2013 Rio Grande 5K Run

When I returned from my trip, I wanted to get back to running and eating right.  I didn't.  I procrastinated with my running and my eating.  I signed up for the 5K run and was going to run last Tuesday to "get back into it", but instead I woke up with a REALLY bad back.  I have had back problems since I fell in 1980 in August.  When I went back to work after having Jessi, I had major knee and hip pain so I went to see a chiropractor.  I've been going back to the chiropractor a couple of times a year since then.  

This time I went two days in a row and I still didn't feel right.  I heard of a Christian related office that advertises a "whole" person approach, so I thought; why not?  I called them and started on Thursday with a video of movement, x-rays and some time talking with the dr about my back.  When I went back the next day for my first adjustment I was still walking strange.  Looking at the x-rays my spine looks like someone tried to draw a straight line without a ruler!  My neck is totally straight, no curve at all.  All that carrying mail did not help my spine at all.  But we knew that.  My video shows limited movement in the upper back and stiffness in my leg and core muscles.  

He adjusted me using the Palmer method of laying face down and using pressure to move the joints back into place.  What a difference from the laying on the side and jerking me into place.  I actually walked better when I left the office.  

So............I went to my 5K not knowing how I would do.  I felt okay that morning.  I had one cup of coffee, my vitamins, a small smoothie with one scoop of protein and greek yogurt.  I was worried about having to make a pit stop, but I didn't.  Yay!  I came in 5th out of 5 in my age group.  40:33 was my time.  This was actually a personal best, so I am proud of myself for hanging in there.  Who knows how I would have done with some actual training!  

There wasn't as many people in this run as I am used to seeing, so for a while I was really all alone on the road.  I had to run across Bridge while the police held the traffic for me all by myself and I felt that I should speed up, so I did.  I could feel my muscles kick in and pick up the speed which is a weird feeling.  Don't know how much faster I went..... probably not enough for anyone watching to notice, but I did feel it.  

Then I went to work and it was really busy!  I clocked in at 15 activity points on my weight watchers active link.  That again was a personal best!  This morning my hip joints are a little sore.  I will take it easy for a couple of days and go work out on Weds.  I am going to see the chiropractor three times this week and next and also go through some therapy to improve my mobility.  They will work on my core muscles and my leg flexibility   That should enable me to move more freely and maybe keep my back from "going out" every time I run. 

If I can get my back from giving me problems my goal in the next year is to run a 10K and maybe do a half-marathon by the time I am 60.  Wouldn't that be something!  

Back From My Trip.....Time to Get Back to Work

I am back from my long trip to Virginia.....then across the country to Nevada, then to LA and back to Albuquerque.  I am looking forward to going back to work, getting back on my normal diet and getting some runs in.  Today I am relaxing more than anything.  I woke up at 7 AM.  Not normal, except I have been getting up early every day on my trip so we could get on the road early.  I had a smoothie for breakfast.  I have not over-eaten while I was gone but just not eating what I normally eat.  

Jessi likes to eat proteins, so I had more meat than I normally do.  Steak, bacon, etc.  Not bad, just different.  Sitting in a truck for 10-12 hours a day is not good for your muscles.  I don't know how truckers do it.

At Mary's we had bacon wrapped corn on the cob, yummy.....but bacon again!  We also went to a sausage place near the beach.  I tried to watch the fries, and I had a sun-dried tomato and chicken sausage with peppers and onions, no sauce.  Still too much.  

I have a weight watchers meeting today.  I am scared to go.  I know I gained, but the trick is to get it off quickly.

I took a survey online today.  It calculates your age based on your activity, illnesses and life style.  I managed a 53, which is 5 years younger than I actually am, so I am at least going in the right direction.

So anyway........ Back to work.  

Taking A Short Break

Thursday AM.  I should go for a run.  My leg is feeling a bit weird.  I need to see the chiropractor again.  I have a ton of things to do before work.  I need to clean my bathroom, wash the sheets on the spare bed, pack and that's all I have time for.  

I am leaving for Virginia tomorrow morning at 8:00.  I am helping my youngest daughter move from Newport News to Las Vegas, NV.  It's gonna be a long trip and I have been trying to get my things together for the last two days.  I made a trip to Weight Watchers, returned a couple things at Big 5, went to Target for a set of headphones on sale, got gas, went to the grocery store and the library.  I picked the peppers that were good to go and made a meatloaf with my homegrown tomatoes, peppers and stuffed a couple of homegrown bell peppers.  It was yummy.  Did some laundry, watched some TV and went to bed.  

So my fitness has to be put on the back burner for a few days, or I should say a couple of weeks  I have got to get my back into place before I start running again.  I can't stand the way my knee, hip, joints pop.  I wonder if a joint supplement would help.  

Chunky Monkey 5K

I rested my knee, changed my schedule with another supervisor, lost 4 hours of work all so I could run this evening at this 5K.  I was all ready.  I really felt good about it, thought I'd do a great job and then the weather happened.  This is a pic of the approaching storm, lots of lightening and it dumped a ton of rain.  We really needed the rain, but just not tonight.  

I go to work tomorrow at 2 PM, so I will go do a long run on the treadmill tomorrow before work.  I have to check my schedule to see when I can do the next run.  There is one on the 28th, but I will be out of town.  So August is next.  http://www.active.com/running/albuquerque-nm/rio-grande-half-marathon-and-5k-run-walk-2013

Chiropractor Appointment

I got to the chiropractor yesterday morning.  He put electrodes on my back, and heat.....awwww feels so good.  Then some icy jel with ultrasound for my left knee.  My injuries are what I thought they were, (I should be a doctor he he).  The sartorius muscle in my thigh, and some tendons in my knee inflamed, so I am sitting it out one more day.  Tomorrow morning I will try and run for a mile and then I have the 5K Sunday afternoon.  I don't want to overdo it and hurt my knee so I can't run on Sunday.  At least yesterday at work I wasn't limping.  It's also much better this morning.  sartorius    



It takes a long time to get these muscles to work like they should.  I've done a lot of reading on how to get in shape to run and while it's not easy, I'm working on it.  

Today's Run/Walk/Run/Walk......

Went for my "run" this morning at about 10.  It was 84 degrees out and since I am trying to acclimate myself to the heat, that was okay.  I am using three apps all at once, Google Play Music, Map My Run and C25K Pro.  I am having trouble with the music.  I have downloaded some of my I tunes to it and it runs ok for awhile and then it will say "that track is not available".  So aggravating while you are running.  I am not sure what I am doing wrong with the program, but I guess I will get it right eventually.  I keep working on it.  

The Map My Run app is great.  It tells me when I have reached a mile, lets me know how fast I covered that mile and then does it again at 2 miles.  When you look at the whole run you can see how fast you ran at certain spots and how s l o w you were at others.   It tells you what your elevation is too which is kinda neat.  I started at home at 5191 and ran uphill to 5285.  That is not too much, but enough to tell me I need to do it more to get in better shape.  My muscles hurt!   

I made a chiropractor appointment for tomorrow.  I know my back is out because my knees hurt and my left leg is bothering me.  When I go to stand on that leg a muscle inside the thigh feels weird.  Looking it up, I think it could be the "sartorius".  Assists in flexing, adduction/abduction (weak) and lateral rotation of hip, and flexion of knee.     

I am old, so that's probably much of the problem, but I refuse to give up.  Tomorrow I will rest, well as much as you can rest when you walk for 8 hours.  Friday I will get out and do another 2 miles and then on Sunday afternoon I have the 5K.  After that we will see what else I will do.  I need to sign up for another run for sometime in August and September.  

The C25K app is great also, but I have been ignoring it when it tells me to run....I stop running and walk when I feel the need.  I am stuck in week 6 cause I need to get that down before I get to week 7, which is mostly walk 5 minutes, run 25 minutes.  If I can't do run 10 minutes how am I going to run 25?  I can do it on the treadmill at the gym, but out on the road it is much harder.  I want to get to the point where I feel like I can run forever.  It's happened only once and that was on the treadmill in the air conditioning.  

Oh, and one other difficulty.  I gotta pee too often.  I don't want to go somewhere with no bathrooms.  When I ran at the Bosque trail, I peed before I left, stopped at the McDonalds close to where I ran and then had to stop again on the way home.  There are no portapottys at the Rio Bravo Bosque parking lot and the only one with bathrooms close by is on Central which is still a drive.  One cup of coffee in the morning is about all I can handle before a run.  Don't know what I will do if I ever want to run more than 2 miles at a time!  

Better Health

I have a goal to get to a certain weight, but I also have goals to get to better health.  While I was with the Postal Service I had high blood pressure and high cholesterol.  Even while eating right and exercising I still had high cholesterol.  Since I am 8 years older than I was last time I was on WW, I expect my blood pressure to remain higher than it was when I was in my twenties and thirties, and it does.  

I went to give blood last week.  I am trying to go each time I am eligible.  My blood pressure was 130/88.  Now normal is <120/<80, so I am still above normal.  In March it was 123/83.  Studies show your blood pressure changes depending on your activity, posture, stresses, and sleep.  I had run 2 miles before I gave blood last week, so it should have been up a bit.  It also says the lower number will rise with age due to stiffening of the arteries.  According to the American Heart Association, I am okay.  Unless my blood pressure rises above 140/90 I shouldn't need medication.  My diet is within all the guidelines for a healthy heart diet.  I am exercising regularly and that is also within the guidelines.

Now as to cholesterol.......  this has been my concern due to family history.  I really do not want to be the first woman in my family to die from a heart attack.  Well, that's silly...I don't want anyone to die from a heart attack.  What I mean to say is, no woman has died from a heart attack in my family, only men.  I do not want to add women to that statistic.  In March my total cholesterol was 224, in May it was 202, last week it was 176!  It is going down and that is good.  I have an appointment with my doctor this month to get the break down of HDL, LDL, etc.  I am hoping my good "HDL" will be better than it was 6 months ago.  Studies show.....there's that study again.....  150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic activity a week will help to get your good HDL up.  I believe I am in that category.   

So exercise, better eating and less stress all work together to give you better health.  I think I am on my way.  

My Journey Thus Far

Last year my daughter Jessi decided to get married in Hawaii.  I refused to go to a tropical climate approaching a weight that no one except the men in my family had ever weighed.  All that and the fact I am the shortest person in my family over the age of seven!  I procrastinated until the last day of March and then headed to Weight Watchers.  By August I had lost a total of 24 lbs, not a great feat, but well enough.  

At that point I needed to start exercising, so I took up the challenge of running a 5K.  As I walk all day long at work I thought it would be easy.  I was wrong.  I found a program that would help me learn to run, and set about following it.  Walk 1 minute, run 30 seconds.  After 30 seconds I thought I would die!  How could running be so hard?  Must have been the streets around my house.  (I live in an area that is all uphill, even the downhill.)  My first 5K was the Hot Chocolate downtown Albuquerque.  Running for chocolate has to be easy.  Three miles then chocolate, no problem.  I did it, nearly 45 minutes, but I did it.  So I signed up for the Duke City 5K in October.  Did that one too, even improved slightly.  Then I joined a gym so I could run on a treadmill during the winter months. 

Well, during the winter months I procrastinated again.  Ran some, sat on the couch more.  When the weather improved I headed out again.  Armed with new apps on my phone, some music and a little motivation I started to run some more.  A trip to California and running with Kristi showed me I could break through the 3 minute barrier and run a bit longer.  A trip to Virginia and I ran with Jessi, she literally ran circles around me!  Still with all that I only lost 5 lbs from November to May.  

So here it is July.  I ran one 5K in June, the Cherry Garcia in 43:40, got another coming next Sunday, the Chunky Monkey, more ice cream....best motivation in the world.  I am keeping to my diet.  Protein shakes, fruit, vegetables, chicken, salads.  Low fat, no sweets and I am still 10 lbs from my goal.  One week I gain, the next I lose, then gain, then lose.  The graph shows a steady downward trend, but how many years do I have to do this before I get to where I need to be and level off?  

I am 40 lbs lighter than I was when I started.  I should be happy about that, and I am, but.............