Back when I got my Wii Fit and wanted to see if it would actually help me with my fitness program, I was preparing for my next round of distance events. Wii still calls me a couch potato because I have trouble doing ab crunches.
Well, intent upon getting my body to that magical, elusive, efficient fat-burning level, I've joined a gym, a rather swank one at that! My daughter talked me into it. I was considering the more stripped down, serious gym rat location closer to home rather than the family friendly resort spa environment that's a good 15 minutes out of my way (my daughter is a mere 5 minutes away from the gym). However, I'm willing to make the commitment, physically and financially, to do what it's going to take to conquer the menopause weight, overcome the hydration and hyperventilation issues and train well for my upcoming marathons.
My daughter and I have, understandably, different goals. She's training for her first marathon, now that she has half a dozen half marathons to her credit. She needs to train to go the distance. I, on the other hand, need to drop at least 20 lbs and develop consistency in my pace. I've trained with other elites, including a legendary Olympian, but I'm not particularly talented or biomechanically gifted. So, this slow fat runner simply needs to get better, and faster (I'm pretty fast, just not for 26.2 miles straight).
Today, I met my real life Personal Trainer. She's about my height, at least 15 years younger, about half my size and an elite athlete: ultramarathoner (50-100 miles), cyclist and triathlete. She had my daughter and me do a "time trial" - a 30-minute tempo run on a treadmill.
I've never liked running on a treadmill, preferring the feel of the earth or asphalt beneath my feet. However, the German-engineered machine we used was made especially for distance runners and it felt pretty good. We were at a fairly slow pace, which I didn't mind because I'm just recovering from a nasty stomach virus and now dealing with a bit of seasonal bronchitis. For 28 minutes, we were to keep a fairly steady pace, increasing it ever so slightly every few minutes, until we were at a sprint for a final 2 minutes. Frankly, I run faster on asphalt, but haven't done a 30-minute tempo run in ages. I did slightly better than my daughter!
For our next session, we'll be doing a MAP (maximum anaerobic performance) test to determine our anaerobic threshold. This will be particularly important for me, as I need to know at what level of exertion my body will go into fat-burning mode. Then, we'll get our full training schedule.
Rosemary gave us a sample macrobiotic diet for runners. It wasn't until I got home that I noticed it was designed for a 30-year old male with no body fat. Well, we can remedy that.
So, here we go into week 1 of 20 working with a real life PT.
Sorry, Wii - you're going to be relegated to helping me with Yoga and balance, for a while.
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