There was a time when I was proud of myself when I got a workout in for the day.  “I got my run in!” I would beam…  And if I got 3 or 4 of those in a week, I would be so excited…

Stupid, type AAA personality triathletes.  They’re a bad influence.  First they sucked me in to triathletes by telling me I wouldn’t drown.  OK… they were right about that… barely.  Then they “encouraged” me to upgrade my equipment (read: sell my soul) so that I would be faster.  ok… they were right about that too… barely.  But the whole concept of multiple workouts a day was beyond me.  I didn’t have time.  I didn’t have energy.  I didn’t have the desire.

Yet here I sit tonight, lamenting the fact that I ONLY got one workout in today.  And worrying that the light snow that is falling will screw up my opportunity to exercise 4 or 5 times THIS WEEKEND.

What the hell happened to me…

Yet I will never blame my well intentioned, if a bit obsessed, friends for this condition I find myself in.  And it’s not my “fault” either.  It’s my choice.  I want to do this.  And I don’t think anyone would find “fault” a good term to describe wanting to lead a healthy lifestyle.  Although some in my life may lead a healthy lifestyle TO a fault.  …and you know who you are…

But it’s hard not to get down a bit sometimes when I look at what I’m doing for exercise (3-4 swims, 4 runs and as much bike trainer time as I can tolerate, plus lifting with my son 3 days a week) and the fact that I have cut ALL the fun out of my diet AND cut back on portions of what’s left… and nothing is happening.

I hear all the chatter about older people (physically, but never mentally and certainly not emotionally), over 40 having a tougher and tougher time losing weight and it makes me worry.  You know the old saying about doing the same thing over and over yet expecting a different result.  I hope that is not my future.

But I guess if it is…  I don’t really want to change it.  I enjoy the exercise and all my type AAA personality friends.  They give me perspective.  I may work out a lot and feel obsessive about it sometimes, but then I hear their stories and… I’m good with where I’m at…

What I really hate though, is knowing what I REALLY need to do as far as eating goes, but not feeling like I’m able to do it.  I “should” be managing every calorie.  I SHOULD be drinking water constantly.  I SHOULD be eliminating even the occasional Coke Zero.  But me asking myself to do that is going to take some time.  Food is comfort for me.  I LOVE food.  I love to cook.  I want to own my own restaurant or coffeeshop someday so I can show people how to do food right.  So asking me to cut back to tiny portions of lifeless, tasteless, squeeze it out of a bag, triathlete feed is a big struggle.  I’ve cut out all the other culinary pleasures in life.  No beer (I used to make my own), no chips… nothing.  And now, like tonight, even though all I had for dinner was an apple, an orange, some greek yogurt and a small piece of cheese pizza, I felt guilty for all of it and REALLY guilty for sharing some popcorn with my daughter during our evening movie.  I hate that.  Feeling guilty for eating.

But I can’t help it.  That’s just how I feel.

But my friend Beth popped off a quote last night on Facebook that was like a punch in the head.  “You can’t out-exercise your diet”.  I’ve known this forever on the inside.  I just wouldn’t admit it to myself openly.  I used to say that it was cool to have a beer or two, a pizza, whatever I wanted because I had just exercised and it all balanced out.  I told myself this lie for years.  As much as I hate to make this the 800lb gorilla in the room, I have to in order to deal with it.  I guess that’s where the guilt comes from.

I know, I know.  One day at a time.  Then 21 days.  Then 21 more.  That’s easy for all of my fit, type AAA triathlon friends to say in encouragement.  And it’s appreciated.  But they have no idea what it’s like to be fat.  Even if they were at one point.  They beat the 800lb gorilla in their life somehow.  Mine keeps wanting to buy me dinner and drinks.

There was nothing abnormal about the start of today’s run.  I started off at an easy, warmup pace and was breathing comfortably and enjoying the conversation going on around me.  I got a bit miffed when the “warmup” group took off at a much faster pace than usual.  We usually start out in a big pack for the first mile and then the faster guys take off of the front.  But they were gone after a hundred yards today.  Their warmup had to have been 8:00 because by the end of the first mile (I was running about 9) I couldn’t even SEE them anymore.

Other than that, the route was flat and familiar. My legs felt good and my lungs didn’t even feel like I was running.  I was able to chat all the way to the turnaround (I’m usually wheezing by then) and on the way back I found my pace wanting to creep up.  I tried to hold it back to stay with the pack I was in, but finally gave up and decided to hit the last mile hard.  I ended up with an 8:01 last mile which is the fastest mile I have run in 6 months.  I think if I had known how close to a 7 I was I would have pushed it even more

I need more runs like that.  It felt like a win.

I did something else I have not done in a LONG time tonight at the gym.  I hopped on a spin bike!  I did my own routine to my music based on what I remembered.  Warmup, spin, sprint, jump, climb (seated and standing), single leg.  I tried it all.  It was really fun!  I’m sure spin has changed and now there are a bunch more moves or exercises.  I watched part of a spin class the other day and the instructor had the class get off the bikes and do other stuff.  I don’t think it was a true spin class but… screw that!  I want to SPIN.  That involves staying on the bike.

I forgot how much I sweat when I do spin class.  Yuck!  I mean, I sweat a lot anyway… but YUCK!  I think the workout is a keeper though.  And right now until all the resolutioners go away it’s almost impossible to get on any equipment in the main area anyway.  For most of my spin workout tonight, I was alone!  Much better than staring at 8 TVs full of stupid with a hundred or so other sweaty humans.  I just need to remember to bring water and a BIG towel… cuz… YUCK!

I used to keep track of the places I went that I found cool running trails, etc. but I’ve kind of let that go.  I’m going to start it back up again this spring though as I find neat spots.  I’m going to some new towns so it will be fun to explore.

Eating on the road is a disaster.  With all the gear we have to pack sometimes, you can’t exactly carry a cooler.  Buying stuff in the town you are going to can be done… if the town is big enough to have a grocery store…   But some hotels have microwaves and some don’t.  So that either leaves you eating cold food, or going out.  And though I have been successfully able to avoid drinking alcohol (even while sitting at the bar!), I can’t say my intake has been stellar (bar food?  are you kidding me?  Nacho’s is the BEST thing on the menu… *sigh*).

So all I can really do is train extra hard on the days I have available and work on my nacho habit when I’m on the road (one vice for another).

I have decided that since my priority is to get a bike so I can do the whole multisport thingy again, I’m not going to enter any races until I buy one.  I can’t afford to run 5Ks every weekend when I need that cash to buy a bike.  I hate not racing but it’s either just do run events all year OR buy a bike and do triathlons.  Not “and”…  I can sneak in a couple of local events that are free to club members in my local running club.  That will have to do.  I just really hope I can get a bike by summer.  The one I have picked out is not crazy expensive, but it’s not cheap either.  This will be interesting.

All I know is my pants are fitting MUCH looser and I can get back into a pair or two that I haven’t been able to wear in 6 months.  THAT is a win and a big up.  I can’t do anything but what I’m already doing so worrying about it is just going to get me frustrated.  Not something I need with all the other stress in life.  I have to keep telling myself I CHOSE this stress.  I WANT it.  So stop bitching about it…

I’m pretty excited about the swim yesterday.  To swim 2200 yards this early in the season and call it easy…  that’s a good sign.  I just tried to relax and glide.  And save for  a couple of times when people got in the way, I was able to do that.  It seems to take me about 500 yards to really warm up but after that I’m pretty comfortable.  I even threw in a couple of hot laps just to make me work a little harder.  That is probably what I should start adding in to my swim workouts next.  Speed and interval work.

I think I’m starting to lag a little bit on my bike training.  I need to get on the spin bikes at the gym and get away from the recumbent in front of the TVs.  There are a couple of interactive (video game driven) bikes that I can actually get a good workout on, but they are always taken.  I found out from a friend that the spin bikes can be used at any time so I may just start jumping in the spin room for a bit.  It is still going to be a while before I have a road bike and the weather makes mountain biking sketchy at best, so I need an alternative for now.

I’m having a hard time controlling the urge to revisit some of those goals I missed last year.  The sub 22 min 5K especially.  Depending on how the weight loss goes, I might just have to bring that one back because I WANT that one.  I think if I hit 175 I can do it.  I was close at 180.  I also want to do an offroad tri but they are hard to find without the Xterra label on them.  Not that Xterra races are bad, they just don’t believe in doing them inside the Missouri state lines and I don’t have the money to go THAT FAR out of state.  The closest one to me is about 7 hours away…  meh.

Finally, I started a Pinterest board on mountain biking.  This board is about all the places I have mountain biked or the places I want to go.  Most are in SoCal for now, but I hope to add some of the great spots here in Missouri to the board soon.  Pinterest is highly addictive, by the way.

Weight:  I have no idea… I guess 201 because that’s what the BL scale said.

Oh it looked like water.  Even smelled like chlorine.  But it felt like pudding.

I could NOT get going today.  I managed to get 1800 in but it was a death march (swim).  My balance didn’t feel right… Oh I’m not going to go through it all.  I was just slow.  My shoulders hurt for the first 800 yards before they finally loosened up.

I know, I know.  Any swim you can walk away from (not drown in) is a good one.  But I don’t really believe that.  This was just a bad swim and though I could have gone farther I stopped because I could tell I was getting frustrated.  Swimming is very technique based and is all about muscle memory.  Do your stroke the right way 10,000 times and it will start to get better.  Today my arms were all over the place, I rotated too much and then not enough.  I was lifting my head when I breathed.  All signs it was time to stop.   So I did.  I would rather save it for a time when my mind is in it more.  Today I was pretty much out to lunch.

I switched my lifting routine tonight to reflect my desire to lose weight.  I have dropped to half the weight I was lifting and am basically doing burn out sets (lift until you fatigue).  For most exercises that is about 25 reps.  I’ve also added back in some stretching, especially for my lower body.  My hamstrings are horribly tight.  Not the best for distance running.  Now that I am past the soreness of the first few weeks of serious training, it’s easier to stretch and the gym has all the toys I need to help get the job done.  I just need to commit to doing it.  It doesn’t take that long but for some reason it is one of the first things I stop doing.  Just a bad habit.

Weight (by my scale): Down one pound to 197.

Here’s a mindset for you.  Train hard, focus on getting the workouts in, have fun and DON’T worry about the scale.  I really am enjoying the freedom of just moving under my own power now without the stress of hitting constant mileage/time goals that I realized that even though I am in this (friendly) competition to lose weight, I’m still only weighing myself about twice a week.  I’m more interested in beating the weather and getting back into pants that haven’t fit in 6 months than I am about anything else.

I just think people put too much emphasis on the scale.  Yes, it is the final judge, I get that.  But just like working and trying over and over to hit that mileage/time mark and coming up a few seconds under, or worse, right at or a few seconds over your goal.  You can get so obsessed about the numbers that you forget everything else.  For me, this leads to frustration which usually ends up DE-motivating me.  Heck, I forgot my watch this morning and after that old habit pang of “oh crap, how am I going to know how I’m doing?”, I stopped myself and laughed.  Who cares?  I will KNOW how I am doing by how I feel.  I’ve been doing this long enough to know what good effort feels like.  Besides, the only important stat for me on my watch is what my average pace is and (warning: old guy admission ahead) I can’t even see the stupid numbers because they are too small on the watch…   Which, of course is CLEARLY the fault of the watch, not my eyes…

Yes, there will come a day when all of this stuff will matter more.  But not now.  I need to get back to the day when my weight will realistically let me “train” for something.  I have a training plan for a half Ironman.  But I’m not even going to start on it until my weight is at a point where it is realistic and SAFE to train for those distances.  Like I’ve said, I can DO the distances, individually, right now and I could probably slog my way through a half Iron, just to say I did it.  But that’s not what I want.  I want to do it right, and I want to do it well.  This starts with being at the right weight.  Correction, this starts with not being at the WRONG weight.  That is where I am now.  I won’t know what the right weight is until I get there.  I’ll let you know.

I do know what would happen at this weight…  Slow swim, dizzy T1, 3 hr bike ride (falling further behind on nutrition the entire way), nauseating T2, dehydrated, cramp filled 13 mile run.  Why would I want to do this?  I know this is what would happen because any time I have tried to compete heavy in any race (or even train for one) this is the result.  Packing an extra 25-30lb is just dangerous.  Heat affects me more.  If I don’t hit all of my nutrition marks I cramp horribly but I just can’t take in enough fluids/calories to support packing the extra weight around the course.  If I hydrate and eat the way I should, I get sick because I’ve got too much in my stomach.  See the vicious cycle?

Look, this is just me and my body.  Everybody is different.  I’ve seen and talked to several multi Ironman finishers who are heavy.  I have tried their suggestions but I just can’t make them work.

This is not me feeling sorry for myself either.  It is just the way things are.  It’s all a learning curve.  My friend Betsy once said to me that it takes 7 years to get completely comfortable with triathlons.  And things still go wrong.  I’m cool with that.  I just know the first thing on the list to get me “comfortable” is weight loss.  Oh, and the whole “losing weight will help me with everything else in life” thing is pretty cool too…

Weight: 198lb.  Down 2lb.

Regardless, I’m not worried.  I’m happy with what I am doing and I can already see and feel results in my body.  Yesterday, with a head cold, I ran 8.5 miles at Rock Bridge.  I felt really good and my legs felt strong.  I didn’t get tired and could have run more.  That is a big improvement and I have been feeling that all week.  Stronger and stronger.

I really just need to keep up with what I am doing.  I might ease up on my portions a little more, but if I train hard and don’t stress about pounds, I will be 175 by summer.

The crazy weather around here is… well… still crazy.  Yestarday? 25 degrees (16 down in the valley where we ran) and tights.  Today it is 10am and already 54 degrees.  It might hit 60 today.  I am going mountain biking in the middle of January this afternoon, in shorts.  Tonight?  It’s supposed to snow…  Tomorrow?  30 degrees colder.  Sunday?  65 degrees.  I usually put up my shorts and warm weather stuff and get out my cold weather gear around Thanksgiving.  This year it’s all out and I have no idea what to wear.  Even my clothes are confused.

Olfactory hallucination of the day:  Yesterday while running through the most remote part of Rock Bridge State Park…  I smelled ham.

Weight: 200lb (my scale says 196) unchanged

Goal for the week:  Get out of the Clydesdale division.

I think if I can keep my eating in check now and gradually cut back a little more, I will start to see a steady decline in “real” weight.  But as always happens with me there will be some redistribution of weight as I gain a little muscle here and lose a little fat there.  It never just falls off and those who think it does are foolish.  Now is when the REALLY hard work begins.

I’m going to run a little longer at Rock Bridge tomorrow.  Maybe the full 7 mile loop on the Devil’s Ice Box side…  Hopefully I can get it in before the trail goes from frozen to muddy.  Even though it is supposed to be in the 50s tomorrow I don’t think anyplace will be rideable.  The snow will melt quickly tomorrow and anything but roads will just be gross to ride on.  Oh well.  Maybe I’ll swim for that second workout tomorrow…

The hardest part about all this so far is not trading one vice for another.  I have dropped alcohol but now I want soda or coffee.  I’m cutting back on my portions but I want chips.  And every night, I want good chocolate (not a Butterfinger, GOOD chocolate… I’m picky).  I hate this part of it all.  I really just want to forget about food altogether.  I feel like I am failing when I daydream about a bag of Doritos.  My 21 days may have to stretch a little.

On a different note.  HOLY CRAP!  Ironman REALLY likes their events!  Almost $300 for a half Ironman?  …really?  You realize it’s in Kansas… right?  You know what’s IN Kansas… right?  My 70.3 experience may not come with an Ironman tag.  Pigman, Great Illini or Redman may have to suffice.  Even they are expensive.  Maybe I should just go back to running.  I don’t know if I can afford this kind of healthy.  Oh… and I STILL don’t have a bike.

Exterra’s schedule is pretty frustrating as well.  They don’t have anything within 300 miles of me.  With all the fantastic venues in this state, surely they could find SOMETHING that would work.  Instead of 50 events in Arkansas… *sigh*

Oh I’m still gonna swim, bike and run.  I just may not wear a number or timing chip this year…

One thing I don’t need to do when I’m swimming (or anytime for that matter) is math.  I can barely count my laps right but for some reason today I insisted on thinking about, of all things, what I would need to do to get my time down below 1:15:00 at TriZou.  Of all the stupid things.  First, I don’t like pool swim races so I probably won’t even do the race.  Second, I want to go longer on my races this year so… I probably won’t even do the race.

…but I really wanna do the race. *sigh*

Anyway, I think I can safely knock at least a minute off my swim time.  Probably more but I went with a minute.  Then I started trying to figure out how much time a mile an hour increase on the bike would give me and damn near drowned trying to work it all out.  I’m a mathematical moron on a good day.  I need to focus more on my swim technique and less on stupid stuff.  No wonder I lose my lap count.

I had to laugh (which is never good while swimming) when I came to the decision that if I ever wrote a book about my journey through losing weight and triathons, I would call it “The Littlest Clydesdale”.  Whaddya think?  Pretty good, eh?  For those that don’t get it, The “Clydesdale division” is reserved for, umm… men of substance.  You have to weight AT LEAST 200 lb to get in.  The VAST majority of clydesdale participants are 6 feet or over.  Most are ex football players, etc.  Putting me in a lineup with them is like Gimli on the wall with the elves.  …If you don’t get that reference, watch Lord of the Rings.  Let’s just say my frame is a bit compact to be carrying the same amount of weight…

So I’m hoping to achieve my first real goal by the weigh in this Sunday.  To get OUT of the clydesdale division.  And stay out.  Permanently.

The one thing I will never be able to escape is all the weightlifting I did when I played baseball.  My legs are like tree stumps.  My calves are more cow like.  I can still bench 200lb.  No matter what I do, unless I lie in a bed for a year and completely atrophy, I am always going to be what the government calls “overweight”.  Even if I get down to 10% body fat.  I was talking with a coworker about ideal weight and race weight, etc.  I think even if all I did was train all day, my ideal weight would still be around 170 and my race weight would be around 165.  At 5’7″, most triathletes are around 150 at ideal weight and 147 race weight according to what I read.  Not only do I not think I could ever get down to that weight, I think it would be unhealthy for me.

In short races, this really doesn’t mean anything.  If I were ever to hit my ideal weight, I could easily run 6 minute miles.  I was running just under 7 minute miles at 180lb.  I think my bike times would come down because I would climb better.  I think my swim times would be faster too.  I think where the extra weight would start to affect me negatively would be anything over an olympic distance.  I just don’t think I could ever physically do an Ironman.  Not that I even want to, but I think I would tear myself apart trying to.  Just too much pounding on an old, used up frame.  And too much weight, even at race weight.  I tore myself up just trying to do a marathon and was out for a year.

Anyway, I have to get out of the clydesdale division first…

Weight: unchanged at 200lb. (come on weekend workouts…!)

For instance, I have cut back on my intake and stopped drinking.  This was HELL for the first few days.  Headaches, stomach cramps, that starving feeling, etc.  The next few days have been slightly more tolerable.  No headaches, hungry, but not starving.  I’m 12 days into it.  I know because I’ve done it before that 9 days from now the changes I have made will be my new routine.  My body will be used to working with less and those cravings for a cold one (or 4) will be gone.  It’s hard to convince myself of that sometimes though…

It is clear to me that I have at least some minimal addictive traits as now my body… No… My brain keeps trying to substitute one bad habit for another.  Can’t have beer?  Get some Coke Zero!  Or good chocolate!  How about another cup of coffee?  ugh…  I swear I am even having olfactory (that’s smell…) hallucinations.  I walked into a small conference room today and was overwhelmed by the smell of pizza.  I could even tell you what toppings.  My coworker came in and didn’t smell anything.  I was walking through the house the other morning and I smelled beer.  And my food cravings are laser specific.  Yesterday I wanted Greek Yogurt with blackberrys… oddly specific…  and today I wanted fish tacos.  I don’t really even like fish tacos…

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And, no, I’m not pregnant.

The 21 days thing works for me though.  I do think that breaking your goal up into small, manageable portions is the right thing to do.  I think that I should also reinforce my 21 days with another 21 days when I’m done.  Not a different goal, just an extension of the same “no beer and smaller portions” goal.  Just to drive it home to my body (brain) that I am not kidding this time.  I need to start hallucinating about bananas and Hammer Gels.  And low cal pasta…  And maybe a Coke Zero…