I’m going to start this (probably dead) thread for anyone who cares to share their personal achievements in exercise.
I just ran a 6:53 mile today. For the first time ever. Caveats are that it was on an elliptical machine so no impact and that the resistance was fairly low at 6 out of 20 levels the machine has. Still, nothing to sneeze at coming from the guy who couldn’t beat a 12 minute mile as a kid (granted, this was due to since diagnosed exercise induced bronchospasms which I now pre-treat with albuterol).
Give me a little time to get some achievements in and I’ll come dig up this thread and post. I need a little inspiration to get off my butt sometimes.
For now, a very minor one. I took the dog for a one-mile walk a few minutes ago, which is more exercise than I’ve gotten in the last two weeks minus putting stuff into suitcases. I had my mp3 player on shuffle and it was dark and the streets were empty. Very beautiful. The Hallelujah Chorus came on while I was looking up at the stars. Nice moment.
So far the thing I’m most proud of is climbing Humphreys Peak (highest in AZ) a couple summers ago. It’s 9 miles round trip and 3,300’ elevation gain from trailhead to summit. The pain in my calves woke me up the next morning.
My second proudest achievement was doing a sprint triathlon in December of '06. I did horrible but my goal was to do it and I did. I plan on doing it again this year and doing much better.
I think I’ve done a 6 minute mile but I’m not sure. My average is more like 8 minutes. I want to cut that significantly. I’ve been lazy all summer, though.
I just got back from running not-quite-18 miles. I’ve never done longer than a 15-mile run until today. At my long run training pace, that’s 3 hours of running!
The kicker? I’m pissed at myself for not planning the route better and making it to an even 18. :smack:
I can get up that really steep hill covered in bark & sand on my mountain bike now. I used to never think I could do it, but a new bike + 2 months of riding did the trick!
I was always skinny. Two years ago, I got up enough nerve to go into my local gym and start lifting weights. I embarrased myself by struggling to bench press 110 pounds. (Struggling. Like, “I have to get this bar back on the rack to live”.) I went home pissed, read everything about fitness I could, and started eating. One of my goals, as superficial as it was, was to bench press my weight (155 lbs).
I eclipsed that and kept going, and now press 260. I would never brag about that exercise or weight IRL, because as shown above, someone can always lift more. But dammit I was proud of myself when I went to two plates/side.
I’ve been riding my bicycle to work. They remodeled one of the floors and put in showers, so I can get cleaned up once I get here. 20 miles, round trip; I did 100 miles each of the last two weeks.
I always hesitate to post in a thread like this because my achievements aren’t noteworthy in the least.
However, having had seven major abdominal surgeries over the last 29 years, with three of them coming in the last four years–I realized that if I didn’t do anything about my lack of belly muscles, they would never get better.
So two years ago I started Pilates. Then I added yoga. A year ago I returned to running (I’d run in the Army because–well–you have to). Now I’m running just over four miles at a time, and under 10 minute miles. That’s HUGE for me and I love that I have visible muscles.
A small thing…when I first tried using the elliptical, my leg muscles would start burning after a few minutes and I always gave up thinking it was hopeless. I’d go to the treadmill, which wasn’t as bad, and stare at the people who seemed to effortlessly glide on the elliptical for hours.
But I started pushing myself a little bit more and a little bit more and now I can do 45 minutes on the elliptical…and almost enjoy it!
Another boost to that awesome feeling is that my legs look killer. That only adds to my desire to continue using the elliptical.
Yesterday I competed with co-workers in a Dragon Boat mini-regatta. We’d “trained” for six weeks, previously never having done it before. I’m a fat smoker, who walks the dog around the block and gardens, and that’s my exercise.
And we rocked! I have my very first ribbon for a first place in any sort of athletic endeavor. Ever. Not even in Woodland Park Elementary school did I win a ribbon.
I used to be proud for having run three marathons in three years. Now, after having had my son two years ago, I’m proud because I’ve exercised every day for the last two weeks. Keep in mind that said exercise has entailed both running and walking. Even moreso, I get ridiculously proud when I run more than 20 minutes without stopping.
I used to think that I was being a weenie if I deigned to walk during a running session; now I don’t give a crap whether I walk or run - doing something at all is a big achievement!
I’ve started doing 2.5 mph on my incline trainer at 21% incline. 2.0 mph is actually starting to feel slow now, whereas it used to be very difficult. Based on the time, it’s about the equivalent of running at 4.0 mph with the machine level.
But, seriously, that’s good. Everyone needs to set their own personal benchmarks and improve on those. By biggest complaint when I went to the gym were these asshole guys (yes, they were always guys) who would talk about how they benched XXXXX or the ran XXXXX and implied that anyone who didn’t do that had a smaller penis than he did.
I ran a 4:40 mile in high school, but would probably kill myself trying to beat your 6:53 today. If someone finally gets off of their fat ass and runs a 20 minute mile, then that is better than continuing to pack in the cheez-its and getting fatter.
Just a tiny something, but since I rarely exercise…
I was getting into a foul mood today, and decided I would take a friend’s advice and start trying to exercise some, if only for the mental benefits. Decided there was no time like the present to start.
I walked about 3.5 miles this evening. Just got up and did it. It took a long time, because I am the slowest walker ever, and wasn’t pushing myself, but I still walked 3.5 miles today.
I wasn’t sporty as a kid - which is why I am personally very proud that this year (at 32) after riding my road bike for less than 6 months I completed a 145km hill ride, and have signed up to do another 120km hill ride, which covers some of the ground that Cadel Evans trains on when in Melbourne. Even thinking about doing the 160km Round Taupo ride at the end of the year.
This was about a month ago and I’m not sure if it really counts. I was in for my six-month checkup with the cardiologist, just a normal visit. We’re chatting, he has me hop up on the exam table and starts checking my pulse and blood pressure. Asks me if I exercise (he *always *asks me that; sometimes I want to ask him if there’s some reason he thinks I don’t). Anyway, I explain what I do for activity. Then he smiles and says my blood pressure is still going down and my resting pulse is down to 63. I looked it up on the internet when I got home and it looks like that’s just a little above normal. I’m not losing any weight, but at least there’s *some *evidence that I’m making progress. The cardiologist says I’m in pretty good condition, for the condition I’m in. (Corny joke, but what the heck.)
I’ve been riding for about two years now, but in June I started getting serious and biking to work every day, about 25km round-trip. A couple of weeks ago I went down to the river bike path early in the morning to see how fast I could do 100km. I managed it in 3:37.
I think I’ll try again during the holiday this week.
