WENDY’S WORKOUTS 4-29 to 5-3

May 5, 2013 By Wendy Leave a Comment

Monday: Ran 2 hours and 50 minutes which turned out to be about 15 miles. Yes this was a big whoops! If you follow me on Facebook you can move ahead to Tuesday because you know the story. Monday morning I dropped my car off to get an oil change. It takes an hour. Perfect, efficient me thinks, I’ll run while its getting done. Well after running about 50 minutes I get a call. My mechanic says I need new brakes and my car won’t be ready for several hours. Well shit! What do I do? At that exact moment Eye of the Tiger comes on my iPod and I think, “hell I’ll just run home!” It’s the thrill of the fight, right?? So I take off running. 2 hours and 50 minutes later I’m finally home. Note to self: never plan on running during an oil change again!

Tuesday: So now that you know what happened Monday, you know I have to pick up my car. So I head out on my bike thinking it will take my 20 minutes to get there. Well some bad approximating and a gnarly headwind the entire ride… And I finally arrive 45 minutes later. I can’t win with this car deal! I also swam 45 minutes… 2000 yards.

Wednesday: My plan was to ride my wind trainer for 1 1/2 hours. But after 60 minutes I called it quits. I had nothing in the tank. Think I’m still recovering from Monday!

Thursday: Had a huge work day. No workout.

Friday: Ran 50 minutes on a treadmill then swam an hour. Swam 1500 then pulled a 1500.

Can hardly wait to see what mishap next week brings!!

Filed Under: Play, Wendy Tagged With: inspirational, losing weight, sports, working out

WENDY’S WORKOUTS 4/22-4/26

April 26, 2013 By Wendy D Leave a Comment

Ok, so you haven’t seen my workouts in the last few weeks. Why? Well, let’s just sufice it to say… there haven’t been too many. Spring Break is a killer on the workout plan, is it not?? But I’m back at it… hitting it hard. Ok, not too hard! Shall we say easing back into it! So here ya go! I hope this motivates you to move!!!

Monday: Ran one hour and 7 minutes. Did hills which felt great. However, as I was climbing up through this neighborhood, I got lost. I mean I knew where I was, but I couldn’t figure out how to get back to the one street that would bring me back down to my car. Hence, the 7 extra minutes.

Tuesday: Rode 2 hours with my Little Friend Lynn. Ok, to be TOTALLY honest, we stopped by her daughter’s house for about 15 minutes to see her new baby! Super cute little guy! And since we had a little break, Lynn of course headed straight for hills and we climbed and climbed and climbed. I swear I do not know how she finds all these hills. Damn her!

Wednesday: I wanted to swim today but I arrived at my gym while the aquasize class was still going on. I love and appreciate exercise of all kinds…but man it burns me out when I can’t get in the pool! So I put my goggles away and laced up my running shoes. I ran 1 hour on the treadmill. I’ve had an irritating headache for about 9 days and today was no different. In fact, I almost let it serve as an excuse to not workout today. But I started out slow and the headache actually got a bit better. But an hour after my workout, my headache returned to its throbbing loveliness. I’ll explain more about these headaches in a post next week.

Thursday: Rode my windtrainer for 1 hour with my boyfriend, Mr. Reese. It’s been awhile since I’ve seen him so it was good to catch up.

Friday: GREAT WORKOUT TODAY! I took off on my bike and rode hills for an hour. I ended up at my gym and swam for an hour. 3000 yards. I then rode home… about 30 minutes. A 2 hour and 30 minute workout is a huge luxury for me! Man I wish I could do that more often!

Filed Under: Play, Wendy Tagged With: working out

WENDY’S WORKOUTS MARCH 18-27

March 29, 2013 By Wendy D Leave a Comment

Monday: One hour on the windtrainer. I put it on the hardest gear and kept it there for the entire 60 minutes. I wanted a good leg workout… this was it! Ran 30 minutes after.

Tuesday: My Little Friend Lynn and I rode hills today. Not a great choice for me considering I did a huge leg workout yesterday, but Lynn doesn’t care. However, I got her back. It was cold this morning in Reno so I ususally ride in legs and arms. They are just that. Stockings that go from your ankle to your thigh, and arms that go from your wrist to your armpits. That way when you get hot, usually an hour into your ride, you can just pull them down or they are small enough to fit into your pockets. Well on this day, I dropped one of my legs between my closet and the car. I didn’t want both of my real legs to freeze so I wore just one leg. Lynn HATES not being cool…and boy was I a dork on this ride!

Wednesday: No workout

Thursday: Swam 3,300 yards. 2000 straight. 10X100 pulling on the 1:45. 300 warmdown.

Friday: Rode my windtrainer for 1 hour on a hard gear again.

Saturday-Sunday: 4-H ALL WEEKEND! I supposed I could have run to the sheep clinics… but I didn’t. So no workouts.

Monday: Rode with My Little Friend Lynn. All hills AGAIN. What is up with that woman??

Tuesday: Ran for an hour around Virginia Lake. If you don’t know Reno very well, this is a great place to go for a run. It’s one mile around the lake. Totally flat. But you do have to watch out for goose and dog poop. Come on people!!! Pick up after your dogs!

Wednesday: Swam 3600 yards. 1000 swim. 1000 kick. 1000 pull. 600 swim.

A pretty boring week and a half of workouts. But truth be told, I’m exhausted. The calving season is kicking my family’s ass and the kids have tons going on in their lives. I’m just happy to squeeze in a few workouts here and there.

Filed Under: Play, Wendy Tagged With: eat healthy, how to lose weight, sports, swimming, working out

WENDY’S WORKOUTS MARCH 9-15

March 15, 2013 By Wendy D 1 Comment

Saturday: Ran for one hour. Yay! I got a weekend workout in. Boo!! It was on a treadmill in Stockton, CA!

Monday: Rode my windtrainer for 1 hour, again, in front of the TV with my boyfriend, Mr. Reese. And after admitting last week I had a crush on Mr. Reese, my husband asked me if he had something to worry about. Well, no, unless Jim Caviezel ends up in Reno, Nevada and doesn’t mind a middle aged broad with two crazy kids and a fluffy dog! Nope, nothing to worry about here!

Tuesday: Swam 3200 yards. 2000 straight (yuck!). And then 6X150′s on the 2:30 pulling. This I did with a man I’ve befriended at my pool. He’s from the middle east somewhere and said to me, “Vendy, I see yous going to svim a pooool set. Vants me to join you?” I answered, ”No problem amigo! Let’s do this!” ”Hokay, Vendy, vee svim!” He then proceeded to kick my ass! After that, I ran on the treadmill for 30 minutes… because he got out and went home. Take that Mr. “Vendy Yous A Gooood Svimer!”

Wednesday: It was my hubby’s birthday so I snuck in a 1 hour wind trainer session with my boyfriend, Mr. Reese, before hitting the shooting range for a nice round of skeet and trap. No, I’m not counting the shooting as a workout! Although it was truly an arm workout for me! Darrin makes me point my gun at the sky first and then bring it down to shooting level. That’s like doing 75 upside down push ups!

Thursday: Rode with my Little Friend Lynn outside! The weather was beautiful! We rode hills, of course everything with her is hills. We went for about 1 hour 40 minutes.

Friday: No workout. I took today off. I’m exhausted. Every workout this week was a struggle for me. My life was hectic this week and my workouts paid the price. It’s a hard lesson to learn, but sometimes the best workout is no workout at all… we need to listen to our bodies!

Filed Under: Play, Wendy Tagged With: how to lose weight, inspirational, losing weight, play, sports, swimming, working out

WENDY’S WORKOUTS MARCH 2ND-MARCH 8TH

March 8, 2013 By Wendy D Leave a Comment

Saturday and Sunday: No workouts. The weekends are my biggest challenge. Trying to squeeze in a workout in between the chaos of these two days is something I’ve yet to figure out. Yes, I could wakeup at 5am and do it then, but come on! It’s my weekend too!!

Monday: No workout. I typically hit it hard on Mondays. But today one of my friends ended up in the hospital so I was with her. I started to stress out about not working out 3 days in a row, but you have to always remind yourself, life happens. And being there for a friend is way more important than riding my bike.

Tuesday: I hiked for 50 minutes to the top of rattle snake mountain with my friend who’s diabetic. I’m helping him lose weight and on this day he told me his doctor hopes to have him off insulin in 3 months. YAHOOOOOO! And this is what the top of rattle snake looks like… in case you’ve never been up here.

Wednsday: I rode my wind trainer for 2 hours. It was snowy and cold in Reno on this day so I was forced inside. However, truth be told, I have a huge crush on Mr. Reese so thankfully I had a few episodes of Person of Interest on my DVR. The time flew by!

Thursday: I ran for 40 minutes and then hit the pool. I swam 3200 yards (128 laps for all you non swimmers). I swam 2000 straight and timed myself the last half mile. 13 minutes. I’m hoping to get that down to 11. Then I pulled 10X100 on 1:45. 200 cool down. YES I COUNT MY COOL DOWN YARDAGE!! Plus, check out my new cute “Dolphin Ugly” swimsuit. These suits are said to hold their shape way better than other suits. I’ll let you know if I agree! (nice goggle eyes!)

Friday: No workout. Was hoping to get on the wind trainer for an hour but again, life got in the way. As my coach always has to remind me, the stress of not working out is way worse than simply not working out. Life happens, and that’s ok!

Filed Under: Play, Wendy Tagged With: eat healthy, play, sports, swimming, working out

WEIGHT LOSS PLAN

March 5, 2013 By Wendy D Leave a Comment

The last two days, I’ve updated you all on my friends who I’m helping to lose weight. The husband has type 2 diabetes because of his weight. Doctors have told his wife she was on the same path. It’s been an 8 month journey and they are both doing great. Ups and downs, but all in all great. I’m the one who has had the problem. And this is it. I’ve posted this journey on my Facebook page and from day 1, I’ve had many requests for help. One woman emailed me from her hospital bed begging me to help her lose weight. Another woman said she has young children and is afraid she’s going to die from her diabetes. I’ve had so many requests they’ve paralyzed me. I’m the type of person who hates to say no. I want to help people… all of you. I would love to quit my job and open a free gym where you could all workout with me. Unfortunately, I also love a paycheck… so that’s not going to happen. So what can I do??? Well, I’ve decided on two things. First, I’m going to do a book report for all of us. A nutritionist gave my friends and me this book, “Why We Get Fat.” I’ve started it and it’s not a beach read. It’s case study after case study. So, for all of us, I’m going to plow through this beast and give you all the highlights. Give me a few weeks, I read at night when I’m already tired! Secondly, I’m going to start posting my own workouts once a week. Every Friday I will post what I’ve done for the last week so you can copy my workouts, use them as motivation to start working out, or laugh at them and say, “Who does this chick think she is?? Dara Torres?” It’s the best I can do. If I could help each and every one of you, I would! But since 2 children, a husband, a dog, two cats and a job make that impossible (oh wait, did I forget the hamster??), I hope you will accept this small gesture. A lot of you out there just need a big toe… I hope this blog can be that for you!

Filed Under: Play Tagged With: how to lose weight, losing weight, weight challenge, working out

WHEN SHOULD YOU STOP RUNNING?

February 27, 2013 By Wendy D Leave a Comment

To answer the question about when to stop running, I had to seek out a Sikh. And look…I found one! Amazingly, Fauja Singh and I have something in common. We run to save ourselves. We run because it’s our therapy. We run because that’s how we deal with pain. I lost my parents back to back. He lost his wife and son back to back. Both of us turned to training to continue living life. At one point, we both faced a fork in the road. The path to the left led to depression, saddness, hopelessness. The path on the right lead to peace, therapy, hope. Fauja and I CHOSE the right path. We CHOOSE to stay on that path. Every day, we all make decisions. Fauja and I make a conscious decision to live a life where endorfins flow freely through our bodies lifting our spirits, our hearts, our minds and our sights. I do believe the path of depression would be easier. But it’s not the right path. The right path is hard and takes determination and grit. But if an 89 year old man can choose to stay on that path for more than 10 years, I have a lifetime ahead of me on the right path. And in the end, running saved Fauja’s life… just like it’s saving mine. So I guess the answer to the question of when you should stop running is simple. When you’re 101.

101-year-old vegetarian runner completes his final marathon

Rick Chandler, NBC Sports

Feb 25, 2013, 11:00 AM EST

Getty Images

Fauja Singh, the oldest runner ever to complete a full marathon, finished his final race on Sunday, and now will hang up his competitive running shoes for good. From now on, Singh, who will soon be 102 years old, will run just for fun, “to inspire the masses.”

Singh ran in the 10k division of the Hong Kong Marathon, and completed the 6.25-mile race in 1 hour, 32 minutes, 28 seconds.

The Indian-born runner, nicknamed the Turbaned Torpedo, took up running at the age of 89 to help with his grief when both his wife and son died. A great-grandfather, he unofficially became the oldest man to run a full marathon when he ran in Toronto in 2011, at the age of 100. But he is not recognized by the Guinness Book of the World Records because he doesn’t have a birth certificate. Danged birthers. “I will remember this day. I will miss it,” Singh said minutes after crossing the finish line.

Singh completed nine full marathons after the age of 89.

Filed Under: Play, Wendy Tagged With: Grief, Grieving, inspirational, life, LIVING LIFE, sports, working out

IT Band Issues

February 14, 2013 By Wendy 2 Comments

Do you know what this is?

It’s a roller. Or as its referred to in my house, a fucking roller. If you’ve never used one you might think I’m being crass. If you’ve used one, you totally understand. I even put Donner in the picture to try and make me like it more. It didn’t work.

If you’re a runner you know about your I-T band. The iliotibial band runs along the outside of your legs from your hips to your knees. They basically hold our upper body and lower body together. I think of them as guitar strings. Each time I run my body is plucking away at them. Now if my legs would just make music as I jogged along. That would be cool!

I-T bands tend to get inflamed. That’s where the fucking roller comes in. You have to roll them out like a baker does a ball of dough. AND IT SUCKS! It hurts more than walking over hot coals. Trust me I know!

You begin by laying on your right side with your right elbow supporting your upper body and your right leg on the roller. Your left leg can either be bent forward to give you some support or if you’re a masochist you can lay your left leg on top of your right. And then you begin to roll up and down. Eventually you’ll find a hot spot. You are supposed to stop on that spot and hold for 90 seconds. I’ve never gotten past 23. It feels like your leg is going to snap in two.

But what really sucks about the fucking roller? It really works. I recently went to my chiropractor complaining of right hip and left hip flexor pain. She checked my I-T band. The right one was super tight. She said go home and roll it and it will take care of both of your complaints. Sure enough, after rolling it just one night much of the pain is gone. Damn! I hate it when the prescription to get better is the fucking roller!

Filed Under: Play, Wendy Tagged With: play, racing, sports, working out

MY “FIRST” WORKOUT

December 7, 2012 By Wendy D 4 Comments

And she’s back in the pool! “She” being me speaking in the third person. Because whoever that was in the water today sure as hell wasn’t me! That was until some woman walked over to me, panting on the wall, and said, “Oh hi Wendy! Nice to see you here.” Dammit. it was me. Ok, I should explain. I’m a swimmer! I have been since I was 7 years old. My closet growing up was decorated with blue ribbons, gold medals and pictures of my many many swim teams. I SWIM. I’M A BADASS IN THE POOL….and now I’m 40. Apparently, that changes things up a bit. My last true swim workouts ended back in June when I completed my half ironman triathlon up in Oregon. And as many of you know, I’m now on the hunt for my next big race. And while I figure out what am training for, I thought I would shake off the cobb webs and get in a quick pool workout. My first lap was good. And I should have quit right there. BUT I’M A SWIMMER! I can do more than 25 yards. Well, by lap 16 (just 400 yards) I had to stop and stretch! The backs of my arms were so tight I could barely pull my elbow up above my head. And my heart was pounding. Did I think there was a shark in the pool? That’s how fast my heart was beating! So after I caught my breath, I pushed off the wall to see how bad things really were. Normally, I’m a 19 stroke gal. That means it takes me 19 strokes to do one lap. Today? 23!!!! Let me put this into golf perspective for you. That’s like hitting a 5 on every hole of a par 3 executive course. So at the end of 18, you’ve swung 36 more times than you needed to! I was stroking hundreds of times more than I needed to! That’s called not being efficient… or totally out of shape, whichever. And if that wasn’t bad enough… I just had to do it. I just had to attempt butterfly! That’s my stroke. That’s where all those blue ribbons in my closet came from. I CAN DO BUTTERFLY! Except today. Instead of gliding through the water like a dolphin, I was like an elephant pulling a piano. I honestly wasn’t sure my arms would actually come out of the water during my final stroke to the wall. My heart was beating so fast NOW it was as if that shark was actually biting my leg. It was at this point I started to fantasize about stretching! I’m as limber as a tree trunk, but I just thought, “If I could just swim back to my towel, I can get out and go stretch. Stretching sounds fantastic right now. Anything sounds better right now than SWIMMING!!!!” But I didn’t. I stayed in the pool. Why? Because I didn’t want another “first” workout. The “first” workout always sucks. Unused, lazy muscles, the ones that have become happy to slightly sag… are being whipped back into shape… screaming and fighting the whole time. I bet that’s why so many new year’s resolutions to get back into shape don’t last past Valentines Day. The first workout SUCKS! You say to yourself, “Hell no I’m not going to do that again. It sucked!” That’s why I’m glad I started swimming again before the start of the new year. Because come January 1, when everyone else is gasping for air, swearing they’re going to stick to their workout resolution THIS TIME, I’ll be gliding through the water as a 19 stroke gal once again!

Filed Under: Play, Wendy Tagged With: fitness, swimming, working out