The Results: PR achieved!

 

So for the last 2 weeks Kelley and I have been doing this Paradigm Diet challenge. We started this with the end game in mind:

1. shred some body fat
2. heal the right foot
3. make it a habit
4. get a shiny new PR!

The raw data does not lie.  We did a fairly strict adherence to the program, and I recorded my weight/bf%/workout log/diet log here on the blog. The raw data doesn't lie, here's how the goals turned out:

1. Body fat went from 22.2% to 18.1%, and my weight went from 185.2 lbs after the Thanksgiving bloat down to 175 lbs. So I lost 10 lbs total, and 9.4 lbs of that was pure bodyfat.
2. Healing the foot is tough to quantify. It does feel better, but not much better. These things take time.
2. Make it a habit. Today I missed my breakfast smoothie, but had one for lunch instead. And it was a real mental debate if I wanted to do the smoothie or the kale salad. Save that for tomorrow. I'd say it's a habit.

Ok cards are on the table. After the race and choir practice on Saturday we kind of went non-vegan nuts. Kelley debated me that the number of plates I get at the Chinese buffet should not exceed the number of miles run, but I proved her wrong (3.1 mile race, 5 plates at the buffet). This kept going into sunday, and by sunday night we both felt like absolute crap and couldn't wait to get hungry again so we could finally eat something healthy. Today was back to vegan with quite the sense of relief from both of us.

4. Shiny new PR! Why yes, actually I did get a shiny new PR. Saturday morning was the Jolly Elf Trail Run 5k. This was my third time doing this race, I set my old PR here 2 years ago, then in 2012 came in a minute slower than 2011. In other training runs, I will routinely do 5k tempo runs with times ranging from 20:45 to 21:30, so I thought I could easily beat that 21:58 PR.



Hi there! PR awaits this guy

They gave us all bells to wear on the shoes to make a big jingle.

I was not trying to blend in with this outfit.

I got there very early, and warmed up by jogging to the packet pickup then back to the car. Some light stretching in the park, a quick trip to the men's room to lose some extra weight, and I was ready to race. I got up towards the front and started talking with some other guys with much faster times than I was going for.

At the start I took off pretty fast, but was careful not to go too fast. The course starts out in a field, then heads off into the woods for some trail time. Some of the trails are paved. Then right around the one mile marker, you come out of the woods, run up a hill around the field where you can see the finish line clock and get a rough 1 mile estimate. The clock said 6:19 when I ran past, and the garmin said my 1 mile split was 6:49. My goal was to break 7 minute miles, so this meant I was right on point.

The second mile had the only really tough hill in there, and I passed my friend Jason on that hill. The 2 mile marker was right after the water stop, and the garmin said my second mile took 7:12. I was ok with that. Jason passed me at the water station, I was less ok with that.

The third mile repeated the first mile of the course, but this time when we came around the baseball courts I walked for only 4 steps to let my heart rate come back down some. I had been pushing it for a while and wanted to put up a strong finish. When I came back out onto that field the garmin said 20:35, so I thought I had a PR well in hand. I mean, you could see the finish line right there in the field!

Turns out the garmin also said that was only 2.9 miles into the race. I thought it was a short course at first, but when you start that finish line kick.... then keep kicking.. and kick... and there's the 3 mile alarm from the garmin... and you still need to hold a strong kick..... yea. not a short course. But my lungs, abs, and legs were totally screaming when I hit that finish line in....

21:56! I still got a PR by two whole seconds! I'll take 2 seconds. It wasn't the 21:30 I was looking for. It wasn't the sub-7 pace I thought I would get for sure. but I'll take it.  Goal 4 is very achieved!