Thoughts on New Year's Resolutions

Happy End of 2014!

The end of the year always brings bitter-sweet feelings for me. “Did I do everything I wanted this year? What new things can I/should I/do I want to do next year? I should be better at… I need to get in shape and finally stop eating everything in sight. I am going to be a better husband, go to church more, etc.” Or my personal favorite, “I need to work out more so I’m going to join a gym!”

Don’t get me wrong, I am all for doing new things in the new year. Isn’t that the whole point of a new year? To experience new things, set new goals and ultimately have a better year than the one past? I believe that it is, but what I am not a huge fan of is New Year’s Resolutions. The concept of changing one’s self in the new year is a good one and starting on the first of the year only makes sense, but the problem comes around mid January to mid February. We forget about the resolutions to change that we made on Dec. 31 and get stuck in the rut that we’ve been in for the better part of forever. Life happens, I get that and change is hard, but isn’t there a better way to go about it?

Lets take for example those people that make their resolution to get in shape. I did a quick internet search and found a couple of articles on the percentage of gym memberships in January versus the rest of the year and those that keep them. According to the International Health, Racquet & Sportsclub Association (IHSA), 12% of the years gym memberships are sold in January as opposed to 8.3% per month throughout the rest of the year. According to an article from Quora.com, 80% of all New Years memberships drop off by the second week of February and the IHSA states that most clubs report that members will only visit the gym an average of 54 times per year. Do that math, that’s just a hair over one time per week. Those of us that regularly go to the gym can attest to those statistics. January and most of February are really crowded gym months and the rest of the year the gym goes back to the way it was save the few that stay. How can you not be a gym statistic in 2015? One word, Consistency.

I mentioned that I’m not a huge fan of New Year’s Resolutions. New Year’s Resolutions imply that I’m not going to stick with the changes I’m making even if I really want to. You don’t agree? Well did you keep all your resolutions from last year? I can’t even remember my resolutions from last year. So this year, I’m not making them. I’m going to continue doing what I’ve been working on during the end of 2014. Instead of partying all night and spending the first day of 2015 with a hangover be it food or alcohol related, I’m going to eat healthy tonight or atleast I’m going to do my best and make certain that I get a workout in on Jan 1.

Instead of starting a new training program on the first of the year, I’m going to continue the one that I’m currently on in pursuit of my 5K/triathlon goals. Speaking of goals, I’m going to be setting some goals for the new year instead of those pesky resolutions that we know no one in their busy life will keep by mid Feb much less Mardi Gras!

Don’t be a gym statistic this year. Don’t set New Year’s Resolutions only to forget about them and give up on them before the ground has thawed for spring. Set some goals and write them down! If you write down your goals, you are much more likely to complete them. You’re even more likely to complete them if you write them down and set a time limit on them. Here are a few articles regarding goal setting that I have found rather helpful: Dave Ramsey's High Performance Achievement and Goal Setting and How to Acheive New Year's Goals.

What are my goals for 2015? I’ve been working on training for a 5K and the Rec-Plex Indoor Triathlon short course. I’m going to continue training for these things. The 5K I will shoot for is the Go! St. Louis Marathon and Family Fitness Weekend 5K. There may be a few more that I will end up squeezing in there but I am going to keep my training consistent. I will also be making a point of writing down atleast one Bible scripture a week that I have been reading. Something to keep me focused on God and my relationship with my wife.

I found a few tweets from a radio station that I like that I thought I would share.

#VOTD #faith pic.twitter.com/KeJATFaN1z
— Air1 Radio (@air1radio) December 29, 2014

#ThankGod ~@Air1Brenda pic.twitter.com/ILn4M0D1MM
— Air1 Radio (@air1radio) December 31, 2014

I sincerely hope that everyone had a great, safe, and happy new year. Don’t eat too much and enjoy the evening!

A Weekend of Basketball, Chruch Volleyball, and Running

1.Basketball in Champaign

I shot my first basketball game this weekend. We travelled up to Champaign to cover the American versus Illini game on Saturday. It was a long day and once I finish the photos, you can read about it on my Off the Street Photography blog. For now, here’s one of the pics that I posted.

2.Church Volleyball

This weekend was our annual church Christmas party and volleyball tournament. It’s a fun time for all of us to get together and fellowship and have some friendly competition. My wife and I are in a home group for newly weds. Sadly most of the group is much younger than we are seeing as we got married a little later in our lives. I made a reference to Zack Morris from Saved by the Bell and one of the guys in the group responded with “who is that?” My jaw hit the floor! He said the show was before his time. I’m not even that old!

We played against several different home groups and got knocked out in the second round. It was still lots of fun and very great to have some competitive fellowship with friends!

3.Running

This week was week 2 in my current training regimen for running. It has been so long since I have run consistently that I have to start off so very slow. In looking for some program to aid me in starting super slow, I stumbled upon Personal Running Trainer.

The program starts off by having you train to run a mile then moves you into running a 5K, then a 10K, then a Half-Marathon, then a Marathon. I like this program so much better than Couch to 5K because it really makes certain that you don’t over do it and injure yourself. I tried Couch to 5K and felt like it was too much too fast. So after finding Personal Running Trainer program I started at the beginning and am moving into week three.

Here is the training schedule:

4 Weeks to 1 Mile Training Program by Personal Running Trainer.com

.	Day 1	Day 2	Day 3
Week 1	45 seconds of running followed by 2 minutes of walking, repeat x4	45 seconds of running followed by 2 minutes of walking, repeat x4	45 seconds of running followed by 2 minutes of walking, repeat x4
Week 2	90 seconds of running followed by 90 seconds of walking, repeat x4	90 seconds of running followed by 90 seconds of walking, repeat x4	90 seconds of running followed by 90 seconds of walking, repeat x4
Week 3	2 min. 15 sec. of running followed by 45 seconds of walking, repeat x4	2 min. 15 sec. of running followed by 45 seconds of walking, repeat x4	2 min. 15 sec. of running followed by 45 seconds of walking, repeat x4
Week 4	4 min. 30 sec. of running followed by 45 seconds of walking, repeat x2	6 minutes of running followed by 45 second walk and finishing with 3 min. run	10 minute run

I’m rather nervous about moving up to week three as all through week two, my legs have been hurting while I run. I asked my sister, who finished her first half-marathon about a month ago, about pain while starting out and she said that she basically ran through the pain. “You hurt for about a month and then you just stop hurting…” or as I interpret it, you get used to it. This is where my problem occurs. I’m so reluctant to push through the pain because when I was in my last year of college (the class part of college) I ran cross country and went from running maybe a mile to running from 3-5 miles a day and increasing speed too! I ended the season with an 8K time of 37:37 and bilateral stress fractures to both my shins which turned into compartment syndrome and required surgery. I’ve been struggling to get back into running ever since then, the surgery was in 2010. So needless to say that whenever I have any pain in the shin area, and I have this week, I am very afraid that I am headed back down that injury road again.

I’ve been reading several blogs about pain and injury prevention and I found several things out. Pain is your body’s way of being uncomfortable and when you are uncomfortable you grow stronger. I’m not talking about the-worst-pain-you’ve-ever-had kinda pain. I’m talking about the I-haven’t-done-this-in-a-while-or-ever-so-my-body-doesn’t-like-to-have-to-move-this-much-or-this-hard-and-it-hurts kinda pain. I also learned that running hurts. It’s hard on the body and starting a running program hurts. Did I mention that running hurts? You just have to get used to pain.

I’ll still admit that even though I know these things and have read the articles, which you can find Here | Running Pain Hurts So Good and Here | Running’s Dirty Little Secret, pushing through the pain and moving forward is hard. It’s really hard, more mentally than it is physically. There are some things that I have a high pain tolerance for and others that I don’t. In this case I can push through the physical pain, but mentally not worrying that I will end up like I did in college is probably the hardest thing to get over and the single thing keeping me from succeeding in running.

This is where I am and I intend to get over this hurdle. I’ll leave you with a couple of pics from my last two runs. Thanks for reading, until next time!

Turkey Trot STL and Thanksgiving

Happy December friends! I hope that everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and a great weekend after.

Let me start this post with the Turkey Trot. This was the first Turkey Trot that my wife and I have done. She says that it was my idea to do the race, but I remember it being her idea. Either way we did it. We got up for the race around 6:30am and made it there with about 30 min before the race started. We are both not morning people AT ALL, so getting up that early was not fun. But we got there before the race started which is what I really wanted for us to do.

We stayed in the car for about 15 min after we got there because it was SO cold! We were dressed appropriately for the weather, maybe a little over dressed, but it was still cold. The thermometer read 30 degrees F when we got there. COLD!

About 15-20 min before the start of the race we got out of the car and headed to the starting line. I thought I was cold sitting in the car, I was really cold once we got out of the car. The race was held at the St. Charles Family Arena. The starting line was located behind the arena where the parking entrance was. We made our way to the starting area, where we waited for the race to start...in the cold. I tried to position us in between the other racers and the cold breeze. It worked some, not as much as I would have liked.

We migrated to the starting area with the other racers trying to keep warm while waiting for the start. Before we knew it (read: what felt like an eternity in the cold) the race was started and we were off.

This was great, alot of people had turkey hats on!

The course was flat and I'm sure fast as we saw the lead guy reach the 1.5 mile point when we were barely underway. My wife and I were walking and thus not very fast. Once exiting the parking area the course made a loop around the river road and back to the starting area. Pretty straight forward.

Overall the race was good. It was fun to get out the morning of Thanksgiving instead of sleeping all day and then being lazy and eating. I found that it kept me from overeating all day too. I don’t believe that I gained any weight during the holiday.

After the race, I watched some of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and made sure the Turkey Trot imported to my training trackers correctly. For the race I used Wahoo Fitness’s iPhone app. The app is nice because after you finish with the race you are able to export it to any of your favorite tracking sites: Nike Plus, Map My Fitness, Garmin Connect, etc. to name a few. It was my first time using the app and it is very customizable and while that is very good, for the first time user that can be very frustrating. The app was tracking my pace based on GPS and I had enabled auto pause. I noticed that during the race it kept pausing randomly. I found out that I had set a 24 min/mile threshold for pace. Since GPS pace is variable based on reception of GPS, the app kept pausing the workout intermittently. It turned a 3.1 mile workout into a 3 mile workout and thus not giving me credit for the full run.

So while I was watching the Parade, I was editing my data and making sure that it was recorded properly. I have all my run data on Nike Plus (it was the first tracker that I knew about and has all my run/walk data on it from the time I first started using it, around 2008). I have all my workouts on MapMyFitness (I like using MapMyFitness for everything because its very versatile and you can record all different kinds of workouts on MMF). I started using Garmin Connect because you can export the GPS data to Nike Plus if you use something else and I wanted to get a feel for it because I asked for a Garmin FR 15 for Christmas. I went through all those sites to make certain that the data matched. Importing data to different sites can have different interpretations of the same data and sometimes the data will come out skewed.

Nike Plus Data

Garmin Connect Data

Map My Fitness Data

The rest of the day went like many other Thanksgiving Day’s. I helped my wife get ready for the evening meal at my parent’s house. She made homemade stuffing and apple crisp. YUM!!! We were so busy that I forgot to get pics of it. I will say that the meal at my parent’s was very good. The homemade stuffing and apple crisp was probably the best part. It was good to see family and get a workout in.

Hope everyone had a great holiday weekend and didn’t eat too much. Thanks for reading!

A Few Adventures from This Week

This past week started off busy in preparation to get caught up before Thanksgiving. I had a few clients to get portraits to and put last minute finishing touches on before I sent them out. I also picked up a few extra shifts at the hospital to earn some extra money for the biggest spending time of the year, AKA Christmas.

So on Tuesday, during my edits, I skipped out of the house to get a few errands done. I ran up to Fleet Feet to get our race packets for the Turkey Trot St. Louis and then I ran next door to Great Harvest Bread Co. to get a sandwich and a yummy loaf of bread.

Turkey Trot St. Louis:

This is our first year doing a Thanksgiving race. I have always wanted to do one, but I was either working or too tired to get myself outta bed to go to the race. I also didn’t plan ahead enough to register for the race. This year was different, this year My Wife and I decided that it would be fun to do a Thanksgiving race. We are going to take it easy and walk the whole thing but I’m still excited to be out there none-the-less.

I’m not sure if the race has ever been in St. Charles, but this year it is and I’m glad because its alot closer to home. Due to all the unrest in Ferguson, the Thanksgiving festivities in downtown St. Louis have been postponed. You can read about it here: St. Louis Thanksgiving Day parade is postponed due to Ferguson unrest : News. The fact that things have gotten this out of hand is ridiculous, but I digress. In years past, I haven’t wanted to drive to downtown for a morning race, but it being in St. Charles makes things alot easier. I’ve read that Thanksgiving is the busiest race day of the year. It makes sense because its a great way to start the day in preparation for all the food you will be consuming that day. This was one of the main reasons that My Wife and I are doing this race. I have to say, I’m rather excited about it.

One of the errands that I made yesterday was to pick up mine and My Wife’s swag for the race. She got a shirt and I got a stocking cap or as they call it a beanie. I’ll write more about the race after we’ve completed it.

After picking up our race packets from Fleet Feet, I walked adjacent to Great Harvest Bread Co. for a sandwich and picked up a loaf of bread. Great Harvest Bread Co. has been around a while but it has grown in popularity over the past few years. When I went in there, it was packed. The space that they have isn’t really large, but it has a few tables to eat at and racks of bread for sale along with locally made chips and soup mixes. They basically have a lot of homemade-type foods and of course breads, as the name suggests. Their sandwiches are made on their homemade breads, I usually get the Farmhand, which is a little bit of everything meat, cheese, etc. They have samples of their breads so you can try before you buy. I picked up a bread called Stuffing Bread. Think Thanksgiving stuffing made into bread loaf. YUM! And they make a bread loaf into a turkey just for fun! I think you take the top of the turkey off and put dip in the center of the feathers and then dip the bread in the dip kinda like rye and dill dip (my mom makes it for parties.)

Thanks for reading and have a happy and safe Thanksgiving!

A Few Adventures from Last Week

This week has been a bit of a busy blur, but I was able to fit in a few fun things in. Ready. Set. Go.

1) Anyone who knows me, knows that I am a huge Disney fan. So is my wife. There are times that we rival each other in how much we are Disney fans but for the most part, I usually win. Anyway, this week was opening week for Disney's new movie Big Hero 6.

**Images from @DisneyPictures

We saw the movie with some friends that we hadn't seen in a few months. It was really good to reconnect.

The movie was really good. We laughed and even cried. I'll be honest I'm a crier when it comes to movies. I don't cry at the typical girl movies like where the guy gets the girl or something like that but when it comes to the main character overcoming emotional obstacles or losing a loved one and really grieving and then rising to a challenge then I probably will cry and emotional music never helps. :-)

Ok back to the movie night with friends. We started our evening at Panera Bread. They have these BBQ Chicken Flatbread sandwiches and they are Sooo good. (I wish old have gotten a picture of it but I failed to do so. Next time I go I'll take one.) After dinner we walked in the cold to the movie theater. Fortunately, we only had to walk across the parking lot. We almost didn't get to see the movie because of projector problems but fortunately by the time we got there it was fixed.

After the movie my wife and I wanted to get pictures with the inflatable Baymax character in the movie theater lobby.

2) The next morning we had breakfast at a quaint little cafe in with a friend of mine from Novosibirsk, Russia. I met him in 2010 during a mission trip to Novosibirsk. A little background on why I went to Russia on a mission trip.

I went with an organization called Youth Reach International. They are an organization that works with orphans in Novosibirsk, Russia and Belarus. To be an orphan in Russia is to be labelled less than a third-class citizen and/or handicapped. The thing is, none of these kids did anything to deserve this status label. Some of these kids are products of orphans and some aren’t orphans in the traditional sense as in their parents passed away, but they are orphans because one or both of their parents are in the prison system for one reason or another. The problem is several fold. These kids are brought up to believe that they are basically worthless and have no value what-so-ever. This causes them to spiral into destructive behaviors and believe the lies that they have been told.

10% of Russian orphans will commit suicide

40% of Russian orphans will turn to drugs and/or alcohol

60% of Russian orphans will be jobless and homeless

Given the fact that these orphans are released into society at the age of 16, consider that 86% of the people (in the entire world, not only the former Soviet Union) who accept Christ do so prior to the age of 14.

The trip was so expensive that I had to raise support for it. It was the most humbling experience that I have ever done because I am the type of person that doesn’t really like to ask for help or ask for money or anything for that matter. This was very hard for me to do and the best part was that God was very awesome in blessing me and it was so awesome to see people giving. I’ll admit that I was in a really rough spot during this time and I was not very good at letting those who gave me support know what happened or how things went. If you would like to read my support letter please follow this link you can also see the photo card that I included with every support letter.

As a brief summary of what we did while we were there, we met with daily with the orphans at St. Nicholas Orphanage along with the mentors. Mentors are Russian young adults, usually college age, who have either grown up as orphans and were impacted by the YouthReach program or people that have a heart to help orphans. These mentors are key in impacting the lives of the Russian youth. Basically you can think of it as a Big Brothers and Big Sisters program for Russia.


If they have that program, then why did I go over? Well, good question! Americans are a novelty. We go over to Russia to aid in the continued relationship between mentor and orphan or help one get started. For a week myself and the team that I was with, would have craft sessions and story time and sharing of stories and experiences, which was VERY hard to understand as I don’t really speak Russian. The week went by fast and the last day we all gathered for a group picture. It was sad to go and Russians have a special place in my heart.

When I got home, I needed to do something. After being impacted like I was I couldn’t just sit by and do nothing. So I decided to support my friend Ruslan. He is the Director of Russian Operations and now oversees the new operations in Belarus. This week he was in town visiting friends and supporters. My wife and I met him for breakfast. We heard all about what is going on in Russia and had a great time catching up as well.

I’m also including a slideshow of pics from my trip to Russia.
Please note this slideshow does not work on iOS devices such as Apple iPhone or iPad. To view the photos in the gallery please follow THIS LINK HERE .

Getting Back on Track

Its been a while since I wrote in this blog. I had been wanting to update on my running and weight loss but there was nothing to update. I hadn’t been at all successful in getting anything done, at least not consistently. So I haven’t wanted to write anything as I feel like I’m extremely hypocritical even having this blog.

If I have a blog about exercise and weight loss and don’t do anything to get myself towards weight loss, then how can I write a blog about weight loss or my fitness adventures. Blogging for me has always been a love-hate relationship. I love the idea of a blog and I hate taking the time to write in it. The blogging higher-ups would tell me that I shouldn’t be this open and honest while blogging and maybe they are right, but I have always gotten good responses while bearing my soul, as scary as it is.

So I am going to attempt to revive this blog. I don’t need to have advertising, I’m not looking to get paid for this, all I believe that I want is to be an inspiration to someone who is looking to lose weight and wants to revive his or her exercise/fitness life. If nothing else happens and all I get to do is share my experiences with the interwebs then so be it! For those of you reading, please comment either on this blog or on Facebook when I share it to FB. It would make me happier to know if people are actually interested in reading my stuff.

Lets get started: here goes!

1. What’s been going on for the past several months?

The last several months have been crazy. If you’ve been following along with my photoblog, I got a job as a photographer for a wire service agency, Icon Sportswire . They had me shooting professional sports off an on all summer long. I think that most of July and August was spent at Busch Stadium photographing the Cardinals. I don’t think I shot all that many games as it feels like but between shooting games and working my real job at the hospital, I haven’t had all that much time to write or any energy to workout.

Here’s a little secret, I’ve actually been rather lazy up until this last month when it comes to working out. One of the things I’ve found out is that the more you exercise, the more energy you actually have. It is the most paradoxical thing I’ve ever come across, but it works.

2. Have I been exercising at all or just sitting on the couch eating bon-bon’s?

Ok, so I don’t even think I’ve ever eaten a bon-bon, but I definitely have eaten my fair share of crap. When I went to my health-care convention last December in Orlando, FL, I weighed in at 256ish. This summer I gained almost all of the weight that I lost when I was getting married. I had had enough. What I was doing wasn’t working. Before I start into what has been going on in the last few months, here is the little that I was doing this summer.

From the beginning of May and throughout the summer my buddy, Jeff and I had been running/walking once per week-ish after I got off work. It was going okay...well it actually kinda sucked since that was the only exercise I was getting in a week. I liked exercising at night after work so I joined Planet Fitness in Ballwin and guess how many times I actually went? Once. The one time I went was good I did some running, but it ended up being too far from my house and I never went. There was nothing wrong with the gym, in fact, I liked the gym it was just too far from my house and thus I didn’t use it. The one thing that I did like about the gym that I was unable to use was their Planet Fitness Biggest Loser 30 min Express Workout. Basically, the workout is a giant circuit that is supposed to only take 30 min. You are given a timer in the form of a stop light. On green you work and red you rest. You alternate between the steppers and the circuit machines. It looked like a killer workout if you followed the whole thing from start to finish.


So where am I now? Well, after getting sick and tired of being this way and not doing anything about it, I decided to start up our Biggest Loser competition at work. It’s going ok. I’m not winning but I’m not losing either, the competition - I am losing weight very very very slowly.

I’ve been going to Gold’s Gym in St. Peters which has really helped me get back into the swing of working out. I went there because my wife and I got a 3 month groupon deal and figured we couldn’t pass it up. I’ve been doing cardio and circuit work including a few kettlebell swings. I think that I strained a muscle in my lower back from the kettlebell swings so I’ve taken a few days off. Hopefully this week I will be able to start working on my sprint triathlon training. I’ll let you all know in a few weeks how things are going.

Thanks for reading as always. Cheers!

New Team Chocolate Milk Contest and Update on Training

Blank...I sit down to type a blog post and thats what happens, I hear crickets. It's terrible. I want to write a consistantly, but I sit down to write and I got nothin'!

Ok so here is what has been going on in my training world since I wrote this blog as a way to spread my insights in weightloss and training as well as keep me accountable for working out. Ha! That last part is rather funny. I have this terrible habbit of avoiding things when I am behind on doing them or have been lazy. I have been having a terrible time working out lately. Infact, I haven't been working out at all. I was supposed to start my training a few weeks ago and having recently been sick...again!...it's been really challenging to even get back to doing anything. So, since I haven't been doing much of anything, I haven't been writing. I didn't want to get back on this blog and write about how I haven't been doing anything again and sing the same song I feel like I've been singing for so long now. So that is why there has been a long lapse in blogging.

Last Friday, April 4th, I received another email letting me know that I had been accepted as a finalist in the Team Chocolate Milk Contest! You can vote HERE. I was really excited to hear this since I didn't get in last time. I've been given a second chance. If you haven't been voting for me, it's ok to start now, and if you have been voting for me, keep it up. Because of the second chance in getting into the contest I felt like I needed to get back to working out. I felt like I couldn't be in the contest and not do anything. I'd be a hypocrite if I didn't workout and continue on this journey to be on the Chocolate Milk Team. So I put something in to motivate me that would probably motivate anyone...money.

I signed up for the BikeMS race, I signed up for the distance I wanted to do, and I booked the hotel. After looking at the final bill I was so much more interested in biking and getting my act together that if it hadn't been almost 1:30 in the morning I probably would have biked, but it being so late I decided to go to bed instead.

That all being said, tonight I restart my training and I don't know how much I will blog during this. I will probably blog alot more than I think I will, but I'm not super sure.

So here I am starting up my training again and using $$$ as a motivator. I'm excited for warmer weather to start golfing again. Some of my golfing buddies have been talking about hittin' the links when it gets warmer and I am rather excited about getting back into golfing again. I didn't do much golfing last summer because of it being my first year of being married and being lazy. I'm excited about getting back into golf. I need to get my clubs regripped with my new grips that I bought a few years ago. I also got some new Nike Golf shoes although they are nothing like the ones desgined for the Masters, which by the way comes on TV this Thursday through Sunday! I'm excited to watch it!

Here is the tweet @NikeGolf sent out about their new shoes:

Designed for Augusta. Engineered for greatness. http://t.co/j9v7hx1hxe pic.twitter.com/EnSSNNcofy
— Nike Golf (@nikegolf) April 8, 2014

I'll have to post some pictures of my shoes and golf clubs after the clubs have been regripped. I will also be posting some pictures of our golf outings as well as my training from biking. Right now with all the rain, I've been biking inside (and by right now, I mean last night (this got is getting posted a day late)), but once I get outside I'm sure to be posting photos.

Thanks for listening and don't forget to vote for me for the next Team Chocolate Milk!

Team Got Chocolate Milk Update Final Results

The wait is over, I have the news…and it wasn’t what I wanted to hear. I just received an email from Team Got Chocolate Milk and it reads:

”Thank you for submitting your application to join Team CHOCOLATE MILK. While your entry did not rally enough votes this time, don’t let the competition leave you in the dust during the next voting period!...”

Yes that’s right, unfortunately I did not make it on to the team during this voting period. I was very much disappointed when I read the email. I really wanted to be a part of the team. The good news is that I have a chance to apply again. I’m not sure as to whether or not I actually have to apply again, but it wouldn’t seem fair to me to not apply again so I just resent my application in using the same video (I haven’t had a chance to make a new one yet, but I plan to do so soon).

So assuming that if my video made the small cut last time, only 8 finalists with only 2 winners, it should make it this time as the cut is larger, 25 finalists with 8 winners. I believe that they widened the cut amount due to the popularity that this contest has gained. That being said, there are going to be a larger number of people applying for the competition and having the opportunity to win. I can get in the door, but I need your help to make it the rest of the way.

This really will be a team effort. Much of what I’ve been writing about lately has been me talking mainly to myself to get myself motivated, but I’ve also been trying to encourage people who read this blog (friends, family, random strangers) that anyone can change and become better. Anyone can workout and get stronger and healthier. There are so many benefits to working out, most notably more energy, better mood, and decreased risk of long term disease.

As I said, this contest is a team effort, I cannot become a member of team Chocolate Milk without the help of all of you, much like all the Olympians could not have made it to Sochi without the help and support of their friends, family, and even those who donate to the Olympic Committee. I loved the celebration after the women’s skeleton race by USA Olympian Nicole Pikus-Pace when she realized that she had won a silver medal. She couldn’t contain herself, jumped into the stands straight to her husband and family screaming we did it! WE DID IT! She never said I did it, she always emphasized the “we.” I was very much inspired by that.

So, provided that I make the final cut for the next round of Team Chocolate Milk voting, I need your help! I need all of you to be behind me! Team JStreet! #teamjstreet I appreciate all of your support as I continue on this journey toward weight loss and healthier living. I appreciate your support as I continue to apply for Team Chocolate Milk. I appreciate you joining me in my journey, bettering yourselves and working toward your own healthy lifestyle.

My first week of riding is done. Total weekly miles from cycling and walking = 31.9 miles. Last night I rode 14 miles while watching the Sochi Closing Ceremonies. I did infact use chocolate milk after my workout and while I was sore this morning, I wasn’t as sore as I thought that I would have been. That’s my blurb training update along with my Team Chocolate Milk update.

The Walk Game by Six to Start

The Walk Game – If you remember my post about the running game I play, Zombies, Run! from six to start (if you never saw the post you can read it here). Well, they just released a new game called The Walk. I will try and describe some details about the game without giving away any secrets of the storyline.

Here is the description as per thewalkgame.com website:

A bomb explodes in Inverness station, and you're given a package that could save the world. To stay alive, you'll need to walk the length of the UK.

The Walk is more than just a (great) pedometer — it's a way to turn walking into a journey, a challenge, and a rip-roaring adventure.

The game is similar to and completely different than the Zombies,Run! game. You still have episodes throughout the game like in Zombies, but instead of choosing an episode and going for a run or a walk the app functions as a pedometer. As you walk through your day you move through the game and as you move through the game you unlock various audio clips revealing more and more of the story.

At first I started listening to them as I unlocked them, but then I found out that it was better to listen to them in a bundle. Say there are 7 audio clips per episode and the episode has a length of 66 min of walking to complete. I stick the phone in my pocket and leave the app open throughout my day. As the day progresses and I walk throughout, I move through the game board or in this case map.

Once I complete the map in that particular episode I will listen to all of the clips that I unlock. This makes the story more enjoyable and I have found that I rather like knowing how much I walk throughout my day.

There have even been a few times throughout my day where I am very close to unlocking the next clip or finishing an episode where I will maybe take the long way to where I am going or take the stairs instead of the elevator. This was the reason that the app was created. It was created in conjunction with the UK Department of Health for the NHS as a way to get people to be more active throughout their day, not just once per day like going for a bike ride or a jog.

As a person who is currently using the app, it works! I believe that it is a fun way to encourage people to walk more and in general be more active.

There are a few things that I do not like about the app such as there is no online tracking feature like Zombies to track how much you

walked over the history of the game, the feature for tracking your achievements seems to me to be too general and I’m not a fan of the way to switch between episodes or track your progress across the UK. Aside from these minor complaints of the app, I do like the tracking feature as it knows when I’m driving and when I am walking or not doing anything. I also generally like the app. It has indeed made me walk more at work and I never realized that I was walking over 3 miles at my job on a normal day, but on a slow day I had to push to make it to two miles.

At any rate I really do like the app and I believe that it has potential. I am also one of those people that like to track my progress and get rewards for my workouts. This app does that trick. I recommend it and really like it despite the changed I think need to be made.

All images are courtesy of six to start and Naomi Alderman via their media package.

Team Got Chocolate Milk Update and Bike MS

It’s been almost two weeks since the got chocolate milk? Team Refuel (now Team Chocolate Milk) voting period has ended for the first of this year and I haven’t heard a thing. Because of the silence, I am assuming I didn’t win, but at the same time I am holding out a little bit of hope. I won’t lie, I really wanted to be a part of the Team Chocolate Milk. All is not lost, especially since I still don’t know for sure. I have been looking and checking the websites looking for any information, but I believe that it is more of a secret than the next Apple product release.

Moving on to where I am in training. I just started my newest training program as a way to get my body back into the swing of working out. I took almost two months off due to illness and then laziness so it is time to get back on the proverbial horse. I am training for a Bike MS race in the middle of June. There are several events during the weekend that I am looking at so I haven’t picked a destination yet, but I will update when I know more. As far as the race goes, for those who don’t know Bike MS is a bicycle race to raise support and awareness for the MS society in order to hopefully find a cure for MS. The races have multiple degrees of distance such as 35mi, 50mi and 100mi and most are two day events which you can choose the same or different distances on each day. My goal and what I am training for is the 50 mile each day distance. This will be the furthest I have ridden. I haven’t invested in a road bike yet because of how much money they are so I was going to try and do the entire ride on my Trek mountain bike. I’ve been told that would be a mistake as the mountain bike is a lot heavier than the road bike, but they are SOOO expensive! I’m not sure, but I know that I will be doing my training on my spin bike and my mountain bike, I figure that will be like taking practice swings with a heavier bat, or swimming with drag shorts on. The extra resistance will give you more power when you use the lighter bat or in this case a regular road bike.

Given that I haven’t done much in the way of working out or training in the last two months, I have had to kind of start over in the way of working out. I found a 20 week program from Britain online to bike a 60 mile bike ride. It is from a website called doitforcharity.com. Here is the program:

20-week training guide for Beginners/Social Cyclists! 

(taken from: http://www.doitforcharity.com/cycling-training-guide.aspx)

Week 1 2 x 15 – 20 mins Sat or Sun: 1 hour Week 2 Mon or Tues: 20 - 25 mins Thurs or Fri: 20 - 25 mins Sat or Sun: 1½ hrs Week 3 2 x 25 – 30 mins Sat or Sun: 1½ - 2 hrs Week 4, 5, 6 & 7 3 x 30 – 40 mins (8-10 miles) Sat or Sun: 2 hrs (25 - 30 miles) Week 8 Tues: 10 – 15 miles Thurs: 10 – 15 miles Fri: 5 miles Sat: 30 – 40 miles (2 - 2½ hrs) Week 9 & 10 Mon or Tues: 10+ miles Thurs or Fri: 10+ miles Sat or Sun: 20 – 25 miles Week 11 Mon: 8 – 10 miles Tues: 10 – 15 miles Thurs: 10 – 15 miles Sun: 40 – 50 miles Week 12, 13 & 14 Mon: 10 miles easy cycling Tues: 15 – 20 miles Thurs: 15 – 20 miles Sun: 45 – 55 miles

Week 15 Mon: 10 miles easy cycling Weds: 10 miles Fri: 15 – 20 miles Sun: 50 – 60 miles Week 16 & 17 Tues: 20 – 25 miles Thurs: 20 – 25 miles Sun: 50 – 60 miles Week 18 Mon: 10 miles easy spinning Weds: 15 miles Sat: 20 – 25 miles Sun: 55 – 65 miles Week 19 Tues: 15 miles Thurs: 25 miles Sat: 25 miles Sun: 60 - 70 miles Week 20 Tues: 25 miles Weds: 15 miles Thurs: 25 miles Sat: 25 – 30 miles Sun: 70 – 75 miles THE WEEK BEFORE YOU GO! Mon: 10 miles Tues: 5 miles Weds: 10 miles Thurs: 5 miles Fri: Rest

This seems to be a pretty daunting task, but I am very much tired or sitting around wanting to do bigger athletic things and not making them happen. I am tired of yo-yoing up and down with my weight and I am tired of not feel as good as I could. Do you ever feel this way? Do you ever feel like you are so tired of sitting on the sidelines of life that you are desperate to do something?! This is where I am and I am so ready to change. So here goes. Cheer me on and/or join me on this journey. You don’t have to do anything huge, but get up and move. If you’re tired of where you are then change is on you! It’s not ever going to be easy and I’ll be the first to admit that most days, I don’t want to do the things I need to do, but I know that I feel better when I do those things. Let me know what your story is and how you are going to join me in this journey!

I can already tell you that one of my biggest challenges is going to be my diet! After being off my game for two months it is very challenging to get back on track with food as well. I know that it is going to be of great benefit for me. Here’s to eating healthy!

I look forward to being able to update more as the training program goes forward. This is my first week and I have completed my first biking workout last night. It was hard and felt good. I biked just over 9 miles. I am looking forward to this race as it will be my first big race since I ran cross country in college. Stay tuned for more updates. Pictures of me training to come…at least that’s the plan. J

If you would like to learn more about the Bike MS races visit their website by clicking the image below. You can also check out the charity website by clicking their link below.