Right if you have read my review of Horizon’s The Truth about Exercise and my follow up post about my exercise experiment then you’ll no doubt be interested to read the results of how I got on. Unfortunately, it will take a while to work through it but I thought I would share that I have now started. I did three bursts of 20 seconds intense running on a treadmill, seperated by 30 seconds jogging along. I already do a 6-7 minute run around the block every morning and evening weekdays and just in the morning at the weekends. I have been upping the pace on that for the last week to minimise the risk of pulling a muscle on the treadmill. I am not going to time the runs for the duration of the experiment, the idea being that if I am getting fitter then my times should steadily improve. This isn’t as good as actually measuring my physiology, but it is the best proxy I can come up with without having any means of measuring it. My weight is 14 stones 2 oz (196 lbs) at the moment, which given that I am 6ft makes me about a stone (14lbs) overweight. I don’t intend to do anything about being overweight for the next 4 weeks, but I will see if there is any effect on it. What I am most interested in is the effect on my energy levels. Again I can’t measure these, but I will know and should be able to assess what if anything it is doing.
I am not following the protocol from the Horizon programme exactly. I know how I tick and I am pretty sure I will have a lot of difficulty keeping to a three times a week routine. I’ll find it much easier to make it daily during the week, so I’ll be doing intensive exercise 5 times rather than 3 times a week. No doubt there will be a few interruptions, so I may end up at less than that on average.
Right, that is all a bit dull I know, but hopefully I will have something to report soon. I will keep you posted. Any encouragement you feel inclined to give me will be gratefully received.
Go Colin Go! (encouragement enough?)
Thanks Lise.
Good luck! I know how difficult new regimes can be, I routinely fall off one every month…! The nice thing about this one appears to be how easy it is to fit into the daily grind, which is usually my downfall – finding the energy to go and do 3-4 hours of exercise a week when I already work 50-60 hour weeks is tough.
Thanks Charlotte, all encouragement gratefully received.