Running with the Devil
[prev] Wed, 15 Sep 2004 19:34:14 -0400 [next] [health] - [comment]
I've come to a sort of crossroads in my life.
I've realized that I'm not particularly healthy. I'm out of shape, and I lead a pretty sedentary existence. So, I determined I need to do one of two things.
1) Start moving around.
2) Start eating better.
Now, I like to eat. I like food. I like things that taste good. I like beer and pizza and peanuts and sandwiches and wings and beer and steak and hamburgers and fish and beer and ice cream. I really find enjoyment in eating things that taste good.
I don't like tofu. I don't care much for salads, and I don't like V-8. I like vegetables on occasion, but they're not my favorite. I would be sad if I had to eat these things all the time in order to be healthy. And don't even get me started on the crazy shit people eat when they're on Atkins or the Celery Celery Celery diet.
I don't have any particular aversion to excercise. I don't mind walking, running, or canoeing. I just have to make myself do it.
So I decided to take up running. I bought a pair of cheap Nikes (thank you sweatshop children) and some shorts and socks. Today, I started running after work.
My goal is to work my way up to running 5 miles at a stretch. This could take a while. ATTENTION: This is where this post delivers. I started off today just trying to feel out how far I could run without getting light headed or without hurting myself.
I ran nine tenths of a mile in just over thirteen minutes.
That's pretty sad, folks. I'll leave the math as an excercise to the reader, but that means two things: I'm slow and out of shape. We established this already, but this drives the point home. I think there was I time when I could run a mile in 8 minutes, but I might be imagining that.
Needless to say, I plan to track my progress. There may be graphs involved.
1. start slow, do it like 3 times a week. If you do it less you won't get any benefit and doing it more means doing it more.
2. stretch a lot, before and after and on days you're not running when you watch tv.
3. All that low carb crap is a big fat lie. This becomes painfully obvious when you run.
4. Track your progress
5. Don't run like a girl.
1. Well, I was going to try to do it everyday, but I'm not sure if I can keep that pace. So far I've done two days on one day off.
2. Yeah, I didn't really stretch the first time. I stretched the second time, and the third them I stretched a lot.
3. I actually felt better (although every muscle in my body ached) after running. I was able to sleep easier, which was pretty cool.
4. This was the best part, you and the rest of creation can track my fat ass here:
http://alphamonkey.org/running/
If there's no activity on it for a while, that probably means it's time to call me up and hassle me. I'm hoping that won't be necessary though.
5. I started running with my fists clenched but I noticed they got sweaty and gross fast. So now I sort of run with a karate chop motion, hands flat. Also, I found that keeping my head up and straight -- rather than hunched over, looking at the odometer -- allowed me to run further with greater ease.
I might still be running like a girl though.