You win some, you lose some: 4/24/08

Tomorrow is the last day of the April session of boot camp. The May session starts on Monday. Woo hoo! I get a whole weekend off before the next session starts. (I'm being very facetious just in case you didn't pick up on it.) We get to do our final test for the month tomorrow morning. I'm hoping I have improved on my 7:53 mile time. I'll get to see in the morning if I have lowered my time over the past couple of weeks.

I ran the Sprint for Cancer 10K this past Sunday morning. Finished it in 1:09:56. That's a whole 12 minutes slower than my previous one. I was so disappointed with my results. I was really tired during the race and I could really tell that my body was fatigued. My calves started burning about a mile into the race and never stopped bothering me. No matter how much they hurt, though, I never stopped running and kept moving the entire race. I shouldn't get down too much about it. I did just complete my second 10K ever. I believe that every athlete has their on and off days. Obviously, Sunday was an off day for me. I'm going to work harder and better prepare for the next race so that I can blow my previous times out of the water. I'll have to check the calendar to see when the next 10K is that I can participate in.

My buddy Jay ran this past race with me. It was nice to have both him and Denny with me the whole time. They both took turns motivating me and helping me through some of the more difficult parts of the race route. This is the first time that Jay and I have ever done anything together like this before. Most of our time together is spent hunting, going to football games, fishing, etc. You know, mostly doing "guy" things. The funny thing is, if you have known us since we were in school, that Jay and I are probably the last two people in the world that you would expect to see running a 10K. And there we both were...running the Sprint for Cancer 10K. We started together and we finished together. Two friends participating in an event together and using each other as motivation. It was a great moment that I'm sure both of us will cherish for many years to come. Jay has already talked about doing a half marathon or a sprint triathlon. We'll see what my next move is....

I'm running the Big Peach 5K next Saturday, May 3rd in Brookhaven. Come join me. Get the details at http://www.bigpeachrunningco.com/. I hope to see you there.

Progress, almost 4 minutes down: 4/15/08

I ran the Georgia Tech Pi Mile this past Saturday morning. I finished the 5K in 27:45! I was shocked when I saw the clock at the finish line because I really felt that I wasn't doing a good job of keeping pace. I'm sure you can imagine how happy I was to see the official race time. Saturday's race was an interesting one for me. It's the first race that I have run by myself without my boot camp instructors. It was different to say the least. It just didn't feel right not having anyone from boot camp there with me. At least I was able to prove to myself that I can complete a race on my own and should never use the excuse of not having anyone to run a race with me.

The past couple of days at boot camp have been exciting. Yesterday, we had our midpoint test. I ran a 7:53 mile! That's 4 seconds faster than my previous time two weeks ago. I'm at the point where my mile time is only going to improve in small steps like this. I've got to continue to push myself and work hard in order to keep shrinking my mile time. It's going to be a while before I build up the endurance required to consistently run that fast of a mile.

We played war today at boot camp. Some folks might even call it capture the flag. Everyone was divided into 2 teams and had flags around their waists. We used the flag football type flags that are attached to a belt and can be easily pulled off. We chased each other around an enclosed area and tried to rip the flags off. When your flag was taken, you had to go to prison and do different excercises. Whichever team one got to celebrate by doing victory jumping jacks while the losing team did pushups or burpies. It was a very fun way to get a good cardio workout. You don't realize how much sprinting and running around you're doing until it's all over.

The Sprint for Cancer 10K is this Sunday. This will be my second 10K and I'm looking to beat my previous time of 57:25. Barrett and Sean are both running it as well. I think there are several other boot campers running the 5K. We're hoping to have another large presence of American Boot Camp Company campers at this race. If you make it out there, stop by our booth and join us in the fun. For information about the race check out http://www.sprintforcancer.com/.

Change of Focus to Weight Loss in Boot Camp: 4/7/08

Started the second week of the April boot camp session at West Midtown today. It felt good to be out there. It's nice with the weather starting to warm up. We had a good workout with tension bands this morning. Luckily, I'm not quite as sore as I thought I would be. The workout was tough and I was able to complete it again with the blue tension band. This time, I wasn't the only one to use the blue bands. A couple of the other guys in the group stepped up and completed the workout with the stronger bands. Maybe one day, I'll be able to do it with the black tension band...which are the toughest. We'll see...

I'm really excited about these next few months of boot camp. My busy time of the year has now passed, and I'm going to focus on weight loss. I still have a long way to go to reach my goal and it's going to be a tough journey, but I think I can do it. I'm really going to watch my diet and strictly adhere to the meal plan. I've done a decent job so far, but I'm really going to start counting the calories. I've also even floated the idea of trying to get even more exercise than just going to boot camp in the morning. I was thinking about trying to run every evening and even giving my body more opportunities to drop weight. I haven't discussed this idea with anyone, but I plan to because I don't want to push myself too hard. This is a long journey that I have embarked on and I can't afford to injure myself in any way.

I signed up earlier today for the Pi Mile at Georgia Tech this coming Saturday. It's only a 5K, but I'm in the mood to run a race. I can't believe I just said that! It's weird how I have started to think regarding working out and running races. I hope I can recruit some of the other boot campers to join me. My best official 5K time is 29:02 and I'm hoping to beat it this Saturday. When I passed the 5K finish line during my last 1oK, the clock had just turned 27:00. That being "unofficial" since I was running the 10K, but it gave me a nice benchmark to work with.

I'm also signed up to do the Sprint for Cancer 10K on April 20th. I hope I can break my previous 10K time of 57:25. This race is at Atlantic Station and will probably be close to the same route of my previous 5K. If so, I will really be able to tell what kind of improvements I have made over the past month. I really feel good about my speed, but it's going to be another tough test. With two more weeks of boot camp to go through before then, I feel confident that I will be ready. The American Boot Camp Company is sponsoring this race and I expect that we will have a large number of boot campers in attendance. You should come out and join us...