My Current Plan – Cardio Version

06May09

My current workouts for cardio are almost exclusively one of the following:

• Spinning on the elliptical before I lift (25-60 minutes)
• Walking/jogging with the dog (25-40 minutes)
• Riding my bike

I almost always do the elliptical at the gym for several reasons.  First, it is low impact.  Second, it is right in front of the tvs.  When I have a set of earbuds that I have not sweated into oblivion, I still like to watch TV and spin away the minutes.  Third, the ellipticals at my gym are all fairly consistent.  There is a “hills” setting, which I use, and either “around the world” or “intervals”.   The machine also counts calories and, while I have doubts as to the accuracy of the measurement, it is a good baseline.

One or two days a week I take my dog out for a walk.  Recently, but before I started working out and watching my diet, I was pressed for time, so I decided to jog a block, then walk a block, off and on so she could get moving a little quicker since I didn’t have all the time I normally did for the walk.  These short jogs were definitely tough.  I have noticed recently that, while my jogging is still pretty slow and is laborious, I have improved my stamina as well as simply how I feel jogging.  Last week I ended up going for half a mile before stopping, farther than I’d jogged in several years.  Definitely felt good.

As for cycling, well, I have a road bike and I love to get out and ride.  I’m “training” for the MS: Beyond the Beltway ride which is coincidentally one month from today – a 63 mile ride in the rolling hills of Loudon County.  My normal rides are anywhere from 15-40 miles, so 63 might be a bit of a stretch.  I’m hoping that much of the rest of my training helps with my cycling legs as well.  This spring and summer I hope to ride my bike into work (19 miles one way) a few times a month.  At the latest, my first work ride will be May 15, for National Bike to Work Day.

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