Climbing & Fitness

Yoga: First impressions

So it’s the day after my first Yoga lesson (Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga to be precise) and I’m in severe pain! I guess it’s pretty typical for first time Yoga-ers to experience a feeling like their ligaments are being torn from their bodies. Walking has become painful and I feel 40 years older. Enough about the after effects.

The class itself consisted of holding certain painful positions and moving into new more painful ones while breathing in or out depending on the movement. Some of them had names like “Downward dog” and I’m guessing I could learn them after a while rather than constantly glancing across.

It’s hard work despite no particularly hard or fast movements, but I was pissing with sweat after about 20 minutes. I’m not the most flexible person and I have no sense of balance which was particularly apparent on the balancing positions. Some of the stretches were a little beyond me and I just cringed at the positions some of the other people got themselves into.

I’ll book myself in for another class, hopefully it’ll get better and I might even get the spiritual aspect of it.

Dave MacLeod Lectures

I’ve been climbing for over a year now, almost exclusively indoors at either Alien Rock or out at EICA:Ratho . I’m not a great climber but I enjoy it and it has motivated me to go to the gym to tone up and lose weight so I’m not hauling my huge ass up the side of a wall.

On Friday it looks like one of the more well known climbers Dave MacLeod is doing some lectures out at Dunfermline, everything going well I’ll be attending, however I can imagine it being pretty busy as it seems to be only 1 of 2 dates! Luckily this blog is not very popular or I’d be shooting myself in the foot posting this. If I manage to attend I’ll let you know how it went.

Dave also offers classes which are reasonable prices if there are a fair few of you… not sure if I’m at the stage I need an improved technique but it’s worth considering for the future when I actually have a technique!

10 tips for actually going to the gym

This is the second time of writing this, damn timeouts! Any way to put this list in context, my wife and I made a New Year’s resolution to get fit, lose weight and all that good stuff. The problem is that we I’m a bad procrastinator, so to combat this problem I need to get rid of the big excuses for not going to gym.

  1. Pay over the odds: if it costs a bomb you won’t want it to go to waste.
  2. Listen to Podcasts: something that really interests you, it really passes the time well.
  3. Don’t over do it: otherwise you’ll injure yourself and that’s one reason not to go.
  4. Don’t focus on your weight: it’s not as important as feeling good, you clothes will soon feel loose anyway.
  5. Stock up on gym gear: make sure you have enough so you don’t have the excuse that everything is dirty.
  6. Take your partner: it’s always good to do things together, you motivate each other and you can take turns on weight machines.
  7. Plan your life around the gym: sounds pretty depressing but you have to make time for the gym otherwise where else will it fit in?
  8. Eat and drink before, during and after: you need to keep your energy up and dehydration isn’t nice.
  9. Mix it up: attend classes, change your work out, try different cardio machines, just keep it interesting.
  10. Have a good reason for going: have a goal basically, I’m doing it to lose weight to make climbing easier and also tone up my muscles.

That’s it for now, remember why you’re going in the first place!