Fitness Goals.

As I have said in multiple posts, it has been a long time since I've been really fit. Part of that is due to knee surgery, part of that is due to our leisurely summer in Europe, part of that is due to having a job that lasts till evening rather than soccer practice every evening. But I am in that stage of rehab where I am all amped up to be crazy fit and alongside my husband have vowed to get strong again. I made a long list of both short-term and long-term reasons why I want to get back into shape, and here are a few of them:

1) I played on the same club soccer team for the same coach for nine years. After I graduated high school, my coach took a coaching hiatus for a couple years until his daughter was old enough to play on a club team. So for the last few years, I've been going to the Valkyrie practices to say hi and watch the new "us" play, and I've been wanting to set up an alumni game, where my old team could get back together some weekend and play the girls. Well, the Valkyrie just won A-Cup and most of them are heading to high school in the fall, so I would say they're old enough to play us now. It's going to happen sometime at the end of this summer. And I need to get back in shape and shake all the dust off my soccer skills so I can show these girls who's boss. ;)

2) When we were still in college, Steve and I lived one year in a four bedroom house with a bunch of our friends. This house was down the street from a supermarket that had one of those blood-pressure test cuffs near their pharmacy, and every time we went, our friend Marc and I would basically compete to see who had the lowest resting heart rate, aka who was in better cardiovascular shape. The lower your heart rate is, the stronger your heart. Generally, when you are in good cardiovascular shape, your resting heart rate is low because your heart is strong enough to pump out enough blood for your body in fewer beats. (Unless you have a rabbit metabolism like my husband, whose heart rate is much higher than mine no matter what.) Anyhow, whenever Marc and I tested ourselves, I always won (except once, which I still think is because Marc had a long-sleeved shirt on, which interfered with the cuff's ability to measure his bpm. But no matter.). But Marc has been playing soccer without a huge break like I had to take, and I have no doubt that his bpm is much, much, MUCH lower than mine. And that just isn't right!

3) Right around when Steve and I got married, I was in a big get-fit craze. It was gorgeous outside all the time, I was only working part-time while doing last-minute wedding planning, and there were sweet horse trails all throughout our neighborhood that I would go running on. And at some point, all of us girls (which, in our group of friends, is a small minority) decided that we were going to have a race to see who could get a six-pack first. And no one ever won. SO I CAN STILL WIN IT!!! :D

4) Because my kids are going to be awesome athletes and I want to be their inspiration. Oh, and I also want to be that hot soccer mom, so I can measure up to my babe of a husband.

5) The simplest reason: it has been far too long, and I miss it. I miss the ache in my muscles after a hard workout, I miss the instinctual movement of my body on the soccer field, I miss the sound of my feet on the pavement as I run. I miss just being able to kick a soccer ball around with my husband. I miss how good it always made me feel. I miss the laughter and the friendship and the camaraderie that just isn't the same when you're on the sidelines. And when I start playing soccer again, I don't want to begin by just starting to get in shape THEN learning how to play soccer again. I need to be fit before I start, so I can focus on the ball and the strategy and the team and not get distracted by how *%^#*$)%! tired I am. And that begins today. (Or really, it began a few days ago. ;)