Super Rad Kick-Ass Workout

That’s how I felt during Saturday morning’s workout! It was a nice change to feeling kind old and rickety on that dang treadmill. For my pre-gym fuel I ate an apple with a little bit of peanut butter.

I didn’t add peanut butter to many of my apple pieces because a little peanut butter goes a long way with me. It’s a high calorie item but I never need much of it to feel full. Peanut butter is a great pre-workout snack too. The gym parking lot and garage was full. I thought that was a bad sign but once I got inside I found a line of empty treadmills. I deducted that everyone was at the Body Pump class. I think I was right.

I had a kick-ass, super rad run on the treadmill. No pain or aches at all! I ran faster than normal and enjoyed my time on the treadmill (shocker). I even considered extending my distance from 3 miles to 3.25 again but decided not to push it. I’d rather be able to run 3 miles with zero pain than run 3.25 and not be able to run for a week.

I ran 3 miles in 43 minutes. If you can call it running….my legs were moving on the treadmill. I realize that’s like a 14 minute mile. I used to run about a 9:30 mile…SIGH. STOP. Stop comparing my current self to my old self. It’s not fair. That’s what I tell myself at least. Stop sneaking glances at other runners to see what they have their treadmill speed set to. Stop feeling bummed out that I’m slow. These are often daily reminders I have to give myself as I try to heal. I had no idea the healing process would take THIS long…

If you still haven’t gotten a Heart Rate Monitor I really recommend Polar! I have a Polar HRM and I love it. It absolutely changed the way I work out. For example, if I went off the machine  telling me how many calories I burned I’d be way off. My treadmill run burned 272.9 calories.

My HRM said different: 389 calories. That’s a vast difference and something I notice a lot on the machines. The stair-master is the same–it underestimates my calories when my HRM says I burned more. The elliptical is oddly different: it overestimates my calories. Weird?

After my run I lost myself in the weight room. I started with Abs and moved to the “scary weight room where big guys pump iron” and then moseyed on to the weight machines. I increased the weight amount on several of the machines I normally do in hopes of shaking things up a bit. I also thought about my recent post about my desire to lift 50% more than what I currently do by June of this year.

I was feeling really good about my body and I felt confident in my abilities…..then as I was leaving the gym I banged my knee on one of the machines. Ouch. 🙁 Massive fail–and of course it was the bad knee too. Just my luck!

Gym Stats:

Time: 1:42

Calories Burned: 776

Not bad for a sleepy Saturday morning! My immediate post-workout snack was a small glass of chocolate milk. Lunch was leftover chicken. This time however I cut up the leftover chicken and put the pieces in the broth to eat it as a soup. It was really delicious as a soup. The sauce was richer after sitting in the fridge for two days and the chicken was just as perfect as it was on Thursday. So happy with that recipe!

After lunch I did my taxes. I was prepared to cry and scream at the computer (like last year…I donated my old car to the Humane society yet somehow OWED money to Oregon. Damn Oregon taxes). I was pleasantly surprised to find that my Federal tax return will be enough to go on vacation! Happy day. The rest of the day was spent menu planning with Michael and grocery shopping (more on that later). We definitely made some good progress on the whole subject matter.

Now for something completely different…I want to give a shout-out to my friend Jenn who has a blog called Diary of a Fat Artist. She’s a fantastic artist and she’s currently working on her thesis for art school: “My thesis will be a series of 6, 42 inch constructed paper dolls depicting the standard female body shapes of triangle, inverted triangle, rectangle, pear, hourglass and oval. Through the construction of the paper dolls assembled over found art in the form of vintage women’s underwear ads, I will explore standards of beauty and body image in a lighthearted manner.”

I love the concept and I’m really excited to see what she makes! Her artwork is so cool. Her recent post is about the emotional event of taking photos of herself in her underwear to be included in the project. As someone who went through various phases of body-loving and body-loathing at every weight possible, I could really feel what she was feeling. I wanted to be proud of my body at all sizes and OWN my fat, accept it, accept who I was. I struggled with that notion at every step of my journey.

So check out Jenn’s site! You won’t be disappointed. (I’m hoping she’ll let me talk her into doing something on my own site.) 🙂

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

QUESTION: How did you spend your Saturday?