The last time I wrote about my exercise, a few days ago, I had to give myself a pep talk and remind myself that working out five times a week instead of six was just fine.
Well, here’s the update: It’s now Sunday, the start of a new week, so I can look back at the week that just ended and say, quite definitively, that I did not work out five times last week.
I worked out four times.
And skipping that one additional workout this past week makes me feel like I’m off my game and that I should stop working out altogether for a while. I wish I was exaggerating, but I’m not. Getting that fourth workout in was a struggle, too. But I did it, and I’m not even sure how.
Yesterday, my to-do list was pretty short and sweet, and a lot of it involved catching up on all the quality (and not-so-quality) TV that I missed during the week. I needed to exercise, but I put it off and put it off and put it off some more. I couldn’t rally for the gym for the life of me. My gym closes at 7 on Saturdays, and as I watched, from the comfort of my couch, the clock switch from 6:59 to 7:00 to 7:01, a ball started forming in my stomach.
The thought of having only worked out three times during the week made me feel queasy. And yet I couldn’t bring myself to get of the couch and do something about it.
At 8pm, I decided I should go for a run. I changed clothes and when I sat back on the couch to put on my shoes, I didn’t get up for another half-hour. Finally, at 8:30, I started walking a few blocks to warm up.
Once I started running, I felt a lot better. Thank God. I decided to NEVER look at the clock – my goal was just to run as long as I could. I also gave myself a little project. Lately, while running, I’ve been using the GPS and my RunKeeper app on my phone to draw things in open fields and parking lots. So far I’ve drawn a star and spelled my name. This time, I decided to spell out the entire name of this blog. Thankfully, my local Macy’s is surrounded by big parking lots that were all virtually empty, as I was running after the store had closed.
My “Keep” looks pretty good – it’s in cursive:
The “It” looks atrocious. I tried to do both capital letters, but this is how it turned out:
I redeemed myself a little bit with the “Up” (and I crossed the 3 mile mark mid-U):
And the “David” started off OK (although my ‘A’ looks more like an ‘R’), but I misjudged the space in the parking lot and had to cram in the final three letters, and there’s an ‘I’ in there, even though it doesn’t look like it.
Altogether, I went 5.3 miles in 56 minutes:
Keep it up, David!
Keep It Up, David! 
perhaps you need a significant change-up exercise wise – find something new to do or a new sport to pursue.
I read something really interesting in a blog post, and your post reminded me of it (I can’t link to that post because it’s a members-only site, but I’ll do my best to share what it said).
Let’s imagine a very large dude, with 30% plus bodyfat, never works out, One day, he decides to run. He runs a mile, and crashes. Aches for a week. Then run again, just 1 mile. And again. And again. Just 1 mile. It’s his limit, and when asked why he doesn’t run more, or more often, he says “I’ll feel like overtraining if I do more than that”.
Yes, if he goes for 2 miles he would feel awful the day after. Cramps in his legs, sleepy, tired. But, is he overtrained??? Or he is just undertrained overall, and the only way for him to get better is pushing himself to do more??
Or see it this way: you, David, with the right amount of time, proper nutrition and workout schedule, could be able to run a marathon (if you haven’t ever)?. The logic answer would be yes, thousands of people run marathons, but they have to train for it first. It would be tough, hard, and painful; but if you give yourself a whole year to train for it, I think you’ll agree with me that it can be done. You’ll feel tired after each training session that takes your limits further. But you will not be overtraining, you’ll be just training, right?
Overtraining as in “pushing yourself so far that it doesn’t makes a positive difference in your health/stamina, but actually harms you”.
The blog post I was talking about basically said to me to “just shut up and train”. That the word “overtraining” is reserved to proffesional athletes, who works out several hours a day (think Michael Phelps), almost everyday, Over and over. Yes, pros have better genetics, but they aren’t a different species either… That that “overtraining feeling” is actually the feeling the fat dude running just a mile is feeling when he runs 2 miles. He’s pushing his limits, it is tiring, but he can overcome it and do better.
Like there’s no way you can reach real overtraining by working out just an hour everyday. Aches and tireness, sure, but REAL overtraining? Hardly. Heck, you’ll do more work working in a farm everyday.
Just a month ago, I was trying maintenance and lifting just 2-3 days a week (for 30 minutes), and cardio for 1-2 days a week (1 hour). Recently, I shifted to a 4-5 days weightlifting (1 hour, or 90 minutes) and cardio 2-3 days (1 hour). In a good week, I workout EVERYDAY. The first week was awful, wanted to die… I was getting that “overtraining feeling” all over, but I kept at it. This week was easier, worked out everyday, and feel awesome. So maybe I was like that heavy guy running 1 mile, calling the overtraining alert to avoid pushing myself? And when I pushed myself further, my body actually adapted!
So, mentally you called the overtraining alarm and sat at that couch… you tried to tell yourself that “taking the day off is healthy because avoiding overtraining”…. excuses! You knew it. Yes, you knew it. That’s why you eventually got up and run anyway. You knew you could do it all along!
I know about guys doing 1 hour weights workouts TWICE a day. They’re cool about it. It wasn’t easy at first, but they body adapted. If they can do that, why I can’t do it 5 days a week, but half of that (just 1 hour)???? I totally can. But only if I stop reaching for the “overtraining alarm” everytime I get tired.
What are your thoughts about this?
Keep it up David! You are doing just fine as far as I am concerned.
I agree with Nina David, you are doing just fine and you are most definately not looking for the easy way out! Keep it up!