When I started running longer distances (7+ miles) on the treadmill last winter, I listened to Dave Matthew's Band's Concert in Central Park to get me through the tedium of the run. There is nothing like listening to an 11 minute song that keeps your legs moving independently from your brain. DMB helped me accomplish a lot on that treadmill.
And lately, I've been listening exclusively to DMB when I run. I've downloaded a lot more of his songs from iTunes and ripped my favorites from my CD's into iTunes, and yesterday I finally cleaned my Shuffle of everything but DMB songs. I've been skipping all the others anyway, so I just admitted I'm going to be a DMB junkie for a while and set up the Shuffle that way.
This music choice probably sounds insane to a lot of you music lovers. But here's what it's doing for me--when I hear Dave in my ears, I am automatically in runner's mode. When I listen to Dave in my car, I want to be on the road in my Brooks hitting the pavement. And when "When the World Ends" starts playing, I'm instantly in a 10:30 min/mile pace.
It's a Pavlovian response, and it's pretty cool.
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Yesterday I got in a fabulous 4 mile run, avg pace 10:38 which is fast for me. The sun was out and the air was crisp, and I was in shorts and a sleeveless tank. I take a low-dose antibiotic for my skin and it makes me photosensitive, so I even came back with a light tan after my run (gotta start using sunscreen, I know, but it's fun to see some color on my otherwise lily white legs and arms).
Food was good until last night when, yet again, I fell into the carb fest trap. That seems to be a Pavlovian response too--wake up in the middle of the night, feed face. I finished yesterday with 2380 calories, and 480 of those were crap. I also ate a Lean Cuisine and cottage cheese for dinner so I'm guessing my uptick in weight is partly water because of excess sodium. But it still ticks me off.
So I'm back at it today. The next meal is when the good choices start now, not "Next Monday I'll start my diet again." I just have to figure out how to keep myself from saying "I don't give a fudge" when I want to eat chewy granola bars and Entemann's Little Bites muffins at 1 a.m.
This afternoon it's supposed to be 70 degrees by 4 p.m. and I am thrilled. I'm hoping for a 6 miler, if I can get out of work in time. Tomorrow I will be posting a lower weight, or I swear I'm going to hack off a hand to get that number back down where it belongs.
4 comments:
You'll get it back down there, don't worry! And hacking off body parts doesn't count!
I loves me some DMB as well. =)
I get the Pavlovian response with some of my music, too!
You're doing really well, Laura. I'm always impressed by you.
I don't eat meals like Lean Cuisines anymore--they are such low-quality foods that they leave me feeling unsatisfied. I'd rather have a simple homemade meal of whole foods than a Lean Cuisine.
I did this with TV watching the winter before last. I wasn't watching ANY TV all that winter - unless I was on the treadmill.
Pavlovian describes it perfectly. And for me, it worked like a charm. I averaged an hour a day - all that winter.
I've always been a DMB fan, and I used to have "Two Step" on the iPod for running; don't know why I cleaned it off.
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