No More Excuses

The piles of snow are (almost) melted and the streets are clear and dry. The temperatures spend more time hovering above the freezing mark than they spend below it and I've dropped two layers of running clothes already.

So basically I have no more excuses.

It's time to get back into hill and speed training again.

I tend to avoid it during the cold winter months because a) the freezing air wreaks havoc on my lungs when I'm gasping for breath and b) the roads around our home always have some degree of snow or ice cover and it feels a little too dangerous to be tearing around a corner at breakneck speed in the dark over unpredictably slippery roads.

So I don't do it and, to be honest, it's a nice break.

Like most cyclical activities though, after a bit of time away from them, I'm ready to get back at it.

Yesterday morning I got up early, pulled on my running clothes and filled a water bottle. I strolled to the end of my driveway, put the water bottle on the top of my car, and headed out for an easy 1.5k warmup around the neighbourhood. At exactly 1.5k I was back at my car. I hit 'lap' on my watch, stretched my calves and sipped water for two minutes and then hit lap again as I headed off for an 800m sprint.

I love the fact that one time around my block is exactly 800m. I start at my car and end at my car and don't have to do much thinking other than to remember to turn the corners.

I usually do 6 or 8 times 800m when I do this workout but I figured I'd start with 5 since it has been months since I've run this hard.

It went something like this.

Sprint 800m. Hit lap on the watch. Check out my time and my heart rate. Try to get my breathing back under control while I stretch my calves. Do it again once my two minute rest was up. After the 5th one I turned off my watch and headed inside for breakfast, feeling energized and strong.

My 800m times were:
4:29
4:33
4:36
4:37
4:39

My heart rate at the end of each interval was 174 beats per minute. Since my max heart rate (based on my hill running experiment last fall) is 180bpm, I was running at just under 97% of my max before I dropped back down to 115 or so during the rest break.

Each 800m felt pretty tough and I don't think I could have gone much faster but they didn't kill me. I spent the day feeling energized rather than exhausted and nothing felt tight or sore afterwards.

Next week - hill training!

Ladies' Remedial Golf League

I came home tonight to find a letter from a golf course on my desk.

It's the golf course that me and a few of my girlfriends played at most Monday nights last summer.

A little par 3 course that had a pretty sweet ladies' night deal.

We called ourselves the Ladies' Remedial Golf League and there was only one rule. If you're too good, you can't be part of our gang. It says a lot that none of us came close to being kicked off the team.

I liked the course because it was easy - allowing me to focus on my game rather than just desperately trying to get to the hole. I loved it because every hole was a possible hole in one. And I want very much to get a hole in one.

I tried every single time to not just hit the ball but to hit it onto the green so that it rolled into the hole.

Several times I made it to the green. Just as many times I made it into the nearby woods, fields and water hazards.

We laughed at ourselves and each other and we slowly got better.

The letter from the golf course reminded me that it's time to dust off our clubs and gather the ladies together again for the 2015 Remedial Ladies Golf League.

The Remedial Ladies (minus one) decked out in our fabulous matching jackets at the end of season banquet. 

Blood Pressure

I had two medical appointments yesterday.

I had an appointment with my family doctor because I went to renew a prescription last week only to discover that I had no more repeats on it. They were nice enough to squeeze me in so I could get another six months' worth of a prescription that I will be taking for the rest of my life (sigh).

While I was there, they checked my blood pressure.

It was 127/72.

They said nothing other than to speak the numbers out loud.

I left, prescription in hand, and headed down the road to my dentist for my 6-month cleaning and check up.

When I got there, they tested my blood pressure.

It was 119/80.

"That's pretty much perfect isn't it?" I asked. "120/80 is the magic number right?"

"No", replied my dental hygienist. "120/80 is the highest you want it to be. So you're just on the edge of too high." "Your heart rate is really low though. It's only 55 beats per minute" she said. And then she proceeded to scrub my teeth within an inch of their life for 45 minutes...which gave me 45 minutes to think.

I realize that blood pressure fluctuates for all sorts of reasons. Stress, movement, time of day, the way they did the blood pressure reading etc.

So I'm not particularly bothered by the difference in my readings.

What I am bothered by is the fact that my family doctor didn't bat an eye at 127/72 (and she is the type to prescribe medication even before it's needed) and my dental hygienist's comment seemed to indicate that I was teetering on the edge of problematic blood pressure.

After CoreFit and a late dinner I went online to do a bit of research. Here is what I learned.

The top number indicates the systolic blood pressure which is the pressure in the arteries when the heart is pumping. The bottom number is the diastolic pressure which is the pressure in the arteries in between heart beats. With me so far?

According to the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada, low risk blood pressure is a top number  below 120 and a bottom number below 80. (uh oh)

Medium risk is a systolic blood pressure of 121-139 or a diastolic blood pressure of 80-89.

High risk is 140+/90. Unless of course you have diabetes and then it's 130/80.

Bloody hell!

I looked up what the Heart and Stroke Foundation recommends for lowering blood pressure.

• Eat a low sodium diet (stay under 2,300mg/day) - I don't get anywhere near that number most days. I typically hover around 1,500mg. 
• Eat a diet low in saturated fat - again, no problem there. 
• Exercise 150 minutes per week - I do several times that most weeks.
• Don't drink more than two alcoholic drinks per day - I hardly drink two per week
• Don't smoke - you couldn't pay me enough to pick up a cigarette
• Keep stress to a minimum - I have a pretty stress-free life most of the time and work hard to keep it that way. 

Well, I have six more weeks until my next appointment at the Diabetes Centre. They're really good at answering my questions so I'm sure they'll give me a good sense of a) what my readings mean and b) if I need to do anything about them. 

In the meantime, I'll keep on doing all the things I do to stay healthy and I may just pop into the local pharmacy for random blood pressure checks. For research purposes. 

Just Some Numbers

A few numbers, for the record.

• I've been using the FlexBar for 12 days. My elbow no longer hurts when I grasp things with my right hand and it no longer hurts when I lift things with my right arm. The only time it hurts now is right after I use the FlexBar. 

• I have been using My Fitness Pal for 80 days. I have not missed a day of logging my food intake or my activity, not even during our two week holiday. 

• I typically meet my daily fibre goal before lunch and I haven't come anywhere near my sodium limit in weeks yet I'm still struggling most days to get all of my calcium and all of my protein. Despite what feels to me like a lot of nuts and a lot of yogurt. Maybe if I top my yogurt with some grilled chicken? 

• I've dropped 4 pounds. Not a ton but I wasn't going for a ton. I just wanted to get back to the weight I was a few years ago and I'm almost there. 

• The weight loss is fine and all but the best part of it all are the other things I've changed. I hardly drink alcohol at all anymore and I hardly miss it. I still have my after curling glass of red wine but I have not opened a bottle of wine in my own home in six weeks. The 8 bottles sitting the cupboard aren't even calling my name. 

• I no longer buy chocolate bars to stash in the cupboard for after dinner treats. I find it easy now to turn down treats when they are brought into the office and my serving sizes have been cut in half. I rarely feel hungry but I also rarely feel full. I just feel good. 

• I use almost 20 fewer units of insulin per day than I did a year ago. I've gone from the high 40s and low 50s to the low 30s. 

• I chopped my hair a few months ago which resulted in some unexpected savings. I save several minutes in the shower every morning since I have much less hair to wash and rinse. On the other hand I spend much more time drying it now that I can't get away with letting it dry on its own. I am saving a lot of shampoo since I have much less hair to lather. On the other hand I am spending more on haircuts since I now go every 6 weeks rather than every 8-9. I'm guessing if I crunch the numbers it was cheaper and easier to have longer hair but I like it short so short it will stay. For now at least.

All About the Pride

I've tried being patient.

I've tried being understanding.

I've tried guilt and I've tried peer pressure.

And I'm still not finding a way to get myself back into the swimming groove.

Which seems completely bizarre to me because I really do love it when I get there.

I just don't seem to care enough to get there.

So I'm through being patient and understanding and I have dropped the guilt and peer pressure tactics.

I'm moving on to more drastic measures.

I've registered for two triathlons. Entered my information. Chose my shirt size. Gasped at the price once they added taxes, administrative fees and insurance. Entered my credit card number anyway. Clicked confirm. Got the email saying I was in.

I'm committed. I'm doing a sprint triathlon in June and an Olympic triathlon in July.

I'm eyeing two more races as well although I have yet to pull out my credit card again. But they are another sprint and another Olympic which would bring my summer total up to 4 triathlons. (Plus a half marathon just to liven things up a bit.)

This is where the psychological part is going to kick in.

See, I know I could swim the distance if I had to do it tomorrow. When I hopped in the pool back in January, after a few months off, I swam 3k fairly easily. So the thought of having to swim 1500m is not enough to get me back in the pool.

What is enough is the thought of swimming 1500m poorly.

See, swimming is actually my strongest of the three sports. But I've neglected it so my speed and my form are nowhere near where they were two summers ago when I was swimming 3 times a week.

And finishing a triathlon in June with a swim time that is several minutes slower than it was two years ago is enough to get me back in the pool when nothing else was.

Turns out it's not about the guilt.

It's about the pride.

Strategic Strength Training

Now that I have my very own fitness centre just down the street, I figured I should probably be strategic in how I approach weight training. I mean I can certainly go in there a few times a week and lift weights but I thought it might make a bit more sense to make sure that I was doing exercises that would target specific areas in order to improve how I perform in my other activities.

You know, like do trunk rotation exercises to help my golf swing and that sort of thing.

I decided to see what I could find online by searching for weight training for a specific sport and then seeing if I could string together some sort of targeted weight training routine.

I got about that far in my thinking before I laughed out loud.

Weight training for golfers would certainly give me a few ideas for how to strengthen the muscles I need in order to be a strong and stable golfer but that would not necessarily help my running.

Or my curling.

Or my cycling.

Or my swimming (once I get my sorry a$$ back in the pool).

So I laughed at the ridiculousness of my idea.

If I looked up specific weight training exercises for each of the activities that I do and strung those together I would have to quit my job so that I could spend all of my time lifting weights.

I stared at my monitor for a few moments and then decided that the best approach is probably a varied one. Every part of my body can benefit from getting stronger and, as long as I do a variety of exercises so that I don't strengthen one part at the expense of the other, I'll probably come out ahead.

So rather than driving myself mad trying to create a routine to help with everything, I decided to go with option #2.

Book a session with one of the instructors and let them give me some guidance as to how to proceed. Which is exactly what is happening this afternoon when Doug and I meet with the Cybex instructor so that he can make sure we know how to use the machines and then answer any training questions we have.

I'll let you know next week how it all went and pass on any great tips I may learn.

Le Curling

As the temperatures continue to rise and the mountains of snow continue to melt, the last thing I'm thinking about is next winter's curling season.

I'm thinking about running outside without having to spend 10 minutes pulling on layer after layer of clothing.

I'm thinking about how long we have to wait until the golf course opens and how soon we can cycle outside again.

I'm thinking about spring half marathons and summer triathlons.

So I was a little taken aback when I received an email from one of my curling friends asking me if I would be interested in playing on their Tuesday night curling team next season.

I was a little more taken aback when I read that they wanted me to play vice (3rd).

Tempting...and flattering. A good combination for a recruiting committee.

I liked the idea but didn't like the fact that a) it would mean no Tuesday night CoreFit and b) I'd be up until almost midnight on the weeks when we played the late draw. (For those of you who know me, you know how utterly crazy that is). 

A few emails went back and forth and, in the end, I decided to accept the offer.

What sealed the deal you ask?

What could possibly convince me to skip a season of CoreFit and stay up late on a school night?

How about the fact that three our of four of us are French-Canadian?

Spend Tuesday evenings in the company of some very entertaining French-speaking curlers? Oh, and every so often play against Doug's Tuesday night team just for kicks?

Sold!

So even as I look forward to running in shorts, golfing with the sun on my shoulders and open-water swimming, a little part of me is already looking forward to the end of the warmer months and the start of a new curling season.


For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about when I go on and on about curling, here is a two-minute video that captures the game...and makes me laugh.

And for those of you who speak French or simply like the sound of this lovely language, here is the same video en français for your listening pleasure.