Adventurers of the Lucky Vale VI

[Sciread77]

It’s time. I know it’s the holidays, but I’ve an important event coming up. Probably in about 2 months. I need to succeed in it and to do so I must seriously step up my game. All my goals are built around this. 

Goals 

1. Sleep. I’ll never reach my goals without it. 
2. Push-ups and sit-ups. I need to roughly double the number I can do; I’m shooting for 50+ sit-ups and 55+ pushups. I’m also doing pull-ups and things like Supermans to keep myself balanced. 
3. Running. I’m less concerned about a 1.5-mile run than I am the sprint. I’ve been running stairs, which helps. But I really need to start running outside more, too. And more distance. I’m shooting for a 10:30 1.5-mile and a 45-second 300m. Ultimately, that’s cutting around 4 minutes odd the 1.5-mile and 17 seconds off the 300m. 
4. Stay grounded with my immediate family and avoid unnecessary drama with the extended family. I value these relationships, and it’s unlikely I’ll reach any of these goals if I’m burning emotional energy. 
5. Eat quality food. I’ll need good fuel to make this happen. I’ve had far more dramatic performance increases when I was younger, but even then I had nice quality food as opposed to empty calories. 
6.  Avoid injury. I can’t afford 6 weeks of recovery. 
 

That’s it for now. 
 

 

[Manarelle]

Well-rounded goals. Are the holidays going to throw any curve balls against these?

[Sciread77]

5 minutes ago, Manarelle said:

Well-rounded goals. Are the holidays going to throw any curve balls against these?

Thanks. 

 

Holidays will make them difficult. Mostly, holidays can be hectic and they’re usually full of people trying to fatten us up so we don’t starve to death over winter. 
 

Which is odd because these days winter has all the food. 
 

In any case, I think they’re doable with the support and buy-in of my wife. 

[Aquarii]

15 hours ago, Sciread77 said:

1. Sleep. I’ll never reach my goals without it. 

 

I have found that if I can do this one thing right, it makes a dramatic difference in every other area. 

 

 

Looks like you have some great goals here. I will be following along!!

[Harriet]

Sleep is excellent, sleep is good. And planning to manage your emotional energy around family seems wise. 

[Sciread77]

13 minutes ago, Aquarii said:

 

I have found that if I can do this one thing right, it makes a dramatic difference in every other area. 

 

 

Looks like you have some great goals here. I will be following along!!

 

Thanks! Yeah, sleep is usually a goal. I can compromise it for a short period of time but there are consequences for not prioritizing it over the long run. 
 

12 minutes ago, Harriet said:

Sleep is excellent, sleep is good. And planning to manage your emotional energy around family seems wise. 

 

Yeah, failure to plan around emotional energy/the pitfalls of my extended family got me in trouble last time. I made a couple people angry, discovered some rules I didn’t realize were there as well as the finer points of some of their relationships, and it was absolutely exhausting. Not again. Definitely not if I want to make good progress. 

[Sciread77]

Glad I planned to handle emotional stress. Another unexpected thing related to Jessie’s job. Complete BS, and not anything officially bad but more hurtful and cutting to someone who is already very, very burned out. It could be worse, but it still kinda killed our plans last night. 
 

Tonight, I suspect, will be better. Time to finish the inside Christmas decorations and get in some quality reading. 

[Sciread77]

Oh goodness. I’m so used to our quiet little corner in the Adventurers Guild that the number of posts here are a little overwhelming. 
 

Today I’m working on revamping Jessie’s resume, signing off on some paperwork for the nonprofit, and hopefully putting up outdoor Christmas lights when I get home. Hopefully. Woody is sick today and Bo Peep was a cranky mess who barely spoke this morning so I think she’s getting sick too. 
 

It’s also a day for running stairs in addition to my body weight workouts. Work seems fairly light today, so getting that in shouldn’t be too hard. 
 

The weekend was pretty good. I ran about 2 miles of 450m at my goal pace without dying.  I’m still falling short on the sprints. I don’t have much of any sprinting experience minus a week or two when I very first ran track.  I’m improving but I wonder if there’s a better way?
 

Currently, I run stairs 3 days a week and on Saturdays I do standard speed/pace work. I’m good on the 1.5 mile run-distance was my bread and butter. And my wrestling days got me pretty good at training for Situps and push ups. But I’ve never done sprints and I struggle to hit anywhere near my goal pace even with breaking it down to 100m instead of 300m. It’s got to be some sort of mental thing, because my pace on 100m is barely any faster than my pace for 300. 
 

I’m open to suggestions or any tricks of the sprinting trade anyone has. 

[oromendur]

1 hour ago, Sciread77 said:

Oh goodness. I’m so used to our quiet little corner in the Adventurers Guild that the number of posts here are a little overwhelming. 

 

SAME. Good gracious there's a lot of people here 

 

1 hour ago, Sciread77 said:

I’m open to suggestions or any tricks of the sprinting trade anyone has. 

 

Do you have a steep hill available? It's different than stairs, because you can stretch your legs as they wish and aren't forced to play dexterity games to avoid tripping on a stair corner (yeah, don't ask). Sprint up the hill and jog back down. Do it until you're ready to puke, and then a few more times. Pros: it's a short HIIT workout that is over quickly, and if you practice it for a while sprinting on flat ground feels easier. Cons: it's running hard (which to me is made of suck) and it makes you want to puke.

 

Sea story: a zillion years ago my high school track coach used to make the sprinters do this. At first I was over in the circle happily throwing the shot-put and discus, and then one Saturday we were short a few competitors and the coach made me enter the 200m in a meet and I made the mistake of winning it. Life got shitty for a while and I had to run up hills. In the end I really was better at throwing things than sprinting so that kind of petered off the next year  Sprinting I could sort of do, because mentally it's more a test of strength than of endurance, and my strength has always been much better than my endurance. Long-distance running required a whole different set of mental muscles and I never really figured out how to use them. Sprinting and running are very different skills in my mind.

 

Maybe you could do sets of super-short sprints? Like 50m or so? Make it as close to a muscular, anaerobic strength effort as possible to trick your mind into making it not be running? I don't know. Maybe someone with a clue will weigh in...

 

1 hour ago, Sciread77 said:

 I’m improving but I wonder if there’s a better way?

 

If you're improving, it's probably a good-enough way. You don't have to win gold in the 100m, after all -- you just need to meet the standard. You're disciplined and motivated and doing your bit every day like you need to, so as long as you keep it up you are likely to be just fine.

 

I'm actually kind of excited for you  Good luck! 

[Sciread77]

24 minutes ago, oromendur said:

Do you have a steep hill available?

I could probably scrounge one up. There are some minor hills at work. I think further back in the neighborhood we have a steeper one. That’s a good idea. Thank you very much. 

 

24 minutes ago, oromendur said:

If you're improving, it's probably a good-enough way. 

Normally, I’d agree. But I have to do my absolute best to hit that standard, which I’m still infuriatingly far away from after close to a month of specific training, on my first shot to keep from aging out of the program. And things are going to start rolling on that test here soon, soon! I’m expecting to take it within 5-8 weeks. 
 

If I had 6 months, at this rate, I’d have every confidence that I could achieve it. But between where I am and where I need to get, I can afford exactly no complacency. 
 

(Complacency has bitten me too many times. I may fail that first test in spite of everything I do and have to worry more about aging out, BUT, I’ll be able to say I did my best on the way in... I don’t want any “I coulda been a contender” speeches about this one in my future)

 

(Also, I’m coming off over a decade out of running shape and I’d hate to assume that the training for distance that I was so successful at when I was younger would be adequate for the shorter sprints I’ve never been good at)

[sarakingdom]

28 minutes ago, oromendur said:

SAME. Good gracious there's a lot of people here 

 

I normally try to read all unread posts. This is really pushing my ability to do so.

[Sciread77]

1 minute ago, sarakingdom said:

 

I normally try to read all unread posts. This is really pushing my ability to do so.

Even in the Adventurers Guild, half the time I end up reading the email updates and mentally reacting instead of actually reacting! I definitely don’t have the bandwidth to do them all anymore, and kudos to you on that. 

[oromendur]

9 hours ago, Sciread77 said:

(Complacency has bitten me too many times. I may fail that first test in spite of everything I do and have to worry more about aging out, BUT, I’ll be able to say I did my best on the way in... I don’t want any “I coulda been a contender” speeches about this one in my future)

 

It's a very fine line to skate, between perfectly-optimized-training-for-maximum-results and actual overtraining that can injure you and cause further delays. Good luck in finding the right balance! We're rooting for you.

 

9 hours ago, Sciread77 said:

Even in the Adventurers Guild, half the time I end up reading the email updates and mentally reacting instead of actually reacting! I definitely don’t have the bandwidth to do them all anymore, and kudos to you on that. 

 

Dude, if I even *read* all the Adventurer threads I'm doing quite well. Posting and interacting regularly is way beyond my capability.

 

9 hours ago, sarakingdom said:

I normally try to read all unread posts. This is really pushing my ability to do so.

 

This made me try and see how far I could get, if I just settled down for a huge reading session. I, um, made it maybe halfway through. But (after I crammed my inner introvert protesting into a closet and locked the door) I did actually post on a few non-Adventurer threads of people I don't know, so your inspiration was not totally wasted  

[Manarelle]

On 12/9/2019 at 1:59 PM, oromendur said:

SAME. Good gracious there's a lot of people here 

 

I hear you there. I generally just pick a couple people to follow, try to get one or two newer posters, and wish everyone else the best. There are a couple of folk in the assassin's guild that get up to several hundred replies over a challenge and my little brain boggles. 

[Aquarii]

On 12/9/2019 at 12:34 PM, Sciread77 said:

Oh goodness. I’m so used to our quiet little corner in the Adventurers Guild that the number of posts here are a little overwhelming. 

 

Same. I have tried a few challenges with the Rangers, and was so overwhelmed by the number of posts, but I had STARTED to adjust to that, and then we got the holiday challenge. And WHOA. I was not ready.

[Sciread77]

14 minutes ago, Aquarii said:

 

Same. I have tried a few challenges with the Rangers, and was so overwhelmed by the number of posts, but I had STARTED to adjust to that, and then we got the holiday challenge. And WHOA. I was not ready.

I mean, I looked at the Ranger board a few times. It’s one of the other groups that bests fits my fitness goals and styles, but I’m better off in a smaller group. 
 

I’m a little amused that my natural tendency in this virtual holiday party is exactly like my IRL tendency: find a small group of people to chat with and survive. My company’s holiday party is this afternoon and if friends and coworkers of mine weren’t already going, I’d skip it. 
 

Dinner parties are more my speed. I can dinner party with the best. 
 

I’m prepping for a sprint workout. Which I’m planning to follow with some jogging, then this afternoon a sit-up and push-up test. We were going to go to a choir concert tonight but it’s starting later than expected, the kids have been super tired, and I have to leave with them when I usually get up to make it to a doctor’s appointment on time. So I think we’re going to miss it this year. 

[Sciread77]

Post-workout report:

 

Today I ran several short sprints: 110 m, 55m 88m, 55m, 55m, and 110m all with 10 seconds rest in between. I took a 4-minute walk afterwards and jogged 2400m afterwards. Surprisingly enough, that was a 14:31 2400, which, while 41 seconds off my best of 13:50, was done outdoors with about half the track at 3% incline and I was just jogging instead of trying to race it. Which I think is a good sign.  I’ll be racing it on Saturday and I expect a better time than I’ve been getting. 
 

I also tested situps (34 in a minute, down 5 from 39) and pushups (up 4 to 26 from 22), all tested 11/23 and tested after all the running. So it’s out of order and I’m moderately happy with my progress because it’s mostly the right direction. 
 

All that said, I need faster progress. At this pace, 2 pushups a week, I’m looking at 35-36 pushups and probably 45 sit-ups. The long run will likely be fine and passing. But I still have to fix my sprint speed because it just isn’t fast enough. 

[Aquarii]

4 hours ago, Sciread77 said:

I mean, I looked at the Ranger board a few times. It’s one of the other groups that bests fits my fitness goals and styles, but I’m better off in a smaller group. 
 

I’m a little amused that my natural tendency in this virtual holiday party is exactly like my IRL tendency: find a small group of people to chat with and survive. My company’s holiday party is this afternoon and if friends and coworkers of mine weren’t already going, I’d skip it. 

 

That is pretty much what I do, too. I just don't have time (or social energy) to go and post on every person's thread. I do try and meet new people, but I certainly don't try and conquer the entire list. 

 

51 minutes ago, Sciread77 said:

Today I ran several short sprints: 110 m, 55m 88m, 55m, 55m, and 110m all with 10 seconds rest in between. I took a 4-minute walk afterwards and jogged 2400m afterwards. Surprisingly enough, that was a 14:31 2400, which, while 41 seconds off my best of 13:50, was done outdoors with about half the track at 3% incline and I was just jogging instead of trying to race it. Which I think is a good sign.  I’ll be racing it on Saturday and I expect a better time than I’ve been getting. 
 

I also tested situps (34 in a minute, down 5 from 39) and pushups (up 4 to 26 from 22), all tested 11/23 and tested after all the running. So it’s out of order and I’m moderately happy with my progress because it’s mostly the right direction. 

 

Well done! I still haven't quite mastered my first pushup and doing that many situps at once just sounds downright miserable, so I am quite in awe.

[Sciread77]

3 hours ago, Aquarii said:

Well done! I still haven't quite mastered my first pushup and doing that many situps at once just sounds downright miserable, so I am quite in awe.

Thanks! I have, at times, worked very hard at most of this. When I was young and single I basically worked out and studied all the time. 
 

When I was a teacher, I largely taught boys in their early to mid teens. When they got out of line, I challenged them to a one-on-one challenge in the push-up game as well as holding a tournament every Friday. I never even came close to losing.
 

I was a wrestling coach and in the best overs shape of my life (the standards in currently training against would have been a joke). I mentioned something like that in an interview and started to say “but 10 years” and the guys quickly started in on “we’re older and can do it so you’re not too old.” But age wasn’t my excuse. The rest was “10 years of desk job makes me feel frozen and dead, so I’ve work ahead.”  I’m almost 36. That’s young and this is all doable. The only question is the short timetable. 
 

While nearly anyone can do this stuff, most gym teachers (and PE curriculum) are actually pretty terrible at teaching the skills and working the progressions. I was awful as a child and never really succeeded until high school when a coach took time with me. Which is part of why I believe nearly anyone can, even though everyone has different struggles and no two journeys are alike. (That is, I’d never prescribe a program and dismiss issues you may have just because you’re different than me!)

[Sciread77]

Also, feel free to tell me to shut up. I reread what I post and sometimes get annoyed (At myself) because I’m concerned I come off as arrogant. If I do... by all means let me know. 

[Aquarii]

15 minutes ago, Sciread77 said:

Also, feel free to tell me to shut up. I reread what I post and sometimes get annoyed (At myself) because I’m concerned I come off as arrogant. If I do... by all means let me know. 

 

Don't apologize. You worked hard to get to where you were and even still are. I am so tired of our culture teaching people they aren't allowed to take pride in the work they have done. It isn't arrogant, it is simply stating the fact. You put in the work and you saw the results. If people have a problem with you talking about your successes, they need to put in the work before they start complaining. 

 

I think it is great that you have reached that level in the past, and I am sure you will get there again. I am more at the beginning of my fitness journey, hence the reason I can't do all that stuff. I have done some stuff in the past, but never stuck with it. Or it was something like swimming or biking, where things like pushups and situps were not an expectation. I was also homeschooled through my sophomore year of HS, so I didn't take PE, meaning I didn't have a gym teacher forcing them either. My parents would make us do situps and stuff when I was young, but by middle school they had mostly given up on trying to make us do the calisthenics stuff.

[Sciread77]

I appreciate it. I feel plenty of pride for what I have accomplished, also knowing there’s always  someone who accomplished it better out there. These days, it’s all in the context of how bad things were in 2012 when the arthritis really hit and I had to use a cane to walk. Modern medical science is amazing and I’m overjoyed that my body works every day. 
 

AlsoI say it coming from the perspective of someone all too aware that there are people who think all people who can’t do what they can are just lazy or just need to do the exact same thing. It’s infuriating and counterproductive. Being aware that bragging on oneself doesn’t really help someone else achieve something, and some people find those who are struggling and humblebrag like crazy. Men, in particular, seem to be bad about that.<- I have no idea why this is bigger. 

 

My aim is to create an inclusive and supportive environment, helping when I can while also being as honest as I can about my own struggles. Gods only know I don’t have all the answers. 

[Aquarii]

1 minute ago, Sciread77 said:

I say it coming from the perspective of someone all too aware that there are people who think all people who can’t do what they can are just lazy or just need to do the exact same thing. It’s infuriating and counterproductive. Also, being aware that bragging on oneself doesn’t really help someone else achieve something, and some people find those who are struggling and humblebrag like crazy. Men, in particular, seem to be bad about that.

 

That is fair. But I think there is definitely a difference between stating what you have accomplished and how you accomplished it, and bragging. If you are simply telling your story, talking about where you are and where you have been, I wouldn't call that bragging. Even if you are lamenting where you are at, because you were once at a higher point, even if your current point is still significantly above other people, I wouldn't call that bragging. That is being open about the struggles of a fitness journey, and that being further along in progress doesn't necessarily make you happy with where you are at. Some people are not going to like it, others are going to find it relatable or inspiring. 

[Sciread77]

Good news from the doctor today, and better news for next month/next year. I’m starting a new medicine that in some cases even reversed previous joint damage. And I’m more visibly stronger, healthier, and better off than when I first showed up in 2012. 
 

I am, however, physically exhausted after running yesterday and getting a lot less sleep to make it to the doctor’s on time today. We’re going to a Boar’s Head Christmas thing tonight by where Jessie works. Hopefully, it isn’t too late. Tomorrow night is the kids’ Christmas program and Saturday morning I have an exam that I want to be well-rested for. Plus, I’d really like to be able to effectively work out and recover. 

[Aquarii]

9 hours ago, Sciread77 said:

Good news from the doctor today, and better news for next month/next year. I’m starting a new medicine that in some cases even reversed previous joint damage. And I’m more visibly stronger, healthier, and better off than when I first showed up in 2012. 

 

That is awesome! Gotta love when modern medicine comes through for ya. I bet it feels great to look back and feel a lot stronger and healthier, a full seven years later.