Couch to 5k

One of the things that really helps to keep me motivated, and returning to the gym day after day, is to have a goal other than a number on the scale.

With that in mind, I've decided to give the Couch to 5K program a(nother) try! C25K is great. It is a 9 week training program to turn a non-runner (ooh, that's me!) into someone who can run a 5K (oh, I'd love to be able to do that!). For each of the 9 weeks, you are supposed to run 3 days each week, and there are different workouts, that get progressively harder as you continue. I completed week 3, day 2 yesterday.

One of the great parts about the couch to 5k program is that as it's gained in popularity, people have made podcasts to go along with it. They're great free downloads with music in all different styles that tell you when to run and when to walk for all of the 9 weeks of workouts. They make the program a snap to follow. You can find a bunch of them at www.c25k.com

If you're looking for a new source of motivation in the gym, I definitely recommend giving this program a try. It's definitely more interesting than just getting on the treadmill for half an hour, because I actually feel like I'm achieving something while I'm on there!

Social Training

I am a social media junkie. I freely admit it. I even watched the inauguration yesterday at cnn.com and made full use of their Facebook feed. It was great.

Well, my friend Carmen over at Pecan Flan clued me in to a great new site this morning called dailymile.com It combines two of my favorite things, Social Media and Exercise! OK, well it combines one of my favorite things with one thing that I begrudgingly do everyday...even if I don't love it. And while I may not love exercise (although I'm working on it!), sites like dailymile.com definitely help to make it more fun, at least for techie nerds like me. Dailymile lets you log all of your workouts, but it also lets you make friends like your typical myspace or facebook site. And they can see how much you've been exercising. Talk about accountability! They can even send you little messages to help motivate you in your efforts. The site also helps to connect you with people in your area who are interested in similar types of training, and lets you know about races and events in your neighborhood. Pretty cool!

One extra perk is that you can sync Dailymile to work with Twitter, so it will post your workout summaries to your twitter feed. How nice for a twitter addict like myself!