Week 4 Recap and a Look Ahead

I'm finally getting a chance to write the post I've been attempting since Saturday afternoon. Some days, I just get busy!

Where I Am After 28 Days:

• Weight: 149.5 lbs.
• Estimated Body Fat: 15.5%
• Estimated Water Mass: 61.7%
• Estimated Bone Mass: 7.9%
• Average of all Blood Glucose Readings, Last 7 Days: 9.04 mmol/L

It looks like I have, in fact, lost a couple of pounds over the month. I'm not thrilled about that, but I won't worry about it until I hit 145 lbs. or so. My blood sugar is stabilizing quite a bit (see graph below), so the weight loss is almost certainly not related to diabetes, but rather the increased overall activity level. Furthermore, I do not lift weights as much as I did prior to initiating my marathon training, so some loss of upper body muscle mass is likely.

In fact, the real story this week is how much I've physically improved in just four weeks. I blogged about my tangible results a bit last week, but the best of Week #4 was yet to come. My long run consisted of twelve miles in eighty minutes. Then, during yesterday's "run," I ran eight miles in less than fifty minutes. That is, I ran four miles in twenty-five minutes, and then ran a negative split on the way home. I might add that on this particular out-and-back course, the way home is entirely uphill.

So things are off to a strong start.

Where Do We Go From Here?

Week #5 marks a new phase in the training regimen. Where the first four weeks were about routinizing, acclimating, and strength training, this week is when the real fun begins!

In particular, we start by phasing in regularly scheduled morning cardio workouts. This week, we'll jump rope on Wednesday and Friday mornings; but of course we are simply setting the stage for morning runs, beginning on Week #6. 

We will also tackle our first track workout of the season this week. I know you're excited about that! I sure am. I'll have all the details you need written down tomorrow, so that you'll have plenty of time to take a look before you hit the track. 

We also maintain our morning plyometric workouts. I know I haven't been very good about elaborating on those, so I will endeavor to correct my shortcoming this week.

More broadly, though, we are finally initiating the "serious training" segment of the show. Until now, especially if you've been training at Level 1 or Level 2, what we've been doing has more or less been evening runs with a bit of structure. If you've never experienced real, serious training before, you are about to. I think you'll really enjoy how it feels. There is a certain trepidation going into one's first track workout of the season, but don't worry! I know you can do it. When you do, you'll fell such an incredible sense of accomplishment, like you can do anything. That much, at least, is true: you can do anything you put your mind to.

I guarantee: by the end of Week #6, you'll feel like a whole new person, physically speaking. And you'll have no one to thank but yourself. 

Up Next: I'll provide you with tomorrow morning's plyometric workout, and tomorrow afternoon's track workout, including the next in my 'The Marathon' series.