The Start of a Great Adventure... or Disaster :)

OK... welcome everyone to my running blog! The purpose of this web diary will be to keep track of how my training is going for a race I plan to run THIS FEBRUARY. That race is the "8 Tuff Miles" road race which will take place Saturday, February 23, on St. John, US Virgin Islands.

A little background (which I'll go into more in the future hopefully). I heard about this race from my parents who are frequent visitors to St. John, and in two visits to the island, I have fallen in love with the place. First off - I'm not a runner, and I never really have been. There was a point in college (just before heading off for a Caribbean cruise coincidentally) where I was running about 4 miles every night to stay in shape, but that only lasted about 6 months. Other than that it was hockey and just staying active that kept me in shape when I was younger.

So here's the point to fess up - I'm FAT. yep, since moving to Illinois about a year ago I've put on quite a bit of weight and am just about at the highest point I've ever been: 246 lbs (I'm only 6'). My weight has been up and down my whole life, but I've never been "really in great shape" or "really obese". I'm as close to the latter as I ever hope to be, and it's time to make a change.

When I came up w/ the idea to run the race several months ago I knew that I'd need someone to do it with and immediately called my best friend Brian as I knew he'd be up for an adventure and is already in very good shape after himself taking on some major lifestyle changes. He was in immediately as I expected and we also asked our other best friend Brett if he'd like to join us. Brett was in as well, but up until this weekend we've kinda been brushing off the details and I, in particular, have been brushing off the training. We went to visit Brian this weekend and I decided it was time for that to change. We also spent several hours on the phone together Sunday afternoon and now have our plane tickets, accomodations, race registration, etc. completely taken care of. In other words - we've put our $ down, there is no turning back!

OK - enough about all that for now as I need to get to bed. So I'll say tonight was my first "official" training run. I did better than I thought, but I have been doing some little runs and more walking here and there. It was a perfect cool night and I ran to the park a few blocks down the street and back with Pim (my white boxer), who enjoyed it immensely. I did not go fast at all, but I also did not stop. I know it's dumb to be happy I ran a mile w/o stopping, but you have to start somewhere. You can see my run information courtesy of my ipod nano and the nike plus website here:



Certianly nothing special, but like I said - it's a start and it's a mile. We'll do the same or a little more tomorrow and go from there.

I'm also attempting to seriously change my diet to cut the weight and get healthier. This has resulted in 2 horrible headaches the past few days that I am guessing are due to lack of sugar and caffiene. Anyway, today I had a small half a sub for lunch, cup of chili, chips, and diet coke (not great, i know). Then for dinner Ashley and I had chicken breast, grapes, and potato salad, w/ fat free jello for dessert (it was in a cool little mini pie crust w/ light whip cream). I'm going to try and pack my lunch a lot more and will do this tomorrow. Also, I rejoined the Naperville YMCA so I'll fill you in when I figure out how to work that into my schedule. I just don't think I'll be able to go in the morning - its too hard for me get up but I may go at lunch or after work. For now I will try to run every night and Ash said she'd start doing 8 minute Abs with me this week.

OK, that's enough for now!