details yet, but this better not turn into something too time and money consuming because we don't have either of those to spare.

OTOH, for the first time in my life I actually got not-bad exercise while on vacation. I got out for three morning runs in the six days I was at Pennsic. I would have gotten another day of swimming and cycling but God didn't want me to. I went to the state park next to the Pennsic campground to swim in the lake and rent a bike and do their 7 mile trail back and forth a few times, but as soon as I stepped out of the car at the lake there was thunder, so they made everyone come in from the water. I drove over to the bike rental place and got there just as the guy was closing it down (four hours early! He said he got in early that day so he was closing early, but four hours? Really?). So I decided to do a trail run instead so the day wouldn't be a total loss and I ended up wiping out spectacularly after less than a mile--one knee is really a mess, and the other knee, one shoulder, and one hand are all scraped up. If I had a camera with me I'd post a picture of the bad knee because it's really disgusting. And I have to leave it in plain view of the world, even though it's disgusting, because covering it up with clothing or even a bandage makes it hurt badly.

So here I am, a week and a half from the race, and I haven't ridden my bike in nearly a month and I haven't gone swimming in a week and a half and while I've gotten in some running I'm a danger to myself doing the simplest activity and I haven't slept through the night since July 30 (Connor was also up in the night every night at Pennsic, although not always for five or six hours like he has been the past two nights) so there's no telling if I'll even get through the race. Maybe I'll stop and take a nap at the halfway point.

Gaining weight?

I was 144.5 this morning, an increase of a couple of pounds since last week, and consistent with what I've seen the last several days. I don't feel like I'm retaining water, but given that my calorie intake was right at 1200 every day except Friday (1600-ish) and Saturday (1800-ish) for a total of only 9000-ish calories, it would be impossible for me to have gained two pounds of real weight unless I burned zero calories over seven days. And since the long run alone was probably around 2000 calories, it's safe to assume that I did burn a few more than zero. I may not be retaining water per se, but it might be that last week I was a little dehydrated and didn't know it.

At any rate, I'm not overly alarmed; I know I'm exercising well and eating well -- I've even started filling up my leftover calories at the end of the day with healthy foods, like cheese and bananas, instead of junk foods like beer and ice cream (well, maybe just a little beer and ice cream, but not something bad every day) because I keep thinking of the impact the foods have on my running. It's pretty cool how I feel like it's all starting to come together. I've built up the muscle strength and stamina to run a marathon, but I'm wanting to feel good as I do it, so I'm paying more attention to eating and sleeping well, and I'm just feeling so much better all over. It's going to feel weird when this is all over and I don't have a goal anymore. Maybe that's why people stick with the marathon circuit -- so they always have something else to shoot for. But I've hated what I've had to do to my body to get to this point, and most of the time I really resent the time it takes to do a long run. And I'm tired of feeling injured -- it's working its way in a circuit through my legs. My right hip, my right calf, my toes, my arches, the massive blisters UNDER my arches, my achilles tendon, my left knee, my left hip (same injury as the knee -- when the I-T band gets inflamed you mostly feel it in your knee but it's anchored at the hip so sometimes that hurts, too). Surely I'm going to run out of things that can hurt anew soon. Of course, I haven't strained my back yet, or my shoulders, and I haven't fallen and broken an elbow or a wrist, so I guess I shouldn't say that!

Down finally

My weight was down this morning to 246.6. - so that is 2.6 pounds from the last two weeks. It is also slightly lower than the lowest weights I have seen on non-weigh-in days (247-ish). So I am sort of pleased with this. I don't know if this is real weight loss or just a random number. I was more physical this past weekend than I normally am (Pennsic - even going to the bathroom requires you to use yoga poses!). But I was also more blobby than normal too. All in all though, I consistently burned about 3300 calories each day. I DEFINITELY didn't consume that many each day. The Mimosas in the Morning party was the only day I drank more than one or two drinks - and they were VERY sugary sweet drinks - but then, I had to go to the bathroom at least three times - which considering that the party was at the bottom of a cliff and the toilets were at the top, I worked off SOME of those calories. I think I only did three trips up the hill on foot. Each other trip to the top was done through the back way, which is longer but MUCH lower. Living on a steep hill outdoors definitely makes doing yoga a good idea. I kept laughing at how many poses you do just to live day to day... Downward Dog to get something off the bed, Child's Pose to roll up the sleeping bad, Warrior Pose - just because it looks cool. 8-)

I need to remember for next Pennsic that I need to take protein bars with me for breakfast. NON-sweet protein bars. I also have to set an alarm to eat lunch. Friday I ate breakfast and dinner. Saturday I think I ate lunch and dinner. I don't remember. I know I ate dinner each night and I know I ate one lunch and one breakfast. I had a few Siamese coffees, but that was it. I ate grapes one day. I need to eat better at Pennsic. I think I would have made a better effort if I had been there longer - but a long weekend didn't make it worth it.

Sarah's Favorite Thing

I took my first swim lesson last night.

Huh?

See, I've never actually learned to swim with proper strokes and form. There was really no opportunity for being on a swim team or anything like that growing up, so my "swimming" is really just glorified doggie paddling, or whatever the fancier name for that is. I did take swim lessons as a child, but they were the type that taught you stuff about how to not die in the water.

So for 30 minutes last night I did all sorts of drills to help get me started for proper swimming. It was fun, I was tired when it was over, and only once did I suck sufficient water into my nose to make me cough. I need a lot of practice with timing my breathing and with keeping my face completely in the water. Oh--and a pair of goggles that fits my face. I borrowed Peter's, and while they sealed, the eye cups kept poking me in the eye area near my nose. I think they were just a little too large for me.

In total last night I swam either 14 or 16 laps; I can't quite remember if I did this one drill 4 times or just 2. Each lap is 25 yards, and 18 laps was a 1/4 mile according to the chart on the wall. So in total I was somewhere under 1/4 mile, and of course this was with starts and stops since these were all drills. The good news was that I kick properly, from the hip and not from the knee. The bad news was I suck at everything else. :-)

I had this weird water induced vertigo when I got out of the pool, or at least I am hoping that is what it was from. I was stumbling around like a drunk person for the first few minutes out of the pool. My next lesson is next week.

I plan to keep my experiment quiet at least for now. Not so much because I am embarassed or anything like that, but mostly because we have this one friend that just knows the best way to do EVERYTHING, and while I love her, the thought of listening to another speech about how her dad taught her proper swimming just makes me want to throw up. This is the same chick that had way too much weight on her bar for the Body Pump class and had terrible form as a result AND pulled a muscle in her neck. But her dad showed her how to lift weights, so she knows it all...blah!

Gol-ding-it all to heck, and lots of other bad words!

For the past three weeks I have not missed ONE mid-week run. For the past two days I have been especially careful about my diet, and yesterday I cancelled all calorie restrictions and ate to appetite, but avoiding unhealthy pre-run foods, which turned out to be only 1600 calories, surprisingly. I went to bed only a little later than I meant to, got up on time (and had to wait around for the sun to come up -- I need to factor in the shrinking days, especially since I'm further south and west than the rest of you!), dressed just right, and ate a healthy pre-run breakfast of a banana and a piece of bread. So far so good.

I went out feeling pretty strong -- next time I need to eat breakfast before I get dressed, so it has time to settle -- and at 6 miles in I was feeling very good and switched from water to electrolytes and started adding in Shot Bloks every 15-20 minutes. All continued well, and my stamina NEVER ran out! No wall! Hooray! But... at around 14-15 miles my knee started protesting a little bit. By 15 3/4 miles, it was SCREAMING at me (figuratively speaking, of course). When I stopped for my walk, I found I couldn't run again. It was just too painful. I called Daniel and told him I had to wimp out, but I was going to walk home the direct route. By doing looonnngggg walk breaks I managed to run two or three times more over the last two miles or so, and I walked an extra couple of blocks to finish up at 18 miles instead of the 20 I was aiming for. My pace had been good -- cautiously slow but not sluggish -- and, as I said, I was nowhere near out of stamina. I honestly felt like I could have done the whole 26.2 today if I'd needed to. After sitting at home for a few minutes feeling annoyed, I went back out (with Daniel for company) and walked two miles more, so I've gone 20 miles today, but the final 4+ were at a snail's pace.

I guess the good news is that I have a pretty good idea what I need to do to get ready for the race, stamina-wise -- that is, I have a clue about how to eat and drink and pace myself when I run, and how to eat and sleep and such beforehand. I think I might want to try some gels after all for nutrition; I liked the Shot Bloks for the first hour of them, but then my teeth started getting sensitive, so it would be nice to have something that doesn't require chewing. But I've just heard such icky things about the gels.

But now I have NO clue what to do about my knee. Knee injuries aren't something you want to mess around with. I've been doing some online reading and it might be an iliotibial band injury, and for that I'm supposed to be using ice (check) and ibuprofen (check) and doing IT band stretches (no problem). They say over-pronation can cause it, but that's not my problem; however, a long stretch of today's run was on a road that had a lot of hills and some serious curves, which meant the road kept banking, so I was running lopsided a lot. And there was NO shoulder, and there were a lot of seams and potholes, so it's possible that road added just enough strain to do me in, especially given that I've had some minor knee pain of this sort over the last couple of weeks (not so much this week, but definitely last).

Well, phooey. I really wanted to post that I'd gone 20 miles and it had been a breeze and now I was happily tired. I am happily tired. And I did go 20 miles, and except for the knee it was a breeze. But my knee hurts and I couldn't RUN the 20, so I'm ticked. Phooey again.

143.0

My weight dropped sharply early in the week (4 pounds in 8 days) but has stayed steady for five days now -- I think it is adjusting to the new calorie level and will move more slowly from now on. But that's the way it goes. I will need to stop the calorie restriction at the end of the week for a couple of days because I have the 20-mile run this weekend, but after that I am bound and determined not to fall back into the excessive eating!!

Nothing much else to report here -- the sun is coming out, but I wish it would stay away long enough for me to get in my 30-minute run today!

Weight = steady

So my weight this morning was 249.8 - which is up .6 from the last two weeks, but considering that I have done NOTHING (one walk last week and then a weekend of building yurts) to work to lower my weight, I am not displeased. However, since it is THAT time of month AGAIN, and I traditionally gain four pounds for the event and lose three, I am hoping that this weight is the upside of the cycle and that I will suddenly drop three pounds by next week. It could happen...

I have been eating badly. I discovered last week that I really like the protein enhanced 7-grain oatmeal at Caribou... which calorie-wise is not great (290-400) but it has fiber and protein and is way better than the nothing I have been eating for breakfast lately. Katie had to take me in to work yesterday (my car had to go to the car doctor and is still there) and so was up to make me breakfast. It was nice having real food in the monring, but I missed my Caribou oatmeal. This morning I had the worst of all worlds. I had a friend take me to work, so Katie didn't make me breakfast, but I also couldn't make my person stop to get me oatmeal and coffee - so I had to eat a package of Quaker instant oatmeal - which just isn't the same...

Happy Sisters' Day!

Mary informs me that today is Sisters' Day, so happy day to all of you, even my non-blood sisters.

I went for a run today and cruised through six miles in under an hour (6.1 in 59:29, to be specific). I am LOVING the cooler weather. I know it's not going to last -- it will be back up in the upper 80s this week, but at least that's not upper 90s. But in another month this will be more common so I hope I have lots more good medium-length runs over the remainder of my training. My injuries continue to move around; my arches are mostly happy now (no more blister troubles, but I'm back to the occasional aches that caused me to use the supports that gave me the blisters to begin with) but my left knee is twinging a lot (hmm, my spell-checker doesn't like "twinging"), which suggests I need to be doing more gym workouts on the non-running days to keep it in alignment.

I'm also slowly and steadily losing weight. I find it very curious that when I'm not on a diet it feels impossible to get going, but once I get going I can't figure out why this was so difficult to begin with. My weight chart is so funny to look at -- a long downhill to start, with only tiny plateaus. Then a slow uphill in curved spurts -- I gain a little, lose less, gain some more, lose even less. Then occasionally it reverses. It almost never stays more or less steady. I did spend about 6 months in the low- to mid-140s two years ago, but even that had some dips and spikes. Daniel points out that it looks a lot like the stock market:

Who knew I was so personally attached to Google?