2014 week 7

Random thoughts about my runs and anything else that comes to mind.

 Here's photos of everything I eat: http://instagram.com/stevetursi

I am in two weight-loss contests right now. The first one, held at work, is in its third week and posts results every two weeks. The second one, held at my gym, is in its second week and posts results every week.

Work Weight-loss contest: In two weeks I have lost 5.38% of bodyweight and am in tenth place out of 484. I've officially gone from a sandbagged 316lbs on Jan 24 to 299 on Feb 6.

Gym contest: in 9 days I have officially gone from 30.1% bodyfat to 27.5%. That is an 8.6% change. I have also gone from 313.9lbs on Feb 9 to 292.1lbs on Feb 18. Bodyfat percentage is calculated using a bioelectric impedance gadget, which is not super-accurate, but if it was, the maths suggest* I've lost 14lbs of fat and 8lbs of lean. It'll be interesting next week to see the non-sandbagged week-to-week results. I'm in first place at my gym location but not in the top 100 nationally. Alex, who is doing the pure weight loss contest there, is in second place at the location and in 64th nationally. If I was in the pure weight loss contest, I'd be in 6th place nationally. With a $10,000 prize, I'm beginning to regret not entering that.

on to my week...

Drilling screws into your old shoes is an awesome effective cheap way
to gain traction on snow and ice. But this doesn't offer sufficient
protection from fast-moving 3000-lb blocks of aluminum and steel.

Wed Feb 12
I actually had a free personal training session today to help me on my form with deadlifts, jerks, and squats. It went well. And before the session, I ran ten minutes on the treadmill.

Thu Feb 13
Went out in the blizzard for 19 minutes, where I ran 1.7 miles. Thought I'd have a good story to tell about this run, but not really. Snow blew in my face when running into the wind, that wasn't pleasant. A bunch of people shoveling snow were looking like they were pissed at me. There were a few unplowed side roads that I ran through until well after 1 mile, and then I walked through. That's about it.

I am starting to get a little concerned that my volume is really low lately. I'm really going to have to ramp up the second half of February. Temps are supposed to warm up a bit next week, and that's going to help a lot.

Fri Feb 14
Me - "Hey honey want do you want to do on Valentine's Day?"
Wife - "Binge-watch House of Cards."
I love my wife.

Kingsbridge Hill Climb after work (from home.) Kind of sketchy.. Lots of snow, not a lot of room to run.

Weekend Feb 15-16
(Actually writing this on Monday)
Both runs this weekend were half-hours in the afternoon on the treadmill. There is too much snow to safely run in the streets - my Friday outdoor run was a bit sketchy. The temps are going to warm up starting on Wednesday, which will alleviate the problem (and may cause a different problem - flooding!)
Saturday's run was 3.21 miles, Sunday's 3.38.  I am now just over 50 miles for the month, with 12 days to go.

Sunday I had one of the crappiest days of bowling ever. I shot 94-138-143 for a 375 series. Holy crap, I thought I had bowled my last sub-100 game.

Mon Feb 17
I wrote a blog post on nutrition today here: http://stevetursi.blogspot.com/2014/02/nutrition-update.html. I am struggling to go all-out but can manage a respectable pace under the current nutritional restrictions. 3.49 miles in 30 minutes on the treadmill. I don't think I'd want to try to PR a 5K without some simple carbs in me. This nutrition approach seems better at supporting long slow work, but that is a hypothesis I still need to test.

Tues Feb 18
It snowed some more this morning. By 6pm when it was time to run the snow had stopped, the sun had come up, and at 36ºF it was downright balmy. But there was way too much snow on the side of the road and it just doesn't feel safe, especially after dark, because there's not enough clearance. And so it was yet another treadmill run, with the lifetime run group. We had a great time though, and I ran 7.05 miles in 63 minutes.

* I'm watching too much BBC programming