Grizzled Ronin joins the fray

[jfellrath]

Hi all,

I'm Jamie, from Columbus, OH, and I've been a long time browser at NF but never joined in or followed it on a regular basis. This wasn't for any reason such as not agreeing with anything that has been said here, or disliking the Nerd Fitness ideas, but just that I was trying to concentrate on other programs and not spread myself too thin by distracting myself with other stuff.

I'm 43, and I've been pretty active and fit most of my life (except for a few years when I was out of college and making my way in the world, and suddenly having to do things more on my own schedule). I was a competitive swimmer in high school, qualifying for the State meet in Michigan twice in my event. I also played soccer regularly growing up. I was always a play-outside explore-the-woods kind of kid as much as I could - my mom tells stories of losing two-year-old Jamie on a camping trip and calling my name only to hear my voice from 50 feet up in a tree (I commend her on not panicking). We had a pretty intense tree house in our back yard growing up where we played for hours so climbing has always been a big thing for me.

I did some time with Martial Arts as well - a couple years of Tae Kwon Do in college and some renaissance fencing/wrestling stuff for a couple years about eight years ago. Enjoyed it fully but time was the issue in continuing.

If I was going to describe myself in the class/race terms, I suppose I'd mostly be a half-elf/assassin-scout. Endurance sports have always come naturally to me, and love the climbing stuff - parkour fascinates me as does Erwan Le Corre's MovNat system. I've always loved climbing - the story above being a key indicator of that... and my wife gets annoyed at me when we go hiking because I have a bit of mountain goat in my blood.

So my personal likes lean more toward the assassin side of things than the scout, I just consider a bit of natural endurance aptitude as a plus.

I describe myself as a Ronin, though, because I am constantly looking for something new to try. I am a masterless samurai in my working out because I get bored and/or distracted REALLY easily with workouts. I've done Matt Furey's Combat Conditioning, Mark Sisson's Primal Blueprint Fitness (yes, I'm Primal - been so since about 2008 and it's been wonderful), Mark Lauren's You Are Your Own Gym book, and followed workouts from various Men's Health articles and the like as well. It's hard for me to get out of the house to work out a lot because I have two kids, one of whom is my 7-year-old autistic son Duncan. He's high-functioning but requires a lot of monitoring to make sure he's not getting himself into trouble, basically (his autism manifests as a lot of hyperactivity and instant gratification stuff). Because of Duncan and my own history and family history, I'm fascinated with the neurological effects of the Paleo/Primal lifestyle and I have a blog where I record my interests (though it's been pretty sparse of late) at http://www.paleomental.com

My workouts, though, have always been pretty much a combination of those three sources: mostly bodyweight stuff with some light running and biking thrown in as well (as I don't own a car by choice, I commute to work by bike or bus/walking).

I've wandered over this way, finally, after seeing the posts by my friend Anivair of this forum and seeing him talking about being a Ranger and such - my old D&D instincts kicked in and I decided I needed to check this place out more carefully. You guys are having all sorts of fun with the training aspect of this stuff and I want to be part of it.

Current goals include preparation for the upcoming Mud Ninja race (like Warrior Dash) here in Ohio in two weeks - where I'm doing the extreme Mud Ninja Challenge by doing the race with 16-pounds of weight on me, and the Ruckus and Hell Run races in September. That's another thing I have issues with, though - goal-setting. My goal-setting sucks. I'm never specific enough and it ends up being too open-ended. That's a situation I hope to get help with here.

So that's me, the grizzled ronin. Thanks to Steve for this community and the place you've all worked to make it great.

Jamie

[D_chelyst]

Welcome to the Rebellion, jfellrath! We can definitely help you with getting your goals more specific and into attainable chunks. You said that one of your current goals is to be ready for the Mud Ninja race, so what have you been doing to get ready? What will be required of you in the race? What's required of you in the September Ruckus and Hell Run races?

[The Barefoot Ninja]

Welcome! Glad to have you here, hopefully as part of the Assassins....Ok, sales pitch done with. What have you been doing to prep for these events? If you need any help, with goal setting, workouts, etc., you have an entire community ready, willing, and able to lend you a hand/paw/claw/flipper/ or whatever other fore-appendages I may have missed.

[jfellrath]

Thanks, D_Chelyst and Barefoot Ninja. My workout routines have been lots of bodyweight work, mostly in HIIT type situations like Tabatas or sets with rapid turnover from exercise to exercise and little rest in between. I posted a blog about my current goals and such and thus far (this week) I've been on track with the Parkour workout from the NF article about it.

I also walk a lot - I don't own a car (by choice) and walk or ride my bike most places. I walk and ride the bus to work every day so I get lots of low-impact cardio.

As I said earlier, I've done the mud runs before - did two last year (Warrior Dash and Ruckus) and I did well. I'm here primarily for workout ideas, motivation, and help with goal-setting.

So.... on another topic - I love the idea of setting up the "D&D" type stats like I've seen a lot of folks do... but can't find an article/post about that. Would someone mind sharing the guidelines on setting up a base for these stats for me? Just a link to the post/article would be more than okay!