I can do that?!

I received my No Excuses system with the heart rate monitor just before Christmas but like most people, I wanted to start fresh January 1. Let me just say that was an incredibly stupid move on my part... not because I waited till then but because everyone else waits till then! In my small apartment workout room for the first month there was always someone on the machines. As a fat girl I was always self-conscious of what everyone thought of me so I wouldn't go to the gym if there were people in there. So pretty much for the month of January I did my workouts on my elliptical at home.

I started off kind of easy but I soon discovered if you do it correctly it is some hard work. With the heart rate monitor I would push it hard for 3 minutes to get my heart rate up to the designated heart rate zone then back off for 1 minute to let my heart rate go down. I would be ok for the first couple of intervals but as the intervals increased so did my heart rate goal!

Interval training with a heart rate monitor is a whole big equation of 220 subtract your age and blah blah blah, lucky for me the online website that I gained access to with the system figures it out for me and then scales the numbers up or down as to how 'dead' I feel after my workout. So I would start out with getting my heart rate up to 157 and by my 8th interval I was pushing to get it up to 172!

After a month or so I finally worked up the nerves to do my intervals on the treadmill. I was nervous because there was a sticker on the treadmill that blatantly stated up to 300 pound weight limit, and I weighed over that still. I got on it anyways! The intervals were different than the elliptical because I didn't have the resistance I only increased the speed. And at that point I had no idea that increasing the incline on the treadmill was basically adding resistance :). So I switched back and forth from a walk to speed walk until the last interval. I decided that I was going to increase the speed one more MPH for my last interval.

As I hit the 4 MPH on the treadmill and the belt slowly went faster I couldn't keep my walking pace and I started jogging! What?!?! I can run?!?! Then about 20 seconds into it I had to change the speed back down but I didn't care... I ran! This fat girl got her tushy moving fast enough to run!! You could have handed me $100 right there on the spot but I wouldn't of cared because I just ran! I felt more accomplishment in the 20 seconds of that workout than I did in the previous 35 or so minutes. From that point I decided I wanted to make it my goal to try and run an entire 3 minute interval without stopping. I don't know if you can get a runners high from just 20 seconds but I had a euphoric feeling that put me on top of the world... and I wanted to keep going!!