"Only 26 miles to go!" Are you kidding? Did you say ONLY?!?

Back!

2007-04-17T17:03:00.000-07:00

Sorry that I havent been around I have been traveling like a madman and got Valley Fever in Arizona and damnit well everything! haha

Been doing good on the weight loss but not running for a marathon anymore I think. I have dropped about 20lbs so far and looking to drop another 20. Been back on the mountain bike more than running, I enjoy riding a lot more than running. I have been on the treadmill at the little gym at my apt community though. What I do is a 30 minute working. I walk for a couple minutes then alternate running and walking and jogging speeds. Turns out to be about 4-5 miles and around 500 calories burned so not bad.

Got the Garmin Edge 305 today for my bike and rode with it today. Was really nice being able to see elevation gains, decents, calories, heart rate, cadence, true distance, time, etc... I will have to figure out how to link my online results into this blog!

Hope everyone is doing well!

Back from Vegas

2007-01-09T16:54:00.000-08:00

Well, sorry that I havent been writing much I was on a trip to Vegas for work covering the CES Show. Pretty cool show I wish I could have spent more than one day there though. Its just too much good stuff to see. Apple is coming out with the new iPhone through Cingular this June and let me say I must have one. Steve Jobs introduced it at the show and its incredible. If you havent seen it... http://www.apple.com/iphone/

I didnt do much exercise while I was gone other than walk the show. The show is a good 10 miles of walking so I think I did my exercise for the day yesterday. Today I finished up moving out of my garage and tomorrow I am going to get back on track with running/biking. I am in the process of setting up a home studio in my garage so thats why I cleared it out so I could paint and set it up. Oh, Im a photographer and journalist for those that didnt know.

Hope you all are having a good start to your week. I am off to Texas on thursday for an offroad event to cover then back sunday. So, I hope I will be able to sqeek in some gym time (if there is one in the tiny ass hotel i am in) while I am there.

Ouch!

2007-01-04T20:25:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was my rest day so I didn't even post anything :)

Today after I got done with work I headed back out for some running. I did my normal warm up walking mile and let me tell you how much pain I was in. The arch on the left foot and the ankle on my right were both hurting pretty bad. They started hurting the other day after my run but not too bad. Today they were both really sore and killed most of my running for the day. So, since I ended up walking most of the circle today I beat myself up on the bike instead. Let me just say im pooped!

Weight: 235
Walk: 1.0 mile
Run: .5 mile
Walk: 2.5 mile
Mtn Bike: 26.2 mile
Music on Ipod: Powerman 5000 and Slipknot

The good news is that I am losing some weight! The bad news is that I am hoping tomorrow my feet will feel a bit better. I think its mostly just my body freaking out because its performing a new exercise that it's not used to. After a few weeks I assume it'll do better. I went through similiar aches and pains when I got back into mtn bike riding and now that seems to be pain free unless I really push myself haha.

Hope everyone is having a good week so far, could this short week be going by any slower?

Day Two

2007-01-02T17:26:00.000-08:00

I was more than a bit sore today starting off with my run/walk. The outside of my left foot was hurting a bit but after walking for a little while it seemed to get a little better. Just working out the newbie aches and pains I bet.

Well let's see what did I do today...

Weight: 238
Walk: 1.0 mile
Run 2.1 mile
Walk .7 mile
Mtn Bike 9.8 mile
Music on Ipod: Offspring

Did the same loop today running and walking and although I was a bit sore it felt pretty good. I definitely need to work on some good running playlists on the Ipod. Music definitely helps motivate me and keep me going when I get in a rut. Decided to bike a little farther today because I felt like I could and knew it would be a good cool down once again. All in all I am feeling pretty good but damn hungry. I can already tell that all this working out is going to be increasing my metabolism and hunger like it did when I got heavy into mtn biking. I was pretty good today so far had a bowl of Special K cereal with FF milk for breakfast, brought my lunch to work with me consisting of a turkey sammie with light mayo on wheat bread and an apple. I had a Oatmeal Raisin Clif Bar in the afternoon for a snack and now I am about to make some dinner. Probably a chicken breast and some corn. Trying to stomach down a gallon of water each day is a challenge in itself but I am doing my best. I also put down 1 of the Gatorade Propel sports drinks mixed berry flavor. They taste better to me than original Gatorade and have a lot less calories and sugar.

Off to eat...

Work weight loss contest

2007-01-02T11:35:00.000-08:00

So, today I come back into work from being out for the Holiday and it turns out a few people here want to put together a weight loss contest. The contest starts today and the rules are the first person to lose 20lbs and keep it off for 4 weeks wins the pot. Right now the pot is at $225! I don't know if anyone else had plans on training like I am starting but I am going to win this contest! I weight in at work today at 243 but this morning at home I weighed 238, so I dont know whos scale is right haha. Can't wait to get home today and get the shoes on and get back to the streets and see what I can do. Weight loss money here I come!

Happy New Year!

2007-01-01T13:28:00.000-08:00

Well, the first workout is in the books. Woke up this morning and had two packets of instant Oatmeal and a tall glass of milk and headed out with the new shoes to give them their virgin run. I haven't bought any sort of GPS or Tracking device yet so what I did was ride where I ran/walked today on the mountain bike afterwards. Good cool down exercise! Here is how today went.

Weight: 240 (damn heavier than I thought)
Walk: 1.1 mile
Run 1.3 mile
Walk 1.4 mile
Mtn Bike: 3.8 mile
Music on the Ipod: Rise Against

Not bad actually I did better than I thought I would do. I didn't think I would get through a hole mile of running first time out. So thats 3.8 miles today run/walk and the same on the bike for a total of 7.6 miles. Doesn't seem like much considering my normal mtn bike ride is about 25 miles but I will get there! Off to make some chicken on the George Foreman grill. Hope everyone is having a safe and fun new years!

New Kicks!

2006-12-30T17:23:00.000-08:00

So, I headed over to A Snails Pace today in Laguna Hills, CA for some shoe advice and got all that I needed. Ended up test running in about 8 pairs with one of their staff members watching me closely. Turns out I run with the outside of my foot hitting the ground first which means I needed a shoe that gave me some additional inside support to level my platform. Glad I didn't buy another cheap-o brand shoe this time around.

Ended up buying the Mizuno Wave Inspire 2. I tried on some other shoes by New Balance, Nike, Asics and Saucony and these felt the best to me. I usually wear between a 11.5 and 12 depending on the shoe and he suggested the bigger of the two because of how much your feet swell while running. Can't wait to break them in and give them a good run tomorrow. Wearing them now around the house to help break them in a bit!

Off to the desert

2006-12-27T09:15:00.000-08:00

Well, I am off to Ocotillo Wells, CA a desert playground for some fun with my friends and also do shoot a couple trucks for the mags. Should be a good time. Im excited to return and get fitted for some shoes so I can start running. Yes, I cant believe I said excited. I want to thank everyone who has been giving me great advice and encouragement, thank you!

I have realized one of my biggest struggles with keeping motivated and consistent is going to be the amount of travel I do for work. I am going to have to develop a good system for bringing my gear along with me and being sure to keep tracking progress.

Keeping a good log of the food I am eating I think will be helpful too. I plan on recording that here in my daily jargin.

Have a good next couple days I will be offline but will return shortly and hopefully with some pictures of me, my new shoes, what system I bought (nike+ipod or garmin) and some thoughts.

Nike + Ipod

2006-12-25T21:22:00.000-08:00

So, after doing some research I think I have knocked my choices down to either the Nike+Ipod shoe combo or the Garmin Forerunner unit. Both seem to be great units with the Garmin being GPS and the Nike setup being a pedometer/accelerometer. Right now I am leaning towards the Nike setup because I need music while running, it will talk to me and tell me my run progress as I am running, Nike has setup an online community to track your progress daily online, works with iTunes, etc... Seems like a kickass little system. You dont need to buy the Nike shoes though you can just buy the Ipod Nano and the Nike+ transponder and strap it to any pair of shoes. I'll probably get the shoes for now and when I wear them out consider a different brand.

Well, Christmas is finally over and I am exhaust. 3 days of Christmas for me since my family decided to spread it all out this year. Hope anyone reading this had a good one!

The start of a new era

2006-12-25T01:05:00.000-08:00

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

So you decided to come on by and visit my running blog did ya? Thanks! I bet you expected to see a lot more didn't ya? Well, that time will come. Since this is post numero uno I thought I would share with you why it's been created.

A good friend of mine ran his first marathon last year and I couldn't have been more proud of the guy. Not only is that quite a physical accomplishment, but it's also been a life changing experience. I have always been one of those people that loves achieving goals and decided when my friend took on and accomplished his, it was time for me to set out on my own adventure.

Running has never been one of my strong suits. In fact, I will be honest with you, I HATE TO RUN. I am more of a mountain bike fan. Towards the middle of summer I dropped a couple thousand dollars down on a great Specialized mtn bike that's been serving me well ever since. I took a nose dive around mid October and haven't really been on the bike since. Mostly due to the fact that my job can be crazy at times and I just haven't had the time.

Well, I spent some time with that friend of mine in December and we talked about the possibility of running a marathon together towards the end of 2007. At first I was like, no way I don't think I could do this but then I stopped and realized, yes I can.

Since then, he has sent me some great website links to start doing some research on training, dieting, shoes, clubs, etc... After the first of the year comes and goes I am going to start up the training process and plan on doing my best to login here and share with the world (or whomever really cares to read this blog) my progress. Why did I make a blog to talk about this nonsense? Mostly for me actually to track my progress online and be able to access that information worldwide because I do travel quite a bit for work.

If you are like me then you have a tough time staying motivated because you don't see instant results or even any positive results fast enough. So, if I can keep good track of what I am eating, how I am feeling, how far I run, how fast, how often and all that jazz maybe it'll encourage me to get my butt off the couch more often and get out there! Only time will tell.

I plan on leaving this blog public, hopefully the weirdos will stay away. If you read about me slackin' off please drop a response giving me a boost. Or, if you are a runner yourself and have some advice, drop a response PLEASE because I can use all the help I can get! Well, that's enough for post one, more to come :)