This week, starting in about 15 minutes, I am going to start integrating strength training to my workout routine. I have a mild dose of OCD, and I find diversifying difficult with certain activities. So far this year, I have done nothing but run. I had an outpatient procedure in December, so January was mostly getting over the fear that I would injure myself and getting the legs to run more than two miles at once. By the end of January, I had the distance thing down again, and in February, well…

Nick thought it would be a grand thing to create a Nike-Plus challenge between him, me, and our friend Jeff. Nick was a challenger for the first week of the month, and then decided to sit it out. Jeff and I got a little competitive, however. No time for strength-training during the shortest month of the year, no way, no how! Especially when I wanted to beat Jeff in a mileage challenge spanning those 28 days:



I told Nick that he's not allowed to schedule another one of these, at least not right away. I don't like feeling competitive. I get a little manic and a lot moody. Anyway, I went running outside yesterday. As my quads burned running hard up one of my last hills, I accepted that I have not had a well-rounded exercise routine as of late. Last year at this time, I challenged myself to work out every day until a scheduled surgery in March '09 after inspiration courtesy of Oprah. During those 60ish days, I remember thinking that I should really be incorporating cardio in my exercise routine. See!? Extremest!

I miss those days when I could spend a leisurely two hours in the gym every morning, splitting my time evenly between strength and sweat! Didn't realize how lucky I was to have all that flexibility with my time! For now, I am about to blow the dust off all my Jari Love DVDs and those nasty, unsafe, killer 80's workouts from The FIRM (workouts seem to be much more effective when they disregard concern for injury).

I imagine that tomorrow evening I will have a case of DOMS so severe that I will be in tears. I'm just so gosh darn excited…