Maintainers Moving in October
 

Join us in this thread during the beautiful month of October, as we celebrate our physicality and what our bodies can do when they're released from the chairs that normally hold us captive.

http:////gooutrun.com/fileuploads/Im...7474XSmall.jpg

I put this picture up because when I looked at it, I could actually **smell** the wet leaves and feel dampness on my face.

As for me, I've some catching up to do:

Saturday, Oct. 1: 60 minutes on Stairmaster stepper, resistance at five, with me puzzling over foot placement, whether centered, weight on heels, weight on toes. A few wobbles & grabbing the rails before going on hands-free. I'm glad that this machine is in the front row, right at the windows overlooking the river, and I can't see how people react to my occasional rail grabs.

Sunday, Oct. 2: 15 minutes arc trainer, resistance at eight
60 minutes shoulders, chest & triceps routine.
45 minutes arc trainer, resistance at six, felt like a light run.
This is the pushup workout. I have a very large maroon bruise on my left knee and a smaller matching maroon bruise on my right knee. Next time I'll drag a pad over for the pushup intervals in the weight area. (I should mention that I'm pretty sure these bruises have something to do with my taking Motrin or Tylenol every three hours for my root canal for the past three days on the dental surgeon's instructions. Because I have done this before without bruising.)

Monday, Oct. 3: 45 minute spin class, seriously heavy resistance, on an unfamiliar brand of bike, with a teacher who usually keeps us seated & pushing & pulling. Getting to the class was scarier than the spinning alongside all hardcore Upstate runners in the class. I didn't like driving through the countryside in the dark through a fog at 5 AM but that's what one must do out here, to get to something that was just a two-block walk away from me every day, if I wanted it. No deer in the road, fortunately.

In the evening, 60 minute Kripalu yoga class.

Hi Saef! Love the fall photo.

10/1:
biked to and from DH's 5k race (he set a PR and took 3rd in his age division!), 15 mins each direction
15 min dog walk

10/2:
60 min-ish dog walk, involving a good arm workout of trying to teach Booboo to walk correctly on the leash

10/3:
30 mins pilates:
- 10 min legs/thighs
- 10 min abs
- 10 min back

I had the ganglion cyst in my wrist drained this morning. I was hoping getting rid of it would let me be able to put pressure on my hand again but so far no dice. It is still very sore from being poked with needles so hopefully it will get better.

How are we already on October 3?
Let's see if I can recap....

October 1: 60 minutes walk with dh and Dewey. I woke up this morning with an extreme pain in my neck-- couldn't turn my head at all so didn't think the gym was in the cards.

October 2: 90 minutes Bikram Yoga. Neck was much better though certainly not back to normal. Thought yoga might help but it didn't seem to do anything one way or the other.

October 3: 60 minutes Body Pump. Neck the same today so I'm just going to ignore it and hope it goes away soon. I'm pretty sure it is due to stress.

Totals:
3 days
210 minutes

Nice picture, saef. Thank you.

I've decided to spend a fortnight (= two weeks) really working on rehabbing my poor old body. Then we'll see where we are. I can't go into winter with a niggly back.

So I was at the gymn this morning and yesterday morning. I put in a complaint about a personal trainer who approached me yesterday. He was pushy and patronising. That's no good, friends. Up with this I shall not put.

See you tomorrow, I hope.

10/4
26 min doggie powerwalk
5 min swiss ball crunches

didn't want to go to the gym tonight after working both jobs as it is cold and wet outside. Did make it though.....

Oct. 4: 60 minutes elliptical

Totals:
4 days
270 minutes

Tuesday, Oct. 4:
20 minutes Stairmaster stepper, resistance at five, with just a few wobbles
60 minutes arms and shoulders routine
40 minutes back on the Stairmaster stepper, resistance at six, more wobbling, but more confidence as I figure out how to keep moving on this machine

Wednesday, October 5:
45 minute spin class with a different instructor who does seated sprints and faster intervals with lighter resistance than Monday's instructor. My spin bike was having technical problems, though. It stuck sometimes when I peddled while standing and it would give a kick & keep going from momentum after the sprints. It took me a while to confirm it was the bike & not me. I feel so displaced in this new gym, among a different type of gym-goer, on different equipment (a StarTrac bike as opposed to a Life Fitness bike) and with different styles of spin instruction that my confidence is shaken and I feel like I'm beginning all over again at this. So I wasn't completely sure it was the bike; I thought I was doing it all wrong.
60 minutes Kripalu yoga class. A lot of breathing and then, a lot of abs work.

Wednesday

Gymn (that's three days in a row). I'm giving concerted attention to how my body feels and what makes it feel better. This is helping my niggles go away. The physical ones, anyway! The others may take a bit more time. :)

Oct. 5: I went to the gym for a Zumba class because I thought it was Thursday! Oops..... stayed and did the elliptical instead.

60 minutes elliptical

Totals:
5 days
330 minutes

Thursday: gymn again (4th time this week). Back is slightly niggly again and has been made more so by another test drive.

The test drive was in a Peugeot Partner Tepee. Er, who thinks up these names? It's quite a nice van/car although the steering seems a bit vague. Fantastically big wing mirrors. I told my mother you can fit a goat in the back. My sister thought that could be quite smelly. One of the videos I've watched features a St Bernard - that's how big it is. (NB I put that bit in for the animal lovers.)

Silver, I was watching Top Gear on BBC America once and they were test-driving cars with giant dogs in them, including a St Bernard. Was this one of those cars?

10/5: nothing

10/6: 29 min dog powerwalk, 1 min crunches swiss ball

No, it wasn't Top Gear, just one of the adverts. :dizzy: Have a look at two of them! My brain is currently full of brake horsepower and mpg and the rest. Let me share!

With dog.

Without dog but with music.

Birchie, I'm trying to figure out what, exactly, is on that family's "to do" list for that particular day. Apparently they're going to return some unsatisfactory topiary to a garden center, they're going on a ramble & also plan to do some birding, they're taking the dog to be clipped, and then perhaps they'll do some fishing? (I connect the husband's hat with a trout fishermen's attire. You stick the flies through the brim.)

Thursday, Oct. 6:

20 minutes Stairmaster stepper, resistance at five
60 minutes back & biceps routine
40 minutes Nautilus elliptical, intervals, resistance at nine and four

Saef, it's challenging, isn't it? Yet they seem confident that all will go smoothly and no difficulty will raise its head. I find it amazing that each topic (for want of a better word) stands alone and does not seem to impinge on anything else. And it's all so clean.

Is this the experience I'd have, should I buy this vehicle? I don't think it would have the stamina for our lives somehow.

But the wing mirrors are Huge. I really like them.

Yes, yes, it's far it's too clean. Because there are no empty soft drink or coffee cups mashed on the floor, there is no dog hair, there are no mud splashes (because this family only walks on dry, clean grass when they're doing their outdoorsy things). Most of all, there is no smell. For a family going out into the country? What?

I remember what my mother's station wagon was like when I was seriously into riding and had to be ferried to lessons & shows & etc. with paddock boots, rubber stall-mucking boots & saddle & sheepskin saddle pad with aroma of horse sweat and protective helmet with aroma of little girl's sweaty hair. And never mind the bits of straw and fragments of dried horse manure (despite all the stomping on the gravel outside the car that occurred, under mother's strict orders, before I got back in to ride home).

My verdict: That family doesn't actually go outdoors, it just dresses up like it's going to. Then it goes shopping or something.

Which is, actually, what the majority of people who own such vehicles do.

Those vehicles (or a variant thereof, usually black & shiny) are also very popular where I used to live among what would euphemistically be called Urban Youth. But I never see Urban Youth with their car stereos blaring from the cannon speakers in the trunk used to sell these vehicles.

October 6: 60 minutes Zumba (right day! Hooray!:carrot:)

Totals:
6 days
390 minutes

Friday, Oct. 7:

45 minute spin class, after getting melted frost off the car at 5 AM. As with every year, when the weather changes, I forgot whether one is better off blasting hot or cold air on the inner windshield in the morning after a frost. Which one clears up the moisture & which one creates more fog?

This spin class was sparsely attended, with just five people, but apparently it's the first time it's been offered on a Friday morning. There are some serious athletes in that class. The leg muscles on those people! I am keeping up, but have not yet adjusted to riding on the different brand of spin bike. Everything that I once did unthinkingly feels labored & stilted & off-balance. Which is a good metaphor for the rest of my life, too.

Saturday, Oct. 8:

60 minutes on the Stairmaster stepper, resistance at five, finally getting the hang of this thing -- most of the time.

60 minutes Kripalu yoga class, with the class full of more than 30 people, on a splendid sunny Saturday in October, a throwback to summer but with a slight crispness in the morning. I think I'm figuring out my body through this class. My hips are very tight and inflexible. But I do cobra and sphinx quite well, so I have either abs or back muscles that are flexible. (Maybe from over a year of thrice weekly Pilates classes.) My hamstrings aren't that bad. But my quads are extremely tight, so much so that it's painful for me to kneel & try to sit back on my feet. I'm putting all these findings together into a clearer picture of my physical strengths and limitations.

Sunday, Oct. 9th:

Ran a 5K today at the Apple Festival down in Lafayette, in the most gorgeous countryside imaginable, in perfect weather, with the trees nearing their peak foliage colors and the corn and soybeans and pumpkins all coming in. Our start line was just over a little country bridge, a very modest one made of poured cement, probably from around the turn of the century. The water flowing there was the color of chocolate milk from all the recent rains. I heard a bird overhead singing in a whispery way, recognized the song, put my head back to look directly upward at a nearby telephone wire and discovered an Eastern Bluebird looking down into the crowd of fidgeting runners.

I think my time for this race was close to last month's time. My mother accompanied me this time and seemed to enjoy the pre-race bustle and the free bagel that I snagged for her. (She loves it when things are free.) I asked her to watch the timer for me when I crossed the finish line, but she didn't recognize me. She thought I was wearing an orange shirt; I was wearing a lime-green shirt. I'm not sure why she forgot the color because she helped pin my number on it. She was still looking down the chute, alertly watching for me to arrive, when I came up behind her, finally finding her in the crowd, and asked her what my time was.


ETA: I looked up the race results. My time was 32:23, not as fast as my last race, at 32:21:80, and with the same pace at the mile of 10:26. If I take the time to learn how to run -- to use better form, and to pace myself -- I really do think I can do this in a half-hour.

October 7: 32 minutes running on treadmill

October 8: 90 minutes Bikram Yoga

October 9: 60 minutes walk with dh and Dewey

Totals:
9 days
572 minutes

Monday, Oct. 10th:

45 minute spin class with the instructor who sets the resistance very heavy for most of the class. I did better this time, mainly because I believe I've figured out the settings for this brand of spin bike.

60 minute beginner Kripalu yoga class. This is week four of a six-week session. We were learning the
"ocean breath" last night, which I plan to practice today.

Tuesday, Oct. 11th:

20 minutes Stairmaster stepper, aerobic setting, resistance at five
60 minutes shoulders, chest and triceps routine. This is the one with all the pushup intervals. I do girlie pushups using pushup handles.
40 minutes Nautilus elliptical, intervals at nine and four, half backward

Oh, and those pushup handles that I use during this weight routine? I got them from TJ Maxx. I had to cross gender lines to get them. They were not with the exercise equipment for women, such as the yoga mats, the pink dumbbells under seven pounds, the Pilates bands, etc. No, I had to go over to the men's section of TJ Maxx, and there they were.

Good job on the 5K Saef. Your time is really pretty good! And I'm sure you can improve it if you wish.

October 10: 10 minutes elliptical, 60 minutes UJam dance class

Totals:
10 days
642 minutes

Catching up . . .

10/7: 15 min dog walk
10/8: 75 min yoga class, 22 min doggie powerwalk
10/9: 90 min doggie powerwalk (Carter was such a good boy!)
10/10: 15 min dog walk, ~20 min pilates video (abs/legs)
10/11: 28 min 2 mile powerwalk at lunchtime.

Can I join in? I am new to maintenance as of a week ago...

Today:15 minutes running, 30 minutes eliptical

Welcome! Please do join us. I find it quite helpful to post my progress here and see others as well. Congratulations on your weight loss too!:carrot::carrot:;)

Welcome, k15g15. Personally, I find the accountability of this thread very motivating. And when I feel like I'm an immovable lump, I can look back through it & see that's not so & I am being too hard on myself.

Michele, thanks for the encouragement on my running. I have watched a bit of some YouTube videos on running form and have picked up some sensible advice about avoiding heel striking, which is counter to how I've been using the elliptical and arc trainer, where you want to push down with your heel. I know for a fact that I run too heavily, like a Clydesdale. Also, I may be running with my body too rigidly upright, which would explain why I feel it in my back. I hear so much about correct form in exercise that I thought there had to be a better way to run, but I didn't know. YouTube is such a godsend for this kind of thing. I do want to get better at this, particularly because good form is always easier on the body, safer & a better way to avoid injuries.

Wednesday, Oct. 12:

45 minute spin class, with the instructor who's into peddling more slowly and with heavy resistance, and who only occasionally has us stand up. No jumps, no squats, no peddling while crouched low over handle bars, no holds, no weight intervals. In other words, no fooling around on the bike. Apparently this is the Schwinn Method or Schwinn School. It simulates actually being on the road. It makes the other spin classes I've had seem very frou-frou, as if they target a demographic with an attention deficit that requires lots of entertainment & variety to keep going.

Oh, and let me rant a bit here. Girl on the bike to my right. If you want to talk to your Best Friend Forever for 10 minutes (quite a ways into the class, not during the warmup period, before anything has happened or during stretches) about what you're both going to wear to your friend's wedding in two weeks, and then want to check your text messages for three more minutes, why the --- are you in spin class? Other people around you are trying to sweat hard and listen to the instructor. You know, like get a workout. Like, really focus on their physical fitness. Babe, if you want to multitask, go out of the classroom and use a stationary bike. A class is a class. There's an instructor up front. She's there for a reason. You owe that instructor attention and respect. No matter whether she's relating a history lesson or leading you through hill sprints.

Ahem.

Saef-- I don't think my spin instructors would allow the talking. How rude. I have taken spin from only a few instructors but they sound more like the Schwinn School-- we alter resistance and do some standing but I've never done jumps or anything like that.

I feel like I need to post here because I usually do each day but I couldn't exercise last night (worked from before 7 am till 7:30 pm) and I won't be able to tonight or tomorrow night (bookfair until 8:30 pm each night). I hate getting out of my routine--- it just makes me cranky-- I wanted to cry last night-- but I think it is just sheer exhaustion. Dh said Friday after the book fair I'll just crash, and I told him I was going to the gym first!

Also on Wednesday, Oct. 12:

One hour beginning Kripalu yoga class, with a lot of breathing and a little bit of ab work. I'm not very flexible and breathe too shallowly, but all that Pilates work is serving me well in the asanas that really work the abs.

No time for hard core exercise today...taught all day and then off to the second job till11:30 so I walked a mile with my class this afternoon and did 15 minutes of counting by 2s,7s,12s, and 5s while working out in "3rd grade excercise/dance class" or math as I am supposed to call it...:) They love doing squats and push ups while counting their patterns...kids are too funny!

Thursday, Oct. 13:

20 minutes Stairmaster stepper, resistance at six, aerobic setting
45 minutes arm & shoulders routine, and I think soon I'll be able to go through this sequence twice, as P90X recommends, or will increase the weights
40 minutes Stairmaster stepper, same setting.

The gym has three Stairmaster stepper machines; one is broken, with a sign on it. A heavy older woman got on the one next to me with a few cheerful words. I don't know this woman, I just know her by sight. I witnessed her starting her training at the gym back in 2008, when my father was dying & I moved back home for a month & a half to be with him during the last few weeks of his life. This woman was red-faced then & despairing during her workout sessions with her trainer. Now she is not dangerously obese, though still heavy, but no longer red-faced, and oh, what a change in her demeanor. It's good to see her get on the machine confidently, to chat with me about it, and then, after a few minutes, to see her trainer join up with her. ("I never see people on these machines" her trainer said. "Well, WE'RE on them," countered the women referring to herself & to me.)

So this woman has kept at it. And has had results. And not just in her weight. In her whole manner & her way of facing the world.

Damn. She doesn't know me at all but I think she's amazing.

When I see her, I think of my mother, whose blood work just reported a further elevation in cholesterol, and how I wish my mother would even walk a little in the neighborhood, let alone show up at the gym regularly and work with a trainer.

I think of myself, at my heaviest, and how I would never have dared face a personal trainer then. I had to lose more than 100 pounds before I even dared to speak to a trainer. Like someone like me had no business talking to a healthy fit person.

I need some of that woman's attitude. Still.

So yeah, this is what me, an ostensibly fit and normal weight woman, is thinking when a heavy woman gets on the machine next to her. Which may help some heavy woman afraid of going to the gym. I know that it might have helped me, when I was over 240 pounds & felt a gym could only be a place of fear, pain & humiliation for me.

What an eloquent post Saef. You have so many of those.
You are right-- your post could help those not willing to step foot in a gym. My dd says she isn't a gym person, but I'm sure if she had more confidence/was a healthy weight, she wouldn't have such reservations.

Still no exercise for me-- worked almost 14 hours on my feet yesterday and will do a repeat today. Hoping to get to Bikram Yoga tomorrow. My weight is down though as I'm hardly finding time to eat and I'm drinking way more coffee than I'm used to to fight the fatigue.

10/12: am dog walk
10/13: am dog powerwalk, but a short one (15 mins) since I got up too late

Also Saef, about heavy folks in the gym -- DH and I think that way too. Whenever I see a heavy person in the gym, I am mentally cheering them on. When we are driving together and see a heavy person walking/running outside, we always have some conversation that boils down to "good job" although the person out there running doesn't hear us.

I'm always afraid to actually say encouraging things to people. I think because I know people have mixed reactions. When I have done races in the past, and I was trudging my way through, coming in close to dead last, I always felt better when people would call out to me, "You're almost there, you're doing great," and the like. Meanwhile DH feels worse when he hears things like that because he interprets it as, "You're doing so badly that we have to cheer for you because you suck so much and we feel bad for you." :shrug:

Usually if I have the opportunity to engage in conversation with a heavier person while exercising, and they mention anything about weight loss or fitness or anything, I am very quick to tell them that I used to be obese, hoping that it will encourage them to see that it is possible to lose weight. I also don't hesitate to tell people that I ran my first mile when I was 22, or anything else about my personal fitness history.

Michele, when you have these Book Fairs, I wish I could transmit some stress relief over the screen to you magically. I know what it's like to disappear into my job & to know my life is way out of balance. The only thing that makes it bearable is that I know it's only going to be that way for a little while. But sometimes when we're in the middle of it, it seems endless, like life is always going to ask for more than we can possibly give & that we never have any respite for ourselves. Hang in there. I am sure yoga is going to feel really good, once you finally get to it.

Jessica, when you talked about people applauding at races, I could relate to both your view and your husband's view.

At the 5K I did in September, one of the guys timing it manually called out to me, "You just hit 30 minutes. You pace looks good, I think you've got a lot left." He was right. I had enough left to really sprint for the last few yards. He sounded like a trainer. I believed him & so I believed in myself. And so I thought of anyone applauding me as applauding that last burst of effort.

But on my bad days, I believe what your husband does, that there is something condescending and they are applauding out of pity. But I only believe that for a little while. I believe anyone who's around people who put out an athletic effort understands what goes into that, the mental part, as well as the physical training, and so their instinct is to support it anytime they see it in anyone. It's not only part of being a good sport, it's part of being a good human being. Just finishing a race means so much for many people.

Friday, Oct. 14:

45 minute spin class, with sprints, and me still hating this brand of spin bike. It isn't very smooth when one peddles while standing. Let me just say it outright: The Star Trac spin bikes are cr@p. Yes, I said it. Star Trac, rethink your bike design. Or pay your workers in China better so they take more pride in assembly. I want back the Life Fitness bike that I had at my former gym so very badly. I am turning into an Equipment Brand Snob. In ellipticals & spin bikes, the brand makes a world of difference to me. The expensive ones just seem to have better action. I don't feel off balance or unsupported. I want to not think much about the machine or the mechanics, I want to think about my form and my pace & etc. Instead I've got to compensate for the machine's mechanical issues, sometimes just to be safe. (I am sure that jerky action when I peddle while standing isn't good for my knees.) I'm adapting to the new instructors fine but I don't like the bike.

As someone who has been involved with high school and college cross country and track, 5K's and marathons, both as a participant and volunteer/spectator....

I can assure you that by far the vast majority of the people are there to encourage and support....seriously, why would they still be out on the course long after "their" runner has passed by?!

Oh sure, every now and then there is that butt-wipe teen age punk who showed up only because his cheerleader girlfriend was there with her team to volunteer...but we know who they are and that they are everywhere in life.

One of the greatest compliments I ever received in my life was when several boys and girls on my son's high school cross country team, years ago, told me that when they were running they pretended that I was their dad rooting them on....since their parents never came out to watch...

yes, I was THAT dad...the one always cheering and rooting the kids on....

I'd would do it at the gym too (when I used to go...obvious I don't go now...lol) but I think if I hollered and screamed in the gym I might get escorted out!!!

Kind people root people on sometimes in their minds....

When you are out on the course or at the gym remember MOST people in the world are pretty decent folks.....

NOW GO GIRLS GO!!! YOU'RE ALMOST THERE!!!

Gary-- you brought me to tears this morning with your mention of the kids pretending you were their dad cheering them on. How sweet and from someone who didn't have parents cheering her on-- I know you must have made a world of difference for them.

Dead on my feet. Book fair ends at noon today technically though we don't close until the last customer leaves. Then we have to pack up everything and I have all of the financial paperwork to do. Just praying I can get out in time for yoga tonight. We've *only* had one shoplifter that I know of. He put an eraser in his pocket and has had consequences as a result-- apology letter to me, discipline with the principal, call home, etc. Always makes me sad.

Hopefully I'll be back to posting real exercise tonight!

Thank you Michelle...I am sorry your parents didn't cheer you on :hug:...

what I said was absolutely true. What I did not say was that I was blessed with a job (construction) where I could start very early in the morning or work overtime when I needed to in order to make the race times....also a very understanding boss with kids in sports.

There was always around 100 boys and girls on our cross country teams so there was bound to be parents that couldn't make the events, because of work, as a lot of them were in the afternoons.

There was also a lot of support from parents that could.

I remember a few times when kids would be thanking me after the race and saying that they wished their parents would come to the events, I shared what I just did about work with them...

one time a kid said my parents don't work Saturday....

we were at a Saturday event....

My kids would tell me time to time how some of their friends would say they were so lucky to have their dad watch them....

Broke my heart....maybe that's why I always stayed back rooting for the last kid to go by....just in case their parent wasn't there....and why I still do today when I help out or watch at the races.