Train Like A Martian!!

The Mars Generation is hosting this event April 18-24th, the final day being the day British Astronaut "runs" the London Marathon on the International Space Station.  It is raising awareness that while STEM education is important to the future of space travellers, Space is a hostile environment and astronauts will need to be fit to meet the challenge.  There are many school and youth groups participating - as well as older nerds like me. 

It is also a fundraiser for The Mars Generation :


TMG works to excite young people and adults about space and STEM education through three primary programs. The Future of Space Program is a worldwide outreach program designed to gain excitement about STEM and build support for human space exploration. The Student Space Ambassador Program encourages teens and young adults to share their excitement about space exploration with their own communities. Finally, the Space Camp Scholarship Program provides financial backing for young people who lack financial resources but show an aptitude in STEM to attend Space Camp®.

So, everyday from April 18 to 24th there will be a challenge issues (not sure if I'll get them all done on the assigned day because of work) 

More info if you're interested:

 http://themarsgeneration.org/train-like-a-martian/

doing yoga again

 I've decided that I NEED to start doing yoga again.  I used to do yoga when the Angie was little, 2 or 3 times a week.  Then life got busier, I'd miss one day here and there, then one week, then 15 years....  I wasn't hugely good at it, and I was significantly younger then, so I really don't have high expectations for now.  I stretch pretty thoroughly after jogging or working out - but it's more a stretch the muscles I just used kind of thing.  I have been seriously tight and creaky in an overall way, and stressed in my upper back and shoulders.  I keep all my stress, anger, hostility, aggression bottled up in my upper, back, shoulders and neck - not good for someone with headache issues.

I started this morning.  Three sets of sun salutations (no offense to my catphew - but downward dog can be amazing) I'm going to set a goal of sun salutations 3 mornings a week to ease into things.  I'm not a social workout person, but may at some point take classes again but that is a far of some point right now.





photo credit: mantra1 via photopin (license)

Tuesday Training- Quality vs Quantity

Normally, when you see "Quality vs Quantity" in a title about exercise, you would expect it to be pushing quality over quantity.  Pay attention to form, less reps with better form is what you should be aiming for.  Get your heart rate to 80% for cardio health- keep it between x% and y% for fat burning (since I am constantly seeing different numbers there I left it as x and y).

My problem lately, the past two and a half to three weeks, we've had a lot of yucky winter weather.  Not snow - which I love, but "wintery mix" and "freezing rain" and just plain ice.  Clearly, I'm not a dedicated enough jogger to jog through stuff like this.  I really find it difficult to convince my brain to drive in the stuff to the gym to work out.  I think about working out at home- but this would be limited- and  gets  passed up for nothing.  Then there is when I'm pressed for time... is it worth, getting dressed, going to the gym, working out for only 15-20 minutes, diving home, taking a shower, getting dressed doing ____.   Part of the problem is perfectionistic thought.  If I work out at home, I probably won't get the full cardio or fat burning in.  If I work out from home, I won't hit all the muscle groups efficiently.  I actually did buy a jump rope - figuring when time was the constraint to working out, I could go outside and jump rope for not just the allocated workout time but the drive to and from time as well.. except weather (still holding out hope this will be a good idea when the --- latest weather on my phone?  freezing drizzle?!?!  finally ends) 

Then I read Scott Young's blog post "When the Less Efficient Method Gets the Job Done Faster" link here - or he's on my blog list on the sidebar.  Sometimes it's kind of funny how you could be thinking about something and find something very related to your thoughts shows up in a timely manner.  His point is that although efficient is better than inefficient, inefficient is better than nothing, and if you do inefficient enough times it will add up, maybe even reach effective.  I know I need to exercise to manage my BG levels.  And realistically, it would be better to do 6 ten minute not perfect workouts than one 60 minute perfect workout in a week. (yes, this is slightly exaggerated)  And I probably should go through the 15 minutes it takes to get ready and get to the gym and the 30 minutes of getting home, showering and dressed for a 15  minute workout.

So, now that I've pondered this, and the universe stuck stuff to make me think about in relation to this in my face, what am I going to do?  There is still frozen not snow falling from the sky, it's dark, I don't want to go out.  So I'm going to do some squats, pushups, dips and crunches.  Then I'll go up and down the stairs a bunch of times.  Maybe I'll break a sweat, I'll definitely be breathing harder.  I'll call it a victory of inefficient over nothing, and see what happens tomorrow. 

Fitness Trackers and Apps

I'm looking at a few different fitness app and trackers.  I'm also looking at a couple pain tracker apps.  I keep saying I'm going to track my headaches, and migraines but never actually do.  The magic of me and my phone is I'll actually use apps on my phone. I have a list of 20 different apps I'm checking out, so it will be awhile before I've drawn any conclusions about them.  Quick note: when I wrote about the water app last week I got the name wrong. It's actually WATER YOUR BODY.  Really sorry about that.

Right now I'm shopping for a wearable tracker.  There are phone apps that will track some of the data I'm interested in - but most are for iPhone, and I'm never leaving Android, and most kill the battery pretty quickly (since battery life was a HUGE deciding factor when I got my phone - I can't live with having to recharge halfway through your day- this is also a consideration for apps as well)   There are a LOT of wearables on the market.  I didn't look at iOS only products, I also didn't look at products that weren't reviewed in what I consider "reputable review sites". The top three for me when I'm in the market for electronic devices are: PCMag.com (ironic since in computers I'm definitely a MAC girl) CNET.com and Wired.  There were a few devices that the only reviews I found were on Amazon, and other retailers, and I don't necessarily trust those reviews, so I eliminated them from the lineup.