Day 81 - Swords (and rope) drawn at dawn

Can you spot the would-be samurai? He is often in the park at 6 am
practising his kendo swashes when I'm jumping rope! One of these days
I'll challenge him to a fight...

Okay, here's my report for Thursday, Day 80.

Workout - GMA?

Yes, I gave my all in the morning, but not in the evening when I did 8-min abs and pull-ups/KF sits ups - time constraints of finding a bar. Abs are always a pleasure with Mike and the gang. My pull up still consists of me jerking around and lifting my legs rather than my body. Disappointed with that, but you can't have everything.

Mental progress!  I am very pleased to report that I did not check watch ONCE during entire jumping session. Imagined a piston of a steam powered ship and this seemed to help me keep my movement solid. I did of course trip up about 7 times!

Hearing the alarm as a suprise, not a second countdown, is very sweet! When you just give up and go into it, go into the movement, it's altogether more enjoyable. The body wants to excel.

Nutrition

Good. Only glitch was 5 grams under on evening carbs as I ran out of the supply in the fridge. Cooked up a pile of sweet potatoes for tomorrow and restrained myself from eating a big plate of them, Irish peasant style. Added some rosemary from the garden - that's very worth getting up for and working out for...Call me simple!

Sleep

Light was out at 11.15. Very deep sleep, but still dozy in the afternoon. I've got to catch up that elusive hour or two on the weekend. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, kudos to PCP-ers with young kids or super heavy workloads. Next week I have three late nights with work and I'm not sure how to handle it.

Day 81 for our group and Day 35 for those behind. The midway point of Day 40 is tantalizingly close and a bit of a blur for me now!

Let's have a strong day!

Day 68 - Ma, Jump rope, Radio

Liked Patrick's mail today about the sheer hard work it takes to learn to jump rope. Well done guys on Day 69 and to those behind us, it IS worth it! Today I'm going to weave two PCP themes - Jump rope and bodily awareness - with a personal one, my radio broadcasting.

To be a good announcer, I need three things.

1. Correctness.
For example, I need to ensure I know how to say names and ask or research if I do not. Also, I need to keep to the timings for each news item.

2. Confidence.
Once the On Air 放送中 sign comes on, I need to believe I am in the right place and I am going to do a good job.

3. Cadence
I've been complimented on having a good sound or pace to my voice. I try to feel both the overall direction or music of a sentence and the individual words. Sometimes I slip into my super-local Essex estuary English and have odd pronunciation, but the overall rhythm and tone is good.


Rhythm, confidence, good form...hmmm sound familiar to my fellow PCP-ers?

If you do something as elemental as jump rope everday, you don't get perfect straightaway or even the next day. I am still unable to consistently jump for more than a minute. But I am consistently jumping around a minute and with time and sweat, this will get longer. You improve in a cyclical manner. Improvements, steps back, plateaus, sudden unexpected leaps forward. And this applies to any skill.

If you do something that calls for confidence, which the rope does, you need to know how you are inside, to be aware. Like the space or 'ma', when eating, there is also a pause in the middle of a jump.

And in this pause is awareness of our strength.

Day 68 - The role of 'Ma' and chopsticks in weight loss

Well done those who identified the whale as a rest for chopsticks.

Here is one Yoko gave me, and it also brightens the table as a tiny vase.

Chopsticks are a very important tool for portion control - as Patrick said, you eat less. Or you learn to be satisfied with less. Japanese serve smaller portions, on smaller plates, and take their time over their meals.
This is not out of a sense of righteousness or a desire to diet. It is part of the cultural norm of eating well.

As PCP-ers, we have much to learn from the traditional Japanese attitude to food.

To eat well is to be reverent about food and that means eating faster or slower depending on our energy needs at the time. We often overestimate how quickly we need to eat and feel uncomfortable with a little bit of hunger. We see food and food images around us so much that our brains are constantly suggesting we eat - even when we don't need to! Modern people have stopped listening to the body. Cue the chopstick rest.

To listen to the body, we need a bit of 'ma' 間 or space. This is impossible if the chopsticks or fork or spoon constantly hovers over the food, like an eagle about to descend. Sometimes we need to 'rest the  chopsticks' (a Japanese idiom I think).

Inject a little space into meal times and it becomes easier to let the brain catch up with the stomach. I find there is a kind of quietening and calming that happens shortly after eating. It's a good feeling, tingly, and warm.

There are other things that the Japanese do - say a kind of grace 'ittadakimasu' before eating, which means 'I receive' and 'gocchisosama' after eating which, pleasingly enough, translates to 'it was a feast'.

Let's observe 'ma', the quietening when we receives vital energy from food. Be reverent, and take pleasure. It was a feast.

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PCP-wise, today was a strong day. Made two homemade obento and just about to enjoy my evening fruit. Did a 2.5 hour capoeira class which was gruelling, but very satisfying when Cacapa made us do planks that were shorter than the ones I'd done that morning!

And here's a shot of me skipping in the park on my lunch break yesterday.

Day 59 - Whither Abs?

I'm clearly getting braver/stupider about showing you all what's happening here. This was taken at about 8 am after getting through my workout in 49 minutes - with the exception of the Kung Fu situps.  What helped me get through faster was having the workout scribbled on a small post-it note which I carried in my pocket between the sets.

 

This is from yesterday I think. As you can see, I'm a bit of a dunce with numbers, but I'm figuring out a way to count down. Just to get myself confused, I sometimes count down, say 60, 59, 58, then get to 50, and start counting up. I don't know why I do this, but it happens. The thing I have got straight is turning my body a full 90 degrees if its a new skipping set or a 180 degrees when I'm in my tiny apartment. I'm sure I'll still be miscounting on Day 90, but that won't stop it getting done. 

Today is Thursday, but tomorrow is Golden Week Friday, and a long weekend! I'm going shopping for clothes and shoes for the Sassy Girl video shoot on Saturday night. I'll also need to do some practise at home as I'm still behind the other, more diligent, students. Things like the Sassy Girl Dance class and capoeira are important right now. All the things I need to do - putting on my gear before sleeping, getting up, remembering to count, and finding the burn - can seem a bit trudgy at this point. I need to remember that it all adds up.

Have a great day everyone!

Day 45 - Post capoeira

Week 6, a photo by peakconditionhelenl on Flickr.

This is after my capoeira class at FAB Academy with Cacapa. It was a fairly quiet class, but satsifying. We practised 'el-ua, tempo, troca' and other moves for getting around in the roda. I need to pay more attention to the Portugese.

Before class I had a quick nap in a 'flat floor' net cafe in Roppongi and did the plank and ab. work from the morning when I didn't have time for everything.

Feeling good, but the WO is going to be tonight as I'm officially low on sleep and energy now!

Policy for the rest of the program is as much as possible Eschew the Duvet and Jump.

Have a great Friday all!

Day 43 - Jumps under full sakura

 

First set of timed jumps. I think I was way slower than when I had the target number. But it was lovely being under the sakura. Today I plan to give my all to my muscle workout tonight. I want to make every rep count and to do them with great form. It's going to be this evening and I'll let you all know how it goes. 

Something to keep my mind off the aftershocks.

Day 40 - Holding it off

After a jubilant week of feeling big and strong, I'm now holding a sore throat at bay. I had a four-hour class today and had planned to go to the Sassy Girly dance class after that, but changed my mind when I started to notice slight shivery-ness and sore throat. This is very normal for me to a) get sick at the weekend b) feel it in my throat.

Good stuff was jumping before breakfast. I wasn't as coordinated as I'd have liked to be, but it was a bit windy and hey, I hadn't eaten anything.

I am calling this weekend, my 'Screw the Duvet' weekend. Namely, I'm going to try to keep as much as possible to a regular week schedule and just crash out earlier if I need to. I missed a bit of sleep Thursday and Friday hence feeling under the weather today. I hope I can do jumps before breakfast tomorrow.

A bit worried about eating out again tomorrow. This is a meal that is usually a two-weekly thing with a delightful lady called Yoko, AKA my Japanese grandmother. It hasn't happened because of the earthquake, so it's going to be special. In fact, it was Week 1, as I was eating half sushi portions. I'm going to have a look online to see if there are some better options than our usual places.

I'd like to take my scales in, but the ones I have at home are just too 'down home' looking to feel okay about in a restaurant!

Such are the challenges of trying to be PCP compliant and sociable. I'm in awe of people who regularly eat out and with clients!

Day 39 - Second PCP meal 'out'

Feeling a bit lost as I tried my second PCP meal out. The first, at Toshimaen onsen, was really good and they weighed everything for me. The second, at my local mom'n'pop sushi place, was less successful. They don't have scales they told me, so they advised me to just eyeball it. The 'mom' started looking at pictures of fish to find a 'low-calorie' one, but I told her sadly that weighing was everything. So had a mixture of squid, tuna, mackerel sashimi with shredded daikon (surprisingly heavy veg. as it has so much water), small amount of pickled cabbage and two pieces of tofu. (I know, I know).

I estimated the fish to be around 70 of my 100 allowance. This was a mixture of eyeballing and how my stomach felt. Not great. Then went straight out into the shotengai, and got 3 sticks of yakitoria (shitake/chicken, onion/chicken, straight chicken). The amount of meat was pretty small, and I was still feeling like this didn't match what I 'should' be having. So I asked for one more, got one as 'service', and obviously ate both.

Sometimes I wish I WAS on the banana/apple/egg thing in the evenings - no pesky weighing or guilting. (Is that a verb? It is now).

Moral of the story is...if you think that it's not worked out in a restaurant or other culinary establishment, then quit while you're behind. Put down the chopsticks, walk into a place that sells produce, buy it quickly, take it home and weigh a conservative guess on what you missed. This IS why I tend to cook more at home. Hey ho.

In other fails, I misjudged my fruit (don't ask how, it's my special secret) and forgot how many pullups I needed to do when I got to my 'bar' in the playground, so I did 40 in 4 sets. Now I check, I see that I was right, huzzah!

Today's highlight was a set of scarily fast jumps just after noon. Done in a wraparound dress under the sakura surrounded by salarymen and kids on their lunch break.

Day 36 - Sleep, mind, exercise

I've been going on recently about how important it is to get enough sleep! I know I have it easier than many PCP-ers who have families and more demanding jobs, but the video is produced by a mother of two young girls and she's learnt how to say 'NO' to the email, the tv, the books, the 'one more thing', and just switch off the light.

Deep, heavy, knocked-out sleep yesterday! Oh yes! Then a really satisfying pre-brekkie workout under the sakura this morning. I still need to push myself with the floor jumps, and the piston squats were on pathetic jelly-legs after jumping. Failed after the third set of pull-ups. I'm going to do PU again tonight on my way home in a different 'free gym' AKA kids playground and play around with the form of the squats in my room tonight. A little bit of advance planning will save me time consulting the computer screen!

Saying 'Do it badly' is a way for me to get past the feeling of 'I'm so useless'. It's better to fail on the first attempt, than to never try. I think I failed this morning as I really went for it with the swing of the PU. With skipping, I found the form easier when I tried to go fast (less mind interference) and then my lack of cardiovascular strength let me down.

As we all get fitter, I think mastering new exercises will be different. Still hard, but more control and body intelligence. Have you noticed any patterns with your training yet? Do you go after speed or form or just get through them?

Have a great Day 36 gang!

Day 35 (4.4) - Feta Fetish

I had cheese for the first time all project... Just a little feta,
creamy speckles in a Greek salad. Picked them out with chopsticks and
arranged them in a (ahem) scattered formation on my brown rice bread.
It was pretty lovely especially when I toasted them. I don't know what
will happen with the new diet plan tomorrow, so I really savoured two
whole slices. Did well to use only a teaspoon of dressing,
less well to eat the clusters of cranberries in the salad. Can't
believe this is the person who ate 12 dried figs in one go a year ago.
It's odd that I both want and don't want to be someone who is happy
with less.

In other news, I repeated the 300 jumps from yesterday and other runs
were about 250, a couple of clear 150s. Muscles and nervous system,
plus breathe came together under the sakura today. For this, I have to
thank my friend, sleep. Going to bed when I still have a bit buzzing
in my head is so boring at the time - I used to want to read or
whatever for ages until I was struggling to stay awake. Now I assume
sleep isn't far off.

Good sleep is vital not just for our physical training but for a clear
mind, imagination, and confidence. All things for we want at our peak.

To a strong Week 6!

Day 34 - Be a User

I've been tired a lot this weekend. The achy muscles ache less thanks to some rest yesterday, and I got on a high this morning when I ploughed through a tidy 300 in a row. That was some fun. If I'd posted earlier, this would be a peppy one. Went to capoeira in the evening - a different group's class - and to be honest, had a lot of trouble processing it all. Body felt frustrated at having to go slow to master moves and I spent a lot of time in my head during that class, rather than letting my body move.

 It feels like I used up not just all my physical strength before 8.30 this morning, but some of my brain power too! I'm looking forward to feeling like my body and mind being more in synch. I guess that this is part of the journey - a stronger body having different cues.

Recent inspiring thought that keeps going round my head is from Patrick's email a few days back - "Send your body the message that it is a energy burner, not a fat storer" (paraphrasing here).

Use it up; let it go already.

Day 21 - The beginning of a beautiful friendship

I feel like I am a child playing off two parents, the first is the wooden handled rope I started with from the 100 yen shop (Woody) and the second the light pink flashy one (Pinky) from Tokyu Hands.

Remember a few nights back when I had that miserable session? The threes, the fives, the tens? That was with Pinky and I was so disgusted that I cleverly put it somewhere I couldn't find it. I was punishing it...Went back to Woody for a couple of days, got a bit better, into the fifties, eighties, a couple of hundreds. Today was a national holiday and I slept in, then went to see a couple of friends - packed Pinky having found it by my door and wore running shoes. Thought that I would 'sneak the jumps in' somewhere when it stopped raining. Well, got home, and decided to just throw my stuff into the apartment and head out straight away while the rain stopped. Pinky got a second chance with low expectations, and I bashed out an easy 214. There were a couple of runs of 100 and 140 too. If I was being really technical, I'd say wearing my heavier shoes gave me a better rhythm, but whatever, it flowed and I feel really good about it.

Ricky had a breakthrough today as well - congratulations!

Let's rock Week 4!

Day 18 - TGIF

Short post as pretty tired. Biked home and had a better workout with
the jumprope. Lunch was eaten out and far too salty. Need to ask about
canned fish...
Very glad to make it to Friday!

Day 17 - The satisfaction of a lousy workout during a crisis

I stumbled through jump ropes. The most I got in a row was about 50 and there were a lot of runs of 3. Please tell me someone else has been there. But the thing is I churned, jumped, dribbled them out in mixture of average to mediocre form. Then back in my room for the upper arm/body work which I love. Still to find a decent pull up bar, and tried with high shelf in my room. I successfully hung and swung. Housten, we have a fat-arse.

Immensely proud that with the exception of low fat milk, which I am substituting with smaller amounts of yogurt (full fat) and soy etc, I am sticking to my grammes. In fact it puts the hoarding and panic buying into perspective.

Spent the day working at home, but all being well tomorrow, I'll get into the office tomorrow, see people, get some work to do at home, and then make it back. If there has been some response to my request for foodstuffs, I'll drop them on my bike at Second Harvest. Tomorrow is another day. I want to be able to look back and say I did the right thing, I made the right decisions. But sometimes you just need to do your best today. Corn-eee! PCP-ing, no matter where you are has got to be a step towards self determination and self control. And that is satisfying.

PCP-ers who remember this stage, any advice? I've had references to good cooks which is ace. Thank you for reading this everyone and a huge shout out to those who are commenting.

GAMBARE!

Day 2 - Skipping is for girls

にわとぶは女の子の運動ではないでっしょう！

When I was a kid the boys in the playground used to laugh at the girls doing skipping or 'rope jumping' or whatever it's called to differentiate it from 'skipping'. I used to skip as a girl, but it was usually in a group with singing or with a friend. It was strange to be skipping, boxer style in the courtyard by my apartment.

The tip about finding a softer surface was dead right. Even going from concrete outside my block to a tarmacked road made a difference.

So far, I've only managed one complete set of 50 consecutive skips. When I started yesterday, I was a bit scared of the whippy sound and wondered if I was going to wake anyone as it was about 7 am.
When I get it right I notice a few things are also happening.

1. I'm looking up, not down. 
2. My wrists are doing the work and I'm not throwing my shoulders around. 
3. The jump is low and springy, not high and flouncy.
4. The count is by numbers one to ten, e.g., get to twenty, then go 'one, two, three...'　not, 'twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three'
5. As my capoeira teacher Cacapa says, do it with a smile! 

However, saying this and doing it are two different things. When I lose focus or just get puffed out I revert to a steppy skip or a double bounce. 

The mat exercises are not great. Lunging after skipping is harder than just lunging. And my ab. pull down things are pretty poor because my torso is weak. Only one way to fix that and it's practice!

Does anyone have any advice for better form for the ab work?