Hello! Short week is almost done! It’s been taking me half the day to wake up because I’m working again this week and getting dropped off by my husband just before 7 am so that he can make it to work on time. I am not a morning person. I used to be. I was the person at sleepovers who would wake up by at least 7:30 no matter the bedtime the night before. Nowadays, getting up around 6 is not fun. My body is rebelling against this new schedule. Sigh.
So today was my first run in about a week and a half because of the pains I’ve been dealing with in my left leg. It went better than I had expected. I didn’t push to go too far because I’m not sure where my knee is at, but we ran about 1.25 miles and walked another .6 in horrible humidity. It didn’t feel like Florida or anything but seeing as how we ran at 8:45 pm after the sun had set, it was pretty bad. My average pace for the running portion was like 12:02 min/mi BUT that included 2 minutes of walking so according to my eyeing of the pace chart, it was closer to 10:30 min/mi which is pretty decent for me. It was so hot that when we came back that I was drenched in sweat. Excuse me, I meant glistening. My sister claims she never sweats and she only “glistens”. Whatever. I read an interesting article in one of my magazines about working out in the morning VS at night and I’m going to continue that discussion below.
Tuesday was swim day. Lately I feel like it’s taking me much longer to warm up and fall into my swimming rhythm. I think part of it is that I’m (unintentionally) starting out at my fastest swim pace which is kind of weird because the first 100m feels like I’m swimming through molasses. It takes me around 300-500m to fall into a rhythm where it doesn’t feel like I’m fully out of breath every 50m that I swim. I’m not 100% sure what to do about this when I comes to the race because I don’t really want to wait until halfway through my swim to get it together. Is this why people run around a bit before they start? That’s the only thing I can think of to do at this point that might help. If that doesn’t work then I’ll have to do some more research into this. I ended up a little short of my planned distance by swimming only 900m because one of my earplugs broke its seal and it didn’t feel comfortable. My average pace, not including stops, was 2:02/100m.
Swimming was followed by a summer corn chowder bread bowl at Panera which is one of my favorite soups. I haven’t gone for a bread bowl in so long because it’s too much food but it’s rough because I really like sourdough, especially with this soup. I couldn’t eat it all but it was delish.
The other day, I met the shaggiest happiest dog you could ever meet. My dad was checking out a house and started talking to somebody who lived on the same street because he was out walking his dogs. This dog was the most playful dog I think a dog owner could ever want. I’m not a dog person…. but he was cute to see.
Brady’s regalia came! I think the sleeves are a little to short but he says it will look normal once he’s wearing a dress shirt. We’ll see.
These were the worst idea of the week. I’m not saying that because it’s bad. Nope. They were too good and I’m not going to tell you how fast they disappeared. Don’t buy them. Funny thing is that I rarely buy this stuff and it’s not because I don’t allow myself to but because it is simply junk food. I don’t believe in junk food especially with zero nutritional value. I try to avoid it because even if it tastes good, it’s not usually worth how I feel after eating it.
So back to morning and night routines. I’ve always heard that morning running is better; It gets you energized for your day, most people like the temperatures better, something to do with weight loss, blah, blah, blah. I subscribe to a few health and fitness magazines and while I was reading the July/August issue of SHAPE the other day, I found an article talking about the health benefits of working out in the evening. I am much less likely to get out of bed to go for a run and opt for sleeping if I try and plan on a morning run so I’ve mostly given up on the morning plan thing for now and I spend my day mentally preparing for the exercise I’m planning on doing that evening. This article claims that if you change your exercise routine to the evening, you will “boost your fat burn and stamina”. I’m interested. Here are some of the highlights from the article:
- “When people exercise in the evening, they are able to go 20% longer than they are in the morning, research in the journal Applied Physiology, Nutrition, and Metabolism found.
- “Nighttime exercisers also had larger increases in levels of cortisol and thyrotropin, two hormones essential for energy metabolism, than people who exercised at any other time of day, according to a University of Chicago study.” (cortisol works as a fat-burner during exercise)
- “A study in the Journal of Sports Medicine and Physical Fitness compared women who walked for exercise in the morning with those who did so in the evening and found that… the women who walked later in the day burned more fat overall, regardless of caloric intake.”
- You should still go even if it’s close to bedtime. “People who exercised vigorously for 35 minutes about 2 hours before bed reported sleeping just as well as on nights when they didn’t exercise” (Journal of Sleep Research). “Compared with morning exercisers, those who worked out at night actually slept more soundly and longer” (Appalachian State University).
I often feel that studies can support or debunk whatever they want to be proving but in this case, whatever the results are, I think it comes down to finding out what works for you. Everyone is different and you won’t know until you try. Maybe one day I become more of a morning runner but for now I’m glad I have some science to back up my evening workouts. 😉
Let’s Talk!
Are you a morning or an evening runner/exerciser?
What do you do to warm up before swimming?
Dogs or cats? (We can still be friends either way :-p )
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