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| October 2011, Portland Marathon Finish |
I was 40 years old and pushing 200 pounds at the time. I had trained for 16 weeks leading up to the marathon, but all that running only took about five pounds off me. I wasn't training particularly hard since my only goal at that time was just to make it through 26.2 miles without keeling over. I finished the marathon in 4 hours 50 minutes and struggled mightily, but I finished. I was happy.
A few months later I decided I wanted to take my fitness more seriously. I wanted to be a better runner, but I also just wanted to be all around more athletic, healthy and fit. I found a trainer who was holding boot camp classes not far from me, so I went to one. I thought since I had finished a marathon that I had to be in OK shape, but I quickly learned otherwise. I ran to the bathroom halfway through the first class and threw up. I was embarrassed and frustrated and had almost convinced myself not to come back to anymore classes.
There was this voice in my head, though, that said, "That's exactly why you need to go back." So I did. Three nights a week I went. Consistently. I didn't let myself make excuses to not go. Each night it got better. I didn't throw up again. Pretty soon the other people in the class were struggling to keep up with me. We ran stairs. We did broad jumps. We bear crawled across the gym and back. It was as lot of sweaty work. I was still running two or three times a week and I was getting faster. I lost a bit over 10 pounds.
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| August 2012, Crater Lake Half Marathon Finish |
The classes came to an end and I decided to hire the trainer as a personal trainer. I told him I wanted to be a better runner, to be lighter, stronger, faster. But I also wanted to keep my overall fitness high. Running is a great endurance sport, but fitness includes strength and flexibility. Running doesn't do much for you in those areas (trail running does include some strength building, but I wasn't trail running at the time).
He was tough on me, and I learned a lot about my physical capabilities. We sprinted and did park workouts, we squatted and pressed and did a whole lot of jumping. I lost 15 pounds in my first five weeks and another ten the next five. At one point my trainer held a dowel up about four feet off the ground and said, "Jump over this 20 times." I gave him my "You're a nut job" look and he told me that if I didn't at least try it, I could find another trainer. So I did. I jumped over it. Twenty times. And that's the moment I learned confidence in my physical abilities.
Since then I've continued training at the gym and running. I began trail running seriously about a year ago - it took me a few months to warm up to it, but I was burned out on road running and the trails have re-invigorated me. I have a new strength training coach who I'm very happy with, and I'm doing my first 50K trail run in two months. My health and fitness are great for being 44 years old... BMI is 23, body fat is 10%, VO2 max is 65 and my resting heart rate is 45-50 BPM. My doctor tells me my blood pressure is good, my cholesterol levels are ideal and I should keep doing what I'm doing. I'm strong and I have good endurance... I still need to work on flexibility, though.
Fitness is a lot of work, especially in our society where we do everything we can to NOT move. There's no magic formula. You have to move. You have to not eat like an asshole. It's not easy, especially as we get older, but if I can do it - especially with no athletic background before I hit my 40s - anyone can. And the good news is, once you get to a fit state, it's a lot easier to maintain it than it was to get there.
