Milo and the Calf

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November Experiments

November is going to be a big month of experiment for me. With my running limited, but the fear of getting out of shape and putting on the pounds terrifying me, I’m going to be doing some experiments in eating, drinking and working out. Every year I do a race in my hometown on Thanksgiving morning. This year I was hoping to crush my previous time, but this stupid foot injury is limiting my training.  I just won’t be able to get in the miles I would have liked.

So, if training needs to stay constant, what other way is there to get faster? Lose weight.

In November I am going to do two things to try and drop five or so pounds.How am I going to do this? First, I’m not going to drink as much. E and I have wine with dinner most nights, I am going to cut that back to a weekend treat. Second, for the middle two weeks of the month, I am going to give the much ballyhooed paleo diet a try.

I have some friends who are deep in the crossfit world who have had excellent results on the paleo diet. They have lost weight, felt better, blah blah blah. These guys are serious athletes, very strong and very fast at short distances, and this diet has worked really well for them. For me, I don’t think it’ll work long term. Despite all the injuries which have keep me from the marathon, I am (or want to be) a distance runner. That means I need to log big miles, and if I am running a lot, I need carbs. However since I can’t log the big miles right now, I feel like this is the perfect opportunity to experiment with a diet that has been successful for others and see what it is all about. Its only two weeks. If it sucks, It’ll be over quickly; if I like the results, perhaps I can adopt certain aspects to a more carb friendly diet.

So, the November schedule of fun events include:

November 1 – November 26 – cut out weekday booze.

November 9 – November 23 – paleo diet experiment

November 26- December 24th – row 200,000 meters as part of the holiday challenge.

Should be a fun month!

Additionally, I am thinking of using twitter to track some of this. Does anyone else out there use twitter to track their running?

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4

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  1. smt

    There is so much technical info on that Wikipedia page that I’m not going to get through, but basically the idea of that diet is protein and veggies, no? I have to say that I kind of agree that this works. I’ve long since stopped counting calories with that stupid website, but I’m still trying to be way less carb-y than I was before. Honestly, provided that I’m not actually training for a marathon, I don’t even buy the “runners need extra carbs” thing. Running for an hour a day is not that much — even when running at a half marathon pace, which is a lot faster than the pace that I train at, you still get about 80 minutes before your body runs out of carbs. And if my body has to go to fat burning mode on my runs? Not terrible! Anyway, the fewer carbs are working?

    Also, are you doing any strength training? Even though running burns calories better than anything else, I’m still in shock at how strength training gives me a better body than running ever could alone. My weight itself doesn’t go down by that much, but the fat kind of melts away.

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  2. seanv2

    Basically the paleo diet is a low carb diet heavy on the veggies and meat with some fruit. I had a long conversation today with a friend who has been very successful on the diet and he said he has had no negative effects on runs up to an hour. I’m not going to be running more than that for sometime, so I think this is definitely the time to play around with such a diet.

    As for strength training, I am doing some standard bodyweight work (i.e. push ups pull ups, etc). I have tried to fit more weight lifting in… but who has the time? I’ve got meters to row!

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  3. Glenn Jones

    Another rower! Cool! Have you seen this website? http://www.row2go.us/ . He’s the guy I who taught me to like the erg. I’ve put in a few (> 2,000,000) meters.

    My kids also rowed – my daughter rowed for U.C. Davis and my youngest son has gone to the Royal Canadian Henley Regatta a couple times. Love it!

    Reply
    1. seanv2

      Thanks for the link, Glenn, that looks like a very helpful website!

      Now, can I convince you to row 200K meters with me in December?

      Reply