2012: Run For It - C25K W2R1

So I've been for a few runs since the last time I did a run report - they mainly have been runs on the treadmill, after teaching classes. I haven't gotten out on the track again because I've been doing other training in the weekends.

Today it's an absolute stunner in Auckland, absolutely beautiful - blue sky, sunshine. Which means it's absolutely cooking outside, and running outside in that heat is incredibly undesirable. I prefer to run in more overcast weather, even in the rain (only thing that gets in the way there is my glasses), so I opted for a run inside.

The last few times I've run, I used this playlist.

Today, I set a different playlist, but it didn't actually occur to me that today, the run format changed.

Week 1's runs followed this description.

Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 60 seconds of jogging and 90 seconds of walking for a total of 20 minutes.

Week 2's runs then became the following.

Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 90 seconds of jogging and 2 minutes of walking for a total of 20 minutes.

I didn't realise it until the voiceover in the app said "Our first run will be 90 seconds, and we will be running 6 times." I thought "... Hang on a minute...? Isn't it 60 seconds for 8 times?"

I would actually say that I found this run easier than the first weeks ones. It felt less stop-start-ish, and mentally it felt easier because the number of runs was less, even though the distance had increased.

What I was actually worried about was "OMG do I have enough music in my playlist to cover the run time???" I hadn't had an opportunity to sit down and calculate everything to make sure that I had enough music on my playlist for it.

Thankfully, it actually worked out perfectly. The only thing I need to do for future playlists is to add two more tracks onto the end to encourage me to stretch.

Today someone who smelled really bad actually got on the treadmill next to me so with 2 minutes left of the cooldown I bolted off the treadmill and went into the womens area in my gym to do some stretching. My quads in particular really need to be stretched out after each run - they're getting really tight, to the point where when I teach the final stretch track RPM, it takes me a couple of attempts to bring my heel up to my glute to stretch it out.

I can honestly say that I really enjoyed today's run. I taught a class in the morning, so it would have been easy to chill out at home for the rest of the day, writing, planning etc. I'm not sure at this stage whether I'll run again tomorrow or Tuesday morning. Either way, I know I'm already enjoying the extra running distance.

Speaking up and saying 'STOP THAT'

A few weeks ago, I was chatting to two of my BODYJAM instructor friends. One of them I hadn't seen in a while, and I was keen to hear how things had been with her.

The other friend bounded on up to her, having seen us chatting, and joined in.

She said, "Heeeeeeeeeeeeeey!!! Oh my god it's been SO LONG, how are you? You're looking good!"

The other one scoffed and said, "Are you kidding me? YOU are the one that's looking skinny?! Check out this big belly of mine."

Then she grabbed at her stomach and tried to jiggle it.

This kinda thing happens all the time, and at first, hearing people who were lean and fit society's definition of 'attractive' denigrate themselves as such, wore me down.

Then I began rolling my eyes and thinking "Oh here we go again..." I would just tune out.

Now, I'm a bit more outspoken. Moreso because I recall the person I used to be, and I know there is a large population of the wider community that still have that fear that I used to have. Fear that gym staff were making fun of them behind their back, fear that they were in general, making fun of people and looking down on anyone who didn't look a certain way. I want to stand up for people who have that fear where it's worth it.

Before I began my journey to being fitter, I constantly be exposed to conversations like this. My heart would sink and I'd think quietly to myself, "If they think that *they* look terrible... what must they think of me?"

The reality is, they're not thinking of you most of the time. They're so self absorbed that the only little bubble they live in is their own. They're oblivious to the consequences of their words outside this bubble, and if you dare point it out to them, you're the one who's the moron.

There have been a few people that have responded positively though - realising that "HECK, my words COULD be interpreted like that... that's not what I want!" and have adjusted their behaviour accordingly.

To the friends that day that were looking at their stomachs and comparing how terrible they looked to each other, I said, "Will you two STOP IT. If I combined the pair of you, you'd still be half my size. When you insult yourselves like that, you're insulting me tenfold, and any other member who happens to be in the vicinity. For goodness sake."

They were startled. Then they began apologising, as they genuinely had no idea.

They are the good ones. There are other ones who turn around and go "Stop being so sensitive.", and then there are the true arseholes that say to me "You shouldn't even be here, you fat disgusting pig. Who are you motivating when you look the way that you do anyway?"

But if the ones who can turn around, do, then that's already a better place than where the industry currently stands.

Keep that fork, it's important

Every three months, as a Les Mills group fitness instructor we are required to attend training. This training composes of three parts.

1. Masterclasses of the new music & choreography for each program that we teach. This gets updated every quarter, so every quarter we need to learn the new music and the moves that go with it. I have to attend RPM and BODYJAM, though I also try to go to BODYCOMBAT, BODYPUMP and SH'BAM as well.
   
   
2. Intensive sessions for a selected number of the programs. Each quarter, Les Mills select a couple of programs and deliver some more in-depth education on how instructors can teach that program more effectively. The training that is delivered is specific to that program. It would be absolutely useless for me to say, go and attend a BODYATTACK Intensive Session.
   
   
3. A generic training session which often consists of a seminar, though can include actual training/drills, which apply to all Les Mills group fitness instructors. This is heavily researched material which is put together by top professionals in the industry, and I find it very interesting and inspiring.

This weekend just gone, there were two sections to the generic training session. The first was about nutrition and general health to optimise energy, and the second half was about developing an 'ultimate version of yourself' which then becomes your persona when you go onstage to instruct a class. That training was very useful.

I'd like to mention the first half of this training though. What was covered was about the distribution of our intake, hydration (*real* good piece there, will be writing about hydration in a later blog post), sleep, and other things.

The group fitness industry is incredibly vain and appearance based. I know I'm only one person breaking the mould. From the outside we fear that vanity and that judgement, and like to think that "Maybe it's not that way." From the inside, the vulgarity with which I hear instructors talking about people makes me sick inside. There have been times I have fought back, but the fact remains is that the majority of the community have this narrow perception of what the results of a fitness regime are.

When the trainer delivered the nutrition segment of his training, he said, "So here is my one simple tip for top nutrition...", and then a slide appeared with the following.

I straight away thought "Oh gawd... here we go..."

What I expected was raucous laughter from the large instructor gathering. After all, so many of them appear to think that the idea of fat people having to eat is pretty amusing, right?

What actually happened surprised me.

Instead of agreeing laughter, there was some awkward silence, then a few people in the crowd laughed nervously. The trainer delivering tried to push the issue, and even said, "Put down the fork fatty? ... No? That normally works really well...".

I think what happened was the instructors in the room were genuinely interested in knowing a top, simple tip for nutrition. 'Put down the fork, fatty'... yeah, not really what they would have been expecting.

Normally in a situation like this, I admit that I would keep quiet. Not because I'm afraid to speak up, but because I know it's a massive uphill battle and my energies are better spent elsewhere - like making sure my classes aren't delivered from a point of vanity. If members come in for vain reasons I can't stop them, but that's not the angle that I want to push.

However, for these training sessions, I know that Les Mills are constantly asking for our feedback, and I know that the feedback is read and taken on board. As these training sessions are taken around the country, they take the feedback from the earlier sessions to improve them when they get re-delivered in the different locations.

So I took it as an opportunity to at least express how I felt.

I will express concern, disappointment, and sadness over the use of the graphic 'Put down the fork, fatty.' I know that [the trainer] was looking for a reaction, though pushing that as his 'top tip for nutrition' I felt was out of line. I recognise that I'm a minority and that the majority of people will find the idea of a fat person eating humorous and will not be bothered by it.

I got a response immediately that read.

You’ll be pleased to know that the fork slide has already been removed

As an industry as a whole, we are a long way from getting rid of the judgemental attitude.

But *this* is a pretty decent step in the right direction, and I for one, did not expect it, and am very happy that they are removing that slide for future presentations.

Maybe one day we will get there.

2012: Run For It - C25K W1R1, again

Finally we've hit a long weekend here in Auckland - one where I'm not working - so I spent my entire Saturday in bed asleep. Which meant today, I really wanted to get some training under my belt.

One of my friends is currently training for the police so she goes for runs regularly, and I know that she tends to go for a run on a Sunday afternoon. I texted her to ask if she wanted to run together, and she said Yes, she was going for a run at The Trusts Stadium which has a full athletic race track.

I don't know what I was expecting, but I was really impressed by the venue. I knew it had been there but was surprised to see that the place was really quite well kept.

The track was great to run on, but the only thing that annoyed me was that the other people on the track were a little less considerate. There was a group of kids doing some discus training so every now and then I'd have to navigate flying discs through the air - never mind dogs running around (not so big a deal) and kids zooming around on their bikes (bigger deal, there is a bike track right around the outside of the track that they should be on instead) etc.

I'm glad that it was overcast when we went, but man, I forgot how much different it is running outside compared to running on a treadmill. For parts of my run I was running into a headwind (or a 'headbreeze' to be more accurate) and the extra resistance consumed much more energy than I had to deal with on the treadmill.

I don't recall exactly how many laps of the track I did - I wish I had because it would be nice to know the distance I covered.

Today's workout description was this:

Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 60 seconds of jogging and 90 seconds of walking for a total of 20 minutes.

Today's playlist looked like this:

I just downloaded the Singles 2004-2010 album from Manian, so I reckon there'll be more tracks from them appearing in the playlists hereafter.

One thing I definitely did notice was that my ankles hurt a *lot* more during this run than they did the last time I ran. I had to pay extra attention to stretching out my achilles and calf muscles immediately afterwards. I didn't have to do that last time - it could be one of two things.

1. I was well and truly warmed up after the first run as I had just taught a class, whereas this time I just had the 5 minute walk included in the program.
   
   
2. The difference between pounding the pavement and pounding the... belt (o_0) meant different impact absorption. Basically, I 'felt' the impact more on the track than I did on the treadmill.

It's been a couple of hours since the run and my ankles feel fine now, so I think it might be more of the second option - and that I'm not used to it.

I'm going to aim to do 1 track run per week at the same time (Sunday afternoon) and then two other runs during the remainder of the week. Hopefully I won't get sick/tired again, as that was incredibly annoying.

While C25K encourages a rest in between each run, that doesn't really fit into my schedule, so it means I'll be doing Sunday/Monday runs back to back and then again on Wednesday. I won't be doing these catchup posts every time I run (unless you want me to...), though I will be checking in occasionally on how I'm doing.

I'm off to design my playlist for tomorrow.

Orewa Beach 10.5km run/walk

When those '1 day deal' sites started popping up I created several accounts in a hurry. A few bad experiences and a few expired deals meant that I tried (note, I said tried) to avoid purchases on them thereafter.

One of the sites gave me a $10 credit which I never used, and I received an email from them saying that the last day I could use this is the 4th of February.

I monitored the deals for the site over the week and there wasn't anything in particular that took my fancy. Then today (being the 4th of February), this appeared.

Ah! Something worth using the $10 credit for. So I entered the 10.5km run/walk event, which means I only paid $2 for it. Pretty sweet deal if you ask me.

It's been a long time since I've done an event like this. I don't think I'll put pressure on myself to run the whole thing since I'll have two classes to teach the following day, but it will be nice.

As for how my running training has been going? After that first run I haven't run since. I don't feel bad about it because I've been sick, and exhausted this past week.

Reason being? The air conditioning at our work is b0rked, and getting through the day is a struggle. It's gotten to the point where I will go and sit in my car during my lunchbreak with the air conditoning on. Auckland isn't particularly hot, but the humidity gets to me big time. What's annoying also is that I'm the only one in my portion of the office that is affected since the others are new immigrants from warmer countries and to them it Ain't No Thang.

How about you guys? How you all doing?

Do More Cardio

Two members of my close family recently have had coronary artery stent placement surgery.

For those of you who are not familiar with the procedure, here is a brief definition.

A coronary stent is a tube placed in the coronary arteries that supply the heart, to keep the arteries open in the treatment of coronary heart disease. It is used in a procedure called percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). Stents reduce chest pain and have been shown to improve survivability in the event of an acute myocardial infarction.

And, for an animation of how it looks, check this out:

The members of my family who have recently gotten this procedure done are in their mid fifties - my aunt and uncle, so my Mum's sister and her husband.

This of course, sends my Mum into a complete freakout, as her and her sister are only a few years apart in age.

She suddenly is all anxious about everything she eats, wondering whether it will lead her too to having the same procedure. It's different it is the wake up call that you require to open your eyes to your current unhealthy lifestyle and make modifications to it.

This is not what my mother is about though - she'll talk the talk and try to make everyone around her feel guilty without really making any changes herself. This is par for the course though, and while it used to bother me when I was younger, now I don't actually have the time to care.

That being said, I found one conversation with her on this matter incredibly amusing.

I came home from teaching one day and as soon as I was in through the door my Mum was talking to me about my Aunt's stent procedure and how We Were All Next If We Didn't Do Anything About It. She started commenting about how she was going to get rid of all of the unhealthy food in the house and eat clean (noble, but she's never going to do that as my brother eats a large quantity of junk food and she'll never let him go without anything).

I kinda roll my eyes and go "Oh that's great..." since it was the same old song that I'm used to hearing.

My mum then comes up with pearl of wisdom.

"You don't do enough exercise. You need to do some more cardio."

The last two weeks, I have been resting because I've been recovering from a cold. This is the level of training that I have done in that time.

Monday	Teaching RPM x 1, Teaching RPM x 2
Tuesday	Rest
Wednesday	RPM, Teaching RPM
Thursday	Teaching RPM, BODYJAM
Friday	Rest
Saturday	Teaching BODYJAM, BODYJAM
Sunday	Rest

So this was a *rest* week, and I'd done 8 hours of cardio.

This is my mother's training schedule, on a normal week.

Monday	Rest
Tuesday	Rest
Wednesday	Rest
Thursday	Rest
Friday	Rest
Saturday	30mins of Water Walking, maybe.
Sunday	Rest

And *I* am the one who needs to do more cardio??

It's one of those situations that are so ridiculous that I laugh at it because if I don't, I'd cry.

New Years Ridiculousness

So it's January, and everyone is feeling sluggish and run down from the excess eating and drinking that they have done over the Christmas and New Year.

And so, it's January, and talk is full of how everyone is feeling so fat and how they want to get their weight down as fast as they possibly can.

The first day with everyone back at work, everyone stood around, clutching their stomachs, all talking about how repulsive they all are. They described how they felt their weight and how it was affecting them on a daily basis. They would discuss at length how terrible they felt, how disgusting they all looked, and how they badly wanted to lose weight.

At our work, we have a routine called 'Biscuit Monday' (American Readers - biscuits here are what you call cookies), so everyone takes a turn at bringing in their favourite biscuits to share with everyone in the office. The reason for introducing this is because everyone is in a sour mood on a Monday morning at having to come in and go to work after the weekend ending.

The first Biscuit Monday of 2012 was my opportunity to bring in biscuits for the office people.

This, was my offering.

To everyone who had professed dieting glory, this was a nightmare.

'OH NO!', they exclaimed. 'WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS TO US?!'

But wait! All is not lost.

One of them said, 'I know! I'll have a Tim Tam now, and NOT EAT ANYTHING FOR DINNER.'

One of them said, 'Oh it's okay because I haven't eaten anything for breakfast.'

One of them said, 'Arrrrgggggh, I can't eat these! I'll just smell them. *picks them up* Ohhhh they smell so good. BUT NO! I will smell them.'

I'm sitting there, absolutely slackjawed, looking at them all. Most of these people were my seniors, and most of them had children of their own. I thought about whether they behaved this way in front of their kids, and if their kids thought that they had to skip a meal was the only way they could ever justify being able to eat a Tim Tam.

Several of them are also on cleanses, eating almost nothing, and all of them either bragging about how much running they are doing before work, after work, or proudly strutting off in the middle of the day.

Then we take it out of the office and into every other place I go to on a daily basis.

In the gyms, people are making ridiculous promises to themselves. "I'm going to come into the gym 5 times per week." My class numbers are higher, and I should appreciate that, though I can't help but think 'You are doing activities you hate for too long, too frequently, with too much resistance, on not enough fuel, and you are not giving yourself enough time to recover. You are going to burn yourself out, feel exhausted, and resent yourself in a manner of weeks.'

Then there's the flourish of Nothing But Updates About My Weight Loss on Facebook, Twitter and other social media. There is one girl on my feed (who is now removed because it did drive me nuts) who every day was whining and crying about how no matter how much work she did in the gym, she wasn't losing any weight and how the scales were her enemy. She would post pictures of celebrities with rippling abdominals and cry as to why she didn't look that way and how it was Oh So Unfair that she didn't look the same way.

I know that I'm not going to achieve anything by pushing my view or preaching to anyone. When my colleagues brag about their lack of eating and put themselves through ridiculous training regimes which they clearly do not enjoy - there's nothing I can tell them to sway them from that train of thought. When my participants excitedly tell me about how many training sessions they've done and how they haven't eaten xyz for however many days, I know there's nothing that I can say to them to tell them that they will burn out and focusing on developing a balanced routine that is sustainable is better off.

There's enough diet talk in the world at the best of times - though this period after Christmas combined with the bombardment of weight loss advertising brings out even more ridiculousness than normal.

I will be so incredibly relieved when excessive ridiculousness calms down to just regular ridiculousness.