I’ve written before about my issues with my weight. Well, it all came to a head last month when my blood work showed that I was technically diabetic. Yup, Type 2 diabetes. The fat man’s disease. Granted, I had just barely crossed over the threshold of glucose levels to merit that diagnosis, but I had indeed crossed it. My weight was up to 238 pounds, as much as I’ve every weighed.
Typically, I’ve just said, “Fuck it.” Sometimes I made a 3 month effort to drop 10 pounds or so.
This time, I just said, “Fuck.” And then I started to take action. Real action. I’m eating a lot differently. I’m drinking a LOT less. And like the guys from LMFAO, “I work out.” I see a personal trainer two days a week. I “run” three days a week.
And believe it or not, in only a month, this is working.
A year ago, I “ran” a half marathon. Well, I used a run/walk approach where I would run 4 minutes, walk 1 minute, run 3 minutes, walk 1 minute, run 2 minutes, walk 1 minute. Repeat until I finished the 13.1 miles. I’m by no means a fast runner, and last year, I ran the thing in 2 hours and 42 minutes. That’s a glacially slow pace of 12 minutes and 22 seconds per mile. And the thing is, I was really pleased with that result, as the run-walk approach made this much more doable.
I’ve signed up for the same half marathon, which is on March 18th. This time around, I’m walking even more. I’m running 2 minutes and walking 1 minute — and repeating that to the end. Last year, I walked 25% of the time. this year, I’m walking 33% of the time. And I’m going to CRUSH my time from last year. How do I know this? Well, let me give you some data.
A year ago at this time, I did a 4.96 mile training run in 1 hour and 5 minutes. Ugh, that was slow. Today, I ran 5.02 miles in a little bit more than 52 minutes. That’s a 10:28 pace, my friends. I ran 8.3 miles on Sunday at an 11 minute pace. This is really surprising to me. My simple goal, of course, is to finish the damn thing. The real goal, however, is to finish under 2 hours and 30 minutes. For some people, that’s laughably slow. But for me — all 227 pounds of me (yes, I’ve lost 11 pounds) — this would be great. The fact that I’m going this quickly while walking 1/3 of the time is astounding to me. The personal training is obviously helping. I’m so much stronger than I was just a month ago. I’m eating better. I don’t get the post-prandial crashes anymore. Frankly, I’m feeling damn good right now, and I want to feel even better. My best time ever for a half marathon was at my first, in 2007, when I weighed 212 pounds and trained like a mad man. I ran it in 2 hours and 29 minutes. Oh, I was so fast then! I want to beat that time.
Now I need your help. I’m really doing all of this for myself and for my family. But I also want to raise some money for the local charity that is near and dear to my heart, the Lucy Daniels Center. The Center is participating in the Great Human Race, a 5K, on March 24. I’m not doing that race; I’m doing the half marathon the week before. But I’m running for this charity, which is the Triangle’s leading provider of mental health services to children. I’m the board chair of the Center, and I’ve seen the amazing things this organization does.
So please, click on this link and sponsor me. Make it two dollars a mile (that would be $26.20). Or even better, 10 ($131.00 for the mathematically challenged). Heck, get creative — just email me with a pledge of X dollars per minute that I finish under 2 hours and 30 minutes — now that’s an incentive (and don’t worry, if I am even 1 minute under that time, I’ll be ecstatic). But please do something. If not for me, for the kids.
And I’ll keep pushing harder.
CLICK HERE TO MAKE A DONATION.
Posted by Varmint 
