Fitness Fail

So, as I slowly start to get this year back on track, I need to consider getting some level of fitness back.

Alas my knee injury will require a few more months rehabiliation, so I need to find a low-impact way to exercise. In other words, swimming, cycling or… yeah, something else.

Living at the top of a hill makes cycling a bit tricky, and we did have bikes for a while but sold them on as we hardly got the use of them. But it’s a consideration.

Swimming is another option but I’m not that great a swimmer, I can only really do the front crawl and only at the one pace which, usually, means that after 5 or 6 lengths (ok ok, 2 or 3) I’m puffing hard and already looking at the clock. I can’t really pace myself to sustain it.

In the gym there is, of course, a lot of non-impact equipment and so I guess it’s time to head down to the local sweatshop and see what’s what.

Now I just need to find the motivation.

Comments

  1. But sweetie you already have the motivation: the motivation is knowing how good you feel when you’re exercising regularly and how that filters through to everything else you do.

    I kind of forgot that in lots of moving and things, but going back to the gym has reminded me that that’s all the motivation you need. Yay!

  2. I find your excuses unconvincing. Living on the top of a hill is no excuse for not cycling. What it means is that when you set out you have this wonderful ‘Whooooooosh’ that makes warming up unnecessary. It may mean that the way back involves some getting off and pushing. The fat people in the cars sneering at you are fat sneery people in cars. The fit cyclists in lycra looking disdainfully at you don’t know your medical history, life circumstance or where you are in your personal journey. And eventually you get to cycle up that hill.

    As for the swimming, I suspect that you have an overdose of testosterone. I hate to break it to you but you’re not in your twenties any more. Who are you trying to impress?

    If you are concerned about your lack of technique, how about booking a couple of personalised sessions.

    Try lying on your back and kicking your legs. Try a few strokes of breast stroke. Try again. And again. You’re not the sort of man to give in easily.

    And find out a good time to go to your pool when you won’t feel intimidated by younger men posturing like peacocks.

    🙂

  3. Good point on the bike thing. It’s probably the way I’m gonna go anyway.

    And to be honest, the swimming thing is more of the “go there, get changed, get wet, get showered, get changed, go somewhere else” issue. And I’m not bothered about younger men (pffftttt), I’ve never swum all that much, and my puffing only bothers me. Honest!

  4. I’m the same. I find the biggest problem is getting into the swing of things.

    Once I am going regularly it;s easier. It’s overcoming that initial inertia.

    I’m also surprised their are no easy obvious social networkky things to join up with remote friends and ‘train’ together.

    Nike+ running thing could have done it, but they decided to spank all their money on flashy flash shit rather than smart social shit.

  5. Gordon,

    If you find out when the young men are posturing like peacocks at our pool could you let me know!

  6. Have you thought about just walking as a start? Even just an hour a day burns about 450 cals if you go at a brisk pace. I’ve acquired a pedometer from Amazon, and it really helps to keep you focussed on matching your daily targets, if not beating them.

    The weather’s been so good this week that I’ve burned 12,200 altogether. It’s been really pleasant in the sun, heading for a suitably distant pub where you can have a half-way break, iphone to ear, and via green fields brimming with impending summer.

    I got chatting with someone I knew a little in said pub who had been just dying for a chance to meet a daily walking buddy, and since we started, other expressions of interest in coming along have been generated, so the activity has developed an encouraging social dimension too.

    And when I’m trying to get fit, that’s what I’m doing. I only ever feel like giving the peacocks at the pool a nice, clean shove.

  7. Kat – yeah I have. But I need to keep impact to a minimum. Even walking… impact on the tendon at my knee is what has kept me from going back to jogging.

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