Over the hump

Sort of an odd title -- Over the Hump --- but fitting. It seems that with any training program, the toughest part is the beginning, when you feel clunky and heavy. If there is some past memory of being fit, your brain seems to enjoy reminding you about it. From the dark, pessimistic corners, a stream of thinking goes like this: "Remember when you were fit? Wow, those were the days. Now look at you. Look at how slow you're going! Look at how you plod along! Remember how nimble and light you were? Now you're older, your fat and your slow. It will take years to get a taste of that again."

Although I wouldn't call myself fast by any means, the clunkiness is gone, and I am back in the groove of training. It feels so good to be back in this state that, as I mentioned to coach Walton, I've become nervous on the days he has slotted as off days. There's a fear (no doubt issued from the same region of the brain) that a day without training will vault me back to where I was a couple of months ago.

This is the trick, of course. Once you get over this hump, training becomes more of an affirmation of possibilities than an affirmation of being out of shape. It's a profound difference. Before, you rely heavily on every trick in the book to ignore negative thoughts and commit to a workout. After, you have to hold yourself back.

This week is a 12-hour training week. This will be about twice the number of training hours Brian started me off with. My weight is down to 195. That's a seven pound drop from early January, and going back to October, I've now lost about 20 pounds. As Brian suggested, when the weight starts burning off, my back problems would fade. And that's exactly what's happened.

21 days since testing

It was a little more than three weeks ago I reported to Cadence for testing. Since then Coach Brian Walton has been sending me detailed workouts plans, and my nutritionist, Rebecca Marks Rudy, of Trismarter.com, has been watching over my diet.

As I've mentioned before, accountability works magic when a schedule becomes inflamed with responsibilities. Work has been crazy. But I've hit all my workouts and have been following Rebecca's recommendations quite religiously. Although I did have a few more beers yesterday than my allotted one, Rebecca said that on occasion, in conjunction with heavier training days, it was OK to do something like enjoy the Super Bowl.

It's amazing what can happen in three weeks time. Something clicked over about 10 days ago and I could feel that I'd lost weight. Yesterday, in fact, I weighed in at 197. I'm soon due for a bike test on the Computrainer using a CycleOps Power Tap, but I can tell you right now that I'm feeling more power and fluidity on the bike. On the run my pace at 145 beats per minute has noticeably dropped.

It's funny; I had been out of shape for about two years. There's a despair that sinks in. You start to believe you're ten thousand miles away from feeling like an athlete again. Yet in truth, it's really not that far away. Certainly I'm a long ways off from attaining a level like was, but the feeling alone of being cattle-prodded back into a good training discipline is enough of a buzz in itself. There are 10 weeks of training until I return to Cadence for my followup testing. It's marked on the calendar, believe me. Like Dave Scott often says, a key to good training is to make a game of it.

Another note about working with Rebecca. She understands how life can be, and in talking with her about how to redirect my diet, she didn't load me up with dozens of recipe books. She talked me through how I can set things up so if I get home after a long day of work, training, commuting and errands, I don't have to spend an hour trying to cook something. In other works, I have become a big fan of Lean Cuisine and other relatively healthy frozen dinners. That and a salad and I'm good to go.

That and one light beer. Except on Super Bowl Sunday.