A Passion for Running

I’ve begun my 3rd week of bike commuting. Wanna know what I’ve learned so far?

1) The wind is never at my back.

2) I seem to adapt quickly to being on the bike. Week one was hard. Week two I introduced a run on a bike day and it wasn’t bad. And this week I already feel like I could bike every day and run on a few of those days as well. Of course, runs on those days would likely not be fast or particularly long but…we’ll see.

3) I’m not fond of road bikes that pass me and my mountain bike like we’re standing still. Not fond of them at all.

4) I have a “natural” cadence of 90 revolutions per minute. I hope I am stating that with fairly correct cycling lingo. At any rate, my legs seem most comfortable peddling 90 times each per minute. This is fascinating to me since 90 is also the minimum cadence I aim for when running - something I learned under the Pose Method. Are my legs good at 90 because of what I have engrained while running, or is 90 just…natural?

5) A 45 minute bike ride to work more than replaces morning coffee.

Ouch ouch ouch! Today’s April fool’s joke is that I am damn sore! My shoulders are WAY sore from rowing and my calves and hamstrings are WAY sore from POSE drills.

But that’s ok because even though different = sore, sore = growth!

In keeping with Chris’ challenge, I did a couple of different things today. First, I did a little cross-training on one of these:

MAN, that was hard work. I only rowed for 15 minutes but my hamstrings, butt, shoulders and arms killed me!

Afterward, I did some balancing on one of these:

And that was good stuff too. Good for the ankles, good for the arches, good for the core. All good stuff for running and it will complement what Aaron and I are going to do this evening - that being POSE drills.

Three new things in my belt today. Yay me!

uggh…

Want to find out what’s outta shape on your body? Just do a few minutes of rope jumping. I did 20 minutes today and stuff was moving around. Stuff in my abdominal area. Stuff on the sides. Stuff in the “love handle” area…me no likee.

I will say, however that it was GREAT exercise and loads of fun.

That title definitely will have come across wrong but I had to get your attention right?

I did not pull my groin swimming. However, Thursday night I lifted Christopher and while doing so, turned a bit funny and BLAMMO - something weird happened in my inner thigh. OUCH! Talk about pain. I definitely pulled something in the groin area.

Am I getting old? Garsh, nothing like that has ever happened to me before?

The good news is that the pull doesn’t bother me doing any kind of activity - it just hurts like an SOB when I bend at more than a 45 degree angle at the waist. Weird huh?

Swimming rocked on Saturday. I did 1000 meters for the second week in a row and got stronger at it too! My goals for the next several weeks are to eventually eliminate breaks between the 20 laps and improve swimming time for those 1000 meters. This Saturday, I didn’t take any breaks for the first two laps and then took only a 10 second break between the other laps.

The result was a four minute improvement over last week’s 43 minute “record”. This week I got the job done in 39. The “anticipated time” I wrote down on my triathlon registration for finishing the swim was 35 minutes so I’m feeling pretty good about things!

How was your weekend? Did you pull anything in your groin? How about someone else’s?

I know I know - that was a BAD one.

Today, I know the true meaning of that famous FDR quote because today was a real milestone for me. A milestone in both the physical and spiritual sense.

Today, I swam 1000 meters. One whole kilometer.

I’m blowing my horn because this really is a big deal for me. Why? Because for years I’ve been afraid of the water and during my 37 years on this planet, never thought I’d swim anywhere near 1000 meters.

Not only did I swim that kilometer but I did it without being afraid. Not even the least bit afraid.

After our swim, Aaron talked about swimming at Hubble Lake - a very small but very deep lake located west of Edmonton that sees a lot of triathlon action.

You know what? I can see myself swimming across that lake this summer. How cool is that?

We have nothing to fear but fear itself. You can swim a kilometer. You can run 5k or a marathon. You can do whatever you set your mind to but in order to do those things you first have to do another thing…

…you have to start

I swam 900 meters this Saturday! For people who swim regularly, I know that will not seem like much but the further along I get with it, the more skeletons I am clearing out of my closets. You see, I grew up being deathly afraid of water. I couldn’t even swim 10 meters until I was about 16 years of age.

When I started in the pool four weeks ago, I was still afraid and I found it very difficult to swim and keep my feelings of panic under control.

But now I’m feeling more and more confident and less and less insecure in the water.

Get this - I’m even starting to enjoy some things about swimming (who’da thunk it!). The first thing I like is the minimal amount of preparation you need to go swimming. All you need is a towel, a swimming suit and goggles. That’s much less to worry about than winter running in Alberta! The second thing I like is I get to jump into a hot tub after my swim. I LOVE hot tubs! The third thing I like is showering and changing immediately afterward so I am ready for the rest of my day.

Exercise-wise, I love the fact that I am working my upper body - something I really must do more of. In addition, turning my head (so I can breathe!) works my neck muscles and that’s gotta be good for spinal difficulties I often have.

Will I ever have a passion for swimming? I doubt it but I am enjoying it and can definitely see positive things from doing it.

Next Saturday, I will take a shot at 1000 meters - the distance I need to swim for the triathalon.

Woohoo!

I listened to my audio post from last Saturday and it was pretty easy to hear how tired I was so I’m hoping this post sounds more like my regular upbeat self!

It’s a big file so beware - especially to you dial-up bloggers!

Here’s the Audio

Just in case you choose not to listen, I swam 800 meters today. Wahoo!

Yes, I am going to do a triathlon!

The ankle is feeling good and I think as long as I stay away from runs over 10km for a while, it will stay that way. In addition, I feel uber-confident on the bike and NOW the swimming is coming along. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t feel like a swimming champion (yet) but I think swimming even once a week for the next couple of months is going to get me ready.

No speed records will be broken on this first (!) tri. It’ll be all about just doing it, growing as an athlete and as a person and having a whack of fun!

Credit goes to Aaron on this decision. Although I HAD decided to give swimming a try, I was nowhere NEAR committing to doing a triathlon but you know what? That buddy of mine is a sneaky bugger. He gets you in the pool and makes you take tiny steps and the next thing ya know he’s dangling carrots in front of your nose.

Seriously though, Aaron and I are gonna have boatloads of fun getting ready for this.

Wahoo!!!!!!! Yippee kiyay mudder trucker!

I wouldn’t go that far - not even close but I did do WAY more swimming today than I’ve ever done previously in this lifetime anyway!

10 laps x 50 meters. That’s 500 meters or a half a kilometer!

Wahoo!!

Okay, okay, I did have to take breaks in between laps (it was HARD!) but I still did the distance right? What am I saying? Of course I’m right because this is pretty much exactly what I’ve told beginning runners who are building up their distances or who take walk breaks within runs. In other words, I’m cutting myself some slack and giving myself a pat on the back. Yay me!

Thanks goes out to my bud Aaron for getting me out there today. Thanks bud.

Speaking of Aaron, he thinks swimming “half a kilometer” sounds like more than swimming “500 meters”. I think the latter sounds like more.

What do you think?

(PS. I am DAMN tired!)