C25K for DLers (run, run, run!)

[Ultradude]

Hey, haven't run a 5k in a while.

Won't be running much either with a physically strenuous job, much as I'd love to see how out of shape I am right now.

[Lady Door]

While no one who wants to follow along with the "get your asses out of your chairs" exercise program has to be doing it for weight, I certainly am. With that in mind, I'll be posting my weight once a week and generally tracking my calories/nutrition (no one else needs to do it - but it helps keep me accountable). Feel free to make fun of me and what I eat all you like.

Starting weight: 183
Target caloric intake: 1200-1800 (1500 on average)
Aiming for 1-3 pounds per week, so about 20 pounds over the course of the program (so: 163 by November 8).

I don't lose weight when I do cardio only, so in addition to running Monday, Wednesday and Friday, I'll be doing some cross training on Tuesdays and Thursdays and some free-form exercise or another on Saturday or Sunday, for a total of 6 days "on" and 1 day "off."

Week 1, Day 2 (pre-program)
Week 1: 5 minute warm-up walk. 60 seconds jogging, 90 seconds walking; repeat for 20 minutes. 3 minute cool-down walk.

Whee, I'm so glad I gave myself the extra two days of running. I need to feel my way back to this thing. Damnation. It's unfair how you get more unfit in 8 weeks of not running than you get fit in 8 weeks of running. Also, my shoes suck, so I'm probably going to try barefoot running on the treadmill. This means my future times will be even slower, likely.

2.15 miles, 28:00 (a little over a 13:00 mile)

Tips for myself:

• SLOW THE HELL DOWN. I know you used to run a LOT faster than you're running right now, but you haven't run in several months. Take it easy. You'll get there.
• Humidity sucks. Breathing is hard when the air is made of water. Open the window and turn on the fans. If you don't, you will die.
• Run on the midfoot. This will go a long way toward slowing you down, too, but it's not healthy to land on the ball of the foot all the time. Stop doing it.

[Luther Lansfeld]

I think 20 pounds in 2 months might be a wee bit ambitious. My body seems to be basically incapable of such a thing! To be fair, I don't really count calories, I just try to eat less/whatever.

I am also going to try to lose weight. My goal is just 1 pound a week for the 9 weeks and as long as I decide to continue exercising, as my goal has always been. Stupid three weeks of sin to ruin my goals. >_<

[Lady Door]

My body tends to hover around 155-165, so it goes back to it pretty easily. I'm not too worried about making the goal, though it's just a little higher than an average of 2 pounds per week. I will probably lose 3-5 a week in the first two weeks and then drop down to maybe 1 per week for the rest. Especially if I actually pay attention to my food like I should be.

Good luck! The hardest part for me has been dealing with hiccups - a weekend in Vegas is a GREAT TIME to take advantage of awesome food! I must eat it all! cake for my birthday! - but approaching it less in a "NO! CAN NOT HAS" sense and more with an eye toward maintaining a balance has made it easier. There is no such thing as a "lost day"; just pick up again when you  notice that things aren't going the way you want them to be.

[Luther Lansfeld]

I have tried to watch what I eat on the cruise but it's very hard when you work weird hours and can't exercise. Okay, there's an exercise room, but because the boat rocks, I get sick when I try. >_>

I have a lot of trouble even losing a pound a week. I should try to cut portions more or something but it leaves me hungry every day which frustrates me. I'd just settle for losing weight in the thighs/ass. I just can't seem to get rid of anything there no matter how hard I try.

For the record, to lay it out: 180 now, goal is 160 20 weeks from now. Which I am currently too lazy to do the math on!

[superaielman]

Half a point a week is more normal weight loss, yeah. Nothing wrong with that.

[SnowFire]

So ran two miles on the treadmill after work both Monday and today, think I made a mile and a half yesterday.  Did the first mile in 7:40 today, did the full two miles in 18:10.  Think I did two miles on Monday a bit slower at ~18:30.  Figured I'd get my third mile in with random walking elsewhere; know I walked to the supermarket on Monday which was a good mile anyway, so if we're assuming 4mph, that's ~34-35 minutes for the 5K.

My diet remains fairly horrible, though.  Cannot...  resist...  free.... really good... cookies...  at least I'm having more salady stuff for lunch / dinner these days.

[Lady Door]

Super uber stressed yesterday, did poorly on the diet. Ate *cringe* about 2400 calories.

Three things that did it:
1) VERY limited time, running late, did not pack lunch and thus ate at Subway (a little over 500 calories)
2) Habit of eating dessert after dinner (450 calories - good lord, cafes are terrible)
3) Eating my stress to avoid coming back to work (670 calories - tall non fat, no whip hot chocolate and a slice of pumpkin bread, my go-to comfort food)

If I hadn't run up 1,100 calories in the "snack" category, I would have been much closer to 1300 or 1400 for the day.

On the plus side (is there a plus side? jeeze), I at least have taken a moment to look at how I react and what I tend to fix it with so I can approach these situations with a little more presence of mind.

Today is going much better. I'm on track for ~1500 today (and packed my own lunch, hooray), with about 500-600 left for dinner.

[superaielman]

Cutting out desert and snacking will kill most people's bad eating habits. That is just ;_; to do.

[Taishyr]

I can't really say I'm going for weight loss as most of my exercise "program" is more of a muscle mass building sort of thing. Still, if I can keep weight level where I'm at (250), then I'm alright - and if I gain some but don't feel it, eh, muscle.

Currently at 100 situps today. Aiming for 150.

[Scar]

About to run one mile on the treadmill at work. I don't know if anyone has mentioned this, but fishoil (pills) are great for dieting. They make it so that you lose yer appetite and are super good for you to boot. I thought I'd recommend those to anyone who has trouble with being hungry all the time!

[Lady Door]

Finished yesterday just shy of 1800. Yay! Much better than the day before, and I actually made some bad choices yesterday, too, so it's great that they didn't simply throw me completely out of the ballpark.

No run today - key shenanigans meant I'd have to be an hour late for work if I wanted to do that, boo. Maybe I'll run it tomorrow. We'll see.

I think I'm going to make Sunday my weigh-in day, so prepare this weekend for completely underwhelming changes since my last weigh-in! Except that I have also had Female Things, so I may have lost weight simply by virtue of that. I'll take it!

[Grefter]

You gave birth?  Congratulations!  I wasn't aware that Andy was an Alien though, the gestation period seems very short.

[Lady Door]

Anything I could possibly say here would be ridiculously graphic.

Kudos, sir, for shutting me up down.

[Grefter]

[superaielman]

Holding steady at 3.5 miles for walking right now. Can do more at a slower clip, but eh.

[Lady Door]

Whole lotta nothing this weekend, mainly due to stress and giving myself a free pass because the "real" start is tomorrow.

Weighed this morning - as expected, "lost" 3 pounds and am at 180.

[Cotigo]

Haven't been running, but I went to the gym during my lunch break over the week so close enough. 

[Lady Door]

Didn't get up until around 11 (hooray for holidays!), so I didn't really eat breakfast. Sammich for lunch, and probably tacos or the like for dinner. Going to be low on calories today, but eh.

Ran 2.25 in 30 minutes today. Not great, but I'm okay with that since about 8 or 9 minutes was made up of warm-up/cool-down walking.

Reminder, for anyone else who may be starting this week:

Week 1:
5 minute warm-up walk.
60 seconds running, 90 seconds walking; alternate for 20 minutes.
5 minute cool-down walk.

[Lady Door]

Calories have been all over the place -- 1000 one day, 2400 the next. The important thing is they're averaging out around 1600, so that's perfectly okay with me. Next step: getting DAILY averages within my range, and making better choices overall (goodbye, soda; goodbye, Starbucks breakfast).

Ran 2.30 in 30 minutes. A little better, but oddly slow considering that I added in an additional run segment. I blame being tired?

Week 1 is still:
5 minute warm-up walk.
60 seconds running, 90 seconds walking; alternate for 20 minutes (or, run 1 minute 8 times, with 1.5 minutes of walking in between)
5 minute cool-down walk.

[Taishyr]

Eating around ~2000 calories myself, occasionally 2500 - which is still like 500 below what I need to "maintain" weight in theory but whatever. Big dude shit.

Still holding steady at the 100 situps mark on average, about an hour or two walking, and trying to work pushups into the regiment but I suck at upper body strength so those'll take a while to get a decent count on. >_> The one (light) arm weight I've got I'm generally throwing around, at least, so that's good I guess.

Also oh god Monday/Tuesdays will be killer calorie-wise this semester. Generally will be limited to a fast breakfast/dinner (we're talking "handful of peanuts and some dry cereal" both times) and whatever I can sanely pack into a lunchbox, so... 1500 tops, usually. Those'll be the famine days. Ah well, needed to lose the appetite some anyway~

[Cotigo]

So, funny thing.  Lifting weights, strained a muscle (or something) and it felt like someone stabbed me in the brain for a good 5 minutes, and then I was disoriented for several hours.

I think I'm going to start just running instead now. >_>

[SnowFire]

Ran 2.66 miles in 24:30 today.  That's worse than a 9 minute mile, so yeah, pretty pokey, was walking a lot on the second mile. 

That said this thread has helped inspire me to run in an actual 5K.  Specifically, I'll be doing the "Race for the Cure" Susan J. Komen race in Central Park on Sunday.   ( http://www.komennyc.org/site/TR?fr_id=1210&pg=entry )  I never was entirely certain about the logic behind these various "run/walk for a charitable cause" deal, but hey.  If anyone wants to contribute toward breast cancer research, drop me a PM or IRC message, and I'll send you the link to the pledge / sponsor page.

[Lady Door]

I may as well have walked by comparison!

25:15 for 2.00. Had to cut it a bit short since I was running late this morning.

Next week is Week 2:
5 minute warm-up walk.
90 seconds jogging, 2 minutes walking; alternate for 20 minutes.
Cool-down walk.

No soda yesterday, yee haw. I don't drink soda every day, so the only reason this is notable is because I was in a situation wherein I normally drink soda, and I deliberately chose not to.

Baby steps, y'all.

Next week might be when I add in whatever cross-training stuff I'm going to be doing. Methinks pilates and/or yoga, because goddamn do I need to stretch more. >_<

[NotMiki]

beginning my exercise program, affectionately titled "Jim gets to class on time."  walk/run 1.5 miles in exactly as many minutes as I have left between finishing breakfast and when class starts, usually somewhere around 18 (though I pulled 15 minutes yesterday when I overslept).  Pretty good cardio, what with the backpack (yay heavy law books) and the hills and all, I figure.

This is about as structured as my exercise is going to get, I think, unless by 'structure' you mean 'play a lot of DDR.'