Beards, Barbells, and Beer

Ate pizza.and junk Friday night, weight was 218 on Saturday lol. Was back down to 210 this morning. Dat bloat.

Mon Mar 22, 2021

C25k Week 4, Day 1 - 3 minute run, 90 second walk, 5 minutes run, 2.5 minute walk, 3 minute run, 90 second walk, 5 minutes run. I feel like today is a bit of a milestone in this program because it's the first time you run more than you walk. Felt pretty good. It was sunny and warm today so a great day for a run.

Covered 4.36 km, high pace of 5:13.

Chins: 5 max effort sets
(1/2)
6/5/4/3/3
 
Wed Mar 24, 2021

C25k Week 4, Day 2 - covered 4.32km with a high pace of 5:27. Both of my daughters are sick right now and one of them barfed on the bed multiple times on Monday night so I think I'm still recovering from that night, hence being slow and tired today.

-Chins
(1/2)
3/3/3 - wide grip
3/3/3 - neutral grip
3/3/3 - underhand chins

Just barely got the last rep but I'll count it. On Friday I'll try max # of work sets and if I can get 9 again go to sets of 4 next week. Progress!

Also weight the last two days was 209.2 and 209.9 so I'm down around 4-5 lb in the last month or so.
 
Fri Mar 26, 2021

C25k Week 4, Day 3 - It was cold and windy so today's run was kinda crappy. I also met my wife and son for ice cream after the run (because my son needed a covid test which was negative). So I ended up walking around the area where the ice cream shop was for a while so the metrics from my Fitbiit are out of wack. I hit almost 5k with a pace of 6:02 which is obviously affected by all of the walking at the end.

No chins afterward, just ice cream :)

Tues Mar 30, 2021

C25k Week 6, Day 1 - Jog 5 minutes, walk 3 minutes, jog 5 minutes, walk 3 minutes, jog 5 minutes. The weather was great today and I felt pretty good. Hit 4.51 km with a pace of 5:18. The 5 minutes of jogging feel long which shows how out of shape I am. It's also a mental thing because I've never had to stop. I've never really been an outdoor runner and a treadmill gives your feet a bit of momentum so I think part of it is just getting used to the difference and keeping a steady pace.

Did a pyramid of chins at the park: 1/2/3/4/5//2. After the set of 4 I had to switch to doing chins on the swing set because some kids were playing on the monkey bars. The top bar is really thick and my left hand really didn't like not being to close around the bar. Since the beginning of they year its been sore on and off. Honestly I think it's from bending it into my chest while I sleep because it is often sore and/or numb in the morning. I should probably get a wrist brace for sleeping. Hurray for getting old!

Weight is steady at about 209 lb.

Because of Easter I'm not going to get 3 runs in this week or next week so I'll do day 2 tomorrow, day 3 next Tuesday and then repeat one of the days from week 5 on Thursday or Friday. Day 3 is just run for 20 minutes without walking at all which will be a good challenge.
 
Friday April 2, 2021

C25k week 5, day 2. 8 minute run, 3 minute walk, 8 minute run. High pace was 5:51 and covered 4.21km. The girls slept like shit on Wednesday so I didn't do this run yesterday. Slept better last night but I'm still dragging ass today.

Chins: 4/4/3, 4/3/3, 3/3/3

Weight 209.4
 
My entire family got covid the week after my last post (started feeling sick the night of April 6, got the positive test April 8). Thankfully it was mild but had to isolate for about 2 weeks. I'm almost feeling back to 100% now but have a bit of lingering chest congestion. In the meantime schools have closed so my soon is doing school at home. My twins can still go to daycare (ironic because that is where we got covid from) but it's going to make it really hard to get many runs in.

The Spartan Race was cancelled and we have the option to reschedule for the Tough Mudder in September or Spartan Race in October. Not sure how I will fit runs now that my son is home all the time. I guess maybe I'll run when he has some tablet time. I dunno.

On the plus side I lost my sense of smell and had a gross bitter taste in my mouth for about 10 days and as a result barely ate so am down to 203 lb now.
 
I'm really getting the itch to start training again. I have so little time right now because schools are closed so my son is home all the time and my twins are only at daycare part time. However my wife and I are also both feeling the itch to get our house organized so hopefully we can clear out our spare bedroom and I can start lifting weights in there. We'll see.

The one positive is that weather is getting nicer again (a lot of rain lately) so I've been getting outside with my son and being active (finally hitting my daily 12,000 step goal again).
 
Sorry to hear about the Covid. I'm glad it wasn't bad for any of you. You'll find the time for training if you work toward it. You could always do bodyweight stuff and sprints while you don't have much time and space. Who doesn't love burpees?
 
Still haven't found time to train but because of the good weather I've been outside with my kids a lot and at least hit my daily goal of 12,000 steps most days. My diet has been good and I was 200.9 this morning. Down from 213 at the start of the year and my belly definitely looks a bit slimmer. woo.

Our extra bedroom is slowly becoming more tidy and there's almost enough space to lift weights. I've been on a big kick of selling stuff or taking it to donation centers. Still have too much stuff though, ugh
 
My back has been very stiff lately, especially on days when I sat at my work latpop too much. So at the beginning of last week I decided to do some light stretching and oh boy was that a bad idea. When I woke up on Tuesday morning my back felt frozen and I could barely get out of bed without pain. Once I got moving it was manageable but I would constantly get shooting pains in my back and down my right leg, much worse after siting. Advil helped and by Thursday afternoon it started feeling better.

Today its still sore and stiff but I'm basically able to move around and pick up my girls without pain. Occasionally I get a twinge, mostly if I twist akwardly. I think what my back didn't like was lying torso twists so I'm going to avoid those. After a consultation with Dr. Google I feel like it might be a herniated disc. The symptoms and recovery time match. Anyway, gotta take it easy and do some light core strengthening exercises as I feel better.

Also, weight has been flirting with being under 200 lb. I've been in the 199-201 lb range for all of June, gotta get back to eating a bit better so I resume the weight loss. It has been about 1 lb/week until the middle of June and I'd love to be 190 by the end of the Summer.
 
Some of the kids on my street are learning to rollerblade so on Friday I broke out my old ones to roll around with them and one of the mom's on the street. Later, after the kids went to bed, I did a bunch of laps around my court for 15 minutes. I did it again last night for 16 minutes. I think this will be good training for the Spartan Race (hopefully will happen in October) since it makes my legs burn but also gets my heart rate up.

Weight is still bouncing around 199-200 lb.
 
Wed July 21, 2021

Went rollerblading. Mapped out a 3km route that I thought would take at least 15 minutes but it actually took about 11 so I looped around a couple side streets and made it about 18 minutes. Total distance was about 4.5km. My Fitbit says 2.2 which is waaaay off. It was supposed to be using GPS but my guess is that it used steps x stride length instead and obviously when skating you get a lot more distance for each stride.

I checked plotaroute.com and my Google timeline and they both match up to about 4.5km. Next time I'll try logging my session as biking instead of a run to see if it's more accurate.

Weight is down a tad, lingering around 198-199. At this rate I'm hoping I can be at 195 by the end of August. I've been eating too many snacks and not enough meals lately.
 
I picked up a used bike on the weekend (a Jamis Trail X mountain bike) and took it out for a spin on Wednesday night (July 28) after the kids were asleep. I haven't ridden a bike regularly since I graduated university in 2004 but actually felt pretty good. It's a slightly bigger bike than my old one but it's actually better suited to my size. I set a timer for 10 minutes and biked away from my house and when the timer went off turned around and came back, for about 20 minutes total and 5.8 km. It was definitely an easy ride and while my legs felt tight afterward I was fine yesterday. Now I just need to figure out how I can fit a few rides in every week.

Weight is the same.
 
Aug 2, 2021

Took a ride this afternoon. Covered 8.5km in about 25 minutes. Average speed was 20.8 km/h and average HR was 123 BPM.

I need to raise my seat a bit to get a fuller stroke but otherwise the new bike is pretty comfortable. It's definitely much lower impact than jogging and honestly more fun too.
 
Aug 4, 2021

Squeezed in a quick bike ride in the afternoon before I had to get my girls from daycare. Did a quick loop which was 7.6km and took 20m20s. Average speed 22.4 km/h, average HR 133 BPM.

I downloaded the Strava app on my phone which provides more information about the ride than my Fitbit, which won't sync to my GPS at all when I start a bike ride (it syncs for walks and run though). But I'm still using the Fitbit for HR info. Anyway, I've decided my goal is to do an entire loop roughly around the border of Milton (the town I moved to last year). I think it's around 20-25km but I'm going to map it to get a more exact distance. I know that's not a huge distance but you gotta start somewhere. Much more doable than biking around all of Toronto (where I used to live).

In related news, I bought a bike helmet and the first time I put it on the visor attachment broke so I need to take it back to the store for an exchange. Luckily this town is pretty quiet so I'm not super concerned about having an accident on my bike while I don't have a helmet (my wife has a big ead and her helmet is actually too big lol).
 
Fri Aug 6, 2021

Started my progression toward biking around Milton today. First half was easy but heading back the wind picked up and made it a lot tougher.

10.77km, 30m11s, avg speed 21.4 km/h, avg HR 132 BPM. Looking at the speed graph provides by the Strava app I think my average speed in the first half was around 25 and the second half around 16-18, lol. Sloooow

Weight has been 198-199 for the last few days so maybe I've officially broken through the 200 lb barrier. Of course I had a big ass cookie from the dollar store this afternoon and pizza for dinner so at the very least bloat will probably push me back up ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
 
Tues Aug 10, 2021

Took a bike ride in the evening after the kids were asleep. It's been hot as fuck lately so at least biking so late it wasn't as hot. And there's something nice about biking on the quiet, dimly lit streets. I live in the south end of town where it's mostly residential and most of the stores are in the north end so its usually pretty quiet at night. Heck it's pretty quiet during the day!

Anyway, basically went straight across town and back. 11.48km in 28:12, avg speed 24.4 km/h. Avg HR 143 BPM. Went a bit harder than before.

And yeah I live almost at the west edge of Milton and it's about 6km across. A big difference compared to living in Toronto!

Wed Aug 11, 2021

Probably won't get out on the bike over the next few days so thought I'd take a more leisurely ride to burn some calories. Halfway through I remembered that last year an outdoor gym was installed near a community center in the north end of town so I headed there to check it out. It's small but has enough stuff for a good bodyweight workout. Monkey bars, parallel bars, some low hurdles for push-ups or jumping over, and a bench for ab work or maybe step-ups or box jumps.

If I go straight there it's about 5k so a short bike ride. I figure I can bike there, do an upper body workout, then take a longer route home.

So what was going to be a shorter ride ended up being 14.02km in 40:59, avg speed 20.5 km/h, avg HR 126 BPM.

Spartan Race finally fixed my registration so my friend and I can register for their race in October... If it happens this time. We might take advantage of their offer to change races for free if they announce the 2022 races since I'd prefer to be in better shape. But whatever, it's just for fun anyway
 
Aug 17, 2021

Zoomed out for a quick ride while.my girls napped. 13.83k in 35:09,avg speed 23.6 km/h. Avg HR 142 BPM

Aug 19, 2021

Dropped my van off for service and brought my bike with me. Biked over to outdoor gym and did:

Chins: 1/2, 3 sets of 3, 7 sets of 2. (26 total)
Dips: 1/1, 10 sets of 2 (22 total)

Gonna bike home and will add those details later

Screwed up recording my biking because it recorded some of my time doing Chins/dips so my average speed was super low. Then I forgot to restart my Fitbit so missed recording the last half of my ride. Anyway covered 15.85k in about 54 minutes. Was a good ride regardless.
 
Last edited:
Fri Aug 20, 2021

Decided to squeeze in another ride before heading out of town on Saturday. I got about halfway through the ride and my knees started aching, getting old sucks! I guess I need at least one day of rest between rides.

I decided to change my route a bit and instead of going to the East edge of town I headed north up to a series of paths I used to walk/jog on which my twins. It's pretty flat so I was able to get a casual pace going and my knees started to feel better. In the end I did a different route but still roughly the same distance I had planned.

13.84km in 37:48, avg speed 22.0 km/h, avg HR 130 BPM.
 
Wed Aug 25, 2021

Quick bike ride because I had a mobile mechanic coming by to look at the A/C in my second car. 10.3 km in 28:43. It was very windy so average speed was a bit slower, 21.5 km/h. Avg HR was 131.

Didn't weigh myself this morning but after the ride I was 197.8 lb. Probably a bit dehydrated so will be interested to see what I am in the morning. I was out of town over the weekend so didn't weigh myself for a few days. Looking at pics from the weekend my wife commented that I look like I've lost weight. I laughed because I lost most of the weight from March to June and have been steady at about 200 lb since early June. Oh well, glad its noticeable.
 
DrBdan said:
Wed Aug 25, 2021

Quick bike ride because I had a mobile mechanic coming by to look at the A/C in my second car. 10.3 km in 28:43. It was very windy so average speed was a bit slower, 21.5 km/h. Avg HR was 131.

Didn't weigh myself this morning but after the ride I was 197.8 lb. Probably a bit dehydrated so will be interested to see what I am in the morning. I was out of town over the weekend so didn't weigh myself for a few days. Looking at pics from the weekend my wife commented that I look like I've lost weight. I laughed because I lost most of the weight from March to June and have been steady at about 200 lb since early June. Oh well, glad its noticeable.
Click to expand...

Your body is changing brah! More muscles and what not probably. Great job!

I got into biking this year too. Never thought I’d ever like cardio! Stay safe out there!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Forum statistics

Threads
1,237,068
Messages
55,465,148
Members
174,785
Latest member
JoyceOuthw

Share this page

Back
Top