Physical Challenge

Cliff and I have decided that we are going to make a prolonged, conscious effort to be healthier.  When we lived here before we were far more active.  For a few months in 2007 we swam over a mile four days a week, ran (varying distances) one or two days a week, and generally did more walking ad riding of bikes. Well now that we are back we are trying to create our new healthier lifestyle.  It has been pretty easy so far as we have had a blast doing one or two hikes each week.  This week I feel that we kicked it up a notch.

Cliff (who is the more active out of the two of us) has started rowing regularly again and is planning on doing the Concept2 holiday challenge which is rowing 100,000-200,000 meters from November 24th- December 24th.  He is trying to talk me into do the challenge as well.  I think I have put maybe 30,000 miles on the rower since it became apart of the family last October so 100,000 seems crazy.  But there are incentives.  Not only could I get an iron-on decal and Cliff could get a pin but for every kilometer rowed Concept2 donates money to the Vermont Disaster Relief Fund, American Red Cross Disaster Relief (International), and Unicef- Emergency Relief Program in the hopes of helping those who had the world rocked by Hurricane Irene.  Pretty cool, right?  Concept2's goal is to raise and donate $30,000 this year.   My plan....if I can manage to row 5,000 meters each day for 20 days then I will make it.  This is going to be pretty difficult as after 3,000 meters I am ready to give up and lay on the floor.  Oh well....we shall see.

In addition to rowing Cliff and I have been running. Cliff has had spurts of running over the past few years.  Each summer he would run along the William and Mary trails and meet me back at my office for a quick hello, a place to change clothes, and an occasional freeze pop (we always had them).  Some days he would run eight to ten miles in the swampy Williamsburg heat and humidity.  Nuts.  While at the elementary school he participated in the Boys and Girls running clubs.  He ran two days each week with the kids and did 5Ks with them.  He really enjoyed it and I can tell he misses it.  I have seen and heard stories about folks discovering that they enjoy running out of the blue and I have seen evidence with both Cliff and Brie.  I want to catch the running love bug so I am going to give it an honest try...plus I like running along the fuzzy trees.

So, as advertised, we have been running up to and on the Blanton Ridge Trailhead.  This week I have gone out twice. The first outing I ran (ok..jogged might be the more accurate word) with Cliff to the trailhead and then ran/walked along the 1.8 mile trail while Cliff ran ahead. Our plan was to meet up on the trail and then run back together.  I surprised the heck out of Cliff and myself by making it almost all the way to the end of the trail before Cliff caught me while he was coming back.  Cliff thinks that I might have had some sort of breakthrough as I did not complain at all (I'm normally pretty miserable to exercise with) and I was able to cover some serious distance....running!  I was pretty proud of myself.  Today I went out and ran to the trailhead and back.  Cliff continued on the trail with his new running shoes!  That is right.  Cliff bought his first pair of athletic shoes in 10 years.  Oddly enough we bought his last pair together on one of our first dates (exciting date...right?).  While he was out running last night a physical therapist critiqued his gait and was able to pick out Cliff's past injuries.  Since we want to run more it made sense to go out and get some shoes (don't judge Stephen). We went to the Eugene Running Company which was rated one of the top three running stores in the Northwest.  We figure since we live in Track Town USA that these folks should know what they are doing.  It only took about 15 minutes and Cliff had found his shoes.  In the car on the way home he looked shocked.  He has been trying to find a comfortable running shoe for years and they were able to put him in a pair in 15 minutes.  He put them to the test today and said that they felt great.  He has a month to run with them and if he is not happy then he can return them.  From what I can tell I think they might be sticking around as he looked pretty happy.

While Cliff has been out running or doing long rows, I have been hitting up the Wii Fit again. I love that thing.  You get to exercise in the privacy of your own home in your pajamas.  It is wonderful.  It is also pretty fun as Stephen and Nicole designed their own Miis on our system so their little animated faces appear along with animated Cliff and Rudy as I am hula hooping, doing kung-fu, and other fun games.  I think all of our Miis look pretty accurate.  Can you guess who is who? I bet you can. Anyway so far I have done it three days in a row and I am feeling good about it. 

I took a photo of us this morning to show you guys how serious we are about our pursuit of better health.  It was kinda cold so we are both decked out with nerdy ear warmers.  I think this photo pretty accurately describes how we feel about the endeavor.  Cliff looks overly excited to get done with the photo taking and get out on the trails and I look nervous.  Pretty accurate indeed.

Ok I've got to go now as we are making apple crisp for dinner.  Apple crisp is definitely apart of our healthier lifestyle.  I'm ok with that.


Also, I wanted to say thanks to Mom, Shane, and Aunt Pam for becoming followers of the blog.  You guys make me so happy!