Journey to the Race: Day 69

Teamwork is the ability to work as a group toward a common vision, even if that vision becomes extremely blurry.
-- Unknown

Ahh getting so close! Today was a day off spent relaxing and buying more exercise gear for the race since mine wouldn't work as well as I'd have liked. My arm is feeling better although I still get an ache every now and then so more rest is needed. I haven't been sleeping that well lately so hopefully I'll get a good nights sleep tonight. Hope you're all having a good weekend! :)

Journey to the Race: Day 68

It's not about perfect. It's about effort. And when you bring that effort every single day, that's where transformation happens. That's how change occurs.
-Jillian Michaels

My arm is still hurting which is more frustrating than painful. The weather also hasn't been great as it's been raining all week. I wanted to take it easy but still go for a run so my sister and I ended up going out for a run. It was cold but thankfully didn't rain while we were out. We had planned to alternate running and walking but ended up running the entire 2.5k with only about 3-4 10 second breaks to catch our breath. We also jogged most of the 2.5k back even though we had planned to walk. I feel really good that I can push myself to run that far even with short breaks. I'm still resting my arm but it does feel a bit better so hopefully it'll be better soon. And now I'm off for the rest of the evening. Night all :)

Journey to the Race: Day 67

I love those who can smile in trouble, who can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection. 'Tis the business of little minds to shrink, but they whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves their conduct, will pursue their principles unto death.
-Leonardo da Vinci


Sue passed away today in her sleep. She went peacefully with her husband holding her hand. After fighting for so long first with breast cancer then when it spread to her spine, then sepsis, it's nice to know that she's no longer suffering or in pain. She was one of the strongest, happiest, inspirational, and most optimistic people I've ever known. Though I never got to meet her in person, I had the pleasure of talking to her with my mom through skype while she was in the hospital before her condition worsened. She was one of those people that you can meet once and never forget, and I know she will be missed by many.
R.I.P. Sue <3



My arm is still aching so I avoided any arm exercises and stuck to leg exercises. I did a short workout of the exercises below doing each for 30 seconds and going through the list twice.
jumping jacks
wall sit
oblique crunch
ab crunch
squat
reverse crunch
high knees
lunges

I'm really hoping that my arm will be better soon, I think I strained something but I have no idea what or how I can fix it other than rest it.

Journey to the Race: Day 66

I am doing the best I can given what I have today.
-Jillian Michaels

Sorry for not posting yesterday, I only worked out around 11pm and then I forgot to make a post. So here's yesterdays.
I'm still very unmotivated to workout which is horrible. I'm on a new med that has a side effect of muscle pain so my left arm and abs in particular have been aching lately. I'm trying to rest both for now while still exercising. I did force myself to workout so I biked for 20 minutes. I had planed for at least 30 but I was getting very dehydrated. I'm hoping to get out running tomorrow so we'll see what happens. Hope you all had a great day :)

Journey to the Race: Day 65

“When adults say, "Teenagers think they are invincible" with that sly, stupid smile on their faces, they don't know how right they are. We need never be hopeless, because we can never be irreparably broken. We think that we are invincible because we are. We cannot be born, and we cannot die. Like all energy, we can only change shapes and sizes and manifestations. They forget that when they get old. They get scared of losing and failing. But that part of us greater than the sum of our parts cannot begin and cannot end, and so it cannot fail.”
― John Green, Looking for Alaska

Today's been...interesting. Started well, with me driving all over town job hunting. I've driven more today than in the last year. I applied to about 10 places, only about 2 of which actually seem at all promising but we'll see what happens. After I got home was when the day took a turn for the worse. I came home to find a post on facebook letting us know that my moms best friend, who has been fighting breast cancer which spread to her spine, had sepsis and was no longer responding to treatment. She's now in a drug induced deep sleep so she's not in pain and will very likely pass in the next few days. It was very hard news to get, and even worse to have to pass on to my mom as she's been relying on me for updates. Needless to say I was in no mood to workout and my left arm has been aching so today was deemed a day off. I'm exhausted so I'm going to read then go to bed. Night all.

Journey to the Race: Day 64

Where there is unity there is always victory.
-Publilius Syrus

Was feeling lazy today but my mom and neighbour decided to go for a walk so I joined them. They walked the 5k while I would run to a landmark then walk or jog back. We also went to a hill and I ran up it twice, my mom joining me the second time which was fun. I should train at that hill more often since I mostly do flat ground exercises otherwise. Overall we figure I ran/walked at least 7.5km in about an hour and a half so I'm pretty happy with that. Was a very beautiful day with blue skies and lots of people out and about.
Great day and now I'm off to relax for the rest of it :)

Update: well that was odd. Apparently my parents found an animal skull on our lawn and asked me to see if I could ID it. I was able to (red fox) but I have no idea how a skull ended up on our lawn so that's weird ><

Journey to the Race: Day 63

This is where it matters the most. This is where lives are made, in these moments when you can choose whether or not to say 'I cant' or 'I can.' It is a choice that will either make or break you for life.
-Jillian Michaels

Yay for an official training day! Damn that was a good workout. We did some light stretching, jogged to the park, then did a warm up including:
20m squat run
20m karaoke run
20m medium skip
20m high skip
20 walking lunges then jog back 10m
run up and down a steep ditch about 10 times
Needless to say I was tired before we even began the real workout sets. We then had several stations but our little group did them out of order so here's what we did:
stairs 3-4 times
jog (read: walk) back to the park
attempt 50m crawl with the foot peddle wheel thing and end up doing regular crawl the rest of the way (seriously, I couldn't get 2 feet at a time on that thing)
20 walking lunges
10 broad jumps
30 burpees
run to the stairs
rope climb
3-4 stairs
rope climb

Was a long but good workout. And I finally forced myself to not say "well I can get this far, I'll get to the top during the race" and climbed the entire rope so that I had to touch the metal bar at the top. Somehow managed not to scrape up my ankle badly either so that's always nice. I'm also getting better at forcing myself to continue running even though I'm out of breath. A lot of it is in my mind with negative thoughts so I'm working on pushing through it and telling myself I can do it rather than I'm going to pass out. Overall I'm so happy with the progress I've made, I'm able to run farther and push myself farther than I have in a long time.
And that's it for today, I'm off to clean before my family gets here. Enjoy the long weekend!