S24O cycling: Can't we pack a bit more into our day?

Been a bit busy at work recently? Family time competing with your endurance sport preparation and events? If you're jammed for time, you may be interested in a new phenomenon in cycling (thanks to my brother Richard for bringing this important trend to my attention). Check out this link from http://www.rivbike.com/Bike-Camping-s/46.htm to get the bottom line on this new time saver training plan:

Most of us here have toured on bikes. Maybe everybody. Touring is fine, but it’s often inconvenient to the point of it just not happening. Jobs, families, school, work… it’s time-intensive. Blessed be the frequent bike tourists, good for you if you’re one of them, but you know what’s so much easier and available? The S24O: Sub-24-Hour Overnight.

It’s local bike camping, where you leave after work, ride 1 to 3 hours, find a spot to sleep, and ride home in the morning. It’s minimally invasive to your family and work life. The ride is short, and if you forget some “essential” piece of gear, what’s the big deal? You’ll live through the night without it.

The bike camping gear we offer is the same we use on our S240s. It’s perfect for touring. The selection is small but good. We don’t sell sleeping pads, so get one somewhere else. We don’t sell tents because we can’t find reasonable ones not made in China. We’re not out to compete with REI, anyway, but you can certainly equip yourself almost, but not quite entirely, right here and with confidence.

You get done with a busy day at the office.  Come home and tend to family duties and play with the kids. Around 10 pm when things settle, you bust out on your touring-equipped ride, jam about three hours to 1 am, then pitch your micro-campsite.  Grab a quick five hours sleep, jump up and break camp at 6 am, and burn it for home...you'll be back in time for the kids' soccer game!

Life is getting nuts.  We live in a want it all, do it all society. We are learning to cram and jam it all into one tidy package, but the bag we're shoving it into is ripping at the seams.

Maybe S24O isn't my cup of tea, but don't let me taint your perceptions.  If you plan on throwing one of these rides together, please drop a post and we'll roll out the details.

Wausau reporter shows me east side running loop

I am in town visiting my family and decided to contact the Wausau Daily Herald's ace reporter, Keith Uhlig. I've been able to stay in touch with the local scene in Wausau through an RSS feed of the Daily Herald into my Yahoo! home page...so each and every day, I can live a small piece of my home town life. 

Keith covers everything from new town development to political trysts, but he's also a champion of the endurance sport life - running, cycling and cross-country skiing. We set aside time to share a run at 8 am this morning.

I ran about 5 miles on my normal loop, then circled over to the YMCA to start the second loop of the day with Keith.  He chaperoned me on a wonderful 4 mile east side run, up some hills and out into the country, then back to town.  We jogged at an easy pace and talked of all things in Wausau...and also about keeping the endurance sport spirit alive among master competitors.

It's all good. Running is that sort of sport, you simply reach out to another runner anywhere in the world and convene a run.  It's one of the most fitting "how do you do?" introductions I have ever known.

Thanks, Keith, for sharing part of your day with me. It's yet another valuable Wausau memory, tied to a new friend and my favorite sport.

I like glaucoma glasses

Ever hear the saying "one man's trash is another man's treasure?"

My mom is cleaning out the house and offered me a great treasure...a pair of sunglasses that were provided post-glaucoma surgery.

These are really fine wrap-arounds that offer polarized pleasure.  They are light and really big.

And I'm sure someone billed a medical provider about $300 for these shades, so they're price-point-comparative to a top end pair of Oakleys.

And on this day they're mine for the taking.

I like my current place in life.  I'm 55, running about 70 miles a week and busting lower than 5% body fat.  That makes me quite strange and a 1%er among my peer group.  I'm an outlier and am so far gone I no longer need to conform to style and the norm.  So glaucoma sunglasses are my new eyewear trend for 2012.

You'll get ripped on P90X...in 10 minutes a day?

We've all been inundated with advertorial shows on TV; the premise of most is that with very little effort, you can drop massive pounds and look like a ripped free-weight model.

Many programs are bogus, but one that I would suggest gained credibility is Tony Horton's P90X workout plan. This no-nonsense "muscle confusion" regime combined cardio, weight resistance and stretching...many reported solid advancements over 90 days sessions.

If this level of intensity is good, can less be better? Tony is now promoting the 10 minute trainer...all you need is 10 minutes a day and you'll be dropping dozens of pounds in no time...right?

I felt a dull thud hit my stomach when I saw this pitch.  I don't believe any 10 minute workout can attain results and if someone can explain it to me, please post a comment and I'll do a feature report on the outcome.  That said let's do some simple math.  If we developed a total anaerobic motion for 10 minutes, how many calories might that burn?  Three hundred (300) if I'm being generous?  And if we performed that effort for seven days a week, we'd be looking at a 2100 calorie fitness effort.

Tony mentions his diet planning manual, so let's say it's top flight and we can develop a 1500 calorie a day diet. That's almost starvation territory, but with exceptional discipline, it's possible.  Let's say we were eating 2500 a day so now we carved out 1000.

According to the 10 Minute Trainer, we'd get:

2100 calories burned per week via exercise

7000 reduced calories per week via diet and food intake

4900 calorie advantage = approximately 1.5 pound loss per week

That's 6 pounds a month, 18 pounds over 90 days. Not a bad program, but the advantage comes through calorie reduction, not the 10 minute exercise burn. The problem for me is that 99% of the pitch is about the workout plan, not the diet.  I realize much of behavioral change is based on hope and dreams and that's why one clutches to the potential of flailing around for 10 minutes a day and looking shrink-wrapped.

Living on 1500 a day is a different story.  It's brutal, I've been there.  That part is harder to sell.

Comments or opinions?  Please post and we'll discuss.

Food: It's not your friend and it's not entertainment

Had my elderly father out for a few errands yesterday and on the way home, promised him a treat...he's been a chocolate malt/shake man from way back, so we stopped at MacDonald's.  I grabbed a small chocolate for him, but also succumbed to point-of-sale advertising and ordered a shamrock shake for myself.

I enjoyed every sip of that delectable concoction, until it was time to enter it into MyPlate...a whopping 770 calories!  It was good, but never good enough to warrant 1/3 of what should have been my daily caloric intake.

I've been on a major journey the first 2.5 months of 2012 and have dropped 16 pounds off my frame.  There are no magic potions or 10-minute-a-day workouts that will earn those results.

In this blog post, I'd like to isolate food issues and make a few points that may help you fight the battle of the bulge:

1) Get some distance from food.  Step way back and examine it from afar.  It's not your friend, in most cases it can prove to be the enemy.

2) Food is not entertainment, which means you can't base friends and fun around a meal.  Go out to eat, there's a much greater probability you'll screw up.  Most choices in a restaurant are way off your eating goal, so be aware of that.

3) Food is not a drug that is used to satiate the senses and dull our emotions.  Eating as a hobby is out.  This is huge for me.  I love to graze and hit the cupboards every 10 minutes.  This is where mindful eating comes in. Face the truth; 90% of the time when you want to eat, you aren't hungry. Matter of fact, start to note when you are actually hungry.  I will filling my pie hole for so many other reasons, eating to curb hunger was a rare occurrance.

4) See all foods as calories.  A long, consistent use of MyPlate (livestrong.com) will get you to the place where you know the cost of calories vs. a food choice.  See example above with shamrock shake.  Snacking on a 100 calorie bag of popcorn may make sense, but that big dish of ice cream at 9 pm may dump 500+ calories into your gut. It comes down to simple math, calories in (food) and calories out (exercise and activity).

I realize that this may paint a bleak picture, but it's not meant to.  It's about delayed gratification; you can get the immediate rush of a food binge or you can wait over time to see that ripped physique in the mirror.  The price to pay is high and that's why the reward is great.

Get in the game or stay on the sidelines, it's your choice and mine.

Get jacked with Premier protein shooters

In wilder days, I'd hit the bars with my buddies. If I succumbed to peer pressure and bad influence, it was possible we might knock back shooters of the strong stuff.

I still knock back a few now and then, but in this stage of life it comes after a hard workout when my body is screaming for replenishment.  And my "shooters" have become the little miracle bullets at left...Premier High Protein Shakes.

When you're traveling or don't have access to a blender or the goods to produce a full blown protein smoothie, drop into your local Sam's Club and grab an 18-pack from Premier.  These little guys are way less than a buck apiece and pack 30 grams of high-octane whey protein, have 1 gram of sugar, and come in at 160 calories. The taste isn't bad and you're getting the stuff needed to the muscles with rapid delivery.

I'm in this strange place where I'm not lying to myself any longer; I'm not pseudo-fit, I'm getting truly fit.  When you're headed south of 5% body fat, it's easier to hear your body scream for supplementation.  I hear those screams after banging out my hard 10 mile loop and I hear the screaming subside when I drain 1-2 of the little Premier shooters.

Most of us in the master competitor life can look in the rear view mirror and see the seasons of destruction, then the periods of care and rebuilding.  I'm living a good place right now and Premier High Protein Shakes are a nice complement to my lifestyle.

Get skinny and go fast plan, part #2

I'm continuing to push my get skinny/go faster training plan.  I have now lost 16 pounds since I fought back from a food binge semester break. It's an amazing place to be, this light and fit.

I am learning a few things over the perspective of time.  I'm the lightest I have ever been (155 pounds) but I have to filter that accomplishment through the ravages of a 55-year-old body.  Interesting that all my maladies are on the right side: Clicking jaw joint, arthritic hand, dinged knee and flamed-tendon foot. There's some sort of weight vs. fitness vs. aging body formula I have yet to invent.

But on occasion, you can strip that all away when God casts a ray of sunshine on your run.  I went out today after church - it's a record setting 60 degrees here in central Wisconsin.  Started easy but with most of the ice melted off the paths and streets my footstrike started to turn more rapidly. I had to borrow my mother's gym pants  (didn't pack any from NC) but that's OK, style isn't everything and sometimes cotton balloon shorts feel just right.  My Brooks Ravenna were laced a bit loose like I like 'em so we were well underway.

The miles slipped by and in my world, I was flying.  My pace was dropping under the 9 min/mile mark and a warm breeze was in my face.  The big test comes in the last mile...it's a half mile climb up Callon Street, then a right turn up Steepie on 12th Ave.  This is two blocks almost straight up, then over the top and down the hill before circling back to the finish.  My breath wasn't labored and I wasn't fighting the incline; I was digging and broke the crest, lengthening my stride down the next descent.

I came in with 1:31 for 10 miles, and since that included several miles of muddy and icy trail, I was pleased with the effort.  Thin is in, fat is not where it's at. I'm ramping up with protein, now trying to craft my body since it's down to stick man form.

Stay tuned for more updates on this reformation of body and mind.  It's a heck of  a start to 2012.

Lee McKinley: At 50, setting PR's at Western States 100

I've been catching up on podcasts from Trail Runner Nation. This morning, I was both entertained and energized by an interview with Lee McKinley.  This guy is 50 years old, still banging out Western States 100 mile finishes and...here's the spin...he's getting faster.

I'd highly recommend this podcast, you can download it at:

http://trailrunnernation.com/2011/11/cross-training/

Here's a teaser:  Lee was training with former Western States 100 winner (1990-1991) Tom Johnson, who laid out a training weekend for Lee.  It's a three day plan - 20 miles Friday, 50 miles Saturday and 20 miles Sunday.  The challenge, according to ultra icon Johnson, is to assure you can run all the miles at the same pace...gentle as you go!

Lee is a common sense athlete who has adhered to the swim/bike/run philosophy...the concept is to train hard but take the impact load off the legs when possible.

This interview is good stuff all the way through.  It makes my 55-year-old body yearn for another 100 sometime this fall. Thanks Lee, for keeping the lantern burning for master competitors who still hold onto the dream.

Weight loss tricks for attaining that skinny runner's body

I forging ahead with my post-Christmas-holiday weight loss plan.  It's not that bad once you find consistency and the parameters for food choices.  I'm down about 14 pounds and am looking for 5 more.

To that end, try some of my get-that-skinny-runner's-body food choices:

1) Orville Redenbachers (or Jolly Time) 100 calorie Kettle Korn.  Nice amount of fluffy food and you're locked at 100 calories.  Not many snacks come in that low.  For example, I grabbed a bag of trail mix the other day and cleaned it off...then looked later and noted I had ingested almost 1200 calories!

2) Fruit.  No secret here but once you clean up your diet, you'll learn to appreciate the natural sweet taste of oranges, apples, bananas, grapes, etc.  Good food with low calories.

3) Steamed brown rice and vegetables.  I have a two-stage Sunbeam steamer...brown rice on the bottom, load vegetables on top and steam.  A couple of big plates is low cal and also great fiber.

4) Hot cereals.  I'm into Bob's Red Mill 5-grain.  Microwave a bowl in about 3minutes and get your belly full for only 150 calories.  Add some raisins or a banana for an extra bump.

5) Smoothie.  I make mine with frozen fruit, Crystal Light drink mix and two scoops protein.  Get a big blender full with about 300 calories total.  It's rocket fuel after my workout each morning and serves as breakfast.

There are more foodstuffs you can integrate into your diet, but the ones above have really set the foundation for me.  Add a few energy bars each day and you're on the way to being ripped and ready for your upcoming endurance sport season.