- I want to sweat like crazy and feel like I've had the best workout of the week so I push it hard and my heart rate responds accordingly :)
- I get lost in the music and just forget to check the watch
- I would just feel lame sitting on the bike keeping my heart rate down while everyone else is running or hill-climbing!
I'm trying to get my head around the whole endurance aspect. I compared my last 4 Spinning workouts (below, date order from right to left) to see if I'm getting any closer to the target range of 65-75% of maximum heart rate. Apparently not! I have the real-time heart rate measurements on my wrist, so why is it hard to keep within the defined range?
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I voluntarily put myself through a rather unpleasant experience today - a 4 hour long Finnish language test also known as YKI. What's more, I paid 95€ for the privilege! Signing up for this test is notorious. That is, if you want to take it in a large, dynamic metropolis such as Tampere ;) If you've found yourself among the unlucky ones who start queuing for the registration in lovely sub-zero temperatures at 5am, for the doors to open at 9am, followed by a barbaric stampede of desperate immigrants only to be told... Pahoittelut, ilmoittautuminen on nyt täynnä. Tough shit...but fear not! Every cloud has a silver lining.
The test itself is only held a few times a year, so what are you gonna do now? Wait? Nah, it only prolongs the pain of learning Finnish language and you certainly don't want to inflict that on yourself any more than is necessary. The good news is that you can easily take the test in any nearby leafy suburb such as Valkeakoski, where the fields are strawberry, forever. An added bonus there is the nice factory wafting some delicious sulphurous odours into the air. Pleasant, indeed. No queue, satisfaction guaranteed. Stay tuned! The Finnish Language test saga continues in coming posts... Just before Christmas last year I fell in love. I didn't see it coming at all. So unexpected, yet thrilling and addictive! I have a feeling it's going to last. I opened my arms wide and welcomed...SPINNING into my fitness regime. Admittedly, the very first time I flirted with Spinning, the experience was truly bizarre. It was about 3 years ago and it turned out to be a virtual spinning class. So, there I was in the class, staring bewilderedly at the rather flimsy-looking bikes around the perimeter of the room, thinking to myself... Wtf? This sort of thing can only happen in Finland... Clumsily, I set up my bike and started following a DVD of some wee guy riding through what appeared to be the Rocky Mountains. I suffered on through the boredom and left feeling very weird. That spelt the end of our brief encounter. 3 years later, in need of some lower joint-impact exercise, I ventured back into the Spinning room, but this time I made sure there would be an instructor. It was a 30 minute class in which I literally nearly died. The 30 minutes were spent trying to breathe while frantically clock-watching praying the pain would end soon! However, like a total sucker for punishment, just before Christmas I decided to give it one more try by going to a 1 hour endurance Spinning class. I had another reason to be skeptical about this particular class and it was because of the instructor. I'd previously tried her kettle-bell class, hated it and promised myself never to go to her classes again! The result? I was hooked, it was really great fun! I even saw a bit of myself in the instructor. She is a fitness-freak, loves her music, carefully chooses playlists for the class and TURNS UP the volume: an excellent motivator! I like her anecdotal approach, filling in the gaps in tracks with some wee stories. Granted, they are in Finnish language but I try my best :) For those of you who are unfamiliar with Spinning, it's a calorie-burning cardio workout on a stationary bike. You control how fast you pedal and the level of resistance from the bike. There is (usually!) an instructor telling you how to follow the intervals, stand up, climb hills and sprint etc. In endurance Spinning, the idea is to keep your heart rate between 65-75% of its maximum. I haven't quite mastered that yet because when I feel like I'm capable of working harder, why should I cool it down!? If you're a first timer, it's CRUCIAL that you ask the instructor to help you set up the bike to suit your height and to explain why the adjustments are made like that. Take it from someone who was initially very skeptical about Spinning that it can be a lot of fun, not to mention a killer calorie-burning workout for the legs, bum and your cardio fitness. Don't be shy, give it a try! Starting a diet, healthy eating plan or new fitness regime at the beginning of the New Year is arguably one of the most cliché notions ever. Can it really be sustainable long-term or is it just another fad, among your gazillion other New Year resolutions? Every January my gym is utterly packed with Duracell bunny-like people on their fitness-kicks but low and behold, by mid February they've given up and I've got my space back. My selfish streak says hurray, they're finally gone! That's a bit evil, though. I can't help wondering if they are just going about things in the wrong way... It's perfectly possible to stick to a new health and fitness regime. In my opinion that purely depends on your frame of mind and attitude. Now, let's focus on healthy-eating. By adopting the following mantra (in addition to normal regular exercise routine), I have managed to cut 3.5kg in just 2 weeks and I feel great! This is only the beginning. A couple of "pearls of wisdom" for you guys: 1. It doesn't have to be that hard. Do not starve yourself or ban yourself from eating any single thing, especially the things you enjoy. If you do, you'll manage for a while, but you will eventually cave in and ruin the whole thing by binging. 2. Be mindful of portion sizes, don't be greedy and eat slower. 3. Enjoy the feeling of being a little bit hungry at some points during the day. Your plan is working! 4. Start steaming vegetables. Trust me, you'll never look back. Flavour! 5. Always eat breakfast, it's the most important meal of the day. 6. Completely cut out the heavy carbs in the evenings. Have a light evening meal such as grilled or oven-baked fish or lean meat with some steamed vegetables. Your body will thank you for the protein, especially if you workout regularly. If you crave dessert, try low-fat cottage cheese mixed with frozen berries: delicious! 7. Educate yourself on what's good for you nutrition-wise by reading blogs, watching documentaries etc, but don't become obsessive! Aim only at subtle, sustainable changes in your attitude towards food.
8. ENJOY! I need to credit someone I follow on Instagram, Louise C , as she's been an inspiration to me by posting photos of all her protein-filled meals which are a part of an eating plan designed for her by her Personal Trainer and aimed a cutting body fat. Everything looks delicious, clean and super healthy. Go Girl! I workout on a regular basis but find it irrationally difficult to do a decent, if not minimally acceptable, amount of stretching. Why is it so hard to muster up the self-discipline to do it on your own? My conscience screams at me in the evenings, post-workout, to get off the sofa and spend even just 20 minutes stretching all those muscles I've just used. In reality I rarely do it. What are my excuses, you might ask? Mostly, I feel too tired and lazy and would rather just flop into bed than get my yoga mat out! However, without going into a lot of scientific detail, the benefits I personally get from stretching are crystal clear: - stretching before bed induces a relaxed state for the body and mind - quality of sleep improves - muscles recover faster and actually get stronger - increased suppleness in general and better performance in my next workout From experience, I've noticed that in almost every single gym I've ever been inside, the stretching area is so tiny and more often than not just shoved in some skanky corner of the gym!. It's a complete joke. If you want to go there to do some dynamic warm-up stretching before a fitness class or a workout it's usually jam-packed and you'll struggle to squeeze yourself in there. The same applies after the session. I just don't get it, because I think the general understanding among all people who keep fit is that stretching is a crucial part of your routine, yet the gyms don't offer regular stretching classes, very few instructors advocate stretching. You'd think it'd be in their interest to do so, as it would minimise the number of people getting injured as a result of pulling muscles etc. I know that I would benefit from a stretching class environment and I bet I'm not the only one! Can you be bothered stretching? Is there a good-sized space where you can stretch in your gym? Do you go to stretching classes? If so, how often? Why do you think we neglect this crucial part of our routines? Let me know what you think guys :) Seriously. Back in the days when I was training in Muay Thai, I would often observe the gym and fitness class-goers finishing their Les Mills classes like BodyPump and BodyCombat and a couple of my fellow Thai Boxers and I would say to each other... "Check them out...they are so lame. They should try out a real tough sport! Bet they don't get to train to The Prodigy like we do! Suckers! We were literally laughing at them. We thought it was so cheesy. These days I can absolutely, 100%, entirely willingly, EAT MY OWN WORDS. This is my heart rate graph from today's BodyCombat class: It speaks for itself. Now, you could quite reasonably draw a number of conclusions about this:
1. We were extremely narrow-minded Thai Boxing snobs...and you'd be quite correct. 2. This graph indicates that I'm actually quite unfit and the minimal effort required for BodyCombat is way above me...and you'd be wrong! In actual fact, I'm in pretty good shape (even if I do say so myself) and am doing a variety of different types of exercises in my routine. I typically head to the gym 5 times a week. So, in my humble opinion, the most reasonable conclusion to draw from this is that group fitness classes can be very intense and extremely physically demanding. BodyCombat is a cardio class, based on various martial arts' influences. Although I don't actually hit anyone or anything any more, I would argue that the cardio effect and fitness training here is definitely not lame. It's a fantastic way to release some aggression and just have fun! Over the past couple of weeks I've been feeling really nostalgic about Thai Boxing. Sometimes known as the 'Science of 8 limbs', Muay Thai is arguably one of the toughest fight sports around. I didn't really know that when I signed up for it but I soon found out that in addition to punches and kicks, elbows and knees were completely legitimate techniques too - fabulous! I got into Muay Thai when I was in my second year at university, around 10 years ago (wow!). I went along to my first class with my friend, thinking I was going to 'kickboxing', not really fully understanding what that was either. Little by little, I became dreadfully hooked on the beautiful, vicious art of the sport, the feeling of training so hard that you physically want to throw up while fully aware that you'll plunge yourself right back into it the next day, the attractive shade of blue that both of my legs inevitably turned and maybe even more importantly the feeling that the guys in your club were your new family. We trained in a really dingy, smelly room in the university gym, which totally lacked any kind of ventilation. I vividly recall the lady Yoga instructor who often taught her class right after ours, turning up with a huge can of air freshener, frantically skooshing it around the room in the desperate hope of getting rid of the sour stench of Thai Boxer sweat. It was, of course, highly entertaining for us. Ah, the good old days! From a fitness perspective, I would argue that the kind of training you undertake for Muay Thai is one of the most effective and grueling around. Of course, the intensity of the training varies depending on whether you are training for fun or competitively fight training. I have experienced both and during that time, I was undoubtedly in the best shape of my life. Ultimately, this photo represents one of my favourite and certainly defining moments in my relatively short Muay Thai career: This is from my second and last C-rules Muay Thai fight at Airth Castle, Scotland in Sep. 2005. I won on a points decision and was truly elated! On the rare occasion that I watch the DVD of the fight, I still feel like I could have done more, maybe even gone for a KO but you know, hindsight's a wonderful thing.
In future posts I'll go into more detail about what Muay Thai training comprises and what you can expect if you go along to a training session :) Respect and thanks will forever go to my home club Caledonian Muay Thai and The Griphouse in Glasgow, Scotland. Welcome to my brand spanking new blog! I've always had a niggle in the back of my mind, a subtle desire to write but never have I been inspired enough or courageous enough to give it a go...until now. I will be writing about what energises me, and how I work on honing my mind, body and soul. While this will mainly be a Health & Fitness blog, from time to time I'm sure I'll be inclined to write about nutritional habits, music, food & drink, photography, film, languages, travel experiences + more! I hope I will inspire you in some way, shape or form :) |
About meSports & Remedial Massage Therapist, language-geek, mum, Nordic at heart. Family, travelling, my bike, fitness and music make me tick. Archives
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