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Starting Line Fitness
Starting Line Fitness?

I was recently asked why I chose the name Starting Line Fitness. I realized that I've only told a couple of people how I picked the name Starting Line Fitness. So here goes... It was a dark stormy night...just kidding. One day my wife and I were hanging out in our living room and she asked if I could write her a workout program. She had recently joined a new gym and wanted to do more than just group fitness classes and cardio machines.

I was up to the challenge. I wrote the best damn program that was ever written. She looked at it for all two seconds and said "what are those?" She pointed to the words "Barbell Back Squats 45lbs 3x10".

sleep

Timetables might be stressing you out

This morning as I was getting to the subway the digital arrival board said the next train would be arriving in 4 minutes. As I got about half way down the steps, I realized that there was actually a train in the station that I was about to miss. No big deal, the board said the next train would be arriving in 4 minutes. Except when I actually got into the station, the 3 digital boards all displayed different arrival times for 2 different trains. None of which matched the outside board. So which one to believe?

Ultimately, it didn't matter which was right because none of the wait times were so long that I would've considered an alternate route. So I did what I would've have done any other morning: I stood there and waited.

The only difference is that I was upset this morning. I was mad because the stupid board told me there would be a train in 4 minutes. Then the subsequent boards played with my emotions by saying it could be as long as 7 minutes or as short as 1 minute. I would've been better off if all of the digital boards were turned off (which has happened before). That way I wouldn't have had any expectations and I would've just waited.

That's what I used to do before station improvements that included digital arrival boards. It was the good ol' days of playing subway roulette: you get to the station and hope to god you won't be waiting longer than 5-10 minutes.

Now I'd be lying if I said I wasn't impressed when I saw the arrival boards at my local station. It would no longer be a guessing game, I would know exactly when the train was going to arrive.

Here's the thing though, on average I still wait the same 5-10 minutes. There are those lucky times when I get there and the boards say "1 min" and I feel great about myself (as though I had anything to do with it). Then there are mornings like today when the boards are just completely wrong. It really screws up the whole commute.

The arrival boards took a situation where I would've been content with just waiting it out and literally added a time expectation to it. The problem with the time expectation is that I have no control over it. There's nothing I can do except wait. Now my mood gets affected by this thing I can't control.

Now I'm only telling you about this because this is what I see a lot of people do when it comes to their fitness. They want to know how long it will take to see results. The general answer is probably in the neighborhood of 4-6 weeks. If I tell you less than that you'll get excited but those results probably won't last. If I tell you more than that you'll want shortcuts to make it go faster.

The fact is most of us would be better off just worrying about the things that we can control. Things like making better food choices, being more active and getting more sleep. After that it's about making sure you're continually making progress.

 

Go to Sleep...

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It's 1:16am on Sunday night/Monday morning. Personally I don't think it becomes morning until you've slept, unless you make it to sunrise. Anyway, I'm up watching arguably one of the best World Series games ever. I'm starting the blog now because tomorrow is a crazy busy day and I'm not going to have the normal amount of time I would have to write. So I figure I might as well take advantage of this time. This is going to be a "do as I say, not as I do" post. I'm a parent so I feel like I can play that card. So with that, you should get 7-9 hours of sleep per night. (Said with the alarm set to go off in 4.5 hours.) Sleep is important. Sleep resets our bodily systems and while we build muscle and burn fat while we sleep.

(It's 1:40am, the baseball game just ended, I'm going to bed.)

(It’s 1:30pm, on my home for a quick break before my last session.)

Also hormone regulation occurs while we sleep. I think we can agree that these are some important topics. That being said most of us don’t get enough sleep (clearly myself included). A quick Google search showed that on average 40% of adults don't get the recommended amount of sleep (this stat is from a old 2013 gallop poll; I'm fairly confident this number has stayed the same if not gone up).

The obvious question is "what should we do?" The obvious answer is "sleep more...duh."

The better question is "how can I get more sleep?" The answer to this question isn't as obvious but I'm going lay out some tips to help get you some extra zzz's.

  • Same time...every time: this is one I could stand to work on myself. You want to go to bed and get up at the same time everyday. Yes this includes weekends. Your sleep/wake cycles are rhythms (ever heard the word circadian?). By going to bed and getting up at the same time you make sure your body goes  through all the necessary sleep cycles in order to be fully rested.
  • Set the mood: at least an hour before your scheduled bed time, start turning off/dimming lights (especially flourescent ones)  in your home. As you get closer to bed time eliminate electronic "blue light": this includes computers and cell phones among other things. Also set the thermostat in your bedroom a few degrees cooler than the rest of your home if possible.
  • Get in the routine: change into your pj's, brush your teeth, lay out your clothes for the next day and then maybe read for a few minutes. Your routine can be whatever you'd like as long as it relaxes you and you can repeat the process nightly. A nightly routine lets the body/brain know that sleepy time is coming and will allow you to fall asleep faster.
  • Exercise: I'm not just saying this because I make people exercise for a living. Exercise promotes sleepiness and helps you to fall asleep faster. The caveat here is you want to get your workout in early in the day. Like before 2pm if you can. If you wait too late (like after 8pm) and your workout is too intense it can actually make it harder to fall asleep. So you have to find the right balance here.
  • Your bed is for sleeping...: You shouldn't watch TV or read or hang out or anything else in bed. When you do things, that aren't sleep, in bed it promotes wakefulness. Your brain then associates your bed as a place where you should be awake. So only get into bed when you plan on sleeping. If for some reason you can't fall asleep in 20 minutes or less, get out of the bed. Go read or do some other relaxing activity in another room for a few minutes. Then go back to bed.

These are a just a few tips you can try out to consistently get a good night's sleep.  Also you probably shouldn't stay up watching sporting events that really have no bearing on your life (unless you can honestly say if was one of the best games ever).