Who cares about the weather - go on your daily walk anyway!

January 7, 2010

Well that sucked! My lab and I just got back from our normal morning walk; and with today’s blinding wind and snow, this arctic air is starting to get old real fast.

While I was thinking about how miserable I was, my dog was running all over the place, and lo and behold, she was having fun! The wind chill was around 25 below with driving snow, and she was having a great time chasing all the papers flying down the street! Yup, she was doing her duty of protecting me from all the dangerous papers blowing at me! Attagirl!

I was staring down at the ground so I could keep my direction going straight, but I kept hearing a snapping noise. I looked up to see a flag at full mast waving in the driving and blinding snow. My thoughts turned to our soldiers working in 102 degree heat in Iraq and Afghanistan, keeping us safe.

As bad as it was, walking on the icy streets, seeing that flag reminded I how thankful I am to be walking and not in a wheelchair. Granted, my arms may not look the way I want them to look, I can’t bike as fast as I want to for as long as I would like, and my squatting 405 at times seems really really heavy. . . BUT… I can breathe fine and all of my limbs work just fine, my body still works just fine and I have nothing to whine about. I took a deep breath of that icy air and gave thanks to God.

When we came to the intersection 1 block from my house, my doggie wanted to turn and go around the big block to add another mile to our walk (in this bone-chilling weather?!). I rewarded her for all her work protecting me from flying paper, turned the corner and added one more mile to our walk. We both deserve it. Besides she was loving all this snow and wind.

We got home from our 3 mile walk and I fed her breakfast and after she was done (30 seconds later) she came over to say thank you as always by licking me to death – Yuk!

Remember, sometimes your actions are really appreciated by others even though they might not say anything at the time (if at all). In other situations, you might be the light at the end of the tunnel for someone else who is struggling with something harder that what you are going through.

I sure glad that it is going to be nicer tomorrow; sunny and a high of 12!

-SA

Cooking Day

Hey everyone! Here is a few videos to show all of you my routine of cooking and how I do it. Please comment on this post.

Running in heels

I was out walking my dog the other day - as I normally do in the morning - and as I came around the corner I saw this beautiful blonde lady/mom frantically running towards the awaiting bus with her kid.

As she was running, she was holding her kid's backpack and running down the street very elegantly in a rushed fashion (if there is such a thing) in high heels! I was truly impressed by this feat of physical athleticism! I mean here was this lady running towards the bus, throwing caution to the wind just to make sure that her child would not hold the bus up any longer just because the child overslept a bit. Very impressive!

Think about it for a second, ladies. A woman running down the street fast (nothing derogatory meant by that) wearing high heels (I don't know, 3-- 4 inches I guess) carrying a heavy backpack all the while looking graceful, as if it was no big deal that she could sprain her ankle and go tumbling at any second and go rolling in the street in the puddles. Oh yeah, did I mention it was raining and she had to dodge a few puddles?

How many of us are actually in shape or prepared enough to be able to run at the drop of a hat at a pretty good clip and maintain it for a good block or two? Far too many times we are too busy to take care of our health during our busy, hectic, American way of life. How many of us say that will take care of our health tomorrow but actually never do because we never have the time for it?

Most Americans are too busy to take care of their health today and unfortunately pay for it tomorrow. How many mothers and fathers out there would love to be a play with their kids but they can’t because there to out of shape or can't get down to the floor with them for fear of not being able to get back up?

Unfortunately, I hear this very often. There are a lot of people out there that are parents that can’t get down to play with their little kids because it's just too hard for them to get up-and-down off the floor. And when the kids get older, they also can’t play with them because they can’t keep up with them; sometimes the kids are only 5 or 8 years old and they can’t keep up the kids already. How are you supposed to keep up with your kids when they turn into teenagers and get into sports and want their mom or dad to come outside and play with them or practice with them?

Fortunately my kids can't keep up with me yet; but that's by design. With me working out 4 to 6 times a week and eating right the majority of the time, I don't see things changing anytime soon (I won't get into today's kids not be as active as we were, when we were kids - I'll save that for another topic). I remember hearing stories about my dad at how strong he was back in the day, he never knew this but, I was extremely impressed with that when I was in high school and have been trying to beat what he used to do ever since; though I don't know if I ever will since he used to be a really big strong guy with a lot more muscle than myself; way to go dad!

So what's the moral to the story here? Make time to exercise today so you can enjoy playing and spending time with your kids tomorrow.

Sunday Dirt Biking

So do you want to see how I spent Sunday in my version of relaxing which happened to burn over 2000 calories? Check out these two short videos of me riding my dirt bike.

On the first video, you're waiting for me to come up out of the woods. When I come out, my buddy stops and asks me what my heart rate is after I've been riding for 15-20 minutes already at that pace; which is 183! Then when I try to start it up and get going, I look like a total goon and can't get it going again because I'm in the wrong gear since I am really tired from riding with my heart rate in the upper 170s to low 180s the whole time. Then at the very end of the video I don't do the jump because something is in the way I have to stop to pick it up…


On the second video, my buddy is filming me as I ride my dirt bike up my ramp in my truck as I am tired from riding my dirt bike after three hours and he asked me how it went and I told him I had a good time…


So I was just thinking, when I rode in the MS 150 (that's the weekend where I bike from Duluth back to my house - 165 miles) I burned 4000 calories in around eight hours; whereas I burned 2000 calories in only three hours of riding my dirt bike.

So Monday I had one of those days when I cannot eat enough! You ever have one of those days? I kinda enjoy those days ;)

- Scott

Intensity: my version

So I have been talking about turning up the intensity during your workouts to a bunch of you so I thought I would share 2 quick clips of my workout with you about intensity and what my version looks like.

In the videos, you are going to laugh because I look pretty funny now as I watch them again; but during it, I didn’t notice a thing as I blocked everything out and got in the zone and then came out of it afterwards; that was fun! And to think I actually enjoy doing this stuff to myself!

Yea, I know, I am off my rocker
Anyhoo, this is what you’ll see in the video’s:
• Me working pretty hard
• Making a fool out of myself unintentionally; just working hard
• My maxed out leg press (though I could have done more)with the music too loud; sorry about that one
• My heart rate going from 93 up to 147 in 5 reps
• Me actually tired out and still trying to curl the weight making some weird faces to trying to “bring it” and using some “cheating” moves some of you won’t approve of; though not to bad ;)
• And my heart rate going from 88 to 161 in 6 curling reps
• What my new fabulous Fitness Consultant looks like
• And more of…

well here is your way to see how I look in my workouts, not looking my best ☺
If you can’t laugh at yourself, who can you laugh at?

Let me know what you thought if you wish ☺ I can take it.

Proper Form

Here is a video of my daughter lifting a hundred pound dumbbell with proper form with ease!

Turtleman Triathlon

When you have five or six minutes check out the videos from my triathlon relay that I just got done doing in the pouring rain!

There was thunder. There was lightning. There were a ton of dark ominous clouds everywhere and no shortage of rain - pouring rain I might add.

So here are some of the details from my triathlon relay I just did!

Due to the weather conditions and the lightning, the officials decided not to do an official swim. They called a kiddie swim instead which means that you run through the start your timing chip on, but about 30 or 40 yards and ankle-deep water, come out of the water and hand your timing chip to the biker.

So here are my stats:

* my time was an hour one minute
* my speed average was 20.4
* our overall time was 1:56:56
* my max heart rate was 178
* my average heart rate was 168
* calories burned in a little over an hour: 968!

Very minimal training beforehand :-)

Did I mention it was raining sideways along with lightning and thunder?

My teammate was an old colleague of mine, Anderson. He did the “swim” and I did the bike and our buddy Troy Eichers did the run.

The Lance Armstrong LIVESTRONG bus was there promoting its 'help fight cancer' agenda, too.

All in all, we all had a great time as always.

So go check out these videos - even though the videos the don't do it justice with all the pouring rain that you really can't see for some reason. Rain is coming down in sheets and buckets, and we all had a great time can't wait to do it again next year! :-)

Turtleman Video 1

Turtleman Video 2

Turtleman Video 3

Turtleman Video 4

Turtleman Video 5

Turtleman Video 6

Turtleman Video 7

Hawaii