July 9 to July 17

Not a bad office, not a good gym ... yet

 I have been on vacation.

Well, not really. I'm working remotely inside the new-to-me RV. We are out in a provincial park and I'm working from there. I'm working off an expensive cell phone mifi device that is acceptable, but not really. Ah well, we are almost done. I'm home tomorrow or the day after.

I'm up-to-date on my marking, but my fitness journey is just off. No swimming, no running only minimal stretching and only one kettlebell. I did some sessions, but nothing is really being done.  

To be fair, I'm more worried about keeping my position than training at the moment. There are so many things not in my favour for my fitness journey here. Of course, this is also my first time trying something like this and I'm in the middle of a steep learning curve. Honestly, I know what to bring now and will keep looking at just how to keep my fitness and mobility up during times like these.

We are home soon and I'll go back to old habits and have all of my things conveniently close by. I'm hoping that new good habits will continue and I can go back to other good habits. 

In short, I've been standing perfectly still, but trying things to get my transition to retirement less rough.

July 3 to July 9

 

The woods are lovely, dark and deep...

Man, I'm doing this a smidgen late - meh, excuses are wonderful, but at least I know I was away in an RV yesterday without wifi. It was wonderful and terrifying at the same time. I hate big brother watching everything I do, but I do like being inside some sort of safety net. 

Anyway, got 5 out of 7 days' rings closed. Yoga and swimming throughout. Pic above is the Sunday morning version of "yoga" in the woods. The bugs weren't too bad, but they weren't attacking me as severely as the others I was with there. Being hairy and smelly has perks.

Did this:

Ground stretching for ten minutes - frog and dog stretching downwards and otherwise. Hip opening and shoulder stretching. QL stretching as well. Then into abs - flat legs up swimming kicking and then dead bigs and prone hand lifting. Was good.

Kettlebells and band work. Swings and presses of all types along with body weight and banded exercises for twenty minutes. In the middle of this workout, I keep recalling Supple Leopard stuff I should be doing and looking up. 

Anyway, Swimming is going well - I'm happy with the fitness and the joint health aspects of it for the moment. I know that September is a long way away, but I'm wondering what I can continue and what the cards have up their sleeves. Probably the cards are cheating, but I'll never know.

June 26 to July 2

 

I just liked this one

Monday and Tuesday were just so stressful - and didn't close all the rings. Whatever. Ugh, just too much to do and fitness was the victim. Wednesday to Sunday I made sure that all the rings got closed.

Anyway, Saturday was not quite stupidly hot, merely gosh darn hot and I went out to relive my running around in the heat days. I got a HIIT workout done on the turf with a new kit bag that I have not yet gotten a pic of. Obviously, I will rectify that tomorrow.

May or may not be my home office

Anyway, I got a HIIT workout done by 1 pm ... and then spent about 30 more minutes sitting in the chilly pool inside. I got home and napped for like three hours. Bands, kettlebells and sprints all in one workout; but it was dumb to sweat like that in the heat.

I've done five days in a row going to the gym. Mostly swimming. Stretching in the mornings and swimming at night. It's been pretty good - of course between the early morning stretching and the evening swimming is a basic letdown of civilization. But ... I read yesterday that I will be working remotely for July. 

Yup, that is a nice piece of news: working remotely for July. Hashtag awesome!

June 19 to 25

 

Almost let this week slip by. I'm so tired and the end of June is here. I've got another double job summer lined up, but this time I've got a plan and we will see this summer be better than last summer.

I did. a lot of swimming this week. And stuck with the early morning "yoga" - now including a set of banded exercises for my shoulders, on top of the dumbbell stuff I'm already doing. My abs are nice and strong, I just need to get the diet under control to start letting them see the light of day.

I did get an outdoor HIIT session done o the turf at my gym. An excellent facility: no little black things to get everywhere, usually no one uses it and it has lights. All three checkmarks make this place just awesome.  After the session, I got to jump into a pool and do a contrast session to help with recovery.

Three rounds of:

Indian club swings

banded shoulder presses

banded bicep curls

rugby passes to the wall

Three rounds of:

banded standing ab crunches

10 push-ups

ten mountain climbers with the slidey things under my feet.

Rugby line-out throws

Finished with

Three Figure 8's / sprints around the turfed area

line out throws

It was a good session, took about 40 minutes and I needed to do some recovery afterwards. The sprints at the end were not fast, but at least I got them done. Got my heart rate up to 150 there, too. 

Closed the rings five out of seven times. Missed any hiking this week as I needed to stay away from ticks this time of year. That, and it was muggy and hot. 

June 12 to 18

 

Flat water, paddling was hard

This was a weird week - hard and awful while being soft and cheery at the same time. Got the rings closed three ... four times this week. Too much time being a dad, but at least I got to be a dad and that was awesome. 

Yoga every morning. "Yoga" every morning. Still including some weights and band work in these sessions which probably disqualifies those sessions as purely "yoga". It's all good as they are still a great way to start the day, man. I'm hoping someday the day will start a smidgen later than 5:45 though. 

I got a swim workout and a kayak session done on Sunday. I did get a few hikes throughout the week as well. But lots of extra things make missing workouts necessary. I'll get back on the horse, so to speak and get them done next week. 

I'll pack a bag of kit and bring my stuff in the Adventure Van for surprise workouts. Or my kayak to get out on the water ... hmmm 

June 5 to June 11

 

This is my pic.

I finally did the sprint session I was supposed to start in May. I got on the turf for a HIIT session that was good. I combined rugby line out throws with sprints and I'll admit, I was hurting the next day. The throws were pretty good and the sprints were deadly.

Lots of yoga / early morning workouts this week. Lots of good work and more than a bit of fun.  Swim on Sunday night was a nice way to round out the weekend away in my new-to-me RV.

The sprint spot.

Lets take a moment and talk about the use of AI for the turf session. I asked ChatGPT to put together a workout for me on Monday with Indian clubs, bands and a yoga mat on the turf field. I wrote that it had to be a low setup and include sprints. I was asked about goals and the length of the workout needed. Unreal. 

It was a pretty cool workout. Indian clubs, bands, sprints and rugby skills were all included. Then a quick dip in the pool right beside the turf workout space. The only thing that would have made this better is if I had a pic of the cute raccoon that paid a visit mid-workout. I never had that in my garage gym workouts this past winter, I can tell you that for free. 

I'll have to get more than just a yoga mat into the RV for weekend workouts. The mat was awesome - both my wife and myself stretched out and felt so much better Saturday mid-morning. Like seriously: warm sunshine and yoga outside with few bugs, beside the lake. Was awesome.

May 29 to June 4

 

Outdoor pools were what was on this week

The heat has finally come back. It was humid and sticky and gross this week and I loved it. 

As I look at my notes, there were no hikes this week, no kayak rides just swims in the outdoor pool. I think I got a sunburn during today's session in the water. I'm okay with the slight stinging on my back. 

Here is what I did in 40 minutes this afternoon 

200 breaststroke

750 freestyle

350 kickboard

Of course, I mixed those up and did some laps with fins and with paddles. All good - cardio was the winner today.  I also got two new "Swimming workout record" awards from my iPhone. I'm cool my phone says so.

The yoga in the morning is transforming itself into bodyweight, mobility and a bit of strength training. I really don't care about any of that, all I know is that my hips don't hurt during the day. That and I feel so much better than I did a year ago. Two years ago. Three years ago. I'm still going to blog and monitor it as yoga though.

At the end of this workout, I went and checked out the outdoor turf area they had - I've got plans and a kit bag to put together for that one.