Exercise update, Week 10

We won.

It was tough. The training was rough. The games were intense. The finals were close and competitive. But we came through and are the champions of the tournament.

There are not many feelings more exhilirating than knowing that our team played against amazing teams and great players, quite a few with a good chance of winning, and came out on top.

These moments don't happen often in my life and after so many years of hardly exercising, it puts a significant marker on achieving the milestone of 10 straight weeks of regular exercise.

• Monday: 40 minute gym
• Tuesday: Sick day - Rest
• Wednesday: Sick day - Rest
• Thursday: Sick day - Rest
• Friday: 45 minute hiking
• Saturday: 45 minute hiking
• Sunday: 45 minute hiking (morning), 30 minute basketball (afternoon)

This week was pretty much the least exercise I've done since I started my exercising iniative. I was knocked out for half the week with food poisoning and even easing myself back to exercising with light hiking was progressive; instead of the usual six laps, I only did two laps on all three days at a slow pace.

Even taking part in the basketball tournament earlier today, I was still feeling weak and lethargic from the sickness, and did not manage to play as hard as I wanted to by a long shot. But at least I still showed up and gave my best.

Regardless of how mild my workouts were this week, I still hit my target of exercising at least three times a week for a minimum of 15 minutes and ensuring that I sweat it out.

Which now brings me to an important question. What's next?

I started this initiative just wanting to get fitter, and with the added motivation of the basketball tournament, what I did was mainly geared towards achieving better sports performance.

My runs and Insanity sessions were to add fitness as quickly as possible. My gym sessions were focused on building upper body and core strength. My hikes were the only exception because they are mainly for family time.

I didn't mind a random mish mash of types of exercise as long as it supported the overall goal. Now that the tournament is over, I feel a need to be more focused and a couple of options have presented themselves to me.

Firstly, I can continue what I'm doing. It's not been too bad so far as I've been able to add fitness and strength, and a tiny bit of 'perceived visual musculature'...Most importantly, I've done it while maintaining a decent balance with time spent with family, work and ministry, which is no mean feat.

Secondly, I can go the fun route while building some serious fitness. I truly love competitive sports and if I want to, I can join my friends for Futsal on Monday nights, badminton on Tuesdays, kickboxing on Wednesdays and Fridays, basketball on Thursdays, etc. But the tradeoff here is more money spent and significantly less family time. I'm always tempted with these sessions but I know that I will end up forgoing them time and time again, and for good reason.

Thirdly, I can do a serious push with Insanity and follow the programme properly for the first time (every day for 60 days except one rest day each week). This will get me the fittest I have been since college days and maybe even more. I may finally get a six-pack for the first time in my life but it will be on a 'skinny-type' build. It's free since I have the videos and since I can do it at home after my baby sleeps every night, family time should not suffer (although my sleep time will).

Fourthly, and my last option right now, start hitting the weights more seriously. Have a focused programme to build muscle and start changing my diet to have more protein and muscle-building composition. This is free because I use my apartment gym and may or may not affect family time because I need to leave the home to use it but I can choose to go after my baby sleeps if I choose as well.

So there you have it. It may not sound like that big of a deal but it's causing me a bit of a dilemma right now.

I'm going to ease back into exercise in the coming week after last week's illness and tonight's midnight Man Utd vs Chelsea game which will end at 2am. I'll target to make my decision by 1 November which is this Thursday.

My gut feel is that I'm going to try to create a hybrid programme with only two sessions of cardio maximum per week, and a more intentional scheduling of gym time to target more muscle groups than what I currently do in the gym (chest, biceps, core).

So essentially, it will still be a mish mash routine but just a more intentional mish mash, which will hopefully allow for more visible results and greater impact than before. Let's see how this goes.

Categories: Health