Have you ever noticed that the best exercise is the one that you don’t really notice? I mean if you like the activity – the time just flies by. This is what I have ended up doing lots of lately – hill running/hiking!
I started running a lot (for me) in the last couple of weeks but have had to take some breaks due to knee pain. At least I have stopped when it hurt… by the way have you heard the one about the patient that asked the doctor what to do about pain when he moves a certain way? The doctor replied, “Don’t move that way.” 
In this post I’ll talk some about the transition I am having to make with my workouts and how I am trying to integrate this with my diet and life. Here is a video about a heavy hiker that is walking in similar terrain to my own.
That looks like a cool workout and I think I remember a cowboy from Texas saying on his blog that he hikes up hills with weights. Hiking up a hill with weights will get your blood pumping and burn calories!
On Saturday I drove to a couple of hills and did some hill running! The cool think about hill running is you end up running slower than normal so you do not hurt your knees as much as you do in level running.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, I tend to over do it when I run. On Sunday, I ran to Mission Trails Regional Park and kept is up for three hours. I reasoned that running on the dirt trails would not jar my knees as much. That seemed to work ok but it was too damn long to be working out.
So yesterday while my legs were still sore, I ran up one of the hills and then back down and around the hill. I did one more loop for about a one hour workout. I let myself walk up the steepest trails and just kept up lower aerobic pulse. That is easy to gauge because I run or walk to where I am a little out of breath and keep it up.
My weight has been all over the map this week. The highs have been 241 pound and the lows have been 235 pounds. I ate out at Joe’s Crab Shack and over indulged in one heavenly meal!
The servers also broke out in dances every hour or so (I saw two of these dances). I only showed this video so you can see why I did not mind back sliding for a day.
Now how did this workout in my life? I was trying to workout every day after work. I found I was not able to be effective at my other tasks such as blogging, family time and chores. What I think I’ve decided to do is 4 days a week. I’ll workout the weekends and a couple of days in the week.
Everything in life is a balancing act so I am trying to figure out what that is but for now I am keeping my way of eating the same. I am shortening my workouts to just the four days a week and will report back on the progress (or back-sliding).
Hey John!
On a trip to South Africa, I trained in J-Berg. Plenty of altitude and hills!! Later on the trip I ran the fastest 10K of my life in the Kruger at sea level. I attribute it to running those hills. Even though I felt I was running very slowly, it obviously was an excellent workout!
Thanks for the info Dr. J! Sounds like you paid and then got a lot of benifit. I’m going to keep up the hill running.
I took my old dogs (8 people years, 56 in dog years) on my two hill run yesterday and ended up stopping (after an hour) for 15 minutes letting them catch their breath… I think I stick to walks for the dogs.