The fitness campaign starts here
We’re at that time of year again – New Year inevitably equals a looking back at our pigging out over the festive season (when we all ‘let go’ food and drink-wise because – as we intend to really sort ourselves out over the next twelve months – we may as well enjoy ourselves one last time before we start) and reaffirming our resolutions to lose weight, eat better, moderate the alcohol intake and just basically get fit. Well, as fit as we can be for someone of our age – not really fit like those twenty-something gym bunnies who look like they have stuffed balloons up their latest most fashionable lycra-wear and spend most of their time sitting posing on weights apparatus whilst tapping away on their smartphones.
[Advance warning: I’m about to have a go at occasionally blogging progress on my 2017 fitness programme which actually began yesterday (3rd January) because, in all honesty, you cannot begin one on a Bank Holiday Monday when you’ve got a roast joint with all the trimmings, two boxes of mince pies and two boxes of my favourite mini-cheroot cigars to finish off – but, of course, only so that they don’t subsequently act as naughty temptations when you do actually begin your campaign].
Every fool knows the basic equation that generally your weight and fitness levels are a direct product of what and how much you eat times how much exercise you take. Ergo, the obvious starting point for any fitness regime designed to get these under control or improved is to eat ‘better’ food (and less of it) and then make a conscious effort to take more exercise.
This much we get constant reminders about via media stories and Government initiatives.
There is an obesity epidemic crisis in the UK – or if there isn’t one, it’s coming rapidly over the horizon. Our kids are too fat anyway. We all eat badly and none of us take enough exercise. All we have to do is think about trying to eat healthier food and trying to take more exercises. Simples.
I had a hip replacement in July of last year and in ten days’ time will reach six months past it, the point by when (I had been promised) I would scarcely be able to remember a time when I had a hip problem at all.
I bought a basic ‘week at a double-page time’ diary yesterday in which I plan to record my eating and exercising habits.
I then weighed in at 194 pounds (13 stone 12 pounds in old money).
This is exactly half a stone – or 7 pounds – heavier at the relatively few times in 2016 when I was sailing along with last year’s version of a fitness regime, eating less and in particular going to the gym regularly.
Thanks to my new Garmin fitness wrist band, which can connect to my smartphone, I know that I did a total of 12,103 steps yesterday, this without even trying in terms of setting off deliberately to clock up the number – against the general daily target I have set myself (designated as ‘good’ for someone of a certain age with a typically-sedentary lifestyle like mine) of 10,000.
Yesterday, as an example – and don’t forget I hadn’t officially begun my fitness campaign then, I was just getting myself in a ‘fitness regime’ state of mind in preparation for beginning properly today – I consumed during the day one large black coffee, a pink grapefruit, a tomato sandwich, a small can of Lucozade, two leeks (steamed), some chicken breast meat, two small cans of tonic water … and then two small After Eight ice creams (which, of course, nobody is telling anyone about) whilst I was watching television last night.
Already – in contrast – today, Wednesday 4th January 2017 (Day One of The New Fitness Programme!), at 5.30am I wrapped up and deliberately set off at a brisk walking pace (well, brisk for me) and in 85 minutes completed four circuits of a familiar rectangular route around where I live.
In all, I should estimate that in that time I walked appreciably closer to 4 miles than 3.5 over a course on which, for all but the first circuit, I had to take a sizable detour from my intended route because the tide had come in and flooded the road that I had just about been able to pass along when on my first circuit. Plus I did a slight detour right at the end of my excursion in order to nip across the road and collect my newspapers.
Three months ago, when I was beginning my disciplined attempts to learn to walk properly, I deliberately set off – about once every three days – and managed one circuit (about 0.8 of a mile) of the above course. This instantly became the source of half a day’s self-satisfied partying, two beers and the smoking of two of my mini-cigars in celebration.
On two occasions back then I even managed to do two circuits of the route, but routinely I stuck to one because it was all a bit of an effort and quite tiring – and what’s more a bit boring.
In those days, I should explain, I was consciously having to make my right leg walk properly. Muscles that hadn’t been used for ages had to be ordered “Lift the leg up, you idiots, and plonk it down in front of you!”
The next issue was how far forward. Should I be attempting to stride out, or go medium length, or just take short steps – and indeed, which of those would be for the best?
And, by the way, what was my left leg doing all this time? When you’re fit and walking in the normal course of events you don’t even have to think about what either leg is doing. At that stage of my rehab, however, I had to look down and see what my left leg was doing before then deciding what I’d then attempt to do with my right.
My right thigh used to get tired very easily as well.
Today I managed the above four circuits with no trouble at all. I could have done more but I reckoned four circuits (that was 11,611 steps by the way – more than my daily target and it is not even 8.00am as I type) was enough.
The first two flashed by – I was thinking about issues in my life which helped to pass the time. The next one was tougher because I had run out of things to think about. But the fourth circuit was a bit of a doddle: I kept thinking of myself as some sort of Team GB distance runner taking part in the Olympic marathon who had entered the stadium so far ahead that I was now completing what was effectively a solo lap of honour.
Feeling a bit righteous this morning. We’ll see how things are going when I report again next week.
