might do some yoga.. but depends.. recovering from first dose of cymbalta... long story... nap andmaybe yoga..hugssss,sarah

Last night was "race day" on the spinning bike. The lady who teaches Tuesday nights is the state champion time trial rider for her age group (and the one below hers). She is also a race official for lots of local races, so she does a great job describing an imaginary race atmosphere while we are riding.

The idea of "Race Day" is to really stretch your aerobic engine and go all out for longer intervals and higher intensities. Normally, the profiles are set to take you up and down from an easy pace (~65-75% of max HR) up to your lactate threshold (~85-87% of max HR), with occasional excursions up to your max aerobic capacity (~90-95% of max HR). On race day, the idea is to spend most of your time very near your lactate threshold, with longer periods spent above that at or near your max aerobic capacity.

For our ride, we did about a 10 minute warmup, and then she took us on a "pre-race lap of the course", which was about 10 minutes long and included 2 long hills of varying steepness and some high tempo jumping (pedaling while standing and sitting over and over). After the pre-ride lap, we took a few minutes to recover and then it was race time...3 laps of the same profile at race pace, with all out sprints to end each lap as a "hill top sprint" to the finish line.

The warmup, cool-down, and pre-race lap dragged my averages down, but according to my HR monitor, I did 1 hour and 5 minutes at an avg of 78% of max HR and a max of 94% of max. During the 3x10 minute race laps, I didn't drop below about 85%, and spent most of the time at 87-90% of max. I did feel dizzy after a couple of the sprints and backed off slightly, but I think it was mainly the effort level, and not necessarily anything related to MS, as it went away as soon as I backed off a little.

Going to miss spin class tomorrow night for a meeting of "Because We Can"...our local group for cycling MSers. I will have to catch up on Friday afternoon. Also planning to do a 44 mile ride this weekend benefitting the Independence Fund to help disabled veterans.

Wow txbatman-- you ARE indeed Batman!

A mile today swimming in a cold pool...

I tried out my new Pilates DVD today. It was ok but nothing special. I got 50 minutes of exercise though. :)

Nice job ewiz :)

I swam a mile in the warm public pool today. Back to the cold public pool tomorrow.

Ok, tried out another DVD today, Tamilee Web. She's the one who made the "Buns of Steel" tapes way back when. :D She's about my age, I'm guessing but she make you work hard!

It was stretching, warm ups, abs, arms with weights and some buns, lol.

I picked my way through the sections and tried out most of them. I should feel it tomorrow, especially if I get my H1N1 shot in the morning. :eek:

I've been putting on a few pounds since being off work, and I need to get rid of it before the holidays. :o

Thats great ewiz. I read that exercise doesnt do much to control weight, interestingly enough. So, it might be just cut down on portion size, add protein and decrease carbs?

I swam a mile today. I've been in a minor flare for three days now:sensory stuff, burning in my left leg--blech. What an egg sucking dog of a disease.

Sorry about your flare BBS. I hope it passes soon.

I raked leaves, piled and burned this afternoon. I don't burn all of them, just the excess that I can't fit into the compost pile. I got about an hour of exercise and it was a beautiful day too. :)

We need a mulching mower so I can try to put the leaves to good use instead of burning them.

Good job Ewiz. Yes, I'm sure the flare will pass soon. I hate MS. BUt, I will go swimming anyway today.

well yesterday I did yoga, and today I will do yoga, and/or a walk, sun is shining bright out there. Might be cold or cool, but bright sun takes me out anytime!!

great job all keep on moving, hugsss,sarah

Thats great sabi!

I swam a mile today and I think the flare is over (crossing all fingers and toes).

the walk is what I ended up doing, long walk pushing double stroller.. so a bit tight and sore between shoulders but well worth it... nice sunny day...although chilly 45 but sunny!

Well we didn't do the 44 mile route on the Indepence Ride this weekend because we had some visitors in from out of town to ride with the team (including the bass player for Clay Walker's band who runs the national bike team for Clay's Band Against MS). Not all of them were fast or ready for long distance, so we only did about 31 miles. We did have a couple of sprints where we raced to street signs, and I won every one that I contested (including hitting 29.5mph on flat ground in one)...so it wasn't all a low-speed pleasure cruise. :D

Afterwards, they had an Army Chinnook helicopter out in a field across the street where people could climb around inside it and we got filmed for a documentary thanking our vets as a team while posing next to the helicopter. All in all it was a neat event and went to help a good cause. Weather was beautiful too, which made it just that much nicer.

Nice going TX.:)

Spin class again last night. Tough class...lots of high resistance hill work...my legs are telling me about it this morning. Final #s 70 minutes, max hr 94% of max, avg 79% of max, 954 calories burned.

This was our first ride in the "tour de joy" being put on at our gym. If we do 16 classes before Dec. 19, we get a free long sleeved dry fit shirt. Its going to be tough with T-day falling in the middle of it and us going out of town. I see a few 4-5 spin class weeks in my future...

I unburned that much,easily, this morning, with my Schwans Sausage, egg and cheese biscuit..:D

The good news is, I used cholestrol burning margarine on it..:rolleyes:

I put in 35 minutes on the elliptical today, then I spent ten minutes working out with my 3.3 lb. weights for upper body strength. :) I feel much better now.

And you have good cholesterol!! :eek: You can thank your parents for that! :) ;)

Mine was almost 250 last time and I had to change my diet to appease my doctor (gave up eggs). I had an excellent ratio of good to bad though so it makes it good though the overall number is high. :confused:

I think we are all doing so well with moving around; even burning toast :)

I swam a mile today. And faster than usual, maybe due to a cold pool ;)

Yeah, it was so much fun, I had to have 3 bacon and egg breakfast tacos for breakfast this morning. You should have seen what my HR monitor said for the ride on Saturday...I believe it was around 1950 calories burned...

Wiz, mine was regularly around 220-230 with a decent ratio of good to bad even with me eating a very low fat diet, but because of family history I went on Lipitor. Now, even with more eggs and fat (mostly monunsaturate "good" fats), my cholesterol is around 135.

Holy Smokes! 1950 calories?!! I thought I was burning with my 400 calorie swim! Nice job txbatman :)

I swam a mile today in the warmer public pool: very nice :)

Remember when Michael Phelps was telling about his 10,000 calorie a day diet when training for the olympics? Oh my, wouldn't that be fun ...:p

(Please bring me another large milkshake please, I need to maintain my weight for morning swim practice.) :winky:

Very fun. When my daughter was a teen she played USTA tennis about 3 hours a day and more on the weekend. She was growing rapidly (and is now 5 foot9), so we had to force her to have things like Milkshakes, just to keep the weight on.

I swam 1.25 miles today. Warm pool.

I did 40 minutes of Pilates today, having an early Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow. :Starvin:

I don't know about Phelps and his 10K calories, but we typically burn about 6K calories on the 1st day on the MS150, and about 4K on day 2. Needless to say, it is a chore feeding 13,000 cyclists who are ravenously hungry for the tour organizers. Lots of double plates of food...

Time to catch up...spinning class thursday night went about an hour and I am too lazy to go get my HR monitor to look up the totals, because I just got back from a 45 min spin class this afternoon (754 calories, 91% max 71% average, 63 mins total). We will be doing another class tomorrow morning around 10am, so that will be 4 classes in 5 days. Then we take a break until Tuesday night...

Yay ewiz, you were able to do it today :)

tx: I cannot imagine feeding that many empty stomaches!

Hey TX,

I rode in the local MS150 about five or six years ago, for the first 35 mile stretch (and that was a stretch, lol). :rolleyes:

We consumed lots of calories and water during the ride. They fed us well along the way. I still have my T shirt from that day. It was about 95 degrees with full sun and high humidity. I will never, ever try that again! :eek:

Also, I was taking Copaxone then, and when I did my morning shot in my thigh, I hit the muscle and it felt like I'd been shot in the leg with a gun. :eek: Ouch!!!

There was a 75 year old lady riding too, and she was a bike marathon regular. She had been on a 100 or 200 mile ride in Alaska and part of it was riding through snow accumulation! :eek:

She and I were at about the same pace and we both stopped at 35 miles. It was great, but I was completely worn out for about a month.

So, needless to say, I'm in awe of you or anybody with MS who completes the 150 miles!

Good for you! Alot of people get hung on "what if I can't make it the whole way?" The reality is that it is the fundraising that counts, not the mileage under your tires. If you tell your donors "I probably won't make it 150 miles, but I will go as far as my body will let me go", you will find that most don't really care if you are going that far or not...they just want to help the cause.

My first one was from San Antonio to Corpus Christi, Texas, and it was 2 years before I got my dx, but after my first symptoms. It was 95F with a 105-110F heat index and about a 15-20 mph headwind pushing against us. I made about 68 of 90 miles the first day and all 62 miles of the 2nd day.

During the ride it looked like somebody had driven down the road tossing bikers out the window into the ditch. Ever place where a tree had grown over the fences, there would be a couple of bikes laying in the ditch and a couple of riders laying in the shade under the tree...no matter how small the tree was.

At one point I was laying in a small patch of shade at the last break point next to a high school with about 10-15 other riders. I opened my eyes and looked up and there were about 8-10 vultures circling above us about 200 feet up. I told the girl next to me that either we REALLY smelled BAD or the vultures thought that a few of us weren't going to make it.

I specifically time my Copaxone injections so that I do my thighs on Monday and Tuesday so that I don't wind up with that problem for my weekend rides. It does make Tuesday night spin class a pain at time though...

I told my wife before she joined me for her first ride that she needed to tuck her sense of shame into her back pocket and leave it there before the ride. I told her that there would be people that were older (like in their 60s), younger (like 14), fatter, handicapped, riding mountain bikes, riding single sped bikes, etc. that would pass her up at some point during the day...and if she got depressed or upset because somebody like that passed her, she would make it a long day on herself. I told her if she just accepted that it was going to happen before the ride started, it would make life alot easier

Thanks, but I don't really look at what I do as hard. I am not currently afflicted with balance problems, extreme fatigue, etc. I greatly appreciate the support of others with MS, but to me, the ones who have much more severe symptoms than I do and are forced to use a wheelchair or who can't walk to the mailbox because of balance or fatigue, but still put on a smile each morning and make the most of their lives...those are the heroes to me.

They overcome whatever physical or mental issues they are having and put forth the effort to live a full life and to help those around them in the ways that they are able, and it really inspires me to try to do more each day in my own life. Those are the people I am riding for.

You guys are awesome :)

One mile swim today :)

Not much movement from my neck of the woods these days. Furthest I go is to fix fences and chase after fat little ponies. :deadhorse:
I'm not in the mood to swim- it's too wet. I tried yoga and it just hurt. I've had himself stretching my legs up in the air (well just off the ground actually) as I lay on the floor and that really hurt.

Taking one step back recently...

NIce to see you again pud.Fixing fences is plenty of exercise :)

I swam a mile today.

Still doing yoga in the a.m. and that's been about it.:o I am in hopes that within the next week I won't have the muscle fatigue and shocks that I have been experiencing. I want to get back to my walks.

Good job all of you!!!! You guys are an awesome inspiration!:hug::hug:

Did something a little different last night. 45 minutes on the elliptical trainer. Ended with a total of about 4.5 miles and 750 calories burned.

Post surgery directives: no exercise except walking. Not even walking the furbaby, in case he pulls:(
So far I've still gotten exhausted just doing little things. Going to try to take another small walk later today, but it's only about 1/4 mile...feel like an old lady right now:o

Try to limit your exercise until you heal more. Your body needs all the energy it can get to heal Debe!

Good job tx

I swam a mile today. I am going out of town for a few days, so you guys keep on moving.

Spin class last night...1:05, 89% max, 77% avg. It was a strength and intervals class and WOW are my legs sore. My calves were still tight from running on the elliptical on Monday night, and we did a lot of standing intervals on the bike last night. When I got home and took my shoes off, it felt like my lower leg from the top of my calf to the bottoms of my feet were just buzzing or vibrating.

Decided not to go back for a 6am class this morning. Not going to do any classes or riding for the next few days...though I might do some hunting if I get a chance.

I did 38 minutes on the elliptical today so I can splurge tomorrow on lots of turkey and fixings. :D

I'm glad to see you guys kept it up while I was in Atlanta Txbatman and wiz :)

Today, in the Atlanta airport, I was showing off my fitness. DH was walking on the moving sidewalk and I was pacing him on the non-moving carpet. A young man was moving on the moving sidewalk and I started to race him (he was about 26), he got a twinkle in his eye and raced me! A few minutes later on another moving sidewalk I raced a guy about 60 years old-he too got the twinkle in the eye. For a moment we were all like 8 year old kids

Yesterday I walked 2.5 miles in 45 minutes. Too cold to swim in Atlanta!

I had a ride on my most handsome horse a couple of days ago. i'm still very stiff and walking a bit wonky but it was SO nice to be riding. He's such a gentleman and stands dead still for me to slide very un-gracefully off him at the end.
Fat little pony still doesn't have steering so he's off limits for 8 more weeks. Then look out- we'll be running about like fools :)

Ok, 33 minutes on the elliptical today for me. I hope to do some more of something tomorrow. :)

That's plenty ewiz!!

Pud, good for you :) I'm afraid of horses ...

I swam a mile today. Great weather in Florida today.