Stretching

Ever since I've started doing Kung Fu again, I've been adding some basic stretches to my work out routine and I've been noticing a lot of difference. I've never been someone who can touch my toes without bending my legs and though I still can't do it, I am getting closer and I'm able to kick higher too.

I started doing a bit of hunting around on the splits because I know this will be useful in Kung Fu and general flexibility and I found plenty of websites saying you can learn the splits in a week, which I think is a load of rubbish. That's probably possible if you're a dance or gymnast, not if you're an everyday, tightly wound, limited flexibility person like myself.

Anyway, I found this site http://www.wikihow.com/Stretch-for-the-Splits which looks pretty useful. I think I'll try to add these stretches to my routine in the morning and possibly before I go to bed at night. In fact, we'll add the splits to the challenges on the Twelve Month Mission.

On that note, here's how things are looking so far:

Football Tournament - Completed
5km Race every month for a year - In progress
Splits - In progress
Six pack challenge - In progress
Hundred press up challenge - In progress
Kung Fu - In progress
Three Peaks Challenge - June 2012

There's still plenty of work to do. Woah.

Positive Comments

Got some really good comments over the weekend. Saw some family that I haven't seen in a while and a couple of them commented on how I'd got more definition around my shoulders and bigger arms (although I still think there's only a slight increase in them!)

I guess it helps if you're doing something like this and you see people who you haven't seen in a while because they'd really be able to see the big differences in you. When people see you everyday, including looking in the mirror yourself, you may not be able to see the differences as much as others.

Anyway, they were positive comments for me to take on board and to keep me carrying on. Brilliant.

Training Partner

If you're looking to follow a work out programme or just eat better, I think one of the best things you can do is find a person or group of people who have similar goals to you as a way of keeping you on track. You may read about it all the time, and I know different things work for different people, but for me I think it's a brilliant idea that I'd recommend.

I was talking to a close cousin of mine over the weekend and we've devised a plan that hopefully we'll stick to that should keep each other on track with our goals. Last year, when we challenged each other over two months, I managed to lose my target of two stone and he completed his target too. We've got a chemistry that blends both support and healthy competition and it definitely works. If you can find someone or a group of people like this, trust me, you'll enjoy it the new found motivation.

So the plan we've come up with differs from our plan last year, in which we both wanted to be a certain weight at the end of two months. This time round, we're going to set monthly targets to stick to. The interesting thing is, they're not always going to be weight targets. One month I may say, 'I want to be x kg's', the following month I may say 'I want to get my 5km time down to x minutes' and the month after, 'I want to be able to bench x kg's'.

I think mixing these goals up on a monthly basis keeps the motivation and competition going and adds a freshness to your goals. You might get bored with constantly looking at weight as a target, so using other markers can mix things up for you.

We only started yesterday and we've both set weight targets for the end of the month. I'll let you know how I get on. We said we'd do it for six months initially, but there's no reason why you couldn't do it for life. You don't need to constantly need to lose weight, for instance if you reach an ideal weight, you could use the same weight target the following month to see if you can maintain that level. It is, however, useful to challenge yourself physically.

If you can find someone or a group of people who'll do this with you, it could really be worthwhile. If you're doing it already, good stuff and why didn't you tell me before!?

Ideal weight/frame

I was having a hunt about and I noticed that Joe Calzaghe is 5 foot 11.5 inches, which is exactly the same height as me. I checked the weight he used to fight at, and it's all pretty much around the 76kg mark.



I'm going to be using this as some motivation and inspiration now. If Joe Calzaghe had the perfect boxing physique at the same height as me and at 76kg, that's got to be achievable for me. I started the year off at 72kg and even though I'm over 80kg now, hopefully by the end of this twelve month mission I could get to that similar build.

At least I've got a bit of a marker now. He's the same height and I've been his weight before, so I just need to build the muscle and drive the fat down. Easier said than done, but I'm in the third month of this mission. Surely nine months is a reasonable amount of time to achieve this?

Third 5km Race Down... Nine To Go...

I'm writing this as my body is aching from pains from yesterday's 5km race. Good news is it was worth the pain because I've notched up my best ever 5km time now, beating the last record by OVER THREE MINUTES!!! I managed to complete yesterday's race in 27 minutes and 11 seconds! Brilliant!!!

Here's the progress so far:

July 5km - 34.02
August 5km - 30.22
September 5km - 27.11

It's really encouraging to see the figures going down. I know there's a drastic decrease from race to race, I'm sure that gap will get smaller as we go along, but I'm totally over the moon about this latest result. Break the 25 minute barrier for the next race in October? Let's not jump the gun yet, we'll wait and see.

This was a charity fun run rather than a race like the last competition I was involved in. There were lots of different abilities here. I made the usual mistake again that I did last time too. After 1km, I looked around for someone who was running at a similar pace to me and stuck with him, but at around 3km I thought I'd leave him behind. By about 4.5km, I was flagging and he just jogged right by me and finished before me. I really need to learn to keep a reasonable pace for 4km and then really up the intensity as best I can for the final km. I had a nice sprint finish though.

Even though I'm doing the 10km obstacle course in October, I've booked myself in for a 5km run in October too, even though I said I wouldn't because of the obstacle course. Sod it, I've booked it now. In fact, I've booked the next three races until December. That'll be six by then, half way there.

Surely I should be under 25 minutes by then?

Kung Fu Fighting

Had my first lesson in Kung Fu last night in yen years and it was brilliant. My body is in so much pain this morning and that can only be a good thing. I remembered some of the moves and techniques from when I used to practice years ago. Main thing is, I enjoyed it, I found it challenging and hopefully I'm in it for the long haul.

Only thing is now, I think I may have bitten off more than I can chew! Thing is, Kung Fu won't work if I only go to a club once a week. I'll need to practice the techniques at least every other day, and this comes with having to stretch every day to get the flexibility for better techniques, especially kicking. Add this to the Press Up Challenge, running and weight sessions, basically I'm going to go mad!

Sod it, it's done now, I'll stick with it!

Got a 5km run coming up, will post up after it's done.

September Weigh In

It's the first of the month, and time for another weigh in.

After stepping off the scales this morning, I weighed in at 84.1kg, 0.9kg less than last month. Here's how it stands so far:

1st June - 79.5kg (12 stone 7.3lbs)
1st July - 85kg (13 stone 5.4lbs)
1st August - 85kg (13 stone 5.4lbs)
1st September - 84.1g (13st 3.40lbs)

Now I've got mixed emotions today. I guess I should be happy that I've managed to at least lose some weight, albeit a very very small amount. Unfortunately though, August was another one of those months where I actually got my weight down to roughly 80kg. It took about 2-3 weeks to do it, and then it just took the remainder of the month to put all the crap back on.

I went away for the second to last weekend of August, but here's the problem. I binged about a day before I went away (there was no need to), totally drank and ate lots of rubbish while there and then carried it on for the rest of the week and following weekend. Basically, I only got my act together on Monday just gone.

When you compare the weight to what it was in June, I am still technically going backwards. The only thing I can attribute it to is the food. Once I binge, I can't stop! As always, it's something I have to get under control myself.

Onto some positives now, my body is totally aching right now because I've still kept up with my exercise. Plenty of running and plenty of weight sessions. Even during that weekend that I was away, I found the gym and made sure I did plenty of running.

I've finished the football now. Part of this challenge was to get involved in a football tournament, which I did with my work lot. Unfortunately, we didn't make it beyond the group stage so it had a pretty abrupt ending. To replace that now, I'll be starting Kung Fu tomorrow. I used to do it about ten years ago and thought I'd take it up again because I know it will help with my flexibility. I'm looking forward to it. It's late tomorrow night so will let you know on Friday how it was.

Finally, my arms are looking as big as they've ever looked. Don't get me wrong, I'm not talking Arnie arms here. I think I may have added roughly about half an inch to them. It's not a big amount, but it's definitely spurring me on because as I said, they're looking the best they've ever looked.

Got the next 5km coming up soon, so training for that too.

Will update you on Friday with the Kung Fu.

I may have some recruits for the Three Peaks Challenge next year too! That should be fun.