An update- finally!

I need to do quite a bit of updating on here including a full race recap of the Athens Half Marathon. In the meantime, I want to use this post to go over what I've accomplished this year, what I'm doing now, and what I hope to accomplish next year.

This year has been huge, HUGE for me! I have changed my life completely. I like to think back to last year at this time, to what I was eating, the challenges I faced with knee pain/inactivity, and my lack of exercise. I actually really like to dig through my old receipts to see what I was buying at the grocery store before I changed everything. I can tell you one common theme that follows through all my old lists and receipts- junk. Tons and tons of junk food and soda. I'm actually amazed that I didn't weight more than I did when I started this journey.

So, here's what I did this year:
- started exercising in January regularly
- changed my diet completely and started counting calories on Daily Plate
- started running regularly in March
- ran three 5ks with a PR of 29:45
- ran a half marathon
- started The New Rules of Lifting for Women

Last year at this time I would never have believed that I could accomplish all those things inside of a year. I am so proud of myself!

On to what I'm doing right now. It's been a long hard road of recovery since my half. I've run a grand total of 5 miles since then. I fell on my kitchen floor a few weeks before the half and injured my IT band. I did absolutely no exercise for the first three weeks after the half. It was pure torture! I am finally feeling like I'm healed now.

I am almost at the end of stage one of The New Rules of Lifting for Women. I have never followed a lifting program before, and I now regret that. I have had amazing results with this program! I started out squatting and deadlifting just an olympic bar. I can now squat 85 pounds, and I can deadlift 105 pounds! I am almost maxed out on the seated row machine at the gym. I'm at 100 pounds now, and the max is 120. I can also do 12 prone jackknifes without flinching, which is a huge accomplishment. You can google that one if you aren't familiar with it. I'll just say that it looks intimidating and is very awkward in the beginning.

I made my first major fitness related purchase last night. I bought a NordicTrack Treadmill! I'm super excited to have access to my own TM! I can now run whenever the mood strikes. Hopefully this will make running in 2011 even easier.

Speaking of 2011, here are my goals for the new year:
1- Break 25 minutes on a 5k. This one will be tough to do but very rewarding.
2- Finish 3 more half marathons.
3- Break 2:10 for a half marathon.
4- Complete my first full marathon.
5- Finish NROL4W.

That's all for now. I'll try to get my write-up of the half posted soon. Until then, happy running!