FertilehealthyAiming for success, not perfection…

It’s been a busy week for me!  But in a good way…

As you know, I’ve been doing aqua aerobics classes five times a week for the last few months.  And it’s changed my body is some truly amazing ways.  Aqua (our class anyway) provides a good all round workout, with lots of cardio, flexibility work and amazing strength training.  I enjoy it and I benefit greatly from it.

But, I need more…

I tried to incorporate some treadmill interval workouts, but I didn’t enjoy them and the scheduling was kind of tricky.  I tried walking a kilometer in the pool after aqua, but I felt rather silly with all the stationary cyclists staring at me.

Then, last weekend I remembered that I’d signed up for a 5K walk on August 9.  I had two weeks to prepare!  Not that I can’t walk 5K, but I knew I wouldn’t enjoy it if I wasn’t prepared.

We mapped out a 1K and a 2K loop near my house.  Both of them are about 50% uphill.

Fortunately the weather co-operated and I started walking on Monday.

Monday I walked 1K.

Tuesday I walked 2K.

Wednesday I walked 3K.

Thursday I walked 4K.

Today is a scheduled rest day (from walking – I did aqua and swam).  Just as well, because it’s pouring with rain.

Tomorrow I will do 5K (weather forecast says cold and sunny).

Next week I will do four 5K walks – Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. If I have to miss any of these due to bad weather, I’ll make up for it with interval training on the treadmill (I don’t like to spend a lot of time on the treadmill, but I can do a 20 minute interval session.)

That should prepare me properly for my walk on Sunday.

It’s amazing how much I’ve progressed in terms of fitness from Monday to Thursday.  Obviously a lot of it has to do with the fact that I was walking regularly before the winter and my body remembers, but still, I’m very pleased.

After the race I intend to continue walking outside 5 days a week, adding an extra kilometer ever week (weather permitting).  At this stage I’m walking before lunch (allows me to get my daily dose of winter sun), but hopefully from September onwards it will get light early enough so that I can walk in the morning before gym.

I’ve been very inspired by South Beach Steve, a great blogging friend, who walks up to 8 miles a day.   And of course Lynn, who is preparing for a 3-day event and tweets about her epic walks.

And then someone – I think it was Sagan – tweeted a link to an article about swimming and I thought to myself, “Hanlie, you know, you’re already in the pool five times a week.  Why not start swimming?“  Myself reminded me that I suck at swimming and I don’t like having my face underwater (I can’t breathe), but I shut her up by saying, “There’s always back stroke“.

So, for the last three days I’ve been swimming 250 meters (10 lengths) of back stroke.  It takes me about 15 minutes, but I love it!  By today (the third day) my rests at each end were much shorter than on Wednesday and my stroke much more even.  I plan to add 50 meters every Monday.

In one week I have really stepped up the exercise!  And I’m definitely feeling it all over my body.  I don’t think there’s a muscle that’s not being worked by this regime.

I love it!