2024 Training Log- Part 4

What I’m listening to while writing this: Neil Young- Harvest.

General condition- Full of hay fever. Every year I get a scratchy throat and puffy eyes this time of year and I say “Oh I think I’m getting a cold”, but the cold never arrives, and then I remember “Oh Yeah, I get Hay Fever now”. Never got hay fever as a kid or adult, then moved house 15 years ago and now it’s every year this time of year.

Other than that, fairly good. My low back varies between tolerable and intolerable, but once I warm up it’s good to go.

Monday-

It was Easter Monday, so I just put some work in on the weights. Heavy Upper Body day. Did some higher weight as I knew there’d be no training in the evening. still took it fairly handy.

Tuesday-

Lower body in the gym. Just focused on Goblet Squatting to get full movement through the hips. I use this day like weighted mobility rather than heavy lifts. Then some isolation work for the hamstrings was the only other thing I worked hard at.

Wednesday-

Went hard at it in sparring with my new HRM. Regular readers will know that my chest strap monitor kept flicking off and causing issues with my data. Crazy 220BPM heart rates or complete lack of signal. so I bought a Polar Verity Plus. Goes under my arm and uses an optical sensor rather than a contact one.

Successfully used it on Wednesday with the below data. I’ll explain the session below.

Okay wait, what? 1012kcal in a session?

You’re entitled to be surprised, but I can’t imagine it being that high in reality. However the session was tough. You can see on the timescale where my warm up was, when I was teaching technique (the drop off between 10 and 30 mins), and then the beginning of the spars.

The first 25 minutes was first score. I was the only Black belt, so my job was to submit everyone. They just had to score on me. Brown Belts had to submit everyone also, purple belts had to score twice, and blue and white just needed 1 score.

After that, 3 6 minute rounds at high pace. You can see those 3 rounds pretty clearly from about 1hr until the cool down.

Friday-

Back to the gym for some buuuuuullshit bodybuilding pump style fun to recover.

Saturday-

Good quality sparring for 12 rounds. 4 of the 12 with Brown or Black Belts, then focused on some transitions I’ve been trying to do in the others with the Blue belts. Got 3 knees in the head over the course of the session, no bother, and then in the last round I stripped Neto’s grip and he accidentally backfisted me in the nose, leaving me with a shiner and a decent sized mouse on my brow. I had something quite formal to go to on Sunday and that was not the look I was going for. Such is life.

So a fairly light week training wise as it was Easter Holidays and I took some time with family. Still got some quality in.

Training thoughts of the week-

They say “Train smarter, not harder!”. And it’s a truism, but only if you’ve already tried training harder. Most people don’t train very hard and could just do with training harder. They can get smart later.

“Train insane or stay the same!” was written on the wall in a gym I went to once. I looked at it, read it, absorbed its message, and thought to myself- “Yes, I will never come to a gym that has to put stupid shit like this on the wall ever again.” And I never have.

Look at the kcals from my session above. That meant my priority when I got home was to get as many calories in before bed as I could. Even if you don’t do 1000, I bet you do about 650 in an average one. So eat after training.

Other stuff this week-

Listen to less podcasts. Having Giant Headphones on does not imply knowledge or wisdom. That said, I think everyone should listen to Jonathon Haidt on the Joe Rogan podcast. I’ve been interested in his theories about phone’s effects on childhood for a long while and read or listened to his previous work. My wife initiated a phone-free policy in the school she’s principal of, (to much initial resistance, but if you’ve met my wife… ) and the kids are happier for it. Social media is a drug, folks. And like any other drug, an adult should consume it only with the full knowledge of it’s effects. But kids should be kept away from it for as long as humanly possible.

Okay, so long, farewell, see you on the mat.