Football Epilogue

I'm currently feeling that my YMCA gym membership is a bit expensive for the amount I use it. I'm a pretty basic guy when it comes to my workout needs:  a decent treadmill, free weights, a place to stretch out, on occasion an opportunity to lap swim and play racquetball on occasion.  I joined the "Y" last fall thinking the kids would be more involved there than they are as well. I just can't justify the $120ish/month for my basics. Enter LA Fitness. I tried them out this morning by means of a guest pass. The pricing seemed reasonable: $30/month + $100 initiation. They have all the amenities listed above (note that the court use does cost a little extra). I think it wins for value at this point. The equipment was quality. I have to admit I'll miss having the tv on my treadmill. They had a substantially larger free-weight area with more diversity in lifting options. The crowd was a little younger than at the Y...ok a lot younger. Oddly my biggest complaint was...

View from my seat watching the Minnesota North Stars/Wild alumni team square off against the Chicago Blackhawks alumni as part of the Wild's Stadium Series . Both the Minnesota alumni and the actual team won their games. The alumni game had lots of shenanigans including Dino Ciccarelli getting in a mock fight at the start of the game along with plenty of hog-piling on the goalies. It was a little bit of cold and a lot of fun in the outdoor stadium (TCF Bank stadium at the University of Minnesota).

I had a big deadline this week. For some reason that throws my eating and exercising back into the stone-age. I stop buying groceries, take on a two-gyro-a-day eating habit and the gym..well, what's a gym?  It falls in with my having a little bit of a procrastination issue. Things for some reason have to wait until they are the most important thing and then nothing else matters. It's something I resolve to work on each time this comes up (roughly 4 to 6 times a year) and I've developed a couple coping tactics: Setting timers to help keep focus Adopting Only Handle It Once (OHIO) for most details, e.g. paying bills, to keep my plate clear Letting my todo list define what can wait and what needs to be done up until a deadline I could stand to better structure my schedule. The fitness aspects need to keep priority. I feel better with them.

That was my heart rate this morning. While it doesn't reflect a big weight loss, or gaining some superhuman strength or physique, it does say that the cardio is paying off. :) ...now if could only get Samsung S-Health to download my data.

This weekend was a lot of fun. I played a round of golf on frozen Lake Minnetonka in what is dubbed the "Chilly Open" . Essentially nine holes of golf on Ice. They had a chili tasting contest and lots of free stuff from the sponsors. It was a perfect (for winter) 30ish degrees F. I look forward to playing in it again next year.

Me. Senior year of college football at little old D3 Hamline University in Fall 1999. I found this old pic going through some stuff and thought I'd scan it. The most uncanny thing about this pic is just how much my son looks like me. Granted he's 10 and doesn't have the facial hair or build yet, but I think this may be him at 21/22 years old.

I would like to do more interval training. It can be challenging to do things in front of a clock. There are a number of interval timer apps out there, but they seem to be limited to a single work/rest interval. What if I want to do a superset with different timings for, say, lunges and planks and lat pulls. In most cases I'd be stuck. That is, until I found this little app called ChronoList . It allows me to simply build rather complicated timed circuit routines. So far I've just been using it for planks (and timing line changes for my kids' floor hockey team), but it has worked great. I recommend giving this app a try if you want to take a moment to "spice-up" your workout.  I suppose you could also use it for baking cookies, etc. too :P