You mean philosophical questions like, "Why do other people think it's any of their g--d--- business how I spend my workout time?"

No, I wouldn't. My wife has been an almost total invalid for the past eight months thanks to sciatica brought on in part by stepping up her walking workout to a running workout -- and thanks for reminding me. A lot of people have alignment problems and would be insane to take up running without professional help.

There's also the fact that for some of us, running reminds us of middle school and high school gym classes, with cretinous classmates who enjoyed picking on people like me far more than they enjoyed a good 30-minute run, and idiot instructors who were too busy planning next week's loss on the gridiron to be aware of the abuse, let alone do anything to stop it.

Kaillean,
Can you post a little more information on that couch to 5K program?
Thanks!

Warning, the opinion I'm about to post will be a bit controversial. Sometimes the thoughts that run around inside our heads are not always nice. That said, let me be clear that I am talking about me, ME and only ME. These are MY nasty little thoughts and no one else's...

When I see those perfectly thin people walking about, I sometimes (sometimes, not always) experience negative, sarcastic thoughts along the lines of "Yeah, she's thin. I bet she never gained an extra pound in her life." Or "She may be thin, but she has zero chest." Or 'Well, nyah! I bet I can lift more." These people annoy and irritate me all out of proportion to anything rational, and sometimes it's hard to remind myself that they may have worked for what they have just as hard or harder as I am working now.

Guess what? I'm *jealous.* I would give my eye teeth, my favorite jeans and 50 lbs of fat to look like that, and the part of me that wants it sometimes gets all pissy that someone ELSE has it. It ain't exactly PC, but it's part of being human, and once I identify the feelings for what they are, they're much easier to put aside.

Cheers,

Friday

First a couple of words about running. I am the last one who should say this, but please, please be very careful with any running program. It can be very hard on your legs. If you are in your 40s, you can look as a 20s, you can have the skin, the heart the lung of a 20s, but your LEGS are always minimum as old as you. Every 20 lbs excess weight gives 10 + years to the age of your legs. So even if you are in your 20s, you can have 50-60s legs! Regardless of you high school sprinter past.

No, I do not talk against running, I started it at 46, and having great success. BUT I spent three months to reach that 30 min jog. I lost 8 lbs in the first month almost only from walking. Then 7 lbs from mostly walking. When I started to run 5 miles I had only 10 lbs overweight. Despite of this very careful slow approach, (rest days, slowly increasing time, distance, excellent shoes, help from experienced runners) I spent weeks icing my legs every evening. (Though fortunately nothing serious.)

About intellectual life vs exercise. Let me mention another possbility. Somebody is a "gym/exercise rat" exactly because of his/her very intensive intellectual life. I have a computer scientist husband, two science PhD students kids. They all are exercise rats. My husband needs the sunrise run every day to hande the 10-12 hours in front of his computer during the day. My daughter spends 10 hours in the Physics lab, science library, then she always heads to the universtity athletic center to exercise 60-90 min. (And forgive her Frederick, but she - with other grad students somehow prefer trashy magazines during exercise over scientific/medical/law/business magazines.) My son spending a night in the observatory heads for a 6-8 hours hike every Friday-Saturday-Sunday.

About weight loss. The problem with exercise, that your body accustoms to any exercise very fast, working more efficiently, burning less and less calories. If the different running calculations were right I would have been melted away completely already. As I mentioned, when I WALKED 30 min I lost 2 lbs/week. Running was new for my body, and this helped to speed up my metablism. But when I started to RUN 30+ miles a week (10+miles long run on every Saturday) I lost less than 1/2 lbs/week with the SAME diet.

I agree: chose something that you ENJOY. Anything. Do it because you feel better, to improve your healt, not solely because of it's more or less affect on your weight loss.

To Latingirl - a possible running program
 

Latingirl, here is a safe program to start if you are interested:

It is important, if you feel any pain, you should include rest days till the pain goes away. Something else run=jog in this period. Jog=4.0-5 mile/hour.

10-WEEK TRAINING PLAN
The following running schedule was created by Budd Coates, Health Promotions
Manager at Rodale Press, who instructs a corporate beginning running
program. Coates has taken nonrunners and, in 10 weeks, helped them reach
their goal of running the 3.5-mile J.P. Morgan/Chase Corporate Challenge.
Before you start with this schedule, get your legs ready with eight days of
walking: walk for 20 minutes a day for the first four days, then increase to
30 minutes a day for four more days.
Now you're ready to begin with week 1. Each week of the program, do your
run/walk workouts on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday, and take
Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday off.
10-WEEK TRAINING SCHEDULE Week 1 Run 2 minutes, walk 4 minutes. Repeat 5
times.
Week 2 Run 3 minutes, walk 3 minutes. Repeat five times.
Week 3 Run 5 minutes, walk 2.5 minutes. Repeat four times.
Week 4 Run 7 minutes, walk 3 minutes. Repeat three times.
Week 5 Run 8 minutes, walk 2 minutes. Repeat three times.
Week 6 Run 9 minutes, walk 2 minutes. Repeat twice, then run 8 minutes.
Week 7 Run 9 minutes, walk 1 minute. Repeat three times.
Week 8 Run 13 minutes, walk 2 minutes. Repeat twice.
Week 9 Run 14 minutes, walk 1 minute. Repeat twice.
Week 10 Run 30 minutes.

After 10 weeks you are able to run 3.5 miles/30 min (it is your 9-10 min mile range).

Galadriell,
Thank you!!

Latingirl, I think Kaillean's specifically talking about the Couch to 5K Running Plan from CoolRunning.com, which I am also following. It starts off a litle more slowly than the one that Galadriell posted above, but ramps up more quickly once you get about midway through.

Atlee, Thank you!!! I will check both plans out.
Thanks a lot.

I have found that exercise helps me maintain my weight as well as speed weight loss. I do agree that you need diet as well, although I have never been very successful with diet alone.

I too run and do weights, but I don't spend more then an hour doing it. I either run for 30 minutes and do weights for 30, or I run for closer to an hour. I certainly can attest to the fact that if you start slowly and work on it, anyone can run 5 miles, although that 8mph pace depends a lot of height (gait really). For me, 8mph over a 5 mile distance is just achievable, and I run a lot.

I don't believe you need to run that fast however, doing 4 miles at 7 mph (fairly easy to get to) will do wonders to speed your diet, make you feel great, give you all the cardio benefits, and tone you up. Add a bit of weights for upper body tone and you have it made.

Please note that althought I have run for years, I would not classify it as really enjoyable, but either is brushing my teeth and I certainly wouldn't stop doing that. :)

brobin

I too enjoy running and even at my heaviest (105kgs or 231lbs) I could happily run 5kms - sorry don't know how much that is in miles.
I would'nt say I run that fast now, but I love it.
I found even eating like a pig running helped me maintain my weight and when I did Atkins and ran together I was losing a kilo a week consistently.
Unfortunately I am currently off the Atkins wagon and trying to climb back on.

Exercise Ambivalence....
 

If you have picked this mode of new eating habits to continue for a lifetime than I feel you really need to exercise!!!! Whatever program you are doing, whether it be PP, South Beach, Atkins, et al....we are all doing it to lose weight and change our poor eating habits. To live and be healthy, the American Heart Association recommends exercise 3-5 times a week. If your dieting and exercising to lose weight and then stop everyting once you have lost the weight, you have missed the whole realm of developing a healthy life style for the rest of your life. I feel that exercise is so important. It builds a healty heart and muscles and increases your metabolism. When I talk about exercise, I don't mean total gym obsession...but even if you get out and walk three to five times a week....it is better than nothing. I live in such a rural area of Maine that there is NOTHING here for me to do in the winter unless I want to drive several miles to find a gym. I invested in an Elliptical Trainer for my home. This was the best purchase that I have ever made. When it is too cold for me to get outside to hike, snowshoe etc in the winter, I jump on my trainer. I don't feel like exercising some days.....but I know it is something I need to do....but once I get going I feel so good during and especially after my workout. I have so much more energy throughout the day!!! I also started resistance training.....I purchased 5lbs weights from Walmart and found an exercise routine that I do every other day. You just really need to find something that works for you and feels good. Don't select something that is going to bore you quickly because then you will really dread exercising. Mix it up everyday!!! I guess I have really blabbed on haven't I? Sorry!!! Good luck to all!!

Doesn't the American Heart Association also support a low fat diet? (Just to suggest that sometimes the suggestions of a big organization aren't right for everyone).

Is is possible that for some people, all exercise is boring? That doesn't mean they shouldn't do it, just that it won't be fun.

I could say that everyone could benefit from studying Plato, but I'm pretty sure some people would never enjoy it!

Threads go where they will, but my original post was not about whether exercise is often a good thing, but whether some people exercise too much, or feel they do, or depend on it psychologically to a problematic degree.

I love lifting weights, and have for years. But....

I hate cardio. HATE it. I hate running. I hate the elliptical trainer. I hate walking, and I really hate the exercise bike. I hate the rower so much that I will not even get on it. I love to swim, but I hate swimming laps for exercise.

However, I like the effects. I like being able to run for the bus or subway. I like being able to keep up with a fast-moving crowd, even if I'm carrying something heavy. I like not having to ask Gez, whose legs are a good three inches longer than mine, to slow down her pace. I also like knowing that I will probably not end up like my mom or dad, who proved the truth of the old saying, "use it or lose it."

Of course, the main point of exercise for me is the way it strips the fat. I am one of those unfortunates who has to do cardio, in addition to lifting and dieting, in order to get the weight off. Or perhaps it's not that I'm unfortunate, but that I'm simply unwilling to eat as little as I would have to eat in order to get the fat off without significant quantities of cardio work. All I ever wanted was to do as little cardio exercise as possible in order to get weight off. However, "as little as possible" has turned out to be a rather huge quantity which takes a good chunk out of my life. Thankfully, when the weight is off I can cut back to a more mild cardio schedule, doing it for fitness' sake rather than to lose fat. And at that point, I think I'll probably start liking it. I imagine it'll feel like I'm making forward progress and improving, rather than "paying back" a debt of overeating and overdrinking from the past.

Emily

Exercise ambivalence
 

Diane...I guess I was just following the flow of the other posts. I do agree that there are people that exercise to obsession. Just as there are people that drink, eat and do many other things to obsession or addiction. This definately is not a good thing. I guess that some people may find all exercise boring. I guess I am not one of those people. There are so many awesome things to do that allow you to get exercise without it feeling like exercise....like dancing with your kids, walking your dog, taking a walk through the woods etc...

Now, walking in the woods...that is something I love, and always have. But it is not the smart thing for me to choose as a means of fat loss, because it's weather-dependent and not something I am likely to do every day. I can't wait for the weather to get better so I can go hiking again.

Emily