Fitness Update - the Sequel

Well, it's been a while since my last post. Let's just say i am not yet at my physical peak yet.

I went to the gym as often as I could with my life the way it was going, which meant some months I could go a couple or three times a week, and sometimes I would go weeks without getting to it. My membership ultimately expires\d, and my finances were not in a place to re-up. I got new jobs and new income, but that gym had removed the punching bag and timer that they used to have, which are two things I really valued about it.

I got new employment and a new income, and my commute involves a lot of walking and going up and down subway stairs, but my body must already be acclimated to that, because it is really not changing my physique or endurance or strength.

But I looked at myself in the mirror and noticed that I have progressed to "skinny fat guy" (well, it may ot be all that bad, but I have a critical eye). I am not as bad as I was when I was in the "worst shape of my life," but I can say this: Last year I was able to do five laps around a certain lawn in a park where we have the weekly fighter practice of the Society for Creative Anachronism. This year I am doing three laps. I used to do three circuits of a "fitness route" in my neighborhood. Now I can barely get to two on a good day. And my gut is still sticking out farther than my chest if I don't suck it in.

I have a picture of me from that "worst shape of my life" period, and I don't looks bad as that, but I am still not really happy. I just got back from the Pennsic War, and definitely noticed a lack of endurance at the end of a long woods/resurrection battle. I was able to get through the whole battle without taking off my helm to rest but once (during a long general "hold"), but in the second half I had definitely lost a spring in my step and was not commuting in and out of resurrection point as quickly as I had in, say, 2006.

I also lack the arm strength I used to have. I cannot do nearly as many pull-ups as used to (though that may also be a result of my increased weight, somewhere between 206 and 211 these days).

I have been, however, doing those "fitness routes" at least twice a week, and doing the SCA fighter practice every Tuesday. However poorly I did at Pennsic, conditioning-wise, I know I would have done worse had I not been doing that.

Oddly, however, I went for a run this morning and found my body unresponsive. I felt fat and stiff, as if I had forgotten how to run.  It may be fatigue from wearing and fighting in armor on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday, combined with the stiffness that comes from sitting in a car for 8 hours for the ride home. But I did feel a bit more loosened up by the end of the run.

So I am gong to SCA fighter practice tomorrow, and wil do my three-lap run and drills, and then may put the armor back on. I look forward to getting back to a regular workout schedule so I can look, feel, and perform better soon!