Sunday, December 31, 2006

2007 - Here we go!


Happy New Year everyone! Let's greet 2007 with a bang!

I did my last work out for 2006 today. Since I couldn't run and I'm doing a make up of tomorrow's cardio, I did cardio overload today! 40 minutes on the recumbent bike, 15 minutes on the Body Trec, a little bit of back exercises and abs, and finally slow walking on the treadmill at 12 % incline (being extra careful with the shins). Boy was I dripping with sweat! I noticed that there were a lot of people at the gym this morning trying to get a good workout in before we go crazy tonight :-D.

Shins are still bothering me. I've been icing and taking ibuprofen, but they are still sore. I am praying that it is only shin splint and nothing serious like *gulp* stress fracture.

Anyways, enjoy yourselves tonight! I certainly will ;-). And above all, stay safe!

Saturday, December 30, 2006

I'm falling apart!

Lower back feels a lot better. But now I have shin splints...on BOTH legs! WTF!!! Must be from the 4-miles fast walk yesterday. Today's planned 4.5 miles run was scrapped. Instead, I decided to play it smart so I shelled out $7 to use the local gym. Here's my workout:

AM: Eliptical (20 minutes HIIT + 10 minutes MISS), LBWO, Abs

I had to be careful with LBWO since my back still feels a bit tender. For example, I did one set of squats on the smith machine then decided to do something else since it does put a little bit of pressure on the back.

But what a shame! Today is sunny, mild weather, in the mid-50's. Perfect day for running.

I'm kind of disappointed since I keep getting sidelined with injuries. However, I am not deterred! I will keep on going, and hopefully one of these days, I'm going to figure out how I'm supposed to land my feet on the ground, LOL! In the meantime, ICE ICE BABY!

If I have time, I'll probably go to the gym tomorrow for my last workout of 2006.

Have a safe and happy New Years everyone!!!

Friday, December 29, 2006

Dreamgirls


I finally saw this movie! I absolutely LOVE it! Beyonce was great, but Jennifer Hudson rocked the house! Everytime she sang, the whole movie theatre was really getting into it and clapping.
The movie soundtrack was awesome and favorite song from the movie is probably "Listen" which was sung by Beyonce. I highly recommend that you go see the movie!

**********************************

I woke up today with a sore lower back. WTF!!!!

I'm not sure what's going on. I've been spending most of my holidays at my parents' house and the heaviest weights my mom has is a pair of 8-lbs dumbells. Since I'm too cheap to spend $7/day to go to the gym (have to counteract the 3 Couch bags I bought as x-mas present to myself ;-D), my weight-lifting days has been modified to supersets with high repetitions. I still felt the burn though. Anyways, I don't think my sore back has anything to do with the weight lifting. I'm pretty sure it's the running. All that heavy pounding does put a toll on your lower back. So today, it's going to be stretching, icing, Icy Blue, and more stretching. In the future, I'll be more conscious with strengthening my lower back - maybe do some low back exercises right after working the abs.

Thankfully, I'm off from running today. I did go to the park for a 4-miles walk. Man, did it take FOREVER! Tomorrow is my long run and I hope my back feels better then.

Thursday, December 28, 2006

Post-Christmas Report

One holiday down, one more to go!

I am thoroughly enjoying my holidays and vacation! Besides the onslaught of holiday parties, I've been getting in touch with friends who, like me, are also home for the holidays. Two nights ago, I went out with 2 of my close guy friends from college. One now lives in Nashville, Tennessee and works for Nissan as an engineer. The other friend is now a nephrologist (kidney doctor). He will be moving to Phoenix, Arizona next year to join his uncles practice. Man, I feel old! It seems like only yesterday we were all goofing off, staying up all night, partying, etc. Anyways, I'm so glad those two are living where they are. I'm already planning on visiting my friend from Nashville sometime next year since I've never been there. I've already been to Phoenix years ago to visit the doctor friend when he was going to med school there, so I'll have to see about that.

Yesterday, I met another friend for lunch. This friend was someone I used to work with at my current company, but is now doing some post-doctoral studies in Tissue Engineering at MIT. His family still lives in the area so we usually meet once a year around the holidays. We went to our usual hang out, which is an Italian restaurant specializing in authentic Italian hoagies. Man, those hoagies are sooo good!

I may have more plans between tonight and tomorrow night, but Saturday night I'm meeting 2 other friends that I haven't seen in a while. These friends are people I used to work with at a department store during summer breaks from college. We'll probably do dinner then a movie. I am hoping they're open to seeing "Dreamgirls" coz I really want to see it! :-)

Between the parties and reunion with friends, my eating has been shot! I've been successful with limiting my portions, but the meals are not the healthiest. Like for example, 2 nights ago we went to Olive Garden then to a diner for coffee and desert. There are no healthy choice at Olive Garden, so I settled for Spaghetti with Meat Sauce, of which I ate only half. Then at the diner, the healthiest desert was carrot cake. :-)

I'm thoroughly enjoying myself this holiday, but I cannot wait when this is all over and I can get back to a routine.

On the other hand, workouts has been going GGGRRRREEEAAATT!!!

Monday:
No workout. Christmas day. Had a small get-together at my brother's place for lunch, then went to a friend's house for dinner. I was stuffed!!! However, I did run the day before, which was supposed to be rest day.

Tuesday:
AM: Treadmill (3.4+ miles at 5.9 mph and 1% incline + 10 minutes walking for warm-up and cool-down), Abs, leg strengthening exercises
Was planning on doing LBWO, but couldn't get it in.

Wednesday:
PM: LBWO
Was running around all day and was too tired to do the planned cardio. LBWO was completed through sheer will at around 10 pm!

Thursday:
AM: Treadmill (3.4+ miles at 5.9-6.1 mph and 1% incline + 7 minutes walking for warm-up and cool-down), Abs, leg strengthening exercises
PM: UBWO
That's more like it!

I absolutely must get back to an eating routine come January! Inspite of the workouts, I can feel the effects of my poor eating habits. My stomach is so bloated I'm starting to look like the Goodyear blimp!

That's it for now! Hope everybody's having a great holiday as well!

Sunday, December 24, 2006




Merry Christmas everyone!!!





PS: Today is supposed to be my rest day...BUT...since there's a good possibility that I won't be able to work out tomorrow, I got in a 2 miles run + 1.5 miles walk this afternoon at the park. :o)

Saturday, December 23, 2006

LSD

Long Slow Distance run = 4 miles

DONE!!!

Okay, that's probably measley to some serious runners, but to me, that's a LOOONG distance! Anyways, I thought that's worth blogging about today, even though very few people are blogging right now. :-)

Went to the park today and ran at a very leasurely pace. The goal is to make it to 4 miles without crashing. My legs still felt like lead this morning so I made sure to stretch a lot before going out. It was a nice 56F, very cloudy but no rain. There were several people there walking and one woman was running. When I first started, the woman looked like she was going pretty fast (tall with long strides) and I was thinking there is no way I was going to catch up to her. So off I went at what I consider a slow pace and pretty soon, I was passing her! The park was pancake flat and has a 1/2 mile loop around it so it was definitely a leasurely run. Runner's high hit me after mile 3 and after I was done with mile 4, I felt I could have gone on longer! After mile 4, I kept on running for a little bit longer and then slowed down to a walk until I completed lap 9, which made it a total of 4.5 miles! Knees are still holding up so I am pretty happy!

Went home and did some leg strengthening exercises and UBWO (supersets).

Total running miles for the week = 11.6

I'm a very happy camper!

doidle - Thanks for stopping by! I'll try to post some pictures soon. Nothing in swimsuit though. ;-) I did post some pictures in myblends a couple of days ago - before BFL and after BFL.

Have a great day everyone!

Friday, December 22, 2006

3 Shopping Days Before Christmas

Still here and still going strong! Cold is almost gone and workouts for today are done!

Treadmill: 3.1+ miles running @ 5.9 mph and 1% incline (~32 minutes), 8 minutes walking for warm-up and cool-down
Leg strengthening exercises
Abs supersets: 4x25 crunches, reverse crunches, oblique crunches (both sides). OUCH!!!

My butt is so sore from yesterday's and today's workouts that it hurts to sit down. It's a good hurt though. I want to do a long, slow run (~4 miles) tomorrow, but I'll have to see. It's supposed to be 60F tomorrow and I so want to run outside, but the rain is predicted to continue throughout the morning. The good news is, my knees are holding up (knock on wood). Those leg strenghtening exercises and stretches are doing wonders!

Today, I got some last minute shopping done. My brother and I went to this shopping center, which is a little on the higher end, so it wasn't too crowded. The worst part is the traffic to and from there. We left after lunch, but I guess a lot of people were either shopping or were let go early from work.

Anyways, I am DONE with my Christmas shopping! I just have to get a couple more VISA gift checks from the bank, buy some Christmas bags from the Dollar Store, and that should be it! WAAAAHOOOOO!!!

Gotta go! I hear the fire engines going, which means the annual Santa rounds are happening courtesy of our fire department. What can I say, I'm still a kid at heart! :)

Merry Christmas everyone!!!!

Thursday, December 21, 2006

Bored

Can't you tell? That's why I've been on a blogging frenzy lately, LOL. None of my friends and families are on vacation, so it's just me amusing myself.

Workouts are done for today! Here's what I did:

AM: ~51 minutes walking on the treadmill (~3 miles) on a very high incline. This treadmill is old and kind of manual so it felt like I was going faster than what the display says. I was definitely sweating up a storm and my legs were screaming!
PM: LBWO, leg strengthening exercises

I still have the cold, hence, the walking on the treadmill. Otherwise, I'd be outside in the frigid weather running. Thankfully, my cold hasn't been too bad. Guess that Zicam actually works!

Oh, I made a cool discovery on iTunes! There's a podcast called Yoga Today that have video episodes every day! You do not need a video iPod! It's actually better to play it in your computer so it's on a bigger screen. Just download it to your computer, play, and do yoga to your hearts content. And since they have different episodes everyday, you won't get bored! I'm going to dowload an episode to my laptop and go somewhere in the house where there's room to spread out and go from there! Pretty cool, huh?

Now, if you're tech savvy like my one brother, you can build your own computer that has a built-in tv tuner and Tivo-like recording thingamajig, hook it up to your big flat screen TV, and you're golden! He has an older computer (Sony Vaio - still pretty good!) that he's rigging up to function similarly and giving it to my non-tech savvy parents. Lucky dogs!

Anyways, I might do some yoga later, if I still have some energy. ;-)

Wednesday, December 20, 2006

VACATION!!!

As of yesterday, I am officially on vacation! Not returning to work until January 2nd! Yeah baby! Unfortunately, I've been getting calls from our secretary about urgent things that I have to take care of, so I've been logging into work, resolving issues, etc. Oh well! It's still better not being at work.

Here's my workout log so far for the week:

Monday
AM: eliptical (20 minutes HIIT + 15 minutes MISS), Killer Abs (still hurting today!)

Tuesday
AM: ~1.5 miles running + ~.5 miles walking (warm-up, cool-down), as much push-ups as I can manage, leg strengthening exercises
Don't know what happened! One minute I was enjoying my run outside, then I just stopped and decided to walk home. Must be because of lack of sleep (~4 hours)? Then, I had to drive to my parents house before lunch time so I ran out of time.

Wednesday (Today)
AM: ~3+ miles running + .5 miles walking, leg strengthening exercise
PM: UBWO (supersets), Abs

Run today was great! It was pretty chilly, but very sunny and no cloud in sight so that helped a lot. Unfortunately, I was hit with a cold immediately afterwards. Still managed to do my workouts in the afternoon though. Followed my guideline of neck up = workout, neck down and/or fever = no workout. I took some Airborne right away and went to the pharmacy for Zicam and Cold-eeze cough drops, both of which are supposed to reduce the length and the symptoms of cold. We'll see!

Tomorrow if my cold progress, I might just do light cardio like 45 minutes walking plus LBWO.

That's it for now. Be good!

Sunday, December 17, 2006

Saturday, December 16, 2006

Ending on a good note

Today is the 6th day I've worked out this week. Woohoo!!! What an accomplishment! So today's workout is as follows:

AM: Running outside for 3.4 miles.
PM: LBWO, Abs

Overall mileage ran for the week: 9.85 miles. Not too bad for a comeback. :)

Okay, I didn't do abs last night as promised. I fell asleep early and totally forgot! But I did make it up today!

Running today felt great! It was 46F, nice and sunny - perfect running weather! I actually ended up taking off my jacket after a while because I got too hot. The only annoying thing is the wind - it always pick up everytime I go uphill, just to make things harder for me, LOL. It's strange, but I think it's better for me to run outside than on the treadmill. It seems I get injured more on the treadmill. Must be the way my feet land on the ground or something. Who would have thunk?

Friday, December 15, 2006

Don't want to jinx myself, but...

...I'm doing really good this week!

Monday
AM: Eliptical (20 minutes HIIT + 10 minutes MISS), Abs

Tuesday
AM: Treadmill (2.2 miles @ 5.8 mph (~23 minutes), 7 minutes LISS (warm-up, cool-down), leg strengthening exercises
PM: LBWO, leg strengthening exercises (cable machine)

Wednesday
AM: Eliptical (20 minutes HIIT + 15 minutes MISS), Abs

Thursday
AM: Treadmill (2.25+ miles @ 5.9 mph (23 minutes), 7 minutes LISS (warm-up, cool down), leg strengthening exercises
PM: UBWO, leg strengthening exercises (cable machine)

Friday
AM: Treadmill (5 minutes warm-up + 2 miles run @ 5.8 mph (~21 minutes) + 9 minutes fast walking on 3% incline), leg strengthening exercise.
Will do abs tonight - PROMISE!!!

I'm working from home this morning because my heater is being serviced (preventive maintenance). Unfortunately, the service guy is LATE!!! Ugh!!! It's gone past 1:30 pm and I'm supposed to be at work at 2 pm for our Christmas party. The guy is still in the basement doing his thing. So annoying!!!

Sunday, December 10, 2006

Test Run

Yay, I'm back to running! For the last couple of days, all I've been doing was brisk walking on a high incline for loooong periods (boring!!!). Today, I eased back into running by doing a moderate 5.7 mph pace and 1% incline for 2 miles, which took about 21 minutes. My right knee, which was giving me problems, feels FINE! WAAAHOOO!!! For the next week or so, I'm going to be strict and not increase my speed or time by no more than 10% a week. At the same time, I'm going to continue doing the leg strengthening exercises. Hopefully, those two combined will lead me to build a good solid running base, and maybe I can finally improve.

Also after my run today, I did an UBWO. A good day overall for fitness!

Food is another matter. I met my family at Maggiano's for lunch today since it's my brother's birthday. It's an Italian restaurant (for those who don't know) and we had their family style special in which you share the food and you get a choice of 2 salads, 2 appetizers, 2 pasta dishes, 2 entrees, and 2 desserts, plus the bread. Their portions are huge and the food is amazing! My family and I are fairly light eaters, so we ended up taking most of the food home! Needless to say, I was so full afterwards.

After lunch, my mom and I decided to walk off the meal by doing some shopping at the nearby mall. I got a good deal on a pair of jeans at Express. They have a special going on in which the jeans are $20 off, and I have a $15 coupon, so I ended up paying only $25 for a pair of jeans! SAAWEET!!! That's not even the best part! The best part is I actually fit in a SIZE 0 SLIM FIT JEANS!!! This is my first pair of Express jeans since like college, so their size might be bigger. Don't know. But it's still pretty amazing! I was a size 2 in jeans and size 0 in regular pants and was quite happy with it, but I guess I still lost some inches. I bought the size 0 boot cut jeans, but for kicks I tried on the size 0 skinny jeans and they also fit!!! They actually look darn good! I almost started cheering in the fitting room when my fat legs actually slid through and the zip closed with no problem, LOL! The skinny jeans were $20 more than the boot cut one so I didn't get it. Maybe next time. I would probably wear them with knee-high boots worn over the jeans. That would look really sharp! Oh well! Like I said, maybe next time. Hopefully, my fat calves also caught up with the size reduction so I can also get a new, non-stretchy, knee-high boots, LOL!

I was feeling so confident in my newly discovered size that I ended up buying a Coach bag, LOL! There goes the great deal at Express! ;)

Well, that's the end of my fun for the day. Now it's onto cooking for the week, folding the laundry that I did last night, maybe some cleaning, and FINALLY setting up my Christmas tree. I do have the lights outside already set up, so I'm not completely late with my Christmas decorations.

Wednesday, December 06, 2006

Sick

I've been struck with some nasty stomach bug. Yesterday morning, I woke up feeling feverish and nauseus. The only thing I had yesterday was a cup of hot tea and some water. I just couldn't keep anything down! My temperature was above 100 for the whole day so I took some Tylenol. I was feeling nauseus all day, but didn't actually throw up until 9 pm! What a horrible feeling!

I feel better today - no more fever or nausea. I was actually able to eat 2 pieces of toast and drink a cup of hot tea this morning. However, I still feel drained from yesterday, so I decided to take another day off from work today to recuperate completely. I have been checking emails regularly from work to keep up to date and I am already dreading going back! Just so much work to do!

I was watching the news this morning, and apparently there has been an outbreak of E. coli in our area. I don't think that's what I have or I'd be in worse shape than what I've been. Plus, they traced the source to a couple of Taco Bell fast food restaurants, and I know I haven't been to one in months!

Needless to say, no workouts yesterday and today. Honestly, that's the last of my concern right now. I'm more concerned about getting more food in me.

So that's what I've been up to for the last couple of days. Not fun!

Monday, December 04, 2006

Blogging again

Surprise! Another post from me, and so soon! Anyways, I decided to start blogging more regularly again. I need to be extra vigilant right now with my workouts since I can't run so that the weight doesn't creep up. Posting my workouts will hopefully keep me accountable.

So here goes:

Yesterday (Sunday)
  • 2 miles walk at the park by my parents house. My dad wanted to go for a walk so I went to keep him company.

Today

  • Moderate walking on the treadmill for 30 minutes (first thing in the morning on an empty stomach)
  • Abs (3 sets of planks: 30 sec, 45 sec, 1 minute)
  • Leg strengthening exercises

My knee feels so much better. But I'm being smart this time and giving it time to heal. When I do start running again, I will have to force myself to start easy.

I found some great websites that have exercises on how to strengthen the leg muscles to help avoid runner's knee. I'll be sure to incorporate these exercises into my workouts:

http://www.med.umich.edu/1libr/guides/knee/xpatello.gif

http://www.drpribut.com/sports/spknees.html

The latest Runner's World magazine edition also has an article on injury prevention with exercise recommendations. I ripped the page off and posted it on my magnetic board in my basement where I work out.

That's it for now!

Saturday, December 02, 2006

Runner's Knee :(

No running for me right now :(. It seems like I have runner's knee, specifically on my right knee. I lost my motivation for a week after Thanksgiving, which means no workout at all. Thankfully, I was able to keep my eating 90% clean (not counting the Thanksgiving meal, of course). Anyways, I finally regained my motivation yesterday and ran on the treadmill for 20 minutes (BFL HIIT) and walked for 10 minutes (warm-up and cool-down). I made sure to stretch a lot before and after too. I was fine for the whole day, then by the end of the day my right knee started hurting when I walk down the stairs. Also that afternoon at the gym, I couldn't even do leg extensions. Hence, no running for at least a couple of days for me. And today, my planned 5K race has been scrapped :(. This coming week for cardio, it will be walking and cross-training (ie: bike, eliptical, etc.).

It's kind of frustrating. I have never been made for running and have to work my butt off to get to this point. But I love it and will not give up. So this is just a temporary drawback and I WILL BE BACK! I have been doing a lot of reading on runner's knee and I will be sure to do the exercises recommended to strengthen the leg muscles. Also, I will be more conscious of taking my Glucosamine-Chondroitin-MSM and Fish Oil supplements - yeah, those went out the toilet along with my workouts!

I did get the iPod Shuffle and I am totally in love with it! So if any of you are thinking of getting it, I highly recommend it! You don't even notice that it's there! I'm hoping my knees will feel better soon so I can take advantage of the Shuffle.