JonFirestar Back to the Grind

[jonfirestar]

Jon Firestar Back to the Grind

 

My creativity has taken a bit of a hiatus so not much of a theme this time round . I'm just ready to keep things simple and get down and dirty with my training! Coming off of my race at the weekend I've felt a surge of new motivation. I don't have anything in my calendar until the epic cross over event that is Barrel of Laps a couple of months away but that might change at any moment! 

 

Last challenge was pretty rough and full of ups and downs. I want to say that this coming challenge is just going to be back to the normal daily grind after running 3 races, getting sick and struggling with recovery last time round. Everything is back to normal for this challenge, except for one small detail. On week 4 this challenge, my job changes. My promotion finally goes through on June 19 which begins a big change and a new chapter in my professional life.

 

So part of my challenge this time round will be rebuilding and maintaining consistency. Due to sickness and how closely packed together my races were I lost a lot of my consistency and my aim is to jump right back in the deep end with it.

 

Reign in the Food

 

If I’m honest. My food has gotten out a little out of control over the last couple of months. I want to reign this right in so that I can get back to cutting. The goals here are simple:

Record my food in MFP. Actually keep it up to date and accurate

The calorie target is 2600 - 2700 erring towards the high end. This should be enough to produce a modest calorie deficit but may be subject to review depending on the numbers.

 

 

Go Faster, Go Further!

 

Tough Mudder showed up some of my weaknesses. My sprint speed is pretty dire. I’ve not trained it at all so that is not really a surprise. So part of my plan going forward is to include some real speed work into my routine. I’m unsure of the best way to achieve this so I’m going to go back to my original plan that never happened and rotate the speed day with my hills day. Now that the weather is getting nicer I want to start exploring further afield for new and interesting trails to run. The countryside around me is full of hiking routes and big hills that I want to explore. This probably won’t happen every week just because of time but I’ll make it as an extra.

 

Run 3 Days per week:

Tuesday: easy 3.5-4 miles with 4xstride intervals at the end.

Thursday: sprint intervals/hill repeats increasing the interval count with each week from 4x to 8x

Saturday: Long run 6-12 miles.

 

Additional Goals: run at least 50 miles and 1000 ft of climb over the challenge. Twice go further afield to find new trails. Sign up for the Maidenhead Half Marathon

 

Get Strong, be Powerful

 

High volume lifting woot! AKA Fear of the DOMS. Running through the 10s phase of the juggernaut program. Also increasing the volume on some of my assistance exercises. More pushups, more dips, more pull ups (hopefully). The aim is less variety and more focus on the things I want to work on.

 

Moving my body weight around space is vital to my OCR goals so there is going to be an emphasis on some of the bodyweight movements. I’m also going to focus more on conditioning.

 

My shoulder is still a tad bit tender from my run in with TM last month and I’m a little wary of adding impact this week but once I’m happy with it I’m going to start adding many, many burpees.

 

Lifting 3 Days per week, Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

2x sessions of conditioning per week

 

Additional Goal: work up to sets of 20 burpees by the end of the challenge

 

--

 

That’s it. Keeping things simple this time round.

 

I’m removing all the convoluted scoring from last session and returning to my previous health system. There are a total of 64 total points to to hit for the whole challenge. I want to aim to achieve at least 80% of that score this gives me a beginning HP of 50.  Each missed item will result in the loss of 1 health. If I hit zero I fail. There is no healing during the challenge. Unlike the scoring with my last challenge this will eliminate the whole getting killed based just on two bad days.

 

If I hit all of my additional goals. I will buy myself a new pair of road running shoes.

[Rhovaniel]

Sometimes, going themeless is exactly what we need to regain some balance. Following, of course!  

[jonfirestar]

13 minutes ago, Rhovaniel said:

Sometimes, going themeless is exactly what we need to regain some balance. Following, of course!  

That is true, glad to have you back

 

 

Week 0, Monday!

Without further ado, let's kick things off with my first day. No rest for the wicked and it's straight into the fray! 

 

Reign in the Food

2638 calories 

 

 

Go Faster, Go Further!

 

Rest day. My legs felt surprisingly good despite the race yesterday

 

Get Strong, be Powerful

spreadsheet

I hit the gym at 6:30am ready for the 10s phase of the Juggernaut program. Because I've basically been out of heavy lifting for a month I decided it was best if I didn't increase my weights but kept the same numbers I had finishing up the 3s phase 5 weeks back. 

 

Squats: 5x10x75kg (165lbs)

OHP: 5x10x37.5kg (82.5lbs) 

 

Pullups 3, 2, 1, 1, 1 

Dips: 4x12, 1x7 (hit failure at 7 on my last set)

 

Also lat pulldowns, cable rows, shoulder press and decline pushups 

 

It felt really good to be back in it and not holding back. I can already feel my legs and shoulders getting sore. Tomorrow is going to be interesting. I did spend a lot of time rolling out and I hope that helps. 

[deftona]

Following along, and oh gosh that chicken.... *dribbles*

[Kestrel Grey]

Following as always! Hopefully your shoulder recovers smoothly.

[jonfirestar]

5 minutes ago, deftona said:

Following along, and oh gosh that chicken.... *dribbles*

Hi! Thanks, although the photo didn't turn out quite how I'd have liked I was too hungry to fuss around with it any more  

 

2 minutes ago, Kestrel Grey said:

Following as always! Hopefully your shoulder recovers smoothly.

Yay, good to have you back. I was getting worried about my shoulder but things improved dramatically over the weekend and I'm really happy with it now. I'm just going to be a little cautious with it for the next week or so. 

[Salinger]

HEY Jon, here for the ride  hoping the DOMS arent too bad. 

[Tanktimus the Encourager]

Following again.

[Charlie_Quinn]

Following! We have pretty much the same training schedule this challenge, except I'm planning on doing my long run on a Sunday.

 

What are you doing for your 2 conditioning sessions? 

[imprimis5]

Hi!

[Agnarr]

15 hours ago, jonfirestar said:

I’m removing all the convoluted scoring from last session and returning to my previous health system. There are a total of 64 total points to to hit for the whole challenge. I want to aim to achieve at least 80% of that score this gives me a beginning HP of 50.  Each missed item will result in the loss of 1 health. If I hit zero I fail. There is no healing during the challenge. Unlike the scoring with my last challenge this will eliminate the whole getting killed based just on two bad days.

 

If I hit all of my additional goals. I will buy myself a new pair of road running shoes.

I like your scoring system! Rewards never worked for me because even if I did everything ok I was too broke to buy my reward

 

Following!

 

[Ryu0h]

Best of luck with the food. It's such a hard thing to keep in check; I'm impressed to how committed you are with calorie counting. I'm liking the physical training you're involved with, that stuff is badass. Everybody should aspire to be strong and fast!

 

Following!

[RedStone]

WUT WUT heyo!!! Love a good incentives challenge. you'll get those shoes...

[Maigs]

Following of course!

[jonfirestar]

21 hours ago, Salinger said:

HEY Jon, here for the ride  hoping the DOMS arent too bad. 

Hey!! So far the DOMs aren't as bad as I'd feared! 

 

21 hours ago, Tanktimus the Encourager said:

Following again.

Good to have you back, Tank! 

 

8 hours ago, Charlie_Quinn said:

Following! We have pretty much the same training schedule this challenge, except I'm planning on doing my long run on a Sunday.

 

What are you doing for your 2 conditioning sessions? 

Hi! I told you we've got very similar things going on  I do my long run Saturday because I find having a full rest day after it really helps with recovery especially when I've going 10+ miles.

 

I've been doing a conditioning circuit once a week. It's just a quick 10ish minute rotation it's not always exactly the same thing every time but sort of looks like:

 

10x burpees

10x pushups

10x russian twists 

10x KB floor to shoulder

25x kettle bell swings 

 

Normally in 4 rounds for time with minimal rest. I pretty much make up exactly what I'm going to do when I'm at the gym mixing in other bits and pieces. Normally the rule of thumb is to have things to get my heart rate up (burpees, kb swings, box jumps etc) some strength work and some core work. I'll be honest I've no idea how effective and if I should be doing it different but it does get my heart rate up nice and high. Anyway the plan is just to add another one, either Monday or Friday. I'm erring towards Monday. 

 

8 hours ago, imprimis5 said:

Hi!

Why, hello!

 

7 hours ago, Agnarr said:

I like your scoring system! Rewards never worked for me because even if I did everything ok I was too broke to buy my reward

Usually I agree  in regards to rewards. There is a tiny difference this challenge in that I've got a bonus payment coming from work so I'm going to have the extra cash. I actually need to think about getting the new shoes anyway. I've gone several hundred miles in my current pair! I'm really thinking about just replacing what I have because I know they are comfy. 

 

6 hours ago, Ryu0h said:

Best of luck with the food. It's such a hard thing to keep in check; I'm impressed to how committed you are with calorie counting. I'm liking the physical training you're involved with, that stuff is badass. Everybody should aspire to be strong and fast!

 

Thanks! It's good to have you. The food has been kicking my ass recently but I'm determined to get it down. I don't actually do much calorie counting. I calorie plan  it's a subtle but distinct difference. I only really fill in MFP once a week and do my best to stick to the plan. It's not perfect but it does free me up from stressing out trying to record what I'm eating on the fly. There are times, like today, where things go awry for whatever reason though. 

 

5 hours ago, RedStone said:

WUT WUT heyo!!! Love a good incentives challenge. you'll get those shoes...

Hiya!! I'll be honest those goals should be easy to hit  except maybe the burpees. I hate burpees but I can plug out 20 for a new pair of shoes.  

 

4 hours ago, Maigahane said:

Following of course!

Happy to have you back! 

[jonfirestar]

Week 0, Tuesday!

Today wasn't as great as yesterday. It was a bit of an odd ball day that saw me working away from the office interviewing a bunch of candidates at the local college. That is a surprisingly draining task that was made all the more difficult by the fact that everyone we saw was really good. First world problems  

 

I went to the doctors this afternoon. The good news is that the infection seems to have cleared itself away nicely. The bad news is that my ear canal is apparently filled with gunk (gross) It might take a couple of more weeks to clear away but I was told to rinse with saline and that might help (and popping my ears but my deviated septum actually makes that really hard). 

 

I'm trying to decide whether I should sign up for the Henley Tough Mudder again next year while the prices are nice and cheap. I'm leaning towards yes. The first weekend is the 28th April which gives a couple of week gap before The Dirty Weekend 12th May (so it's a training run   for the 20 mile monstrosity) but talking about Tough Mudder, on my way to see my doctor I went through a park that sits at the top of a hill and it occurred to me that the terrain in that park is very similar to what I was running during Tough Mudder with the steepness of the hills and cambre of the trail. So that has my mind ticking about taking training runs in that direction (the downside is that it is very up hill to get there and there is a really crappy road crossing).

 

Reign in the Food

3000+ calories 

 

Lunch was late and spent in the pub. I had to go see the doctor later that afternoon so we didn't stay drinking - that has been known to happen - although my manager was treating it as a bit of a last hurrah before I defect to the other department next month. Still I had a couple of pints and it gave me a bit of the munchies and lowered my inhibitions so I ended up eating a little more than I should have. I'm probably up by a few hundred calories, plus beer but a long way from the thousands of calories I can hit when I just don't give a damn.  A fail but I sort of knew it was on the cards and I regret nothing. 

 

 

Go Faster, Go Further!

 

Took a four mile run this morning. Slow and easy with four sets of strides to see things out. My legs felt kind of tired this morning and I had to keep reminding myself that it is okay to go slow and easy on the slow and easy day. 

 

As a bit of an aside, by the end of the week I'll have run 300 miles run in 2017!! Ask me a year ago and I'll have told you that the words I, run and 300 miles don't belong together in the same sentence  

 

Get Strong, be Powerful

spreadsheet

Rest day. 

 

To my amazement the DOMs aren't too bad today. I sort of think I might have got it out of my system last week  so maybe the crippling DOMS I gave myself last Monday did me a favour this week when I actually did put some real volume in. My shoulders are more achy than my legs but even they aren't too bad. I want to get on the foam roller before bed. 

[deftona]

16 minutes ago, jonfirestar said:

As a bit of an aside, by the end of the week I'll have run 300 miles run in 2017!! Ask me a year ago and I'll have told you that the words I, run and 300 miles don't belong together in the same sentence  

 

Wow, well done!

[Broba Fett]

Salutations my english friend.  Here to follow.

 

Congrats on the 300 miles.  I have done some running in your honor the past few weeks.  Trying to ramp up to regularly going for a run a couple times per week. 

[Salinger]

congrats on 300 miles, thats incredible!! x

[jonfirestar]

15 hours ago, deftona said:

Wow, well done!

 

10 hours ago, Broba Fett said:

Congrats on the 300 miles.

 

34 minutes ago, Salinger said:

congrats on 300 miles, thats incredible!! x

 

thanks! I like to take note of these kind of things because progress is very hard to gauge while you are in the midst of it. Today it doesn't feel like that big  a deal to run 20 miles in a week but 18 months ago I couldn't walk up the stairs without stopping to catch my breath. Keeping in mind why I started doing this  in the first place and how much things have changed helps keep me motivated.

 

10 hours ago, Broba Fett said:

I have done some running in your honor the past few weeks.  Trying to ramp up to regularly going for a run a couple times per week. 

I admire you for doing that! Sincerely. Keep up the amazing work, my friend.

[Salinger]

i.n.s.p.i.r.a.t.i.o.n 

[Maigs]

18 hours ago, jonfirestar said:

As a bit of an aside, by the end of the week I'll have run 300 miles run in 2017!! Ask me a year ago and I'll have told you that the words I, run and 300 miles don't belong together in the same sentence  

Yup, that's pretty badass. Nice work getting those runs in.

 

Glad you're feeling better and that the infection cleared itself up.

[jonfirestar]

7 hours ago, Salinger said:

i.n.s.p.i.r.a.t.i.o.n 

Aww. I hope I can inspire others!

 

5 hours ago, Maigahane said:

Yup, that's pretty badass. Nice work getting those runs in.

 

Glad you're feeling better and that the infection cleared itself up.

What is even weirder is that I actually enjoy doing that running. That kind of blows my mind

 

I'm glad I don't need antibiotics but I'll be a lot happier when I can hear properly again. Apparently it can take more than a month

[jonfirestar]

 

Week 0, Wednesday!

Bit of a mixed bag today. I didn't sleep particularly well last night and have been awake since 3am. Grr. I haven't felt too bad considering I only got 5 hours sleep but neither have I been feeling good. For the very last time in the foreseeable future I've been left in charge of the support department for the next week and a bit. I'll honestly be happy when that is no longer a thing. Not that I can actually complain about today. The team on was my old team from back when I was a supervisor and I really like it when they are on.

 

Reign in the Food

??+ calories

 

I just can't get the damned snack demon under control right now icecream and cookies are the naughtiness of the day. When will I ever learn that I won't stop at a sinlge ice cream and it just sets me up for disappointment for the rest of the day. 

 

Go Faster, Go Further!

Rest day for running.

 

Get Strong, be Powerful

spreadsheet

Deadlift day. I worked so hard at the gym this morning I was trembling by the time I got to the showers. My whole body didn't know what hit it That tends to happen on deadlift day! I have a general ache all over as a result.

 

Completed my program

 

Got in my conditioning circuit

[Kestrel Grey]

50 minutes ago, jonfirestar said:

??+ calories

 

I just can't get the damned snack demon under control right now icecream and cookies are the naughtiness of the day. When will I ever learn that I won't stop at a sinlge ice cream and it just sets me up for disappointment for the rest of the day. 

 

Maybe have a little note book, or enter it on your phone, as soon as you have a serving? That way it isn't deciding once to have ice cream and then eating a bunch, but you treat it as a separate (and immediately accountable) decision each and every time you get more.  I have noticed a decrease in my second helpings when I do this.