Roocifer

I'm inspired by your before and after pictures! I've been toying with going paleo, too - everyone seems to get amazing results with it. Two of my goals are similar to yours - I'm making myself presentable every work day and shooting for a sub 26 min 5k. Looking forward to following your progress!

Awesome - solid goals and you know how you're going to get there! I'm rooting for you!! I second everything that Dawsy said. I was pretty slow in the beginning, but doing speedwork helped SO much. Hal Higdon has a bunch of different training plans, maybe one of those will work for you?

I read this post to my husband and he said "Good, I was hoping someone would call you out on that!" My PR is 25:08, and I'd love to beat that by the end of the summer...but for the first race I just need to see where I'm at. Confident I can beat that goal, though! @Dawsy - Thanks for the welcome! I'm excited for my first challenge. @Chelsea - Thank you! A lot of people have nice tables and whatnot in their challenge posts and I'm not quite savvy enough for that, but I did want to make it at least a little pretty.

Hey unicornassassin, thanks for the welcome!

Just like every cat I've ever known, I've always thought napping in a sunbeam was a better option than...well, pretty much anything else. It's hard to level up your life that way! In high school and college I refused to work out, play sports of any kind, or do anything remotely physically challenging because I had a morbid fear of people "seeing me." That, plus a love of dessert, led to slooowly gaining about 10 pounds over the course of several years. It bothered me a little, but not enough to do anything about it. Then I got strong-armed into signing up for a 5-k race with a bunch of my co-workers shortly after joining a new job. Terrified that I would make a complete fool of myself, I jumped headlong into training. To my complete and utter surprise, I found that once I had a bit of an athletic base established, I LOVED to run. WHO KNEW. After that I was running all the time...tons of 5ks, some middle distance races, and a handful of half marathons - which I NEVER in a million years thought I'd enjoy. But I did! Pretty much the best thing ever. But then I got injured and I got married (two years ago today!) and I really haven't done anything since then. I had some depression issues around that same time, and looking back I think my doctor was much too quick to medicate me - I believe that alternative therapies like using a lightbox, eating better, getting back into a regular exercise routine, etc. would have helped just as much, if not more, than prozac. Plus, I had no appetite when I was on the medication, and quickly dropped about 8 lbs because I was eating next to nothing. It was massively unhealthy and I knew it, and didn't stay on the medication for more than a few months. I've worked very hard to get my mental house in order over the past year - I've worked with life coaches, done a lot of navel-gazing and focused intensely on ways to change my perspective for the better. I found that as I did that, my desire to work out returned. And now my motivation is back! I'm so excited to be running again and can't believe I ever let it fall to the wayside. I am as focused on getting fit and healthy as a cat following a laser pointer. I've registered for some races this summer and will definitely be running a half in the fall (either the Rock n Roll Half in Philly in September, or the BAA Half in Boston in October - haven't decided which one yet). I've been a longtime reader of NF and have lurked the forums on and off for a little while, but then when I saw the post about the new challenge starting yesterday I knew I had to jump right in. It's obvious immediately that you guys are awesome - so pumped to be joining you!!

Has anybody read this? I really enjoyed it. Some of the more in-depth science-y stuff made me go a little cross-eyed, so I just skimmed those parts...but I've found the proprioceptive cues to be really helpful with my form. Thinking about a specific cue during the entirety of a run and trying not to let my mind stray too much is difficult! My form tends to deteriorate towards the end of a run, so staying focused on one thing seems to be helping with that. I'm just starting one of the training plans (half marathon) and I was curious if anyone else had read the book or done any of the training plans.

Three years ago, I ran 4 half marathons in one year, did 4 months of fitness bootcamp, and was in the best shape of my life. Now...not so much. Instead of being active and energetic, I'm now slow, squishy, and sedentary (also, I like alliteration and parentheticals. Sorry.) I don't know where my motivation went over the last two years, but I found it and I am READY TO GO! I have my sights set on a half in the fall (either in Philly or Boston - haven't decided which one, yet) and I've been working over the past two months to slowly build my fitness base by running 3x per week and strength training (usually twice a week, but not always consistently). The next six weeks happen to be the first six weeks of my half marathon training plan (taken from Brain Training for Runners). I'll be running, doing strength exercises, and mostly just working on injury-proofing myself while I sloooowly get stronger and (hopefully) faster. My ultimate goal is to beat my half PR and stay injury-free while training to do it! Name: Roocifer Race: Tibbit Class: Scout Starting weight: 132.8 Attributes: Strength (STR): 2 Dexterity (DEX): 3 Stamina (STA): 3 Constitution (CON): 2 Wisdom (WIS): 3 Charisma (CHA): 2 Total: 15 Goals (April 30-June 11th): Health: Run a sub-26 minute 5k Update 5/18 - ran a PR, 24:18! Since I haven't run a 5k in well over a year, this number is largely a guess and will be my benchmark for the rest of the summer. I've registered for a series of five 5ks on the same course, one a month from May til September - my overarching goal is to improve my time with each race. How I'll do it: Follow my training plan - 4 runs per week with a variety of purposes, including hill sprints, fartleks, and long slow runs. The plan also includes 1-2 days per week of cross training, and for that I'm doing workouts on my exercise bike. DEX +2, STA +3 Lose 5 pounds (127.8 lbs) How I'll do it: Drinking at least 8 glasses of water every day, allowing myself one sugary treat per week (the vending machine is my nemesis), packing a lunch every day to bring to work, and snacking on something healthy if I get hungry in between meals (handful of nuts or something like that instead of my usual bowl of cereal or toast). CHA +2, CON +2 Do one unassisted chin-up I am SO CLOSE on this one, it's killing me!! How I'll do it: My half marathon training plan calls for strength training 2x per week, but the exercises in the book are kind of lame and not focused on total body fitness. I'll keep those, but am adding planks, lunges, squats, pushups, dumbbell rows, and (of course) chin-ups. STR +2, CON +1 Lifestyle: Put some effort into looking nicer on a daily basis. This means doing hair and makeup (even minimally) every work day. CHA +2, WIS +1