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I'm eating between five and seven meals a day at the moment. It should be seven but I miss some of the snacks when work gets busy! I'm also allowed to be a bit more relaxed at the weekend with 2 'naughty' meals like a take out.
My morning routine depends on exercise plans that morning. If it is a run or swim I have banana and I take oatcakes out with me to get used to eating on the hoof. Nairns do these great ones with fruit and spices in. Yum. If I'm out on my bike I have a banana and a bowl of porridge and take the oatcakes out with me to keep something in my tummy. It doesn't matter whether I need to eat nutritionally, if has been a couple of hours since eating, my stomach starts to complain. ;-)
When I get to work I have a mixing bowl of porridge. My colleagues laughed at me to begin with but they have got used to me now!
My mid-morning snack is something simple like an apple, satsuma or plums.
Lunch is also carb based with pasta, rice or a jacket potato. This is great cause there is a cafe round the corner that does great pasta. It is also fairly easy to bring stuff from home. (Having said that, I can count on one hand the amount of times I have taken my lunch in!)
Afternoon snack is yogurt. I buy the big pots of bio yogurt and keep it in the fridge at work. I eat as much as I feel like!
Dinner is an important meal for reloading the protein for rebuilding the muscles over night and lots of yummy vegetables. I try to have no carbs with this meal so I don't store it as fat over night.
My final snack of the day is a bowl of muesli before bed, but only if I have a run or swim in the morning.
I have absolutely no idea how many calories I'm eating or fat, protein and carbs, but I do know that I am slowly loosing weight and trimming up. What is more I feel great!
Wednesday, 18 February 2009
Monday, 16 February 2009
Discipline
Up until recently, I was really enjoying my new found discipline and routine.
I was getting up at 6am, doing my morning exercises of stretches or yoga then stretches and then heading out for a run, swim or bike ride.
I was eating a banana each morning before heading out, followed by a small vat of porridge when I got to work. Pasta for lunch, yogurt for afternoon snack and vegetables and meat or fish for tea.
I was packing the next days kit before I went to bed for 10pm.
I was working for me. I was feeling great both from the diet, sleep and from the exercise.
I think I'm currently having a wee 'break' from my new routine. Chocolate is back on the menu, carbs are back in the evening meal (although this was needed anyway) and late nights are creeping in.
I think I'll start my routine again when I come back from my holiday at the end of February. I'm in London until tonight then I go on holiday to Glencoe on Friday, not back in to 'normality' until the following Monday so no point resurrecting the routine until then.
Oh well. At least I can try to be good!
I was getting up at 6am, doing my morning exercises of stretches or yoga then stretches and then heading out for a run, swim or bike ride.
I was eating a banana each morning before heading out, followed by a small vat of porridge when I got to work. Pasta for lunch, yogurt for afternoon snack and vegetables and meat or fish for tea.
I was packing the next days kit before I went to bed for 10pm.
I was working for me. I was feeling great both from the diet, sleep and from the exercise.
I think I'm currently having a wee 'break' from my new routine. Chocolate is back on the menu, carbs are back in the evening meal (although this was needed anyway) and late nights are creeping in.
I think I'll start my routine again when I come back from my holiday at the end of February. I'm in London until tonight then I go on holiday to Glencoe on Friday, not back in to 'normality' until the following Monday so no point resurrecting the routine until then.
Oh well. At least I can try to be good!
Thursday, 12 February 2009
2/3 of what it should be, I just can't Tuesday, 10 February 2009
And for the skiing!
Life's little challenges - Puntures
I hate them, I hate them, I hate them, I hate them.
I the last 3 weeks I have had approximately 7 issues with tubes, pumps and horrid little bits of glass that you need a microscope to see.
I have walked for litterally hours. I have spent hours changing and re changing and re changing.
Can anyone help me? Please?
I the last 3 weeks I have had approximately 7 issues with tubes, pumps and horrid little bits of glass that you need a microscope to see.
I have walked for litterally hours. I have spent hours changing and re changing and re changing.
This morning I was about to set out for a ride when I descovered I had a flat. I took it out, turned the tyre inside out, held it under the spot light. I pumped up the tube, patched the hole. Pumped it up again, checked for more holes. Put the whole lot back together again and .... A minute in to the ride the bike was feeling sluggish. Went home, checked the tyre pressure - 40 psi, down from 120 litrally minutes before. Now an hour later? Totally flat.
I don't know what to do. I am now scared of going out on my bike incase I get another puncture and I'm in the middle of nowhere.
I want to scream and cry and stamp my feet but I know it wont solve the problem. I just screamed in the shower, it hasn't helped and I'm now concerned the neighbours are going to call the police!Can anyone help me? Please?
Tuesday, 27 January 2009
Life's little challenges
When I called this blog 'Life's little challenges...' I was trying to be ironic. Another meaning, however, can be the 'little' challenges I will encounter during my day-to-day training.
Today's 'little challenge' occurred whilst I was on my long bike ride. 40 min from my house, just out of the city, I got a puncture. Annoyed, but not worried, I changed my tire. I swear it was only a mile or 2 later when I hit a hit hole. Boy do you feel sick when you feel the immediate deflation of your tire. Again, after a bit of swearing, I changed my tire. This was the first time I had carried to tubes so I was really lucky. Or was I?
For some reason the tube wouldn't inflate. A passing cyclist also tried his pump and it wasn't happening. I don't know what exactly what happened but I must have caught the tube when putting it and created a pinch, or it was a faulty tube or I hadn't found the original cause of the puncture, it didn't matter. It was by now 8am and I was 8 miles from home and I had an hour to get to work. There was only one thing to do. I started to walk.
Sights on route to work included Musselburgh race course; the lighthouse on an island on the forth; the firth of forth (always a sight to be seen), Portobello swimming pool (and the grateful use for their facilities with the tremendous luck that no one nicked my bike while I was there) and the promenade.
I started changing the lyrics to songs. It started with 'Brights Eyes' being changed to 'Bright Side', Monty Pythons 'Always look on the bright side of life' and other songs that I can't remember now. It gets a bit monotonous as I can only ever remember a few lines of songs so they kept on being repeated round and round and round.
After 2 hours of walking I was beginning to get a bit jaded.
I arrived at the office after 2 hours and 45 minutes walking and getting close to a sense of humour failure.
Sod the diet, I headed to the corner shop and downed a snickers duo.
I have decided to call the walk to work a 'training session' specialising in 'mental strength'. I hope I don't have too many of them!
Today's 'little challenge' occurred whilst I was on my long bike ride. 40 min from my house, just out of the city, I got a puncture. Annoyed, but not worried, I changed my tire. I swear it was only a mile or 2 later when I hit a hit hole. Boy do you feel sick when you feel the immediate deflation of your tire. Again, after a bit of swearing, I changed my tire. This was the first time I had carried to tubes so I was really lucky. Or was I?
For some reason the tube wouldn't inflate. A passing cyclist also tried his pump and it wasn't happening. I don't know what exactly what happened but I must have caught the tube when putting it and created a pinch, or it was a faulty tube or I hadn't found the original cause of the puncture, it didn't matter. It was by now 8am and I was 8 miles from home and I had an hour to get to work. There was only one thing to do. I started to walk.
Sights on route to work included Musselburgh race course; the lighthouse on an island on the forth; the firth of forth (always a sight to be seen), Portobello swimming pool (and the grateful use for their facilities with the tremendous luck that no one nicked my bike while I was there) and the promenade.
I started changing the lyrics to songs. It started with 'Brights Eyes' being changed to 'Bright Side', Monty Pythons 'Always look on the bright side of life' and other songs that I can't remember now. It gets a bit monotonous as I can only ever remember a few lines of songs so they kept on being repeated round and round and round.
After 2 hours of walking I was beginning to get a bit jaded.
I arrived at the office after 2 hours and 45 minutes walking and getting close to a sense of humour failure.
Sod the diet, I headed to the corner shop and downed a snickers duo.
I have decided to call the walk to work a 'training session' specialising in 'mental strength'. I hope I don't have too many of them!
Monday, 26 January 2009
Doing too much?
What a week! I think that maybe I was trying to do too much.
Let me know what you think...
So Sunday I cycled to Glentress, near Peebles. Not a great distance, only 22miles, but I had a head wind the entire way. I swear, my top speed was 21mph, the wind was that strong I had to peddle to go down hill! I got overtaken by a small peloton of 3 men. Not wanting to appear weak I joined on the back and boy was that nice to get towed along.
At GT I met up with Stu and drove back to Edinburgh and the Loch Fyne restaurant. Arriving 2hrs late for our meal with friends! No matter, they just ate their pudding and drank their coffees really slowly.
Then I rushed home to pack for my forthcoming trip to London on Monday before heading off to the cinema to see Australia. (I quite liked it).
And that was just day 1! Can you see where this is heading?
Monday saw me head out the house with a bike loaded with 2 panniers and a rucksack. I'm sure I looked a sight going in to the gym with all that lot. An hour in the gym and I was off to work. 1pm and I was off to catch the train.
I do love getting the train to London. It is really easy and relaxing. No hour drive to the airport, no waiting around the terminal and no hour train back into London. All you have to do is pitch up and jump on. 4 1/2 hours later your there, in the center of town. AND the bike is free.
I cycled around the city a bit, checking out where my course was, where my gym was (I had blagged membership to a gym in London for the duration of my stay) and then out to Finchley road in zone 2 to catch the tube to my digs in zone 5. I was too knacked to do my run set so I missed it.
Tuesday involved an hour of travel on the tube and bike to the gym, and quick 45 min session in the gym, 20 min to my course, 8 hours of study then 20 min back to the gym for a bit more training and finally an hour of travelling back to my digs loaded with my study materials.
Wednesday was a repeat of Tuesday only add in a puncture, a trip to the local bike shop and four hours of evening study!
On Thursday I went for an hour and 10 min run round the neighbourhood in the pouring rain then off into the city again. Unfortunately Kings Cross was closed so I got off at Euston to walk and... walked the wrong way! When I noticed I was well p****d off and ended up being very late. Thursday night was fun though. I went out to Redhill to play with my friends son, a 9 month old bubbly baby boy and to play on their Wii. And to see them of course!
Come Friday I was knacked. I had good intentions to go to the gym after more course had finished but really couldn't do it.
I was really relieved to be back on the train on Friday, chilling out and studying in equal mix.
Too much do you think?
Let me know what you think...
So Sunday I cycled to Glentress, near Peebles. Not a great distance, only 22miles, but I had a head wind the entire way. I swear, my top speed was 21mph, the wind was that strong I had to peddle to go down hill! I got overtaken by a small peloton of 3 men. Not wanting to appear weak I joined on the back and boy was that nice to get towed along.
At GT I met up with Stu and drove back to Edinburgh and the Loch Fyne restaurant. Arriving 2hrs late for our meal with friends! No matter, they just ate their pudding and drank their coffees really slowly.
Then I rushed home to pack for my forthcoming trip to London on Monday before heading off to the cinema to see Australia. (I quite liked it).
And that was just day 1! Can you see where this is heading?
Monday saw me head out the house with a bike loaded with 2 panniers and a rucksack. I'm sure I looked a sight going in to the gym with all that lot. An hour in the gym and I was off to work. 1pm and I was off to catch the train.
I do love getting the train to London. It is really easy and relaxing. No hour drive to the airport, no waiting around the terminal and no hour train back into London. All you have to do is pitch up and jump on. 4 1/2 hours later your there, in the center of town. AND the bike is free.
I cycled around the city a bit, checking out where my course was, where my gym was (I had blagged membership to a gym in London for the duration of my stay) and then out to Finchley road in zone 2 to catch the tube to my digs in zone 5. I was too knacked to do my run set so I missed it.
Tuesday involved an hour of travel on the tube and bike to the gym, and quick 45 min session in the gym, 20 min to my course, 8 hours of study then 20 min back to the gym for a bit more training and finally an hour of travelling back to my digs loaded with my study materials.
Wednesday was a repeat of Tuesday only add in a puncture, a trip to the local bike shop and four hours of evening study!
On Thursday I went for an hour and 10 min run round the neighbourhood in the pouring rain then off into the city again. Unfortunately Kings Cross was closed so I got off at Euston to walk and... walked the wrong way! When I noticed I was well p****d off and ended up being very late. Thursday night was fun though. I went out to Redhill to play with my friends son, a 9 month old bubbly baby boy and to play on their Wii. And to see them of course!
Come Friday I was knacked. I had good intentions to go to the gym after more course had finished but really couldn't do it.
I was really relieved to be back on the train on Friday, chilling out and studying in equal mix.
Too much do you think?
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