Sharing My Story

About a month ago I was asked by some staff at work if I would provide a brief presentation at our divisional planning day about my "inspirational "weight loss achievements. I work in a leadership position in a health service, and my weight loss has been fairly high profile given my position. Our planning day had a "healthy lifestyles" theme, so although I already had to present on more serious stuff earlier in the day, I agreed to "go public" and in 5 minutes share my story. As I prepared the presentation I became somewhat nervous. I knew that people really wanted to see before/after photos, but to be honest, knowing I was going to put up all my "fat" photos for 130 staff to see, many of whom had never seen me at my heaviest, was not an easy thing to do. However I remembered how inspirational I had found so many other peoples stories/blogs and thought, well even if it just inspired one person to lose weight, it would be worth it. So I did. Since then the rest of the organisation (we are only 1 division of 4) have also wanted to see it, so it is now hosted on our network for all staff to view at their leisure (eekk - more really bad nerves - be brave Lisa) The response has been phenomenal though. I won't go into all the responses I have had, but I have even had staff members ring me whom I barely know to congratulate me, and tell me how motivating they have found it.
So I thought that since its already done I might as well share it with you guys too. It is a large file so it will take a while to download - and you will need to have powerpoint to view it.
http://d.turboupload.com/d/1022837/Transformations.ppt.html

Also - I have uploade the Hadd document that I mentioned in an earlier post about low HR training
http://www.sendmefile.com/00467813

Ciao

Need I say more???

59.9!!!!!!

The New Training Schedule

I have made a discovery… I am very unfit aerobically. What you say – how can that be with all the exercise you do? But its true. Read on to be enlightened…

Now when I look at all the exercise I have done over the last 8 months since I joined the gym and ditched walking, I have NEVER exercised within my aerobic capacity – I have always pushed myself so hard that I am exercising at about the 90% level. But at the end of the fitness challenge that I was involved in (end of August), I was very disappointed to find that my fitness had only improved minimally. A friend who was on the winning team suggested that I really should have been on their team so that I could have been a part of the winning prize – assuming that I must have improved significantly, and was shocked when I told her my results “But you do so much more than the rest of us – that can’t be possible” At the time I thought that it might have been related to the fitness test being done on a bike, because I don’t do any bike riding. But looking back – the test that was done required me to keep my heart rate at a low level whilst the resistance to the bike increased, and I had trouble with this.

From some of the runners’ forums I have listened to people discuss the Hadd approach to low heart rate training – which involves running below your maximum aerobic threshold (usually talked about as 85% of max hr) to train yourself to run aerobically and utilizing body fat as the primary source of fuel, instead of glycogen. Apparently when you run anaerobically (over 85%) you use glycogen (the sugar/energy you currently have in your system) but once you have depleted this, runners hit “a wall” when their bodies try to switch to burning body fat, and they aren’t used to it/very good at it.

But it also talks about how if you always run anaerobically – you will build fast twitch fibres in the leg muscles, but these are no good for endurance runs – you need to build slow twitch fibres, and this ONLY occurs when you run aerobically.

So how much training have I done within my aerobic capacity? NONE
I have always pushed myself hard in an effort to be super fit – and I know it has made a difference (eg I now have a low resting HR level, I can achieve much higher levels of activity in classes, I can run and at a reasonable level etc) but I think I’ve really developed those fast twitch fibres, giving me lots of spring and “go gettum”, but I haven’t been improving my base aerobic fitness. I think I have pushed myself too hard too fast to meet my City/Bay running goals, and missed a few important steps along the way.

The Hadd method requires regular long runs, whilst keeping my heart rate below 138 bpm at all times. Eeek – 138 bpm – I didn’t think that was possible! And I was right. When I first headed out to try this, within 10 metres my HR was up to 155 and I had to stop and walk to get it to return to a lower level. And I continued to have to walk/run every 10 metres or so. Apparently, when you have good aerobic fitness – you can run at a reasonable pace at this level. REALLY? I have to say if that’s possible, then I’m all for it. Because when I stopped to walk there was no need to catch my breath and the run really required no effort. At that level of effort I could run for hours…..Did I say hours? Is this how the distance runners do it?
Because all of my running up until now has been very hard work (hence the high HR!), I often don’t look forward too it because its so much effort! If I can follow this technique (and the plan is that if you keep yourself within this HR threshold, after a minimum of 6 weeks the mitochondria and slow twitch muscles will begin to grow) and continually increase my pace without increasing my HR – this would be fantastic! I might actually enjoy running!

I think my difficulty running within an aerobic capacity shows how much I need to learn to do this! Out of interest, the first day I trialed it – I had to walk as much as I ran (very frustrating), but with practice I have changed my running technique to require far less thigh movement and far more calf/ankle movement which is more efficient and allows me to run more without my HR going up . I trialed this on the treadmill on Thursday – and basically I’ve had to drop my speed to about 7.5km/hr (from 10!). (and if you can call it speed because it doesn’t really feel like running – more like a shuffle). But on Saturday when I ran 6 kms – I ran most of the time, and averaged over 8kms/hr. Now I don’t think that’s from building the right muscle fibers (too soon) but I think I’ve learnt to be far more efficient – and that’s a good thing in itself. Its very frustrating (and embarrassing – running so slowly on the open road!) but ultimately, if it will provide me with some real gains, I think it will be worth it. I will keep you up to date with my progress, am entering every thing into the “cool runners running log”, and it keeps track of every little detail.

I haven’t done justice to Hadd’s methods – have left heaps out, and the article is well worth a read, particularly for those aspiring runners who read my blog (eg Trisca, Jessie, Girl Running) so I will try and attach it.

Here’s to all the slow twitch muscle fibres I’m going to develop over the next few months….WOOHOO!

I Did It!!!!!!

Yes, I did it - I ran the City Bay Fun Run and survived! It was a fantastic day, and I have to say I am so proud of myself. My time was 83 mins, but that's really secondary to everything else. The photo is of me after the race in the hotel room, with a view of the city.

Here's my race run down:
( I wasn't going to do one, but I figure I might appreciate the details later on, so skip it if the length is overwhelming!)
Prep - I had to deal with a lot of pre-race anxiety - but mainly in the days leading up to Sunday. I calmed myself with the knowledge that I knew I could make the distance (had run it 4 times in training) and lowered my time targets, focussing on completing the race as the main achievement. I also made sure I was very prepared, right down to packing a separate bag for all my running gear so that I could easily double check that I had everything and would be able to find it easily (we had to travel to Adelaide the day before as we live in the country).

On the day- got me and everyone else up early (5.30 am - my family loved me for that!) so that we could leave at 6.30am without feeling rushed. Arrived at the race at 7.30 - perfect timing for the 8.00 am race. Had about a 10 minute walk to the start line, so used this as my warmup.
Positioned myself at the 75 min mark - Andrew chose the 60 min one and the kids stood at 70 mins (did I mention that all 5 of us were running it? Of course I was the only one who had done any training - lol)

Had to wait a while for the race to start but it was a beautiful day (29 degrees), and I put my music on, and just kicked back and enjoyed the ambience - just focussed on knowing that I had done everything I possibly could, and I should now just enjoy the experience. And I did.

When we eventually took off, I didn't even notice running up hill for the first 100 metres, which a few months back had worried me. I quickly fell into a comfortable pace although I had lots of technical hitches! My heart rate monitor didn't start when I crossed the start line, and it took me about a minute I think to notice this. Bugger - never mind - I ignored this. Then my MP3 player bounced aound too much in my waist belt and kept changing stations so I couldn't hear anything (I had set it to radio because I decided I would enjoy hearing race updates as I went along). So I tried to fix this whilst running (difficult) and eventually achieved this, only for it to stop working completely 1 km later. Seemed to have turned itself off - so turned it back on, ok for a while - and then off again. It seemed to suggest it was on low battery- but I had put a new one in that morning - grrh. Around the 5 km mark I gave up on it completely.

Back to the 1 km mark - with the delayed start on my HR monitor I hit the 1 km mark still running - my game plan has always been to run for 5 mins/walk for 2 mins - which usually means I'm walking at teh first km and ready to start running again, but not having an accurate start time meant that I must have run for 6 mins (my running pace is about 10km/hr= 6 min km's). Still not to worry I felt reasonably good - I always find the first 1 - 2 kms hard until my legs really warm up . Stuck to my game plan from then on - and it seemed to work fairly well. My heart rate sat somewhere in teh 160's - 170's - but this is very normaly - and I concentrated on trying to get it back into training zone (ie under 155) during my walk breaks.

I was very grateful for having trained with a waist belt and carried a bottle of iced water, as it was very hot - much warmer than I had ever run in before, and I was glad to be able to take a drink whenever I wanted. -Poured it over my head a few times too!
Running along - it was hard though, and I did ask myself a few times - why was I doing this? I had been rading Hal Higdon's Marathon Running book the day before as I have been considering what my next goals might be, and came to the conclusion that I really don't want to push myself that hard - I really don't enjoy running that much! At the 5 kms mark thinking I still had 7 to go was scary enough - without thinking that I had 37 to go for the marathon!

At the 6 km mark - my 16 y.o. daughter ran up to me and tapped me on the shoulder. It was nice to see her - asked how she was going. She said she was doing terribly, but I have to admit I didn't believe her - after all, she was at the same place/time as me - so she was doing ok. I was walking at this stage, but soon after she arrived my two minutes were up, so I started running again. I fully expected her to run with me, and I had mixed feelings about this. My competitive nature wanted me to pull ahead and run faster, in the back of my mind I wanted to prove that I am fitter than my kids, but I also knew that this was silly, and I shouldn't try and take anything away from her. No, I needed to run my own race, as planned, and if she beat me - good for her. But to my surprise she didn't start running - and I didn't see her again for a couple of kms.

After the 6 km mark I knew it was count down time, and whilst feeling reasonable ok, let myself run a few extra minutes every now and then . Eg I would be running my 5 minutes, looking forward to walking again, but when teh 5 minute mark came around, would convince myself that I could run one more minute - I was coping ok wasn't I? Ran a 6 minute block and a 7 minute block this way - and then let myself walk for 3 minutes instead of 3. Say Kaelia again around the 8 km mark - but not close enough to talk. She was on my left, and I watched her run around the same speed as me (maybe a littel faster), but with far more leg lift, and then stop and walk after about 30 secs. She told me afterwards that this was how she tends to run, can't work out how to run slower, and then gets puffed out and has to stop/start all the time. I felt that in comparison my pace was slow, steady and sustainable.
Around the 9km I was feeling tired, and my game plan started to become a litttle unsteady. In retrospect this may have been as a result of me adding a few extra minutes of running - I'm not sure. But I started to plan for my run down Jetty Rd to the finish line, and I wanted to make sure that I finished strongly. So I gave myself an extra break - thinking I would then run the last 1.5 kms without stopping. But in trying to do this, it was too much and at the 11km mark I had to stop again, mainly to make sure that I would be ready for the last leg through the crowd. This did work though. I had picked up the pace with 2 kms to go, and once I turned down Jetty Rd I picked it up again, and thoroughly enjoyed a strong pace, passing many other runners. About 200 meters from the end, I heard a voice cheer me on, and I turned to see my husband on the sidelines, saying "keep going, you've done a great time". That was fantastic to hear, and I was so proud to show him what I had now achieved. One last corner turn, and about 100m to the finish line, I did what I had dreamt of, and sprinted to the finish line. To my delight the race announcer picked up on it, and called out "there you go ladies, how about a sprint to the finish line!" It was a fantastic feeling as I picked up the speed and passed so many - I don't think I even knew I could run that fast! I DID IT.

Post race, my HR was back to normal within a few minutes, I was elated and feeling fine. Kaelia came in about 3 minutes after me, and Tara (19) who had offered to run with my youngest, Tess, (10) came in at about another 20 mins later. Andrew had completed the race in about 66 mins despite no training (he's so naturally athletic). But the true test of my fitness was yet to come. Post race, all the family wanted to do was sit down - so they headed back to the hotel and crashed. Me, I just wanted to soak up the day -so I wandered about the festivities for a while, and then went shopping, walking up and down Jetty Rd for a few hours!

PS - the 48 hours that followed, I suffered from mild stiffness - no more that after any other workout - wasked 6 kms the next morningto stretch my legs, and back to running today - the rest of the family are still having difficulties walking!

Things I have learnt:/observations/achievements:

• Never in a million years would I have thought this possible. Three years ago I contemplated walking the race, and that it would take me 3 hours. I trained for many months, and walked it in 2:20. I couldn't walk for days afterwards. 2 years ago, I dropped 10 kgs and trained for 6 months and walked it in 1:57. I walked at 100% max HR for the full two hours. It took over an hour afterwards for my heart rate to return to normal (and I was lying down to recover). I had blisters and was reasonably sore for a few days. This year, another 30 kgs lighter, I ran it, trimmed another 35 mins off my time, stayed well under max HR and recovered almost instantly, with no blisters, no chaffing, no real stiffness. An absolute miracle.

• I am very proud of the fact that my whole family ran the race, that this is a good health focus for us all, and great to achieve together. The kids have always been active, but now I'm a part of it, and I hope they will pass on the same enthusiasm to their children.

• I had no idea that the majority of "runners" did not plan to run the entire race. I positioned myself to the side, as I didnt want to inconvenience everyone when I stopped every 5 mins to walk, however people were walking within the first 200m, and it seemed that I ran more than most, and faster than most when I was running. I overtook many runners, weaving in and out of the crowds, and continued to do so right to the end. There I was previously thinking how incredibly fit all these people were to be able to run it, but they weren't that fit after all! It was like thinking that I wasn't fit enought to go the gym!
• Training and pacing make a huge difference. Having trained so well, I didn't suffer from a slower second half of the race, like so many people. In the second half so many runners were walking, or running very slowly, but I was able to run a good steady pace right to the end.

• Researching running tips/training programmes also really helps. My husband runs purely on instinct and base fitness (remember he didn't do any running before the race, but plays sport regularly). His game plan was to go out as hard as he could, set the standard for himself, and then push himself to maintain it to the end. He ran the first 5 kms quite well, then had to walk for a while, then ran 2kms, then walked, then run /walk to the end. Yes he was faster than me (he's also a fair bit taller), but was disapppointed with a 66 min result. And to a certain degree I think he should be. Because I think he is quite capable of a sub 60 mins - if he had paced himself at the beginning - I think he could have run the whole thing and done it quicker.

• I think I could have run it faster. Yes it was hot, and that probably affected my time, and I had an injury two weeks prior, and that could have affected it. And my husband felt that if you have enough in you to sprint to the end, then you probably could have pushed yourself harder in the race. All true, but I guess the final time wasn't teh only important thing to me. Being my first real race, finishing was foremost in my mind, and finishing comfortably was also important. The joy of sprinting to the finish line, have done something I never thought I could do, was more important to me, than hobbling to the end with a time recorded a few minutes faster. Next year it may be different - we'll see.

• Despite my thinking about running whilst the race was on, I am still thinking of a marathon ,but I just want to learn to really enjoy running first. I've pushed myself really hard to get here, and I would benefit from taking a step back and building up my mileage without pressure.

• There were other achievements on the day. I loved the fact that I could wear real running gear with out embarassment. I wore real runners shorts (you know baggy with the undies sewn in), and a skimpy top to keep me cool. If had been heavier, I would have had to wear long pants to hide my legs/prevent chaffing, and a tshirt with sleeves to hide the rest of me. The result would have been much hotter than my counterparts, just adding to the weight disadvantage I already had. I loved the fact that I felt like a I looked athletic, "fit the part", so to speak, and was then comfortable wandering through the crowd afterwards, and shopping, still in my running gear. That would have NEVER happened a year ago. It doesn't matter that I am still "chunky", I don't think I look overweight, I fit into size 10 clothing and feel very "normal".

Well that's it from me. A long post I know, but I think I will appreciate having it all recorded when I look back on it. I started low HR running training this morning - but I think I 'll save that for another post!

Massive calorie burn on 10 km walk....

NOT!
Here's one of the down sides of being fitter.....
Walked 10 kms of hills with the family on sunday over approximately 2 hours, and the heart rate monitor told me I had burned guess how many calories....800 you think, 600 maybe, at least 400 surely- NOPE - a grand total of 175!
Why you ask - because my heart rate never nudged over 110 bpm, and most of the time was under 100. To help you make some sense of these figures if you are not used to HR measurements, my training zone for fitness needs to be between 116- 155, (its never at the lower end in classes) and when I run, it sits at between 160 - 170. So 100 bpm is doing absolutelyNOTHING for me.
But it did achieve something - because my legs were a little stiff that afternoon, so this hills challenged the let muscles, but not my heart.
Oh how life has changed!

Not much hope

I don't think there's much hope of me posting a weigh in on Monday in the fifties. I haven't seen last Mondays' weight (60.3) since then, it must have been a particularly "light" day. I'm still at 60 point something, but the 50's might have to be another week away. But I would REALLY like to be in teh 50's for the big race NEXT WEEKEND.

OMG- its next week!!!! and I'm already starting to feel edgy and nervous. I've been training for this event for the last 8 monnths and now its finally here - what if my hamstring isn't healed in time, what if I have one of those "bad" running days? What if my family all beat me? (They are all entering as runners, even my 10 year old, and none have done any training, how much of a goose will I feel?) So many nerves - I'm not sure how I'll get through the week.

I'm starting to have a sense of how athletes feel before a big event. I have been reading a blog written by someone who trained for a triatholon, then a1/2 ironman, andthen a full ironman. Reading her throughs (he he, I must have ESP), I can see the same mental anguish, fear, anticiptation and pain, just on a much smaller scale! Its started me thinking about what my goals should be after this.. The gym are going to hold a triatholon in the future - you can do the whole thing individually, or in a team and do one leg each. I was thinking of a team, and I'd take the running leg - but maybe after the race I should take up cycling and swimming - to add variety to my exercise. Can't do either of them for shit - but then I couldn't run either 8 months ago - now I reckon I could keep training for a 1/2 marathon - so...... WE'll see. At the moment the only definite goal I have is to be able to do all of the ridiculous bicep/tricep pushup combos in the new release of Combat on my toes, before the next release is out (about three months) Has anyone else tried these - they are hard work! And 1 handed pushups!

Injury update - I have spent the last week xtraining most days to try and keep my fitness up. Have warmed up on the treadmill, tried a slow run, stopped after 1 min feeling the hammy, then done combat, plus either the bike or the elliptical. I must have looked a sight doing combat earlier in teh week as I couldn't do any right sided kicks and knee lifts - but did them with great gusto on the left! By the way I also noticed one day with my HR monitor on when warming up walking 6kms/hr - which used to be my ultimate goal speed for walking - that I couldn't even get my HR near training zone - it sat at about 109 - ie walking does nothing for me anymore! I think thats good! Any way - felt fit and strong on Friday - fully functioning in combat - so went for a slow, short road run this morning to test the hammy. I could feel it straight away lower down, but not in the area I had injured - and it was definitely better part way through the run when it was warmer. But as soon as I finished I felt a twinge in the butt (the injured area) but nothign more. So I guess its healing, and I should stick with xtraining this week again - may be have a last run on Wed/thursday. My fitness felt really good though - so that was encouraging. Hopefully this will be enough to see me through to Sunday.
If you've made it this far, hopefully this means I haven't bored you to tears with this long post.
Cheers
Lisa

Fifties Here I Come!

Weigh In this morning - 60.3 - loss of 0.8 for the week - Yahhooo!!!!
Now if I play my cards right (well, eat well, exercise well) I should definitely make the 50's this week. Then I am soooo close to goal.

On the exercise front however, I have hit a snag. I have an injury - have pulled my right hamstring. It hurt after my 12km run last Monday, so I took a day off. It hurt again on my 5km run on Wednesday - so I took 3 days off! By Fri/Sat it felt fine, so I did 12kms again on Sunday - and it hurt the minute I started running! And it got worse as i went. In the end I had to skip some of the walking as teh muscle cramped up to much when I stopped running and I was hobbling - barely able to walk. And in the aftermath of the run, my hip flexor is the sorest - because when I couldn't push myself forwards with my "hammy" i had to pull my hip forwards with the flexors - which weren't used to it and are now stiff. This is bad news because its only two weeks till the race, and I've been so careful/fearful of an injury. The good news is I've done some reading, and the cause is often attributed to running downhill, particularly at speeds you're not used to (guilty - there are hills in my run, and I've loved soaring downhill) or running on banked surfaces (eg roadside) (guilty, and I'm not used to it - no roadsides on a treadmill), and that you can continue to run with the injury - just fix the causes. So no more road running for me until the race - I will just try and maintain my fitness with cross training and some runs on the treadmill. Oh and did I mention that I trimmed by time by 3 minutes to 73 mins? Even in pain! I know now that i can do this race!