Physical Possibility

Ok, so while doing much soul searching, hand wringing and rumpledoodle baking, I’ve come to a moment of (perhaps) insanityclarity. Actually, it was a friend, D, who pointed out today that I might be ready for my next distance challenge. That perhaps what I’m feeling is the nip at one’s heels need to train for a longer distance than a 10K. When she said it, it felt right.

What will it mean to me? Basically, I’ll have to drag my ass out of bed earlier.

If one wants to train for distance, not speed, one needs to be practical and use one’s slowest pace. My pace is quite slow. This new challenge will require running regularly (read: multiple times a week) for 1.5-2.5 hours. That is definitely something new to get my head around on a lot of levels, and to discuss with Dear Husband.

It will also require me to buy a good pair of regular running shoes. Don't get me wrong: I love my Merrell Pace Gloves. They rock. But with the amount of mileage I’m racking up, I need something with a little more cushion, as well as weatherproofing for the impending winter runs. Any runners (or running shoe companies) out there with suggestions, please let me know asap!

Cross training is no problem, as the exergames fill that slot nicely already.

The final question in this mental exercise is: what will that longer distance goal be?

So this evening, I took an Advil for my aching knee and pulled up the New York Road Runner Club site online. And that’s when I saw it: the JANUARY 22^nd 2011 Manhattan Half Marathon (it’ll probably be the 23^rd in 2012). 13.1 miles of running bliss.

I have my next physical challenge.  What's yours?

Day Off

Even though it’s a gorgeous day for a run, and Zumba Fitness can be pulled up on a moment’s notice, rest is just as important as exercise in a healthy lifestyle.  So, with my muscles aching, I decided to take a pre-planned day off from working out today.

There isn’t much that changes when I don’t work out. It’s not like I work out five hours a day. It’s generally between an hour and an hour and a half that now fits in around most other activities, like, say WORK and FAMILY plans.

So one might ask, when one doesn’t work out ON PURPOSE (pre-planned that is), what does one DO with that, say, hour or hour and a half? I give you…..

….RUMPLEDOODLES!

My Dear Child has a “minor” thing for Pooh. And the minor thing has turned into a major thing for Pooh’s entire cast of characters, especially Lumpy (the heffalump) from Pooh’s Heffalump Movie. Our evening plans presently look like PHM for 30 minutes before Dear Child goes to sleep. And “to mix things up,” we now have The Heffalump Halloween Movie to alternate viewing pleasure.

Cover of Pooh's Heffalump MovieWhich brings me to rumpledoodles. As anyone who has watched PHM more than once knows, Lumpy loves rumpledoodles. I’m sure every parent is asked what they are, where can we get them and when can we have them. Hopefully Dear Child will have them as a surprise snack later this afternoon.

They’re actually a made up thing. A new recipe, if you will. The DVD has the recipe in its additional features section. They include baking must haves like salt, flour, coconut and sugar, among many other scrumptious ingredients. Upon making a batch, one finds that the basic recipe is a wee bit runny and tastes a bit odd. The addition of vanilla, chilling the dough before the great bake and allowing them to sit for a couple of minutes before taking them off the baking sheet correct for any inadequacies.

So what do they taste like? Upon biting into a hopped up version (see below), one is reminded of English toffee, but somewhat different and, is it possible, better? And with the inclusion of raisins, they seem somewhat healthy if one is fantasizing in the hazy sort of way.

Hopefully they hold up for the post-afternoon nap and don’t seize up and become too hard. But then, that might be a great reason to dunk them in an ice cold glass of milk.

Lumpy’s mummy would be proud.

***

Hopped Up Rumpledoodle Recipe

1/2 cup rolled oats (ie oatmeal)
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup shredded coconut
1/4 cup raisins
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 heaping tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp molasses
1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted

½ tsp vanilla

1 tbsp boiling water

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and prepare cookie sheets. I fit about a dozen cookies on a regular sized sheet. This recipe makes about two dozen cookies.

Mix the oats, sugar, flour, coconut, raisins, cinnamon, baking soda and salt in a large bowl.

Combine butter, molasses, vanilla and water separately. Then pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and stir until well-mixed.

You can chill the dough for 10-30 minutes before using if you’d like, but it’s not necessary.

Drop teaspoon-sized amounts of dough onto the cookie sheets. I use a teaspoon sized measuring spoon to portion out the cookies. Use it like a melon baller, but level the scoop before putting onto the cookie sheet. I find that larger amounts of dough make for much too large cookies, as these cookies spread; they do not rise.

Bake for 12 minutes.

Allow the cookies to cool for 2-3 minutes on the cookie sheet before removing them to a plate.

Enjoy! 

Exhaustion

Image via Wikipedia

For the last week or so, my body has been telling me that it seems to have reached the edge of physical exhaustion. Or something like that.

I think the final straw was a 10K off-road race that me and a few friends ran last Sunday. Tons of people ran, I just didn’t know most of them.

The race became a turning point of sorts for me that has me going through some sort of deep tissue and emotional reevaluation of this campaign and my own motivation.

Upon starting the race, I started with the pack of all other runners going the 10K distance and realized very quickly that they were going much quicker than my normal pace. Considering that the race was about to go vertically up a mountain to the top, I pulled myself back down to my normal pace and settled in for the trudge. It wasn’t bad, especially since my normal runs now a days are on local mountain dirt roads. We passed through some mud flats, which was fun, and began the ascent. Quite a number of folks had misjudged their ability to keep their pace up the side of a mountain, and I passed them on the ascent simply by retaining my normal pace. I wasn’t trying to catch up with anyone, simply trying to make it through and finish the race. By keeping my own pace, I was able to objectively watch what was happening with other runners, which was interesting to me on a number of levels.

At the top of the mountain, I caught up with a new-runner friend, T. We settled into a companionable run together and joked and talked as we ran along. Some people passed us. We rounded on a lose rock bit and some woman with a Corgy came up from behind us, as others had, except she told us to follow her as she knew the course well. We made the mistake of doing so. What the day of the race we thought was a lame-ass 1+ mile detour, I’m relatively certain was a 1.5+ detour. Ultimately, once T realized she was literally leading us down the garden path, we turned around to retrace our steps. We began calling out for help, knowing we were lost. All of the people stationed to help runners in the race had left and we were left to figure it out on our own. By this point, T and I were exhausted, confused, freaked out, a bit scared and angry.

At this point, another man who knew the race happened by walking his dog. He led us to the point we needed to get back on the race route and touched base with race officials to make sure someone was watching out for us. T and I dealt with another point where the race officials were there, but ignored us, so we ran up and down a road for a bit before we realized we needed to cross at some point and we got them to turn around to give us directions.

By this point nearly the entire field of runners was waaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy ahead of us. Our pace was blown and at this point we were simply trying to stay upright. T threw out the idea of truncating our run before we collapsed. We agreed to finish it together and no matter what the actual time was, because we did the race for ourselves, not for the race officials who were timing us. At this point, the aim was simply to legitimately cross the finish line.

We ultimately found out that one other runner came in behind us – an 83 year old man. Upon seeing the times, someone joked that the only person behind us was a man of such an advanced age.

Since then, I’ve done Zumba Fitness twice and run a couple of times. None of the workouts has been good. I’ve listened to talk during the runs, and become increasingly dejected.

Then, this morning, I went on my normal four mile Sunday run with a few friends. Most of them are fantastic runners. Of course, they’d never say that; but they are and they really impress me. T just started running after I did. And she’s just quitting smoking. She’s really doing well, and I’m really impressed by her on a number of levels, as I am of all of these amazing local runners.  I get a kick out of seeing their progress and cheering them on.

So we were all running along today and of course everyone passed me. Everyone. I started thinking about my barefoot running shoes and how they have no forward bounce (they’re barefoot for goodness sake), how T is 5 inches shorter than me or some such and really outdistances me, how folks talk about time and pace, and I generally slog along at my own pace and might as well be called the caboose.

Then I started thinking about why I’m running and what I’m trying to accomplish: how I want my daughter to see and feel her mommy incorporating fitness into her everyday life and thus teach her that she should too; how I want to lose more weight, but have already lost so much and so many inches that some of my old clothes are lose or too baggy to wear; how with the running I’m amazed at the distances I can go; how it’s never been about time for me, but rather to see how long I can make my body move; how I started this entire adventure with exergaming 10 months ago to see whether one could get fit simply by exergaming and have accomplished that goal by proving that one can and does.

During the run today, my body ached for the first time - really ached. One of my knees gave me a slight limp and my legs felt pain. Normally my legs don’t feel any pain during or after my runs. All day, my gluts, hips and leg muscles have felt…well, I’ve felt all of them. It seems like mentally and physically, my mind and body are going through a self assessment and reconsolidation of effort regarding working out as though I’m about to move into a new mental and physical space. We’ll see.

One thing that’s certain, I’m not competing with anyone else or the clock; this campaign continues to be about pushing myself through known and artificial limits toward personal achievement.

Time Management

Image by Jeff Hester via Flickr

Professionally, I’ve worked well, and tried to surround myself, with people who multi-task well and get the job done. With such people, I feel a commonality of purpose and intention, as though we’re a team throwing a rugby ball to each other to get it down the field, regardless of weather, opposing force, state of general health and level of mud. This sort of group effort allows for much satisfaction and camaraderie upon completion.

This exergaming experience, and blogging about it, on the other hand, is generally a solo act. While I have a fantastic support network professionally and personally, I am the only one who can and must put in my hours of exergaming and other exercise; I’m also the only one who can write about my thoughts and experiences, because I’m the one living them. This personal effort has forced me to experience something that all people with active lives also experience – the time life crunch.

We all have things going on in our lives. I’m a wife and mother. I work, clean, do laundry, deal with my toddler’s active life and schedule (as well as a few tantrums) and my husband’s intense schedule; and I try to make some time for friends. I also, perhaps insanely, try to read and knit. Oh, and exercise and blog about it.

The exergaming and other exercise continue. I generally work out 60-90 minutes four to five times per week. My present exergame of choice continues to be Zumba Fitness. I hope to start a new 21 day challenge on EA Sports Active within the next couple of weeks, but don’t feel pressure to make a change too quickly.

Working out at the same time every day seems to help people keep at it. For me, the exercise is such a habit at this point, and I enjoy it so much, that I can and do work out happily at all times through the day. Depending on the day I’ll run in the early morning, or exergame in the morning or afternoon. It really depends what else is going on that particular day and when I can carve out a block of “me” time. A side note is that most of my daytime “me” time is generally handed over to exercise, with any evening “me” time revolving around knitting and reading.

Recently, as a few of you have noted, my blogging has fallen off a bit. It takes me 30-60 minutes to write a new blog piece. In a perfect world, I’d carve out that time every day on top of everything else. In my world, that time has moved over to other work most of the time. But now that I’m recognizing this lapse, and the cause, I can accommodate to it and make sure the blogging happens more often (again).

Presently, I have a bunch of backlogged ideas, but if you want to hear about anything in particular, feel free to email me, and I’ll be happy to write about that.

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