I decided to learn how to lift weights. I joined the Rec Center at UCSB. Weight lifting is really fun. It also makes you really hungry!
I hired a personal trainer to teach me how to do the lifts. Then hopefully I can just take it from there and get strong.
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Thursday, October 04, 2012
Chronic cardio
A lot of people in the paleo world think that jogging is "chronic cardio." According to them, cardio exercise causes you to raise cortisol levels, increase oxidative damage, systemic
inflammation, depress the immune system and decrease fat metabolism.
The trouble with believing this is that I spent the last 9 months doing the kind of exercise paleos advocate and I ended up feeling that I was getting all those negative things. Since paleo is all about looking to the paleolithic for how we might best eat healthy and exercise, how did anybody come to think it's natural for humans to do burpees and planks and avoid running?
What I really found enlightening about Maffetone's Big Book of Health and Fitness was that he explained "chronic cardio" not with blanket statements about some exercises being better than others but in concrete terms that overtraining is bad. Overtraining leads you to raise cortisol levels, increase oxidative damage, systemic inflammation, depress the immune system and decrease fat metabolism. And you can overtrain doing burpees and planks, lifting heavy and sprinting like paleos say is best. You can also over train by running and biking if you push too hard.
I continue to run slowly most days, ride my bike slowly and generally not work quite so hard, yet I put in the time. I feel happy and healthy when I do it this way. The 9 months I spent doing twice weekly burpees and the like was just too much. Always hiking at high speed was too much. Always pushing hard when I rode my bike was too much. Easing up is so much better.
The trouble with believing this is that I spent the last 9 months doing the kind of exercise paleos advocate and I ended up feeling that I was getting all those negative things. Since paleo is all about looking to the paleolithic for how we might best eat healthy and exercise, how did anybody come to think it's natural for humans to do burpees and planks and avoid running?
What I really found enlightening about Maffetone's Big Book of Health and Fitness was that he explained "chronic cardio" not with blanket statements about some exercises being better than others but in concrete terms that overtraining is bad. Overtraining leads you to raise cortisol levels, increase oxidative damage, systemic inflammation, depress the immune system and decrease fat metabolism. And you can overtrain doing burpees and planks, lifting heavy and sprinting like paleos say is best. You can also over train by running and biking if you push too hard.
I continue to run slowly most days, ride my bike slowly and generally not work quite so hard, yet I put in the time. I feel happy and healthy when I do it this way. The 9 months I spent doing twice weekly burpees and the like was just too much. Always hiking at high speed was too much. Always pushing hard when I rode my bike was too much. Easing up is so much better.
Monday, October 01, 2012
I ran up the bluffs today
I continue with my slow Maffetone running. Today I ran up the bluff to the university from Goleta beach. It's the first time I've been able to do that since I began this.
Last week I noticed I was running around 127bpm most of the time. Today it seemed to be around 126. It was a hot day, too. I make a little bit of progress every day. Seeing real progress so quickly spurs me to continue.
Yesterday I ran like this for almost 3 hours. I ran from my house to Arroyo Burro beach and then through Hope Ranch along the horse trail that parallels the scenic drive. The horse trail is nice and shaded. My feet were super dusty. I enjoyed the run immensely even though it was very slow as always. It was a fun adventure. I did this run without any breakfast. I ate a big "fruit" salad afterward of avocado, tomato, fresh figs, pesto and olive oil and vinegar. So refreshing!
I am looking forward to when I can run out my door and up to Inspiration Point. Or on some of the other trails. I'll pack just my collapsible cup to drink from small creeks (the ones that dogs don't go in) and drinking faucets. I won't need to bring any food with me. The beauty of this kind of running is you train your body to use your body fat for energy so you don't run out of energy or bonk and you don't have to worry about eating.
Last week I noticed I was running around 127bpm most of the time. Today it seemed to be around 126. It was a hot day, too. I make a little bit of progress every day. Seeing real progress so quickly spurs me to continue.
Yesterday I ran like this for almost 3 hours. I ran from my house to Arroyo Burro beach and then through Hope Ranch along the horse trail that parallels the scenic drive. The horse trail is nice and shaded. My feet were super dusty. I enjoyed the run immensely even though it was very slow as always. It was a fun adventure. I did this run without any breakfast. I ate a big "fruit" salad afterward of avocado, tomato, fresh figs, pesto and olive oil and vinegar. So refreshing!
I am looking forward to when I can run out my door and up to Inspiration Point. Or on some of the other trails. I'll pack just my collapsible cup to drink from small creeks (the ones that dogs don't go in) and drinking faucets. I won't need to bring any food with me. The beauty of this kind of running is you train your body to use your body fat for energy so you don't run out of energy or bonk and you don't have to worry about eating.
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