I only run when being chased: Even a rainy day won't slow us down!

I wanted to blog sooner this week, but it's been a whirlwind of a week! This week I had my post-fitness test at Fort Sanders Health & Fitness Center, and also my last visit with the dietitian at Covenant Weight Management Center, along with my final weigh in. Our Biggest Winner Team is gearing up for April 1 and the Covenant Health Knoxville Marathon, and along with that comes lots of housekeeping type stuff.

As I mentioned earlier this week I had my post-fitness test, and was excited that the results were definitely what I wanted to accomplish! They showed that I'd gained strength, flexibility, and was in overall better health.

In December I could do 14 push-ups until I was fatigued...this week I could do 25!
My average flexibility on the sit & reach test in December: 13 inches. My average flexibility this week: 16.3 inches! My body measurements also all moved in the right direction ... except for my calves, which they explained was most likely due to added muscle.

At my weigh-in: I'd dropped one more pound on the scale, but converted 2 more pounds of fat to fat-free mass. Bringing my to-date totals to: 8.5 pounds ... but the more exciting number is converting 12.5 pounds of fat to fat-free mass!

I also had blood work done this week and was able to compare it to my initial blood work in November.
My cholesterol was 139, and is now 135. My triglycerides were 177, and are now 130. My HDL (good cholesterol) went up! Yay. It was 42 and is now 48! I still need to get it above 50! My LDL (bad cholesterol) went down 1 point, and is still in the desirable range at 61. I'm eager to see if there's been any change in my A1C when I visit my endocrinologist in April!

This week our Thursday night strength training session was lead by Coach Kane and Joe Mitchell, former contestant on the NBC show Biggest Loser. We had lots of fun ... which is they key to our successful workouts!

Joe challenged us with some crazy exercises working on upper body strength and core stability. Below is LeeAnn punching out her frustrations, and then below Melody trying to balance while laughing at our teammate Randy.

Saturday for our long effort -- we began to taper our mileage! We were supposed to get in 7 miles, but about 3 miles into our walk it started raining. At first it was refreshing, and then it just rained harder and harder, and we got wetter and wetter. We ended up around 6.5 miles, but knew we would add mileage later in the day walking from our cars to the Women Today Expo.

It was a beautiful day to start off on Cherokee Boulevard, part of the half marathon course.

"Here's your sign!" This is how we felt when we first started out! lol

But enjoyed it anyway!

Here's our teammate Edee who is going to hand cycle in the Covenant Health Knoxville Marathon!

And then it started raining harder. We had to pause on the greenway (about a mile before we were finished) to memorialize the day! Our canine walking pal Zombie was also NOT a fan of being so wet!

Well, an hour after we were done walking we were supposed to be at the Women Today Expo downtown to present on the Conversation Stage. I was so wet I ended up stopping by my parent's house to re-dry my hair and myself to change for the event. By the time I got to the Expo, the sun was shining again! A crazy, but beautiful day!

My teammates Darla, Edee, Peggy and Melody all made it out for our presentation at the Expo. Coach Kane talked through our weight loss journey, and we all shared different info about ourselves and things we've learned along the way. We had a packed house in our seating area. And to close our segment we invited the audience to get up and do some fun exercise with us -- the Cha Cha slide. Although some were hesitant at first -- we had a pretty big group dancing with us at the end! It was a lot of fun!