My third day but, in Kung Fu time, it was only day 2.

16 December 2020 I finally met Sifu today. He is very open and engaging. He was working 3 groups. 1 large intermediate to advanced group (about 8), 1 lady learning Qi-Gon and the newbie group of One! So we redid the stances. He checked my positions, my hips get in my way and my feet needed to be repositioned a little but the stances were much easier today and holding them was easier as well! Then I did 8 "up and back" with the stances. I watched him work with the intermediate students. Then I remembered the 1000 staff hits that I only did 100 of on my Day Zero back on the 9th. So I grabbed the heavily padded staff and threaded it through the angled hole behind your back that you get when your fists are at your waist and did the hip rotation, hit the punching bag with the ends of the staff 600 times. Sifu came and started me on two of the close punches. In Kung Fu you have many strike options, close punching is for 2 to 2 1/2 feet away. There are 6 different close punches. We worked on straight and vertical punches which refer to your hand position at the striking point. The really hard thing for me to learn is the whirling motion. At the time that one hand is striking, your non striking hand is in a blocking position by your chest. When someone who is trained is doing this, they move, water-like, the striking hand forward and the non striking hand blocking then both hands change position, like a waltz and the blocking hand now strikes and the striking hand now blocks. He made it look so simple and easy. I'm like rubbing my belly and patting my head at the same time trying to get the rhythm for 250 straight punches and 250 vertical punches in before the end of class. To Sifu and Simu's credit they are available until closing but I'm the one with the time constraint. I really am glad I went tonight. Christmas is coming so my dojo work is finished until January 2021 so I will practice, practice, practice and hope to become more fluid like and less three stooges like in the next few weeks. Everyone Have a Happy Holiday. May your Zoom gatherings be glitch free. May your food be real. May your family and friends continue to be so! See you on the other side!!

Kung Fu start up.

On December 9, 2020 I did my first Kung Fu class. The Simu (female instructor - say "See Moo") asked many questions that didn't make sense at the time. The first question was, "Do you want to start on Day 0 or did you want to start on Day 1?" I asked what the difference was and she said that Day 1 is the start of Kung Fu training. So I said, "Day 0 please." Today, December 15, 2020 was Day 1 of Kung Fu training. I'm certain that the monks that created this martial art are turning over in the graves and are truly dissapointed in the physical state this 53 year old body is in. With intense struggle and failure I did finish Day 1. This is the learning of the stances day. I know nothing of any martial art training. I told Simu on my first day that my mind is a blank slate and to write on it. She did today. I have run 3 marathons. Hiked mountains. Dealt with what I thought was pain before but this was very different. Holding low and high stances for 5 minutes each doesn't sound hard but until you try it, you have no idea. While holding each stance I am being given a run down of the how and whys of this stance. I kept breaking, falling, losing balance. Just making a mess of it. She kept me going. Gave pointers on holding, tilting pelvis, imagine your foot is a sandbag. She truly gave a lot of help to distract me from my pain and uncomfortableness. To try and help me hold each stance. My left knee injury was not helping. I over extended my knee joint a few months back. When we did the stances "backwards" and the weight was shifted to the right leg the positions became way easier to hold and maintain. We covered 7 stances: Horse, Front Cross, Crane, Arch, Cat, Rear Cross, and Horse again. Then we did the stances front and back seven times. Simu then taught the greeting and awaiting instruction motions and positions. Some "spin blocks" for inside and outside attacks with my arms in horse stance. I really need to strengthen up. I believe this will help my recovery in my legs. This balanced training and working out I hope will help me get better. Running in this body of mine is not the best thing. Here's hoping to a better 2021. Good night COVID!!

Hey! With all that has been going on I thought a quick update would be in order! I am NOT doing a half Iron distance Tri this year, 2013. I will be running the Savannah Rock and Roll Marathon with my brother, Eric Dunn! I AM volunteering at the Ironman Panama City, Florida triathlon in October this year so I can get a slot in the 2014 Ironman. I've registered for the marathon and have submitted the volunteer forms so this year is all set. I'm thinking of working on a diabetes and exercise booklet/class something or other to help others. I think it will be a good direction for me. We moved to Florida at the start of May so we are changing a lot of things in our lives, maybe this will be for the best!?! Only time will tell. Best Wishes to you all!!!

So it has been awhile since I've posted anything. I've been training for triathlons and that does seem to take quite a bit of time. I also have been mulling over alot of different things of late. I'm in the triathlon off season so I have more time now. I am building my base and preparing for another training season starting in May. In October of 2013 I will have completed one Half Ironman Triathlon and 14 days after that I will be running a Marathon with my brother to help him get that off his bucket list. In Novermber of 2013 I will try and register for Ironman Florida in 2014. This will be an expensive year for me! I also started a new page on Facebook which will be taking up the rest of my "free" time. ThingsMyDoctorDidntTellMeAboutMyDiabetes on Facebook is an advice, tips, motivation page that I am setting up. I'm hoping to help diabetics directly with what to do to get their lives back under control and live their lives again! I will be extremely direct and I will NOT pull punches so it may not work but this soft voiced non offensive crap does not work for me with my diabetes. I am not a doctor but I do have life experience so I think I can help others with the day to day stuff. My doctor told me he has had to let patients go because if they are not compliant with his treatment then he is open to lawsuits if the patient feels that their own lack of follow through on his treatment plan make their future complications his fault! I believe that coaching is what we all need at some point in our lives. Some one who has been on that same road before to help us get up and get going in a better direction, in some cases, any direction. It's the starting that is the hardest part. Breaking things down into little steps and then helping others begin....awesome. Anyways, it's past midnight on a work night so I will sign off for now! See you out on the course!

So I completed my first triathlon on the 14th of October. The swim was cancelled due to very bad surf conditions (over 7 feet) and rip currents. So it became a Duathlon instead. We stood in the rain for a half hour before the start of the race. The winds we over 20 mph coming into shore so that meant that the bike back to the transition area would be right into a vicious head wind (my bike was blown side to side by the wind!). Yup we started very wet and lots of sand and dirt covered us at the end of the bicycle portion. The weather started to improve shortly after we started and it turned out ok after all. I road my best bike ever and my run was just too slow by about a minute and a half but I went too fast on the bike! I finished 64th overall, 6th in my division, with a time of 1:20:52. If we had the swim I would have finished under my goal time of 2 hours! The winner finished in just under 58 minutes to put my performance in perspective. All in all it was a great event. You can’t control the weather but everything else was really good. I can’t wait till next year to do a full triathlon in the spring and next October to do a half ironman triathlon in Florida.

Hit a deer Friday night.

Hit a Deer with my car Friday night on the way home. The car is now gone. I miss it. Not the deer, the car. The deer was an 8 point buck. The bullet was a 97 VW Cabrio. The deer was launched several feet in the air by my car and died almost immediately. As a Vegetarian, I feel awful about this. The deer are in rut, that’s a guy’s way of saying “in heat” that sounds more manly, course, and unbridled. The buck probably didn’t even see me, he was just following his sense of smell with his blood all up in a boil and the next thing he knew he was dead.

Too much like me in some ways. I loose myself in passions, be they real or imagined. Sometimes it is easier to give in to desires, lusts, flights of fancy than to fight and stand still when everything inside is screaming to do something! I’ve let outward events determine my inward feelings, thoughts and motives and these, in turn, affect my actions. I’ve let my mind imagine situations and events inwardly that have caused me to follow the same chain of action and caused me to react and do things that were not right for those around me or for myself.

It’s a shame that it takes so long for me to learn self- control. It’s not a subject taught in schools, colleges or universities. It is taught through examples and role models. It is taught through our experiences of life. It is learned the hard way not the easy way. Self-control keeps us from having “melt downs” when life doesn’t go the way we want it. Self-control keeps us from not allowing thoughts and feelings move us to act “out of passion.” Self-control helps us to keep doing the things that are right for those around us and ourselves.

The last time I hit a deer, I called Karen, crying, upset about hitting and possibly killing that deer (I never did find the body of that one so I do not know for certain.) Upset about the insurance not being able to do anything to help. I worried that my wife would never trust me with her car again. I worried about the money to fix the car and since I used that vehicle for work, I worried what customers would think of me in a busted up Ford Escape!

Then a “miracle” happened!

At my first customer stop, on my first day back from vacation, a neighbor across the street backed into the front of the Escape in the exact same spot that the deer had broken! Now, the insurance company could help, I wouldn’t have to worry about what others thought about me. I didn’t have to worry about finding the money for the repair. I did have to worry about when Karen would ever trust me with her Escape again!

Me: Honey, I’ve got good news and bad news.

Karen: What happened now?

Me: I’ve been in another accident.

Karen: What!?!

Me: The neighbor across the street backed into the Escape.

Karen: What!?!

Me: The good news is that they hit the same spot that I hit the deer with!

Karen: What!?!

That was all of 3 years ago. This time around the difference was that I didn’t let the external event move me. I was upset but I was self-controlled NOT controlled. What a different experience!

That is all I’ve got this week.

PS.

No I didn’t run. The tendons in my right foot are still swollen but getting better. I’ve got the company truck to drive so I can work without issues. I will hit the gym today to start exercising again. I will do some strength training and I really believe I will be able to run next weekend. They say it can take up to 6 weeks to recover fully from a marathon and right now is just passed the 2 week mark so I believe this is normal.

Recovery Time

It’s been a week since I completed the Marathon.

My right leg is still sore. The tendons on the top of my right foot are still swollen. My right knee feels hinky from my IT band which I use a foam roller on the floor 2 or 3 times a day to get relief. Lots of Advil.

I can’t run again until the tendons on my foot calm down. Hopefully by next weekend I can run again.

I find myself missing running now. I need that cardio fix soon. Maybe this week I will use the circuit weights at the gym to help. I need my knee to stop hurting so I can work on my quads and flexors and abductors.

I have come up with a 3 year plan to get to Boston. I was very naive to even attempt a Boston qualifying time with less than a year worth of training. My goal this year will to be to train as injury free as possible. To work with my body rather than push it ahead of where it is now, today. So, in theory, which is a small town near Port Wentworth, Georgia, I should be able to beat 5:21:15 next November. So my goal next year is to run the entire marathon which will beat my time this year, since I walked about 6 miles total. The year after that will be to run a marathon in under 4 hours and the year after that to qualify for Boston.

Note to self. No more Brooks shoes. I really think they are fine for me for very short runs but definitely do not work for me for long runs. I guess I will go back to New Balance.

My Blood sugar control was very good after the Marathon! I did not have any severe lows for 48 hours. I took about 10% less insulin with meals. The week after has been really good. A couple of high readings related to drinks with extra carbs and no insulin taken for the drinks. Other than that things have been good.

They say after a Marathon that your body needs to rest. They suggest 1 day per mile run. The day after my Marathon my walk was more like the Dance of the Tin Man from the Wizard of Oz than a walk! I was very concerned if this was normal and then I saw all the YouTube videos about the day after a marathon and felt that all was right with my world.

Here’s to recovery time and working with my body!