Back on the road again!

I am finally able to run again, after a forced lay-off of nearly 18 months.  Last week I ran three times (Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday) - no more than 30 minutes at a time. Even though I am running without any pain, I am still very concerned about re-aggravating the plantar fasciitis so for the foreseeable future that will be it:  3 times per week (Tue, Thu and Saturday) and no more than 30 minutes duration.  Will increase the duration slowly - no more than 10% per week - once I start feeling a bit stronger.

So what does it feel like to start running again?  Fantastic - and horrible.  Fantastic because at one stage there I thought I might never be able to do it again.  Horrible because said running is taking place in Houston in summer - even the minimum temperature is over 70F and it gets into the mid to upper 90's in a hurry, almost every day. 

Since I got back from Africa from my most recent inspection trip I have not yet gotten back into the gym, mostly because my personal trainer has been away or had other(better?) things going on.  From next week, I will start to re-integrate twice weekly PT sessions with the running.  I will try to do the gym session (with the PT) on Wednesdays and Fridays, and work on my own on Sunday and Monday, for a total of 4 times per week.

On top of that I'm planning on about an hour or so of mountain bike cycling on Sundays, Wednesday and Fridays (i.e. non-running days).   Will try to increase the Sunday bike outing to 20 miles+ as time goes by. 

And finally, it is time to kick-start another period of 'No S' dieting: no snacks, no sweets and no seconds on any days except those starting with S, or Special days such as public holidays, festivals and birthdays.

How about one more mid-year resolution?  We will be traveling to French West Africa (Republic of Congo) in November this year, so I had better shape up on my French.  From today I will be tackling  Rosetta Stone French lessons and from next week - or as soon as I can get my courage up - attending the French conversational meetups in our neighborhood.

July 7 2013:
Weight: 186
Bodyfat percentage: 22
Miles run:  0
Strength + conditioning:  50 minutes
Mountain bike:  14 miles, 1 hr 15 minutes.

Today's workout:  The Andy Routine (Wimbledon)

15 reps of each

Medball situps
Rocky solo with medball
45 degree twist with medball

Lying opposites with Swiss ball
Hip cross-over with Swiss ball
Reverse hyperextension with Swiss ball

Seated Ab crunch
Crunch with a cross
Pushups (aka press-ups)

Fuel or filler food?

My personal trainer warned me that my weight may actually increase due to the additional (4th) session per week and because we are getting into some heavier weights.  I guess he is right; I am up a bit this morning, but bodyfat percentage is the same.  Will just have to see how it goes next week.

Day 12 of the 100 Days of Weight Loss is about checking whether we are taking in quality fuel which provides solid nutritional content with limited amount of fat, sugar and empty calories, or filler which add extra calories but minimal nutrients.

If you do a lot of running and physical training you pretty much 'get' the relationship between quality fuel food and performance.  If I don't get my 1100A carbohydrate snack, I often don't have a good noon workout; I might feel a bit weak, even slightly dizzy.  And of course the same thing on a long run, just much more pronounced.

My problem isn't emotional eating either, I don't think.  Although I must admit to the occasional eating binge when I am stressed or unhappy for whatever reason.  My real problem has to do with the so-called 'fun or filler foods':  mostly sugar in one or other form, bread, snacks (nuts and peanuts) as well as wine and beer.  It is the season and one can't be a total grinch.  So there will be a couple of beers here and there, and a few helpings of snacks.  They will go on the record on Fitday and I will just have to work them off on the long runs!

Weight this morning: 171
Body fact percentage:  20%

Dec 22:
Running:  6 easy miles with the dogs along the Bayou.  Left foot plantar fasciitis still an area of concern.  Going for another Airrosti treatment on Dec 23
Personal trainer:  1 hr fairly intensive workout with bench presses, pikes, shrugs, chest, triceps and abs.

Bert's Fitday Journal

Do it anyway!

That is essentially the message for Day 3 of the 100 day weight loss program.  To be successful in the long term, sometimes you have to do the things you don't feel like doing.  Exercise.  Eating your veggies.  Not having wine with dinner. Or whatever.  Patently I've never had a problem with exercise.  To the contrary, tend to over do it.  I do have a problem with portion size and with snacking, so at least for today I will be sure to enjoy smaller portions of what I like, to eat it slowly and to avoid any mindless or even mindful snacking.

As I had anticipated, the food at the country club last night (way out in the burbs) was totally blah:  a plate with a grilled sliced vegetables.  Really?  They couldn't think of anything more exciting?  No starch  (I had to ask for some rice), no protein.  Institutional type cooks have no imagination and no clue:  someone is a vegetarian ergo he or she eats vegetables.  The only redeeming feature of the meal: it wasn't drenched in olive oil.  Also the bread roll and salad was pretty good!


This am:  6 miles easy run @ just over 10-minute pace with the dogs
Breakfast:  oats with soy milk, slice of w/w toast with Marmite, small slice of baked tofu.

Weight this morning:  170 lbs
Body fat percentage:  24% - drat

Wednesday Weigh in

It was not by much, but my Tanita scale (the only place where I'm still 54!) settled at 165 this morning, so I am 'officially' 10 pounds down from 175, over the course of just about 10 weeks.  The next goal post is of course 160, where I've been a couple of times over the last few years.  At the rate we're going, it won't be until the end of July or early August, but that's ok.  It would not be possible or even sensible to try to speed up the weight loss process in the middle of a marathon training program.  It is tough enough already to maintain the daily calorie intake at 1800.

Recap:

Week 1: -1
Week 2: -1
Week 3: -3
Week 4:  0
Week 5: -1
Week 6: -1
Week 7:  0

Week 8: -1

Week 9: -1

Week 10: -1

Starting weight: 175
Current weight: 165

Loss to date: 10 lbs.

150 or Bust: 72 days down, 101 to go.

Running is going as well as can be expected in the Texas heat.  Completed first 3 weeks of 18-week Hal Higdon program, no hiccups so far.  Doing the longer runs at < 140 HR which translates into some pretty slow miles at times, but I have learned that lesson the hard way.  'Race' your regular runs and you've got nothing left for speed work or tempo runs, not to mention increasing the risk of injury or even becoming over trained.  Struggled a bit to maintain my pace during last Saturday's 6 mile pace run; ended up at 8:38 instead of the planned 8:35 pace.  No big deal this early on.  Yesterday's mile repeats at Rice University track were much more encouraging.  The first two were at about 7:42 and 7:35 respectively (botched the timing on the last one; it was slower).  It was around 94F so I was quite happy with the outcome.  Carrying quite a few less pounds around the middle is starting to make a difference!

BFB Day 4

Much cooler here by yesterday morning after a cold front blew through.  Made for a nice brisk 5-mile run with Daisy along the bayou - heart rate initially around 110, eventually settling around 125 to 130bpm. 

By late afternoon, it was off to Rice University's Rec Center for a mix of rowing (just over 7000 meters in 20 minutes), spinning (8 miles) and a mile on the treadmill.

Finally, I joined the Houston Striders for the first Tuesday track event at Reagan High School at 7pm. Warmed up (again) as it was below 50F by then, and managed 12 X 200 meter repeats at about 10K pace, with slow 100 meter intervals.

On the cooking front, nothing very exciting so far this week except a really tasty wheat berry salad; found it on the internet - Ellie Krieger's Wheat Berry Salad.  I just lightened up a bit on the 3 tablespoons of olive oil, reduced it to just 1 and added a tablespoon of Dijon mustard instead.  I love the 'whole wheat' taste of wheat berries but have not found many good recipes for them.  This one is definitely a keeper.  

Weight down slightly again to 175 pounds; bodyfat percentage is 24.7%

Good start to Bodyfat Buster program

I made a very good start to what is likely to be a 12+ week program to get my bodyfat percentage down to 12% or so.  On Saturday, Kathleen and I and Daisy ran 5 miles, and 6 more miles today.  I added another mile on the treadmill at Rice Rec Center as well as a total of 40 minutes on the rowing machine, about 13,000 meters or so total.  And for the first time ever 3.42 miles of spinning: the 'Coastal Run' course on an Expresso spinning bike.  Fun! I will definitely be doing more of that in future.

Plenty of strength training on top of that:  a mix of rear deltoid and pec fly exercises, shoulder presses, lat pulls, low cable pulls, cable push downs and lower back extensions on Saturday.  On Sunday, a mix of resistance band training and ab exercises including catch, reverse crunch, lying leg raises, toe touch, pullthrough, seated ab crunch, open leg balance, bike kicks, quadruped hip extensions and isometric back extensions.  All while listening to Grand Funk Railroad and then Emerson Lake and Palmer.  There's nothing like a musical nostalgia trip to make the muscles push through the discomfort zone.  Try hard enough and you can almost pretend that you're (still) in your 20's... As if.

On the dietary front the two days were mixed, at best.  On Saturday I got very close to my self-imposed 1800 calorie limited, until a late night mini-binge, coming home after a late movie.  The third and final installment of the Stieg Larsson trilogy: The Girl who Kicked the Hornet's Nest.  What a disappointment.  Boring boring, overly long, extremely wordy and totally not worth seeing.  A near complete waste of 142 minutes of my life.  Watching Noomi Rapace onscreen was the only redeeming feature of a complete disaster of a movie.  She is really something.

Sunday was pretty good too (oats for breakfast) but lunch was a slight bump in the road.  Kath and I went to Udipi Cafe on Hillcroft for their weekend buffet.  Ten bucks get you a superb variety of vegetarian options including a southern Indian version of what South Africans know as 'pap': a stiff maize meal (corn) porridge, subtly flavored and studded (in this version) with nuts.  Delicious!  We were the only two Anglos in a room of about 25+ Indians and most of them piled their plates with large helpings of this item.  Together with naan, some fried 'donuts' of sorts, various curries, salads, chutneys, masala and spring dosai, lentil soup and many others.  Both of us overindulged - but hey it's a buffet.  You're supposed to stuff yourself, right?  I'll be good tomorrow.

We would have had wings

If we were meant to fly, yes indeed we would have had wings. As a species we went in a different direction, and c. 12 to 14 billion years after the ‘big bang’ start of the universe, here we are earthbound and ambulatory. And as mammals go, we are slouches. The fastest amongst us - Usain Bolt and the like at maybe 25 miles per hour – would be hard pressed to outrun an angry hippopotamus. Have you seen a hippopotamus out of the water? No elegant racer that one.

We compensated by inventing and perfecting flying machines. Maybe I should take back the 'perfecting' part. Somewhere between the demise of the Concord and the present day, the 'perfecting' stopped and flying became just another boring and mostly annoying mode of transportation. Nothing glamorous like the golden days of flight when a trip on a Pan Am Clipper Flight 001 from San Francisco around the world was like taking a luxury train journey somewhere. You were pampered – in coach! - all the way to Honolulu, Tokyo, Beirut (does anybody still fly there?), and beyond. Back in its heyday Pan Am was not called the ‘Ritz Carlton’ of airlines for nothing.

So why this flying talk? Our two boys just arrived in Dubai, en route to Nairobi, this morning. 16 hours, 20 minutes non-stop from Houston to Dubai on Emirates. 8,164 miles total, apparently the world’s 6th longest commercial flight. #1? Singapore to Newark at 9,539 miles, taking a whopping 19 hours and 10 minutes, in a Airbus 340-500, cruising speed about 540 mph. Is 500 mph the best we can do, 106 years after the Wright brothers first took to the air on December 17, 1903? Do we really have to return to the moon or spend billions of taxpayer money to explore Mars? How about putting some of that money into finding a cure for slow commercial flying? Not counting the late lamented Concord, transatlantic flights have been stuck at about 500 mph for about 20 years now. Want to travel the thousand miles between Johannesburg and Cape Town? It’s going to take two hours. New York to San Francisco? 2,500 miles = 5 hours in the air. If you’re lucky. There are trains that have a top speed of almost 250 mph! It’s not as if flight is impossible at higher speeds either. As long ago as 1976 a Lockheed SR71 Blackbird was clocked at 2,194 m.p.h. New York to San Francisco in about an hour and a half? Now you’re talking! Atlanta to Jo’burg in just over 4 hours. At that speed heck yes I will be there in March for our high school reunion. At 500 mph? Maybe not.

Running update:

This might turn out to be a good year for both of us. Kath and I are both running practically every day, 5 or 6 miles or so. Despite the weather. Houston has suddenly turned into Seattle. Since early December 2009 the only way to tell them apart is not having Mt. Rainier in the distance, and there’s not quite as many coffee joints and only about half as many people dressed in black, here in Houston. I might have to find a special place to dispose of 2 pairs of running shoes which are this close to being toxic, what with the incessant water, mud, moisture and resulting moldy conditions. Beyond the lousy conditions, it’s been fun. Kathleen took 2nd place in her age group at the Texas Med 5k last Saturday, under bitterly cold conditions. And I managed an okay time of less than 23 minutes. Well off the PR but will have to be happy with that for now. Better times ahead!

40th high school reunion - or maybe not

I am still not decided about attending an upcoming 40^th Brits High School reunion in South Africa, in early March. I have done such a dreadfully poor job of keeping in touch with my old schoolmates that they are probably not really keen to see me after 40 years. Of course, if I had remained in South Africa my life would have been different. For one thing, I would have remained a fan of cricket, and in my mind baseball would have remained an odd mostly American sport, rather than the absorbing contest between batter and pitcher which I have grown to know and admire. Love? No. Sorry baseball, that is still reserved for cricket. First and enduring love, you know... Even after decades of being cut off from the world of cricket, I can still get completely swept away by the amazing complexity, the finesse and the sheer excitement of this most elegant of team sports. Naturally, had I not immigrated to the USA with Kathleen and the boys 20 years ago my life would have been different in a hundred other ways. To at least a few people in my 1970 high school graduating class I would not now be a complete stranger.

I love it here in Houston and in the USA but as the years go by, the realization sets in that I will never be able to spend much time with old friends, and of course my two brothers and sister. And vice versa. My life here goes by day after day and so does theirs, 8,000 miles away. A text message or even the occasional ‘phone call is no substitute for looking someone in the eye, gripping their hands and being happy when it turns out that they are ok. Yes I do miss the chance to just hang around with them, maybe watching some cricket on the TV, or cooking something nice. And then of course there is my mother - still very fit and active but growing older. How much – or how little – time do we have left together?

There is nothing I can do now to reverse the course of the last 20 years – they are gone forever. Every time I do find myself in South Africa, I am rushed off my feet trying to fit in a dozen different places I have to see and experience first-hand. It is what I do. Yet I do regret not being able to spend more time with my family. They are the only ones you have and you have to nurture those relationships. I’m batting under .200 on this – if you know baseball you’ll know that won’t get you into the hall of fame. In fact it will get you relegated to the minor leagues. I’ve got to do better.

So I guess I should attend the reunion, spend some time with the family and go to a cricket match. It will be palliative at best but better than a kick in the head, as my old boss Martin Pieterse used to say. Like so many other people in my previous life, I wonder what happened to him. This reunion thing is getting me into a very maudlin state of mind.

The prospect of yet another 16-hr flight to Jo’burg fills me with apprehension especially now that further security ‘enhancements’ are in place. I do not mind having pictures taken which would show ‘everything’ – under our clothes we’re all naked so what the hell. Go on and take as many enhanced x-rays as you want. Just give me some warning so I can pull in my stomach. Just don’t ask me to take my stupid shoes off again!

Running update:

Kathleen and I have been pretty consistent on the running front since we got back from Botswana just eight days before Christmas last year. I am doing about 25 to 30 miles per week and so is Kath; she’s even thinking about running the Oklahoma City Memorial Marathon in April. We’ve started back with track workouts at Reagan High School on Thursday nights (followed by a vegan BBQ sandwich at Field of Greens) and from next week we’ll also resume running hills on Tuesday nights with the Striders. This Saturday is our first 5-K race in quite a while – the Texas Med 5K. We’ll keep you posted.

I almost forgot - we ran the Chevron Houston half marathon on January 17. It was a near perfect day - Kathleen came in under 2 hrs which she was thrilled with and I ran an unofficial 1:50 something. More than 10 minutes off my personal best but I'm happy with it, considering the much interrupted training program. This year is going to be fun! I might even challenge myself to go for a 5K pr in the fall.

Dropping some elbees

The kitchen scale was kind to me this morning, registering 163 compared with 168 just a week ago, on Dec 31 2009. Down 5 pounds in a week, baby! The causes? Eating less/smaller portions, very little to no snacking between meals, almost no junk food, practically no sugar and more exercise. In addition to the 3 X hour-long workouts with Gamell on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, Kathleen and I have been running every day so far in 2010. A run tonight will bring our streak to 7, but as much as I'm tempted, I won't try to maintain it. Tomorrow (Friday) will be a no run day as usual. We're not 18 or even 38 years old anymore... Last night I went out with Daisy for 5 easy miles along Buffalo Bayou. There seemed to be more rabbits out and about than usual. I wonder if they can sense the impending cold spell, which has now been talked about as much as the boy in a balloon incident. Can it just please get cold now so that we don't have to read one more story about wrapping pipes, taking in the pets etc. People with pets really don't need to be told to bring them in when it gets around 20F.

What is on the menu, you may ask? Well this week we had Red Beans and Rice on Monday, just like everybody in Louisiana. One of my all-time favorites and we make it with not a drop of oil or of course, big chunks of greasy sausage. I do compromise a bit on the rice: Red Beans and Rice is served with white rice, not brown. Even in this mostly vegan household. Another main course was Chickpea noodle soup (from Veganomicon), tasty and satisfying with a nice vegetable broth, some onions, mushrooms, fresh rosemary and thyme from the herb garden, chickpeas from the pressure cooker, soba noodles and brown rice miso. Delicious - and we didn't need anything else with it other than Kathleen's famous green salad. Veganomicon featured heavily this week. We also enjoyed marinated Curried Tofu, which I bake on a pizza stone in the oven, and serve with a little bit of chutney, fresh green beans and chunks of butternut squash steamed in the pressure cooker for 10 minutes. On today's menu: Chickpeas Romesco from Veganomicon as well. We've tried it before and the savory fire-roasted tomato sauce with roasted red peppers and ground almonds is a winner! On Friday it will be whole wheat pasta with a marinara sauce.

Should you run barefoot?

That is the title of an interesting article in today's Parade Magazine, which is inserted into the Sunday edition of our local daily the Houston Chronicle. Nothing really new there except to confirm that running barefoot isn't 'bad for you'; a 2009 review article based on searches of 30 years of running studies did not find any research demonstrating that running shoes make people less prone to injury.

Having purchased a pair of Vibram Five Finger shoes some six months ago (thanks Billy for the tip!), I have been using them for the occasional short run of about a mile or so. This afternoon, I decided to step that up a little, if you'll pardon the pun. Strapped on or rather toed into the Vibrams (it gets easier but not a lot) and set off for 3 miles with Daisy. Running all but barefoot is a weird sensation especially for someone who has run on 'regular' running shoes since 1970. Not that there is a great deal of similarity between my first real running shoes - a pair of (now) legendary Nike Waffle Trainers - and most of the high tech shoes of today. In fact the first generation running shoes dating back to the mid 70's running boom were quite spare with a minimum of cushioning. Those were the days of Frank Shorter (who won the 1972 Olympics Marathon) and 'Boston Billy' Rodgers (4 Boston and 2 New York wins) when a decent marathon pace (for recreational runners) was anything under 8 minutes/mile. Like our running heroes, we were were looking for speed, not necessarily comfort, support or some massive boot-like behemoth on which you could clunk along for 6 hours.

Since those days running shoe technology has just about kept pace with the innovation in personal computers. We quickly started abandoning our 'Apple III-e' model sneakers for 'IBM PC's and a couple of decades later we were running on the shoe equivalent of modern-day computers, marvels of high tech - and priced accordingly. In the process we lost touch with 'real' running, adopting bad habits such as heel striking due to the support & shock absorption delivered by sorbothane and dozens of similar impact absorbing materials.

Running barefoot (or practically barefoot in a pair of Vibrams), pretty much forces one back into a more natural posture, which is on the balls of the feet, employing the body's built-in shock absorbers including the toes, the foot arch, the ankle, the many other foot muscles & tendons, the achilles tendon, calf muscles, the knee and so on...

Of course, how my feet and legs will respond to longer distances in the Vibrams or totally barefoot (which is the long term goal) remains to be seen. So far, so good.