The Chairman's Fitness Challenge Blog

So says a report in the New York Times as reported by Alex Hutchison at sweatscience.com.  The theory says that the brain needs downtime to function properly, and overloading it with TV's, loud music, and text messaging at the gym really suboptimizes the potential benefits of a focused workout when it comes to brainpower.

I am not sure if the people listening to iPods at the gym are any more or less intelligent than those luddites without them.  (I've seen some pretty stupid behaviour by the iPod group, but the cause-effect relationship is unclear!)  However, I can say that I tossed the iPod for working out long ago, and only use it occasionally for treadmill runs (which I find incredibly boring otherwise.)  During weight training and interval-type cardio, I find the distraction of messing around with my music is a serious distraction that extends my rest times, encourages bad form , and just generally gets in the way.

On the other hand, loud music during cardio (like spin classes) does seem to raise my performance to a higher level.  The beat and the volume are great at encouraging me to keep a steady pace and give maximum effort - the strange part is, at the end of the class, I can't even remember what the tunes were.  I'm apparently not even giving any conscious thought to the music, I'm just reacting to it at a subconscious level and it seems to work.

So, I agree with the article on a strictly empirical basis.  Background music = good; actively working the touchwheel on an iPod during workouts = bad, and texting on their BlackBerry during spin class = you should really think about going next door to Starbucks instead. 





 

The 52-day challenge is rapidly closing in on the half-way point, and I am having a relatively good challenge.  I thought it miht be time to summarize where things stand and what changes I need to make to achieve all my goals.

The Good:
My circuit training sessions are keeping me right on track when it comes to hitting my resistance training goals.  I am doing 1-hour circuits every Monday and Wednesday, consisting of five rounds of rapid-fire (1-minute sets) of seven different exercises, plus a minute of hard cardio and a minute of rest.  A session lasts about an hour, and I usually hit total exhaustion by the end.  Since starting, I've upped my weight on most of the exercises, and have been using two 40-lb kettlebells for split squats and a 60-lb dumbbell for a swiss ball pullover move.  I'm thinking that most of my body parts are getting hit well; the one area that could use a bit more is the back.

I am supplementing the circuit training with a full-body workout on Friday or Saturday, typically including two sets of front squats, bench press, shoulder press, leg curls, pull-down or seated row, dips, pull-ups, and some sort of abs exercise alternated with back extensions.

My cardio is clustered around the weekend -spin or cycling on Saturday or Sunday, plus a run on Friday or Monday.  If I'm lucky, some other sort of cross-training cardio thing will happen during the week as well.  

All in all, if I keep up this schedule I'll hit or surpass my workout goals by the end of the challenge.

The Bad
My food intake has not been ideal, with too many cheat meals and stops at the pub.  I have learned that I am an impulsive eater/drinker, and among the things that trigger the impulse are stressful gatherings.  Having started a new job, and had far too many big family-type gatherings lately, I have not been sticking strictly to my dietary targets.  As a result, my weight loss has stalled completely.  I have the next four weeks or so to correct that and kick-start some weight loss.

But... 
I am pretty pumped (no pun intended) about some of the physical changes I'm seeing.  My chest feels stronger, and my arms (bi's and tri's) are noticeably better-defined compared to even three weeks ago.  I've noticed my thighs are much tighter-looking too, when I'm lying flat on my back doing some sort of weird swiss-ball ab exercise mandated in the circuit training... 

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 have posted on the Men's Health forums about the circuit training class I am in.  I went through this once before, around Christmas last year, and am now in the midst of another 6-week session of twice-a-week classes doing full-body training.

The format is pretty typical of these things, I think... as many reps as you can do at each station in one minute, seven stations + cardio, five times around.  The total in one hour is about thirty-five sets of various weight-training moves plus five rounds of 1-minute intense cardio on  stationary bike.

The moves include things like tri pushups, one-legged swiss ball squats, and pullovers.  The toughest one to me is the bosu ball squats - I am having a heck of a time getting any meaningful work in without falling off the stupid bosu ball.  Tonight was a bit of a breakout - I finally was able to get some reps in with about 30kg of weight as a front squat.  It doesn't sound like much (my front squat on terra firma is about 65kg) but being able to do it tonight without toppling over was a great feeling!
 

Today was day 1 in another 52 Day Challenge, and I am psyched!  I did a warm-up on our beautiful holiday Monday with a great cardio class ("Bodyattack", one of the Les Mills classes offed at my gym).  I rounded that off by riding my bike to the gym and back (taking the trails on the way home) and jumping in the pool afterwards.

The official weigh-in today was 206.8lbs, a little higher than my best weight during the last challenge, but still within reason given the slacking off that has taken place over the past couple of weeks.  I'm shooting for a 10.5lb weight loss, and that will be my main focus.  I am starting a 12-session circuit training class tonight - that will be the core of my resistance training plan for the next few weeks.  I've done the class before and it is a great challenge! 

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.