Run, Runner!

As those of you who have known me for a long time can attest, I have never been able run for any kind of distance. The problem for me is not muscle endurance or strength, I can walk just about forever and I'm plenty strong, no for me the the problem is air. Once I start running I simply can not breath. This has also been a problem with hiking at high altitudes and I have always believed that this inability has kept me from reaching some of my loftier health goals over the years. However, after my recent success with all this weight loss, I thought I'd attack the problem again. So I charted a course through the neighborhood and started trying to run it. Needless to say I ran into the same old problem. This time however I had another resource - my boss at Avenues. This guy is an ex-army DI and knows a fair share about getting men in shape. I sat him down and talked it over and he came up with some really good advice that I was able to use. In short I was able to adapt a new breathing technique. I told him about the progress I've been making and, well, he still thinks that I'm still not really getting it, but perhaps he doesn't understand how serious this problem has been for me over the years. In any case, the deal is I can now run the entire original course I mapped out through the neighborhood.
So how far is that? I got in the car last night reset the tripometer and measured it. I was pretty sure this was going to be a humiliating experience when I was done, but I was surprised when it turned out to be seven tenths of a mile. Then I reset the tripometer again and mapped out a new course that is just over a mile and that's my new target. I've also checked out how many calories each run burns off and plugged that into my caloric spreadsheet and I'm keeping a close eye on my progress.
The bottom line of all of this is that I am probably in the best shape of my life right now and I am setting some really lofty goals for the coming year. In the next couple of weeks I'm looking forward to a new wardrobe as my current clothes are starting to look pretty ridiculous on me.