I haven't posted here in so long because of everything that has happened in the last 3 months. I've been posting on a different site about totally different stuff going on. Someday I will merge the two sites.
After a 2 month hiatus due to that other stuff, I've started exercising again and getting back on plan with the weight loss. I've been going strong for the last 7 weeks. So what has been happening along the journey?
After the MS150, I realized I had to have a different bike if I wanted to continue to ride for distance. My Expedition is fine for toodling around the neighborhood, but for the longer distances, I was expending too much energy trying to keep the thing rolling.
So after some research, lots of looking and test-riding several bikes, I chose the Specialized Roubaix Elite. It has carbon forks, seat post and I think front post. The frame is aluminum alloy. The bike is so much lighter. I can easily pick it up and put it in the back of the truck where the old one was a lot harder to pick up because of the weight. I've changed the stem out so it's not such a stretch to reach the drops and the hoods. And I went from a 52 cm frame to a 54 cm. We had gone to the max on the adjustments on my old bike as I had progressed in my riding.
Today I did 16.5 miles in less than 70 minutes. That's not blazingly fast, but faster than the old bike. Also, my route is leaving from my house and I have stops signs, lights and corners to negotiate for at least half the ride. It will be interesting to see how it goes when I'm on some of the more rural roads with few navigational challenges and more straight shots. For now it's nice to leave from home and not have to drive anywhere especially since I'm riding alone and not meeting anyone.
I'm trying to ride at least one day a week through the summer now, usually Sunday mornings - mainly to keep some endurance up and also to use the cycling days as cross-training days. Yes, cross-training. Walking has become sport of choice for the time being.
On June 14 I started a 12-week training program leading up to the Rock-N-Roll Half Marathon in Virginia Beach on Labor Day weekend. Todaywas the end of the 7th week of that program. My longest walk to date on this program has been 6 miles last week. Yesterday I did 4 miles. They were supposed to be at a "brisk" pace. I did 3 of the 4 in less than 16 minutes - the fastest being 15:49. I want to do approximately 17 minute miles to finish the RNR in the 4 hour time limit and to allow for things like pit stops and the time it takes to cross the start line. I was worried that I wouldn't be able to do that, now I feel more confident that I can achieve my goal.
I have also joined PearlandFit again and will train for the Houston Marathon. At this time I'm signed up for the Half for Houston as well. I'm pretty sure I can't complete the Full Marathon in the time allotment, but if all goes well, I may try for Austin in February. We'll see how I do after the RNR - if I stay with the full training group or drop back to the half mary group.
Finally, I had fallen off plan for about 2 months. I had gained 10 pounds back - 75 pounds lost. I've turned that around and have lost 6 of those pounds. The thing is I have really been playing in the same weight range most of the year. When I went to England in March, I didn't really stay on plan. I didn't do so well the weekend of the MS150, but felt that I needed the fuel and then to celebrate a little. In May it was going to Atlanta and then everything else. That's when I really gave up for a while.
But now I'm trying to make good choices, but it's more difficult this time around. It was so easy to slip back into bad habits of snacking all the time and eating fast food - I love hamburgers and french fries, but can't live on them and lose weight. Getting the exercise in is really helping because that gives me extra points to play with in the form of APs. I'm just going to have to balance the APs earned against the fuel I have to take in during training so that I don't actually create a deficit.
So I'm back on the journey and for now I'm going places.
