Greg's Running Blog

Today I was going to take it easier than yesterday. I wasn’t ready to run another 5 miles so instead I ran 3. But I ran that 3 like crazy. Well it was crazy for me. I ran the first 1 mile split in 8:18. Then the second two splits were 9:05 each. I finished the whole 3 miles in 26:33 total. It felt like a great workout. My only concern is that I seem to exercise at a pretty high heart rate and maybe I shouldn’t. But I have a hard time slowing myself down. I’ll have to figure something out.

But it wouldn’t be a triathlon if I didn’t ride some bikes along with it. In the morning I promised my son that after nap I’ll take him out on his Adams Trail a Bike and have a ride. He did not forget. So I ran 3 miles while the kids were napping then put the trailer on my bike and dragged him around for another 3 miles. We took the same route as I did for the run. Let’s just say my son does not do a whole lot of pedaling when we’re out and about. I can hear the ratchet clicking in the real wheel as he’s coasting. But we have a great time together and we talk about junkers and clunkers that we see on the side of the road or about angry dogs that bark at us. His favorite moment on today’s ride was when a small dog started chasing us and its owner had to whistle then run after the dog to stop it from following us all the way home. Then my son was giggling as the dog got disciplined for running away. We had to tell all about it to mom too . Times like these I really enjoy spending with my son, he’s growing up so fast so I have to enjoy these moments while I can.

As for the first leg of the triathlon we’ll have to wait until the weather gets better so we can swim in the pool again. In the winter I truly hate my pool but come April it’ll start to look better by the minute!

Running

• 26 minutes 33 seconds
• 3 miles
• 165 bmp avg heart rate
• 424 calories

Cycling

• 20 minutes 19 seconds
• 3.1 miles
• 127 bmp avg heart rate
• 204 calories

• Watched another movie instead of the evening cardio. Last one for a long long time… #
• I'm no longer obese! According to the BMI I'm at 29.5 which is only overweight! Yay! #
• I broke 200 this morning! 199.7 lbs! That's 90.6 kg for the metric folks #
• It's just too late to post my pictures tonight. I'll have to post them tomorrow. #

Today was weekend again. Weekend means two things.

1. I get to sleep in a bit and have a late breakfast of eggs.
2. I get lazy and don’t plan my meals out for the day and then end up scrambling for food.

On the weekends I have time in the morning to make scrambled eggs or make them over easy or sunny side up. So I do. I don’t use any oil in the non-stick pan and I don’t use salt either. Once you give up on salt things start to taste pretty good on their own. I’m not watching my salt intake like I watch my protein or calories but I won’t put much extra salt on the food unless I have to.

For lunch I had leftover chicken from last night with rice and veggies. Then for dinner my wife and I didn’t feel like cooking so we went out to the Chinese Buffet with the Mongolian Grill and I had my usual shrimp, mushroom, bean sprout and squash stir-fry. Lots of it. It was good as usual although the person before me must have used a ton of the hot pepper as my plate ended up pretty hot too. It’s a good thing I can handle the hot stuff. I had some fruit for dessert and that was it. It really starts to hurt me to see my kids eating ice cream and cream puffs but they’re great looking kids, if I say so myself, so I think we’re doing a decent job with their food management even if we let them splurge at the all-you-can-eat buffet.

Today was Saturday. And I was planning on doing a rest day but I just couldn’t. My legs were craving the running. I just wanted to go out and run. I mapped out a 5 mile route around my town and went for it. I had settled into a pretty steady pace around 9:22 for the entire run. I had a couple of places where I was keeping close to a 9 minute mile and on a small section of major road where I did not want to spend any time at all I was under the 8 minute/mile pace. It was a great run and I am still amazed just how much I can run if I wanted to. I have burned 753 calories in under 48 minutes. This is by far the fastest rate of calorie burning I have done which is just great.

• 47 minutes 51 seconds
• 5.1 miles
• 164 bmp avg heart rate
• 753 calories

Today consisted more turkey for lunch and for dinner I had chicken with mozzarella cheese baked on top. It’s one of my wife’s signature dishes and I really love it. I calculated out calorie content at the early stages in my weight loss as I wanted to make sure I still could eat it. It’s really not as bad as one would think as long as you eat from it in moderation. Every time she makes it I’m desperately trying to fir it into my daily calories that’s how good they are.

I think I’m getting a hang of this running thing. Today at lunch I went for running again. This time my goal was to run 10:30 miles and run 4 of them in a row without stopping. Mission accomplished. I ran 4 miles straight. If you had asked me three months ago if I could run 4 miles straight I probably would ahve said yeah but I probably would have died trying. This time I ran it just fine. I actually ran it at 10:04 pace and my average heart rate was 154 bpm. It was a great run and I felt really ood after it while also tired. My left knee felt a bit of a pain afterward but it wasn’t unbearable. The same knee started hurting before 2 miles on my first running day and now it didn’t even hurt during the run. It’s definitely getting better.

• 47 minutes 02 seconds
• 4.5 miles (last half mile was slow jog and walk)
• 148 bmp avg heart rate
• 601 calories

Since my running took up my entire lunch I have to start doing weights after work. I did my two exercises with relative ease and I rushed home for the weekend.

Incline Press

• 3×10 @ 100lbs

Decline Press

• 3×10 @ 100lbs

Here is another photo update. My tape measurement numbers have started shrinking again in all areas. My weight has also dropped drastically by 4.2 lbs (1.9 kg) over the past 4 days. I’m sure it will bounce up as it probably has been mostly water, there is no way I ws on a 3,500 calorie daily deficit even with all the running I have been putting in. My bicep has shrink again by 0.25″ now it’s down to 13.75″ I think the fat is shedding off of the back side now as I can see some of my triceps now. Chest and thighs are down 0.25″ and hips are down 0.5″. When I lie on my back now my stomach is actually sunken in below my ribcage. It’s a great feeling and I’m getting more and more exciting about where I’m heading. My hamstrings are getting also more visible in the back of my leg I’m sure the running helps the legs a lot.

01/14/2010 Transformation Picture

Today was another turkey day. Every time I have turkey I get great results in terms of protein. Apparently turkey is just awesome for protein intake. I’m not even sure if I should mention what I had for breakfast. If you had guessed yogurt and nuts you guessed right. For lunch I went out with the guys from work, something I haven’t done in a long time. This time it was to meet one of the guy’s fiancé. Next week we’ll have a company birthday lunch again. Today we went to Red Hot & Blue. Never mind that I just had dinner there with the family on Saturday, I could eat there every day if I had to.

Last time I wrote how I thought I was cheated on the meat. I sent Red Hot & Blue a letter and complained about their lacking nutritional info and about the meet discrepancy on what I was promised and what I received. Be as it may their regional guy responded to my e-mail today:

Dear Greg,

Thanks for taking the time to visit our website and email your comments. First, allow me to apologize for not having all the information on our website. I will pass this on to the franchisor who edits the content of the website.

In response to your concerns about plate size and weight, I cannot begin to speculate on what happened with your meat portioning but clearly we fell short of meeting your expectation. I would like to make this up to you, simply reply to this  email with your postal address and I will send a gift certificate for your next visit.

Thanks for being a loyal guest, I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Sincerely,

Peter Lehrfeld
Director of Operations – D/FW
Red Hot & Blue – Texas Franchisee

I was pretty impressed my their response even though they still haven’t cleared up the size question. I responded to him, thanked him for his help and gave up the free meal as that was not the reason I wrote the letter. But today I asked the waiter (a different one) again to check on the dinner plate meat size. Today the answer was 6 oz which is exactly what I have received last time. So now I know that it’s 6 oz and that’s how I’ll count it. I ordered green beans and sweet potato again. Given on the math I have done I was going to eat the whole giant sweet potato but I just couldn’t. I simply wasn’t that hungry so I took it home for tomorrow’s lunch side.

Dinner was the same stewed turkey cutlet I had yesterday but instead of the roasted potatoes I just made three slices of whole wheat toast and some broccoli. I wasn’t in the mood for making some complicated side. I still had anough meat left that I can eat it for tomorrow at lunch with the sweet potato. My meal plan for the week is looking pretty darn good right about now.

Today was the first time I actually ran in the dark. I didn’t have time to work out at lunch so I just had to run after the kids went down to bed. I have bought a headlamp made by Princeton Tec It has worked awesome even in the light drizzly rain. This thing is supposedly water resistant so the light drizzle I had to run in did not bother it. It gave great visibility on the road and it gave enough right up front where I could see my watch too. All in all a must have for night time running.

I have also ordered a belt and flashing Firefly Supernova from www.RoadID.com. These are going to make me more visible which is a must on the dark rural roads of Texan suburbia. I have also ordered a Wrist ID and I should have it by the end of next week.

The run was rather uneventful. Instead of the 3×1 intervals I did yesterday I walked half a mile, ran three then jogged another half. While running I have tried to keep a pace between 10 and 11 minute miles, I certainly did not want to overdo it. The run was painless and felt good. My heart rate stayed steady during the run, for the 3 miles it averaged 155 bmp. My pace averaged out to be 10:31 which is right smack in the middle of what I targeted it to be. Overall it was a pretty good workout and I had a really good time with it. My back is hurting a bit and I’m not sure if it’s from the running or the strength training but my guess is from the running so I’ll definitely have to keep an eye on it. It’s not my lower back which I usually have problems with it’s my middle section.

Walking/Running/Jogging

• 46 minutes 43 seconds
• 4 miles
• 145 bmp avg heart rate
• 579 calories