I'm a little tired

Lately I've been uninspired to blog. Yeah I know, it's a poor excuse, but it's all I've got. Since I have the day off today here's a little update.

City Chase 2008. Dude, it was way harder this year. I thought it was physically demanding last year, but I was wrong. This year it was harsh. Maybe we had bad luck and chose all the physical chase points, but I think not. tc has a great round up of the various points we collected. I must say, Team Strangely Asian rocked it again! Somehow we finished in exactly the same place as we did last year. I actually feel really good about our finish because there were far more teams this year. Oh and yeah, we didn't break up either. :-* tc

Physical Therapy on my ankle is going OK. It ends in about two weeks.

I ran yesterday. 5.1 miles in 50:05. It felt pretty good the whole way, and when I figured out it was 10 minute miles I was quite pleased. Oddly enough, my right shin started to hurt. I clearly need to work on my right leg so it keeps up with my, thanks to PT, new and improved left leg. I also managed to bike 15 miles yesterday. My quads are pretty well cashed at this point.

And that's about it. Peace.

Wow, I've improved

We skipped two days last week, because of illness. Did manage to run about 2 miles, and do some sit ups. While doing the sit ups, I hurt my tail bone. The zippered pocket on my shorts poked and chaffed me. Now i have this sore red spot on my tail bone and I've been trying to baby it so it heals quickly. So much for taking care not to hurt it because last night was another assessment.

I honestly have lost track of the number of weeks and days we've been doing this, but I don't think this assessment was evenly spaced. Anyway, I did improve over the last assessment we did. Here are the details

Sit ups: went from 25 to 27
Push ups: from 29 to 31
Mile run: from 8:08 to 8:00

Taking into account the fact that my ass actually hurt while doing the sit ups (and yes my tail bone is all jacked up again) I'm pleased that I beat it by two. I was also pleased with my form during the push ups; all 31 were high quality push ups. I took the first half of the mile rather easy because I didn't want to burn out so quick. I actually had a little too much left for my kick. Next time I'll push just a little more during the mile, so that my kick uses up every bit of energy I have. i should be able to break the eight minute mark, and who knows, I could dip well into the 7s.

Bootcamp, week...uhhh six?

I know i haven't posted about bootcamp in a bit. I think we're into week six but I'm not really sure. All i know is Monday was hell. We ran around the Diversy Harbor and then had to do, get this, 100 push ups. We could do them however we had to in order to get them done. I did sets of ten, then dropped to sets of five. I managed ot get yelled at by the Major (it's only because I talked back...lesson learned). Once the push ups were done, we got to run around the harbor again. Once back we did 150 squats, and 20 pull ups. The pull ups were weak, we were encouraged to jump a little in order to get our chin past the bar. But the squats, well my thighs still hurt two days later.

Today was a little different. We ran a good mile, and ended at the Lincoln Park Zoo entrance. From there it was a rough routine. Do ten of an exercise, run to a fountain and back, then do the exercise again, followed by a new exercise, run to the fountain, come back and do the first two plus a new exercise...rinse and repeat. I managed to do a lot, others managed many more. I ended with a final set of push ups, mountain climbers, jumping jacks, donkey kicks, wide push ups, squat thrusts, flutter kicks, tricep push ups, and squats. I did not get to the sets that included crunches, lunges, and some other painful exercise called butt biters.

If you do the math, I did 90 push ups, 80 mountain climbers, 70 jumping jacks, and so forth. Which brings me to today's realization: I have boobs. Not moobs, and not boobies, but boobs like pecs. All these push ups have really worked my chest. If it keeps up at this rate I'll be homeless in 2 months because I'll have lost my job, from staying home all day playing with my boobs. So, km be prepared for my call.

Bootcamp week 5 day 2

First off, yes i skipped day 3, so i'm posting about day 2.

Today was a workout designed to build speed. this isn't really my cup of tea, i'm more of a distance guy. did i mention i saw my sports med doc and he said i have shin splints? yeah, so the nagging injury coupled with speed work really didn't please me.

at any rate, it was an interval workout. run about 2/3 of a lap, sprint the straightaway, then run to cool down, then sprint. each bit was timed, with strength training in between each.

tc took a tumble. i wasnt too worried, she's vocal and would have shouted if she needed me...besides, she had patrick to help her out. still, it sucks tc is hurt.

maybe all these workouts will do something to my butt.

Not running related

This past weekend we held a home brew throwdown (Bobby Flay style).
The picture above is of the three "competition brews". From left to right they are:
tw's Hefeweizen, sg's Amber Rye, and my own Honey Brown Porter.

tw won. it may have been that his german wheat beer was refreshing and well brewed, or it may be (and this is the explanation that saves my psyche) that we had a lot of non-beer drinkers in attendance and his was the easiest to drink.

In case you're curious, there were five additional brews consumed that day.

Bootcamp, week 5 day 1

This was an assessment day. We've officially been in bootcamp for a month now. Having been working out for a month, we had to see how we (hopefully) improved. Hence, the assessment day. Here's my rundown:
Sit ups, went from 21 to 25.
Push ups, from 23 to 29.
Mile, 8:51 to 8:08.
Overall I am pleased. A quick crunch of the numbers shows like a 20-25% improvement and in just a month...not bad at all. Let's just see if I plateau or not.

On a separate and sad note. I saw the best ever Sports Medicine Doctor today. He confirmed, I have shin splints. It's goes back to the fact that i broke my ankle last year. My left side is far weaker than my right, so it works harder. That combined with the sudden intense effort brought on by bootcamp equals shin splints (left side only for now). He prescribed orthopedic inserts and physical therapy twice a week.

Week 4 Day 1

Bootcamp was rough, as per the usual. We had to find partners that were roughly our size. First time we actually had to partner up. The only stipulation was that the person had to be about the same height/weight. since tc is shorter than me, she was out of the running. in no time i had partnered up with some dude. never even noticed he was in the class before, probably because i was so focused on how bad i was hurting.

at any rate, the first half of the night was spent on a hill with our partner. i really got to know my partner pretty quickly, especially since i had to carry him up the hill twice on my back, he carried me twice, we leap frogged, and did a little chariots-of-fire-pull-on-their-shirt thing. the hill workout ended with a grueling plank hold, which really irritated by left tricep (luckily it felt better the next morning.

the second half of the night was strength training. push ups, squats, unassisted sit ups, burpees, and crunches. each exercise 20 times, then cycle through with 15, and 10 reps for each exercise on the next two cycles.

tc has a new phrase "it's under the cheese", because of her craptastic day and resultant verbiage, i decided the image above seemed perfect.

End of week three

Bootcamp: week 3, day 3

Amen! No direct upper body work today. Instead we worked on running endurance.

We ran up to the harbor off Diversy and found ourselves on a grassy knoll. Oh yeah, the DI was secretly trying to kill someone. The task at hand was to run to a light pole, head up the embankment, run to the next light pole, down the embankment, to the next pole, and so on. Did 18 lights poles 2 times, then finished easy with just 6 or 7 light poles. In between each run was a short set of leg and core strength exercises (e.g. lunges, crunches, squats).

Now I'm looking forward to a couple days rest. I think I'll try a little run on Sunday, couple miles maybe. I'd like to get back to having long run Sundays. With Bootcamp and all, it's gonna take a while until I can get up to my ideal Sunday morning 10 miler.

Hot 100

Bootcamp week 3, day 2.

Today was something called "Hot 100". The crazy ass drill instructor told us we'd be doing 100 of each exercise. Now is a good time to note that when I say 100, I actually mean 200, because the DI uses two (or sometimes four) counts. What did we work out you may ask? All upper body, and pretty much almost all chest. Push ups, wide push ups, tricep push ups, inverted push ups, one armed planks, and some weird back and shoulder exercise done lying down.
So why the "70" image? Because that's as far as we made it in the 45 minutes we had together. Now in all honesty I should have posted a picture of somewhere around 40...cuz that's about all i did. After the first set of exercises, I was feeling it. After the second, I was cashed. By the third cycle I had started to pause during the sets. Even though I didn't do all 70 (or 140 if were being honest) I did as many as my body would allow. There was a lot of shaking and sweating, and oddly a lot of heavy breathing. I was panting like a dog in August, very strange indeed.

Cest la vie. We'll see what tomorrow holds, but I can only hope it doesn't involve my upper body because I dont think it can take it.

Bootcamp - Day 5....harsh

today was no exception, bootcamp kicked my butt again. per the usual, the warm-up run was too fast for me. today the exercises focused on building strength so there were a lot of push ups and squats and the like. the picture is just to make me feel better, because i feel like ass right now.

i think tomorrow is an endurance day, we'll see.

bootcamp

OK, let me preface this with...it seemed like a good idea at the time. tc and i signed up for bulldog bootcamp. see, we haven't been running like we used to and tc thought it'd be a great way to get in shape by august. city chase is in august in case you've forgotten. knowing it's not that far away, we signed up for a 3 day per week, 12 week fitness program where drill instructors take some twisted pleasure in kicking our collective asses.

it's now into week two, luckily the very first day was just an assessment, so it didn't hurt too bad. it did however smack me in the face with my out-of-shapeness.

today was all about speedwork. we sprinted multiple times to cone placed at varying distances. 10 to the nearest, 6 to the middle, 3 to the farthest cone. each sprinting session was separated by core strengthening work (e.g. crunches, mountain climbers, supermans).

clearly i am not a machine, like i thought i was...cuz today kicked my ass. tc is soooooo gonna owe me drinks.

Ran a few times recently

Today for instance.

Didn't run with TC, she had a bad day at work so she went separately. Ran at too fast a pace, but the burning lungs felt good. Nice change of pace form being sedentary. Went 1.45 miles. Not very far granted, but that's about all i can handle these days. Managed an 8:33 pace. Now I can't manage to breathe without coughing.

Also ran over the weekend. I don't recall all the details so I'll have to check with TC, she's better about that than I am :)

little run, no brew

Tonight I thought I'd come home and brew up a nice batch of brown porter. Turns out I'd rather run than brew. So that's just what I did. It was fantastic outside. Somewhere in the 60s with a slightly overcast sky.

Went a whopping 1.55 miles in 16:30 (10:39 pace), with perfect splits. Ran back 10 seconds faster than when I went out. Didn't plan it, it just happened.

not much to report

the post title says it all. I haven't been running like I used to, certainly nothing like when I was in training last year. i've only been running about once a week for about 1.5 miles per run. it's not much but it's what I got for now. it's a little odd, knowing that I won't run a marathon this year. cest la vie.

short but sweet

the run was short so this post will be too. picked up new shoes, then hit the path with tc. it was fun. she had her new camera with her so we stopped along the way and took pictures. by the end of it we were both pretty beat. the only sad thing about it was the distance...maybe 1.25 miles in all. yeah we're out of shape again.

Don't call it a comeback

i ran, yay! for the first time in two months i actually ran. yes, Chicago 2007 turned me off from organized events...but not from running in its entirety. i've not been feeling it lately, but the time, aches, and the pounds started to add up.

i went 3 miles in 29:30, not bad for such along "rest". just under 10 minute pace. don't get me wrong, my lungs were burning at mile 1, and my legs ached by mile 2. but i managed to run the full distance anyway.

it was a beautiful night out. it was snowing large, fluffy flakes. the snow was coming down slowly, just barely masking the tracks of the occasional runner who passed that way before me. it really was a serene little run.

expect more to come.

it's hit or miss lately

I have not been very consistent with the running lately. been doin 15-30 minutes as a warm up before lifting (which has also been very hit or miss). also been in tampa all week. I did manage a run of 30 minutes on thursday morning. let me tell you, it's friggin humid in florida this time of year. i'll be in a car for 2 days so no running tell next week.
on a side note i've come close to injuring my ankle again. I tripped over a walker, fell off a ramp, and was almost thrown out of a jazzy 14 xl scooter. it's been some kind of week.