Attempt #2 at the 1500 meter

 I made some mistakes when I gave up powerlifting and tried to start training for the 1500. I tried running every other day for thirty minutes, and cycling every other day for 30-60 minutes. After a little over two weeks my knees and ankles hurt so bad a had to quit. I begrudgingly went back to powerlifting. I wasn't happy about it. I was still burned out with powerlifting and I still really wanted to train and compete in the 1500 meter. After having gone back to powerlifting and contemplated on the things I did wrong I think I'm ready to give this another attempt. Last time I made the mistake of trying to run every other day for thirty minutes and I tried increasing my distance %10 every week. Those are solid plans. That's what I did back in 2006 when I decided to start training for triathlon. I weighed 292lbs back then. I ate well and trained hard every day. Made consistent increases in volume. I got faster and built more endurance. But it didn't work this time. Simply put, I'm 45 years old and close to 330lbs. My body can't handle what I did at 29 years old. I have to start out easier and build more gradually.  So my plan starting on Sunday is to walk briskly every other day for 30 minutes, bike every other day, and once a week jog for twenty minutes. Just once until I drop some weight, build some endurance, get rid of years and years of fast twitch muscle, and build some slow twitch muscle. There's something that is pulling me to the 1500. I can't explain it. I'm obsessed with it. I'm excited about this new adventure. 

First week of track and field training

My first day of track training, training for the 1500m or 1 mile, was June 29th 2021. I'm doing what I learned from triathlon training a long time ago. I'm running and cycling zone 1 & 2 until I drop some weight and build a base. I've already increased my heart rate controlled speed. Not a ton. But I'm only 4 days of training I've increased my speed an average of 40 seconds per mile. 4 days ago I ran 2 miles averaging a 17:36 pace, warm up and cool down included. Today I ran the same distance at the same heart rate in 16:56. 

back to blogging? or switching sports?

This season I qualified and was training for the tested powerlifting national championships in July and the IPL tested world championships in November. I asked my coach to let me push harder this year in training. He said he thought that was a bad idea but he'd program it if I wanted him to. Well apparently it was a bad idea, just like he said. I got my first two lifting related injuries. Nothing terrible. A pulled glute and a pulled oblique. They were bad enough I had to bail out of the national championships. I still had time to train have a good showing at worlds though. But when I was fully healed and got back to training I found I was severely burned out with powerlifting. So after about a month of contemplating I decided to switch sports top training for the 1500 meter, or mile track and field meet. It's not too terribly out of the blue. I competed in the 2018 and 2019 New Mexico games track and field 100, 200, and shotput taking 2nd, 3rd, and 1st respectively. 

One thing I noticed was blogging about powerlifting was BORING! But for done reason blogging about endurance athletics I have always enjoyed. Now that I started endurance athletics again I guess I'll start blogging again.