Talk the Talk but Can I Walk the Walk, Isaan Thailand.

As I blogged the other day, I hurt my back by picking up a shirt from off the ground. After the trip to the hospital I realised that I am an overweight fat bastard. I hit the scales at the hospital at 105.3 kilograms. I have put on over 20 kilograms in just over a year, around 15 months. It was a good reality check and a wake up call to actually do something about being so unhealthy.

I do actually exercise, virtually every day. The problem is once I ran a lot whereas now I just walk. I was still eating like I was running 10 klms every day. I have lost the “s” shape from my spine I was told. Being overweight isn’t helping the matter of course.

I love soda drinks, Coke, Pepsi, Sprite and so forth and also sweets. These have all been taken away from me by my motivator, Miss Noot. I used to drink at least 9 litres of soda a week. I have now cut back to 2 1.5 litre bottles of the supposed sugar free stuff, it taste like it is though. I am actually hoping to be off soda altogether within the next few weeks.

Getting back into running is always a hard thing, hard being the motivation. I have always played sport or been involved in surf lifesaving. I have run half marathons and was running 10 kilometres every night here in my local park until I turned into a lazy sod.

A reader of this blog (John Paul) sent me a link to a site called C25K.com which says “From the Couch to 5K in 9 Weeks.” I don’t think 5K is a long way to run but in my condition it is. This site has some links to some really easy running plans that you can follow and you only have to workout 3 days a week. The original site is cool running and this goes into the many problems beginner runners and also people getting back into exercise can experience by being impatient. It has a lot of good information.

I went to a site called cairns communications as the person there had transformed all the data into the metric system. It is mapped out in a nice table for the 3 workouts per week. I have included the 9 week programme at the end of the blog. The programme combines walking and jogging, gradually building up to where you are running the 5K or 30 minutes. I have read over the programme and it looks easy on paper.

I will have to try and not get ahead of myself, I will try and follow the programme step by step and document my progress. I am sure adjusting my diet is also going to be a big stepladder up as well. I am still going to walk for 60-90 minutes every day but include the programme 3 times a week.

What was also really cool is a guy called Robert Ullrey, he has put some good dance/trance music together but the best is he tells you when you have to run or walk so there isn’t any need to look at your watch all the time. There is music for the whole 9 week course. He offers some advice and talks a little throughout the podcast but it isn’t over the top. I have downloaded the podcasts and have the first week loaded into my MP4. I am hoping to start it tomorrow. I am planning on running Wednesday, Friday and Sunday this week.

I hope to be able to loose a kilo a week, nothing too outrageous. I want do it steadily, I am sure if I was a little foolish I could lose 2 or 3 kilogrammes a week but I have plenty of time. I have set a kilo a week over the next 9 weeks and then also over my holiday period of 2 months. So, all up it’s 17 weeks and 17 kilogrammes. The best thing is I have all you readers, you guys to give me hell if I am not doing what I am rambling on about here. Well I hope you do anyway.

Here is the 9 week programme. It looks much nicer in table format from the cairns communications site.

Week 1
Workout 1 (W/O) - Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 60 seconds of jogging and 90 seconds of walking for a total of 20 minutes.

W/O 2 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 60 seconds of jogging and 90 seconds of walking for a total of 20 minutes.

W/O 3 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 60 seconds of jogging and 90 seconds of walking for a total of 20 minutes.

Week 2
W/O 1 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 90 seconds of jogging and two minutes of walking for a total of 20 minutes.

W/O 2 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 90 seconds of jogging and two minutes of walking for a total of 20 minutes.

W/O 3 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 90 seconds of jogging and two minutes of walking for a total of 20 minutes.

Week 3
W/O 1 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then do two repetitions of the following:
Jog 200 metres (or 90 seconds)
Walk 200 metres (or 90 seconds)
Jog 400 metres (or 3 minutes)
Walk 400 metres (or three minutes)

W/O 2 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then do two repetitions of the following:
Jog 200 metres (or 90 seconds)
Walk 200 metres (or 90 seconds)
Jog 400 metres (or 3 minutes)
Walk 400 metres (or three minutes)

W/O 3 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then do two repetitions of the following:
Jog 200 metres (or 90 seconds)
Walk 200 metres (or 90 seconds)
Jog 400 metres (or 3 minutes)
Walk 400 metres (or three minutes)

Week 4
W/O 1 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
Jog 400m (or 3 minutes)
Walk 200m (or 90 seconds)
Jog 800m (or 5 minutes)
Walk 400m (or 2-1/2 minutes)
Jog 400m (or 3 minutes)
Walk 200m (or 90 seconds)
Jog 800m (or 5 minutes)

W/O 2 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
Jog 400m (or 3 minutes)
Walk 200m (or 90 seconds)
Jog 800m (or 5 minutes)
Walk 400m (or 2-1/2 minutes)
Jog 400m (or 3 minutes)
Walk 200m (or 90 seconds)
Jog 800m (or 5 minutes)

W/O 3 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
Jog 400m (or 3 minutes)
Walk 200m (or 90 seconds)
Jog 800m (or 5 minutes)
Walk 400m (or 2-1/2 minutes)
Jog 400m (or 3 minutes)
Walk 200m (or 90 seconds)
Jog 800m (or 5 minutes)

Week 5
W/O 1 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
Jog 800m (or 5 minutes)
Walk 400m (or 3 minutes)
Jog 800m (or 5 minutes)
Walk 400m (or 3 minutes)
Jog 800m (or 5 minutes)

W/O 2 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
Jog 1.2km (or 8 minutes)
Walk 800m (or 5 minutes)
Jog 1.2km (or 8 minutes)

W/O 3 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 3.2km(or 20 minutes) with no walking.

Week 6

W/O 1 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
Jog 800m (or 5 minutes)
Walk 400m (or 3 minutes)
Jog 1.2km (or 8 minutes)
Walk 400m (or 3 minutes)
Jog 800m (or 5 minutes)

W/O 2 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
Jog 1.6km (or 10 minutes)
Walk 400m or 3 minutes)
Jog 1.6km (or 10 minutes)

W/O 3 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 3.6km (or 25 minutes) with no walking.

Week 7
W/O 1 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 4km (or 25 minutes).
W/O 2 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 4km (or 25 minutes).
W/O 3 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 4km (or 25 minutes).

Week 8
W/O 1 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 4.5km (or 28 minutes).
W/O 2 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 4.5km (or 28 minutes).
W/O 3 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 4.5km (or 28 minutes).

Week 9
W/O 1 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 5km (or 30 minutes).
W/O 2 - Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 5km (or 30 minutes).
W/O 3 - The final workout! Congratulations! Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 5km (or 30 minutes).

Thanks a lot John Paul for the link.
Brunty