Long time away

Wow, I just realized that I had been away from this for a very long time (8 months or so).  After looking at my last post, I think I might know why, and let me share that with you.

Last I wrote, I was having some sever ankle pain.  I finally got it checked out, and my doctor told me to keep off of it for a few weeks, which I did.  I ran a 5K with some pain, but not terrible, so I started training for my 10K a few weeks later.  I felt a lot of pain at this time, so took a lot of rests, and when I actually ran the 10K, well, let’s say that ‘ran’ isn’t the right word.  I ran, then walked, then ran, then walked.  I went back to the doctor, and after a second x-ray, they found a stress fracture in my fibula that had went all the way through.  I was out of running for two months minimum.

I also stopped doing CrossFit WODs at this time, since there was a lot of impact in the workouts on my legs.  I kept lifting weights, but changed my routine up quite a bit.  I also started bicycling a lot, and incorporated some elliptical machine work, and was feeling pretty good.

Finally, my return to the doctor, and he gives me permission to start running again, slowly.  Unfortunately, I had to head to a course for the Army, which ended up making that stipulation impossible (if I told my chain about the injury, I wouldn’t be able to attend the course, and without the course, no promotion).  That brings me to where I’m at now, I’m in VA attending the Advanced Leadership Course.

There’s some good news in this.  Being forced to start running has felt good, instead of causing pain.  So I’ve been picking it up.  Today, I started a running training program from Hal Higdon’s website.

There’s also some bad news in this.  Being away from home, I have found myself eating nothing but crap food!  So that’s changing also.  I was sitting here, eating a pizza tonight, when I felt disgusted with myself.  I looked in the mirror, and although I’m not a super huge person, I was very unhappy with the way my stomach appeared.  My goal is to fix that!  I’m changing what I put into my body.  Being in a hotel for the next couple of months is no reason to let myself go.

So here is what I’m putting out to you.  Do you have any tips to make a healthy living while in a hotel?  I do have a fridge and microwave, but that’s it.  Any tips are greatly appreciated!  I’ll be back to writing more often, so hopefully I get a few hits.  I look forward to hearing from anyone!

 

Days Off

I’m disappointed, but I’m going to be taking a few days off from running. I ran yesterday, did my three mile run, and now my ankle hurts even worse than before. I’m going to take a couple of days, let it recover (hopefully), and then get back to it. I feel terrible that I’m going to be missing some good runs, but I have to take care of myself.

Quick WOD..and some Army Stuff

Today was a rest day from running, which is good because my ankle is still hurting me.  It’s not like a normal muscle pain either, it feels like it’s bone pain, but I don’t know that for sure.  It’s actually just above my ankle, if any doctor’s happen to read this and have a suggestion (left leg, outside, just above ankle).

Anyway, there was a Crossfit WOD.  Today’s was ten sets of two reps of an overhead press, resting 60 seconds in between sets.  I used 95 lb.  It was a good workout, mainly because it was quick and I had an extremely full day today.  Not to mention, I was still near failure on my last couple of sets, so I know I picked a good weight.

On to a little bit of venting (hey, it’s my blog, I’m allowed).  I started a school for the Army today.  It’s supposed to be an additional duty to prevent sexual harassment and sexual assault.  First of all, I know this is an extremely important job.  The next part of that, I think that my command should have really put some thought into this, as I don’t feel that I’m the best person for the job (I don’t find just any thing to be harassment, I think some people are overly sensitive, especially in the military).  That is the wrong type of thinking to have being the representative.

Anyway, that’s not what actually bothered me.  What bothered me was some of my classmates.  They kept talking!  They were talking, and talking, and talking, and not really giving the instructors the opportunity to explain things, in my opinion.  That may not be completely fair, and I say that because I realized that this frustration may finally be some of my post deployment stress kicking in.  All kinds of people experience it, I would be willing to say everyone, but I was really feeling it today.  So then I was wondering if these people, these other Soldiers, were actually bothering me, or if I was having a slight PTSD moment (any Soldiers reading this will understand).

Well, that’s it for me today.  Hopefully tomorrow is better for my mood and attitude.

Been a few

I haven’t posted in a few days, almost a week, sorry for anyone who watches and reads this.

Don’t worry, I haven’t missed much.  That ankle pain I had the other day has really been bothering me, so I missed Wednesday’s run for three miles at my race pace.  Not going to the gym, I didn’t get my Crossfit workout in that day either.

Thursday, I pushed through and ran three miles, at a decent pace.  Not great, but I still got it in there.  My ankle did not like me afterwards.  I started the Crossfit WOD for the day too, but I didn’t quite finish it.  I did 21 reps of 75 lb. cleans, and I’m not really sure if I did that right, but it was tough.  I then moved on to do about 10 dips, with no weight assistance.  That wasn’t near as far as I needed, but it was something.

Friday was a rest day, so no run, which was good, because I still had a pain in my ankle.  Same as Wednesday, I missed the gym, so I missed the Crossfit.  I’m such a slacker.

Saturday was the day for my long run.  I did five miles on Saturday at roughly a 9:00 pace, so I was pretty happy with that.  I used some softer shoes because of my ankle, but that didn’t really help.  It’s actually caused me to hobble around quite a bit today (Sunday).  There was no Crossfit workout on Saturday, so I didn’t do anything else.

Today there was a Crossfit workout, but Brittany and I had some things to do around the house, and I didn’t make it to the gym.  I start back on some military duty tomorrow, so I’m not exactly sure what my schedule is going to be the next couple of weeks.  I hope to at least keep my running schedule up, and get this ankle pain to go away.

I hope everyone else is doing well!

Three miles, no sweat

Today’s plan was just a run.  There was no Crossfit WOD today, so my mini-marathon training plan was for a three-mile run.  Today was not good though.  It started out good, my first day being back on eight-hour shifts, instead of tens, and things went smooth.

Not only was it a short day, seemingly, but we stayed pretty busy working on our monthly report.

The downside, when I started my run, I started feeling a lot of pain.  I made my first mile in a reasonable pace, but I had to take it down with a quickness afterwards.  I ended up walking twice throughout the three-mile run.  My ankle was hurting quite a bit.  My breathing was fine, but I felt some pain.  I have another run tomorrow, at what I plan to be my race pace, so hopefully being slow with it will help.  I don’t know what I’ll do if there is something wrong with my ankle.

So, as you can see, my title for this post is misleading, my three miles were a lot of sweat!

The work and the regret

Today’s workout was a great run, four miles, and the Crossfit WOD.  The WOD today was a Tabata Row, Tabata Squat, Tabata Pull-ups, Tabata Push-ups, and Tabata Sit-ups.  The Tabata rounds are as many as possible in 20 seconds, rest for 10 seconds, and repeat a total of eight times each exercise.  I wasn’t able to do everything today.  The gym at the YMCA didn’t have a rowing machine, so I left that one out, and I didn’t do my last two minutes on the sit-ups.  My four mile run was completed in 35:40, which I feel really good with also.

Tomorrow’s Crossfit workout is a 5K run, but my mini-marathon training has me doing some cross training instead of running, so I’ll probably do that instead to give my legs some rest from the impact.

The regret, oh the regret, Brittany and I decided to order some pizza tonight.  We both love Papa John’s, and we love it so much that we finished a large pizza and order of cheese-sticks.  For the week, I’ve burned 1,800+ calories just from running, but I ruined all that with dinner tonight.  It was delicious, but painful, and probably set me in a deficit.  I plan on posting my stats in the next couple of days to see if I’m having any improvements in weight loss and fitness.

Oh well, the things we do.  I hope everyone has a great night!

Rest

This day couldn’t have come at a better time.  It’s Friday, so it’s the end of the work week, I’ve done nine miles this week, so far, so I needed a little rest, not to mention, the filthy fifty kicked my butt.  All of it was definitely worth it, it was a much fitter week than I’ve had in a while.  But, I feel like resting today, so it couldn’t be a better day to have the day off from both workout routines.

Tomorrow is back to it, I have a four mile run and whatever Crossfit routine they plan for anyone following that plan.

Not only that, this is going to be a busy weekend.  I have to paint one of the rooms in the house, and a whole lot of school work to finish.  I’m not excited for any of it honestly, but it will all pay off soon.

A Rant and a Workout

First of all, since this is called Nichols’ Randoms, it’s crazy to me how the weather can change. Last week I was riding my motorcycle, at night, in comfortable weather. Today, I woke up, and all I needed was a hoodie to keep me warm on my way to work. On my way home from work, there’s nearly an inch of snow on the ground. I don’t know about where any of you are from, but that’s just crazy to me! Not to mention, since a lot of people are idiots, that meant the speed on the roads was nearly cut in half. That bothers me like no other. Just drive your vehicle! (I just realized, I needed to mention that the roads were clear at this time, if roads were covered, that would be different).

It’s still so funny that the weather can change so quickly!

Anyway, today I did do a three-mile run, and the Crossfit WOD. This three-mile run was my fastest this week at 25:46. I’m proud of that, even though it’s nothing spectacular, and it was on a treadmill. The WOD was much easier than yesterday, in my opinion. Five sets of three rep back squats. I started off testing the waters with 135 lb. for my first set. I then upped the weight to 185 lb. My last three sets were 225 lb. It was a really quick, comfortable workout.

If any of you are in this suddenly changing weather, be safe out there, but don’t be the snail on the road!

Filthy Fifty

Ouch!  That’s about all I can say to today’s WOD.  Aptly named the “filthy fifty,” the workout consisted of:

50 24″ box jumps, 50 jumping pull-ups, 50 1 pood kettlebell swings, 50 step walking lunges, 50 knees to elbows, 50 45 lb. push-press, 50 back extensions, 50 20 lb. wall ball shots, 50 burpees, and 50 double unders.

This is an insane workout!  I did nearly all of it as advertised, except I used a 30 lb. kettlebell because I don’t have a 1 pood kettlebell.  I also was completely exhausted by the time I got to burpees, so I stopped there.  One of the guys on the Crossfit.com website posted completion in 16:23, I completed what I did in 45 and some change.

Not only that, but I got another three-mile run in today.  I was a minute slower than yesterday, but all things considered, I’m extremely pleased with that.

I hope everyone else is getting their fitness in for the new year.  I hope that if I start slacking at all, someone bugs me and sends some motivation my way!  Have a great one!

Back to the Grind!

I took a couple of days off, which I’m noticing seems to keep happening around the weekends.  I need to stop doing that!  I’m on a training schedule for the KY Derby Mini-Marathon, so that should help me keep doing something during the weekend.

Speaking of the training schedule, I did a three-mile run today, in 26:50.  Not super fast, but, it was good enough, especially since I’ve only been doing some mile runs here and there.

I also did the Crossfit WOD.  Today’s WOD consisted of two muscle-ups, four handstand push-ups, and eight two pood kettlebell swings.  I still don’t have the strength to do a muscle up, so I substituted one pull-up and one dip for each.  I also can’t do a handstand push-ups, so I did the recommended substitution of kettlebell push presses (I used two 30 lb. kettlebells, for a total of 60 lb.).  I have no idea what a “pood” is, so I used the 30 lb. kettlebell for the swings also.  It was an AMRAP in 20 minutes.

I completed seven rounds.  What made me really happy about this was that I didn’t use the weight assisted pull-up machine.  That’s quite an accomplishment for me!

So, three miles, and seven rounds of the WOD today, not too bad for a little fat guy.  🙂