Exercise IS Hard

In late January, I volunteered at the Manhattan half-marathon handing out Gatorade on the coldest day of the year to runners as they crossed the finish line. This was an interesting experience on many levels, but the one I'm going to focus on today was watching people cross the finish line. Runner's had 3 hours to cross the finish line, but the winner crossed it a little after an hour in to the race. This 17 year old kid had just run 13.1 miles in a little over an hour and was hardly out of breath. And this trend seemed to continue through the elite runners, it wasn't until we crossed the 2 hour threshold that people really and truly looked tired. And considering I look spent about 5 minutes into a run this hardly seemed fair. :)

However, watching this actually has been the start of me noticing a huge mental hangup that I've had going on. When I started exercising even though I'd already lost about 40 pounds, I was still about 60 pounds away from a healthy weight and I was very out of shape. I have been out of shape most of my life. It has been a constant state of being in my life. There are a lot of reasons for that but that's not today's topic. :) Today's topic is about the feeling that I've never crossed a threshold from out of shape to in shape.

It will run kind of long so feel free to break up the reading. :)

I got a Groupon about this time last year for a boot camp in NYC that met 3 days/week for 3 weeks. It said all the nice things about how it was for all fitness levels and that everybody worked to their own ability. I got on the train to the city to get to boot camp having to get on the train back to get ready for work and then come back to the city for work. The very first day was about the hardest thing I can remember physically doing. Between the push ups and the running and the bear crawls, I had never felt as low as I did at the end of that first session. And for all the various fitness level propaganda on the website, the vast majority of people in that group were very fit and doing this as cross training for other athletic endeavors. The true pain of it set in the next day when my cat Buddha jumped on my shoulder right before my alarm went off. Every pain receptor in my body went off, and then I tried to turn my alarm clock off and couldn't get my arm to reach over between the soreness and stiffness. I some how made it to work and some how had enough determination to make in through the entire 3 weeks.

I then joined JCF Boot camp because it was in Jersey City so no extra commuting necessary, was much more affordable and the pictures on the website actually had women of all shapes and sizes on it. It turned out to be a much better fit for me, but it wasn't by any means easy. I actually signed up to go to it 5 days/week! I couldn't complete warm up runs without walking and I remember when the instructor had to take a picture of me attempting to do a push up to explain all the things I was doing wrong. And I slowly got better. By September, I was feeling how far I'd come and was now running multiple laps at the park and doing push ups and squats at least a little bit more correctly.

However, I still haven't been thinking of myself as in shape. I have a mental hang up that if I'm in shape, exercise will get easy. I seem to have it in my head that because I still breath hard, I still sweat, and my muscles still burn when I do things that its because I'm still out of shape. I feel like I should look like that 17 year old kid, cool as a cucumber after having run a whole lot of really fast miles. I have worked out at least 5 days/week often more since last May; when I got asked the other day if I exercise regularly I had to say hell yes! But am I "in shape"?

I joined a brand new gym in November. My gym is awesome in that it offers lots of fitness classes including a ton of Group Cycling (aka Spin) classes and even has a pool. I was afraid to try a cycling class until very recently because I have always associated them with the super fit. It wasn't a good fit for somebody trying to get in shape I've told myself, it would be too hard, I would embarrass myself etc. Similar thoughts go through my mind each time I do a race. Even though I know there are walkers who do the races and that all ages and shapes do races, I feel certain that someone will call me out as a fraud for being there. I am sure that I will be last and it will be embarrassing. None of this has ever happened and yet I still feel this way minutes before every race starts.

But the good news, I have started having mini breakthroughs and if you're reading this and nodding along at some of the feelings I hope you can too! I have now gone to 6 spin classes at my gym and been the only person in class twice. I can do it, but it IS hard! However, today during class I wore a heart rate monitor. During a particularly intense time I looked down to see that my heart rate was about 181, that is above 90% of my max heart rate. I had news for myself in that moment, doing something that got me to 90% of my max heart rate is going to be hard! My heart is going to be working hard, and I will be out of breath. Its okay that my muscles hurt! They won't get stronger if they don't! And the effort I was having to put into getting my heart rate that high was much higher than it would have been 9-10 months ago. Heck even 3 months ago. Not that long ago, doing the warm up would have gotten my heart rate that high and I wouldn't have made it to the 45th minute of class hitting each rpm target before I took my heart rate to that level.

Stepping away from boot camp has actually greatly helped me with the realization that I can be in shape and still find exercise hard. I have got to boot camp twice this week, a far step down from the 5 days/week I have been doing. I have never felt so good at boot camp! I feel like I can work harder and stronger because I'm doing other things and not pounding my muscles in a similar way each day. I started boot camp when I was fat and out of shape, but I can't continue to associate the fat Francesca with boot camp. Being sore is not because I'm out of shape, its because I worked hard! I have to start associating the fit Francesca with all things I take on!

And while exercise is hard, being fit is the reward! I walk up the escalators/stairs at the train stations around the city with ease now. I walk to/from the train much faster, I know you're jealous I've found a way to cut down my commute time! :) I can keep up with just about anyone now. In fact this morning after spin I honestly thought that I can't wait to take my 8-year old second cousin out on the paddle boats again because after all these spin lessons, I'm going to have her going crazy fast!

So if you're reason for not exercising is that it's hard, you're right! But the rewards are worth it and I've actually come to look forward to exercising. (and I haven't even talked about how great my clothes fit!) It will take more effort to make it hard as you get more fit, but I am making my peace with the fact that it should never get easy.

Plan for the week

Now that I've finished my Sunday night yoga class, it's time to look ahead to my workout plan for the week. My plan each week is usually pretty ambitious but I also am very conscientious about listening to my body and changing my plan where needed. If my body has had enough or needs more, I will give it what it needs. So without further ado, my plan is as follows:

Monday - 7:15 am Group Cycling (aka Spin)
Tuesday - 6:45 am Boot Camp, 7:05 pm Pilates
Wednesday - 7 am Yoga
Thursday - 6:45 am Boot Camp, 8:15 pm Fit Ball
Friday - 7:15am Kettle Bell/Group Cycling
Saturday - 8 am 4 mile race in Prospect Park

Mornings
One of the big things about my workout schedule is that the majority of it takes place early in the morning. I work out, shower and then go to work. One of the things to know is that I'm not a morning person. The reason I decided to start working out in the mornings is that I have no time to make excuses when its the first thing I do out of bed. I do not have to do anything special to get ready so I roll out of bed throw on my workout clothes and go out the door. I've read articles that people who establish a morning workout routine have better success sticking to it. I have definitely found that to be true! I also feel very energized when I work out in the morning. I also find that I get too hyper from evening cardio work outs and don't sleep well. What works for me won't work for everybody, but right now I really like being a morning (work out) person! :)

In the beginning...

Since January 3, 2010, I have lost 81.8 lbs. Some people blog about this process and I have debated it from time to time, but never became one of them. I am nervous about putting myself out there for others and sharing my inner thoughts on the work it takes both with diet and exercise as well as the mental and emotional aspects.

So why start now?
My friend K has blogged about her exercise and weight loss progress and has truly inspired me. It helps to know that we're not alone and that the thoughts and feelings we have are not as strange as they seem. But I'm also making a big change in one of the things that worked for me.

Boot Camp
Since mid-May 2010, I have attended JCF Boot Camp 5 days/week at 6:45 am. I have loved boot camp, it has given me some amazing friends and gotten me to probably the best shape of my life. I went from struggling to run a lap around the track to running races and from struggling to do a pushup to doing 24 in a minute. However, one of the mantras I've heard from fitness is if you do what you've always done, you'll get what you always got. So I've reached the time to stretch out and do something new. I assume that even Michael Phelps gets out of the pool on ocassion. :) I am signed up for boot camp through March 5th, but have already started going 2-3 days a week instead of 5 so I could spread my wings and try new things.

Accountability
The best thing for me about boot camp was the accountability both internally and externally that it gave me. Since I'd paid for the session, I was going to go to every class. I also knew that if I missed a class I would be called on it by either the instructor or my friends in class. So, I'm embarking on half-marathon training now. I wanted to do it with a training group/class but unfortuantly there is not one convenient for my location or the times I can run with working full time. So I'm using this blog for the cammerederie and external accountability that I need. I'm counting on somebody reading it to call me on not posting about my runs or workouts at least once a week. In the last week I only went to 2 days of boot camp, but have taken 2 spin classes and 2 yoga classes and am probably going for a run after I post this. I have the internal drive I need right now, I just want to keep it going!

My Goals
So I'm working on a series of goals right now and this blog is really dedicated to a specific one, but I'm laying out all 3 right here. 1.) I have approximately 20 more pounds to lose, my goal weight will have me losing 101 pounds. 2.) The Brooklyn Half Marathon is 13.1 miles that I'm going to run on May 21, 2011 - this is the primary goal of this blog to track my training for this race 3.) The 2012 NYC Marathon - I cannot believe that I'm planning for a race that won't be until the first weekend of November 2012, but its hard to get in! I'm blessed to live so close to NYC and have the opportunity to use the NYRR 9+1 option to get guaranteed entry. So far I have completed 2 races and volunteered at 1 more. When I cross the finish line in Brooklyn, I will have finished 7 of the 9 races needed.

The current thought in my head is that this blog will be maintained until the day after I drag myself back from Coney Island... but I could also forsee it being a training tool I keep using until the NYC Marathon too. It'll be a test on how vulnerable I'm willing to make myself online and how much y'all read and respond.

Thanks for reading the first post! Go out and have a wonderful weekend! :)