Setting The Table
The next two months are gonna be gonna be busy. It might seem like a terribly time to shoehorn 5-8 hours of training into life while also holding down a job and moving a household and some livestock. It could be the perfect time, too. Evenings and weekends are already committed to moving. Weekdays are work. Carving out a little time for oneself is necessary. With all the other change, it makes sense to slip a little more in—
Exercise will provide some relief. Improving my diet and maybe shedding a few pounds will make me more productive. The key is knowing what needs to be done. There will be no time to figure out today’s nutrition goals. There will be no time to create a weekly schedule based on overall goals. (That’s my preferred way—weekly mileage/climing goal, then working out each day based on weather and life).
No, to pull this off requires setting it all in place before life gets rocks. Small daily habits to provide some stability in the day-to-day.
Lifting
Lifting is what I’m least comfortable programming. After asking around on mastodon and reading some rec’s on She’s a Beast’s Liftcord, I’ve opted for Tactical Barbell
I read the entire book in about half a day. It’s sounds geared to people who aren’t focused on lifting as a sport. It’s geared to people who need to be functional after a gym session. That’s been my main complaint about traditional lifting—it leaves me a little gassed and interferes with running and life.
It’s also very straight forward. Pick the program, pick the lifts, decide on number of days to hit the gym, do a 1 Rep Max test. Then you plug the numbers in, and that’s what you’re doing for 12 weeks. Show up, do the work, nothing else. Gym sessions should be more routine than grocery shopping.
Nutrition & Energy Intake
Plowed through the most of Kylee Van Horn’s Practical Fueling for Endurance Sports today. Taking in the relavent parts, think I’ve put together a basic nutrition and fueling plan. Few things I learned:
- Given my current activity level, I’m probably overeating, explaining the weight gain. sad trombone
- Based on some info from Tactical Barbell, I’m probably not eating enough fat.
But I also have some concerns about underfueling—I can often forget to eat while working, and have a history of undereating and underfueling. As a sanity check, I’ve added a Energy Availability calculation to one of to a spreadsheet I use to track weight, just to make sure I’m in the ballpark. Can’t stress this enough: this an ESTIMATE, a GUIDELINE, a SANITY CHECK. I DO NOT LIVE or DIE BY THIS NUMBER All the numbers going into the formula are suspect. The output is suspect. But it’s a guideline, a backup to be sure I’m getting close. If the number stays in a healthy range, my weight drops, other metrics improve (like morning wood), then TAKEN AS A WHOLE it’ll be seen as good.
All of this, all of the metrics being tracked, they all are looked at in the aggragate and viewed holistically
Running
Drastically scaling back weekly mileage drastically to focus on base building with a little speed. I’m most comfortable creating this type of routine, so it’s saved for last, and that means I haven’t done it yet.
End of Week Measurements
It’s been a stressful week.
| Measurement | |
|---|---|
| Weight (lbs) | 185 |
| Waist (in) | 38.5 |
| Thighs (in) | 50 |
| Biceps (in) | 26 |
