Small Steps

So since my last blog post I’ve been to Malta.

One of my non fitness goals was to travel more so that was my first trip of the year. I stayed in St Paul’s Bay and visited Valletta, the Island of Gozo and the uninhabited Island of Comino. Whilst I was there I ate what I wanted but did do a fair number of steps and I used the hotel gym twice.

So I feel in terms of exercise I’m getting back on track, I can’t run as far or lift as heavy as I used to but I’m feeling goo about the positive habits. I even did my first Park Run of the year this weekend, a 39 minute 5km at Fletcher Moss in Didsbury (first time doing that one and it’s pretty), then I went a did a gym class after that!

I’m a bit gutted because I didn’t manage to get a place on the challenge I wanted at the end of the year but I’m going to keep aiming for it an it might have to be a start of 2025 completion for that.

I’m still struggling with my diet though, I’m eating better since I got back from Malta but still not quite in a calorie deficit. I have about 6 weeks until my next adventure so I need to see if I can sort this before then.

January is almost over

Wow, January is almost done and I’ve not written a blog post this year yet (or even since the start of the December). How have you found January? Have you managed to get started with resolutions for 2024 or has the month just slipped away? In my head I’ve been thinking well we’ve just got started with the year and I’ve loads of time then all of a sudden one month is almost over and I feel like I haven’t really achieved much yet. If I’m fair to myself I have though, but I think to realise that I need to properly reflect on what I have actually done.

My goals this year are:

Lose some weight – ideally 10kg
Regain strength (deadlift 120kg, Hip thrust 200kg, unassisted pull up, press up on toes as basic markers to aim for)
Improve mobility so I don’t become the actual tin man
Get better and more consistent at running – aiming to get closer to a 30 min 5k, 60 min 10k, 2.5 hour half
One (staying secret for now) physical challenge
Grow this blog and business
Travel more
Try new things and tick things off my bucket list

So at the stat of the year I worked out what I needed to do to reach these targets,

I have a rough, subject to change, plan of my strength and running training for the year. Focusing on different aspects of strength training at different points in the year and building up running with my first target being a half in May.
Getting to Park Run consistently.
Stretching weekly.
Attending classes as a participant.
Sticking to a calorie deficit.
Writing blogs regularly.
Plan and book some trips for across the year and look to book things oon my bucket list and other things to do that are new.

January hasn’t been perfect. I have been going to the gym, although I feel like I’m not in a habit with this. I’m starting from scratch – light an getting back into the habit so I can start to rebuild the weight. I have been getting to classes though, I’ve found two I really enjoy- a step class and a strength class that I’ve been pretty consistent with. Running has been harder, the weather (ice and wind) is a challenge and I’ve not made a Park Run yet. I also haven’t really stretch much (mentally I have such a block here as I don’t enjoy it). I’ve also really struggled with my food intake, I’ve over eaten most weeks. So in those terms I’ve made a start with moving more but need to turn my attention to my diet now and just be more sensible because my weight won’t shift without doing this. At the same time I need to remember that I’m never going to be perfect and instead of pressing the f**k it button when I slip I just need to be better than I have been at these things even when it’s not ideal.

As well as trying step, which was new to me (in the past when I’ve tried I’ve never kept up) I’ve started a beginners Sala course and it’s fun! I’ve also got my first trip of the year coming up, I’m off to Malta on Monday for an exploring holiday (and a bit of sun) and I’m umming and ahhhng about where else I want to go. I’m weighing up an epic trip that I think would be amazing but would be scary to do on my own.

How have you done in month one of 2024? I think the thing to remember is that we can’t do everything straight away and as much as I’d like to say oooh I can already see results and like I’ve made loads of progress the fact of the matter is that January is cold and miserable and that makes things harder, so I’m taking January as laying the foundations and February will be where I want to actually feel things starting to take shape.

Are the Scales Bad?

Scales get a bad rap.

These days multiple PTs will tell you to throw them out, so should you wiegh yourself?

Now he thing to remember is they are pretty inaccurate. The flooring your on, the make and model will affect the reading, what you’re wearing, the time of day, how hydrated you are, when you last went to the toilet, what you ate and when. All these things will affect the number on the scales.

It’s for this reason generally PTs are at pains to tell clients not to be too worried about that number. You could weigh yourself several times a day / week and get vastly different results.

And it’s not just that, what’s the right weight anyway. Most people know BMI isn’t the most accurate measure of a healthy weight and one person at a certain weight can look drastically different to another person the same weight. More than that you can be very slender and light and far less healthy or fit than someone bigger or healthier. So what weight do you even aim to be?

So weight monitoring isn’t the best motivating progress tool around. You have a week where you do everything right and still out on weight because of hormones or something else and then end up feeling disenchanted because what else are you supposed to do. This can end up being the thing that makes people think f**k it and give up.

Of course there are other ways to measure progress, but does that mean the scales should go?

I never quite managed to throw them out. I feel like knowing their limitations is enough and the fact is they can work for you. Regardless what the number is, if you weigh yourself at longer intervals, say monthly, you can see a trend of progress over time that should take into account fluctuations across the month. Another way to use them is the opposite end of the scale (no pun intended) and weighing yourself every day. If you do this you can get used to the fluctuations and the drastic up and down changes that do occur and as well as starting to see a pattern over time, this way also allows you to get used to and accept the daily changes you naturally see in weight.

Scales can be used as a tool to help you monitor your progress if you allow yourself to acknowledge that weight loss is never linear, and will happen over a period of time rather than on a day by day basis. The day to day fluctuations are just that.

Project 40 – Week 13

You know when you have weeks where nothing goes wrong but it feels like you didn’t do much right either? That’s been this week.

I literally ended the week feeling like, well I need to kick myself up the arse if I want to achieve my goals for 2023.

But actually it’s wasn’t a bad week. I did eat a bit ad hoc but I was also pretty much in calorie range.

I missed a few days training but did still do 4 gym sessions, 3 runs and 2 classes. I average 20,000 steps a day.

Sometimes you need to reflective on the facts of what you did in a week and then compare that reality to what your head is telling you.

Of course sometimes we think we’ve done great when actually we’re not where we think we are. This is most common with our diet, where we forget the coffees and sauces and so on that add calories to our diet as we wonder how we’ve not lost weight when we’ve been so good.

But equally, sometimes we can just be a bit hard on ourselves and focus on what we haven’t done instead of what we have.

Monday is the start of a fresh week, but no matter what your intentions, forget about being perfect and aim to get a few key things done with anything extra being a bonus. You’re much more likely to achieve this and much less likely to decide to give up come Wednesday this way.

Project Fitter at 40- week 3

Week three of project fitter at 40 and I have focused this week on my diet. Having spent the last couple of weeks looking at where I’m at it’s been clear that for me the amount of calories I’m eating is just too high for me to see the type of results I’d like, so this has been my focus this week.

I’ve not looked to make dramatic changes, but I’ve increased my protein intake (to keep me feeling full), increased my fruit and veg intake and tried to remove the evening chocolate and cake snacking that in reality I know is my downfall.

I forgot to weight myself this morning so I don’t know how this has affected the scale but I feel a bit less bloated so I feel like this change is taking me in the right direction. I know my challenge though is going to be the weekend when I’m at home more and will feel the urge to snack more acutely than I would in the week.

Next week I’m going to continue to stick with my focus on my calorie intake but also look to tackle my morning routine.

I’m a snooze button pusher and it means I feel rushed in the morning and that can have a negative effect on my diet and training as I don’t have food prepared, time for breakfast or end up getting a taxi instead of walking to work. I feel like working on improving this will have a dramatic effect on how I feel overall. It will also help me consistently hit 20,000 steps a day, something I used to do easily but recently have been hit and miss with.

Back to Basics

As I’ve written recently I’m looking at going back to basics to get back into a routine.

Over the last week my training has been more consistent, my NEAT has been decent and I’m drinking plenty of water and nailing a few other habits. There’s two things I’ve struggled with though have been my nutrition and getting up in the morning.

I’ve not eaten terribly but I’ve not eaten what I’ve planned and as such have ended up going over my calorie goal. The reason? Stress.

It’s been a stressful week, work and personal stuff combined has meant I’ve been anxious at times and just generally strung out at others, feeling a bit like I was never going to fit everything into each day.

I wish I was one of those people who lost their appetite under stress. I am however a person who turns to sugar instead. Between snacking on sweet stuff and then opting to not eat the nice balanced meals I’d prepared and instead eat more carb based high calorie meals has meant that my nutrition just hasn’t gone to plan.

In reaction to this though I’m not going to do anything drastic. I’ve got food planned for the coming week and I’m hoping for a quieter week so I won’t be as tempted to reach for a high sugar stress release.

The key here I think is to not beat yourself out when the week doesn’t quite go to plan, not react by going on some drastic campaign to make up for it and just focus on starting again the next day.

So I’m taking the same approach to my mornings too. Last week I snoozed my alarm a lot, this week I’m reverting back to a cheap old school alarm in the next room so I have to get up to turn it off. A few bad mornings last week don’t need to define the coming week and other than trying to make a few small adjustments to improve my morning routine I don’t need to do anything crazy.

Me: Man Down

This week was tough. I needed to complete my February challenge of 56 miles for the month (I had 9 miles to do) and wanted to hit 100km and also run a half with my friend Hollie.

Wednesday we met to go for a 6 mile run, that day I’d not eaten nearly enough and had a busy day, including going for an ill advised lunch time 3km run. I just about managed the evening 6 miles but also completely wiped my energy levels. I spent the next two days trying to refuel and did absolutely limited amounts of activity to recover, but come Saturday it was clear I wouldn’t be able to run. I woke up and my hip and knee were so sore and stiff I was barely able to walk properly, let alone run 13 miles. Deciding to postpone I ended up sleeping a lot on Saturday and generally felt completely wiped out energy wise.

I think the improved weather today made me feel a bit more energetic. A nice long slow walk with a friend round a park made me feel less lethargic and I decided to give a little run a go to get the last couple of km I needed to reach the 100km in February mark. Four very very slow km later I completed that challenge and went home to have a long stretch. A 45 minute Les Mills Stretch class felt needed and made my hip and back feel much better than they have done the last couple of days.

So my lesson for February is I need to focus on my recovery as much as my activity lessons. I know I need to keep increasing my activity levels, that will help me greatly when we can go back to classes and I’m teaching several classes a week again. I don’t want to suddenly go to teaching after barely moving at all for months on end, as I don’t think that would be enjoyable for me Equally however, whilst I do start to increase what I’m doing I also need to make sure I’m eating enough and resting and stretching adequately to ensure I also stay in a good condition.

March is therefore another 100km challenge, a sensible calorie deficit and more mobility work. Hoping the good weather continues to make this feel easier!

So there’s February’s lesson.

Christmas JUMPer Shred – Week 4

Week 4 contained two main challenges- wave training and increasing my NEAT. Week 4 didn’t happen.

I’ve actually been working on increasing my NEAT anyway recently, but the way my week fell meant I not only did way fewer steps than normal (as opposed to actually increasing them) and didn’t fit a single one of the training sessions in.

On Monday night I headed to Edinburgh, which meant I wasn’t able to train Monday or Tuesday, Wednesday I had a PT session in the one hour slot I could have trained in and I drank far too much on Thursday meaning that there was no way I was going to be able to train Friday! Essentially the break from my routine and increase in long distance travel meant I didn’t train as much as normal and definitely walked less. It also meant I ate more fast food and ended up in a calorie surplus.

That’s not to say I had a terrible week. I did still get four short training sessions in. Knowing that I would not have the time to fit in the five shred workouts which all require around an hour, I instead did four short sessions designed by Ricky (between 15-30 minutes each), so I still moved and felt good about those sessions. I also enjoyed my food, even if there was a lot more of the Christmas stuff and takeaways than intended, just being mindful of what I was eating probably meant that I still ate less than i would have otherwise.

Some weeks you will not be able to get everything you want done, some weeks you will eat more than you intended. The key for me is not letting one week that didn’t go to plan throw me off track. I could look at last week as a failure, a week I didn’t complete of the Shred (in fact I’ve been maybe 60% on this 6 week Shred so far, which is what I planned), I could say fuck it and decide to just start again in January.

Or I could do what I’m actually doing. Look at this week as an OK week, a week where despite not training as planned or eating well I still did get some exercise in, I made the best of the time and opportunities I had and I didn’t let it throw me completely off kilter.

December is not the month to decide to do some kind of strict, I will be perfect plan. Equally December doesn’t need to be the month where you just let everything go and never train and eat and drink every single thing you see. Throughout the year I’d encourage the use of moderation in training and eating and in December this becomes all the more important (and harder to do due to the amount of temptations out there).

So week 4- outstanding success? No. Did it keep me accountable enough to not feel like I’ve ruined all the progress I’ve made this year/ Also no. That’s why I would always encourage taking part in programmes like the Shred- the accountability to yourself and others that it brings.

Christmas JUMPer Shred – Week 3

I started week 3 feeling good- I had lost a few pounds and generally felt good from being a bit more active than normal and a bit more aware of what I was eating.

Week 3 was a bit harder in terms in fitting in workouts. Certain jobs that needed doing such as my tax return meant that I didn’t train as much as I wanted and I relaxed how much I ate over the week, increasing my calories.

Could I have done more? Yes. But to be fair watching the videos and doing the workouts when I could, has kept me accountable going into December. For me that is going to be the key this month. I don’t want to miss out on the food and drink that’s going to be everywhere but also don’t want to completely let go of my routine. Therefore having an aim each week for training sessions and calories will keep me in check, even if I miss those goals slightly, trying to work towards those will keep me close to where I want to be.

That would be my key piece of advice for anyone looking to start a plan in the New Year. What you get out of anything depends on what you are willing to put in and there is no right or wrong way of defining success. Going into something knowing what you want out of it and how much you need to put in to get there means you’re more likely to succeed as your expectations will be realistic to your lifestyle.

Scoring an Own Goal?

I had a conversation with a friend over the weekend about goals.

Goals are great for keeping you motivated and on track with your training and nutrition, and people who are quite consistent with their eating and training are often very good at setting and then working towards goals. This is a good thing obviously, but equally it can cause us to put unnecessary stress on ourselves.

See when we are very motivated to achieve XYZ it can become easy to start comparing yourself to others, to start picking holes in our own progress and under valuing our own results. It can also become difficult to recognise that as your goals differ from other people’s what their success looks like and what your success looks like will also be different. Even more so as your goals change what you measure results on might change at the same time at which point it can become even harder to accept the subsequent changes to our body or strength.

Added to this, most of us generally take on board what other people say and think about our bodies with minimal questioning. So if those around us comment on say our weight when we have been training to increase our strength (as opposed to trying to lose weight) it can be difficult to remind ourselves that our weight isn’t important to us because that isn’t our goal.

What I’m trying to articulate here is that at a really basic level setting goals is a great start to a fitness journey but for people where fitness is already part of everyday life we can sometimes get confused about what our goals are and what they mean by paying too much attention to other people’s opinions and other people’s goals.

For me, previously my goals have been running orientated and next year I’d like to pick that up again, at which point my training and nutrition will need to reflect that. Right now though, if I am totally honest I need a break from a specific goal. I’ve spent the last few years chasing one goal and qualification after another and need a bit of a break. I actually just want to train and eat to feel good.

I often say I’d like to be leaner, but if I’m honest right now I’m no willing to stop eating cake in the quantity I do or train more often or for longer that I currently do, so I’m not likely to get leaner than I currently am as I don’t want to change my current lifestyle.

That will change- probably next year I will reset everything and work towards a running based goal. But until then if I see someone smashing out some PBs, running marathons or looking stage ready and feel that sense of failure that I’m not in that condition right now I need to remember I’m not in that condition because I haven’t trained to be in that condition and I haven’t trained to be in that condition because that is not my goal.

Set a goal by all means. Set one that means something to you. Then work to that goal and don’t be swayed by what other people think, say or are doing. And if you change your mind and change your goal that’s fine, you can always readjust your own goal posts.