The Chairman's Fitness Challenge Blog

Friday's are usually tough days for me to get in a workout - regular working days, my gym closes early, and I want to spend the last day of the week having a relaxed dinner with my family rather than the usual hustle and bustle during the week. 

Today was different, though.  On the way to pick up my daughter from her day camp, I arrived 45 minutes early and stopped at the affiliate gym two blocks from the camp location downtown.  I did 2.5 miles on the treadmill, doing three phases of shorter runs while varying the speed to get a more intense workout in.  I'm trying to increase my speed, and shorter bursts seems to be a recommended way to do it rather than a half-hour of steady state.

It felt like a great workout!  I set a PB for one mile at 9:49 at 1% incline (I don't track this stat too often but it's still a good thing!) and maintained a 7mph pace for quarter-mile segments, so that's progress over my usual 5.8mph slogging!  Next stop - a 30-minute 5k!  (I need to pare about 4 minutes off my current pace to accomplish that.)

I've been focusing on cardio lately, for a myriad of different reasons.

The past few days included:

- Spin class, 50min, on Saturday 7/17
- Spin class, 50 min, on 7/18
- Run on the dreadmill on Monday 7/20.  3.1 miles, 34:40.  "Sport Training 5k" circuit, so lots of inclines.  I kept the speed around 5.6-5.8 mph, with short bursts faster.  Didn't make it all the way through without slowing down, but felt it was a good run given the length of time since my last one!  3-4 minute warm-up and cool-down, as always.

Posting blog updates has slipped down the list of priorities this challenge, but a few thoughts now that the challenge half-way-point has passed would be appropriate.  I'm feeling pretty good about my progress, even if the numbers are a little behind.  The Hard-Body plan seems to hit all the right muscles, and I am being diligent about upping the weights whenever I hit ten reps on an exercise.  As a result, I've seen some good gains in strength on things like my bench press and hack squat.  I am considering changing to an "A-B-A" routine three times a week, using the same exercises split over two days instead of three (this is an option in the book).

On the CT front, I'm definitely seeing some cardio gains as well.  I feel like my cadence is up during cycling classes, and my blood pressure and heartrate seem a little bit improved even over the past few weeks.  Today I did a 2.5 mile run on the dreadmill non-stop, hitting that distance for maybe the first time in my life.  I took the pace down about 10% from my usual, keeping it slow-and-steady at about 5.6 or 5.7 mph (0.5 degree incline) until cranking it up faster for the last half-mile or so.  My plan is to get to where I can pound out 3.1 miles (5km) or more comfortably non-stop at that speed as a baseline, then start speeding it up and doing some intervals to improve my pace.   


 

It's been a while since my last post, but I have not been slacking in the challenge.  I'm on track with the RT's and well ahead on cardio, and in fact put in another 3 miles or so today.  The bad news is, I really had my lower-body weight training scheduled and am procrastinating again.  Blah.  My eating has been pretty sound (except for last Sunday...) too, and I'm seeing indications on the tape measure that progress on the 5% weight challenge is forthcoming as well.  I am down almost an inch on my ab measurement since the challenge started, to a number I haven't seen for quite a while!

All that said, I'm starting to feel that things are generally in a bit of a rut.  I'm back to obsessing about relatively minor things (how many tire reviews on www.tirerack.com does one need to read before deciding on a set of clearly-overdue tires???) and most seriously of all, I realized that my recent campaign to get rid of old/ripped/worn underwear has resulted in my having nine pairs of identical gitch, purchased at different times over the past eight months.  The joe fresh line may be reasonably priced, and nicely made, but would it have hurt to at least get different colours?  This is the clearest sign yet that, after fifteen months, I think I need a vacation.

It's Wednesday, and I feel like I'm hitting a bit of a rut after a great start to the challenge. I missed out on CE's two evenings in a row, after dragging the family to a buffet restaurant on Monday and having a couple pints of beer after class last night. Still ahead of my CE target, but trying to tell myself that isn't helping.

My legs were absolutely leaden during cardio this morning - I almost bailed even before class started since I could feel the inertia. I did power through the 45 minutes, though, and hopefully I'll get a little more spring in my step for tomorrow.

I added a link today to Alex Hutchinson's blog, Sweat Science. It has some great discussion of the scientific research behind fitness and exercise. I'm not all that familiar with the site yet, but will definitely be spending some time digging through it.

Alex Hutchinson had an article in the Globe & Mail this week comparing indoor "spin" class to outdoor cycling. An interesting conclusion - "the ingredients of a typical indoor cycling class somehow combine to lift workouts to heights that most participants wouldn't achieve on their own." Research shows that the group dynamics of a spin class can push participants to achieve a better workout - so much so that some participants exceeded their measured VOmax capacity. (This, by the way, indicates an error in VOmax measurement, not people reaching superhuman output.)

I have become a convert to the "RPM" version of spin class - for me, it achieves many of the objectives of HIIT and interval training in terms of varying intensity, and I tend to work harder than if I'm on my own. YMMV, of course.

Got to the gym about noon today (Sunday) after taking the weekend off. I wanted to hit the spin class at 9:15am but making breakfast and doing various other stuff for my sick daughter came first.

It actually worked out great, though - I got a lower body session in, then hit the cardio for about 25 minutes of of hard interval work. I think this was the hardest intensity I've hit outside the classes, so the spin sessions seem to be paying off already! Tomorrow I hope to do upper body and spin for 45 minutes, to get all my numbers right to the pace they need to be at for the challenge.

I'm looking at my old copy of the "Hard-Body Fitness Plan" - it advocates a three-way split with one workout day dedicated to arms, one to chest/back/abs and one to legs. I'm still of the opinion that I'm hitting the arms sufficiently during my back/shoulder/chest work, so I'll probably stay the course for a while before considering that change.