Posts Tagged ‘100 push-ups’

It’s funny how I don’t have much to say about running right now. Maybe it’s because training for the Shamrock Half is off to a good start and I don’t want to jinx anything.

I do feel, though, that I need to continue to mix things up. My core streak has started off well and I have no doubts that will only improve my running; my 100 push-ups effort is also continuing — last night I did a total of 80 push-ups with a redo of week 3, day 2. When I look at what I’m doing, though, something is still missing. I’ve felt like that for a long time.

I have a fairly cheap mountain bike that I bought about 4 years ago that has very few miles on it. It sits in a storage building gaining new cobwebs every day. When I see it, I wipe off the seat, check the tires and say the same thing – “I need to start riding my bike again.”

For those of you who haven’t followed me for years, you probably don’t know about my tail bone injury from summer 2008. That injury pretty much ended my biking outside.

When I joined a gym in 2009, I did some spinning on the various bikes in there, but my tail bone didn’t feel right for a long time.

That feeling of pain when sitting lingered with me for a long time. I know that’s only an excuse now, but I wanted to provide some context as to why I haven’t been on a bike in a while.

Today I took an important step to getting back on the bike — I purchased a bike helmet. It’s actually the first one I’ve ever owned.

Now that I’ve made that $20 investment, it’s time to take the next step to hopping on the bike and seeing what happens …

Image: Sura Nualpradid / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I continue to have a variety of things on my mind, nothing more dominant than the other. So for my 833rd blog post, here are a few of those things:

• January has felt like an up and down month, but in looking back at my previous Januaries since I started blogging, this may be the best first month of a year that I’ve had since January 2004 when I started running. That includes a trail race, a nice double digit long run under a 9-minute mile pace and, after tomorrow, more than 80 miles for the month.
• I’m thinking about doing an “core streak” in February — an exercise every day than engages the core. I’ll think of some guidelines in the next couple of days, but I think it would a great addition to what already seems to be working for me in the past few weeks.
• Speaking of what’s working, the 100 push-ups challenge is back in full force. I struggled a bit last night, but I’ve stayed solidly in column 2 and have seen an increase of 10 with my max test in this short time. This time around, I have realized one of major problems with not ever completing this or getting beyond 4 weeks — my goal has never been to do 100 consecutive push-ups. That defeats the whole purpose. My goal, this time, is to do that.
• I’m not ready to talk about weight gain/loss, but I have lost a very little bit each week this month. In looking back at various times I’ve written about weight, I tend to say the same thing. I just know I want to lose a few pounds and hit the Shamrock Half Marathon with weight not being at the forefront of my mind. I know that I’ll weigh less than 2 years ago when I set my PR, and getting another few pounds off me will be me an additional confidence boost.
• I haven’t talked much about my goals for Shamrock, but I will soon. I need a speed test or two to figure out if my “A” goal in my mind right now is realistic. Only 7 weeks to go!
• Scott and I announced some great #runchat news last week — we are speaking at Fitbloggin’ 12. FitBloggin’s mission is “To bring together the community of health-conscious bloggers for education, networking and friendship.” You can read a little more HERE about us being at Fitbloggin’. We’ll have more details in the coming months.

Way back on April 8, I started something that I didn’t really plan on — a “do something” streak. In the past 45 days I’ve done SOMETHING related to physical activity — push-ups, running, sit-ups, plank, squats … even a trip to the North Carolina Zoo that consisted of nearly 5 hours of walking and time on my feet.

The only day I think I fudged a bit was a day at the park with my wife and son — but it was hot and we did take about a quarter-mile hike in the woods. It counted. The key thing is I didn’t sit on my butt that day. I got up and did … SOMETHING.

Now that I’m 45 days into this, I should have some rules, right? Sure, I could, but then that would end the fun of it. I’m not going to count walking to and from my car every day, or my trips to the bathroom, or things like that to get away with calling it doing something. It is, simply, doing something outside of normal everyday life. If it’s too silly for me to post on Daily Mile, it won’t count.

Today was the challenge of all challenges in the streak. My son wasn’t feeling well all day and I was completely wiped out after yesterday — a 7-mile run and then a trip to a strawberry festival to pick strawberries made for a very full day. I fell asleep around 9 p.m. I didn’t “do something” until 9:15 p.m. today. That “something” was week 4, day 3 of the 100 push-ups program — my first-ever week 4 test is coming up in a couple of days.

I doubt I’ll talk about this much besides logging my workouts on Daily Mile — like making “rules,” I want this to be something fun. If I start thinking or talking about it too much, it becomes a hassle. When I stop for a day or have a day like this that was a true challenge or hit a “milestone” type of day, I’ll let you know.

The title is meant to be a reference to the Salt-n-Pepa song from the 1980s, which popped up in my head tonight while doing push-ups. Lame, I know, but doing push-ups I really have to push it to get through them.

I continue to tell myself that I’m not doing enough of these. I restarted the 100 push-ups program at the beginning of the month, but I should be doing a test getting ready for week 5, or even be on the first day of week 5. Instead I’m on the second day of week 4. That’s OK though — by restarting this program, I have done more than 500 push-ups for the month. I’ve never made it past week 4 either, so it’s important to me to do it slowly, even if it is just on level 1.

I have a major lack of confidence doing this program. I have no idea why or why I’ve never stuck with it, but this time around feels a lot better.

I’m kind of rambling about this and repeating some things I’ve said before, but I just want to keep going. I want this to be a key part of my workouts moving forward this summer to help me avoid the trap of “just running” once my mileage gets higher. Make sense?

* #runchat with me and Scott return on Twitter at 8 p.m. ET Sunday with an awesome giveaway from Hydrapak. If you’ve never taken part in #runchat, there’s no time like now to join in. From 8-9 p.m., we’ll ask running-related questions, you answer them, you chat with other runners about their answers — it’s really that simple.

For more information about what #runchat is, visit my #runchat page. If you have any question suggestions, send me a message on my Contact page. For information on the Hydrapak giveaway this week, visit Scott’s entry on his blog.

* After writing last night about how well running in the morning is going, I was faced with a challenge today: rain. It’s fitting I put a Forrest Gump clip with that post because I encountered some big ‘ol fat rain in the first mile or so of the run. Then, oddly enough, it just stopped. I ran without a watch for the second time this week and, just like Monday, got in exactly 4 miles. I seem to have a great sense of distance with running 4 miles.

* I’m considering entering a trail race this weekend. I honestly haven’t decided. I seem to like spontaneous things lately, but I just don’t know yet if I want to do this. I guess if I do it, some on the spontaneity is gone by mentioning it here, but it’s at the forefront of my mind right now, which I think is causing this bulleted post of a variety of things.

* I have started the 100 push-ups program for the umpteenth time. Since I’ve been doing a variety of push-ups for a while and did a few maxes between 30-35 push-ups last month, I started during week 3, level 2. After one day I realized that I was not doing nearly enough last month. So not hitting that goal I had of 50 consecutive push-ups is purely my fault. The first workout last night was great though with push-up sets of 12, 17, 13, 13, and a max of 22.

Is my goal now to do 100 consecutive push-ups? I’m not sure. This program is so tough, and I really want push-ups to be a cross training staple. The workouts in weeks 3 and 4 are ideal for that. For now, I’m just going to take the training program a day at a time and see how I feel in a couple of weeks when I do another test.

Missing one long run — a big one at 16 miles — caused me to miss my August goal of 110-120 miles by a lot. But I won’t let that one run define my month. If you would have told me at the beginning of the year that I would run more than 100 miles in both July and August, I would have thought you were crazy.

I end August at 100.6 miles — 0.3 more than July. I had my longest run in nearly 3 years. I can’t be disappointed in that. It’s my third triple-digit month of the year. After 8 months of the year, I’m at 710.9 running miles for the year. One run isn’t going to drag me down.

It’s also worth noting that even though my end-of-the-month sickness impacted my latest attempt at the 100 push-ups program, I did 450 push-ups throughout the month.

As the calendar turns to the last one-third of the year tomorrow, I am looking forward to more consistent cooler weather. There have been signs recently of fall coming, but temperatures in the 90s this week have been a friendly reminder that it’s still summer. For September, I obviously want to continue to increase my miles as the Richmond Marathon gets even closer. I’m not sure yet if I’ll get my first 20-miler in or not since I missed last week’s run — I just have to see how the next couple of long runs go before deciding on that.

I’m really looking forward to September and seeing how things go. I’ve mentioned before that I want a sub 4-hour marathon in November and with cooler weather on the way, it’s time that I pick up the pace a bit. My runs in the past couple of months have gotten slower in the heat. There have been a few runs that were a bit sluggish, and I don’t want to slip into just logging miles. The more aware I am of that, the better I can make my runs.

As I have felt for much of the year, I think the best is yet to come.

Back in June, I got completely worn down after a trip to Ohio. To this day, I blame many things for that, including myself for not going to the doctor a second time more quickly. This past weekend, my son was obviously feeling bad, taking earlier-than-usual naps and saying “boo-boo” and pointing to his throat. Then Monday, it was my turn to have a “boo-boo.”

Playing it safe, my son went to the doctor yesterday even though he seemed to be doing better. The doctor said there’s a 5-7 day virus going around and that days 2-3 are the worst and he was probably better. So, he is pretty much back to normal today. Yesterday, though, must have been the big low for me. I slept a couple of hours in the morning, another half hour in the evening and went to bed around 9 p.m. last night. I really didn’t want to get up for work today, but there was some things I really needed to do, so I slogged my way into the office.

By the end of the day, I didn’t feel nearly as bad and even now I feel considerably better than 24 hours ago. I’m not 100 percent yet, but it’s been a much better experience back in June when everything seemed like such a mystery. It’s just frustrating that a week after running 30-plus miles for the first time in a very long time that this hits.

Today marks three days in a row of not running — the first three-day break since early May. While I may feel a bit down, I can feel that my legs are refreshed and ready for another 30-mile week; I just have to rearrange Monday to another day. Fortunately, Tuesday is a usual off day anyway.

This puts me behind on the 100 push-ups program just a bit. There’s part of me that wants to get started on week 4 tonight, but I just want to get completely healed up. I may do a test and repeat week 3 again … I’m not really sure right now.

Getting sick is a nice reminder that my health is my No. 1 priority. A few off days, or even a bad week, isn’t going to make or break anything. I’m coming up on some key weeks with my marathon training and I need to make sure I’m 100 percent healthy to do this.

As things continue to go well, I’ve hit a block this week with things to write about, so here are just a few things on my mind:

* Barring illness, I will hit 30 miles this week for the first time since … well, I’m not sure. I think it’s three, although I might have hit the mark two summers ago. Either way, my 14-miler planned for Saturday will get me to 30.7 for the week, the first 30-mile week in a long time. I’m looking forward to it.

* I’m in week 4 of 100 push-ups, a big make-or-break point for me in this program. In tonight’s second set, I struggled, so I dropped down a level for that set. I ended up with 89 total push-ups and felt great. Now my arms, which are starting to see some changes, are ready to fall off.

* Daily Mile has recently had some site upgrades that I think are awesome. I’m so glad I found this site to log my miles and connect with so many different types of people. There are slow runners, fast runners and everyone in between, and being a part of the site has played a huge role is this year being so successful.

* I’ve mentioned #runchat a few times on here, but we need your help in making it better. Please fill out our very short survey that will help determine the day(s) and time(s) for #runchat on Twitter.

I’m mentioned it a few times, but I’m quietly moving ahead with the 100 push-ups program. I don’t want to make a big deal about it because of how many times I’ve done this and it hasn’t worked out.

Tonight I did the two-week test to determine how to proceed in week 3. I managed 28, which would put me in the top level if I want to, but I honestly felt disappointed I couldn’t get to 30. I think I’ll start week 3 in column 2 based on my experience with trying this. It’s time that I get beyond weeks 3 and 4 and get this done this time.

I feel like I have been very fortunate this year to have so many things going right with my running. After what felt like so much up and down in the past two years, my confidence may be at an all-time high.

* With tonight’s 4.1-mile run, I now have more running miles than all of last year. I continue to be amazed at that number. Seven months into the year and I have passed my 2009 total. Now I’m just 35 miles away from my 2008 total. It will be a while before I hit my all-time high of 960 miles from 2007, but of course my main goal is that 1,000-mile mark.

* Awesome by August has been a great challenge to get me focused on eating better and doing something other than just running. At this point with starting to add more miles for training, I know that weight loss will be harder and harder. But I am happy to report this week that my weight is 184.2, the first time I have been on the other side of the 180s (under 185) in probably three years. So for the challenge, I’ve lost 3.4 pounds, or 1.8 percent in three weeks; this year I’m down a total of 13 pounds, or 6.6 percent; and I’m down 35.8 pounds, or 16.3 percent from my all-time high.

So during Awesome by August, I have restarted the 100 push-ups program and am now in the second week of it, and I have added sit-ups to my routine. It’s a nice addition to just running. I hope that I can do even more in the coming months.

* I have revamped my About Me page to detail my journey of weight loss and becoming a runner. As I have written before, I often shy away from discussing my weight, but if I had never lost weight, I never would have become a runner; I would not have become a runner if I didn’t need to lose weight. So in a roundabout way, this site is just as much about weight struggles as it is with what I do with running. I’ll continue to write about running more than anything else, but it’s crucial I keep reminding myself of what I don’t want to go back to.