I had a very interesting & thought provoking conversation with Mrs. BSR as I had my wake-up coffee this morning. We were discussing how the process of becoming fit is a long one and that there is an innate discouragement in that.
I did my best to express to her that it is a long process, but a worthwhile one. As a way of reinforcing my point, I showed her the graphic at the top of today’s post and explained that it was very true for me. Once I quit smoking, corrected my eating, and got back to active I was filled with regret that I waited so long to do so.
This conversation stuck with me on my drive in to the gym and through my warm-up routine. Eventually, it occurred to me that we have developed “motivational inertia” as a society. I define this as the way of thinking that says “it takes a long time to see results and that delays my gratification, so I don’t want to start now and suffer for no perceived gain”.
I lay a large portion of the blame for this at the feet of tabloid-esque magazines like Woman’s World that month-to-month have large typeface headlines like “Juice your way to 20+ lbs lost in a week!”. While well-meaning, shows like The Biggest Loser also show double digit pounds lost per week as viable.
All of this creates a worldview where a safe, sustainable loss of 1-2 lbs per week is seen as a failure, and not getting Beach Ready Abs ™ in four weeks means its not worth starting. Its ludicrous and sad.
We are facing an obesity epidemic – the dangerous cocktail of fatlogic and over-processed food (a story for another day & another post…) is killing us. It is a slow, hedonistic death that is preventable by personal action.
But maybe I’m just putting off discussing my interval training…
Oh man… this morning was a treat! Stacy is involved with the local 5k training group and received a coupon book that included a BOGO for GU. Since she is low-carb and doesn’t care for them anyway, it passed to me.
One Peanut Butter & a Salted Caramel (!!!) richer, I had a choice to make.
Yeah right. I grabbed the Salted Caramel this morning like it was a life preserver on the Titanic. It is a completely opposite experience from yesterday’s Jet Blackberry. Whereas the blackberry didn’t taste like a real blackberry, the Salted Caramel GU tastes precisely like a melted caramel candy. This is a dangerous, dangerous thing for BSR.
Today’s workout: 6.5 miles, Yasso 800s (3:10 pace): WU: 1 mile, easy (8:00/mi) -> 6x (800m at 3:10, 400m at 3:10) -> CD: 1 mile, easy (8:00/mi).
Thank you to whoever at Garmin programmed the Interval functionality into the Forerunner 210. It makes these workouts so easy to track. Six intervals is enough to lose track of as your brain gets fried from the workout, but the Garmin keeps it all straight.
Yasso 800s are seen (by some, anyway) as a good indicator of your ability to run your target time for a long distance race. A 3:10 per 800m pace would translate to roughly an ability to run a marathon in 3:10:00. So I was both nervous and excited to see if I could hit my splits today.
Hoo-boy… running pure speed intervals on an extremely short indoor track is quite the experience. Especially with the banked corners! But I had my Sub-3:00 Marathon Pace playlist queued up and went out to earn my rest day.
I can’t speak yet as to whether Yasso 800s will predict my ability to hit my target time at Glass City, but they are certainly an ass-kicker of a workout. Every time I hit the rest portion of the interval, I told myself (out loud, no less!) “next one up”. Looking any further ahead than the next 800 was daunting at that speed.
But Garmin shows that I hit my splits nearly dead on all the way through the workout. Boo-yah! Time, both on the active and rest portions, and cadence look awesome!
Now, if you will excuse me… my hamstrings are telling me that I am in trouble and will be duly punished for what I made them do today.
