I've also started playing with this Fit Day site where you can log in all your food and activities and it kicks back a bunch of useful crap I guess. I find it a tad easier to use than the iPhone app I was using, though at times I find their database wanting. Whatever. Honestly it only sort of matters. Based on my use of these food logs the whole trick is you start inputting this junk while watching the calories go up and all sorts of internal conversations break out ("Yeesh 970 calories for a Wendy's triple with everything?! Well maybe if I skip dinner") and you make all sorts of self discoveries like Bill doesn't pay it forward very well.
So I'm at Wendy's having lunch with my son and we're both checking out the calorie chart they have and I'm making modifications to my order. I ended up with a Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger, a baked potato with NO sour cream and a medium coke instead of a Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger, a baked potato with bacon and cheese and a coke float.
What I'm trying to say is the logging of the calories is effective but if someone knows an easier way of doing it then scanning some database and doing the math on "Bacon cheeseburger, 1/4 lb meat, with tomato and/or catsup, on bun" to hack it down to the right number of calories (312) for a Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger let me know.
I'll probably toss up a link to my stats in a week or so and turn Bubbles loose on it. Here's what my overall looks like from Monday to lunch today:
So you get the idea.I stroll into the gym today in a "GROAN I have to do intervals" funk and begin setting up on a recombinant. I lay out my various talismans and what not, decide I better try and pee and on my way in pass the man, the legend, IronMan who looks a lot like a day-glo orange fireplug with this t-shirt he's wearing.
When I come back out he's sitting on the recombinant next to mine already at work. He's doing intervals and is in the first rest phase, asking me questions as I set up. There are two ways I do these interval workouts. I point out that I use the cadence indicator which is RPM on the machine and try to hold it over 80 for the full run OR try to hold it over 70 during the rest and at 100 or higher during the hill.
We both choose 5/9 or level 5 for rest and level 9 for the hill. IronMan has already plugged in thirty minutes and I choose forty because I want to take a serious shot at completing the Pacific Crest Trail I mentioned a few days ago. To do that I have to get my steps waaayyyyy up.
We do a hill or two at a constant 80 getting a feel for it when all of a sudden he sucks me into hammering it on one of them. I think he got to 129 RPMs and I didn't come close to that but both of us come off the interval wheezing. Then IronMan gets kind of delusional and begins babbling all his secrets. I surreptitiously turn on my recorder just for these occasions, the people need to know.
Suddenly he's done and wiping down the machine. I'll have to ask him what he made of it tomorrow. I glance at my monitor, three more hills to go SIGH. Bubbles and awesomeGirl come over to IronMan's machine and begin playing on it. There's all sorts of babble about heart rates and what not that I'm half listening to, I'm prepping for the final hill, kinda dogging it on the second to the last one.
I'm going to hammer it on the last hill and see what happens.
I plug in the ear buds, turn up the volume and select Tom Petty's American Girl. I bring my cadence up to around 85 while in this last rest phase before the final hill. The music is perfect for both tempo and my mood and I'm letting it psyche me up. I close my eyes and feel the resistance go up as I enter the hill.
I go. I start pedaling as fast as I can. Then I pedal faster, and faster and faster. I know I'm making all sorts of noise but I can dimly hear Bubbles and IronMan saying "Go Bill!" My eyes are shut, I don't want to know how much longer, I'm working as hard as I can and feel enveloped, part of the music blaring in my ears... knowing I can't hold it...
And for one desperate moment there... just long enough for a 'taste' of it I was 'there.' I feel the grin break out across my face, hear the giggle... oh yeah, all right... for one desperate moment it felt like I could do this forever, drive those pedals all day long, no pain, just peace. It felt like a tiny slice of heaven. It felt dangerous and addictive.
Weezer's Beverly Hills comes on. I'm muttering, "Bad song, BAD SONG!" The tempo's all wrong! I open my eyes, my concentration gone. I still have a minute to go on the hill and reality intrudes like the bore it is and suddenly I'm gasping for breath, legs shot, feeling the bile rise and the urge to puke almost overwhelming. I can see the cadence falling from whatever it was and I fight to keep it over 100.
It's over.
But I had it, even for the tiniest slices of time, I had it and I'm grateful for it, that glimpse of what can be, of what I am capable of.
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