Sometimes, you need to break your own rules

I woke up & spent an hour incessantly & relentlessly pounding. I'm sweaty, out of breath, & have a silly smile on my face.

-my incredibly clever & uproariously hilarious double-endentre tweet from this morning

This morning was type the morning that a cyclist dreams of. Temperature just on the "warm" side of cool with a tiny breeze. Not a cloud in the sky.

It had rained, heavily, the night before, so the humidity was barely registering. Yet, there was the feel of water in the air, as last night's rainfall evaporated. In all honesty, it felt like I was at the shore . . . now if only I were cycling to the beach, instead of the office.

I started the trip as I normally did - taking it easy. But, the day was just too precious. Days like this, where the weather smiles upon you & I find myself on the road, are few & far between (with a newborn on the way, they may go into hiding for the season). I broke one of my cardinal rules.

When I started biking, I didn't have many rules - but the one I've stuck by was that I would never push myself on the way into work. I didn't want to pull into the office all sweaty & tired. I'm already burning a boatload of calories, so as long as I'm not running late, why would I? Well, days like today are why. I pushed myself. From the first hill, up through the driveway to the corporate parking lot. And the cycling gods smiled on me, too - there's one typically busy left-hand turn I need to make. Yet there were no cars in sight. There are 7 traffic lights I need to ride through, yet only one was red, and I only had to stop for a minute or so.

The typical ride into my office takes me between 1:15 and 1:25 on the Bianchi outfitted with the XTracycle (steel frame + a 12 pound add-on that changes the aerodynamics of the bike so as to allow you to carry more). My fastest ride ever was 59:29, on the Giant (aluminum frame, weighs 8 pounds less than the Bianchi did before I had it altered), without any gear. Today, I completed the ride in 58:00, despite a fully-loaded bike (change of clothing, lunch (carrot sticks, beet salad, guacamole), and my work laptop). I'm not tired - I'm feel freaking amazing.

On top of everything, despite my absolute "avoid the scale" fanaticism I have with my general well-being, I can't help but notice results. I'm going to save most of it for another blog post, but it's kind of awesome to actually see that my body is changing for the better.

For food today, we have grapefruit, cherries, beet salad, carrot sticks, hummus, guacamole . . . and as it's Friday, I just about have to eat all of it. Mmmmm, yay!

Guacamole & Meetings

So I mentioned that I went to my nephew's first birthday party on Saturday. My sister asked me to bring my guacamole. See, guacamole is one of my two favorite "healthy" snacks (hummus is the other). Well, it turns out that I make a pretty decent guacamole (my hummus sucks), so the recipe is to the sidebar, right.

Guacamole

• 7 avocados
• 3 slightly-overripe tomatoes, finely chopped
• 1/2 vidalia onion, finely chopped
• 1 tbsp. cumin
• 1 tbsp. garlic powder
• 1 tbsp. cilantro
• 1 tsp. old bay seasoning
• Lime juice to taste

Mash the avocado, mix in other ingredients, squirt some lime juice. Transport / serve with at least an avocado pit or two to prevent premature browning.

I was hoping to bike into work today . . . it would have been a nice day - the temperature before 7 hit 70, so I wouldn't have had the "sweating heavily while freezing my balls off" conundrum that I typically face on the bike ride in. This afternoon is calling for scattered showers (with late thunderstorms). Riding in a thunderstorm isn't particularly fun, but a small rainstorm is actually somewhat pleasant (as long as you give yourself enough distance to brake). The rain cools you off (nevermind that the temperature usually has dropped a little), and cars tend to give you an extra-wide breadth.

Unfortunately, I have an offsite meeting today, so biking wasn't an option. This morning, I walked the dogs, fed the dogs, and spent some time on my spinning bike watching Dexter (my ankle is still a tiny bit tender - it's annoying, as I thought I was fully back to normal, but I'll give it another day or so).

This afternoon, depending on when I get home (and the weather), I'll give my lawn another once-over with the mower. Maybe run a bit if my ankle is up for it, maybe a quick bike ride. Tomorrow, I do plan to bike into work (it's kind of awesome to get three hours of a workout without actually spending three hours of your day), so that's that . . . this weekend, well, we'll see.

Holiday Weekend / The Benefit of Crosstraining

This weekend was memorial day weekend, and that means that it's traditionally a very active weekend for me. This year proved no different.

Saturday morning came & the weather was iffy. I fully intended to mow the lawn, but it was spritzing, the grass was soaked, & I just wasn't feeling it. So, I ran. Well, first I got up, took the dogs for their walk, and Cosmo absolutely was all wound up after we walked & he ate. So, I tried to run with Cosmo, but he's a completely different animal without the other dogs around, refused to break into a trot. If I wanted to run with him, it was going to mean dragging him around as he looked for his two co-conspirators, and that wasn't going to be fun for either of us.

So, no Cosmo on the run . . . I managed four miles, though I didn't time myself. By the time I was done, the sun was starting to break through. I showered, packed the kid up, and made my way to my sister's house for Jacob's first birthday party.

The full day was spent with family, and food, and drink. It was pretty awesome. I love my sister, and I love my family. I love wine, and I love beer, and I love food. Really, what more could we want to do on a Saturday afternoon?

Sunday, I woke & finally tackled the lawn. Well, I got up, stumbled around, took a boatload of allergy medicine, tried to figure out why the lawnmower wouldn't start, found that it had no gas, found that my gas container was empty, drove to the gas station without my wallet, drove back home, got my wallet, drove back to the gas station, filled the gas container, got myself a cup of coffee, and then enjoyed the cup of coffee in the sun while letting my mind rest for a bit.

To combat early sunburn at the beach, I decided that it would be best to mow the lawn without a shirt on. The Pennsylvania sun, in mid-morning, in early May, isn't all that dangerous on the UV scale, and if I can get my pasty white chest to absorb a little color, I might have better luck come August at the beach. My biggest fear was that a neighbor went by the nickname of Ahab & would choose to restart the hunt for the white whale in an ocean of long, green grass.

Well, I finished the lawn about 2 hours before I needed to go anywhere, so I figured it was prime time for a bike ride. I hadn't been "out" just for fun in awhile -- I prepped the Giant, and managed 35 miles along the Yellow Breeches creek & through Boiling Springs before heading back home.

It was during this ride that I started seeing the benefit of cross-training. I'm a pretty strong cyclist, in that I can muscle my way through just about anything. But, on the "slight-uphill climbs", I usually peak & allow my forward momentum to carry me for awhile. Generally, it's a pretty pleasant way to ride, but since I've been running, where you have to constantly keep yourself working (or you stand still), I found myself powering after the plateaus. Just those different muscles working in a slightly different method meant that I was moving much more quickly. Running hasn't helped my climbing on the bike, at all, but I feel much stronger immediately after a climb, and it's awesome.

After riding & showering, we headed off for a picnic. Memorial Day food is just awesome. I left the picnic, napped, then friends showed up with ice cream . . . all in all, a good day. Of course, when dinner time came around, the wife & I called a bunch of take-out places, trying to figure out why nobody was answering. See, in Carlisle, most places are closed on Sunday, but, as I had the next day off, it was Saturday in my mind, and Saturday in the wife's mind. We eventually got Chinese (wonton soup for the Rib, veggies in garlic sauce for me).

Memorial Day has traditionally been my first real big solo ride of the season, and I wanted the trend to continue. I had grand plans of riding a century between Waggoner's Gap, Doubling Gap, and King's Gap, but I slept in a bit too late, with too early an afternoon picnic, to attempt it. So, I switched to simply ride the 100k (65 mile) Tour de Cure course, altering the very end to a hillier path back home. The day was beautiful, and I stopped to take some pictures along the way.

The Yellow Breeches Creek.

The Yellow Breeches Creek, again.

The start of the King's Gap climb, the ride that absolutely kicked my ass three years ago & made me start taking cycling seriously.

The view from the top of King's Gap, altitude 1,186 feet.

Ultimately, it was a great ride, and I then spent the afternoon with more family (we introduced Cj to the pool at Grandy's house . . . we'll have pictures on the parenting blog once we have them). I wish more holiday weekends were like this past one.

Of course, after all the running around, and then sleeping like crap because my brain would not shut off, I slept in a bit this morning . . . I'll make up for that tomorrow :-)

Resting

I had grand plans for today. I'm four miles away from running a marathon over five days (4 on Monday, 7 on Tuesday, 4 on Wednesday, 7 on Thursday), which would be kind-of cool. It's a great day to bike into work. I really wanted to watch another episode of Dexter, and that would have involved an intimate date with my spinning bike.

Alas, as I walked the dogs at 5AM, I only had one through on my mind - rest. My ankle has been chiming in, since yesterday's run, that it's not really happy with me. My eyes, when I close them, let out a sigh of relief. Between the workouts, and work, and rehearsals, and trying to mow the lawn, I needed just a little bit of extra shut-eye this morning. I refuse to feel guilty about it.

It's a Friday at the office, meaning that I have a series of conference calls with vendors that I've been pushing off all week. I'll continue my silly little "10 pushups every time I close or open my office door" routine, and I'll finish mowing my lawn (allergies & hunger got in the way after I had completed half of the lawn) if the weather cooperates when I get home. But that's it - I'm going to give my legs a day off. However, as it's a holiday weekend, I'll be out & about as much as I can.

Saturday is my godson's first birthday, and I'll live it up there. Maybe a short run or bicycle ride in the morning. Maybe I'll end up mowing the lawn, but the primary activity will be hugging babies, family members, & old friends.

Sunday, well, now we get fun. There's a picnic some afternoon, but that's really it, and the weather is supposed to be beautiful. I'm going to try to get myself up & about by 9 and bike for three hours over Waggoner's & Doubling Gaps. I haven't done any hill work so far this year.

Monday is completely open -- I'll finish up anything at the house that needs to be done, and then I'll figure things out. I want to head up King's Gap, because it's pretty . . . and, of course, spend time with my little guy, but I'm tempted to take my running show on the road. We'll see how things play out.

I think my iPhone is dying

This morning started out a bit iffy. CJ woke up early -- right around 4AM. I got up, changed him (little brat starts laughing as soon as he recognizes me, like he was yelling but just really wanted to see his daddy), took him back over to the bedroom for feeding. It's now just past four o'clock in the morning - but since daddy got out of bed, it means that it's time for the puppies to start their own thing. I did not sleep between bringing CJ back from the crib & the alarm going off just after five.

So I get up, put the weight-vest on, take the puppies for their walk, feed the puppies, and head out for a run. So far, things are mostly normal (just with reduced sleep), but I happen to notice, 3 miles into what would become a 7 mile run, that my audiobook just stops. By the time I've managed to wrestle my iPhone from my pocket, it's started back up again . . . but then it goes into double time. And, it just continues: stop, normal, doubletime, normal, stop....

I thought maybe it was just that file, so I tried it with straight-up music, and the same happened. And then proceeded to get worse (it would switch, at first, every 30-60 seconds, and then every 5). I'll take a look this afternoon to see if anybody else has reported the same and/or fixed this issue. But, part of me is thinking that I've dropped this damn thing too many times, banged it once too often, stuck it in my pocket with my car keys . . . dead from abuse.

If it is the end, it's been a fun ride -- I've had some good MP3 players, but the MP3 player that I don't need to worry about hearing the phone during long bike rides. See, if I'm out, not really caring about the world - sometimes the world cares about me. Most notably, an urgent call from the wife, or my mom . . . the iPhone is really good about letting me know that somebody is trying to call through. See, my phone is almost always set to silent, so it's rare for me to know that somebody is calling through. If this is the end, I'll be getting a new iPhone - but I really wanted to wait for the new release to come out. We shall see.

Biggest Loser / Weight Does Not Equal Health

Last night was the finale of The Biggest Loser Season 9. This is a show that I'm relatively disappointed in myself for watching, but the same thing happens every season:

1. NBC announces the contestants, I try to ignore things
2. Flipping through channels some random Tuesday night, I stumble upon the show and watch for 5-10 minutes, turning things off when excessive crying and/or excessive in-show-advertising gets to me
3. Every week from that point forward, I tune in to more & more of the show.
4. Eventually, I find myself rooting for individuals, and nearly tearing up when the contestants turn on the water works.

However, I have a real love/hate relationship with this show. As somebody who has struggled with his weight all of his adult life, I know that weight does not equal health. I've likely weighed more than 320 pounds at two points in my life (before my senior year of college & two-years after graduating college). I've weighed as "little" as 170 pounds (about 4 months after getting married). Anytime I know what my weight is, I obsess about it. I've written about not wanting to know my weight before, and I'm sure that I'll write about it again.

I can tell you that I'm healthier right now, with a bit of a middle about me, than I was at my lowest weight. Weight does not equal health - my blood pressure is lower these days. I have more stamina in just about everything. I'm not obsessing about calorie count & I think I'm in a better place, mentally. Still, though, at the beginning of The Biggest Loser, reducing weight is certainly the most important thing toward the general health of the contestants.

So, I watch the show, I tell myself that everybody is way too obsessed about weight, marvel at what the trainers are able to get out of the contestants (they're best friends, witch doctors, interrogators, and torturers all in one), wish that they'd start a "moderate loser" because I'd totally kick ass on that show (you put me on "the ranch" for a month, away from work, and I'll come back ripped), and get angry at the end when the biggest person who started ends up winning. See, the weight-loss is truly remarkable for everybody -- but, there are people who simply don't have much fat to lose at the end of the game. I really feel badly for them - because try as you might, if you don't have fat to lose, you can't lose weight & be healthy about it. Organs weigh what they weigh. Bones weigh what they weigh (and, if you lose bone weight, you're either an amputee or you're undergoing osteoporosis). If you don't have excess fat, good on you - but they should make a contingency in the competition for anybody who gets down to x% body fat, give those people a big-ass check, allow them to continue getting TV time, but get them out of the competition. I'd much rather see calculations of VO2MAX for people once they get to that place, rather than just a scale reading.

With all of that said, this season's winner lost the equivalent of what I think I weigh, which is pretty fucking impressive. To lose the equivalent weight of a tall, overweight, runner/cyclist? That's a jaw-dropping achievement.

Speaking of scales, the scale on Biggest Loser pisses me the fuck off. I know it's there to create drama, but grrrrrrrr....

So, in conclusion, I really think they should do more to encourage health by putting less focus on weight on The Biggest Loser (yes, I know it takes a very simple formula and makes it complicated), but they suck me in every season, and they certainly do more good than harm for the individual competitors. Though, as this season proved, when you're not on "the ranch", living day-to-day and being healthy is a lot more difficult. I really hope they'll have a full season of just "follow-up" visits to previous contestants . . . I think it's important for people who struggle with weight/health issues to see familiar faces & the issues those people are dealing with. I was incredibly fat and I lost a lot of weight, to the point where I was incredibly skinny. Trying to maintain, I put in a lot of weight . . . that "loser" part is only the start to a healthy lifestyle. Let's concentrate on the "living" part, too.

Getting out of bed & out of the house

I managed a seven mile run this morning. I very nearly went back to bed, instead, though. Un/fortunately, I have an epic alarm system in the house. Not only is my alarm clock incredibly loud, but it's on the other side of the room. This means that I need to physically get out of bed in order to turn it off -- and "go back to bed" is a bit easier to overcome than "stay in bed for just a little while longer".

Of course, once I'm up, going back to bed is really not an option -- I've got these three little workout buddies who don't take "no" for an answer too often, and one must deal with these three once the alarm goes off.

The blond dog is Hobbes, a rescued Cairn terrier and oldest of the pack. He enjoys the morning walk more than either of the other dogs, but if it weren't for the other dogs, I'm pretty sure I'd be able to sleep in for a bit. On a lazy Saturday (though these are pretty rare these days), he'll hang out in bed will past 8 or 9. Of course, at some point, if he realizes that it's nice outside, there is no pacifying him without a walk.

The brown dog is Snickelfritz, a border terrier, and he's easily the most difficult of the three to deal with in the morning. He's the most food-driven dog I've ever known . . . once he thinks it might be time to start the day, he gets super cuddly & whiny, just waiting for breakfast. The morning walk is simply the price of admission to a bowl of kibble.

Cosmo, the black dog (a yorkie-poo), is the wildcard in the bunch. Hobbes, we can convince to lie down & wait. Snickelfritz takes some more prodding, but I can get him to lie back down and fall asleep most of the time. Cosmo, though - he marches to his own beat. Not only will he wake you up at 3 in the morning in order to lift the covers because he's cold, but he'll also tackle either dog as we try to remain asleep, knowing that he'll get what he wants (attention).

This morning, the alarm actually went off -- normally either CJ starts fussing or the dogs irritate me that I'm up before the buzzer. So, I get up, deal with an overexcited Snickelfritz (he knows that breakfast is right around the corner, so he starts barking - maybe it will make it come faster?), head downstairs, put my 20 pound weight vest on, and I'm out the door. 1.5 miles later, the dogs were fed . . . and I very nearly went back to bed.

The only reason that I managed to get out for the run was because I was already up. I convinced myself that I wouldn't actually fall back asleep for the next hour - so why not run. Somehow, that logic worked (John at 5:30 in the morning is easily convinced of most things) . . . I'm just surprised I was "with it" enough in order to come up with the argument in the first place.

As far as the distance - this is the furthest that I've ever run during a pre-work run. It's 10 times around the .7 mile track (that math is easy enough for me to handle), and I managed it in just under an hour. Of course, I couldn't be bothered to put on the heart rate monitor & stopwatch at that time, so I don't know if my ending pace was anywhere near my early pace, but I felt pretty strong the entire time.

Of course, I'm especially hungry this morning -- I've had a grapefruit, banana, and a bunch of blueberries -- and I'm trying really, really hard to ignore the fact that somebody brought in doughnuts.