Tracking

Usually when I refer to tracking, I'm talking about food.  Monitoring my calories, carbs, fat and protein intake.  Making sure I get enough fruit/veggies, shooting for a reasonable amount of calcium/iron....you know....all that good stuff.

But today, I'm going to talk about a different kind of tracking.  Tracking my exercise.

I think I've tracked my exercise online ever since I started this whole trying to live better thing.  I've used SparkPeople online and I've use the SparkPeople app.  I would enter in the exercise and how many calories I burned, and that would be the end of it.  Poof!  Off into cyberspace it went.  I never really gave it any more thought.

Now, however, I've also been tracking on a calendar.  (You know, the friendly little competitions the hubbs and I have each month.)  Well, I have noticed something.  Tracking on a visible, monthly calendar really makes a difference.

Remember last month, when I said I started out strong, petered out towards the end of the month, but managed to finish strong?  (If you don't remember, I'm cool with it....I really don't expect you to remember every little thing about my life.  Don't feel bad.)

Pretty much the same thing happened this month.  And November.

I'd call that a pattern.  (I also decided I'm not planning out my workouts a whole month in advance.  See all that white out?  Yeah....I like listening to my body and adjusting things as needed depending on how I feel.)

You know what else happens towards the end of the month?  *Men, feel free to stop reading here.*  Lady loveliness.  (Yep, I just went there.)

Lately, the lady loveliness has been draining me.  Seriously exhausting.  This time, I was in bed and asleep by 8:00 twice when it came around.  And proceeded to sleep in until 6:00 am.  (That is a ton of sleep for me.)  I felt achy and sore all over.  Honestly, I was a tad nervous that I was coming down with something.

They say that knowing is half the battle.  Now that I realize this problem, any tips from the ladies out there on how to work with it?  Is there anything I should be doing nutritionally to help things?  Am I missing something?  I don't remember ever feeling so freaking exhausted for several days during the lady loveliness.

In the past, I've been able to work through cramps and the other crap associated with the lady loveliness.  But the past couple of months I've been knocked on my ass.

*Men, feel free to join back in here.*
Anyways, today's treadmill run felt awesome.  Usually, I take Fridays as a rest day, but I got adjusted at the chiro on Wednesday evening, which meant a run Thursday morning was not happening.  (Death Gym Thursday afternoon certainly did though.  Deadlifts, tire flips and kettlebell swings....oh my!)  Anyways, I opted to run.

3 min warm-up walk
1 min 5.6 mph
1 min 5.8 mph
1 min 6.0 mph
1 min 6.2 mph
1 min 6.4 mph
2 min walk
repeat till you hit about 45 min total (with a 3 min cool-down walk)

Felt flipping great!  Plus, I was on a treadmill that they replaced the belt....super cushy.  Plus, it made me happy to see them putting money back into the gym.  I mean, it isn't like the LA Fitness is crappy or anything, but it is nice to know they are maintaining their machines.

Right now though, my legs are sore.  (Hello, did you see what I posted about Death Gym yesterday?)  Tomorrow I am going to attempt a morning bike ride with the Breakfast Club Runners (I have my layers of clothing sitting out), then breakfast, then I have a Death Gym appointment at 10:00, and after that Trainer Frank and I are going to talk about goals/nutrition.  I printed out all my food tracking stuff from the last week, and we'll go from there.

Stats for the month of January
Starting weight: 199.1
Ending weight: 188.1
1,310 minutes (Not including 40 on January 1st.  Chris didn't want to start keeping track until the 2nd.  Me, being the anal retentive person I am, tracked it all.)