Thanks, SYTYCD!

Some readers know that I am an avid fan of Fox's "So You Think You Can Dance". I danced when I was younger, along with cheerleading and color guard. I absolutely LOVE dance and seeing dancers grow within their art. The show is perfect for that. The thing is, when I watch SYTYCD, I miss dancing so much, but I know that my knees would be shot after the second class if I went back to it weighing over 250#. So, I decided Wednesday evening, while I was watching the show, that this would be the -last- year I'm this heavy. I -will- get back to dancing, even if it's just a class taken at a community college. I have no dreams or aspirations of ever performing (though that might be kind of cool), and the only possible way in which I have -ever- thought I would be affiliated with dance professionally is as a teacher. I just want to get back to it for the love of the art form. Taking all of that into consideration, I thought about how I would accomplish this. I'm all about plans. :-) First off, I've -got- to add flexibility training back into my routine. Limber muscles don't get injured as quickly and loose hamstrings help prevent back pain. So, stretching: check. Next, I need to up the intensity of my cardio workouts to get the maximum amount of caloric burn that I can get, while still keeping it mostly low-impact. I will also continue to lift weights for strength, muscular endurance, and for the fact that muscle burns more kCal, even at rest, than fat does. So, fat burning: check. The third leg of the tripod is sticking to WW like glue. I need to really focus on eating filling foods and stay away from processed/refined/HFCS-laden crap and stay as close to "real" food as I can get. That means cooking more, but that's OK. I'll deal. :-) With upping the intensity of my workouts, I'll earn more APs, and I'll need to make sure I'm eating some of them. I'm not sure why, but the more I exercise, the less hungry I am. :-/ So we'll have to see how it goes. So, sticking to WW: check.

Proving that I'm putting it into practice is the fact that I came into work (I work late on Thursdays, but have to be here early because of bus schedule), had some brekkie, and read for a while. Then I decided that I'm not going to banish any weight by sitting on my tushie reading Harry Potter, so I went out to the fitness trail around the pond and walked. For 55 minutes. I did approximately 2.25 miles in that 55 minutes. Next week, I want to go out earlier and see if I can get a full 3 miles in, and how long it will take me, as that's within spitting distance of a 5K. When I get my 5K time to under an hour, I will start adding distance because I eventually want to do a half-marathon and there is an 8K (5 miles) in November that I'd like to do, but only if I can get my time to around 1:20 or so.

I'm working on a shopping list for next week which will have less processed/pre-packaged/refined stuff on it, and more actual food. Watch out world!