So back to the 5k. It was Gallop at the Grove in Golden. I was running with my cousins, Uncle while my wife, aunt, daughter (Happy 3rd Birthday!!!) and mom walked together. The start was uphill and the whole first mile and 3/4 was a slight uphill after that. I started comfortably while the sprinters took off and tuckered out. My uncle was with the sub 6:30/mi group that got out quickly with the sprinters, the 7:45-8:15/mi group I started with pulled away after the first mile and I was stuck in no mans land. I was looking ahead to that group and stuck in between a group I couldn't catch that was roughly a quarter mile ahead and other than one person no one within 1/3 of a mile behind me. It lasted like this until the finish. I had a strong kick at the end (downhill) to gain a considerable amount to the group that was a quarter mile ahead and fend off the only lady that was behind me that I could hear her footsteps before heading downhill. It was fun and I walked/jogged back up to walk with the other group of family after seeing my 12 year old cousin finish 2 minutes behind me and my 9 year old cousin finish 5 miles behind. Had my 12 year old cousin been training as often as I have the past two months, I may have been in trouble! I got to the other group of the family that was missing my mom who had dropped back from them. Her and I walked the last half mile together and it was nice. I was proud to see her finish since 8 weeks ago she wouldn't have done a mile of that course. We enjoyed a nice brunch after courtesy of my aunt and watched Sophie and my cousins play the next few hours while we relaxed and talked about everything including our race schedule.
So ahead is the Bolder Boulder in a week on Memorial day. It is a 10k in beautiful Boulder, CO which draws over 50k participants. It is a race that as a lifer in Colorado that you pay attention to and say I want to do that. It's been probably 15 years I've said it'd be cool to do that, though I've thought about it since I was a little kid and would watch the race. Training for this marathon has been a perfect set-up to finally run it. My qualifying run went horribly for it though. You have to run 2 miles on a treadmill at a 1% incline to qualify and my goal was around 17:45 for it. Unfortunately, I ran it and had not ran on a treadmill in years and was ill prepared. I say this because my 5k would qualify to run 8 groups ahead of where I qualified just over 3 weeks ago. Well, I prefer to catch more people than catch me so it may work out well. I am targeting sub 9:00 miles, so around 8:45/mi to beat a 55 minute Bolder Boulder. A month ago, I was just hoping to run 10min miles. I am excited to finally do this event and see if I can now reach what is a target time though like my marathon target, just finishing and not stopping the whole way is my ultimate goal.
So, I've watched the first two parts of the HBO Documentary The Weight of the Nation and just 2.5 months ago I would have been watching this and just bitched about how the BMI is full of crap. Well, I still think it is off and should be adjusted based off your bone structure, etc. but it is at least a close gauge. At my height my healthy/normal weight would be 125-164. I laught at that. I was 5'-8" and 170 in high school and at my healthiest. I am around 178 now and know 8 lbs would be enough to be healthy, so I feel my BMI is more appropriate around 150-175 for healthy to normal, though 170 is my life target weight. Maybe when I get to 160 I'll change my stance on this but 1999 was the last time I weighed 170 and I was wrestling at that time. Well, about the documentary. My Uncle Tim and I have been discussing many of these issues the last couple months on a regular basis, but the biggest things that are making America obese (I was fringing on that point when I got to 210) is empty calories and not burning off extra calories. We sit at desks eating candy and drinking sodas and sugary coffee drinks. I myself have regularly consumed my entire day of caloric intake in 1 hour by eating 2/3 of a Medium bag of M & Ms and drinking a 64 oz Monuntain Dew. They touch on a lot of great things for if you are overweight and how to change it. The main ones are:
- Stay away from empty calories. Quit drinking sodas, juices and candy. These have been the biggest things that every person can start with.
- Eat less portions and more vegetables which help fill the stomach but have very low amounts of calories. This is tough. Your stomach must adjust. Being a former wrestler, I am used to this and having my body adjust is easy. For the person that is used to eating until they are full, this is tough to get over and takes a lot of patience and will power. For me, I am used to starving myself or trimming a huge amount of food intake in order to shed weight.
- Calories in must be less than calories out. Simple math we refuse to acknowledge. Diets work because it gets rid of one of those groups with higher calories.
- Excercise. Excercising helps a person sustain weight loss. Again, simple but a lot of people go on food diets, lose the weight, then go back to eating what they used to without having something to burn calories. Excercise also is the quickest way to burn calories and allow you to eat. My appetite increases at times and instead of gaining 2 lbs in a day and not losing it, it's gone soon after because my body uses it for fuel.
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