3/28 Some bicycles (the ab exercise moving your legs). 3/29 A few squats & push-ups 3/30 I've been having a lot of trouble getting myself to actually exercise... told myself I'd do a short one today of maybe 15-20 min, ended up doing 30 (its easier to keep going than it is to start). Started with 2 sets of 5 squats, 5 push-ups. The push-ups really got my HR up... I need to do more of those. Mostly kicking today. I feel the roundhouse technique clicking a bit more, just tightening up my mechanics. I think I've got it fairly good (on some reps) when just doing a kick. I find it much harder to get 'good' technique off a punch combo (the distance is a bit different, the body position & movement is a bit different too). My right leg kick is better than my left (not even doing a switch, just throwing from southpaw). I want to work more on both my left leg rear kick & my left leg switch kick. Forgot my ankle brace today; feeling the ankle just a little bit during/after though. I think I should probably try jumping rope again (with the brace on) sometime soon.
3/31 I've been fasting today; I will break it later tonight or tomorrow morning. Its been about 18 hours at this point, I think. I did my hill walking route today for cardiac output. 137 avg BPM, 45 minutes.
4/4 A longer walk, not targeting any particular heart rate. Went to 3 different lookout points in the hills/park near my house. A lot of steep terrain. The distance is incorrect, the GPS gets quite confused as it is a wooded area without good signal. I can see on the map (not posted here) where it thinks I walked vs where I actually went. Probably more like 2 miles total walked.
4/19 15 min walk--got tired pretty quick, decided to go back home... I really need to be exercising more. 4/21 Heavy bag workout. Warm-up: - arm circles, hip swings, ankle circles - Jogging around the mat, adding some forward & backward rolls. I reduced the jogging to walking when I got up into the yellow zone. - Two 30-second intervals of jumping (~60 jumps) Then I worked on various striking combos on the heavy bags.
4/26 Heavy bag workout. Warmup: arm circles, hip swings, ankle circles, jogging & a few forward rolls. 3 30-second rounds of jumping (still no rope, I'll add that back soon I think), 60 jumps in each round. Then I worked combos on the bag, a lot of punching today, some kicking. Tried to work in elbows, but I haven't been taking good care of my psoriasis lately, and I wasn't able to even on the vinyl aquabag as I was bleeding after just a few strikes.
4/27 Heavy bag workout. Warmup: Arm circles, wrist circles, leg swings (forgot ankle circles), some jogging & lateral stepping, forward rolls, backward rolls. Two sets of 60 jumps (30 seconds each). Then I worked combos on the heavy bag, a lot of kicking today, some punching.
I've been for a few walks here and there, but mainly just not exercising at all. 5/13 Warmup: Leg/hip swings, ankle circles, arm circles, wrist circles. Jogging/forward rolls/backward rolls. Some walking, then 30s of jumping (60 jumps). I'm planning on doing a more strenuous workout tomorrow, figured I'd try to wake my body up a bit with recovery intervals today. I did 15 recovery intervals on the heavy bag (~12s work @ 70%, 60s active rest).
5/14 ~45 minute walk, mostly flat pavement but some hills. Avg HR 132 BPM (154 max). Then I did some heavy bag work: This was right after the walk, just took time to put on hand wraps & get some water. I started with some leg swings, ankle circles, arm circles. Then I did three sets on the heavy bag of: 2 min work, 1 min rest, 2 min work, 3 min rest. Alternated orthodox & southpaw (a few reps then switch). Round 1: leg & body kicks Round 2: cross, hook, cross, uppercut Round 3: Jab, cross, rear kick; jab cross switch kick. Round 4: jab cross uppercut Round 5: Jab, cross, hook, rear kick Round 6: cross, jab, cross I had to slow down a lot & lower power in round 5 & 6. My switch kicks were having running my leg into the bag way too early (e.g., after I've only moved the leg 6"), especially if the bag is swinging around a lot; I should move to position better. I found the uppercut in round 3 hard to do well from southpaw coming off the cross, no issues in orthodox. I think if I was trying to move around while doing this I'd have gassed out much harder. I'll worry about that once I get some conditioning back... I really do need to start exercising much more frequently, though I know I need to build up to it as I've let everything lapse for a while.
5/16 Warmup: Arm circles, wrist circles, leg swings, ankle circles, knee circles, some very slow jogging, 1 min of jump rope (caught my feet a good bit as I haven't used a rope in a while). 3.5 sets of: 2 min work, 1 min rest, 2 min work, 3 min rest. (so seven 2-minute rounds in total) Did everything from orthodox & southpaw. BB = banana bag AB = aquabag (spherical uppercut bag) 1: BB: Leg, body, and head kicks. A few knees & teeps. 2: AB: Jab, cross, hook. Working on the hook from a video of Liam Harrison in one of the other threads here (Does boxing have a different hook to MT/MMA?). I did some standalone hooks, and a bunch of jab-cross-hook. 3: BB: jab, cross, hook, rear kick 4: AB: jab, uppercut, hook 5: BB: lead hook, rear knee. And also working just the hook alone for some of it. 6: AB: round elbow strikes--I tried using similar mechanics to the hook from that Liam Harrison video; slight leg & shoulder dip, twisting shoulder power along with the hip movement. It worked rather well. I also threw in some rising elbows. 7: BB: jab, rear body hook, lead head hook I was felt an exertion headache coming on during round 7, so stopped there. I did get a headache from the session I did 2 days ago too... took some advil & sat outside in the breeze for a bit to cool down (both a few days ago, and today). I felt better much faster today than I did a few days ago (though the workout a few days ago was longer, so I'm not surprised).
Wow its been about 4 months since I last posted... and unfortunately I spent the majority of that time just sitting around eating poorly. I've started exercising a bit more recently. I had a steam shower put in and that was finished a few weeks ago--this somewhat motivated me to exercise more and steam afterwards. For right now I'm not going to go back to detailed logging... I want to try to post bag work videos more regularly though, as I do like being able to watch my technique change/improve over time (or be able to find things that aren't improving). I'm starting to work on fasting again; I've done some 18-20 hour fasts, but would like to get to 24-60 hour fasts again. For right now I'm working on a couple things: - Diet -- I am trying to eat healthier, and as mentioned above, start fasting regularly again. - Basic fitness: I have let my basic fitness level degrade a lot. I'm not bothering with my HR monitor or specific conditioning exercises right now, just going for walks or free-style hitting my heavy bags. I've started doing jump-rope again, before hitting the heavy bags, and building up how much of that I can do. Also doing some body weight exercises. - Technique work: 5 days a week, I want to throw at least 200 strikes. It may be difficult to motivate myself, but given I have heavy bags right at home I really should be able to do this. I plan to start today. I'm not sure what format I'll use; some days I may want to just do 200 jabs (100 orthodox, 100 southpaw), other days I may do a small # of reps of a bunch of different strikes. I want to cycle through so I'm practicing all of these (from both orthodox & southpaw): jab, cross, lead & rear hook, lead rising elbow, lead & rear horizontal/slash elbow, lead & rear uppercut, lead (both with & without switch stance) & rear low roundhouse kick, lead (both with & without switch stance) & rear mid/body roundhouse kick, lead & rear teep, lead & rear straight knee, lead & rear round knee. Also bare hand techniques: lead & rear palm strike, lead & rear chop, lead reverse chop, lead & rear slap hook. After the 200 strikes, if I hit the bags more I'll work combos. I'll consider raising the # of daily strikes in the future. My first goal is to just actually do this: 10 days of 200+ strikes over the next 2 weeks (plus whatever other exercise/bag work I wanna do).
Warmed up for ~5 minutes (including 80 jump rope reps). Took about 25 minutes to do 200 strikes today (taking my time, resting when short of breath). I did (total # is listed, half was orthodox, half southpaw) - Jab: 20 - Cross: 20 - Lead teep: 20 - Lead rising elbow: 20 - Lead hook: 20 - Lead round kick, no switch: 20 - Lead elbow (horizontal/stab): 20 - Rear uppercut: 20 - Rear low round kick: 20 - Jab: 20
Good to see you logging again! I hope you will be able to stick to your plan! Getting the motivation is hard sometimes, but I am sure you can do it (still can't understand how you can do the fasting, though)...
If you do it regularly (say, two 24-36 hour fasts a week) the first 2-4 weeks are pretty hard. But your body adapts and you stop really feeling hungry during fasts. I'm actually surprised at how much of this my body retained after not fasting for months--going back in wasn't nearly as hard as those first 2-4 weeks.
My gosh, I am without energy and feeling almost sick sometimes when I wait too long between breakfast and lunch I am very spoiled that way, I guess. Can't imagine fasting for that long. Although it would be nice to not have to care about what to eat, about empty fridge, etc.
9/24 Rest (did bagwork 21/22/23) 9/25 Some active stretching, jump-rope & body weight exercise to warm up, ~8 min. Striking (half of the reps in orthodox, half in southpaw): - 30 lead elbow strikes - 40 [20 jab-cross combos] - 30 rear knee strikes - 50 jab - 50 cross Took a little over 20 min for the striking, worked up more of a sweat than last time. 10 min steam, cold shower after.
9/26 7 min warmup, jump-rope & shadow boxing & walking around 30 min doing 220 strikes (1/2 orthodox, 1/2 southpaw): 20 lead palm strike 40 lead uppercut elbow 20 rear mid roundhouse 40 (20 rear chop, switch kick) 40 (20 lead palm strike, rear slap hook) 40 (20 lead elbow, rear elbow) 20 lead teep Full power (well, 80-100%) on all strikes (prior days too). This is why it takes me so long--I take breaks to keep from getting to the point where I'm panting, generally doing 5-10 (kicks) or ~20 (hands) reps and then resting a bit (walking around the mat generally). 10 min steam, cold shower after
9/27 Rest day, took 15 min steam. I've been eating really healthily for the past week. No desserts, smaller total intake over the day than usual. The increased exercise level seems to help with reducing craving for desserts/random snacking. I often had to sort of prod myself into eating as my overall appetite level has dropped significantly. (If I didn't prod myself, I'd end up getting hungry an hour before bed...) I recall reading somewhere that it is actually a reasonable strategy for appetite control: Eat before you get particularly hungry, and you'll eat smaller portions and never reach that 'I'm hungry eat all the things!' state. I don't recall if it was a reputable source, though I have found this to work reasonably well for me. 9/28 I decided to fast today. My last food on the 27th was finished around 9:30 or 10 pm. I'll either eat sometime in the late evening (8:30 pm or later) for a ~23 hour fast, or sometime tomorrow or maybe even Weds morning, will see how I feel. 1 hour mobility/stability training: - Triggerpoint/rolling (pecs/biceps on acuwheel, quads on foam roller, hamstrings on softball) - Some static kettlebell holds, some planking with kickouts (resistance band), 1/2 standing halos, bridging, etc Striking training, 1/2 orthodox 1/2 southpaw @ full power unless otherwise noted 20 lead hook 20 rear hook 20 rear low kick 20 (10 rising elbow, horizontal elbow) -- Orthodox only, cut my elbow on the first rep from southpaw (sweaty, slipped along bag into the seam), spent a few minutes getting the bleeding to stop 20 (10 jab, lead hook) -- southpaw only (substitute for elbows) 30 lead uppercut 30 rear uppercut That was only 160 strikes, I miscounted during and thought I had hit 200. This took less than 20 minutes today (well, 23 minutes, but I think I spent at least 3 or 4 minutes on the elbow cut). 12 minutes steam, cold shower after
9/29 I started to get a headache last night which was likely dehydration--I sweated a lot that day and hadn't supplemented any electrolytes. Had a small spoonful of table salt with more water, headache was gone about 10 min later. I went to bed around midnight and lay awake for probably an hour. Then I woke up at 4 am fairly thirsty & with some empty stomach pangs--drinking a full glass of water helped, and I went back to bed. Finally got up around 9, my guess is I had 5-6 hours of sleep. This is how it usually goes when I fast overnight; hard to fall asleep, hard to stay asleep. Still fasting. I added a little salt to my black coffee this morning. Right now I'm coming up on hour 46 or so of fasting. My current plan is to break it tomorrow night at 72 hours, or sometime the day after that (probably relatively early in the day). I have been doing my shoulder rehab exercises regularly for a little over a week now. I don't do very many sets--something like 20 abduction on each side, 20 rotation @ neutral OR at 90, 12 y-fly or reverse fly, and then another set of 20 abduction on each side (all with blue resistance band). It has helped, though my delt & triceps still do too much during striking (shock absorption/etc, leading to mild injuries/overuse strains). Working on using my lats more when landing punches/elbows. Striking training, 1/2 orthodox 1/2 southpaw @ full power unless otherwise noted 40 jab 20 rear straight knee 40 (20 jab cross) 80 (20 jab, cross, lead uppercut, rear hook) 20 lead hook 10 rear mid roundhouse Warmed up with 100 jump-rope reps, 20s plank, ~10 push-ups against the wall at an angle, some walking around. (~5 minutes) The striking took me < 20 minutes today because I went for an easier set (the 4 strike combo moved me along pretty fast). I did have another small spoon of salt about 30 minutes before I started exercising, and I've been drinking plenty of water today. Doing my shoulder rehab exercises (~30 min before the striking training) got me sweating & breathing harder than it usually does, so I was worried the striking would be hard, but it really wasn't that bad. 10 min steam, cold shower after.
