Author: dkyo

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2011 Goals June Update

For June the major changes occurred around the workout.  Deciding that I’m pretty much too weaksauce to do many of the CFE workouts I moved over to do the Starting Strength Regimen for a bit.

Diet:
Diet suffered a bit this month.  Especially from the stint I had in OC going back for a few graduations.  It’s apparent that I can’t really stick to a diet while I’m down south.  Overall just not a great paleo month.  I also tried to do the Starting Strength drink milk everyday.  I did 1 glass per day for about a week.  It didn’t seem to make much difference one way or the other.  Note that the program suggests 1 gallon of milk a day and I wasn’t going to do that.

Sleep:
Average Sleep for June: 6.24 hours.

Workout:
Got 13 in 30.  So a couple things really hurt the workouts this month.  The short stint back home limited the workouts.  I also pulled my hamstring (sign of old age?)  That was actually really crappy.  Took me out for about two weeks where I could only do upper body lifting.  I was expecting a slight decline though since Starting Strength cuts the workouts down to 3 times a week.  I will note that my lifting numbers did go up in the past month from what I could do when I was just doing the CFE workouts.  The concentration on doing the same lifting will obviously garner gains, but I’m glad it worked anyways even if it was only a bit.

Body:
Stabalized around the usual 12%-13% this month.  I’d like to see it move, but am unsure how I want to do it yet.  At least it isn’t going up.

Stretch:
10 times…what?  More than I worked out.  Nice!  Will try to keep it up.

Social:
15 times this month.  Staying pretty much on par.

Image:
Got my haircut for the month.

 

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F you Netflix

 Got this nice email from Netflix today.  This is after they raised prices earlier in the year.

We are separating unlimited DVDs by mail and unlimited streaming into two separate plans to better reflect the costs of each. Now our members have a choice: a streaming only plan, a DVD only plan, or both.

Your current $9.99 a month membership for unlimited streaming and unlimited DVDs will be split into 2 distinct plans:

   Plan 1: Unlimited Streaming (no DVDs) for $7.99 a month

   Plan 2: Unlimited DVDs, 1 out at-a-time (no streaming) for $7.99 a month

Your price for getting both of these plans will be $15.98 a month ($7.99 + $7.99). You don’t need to do anything to continue your memberships for both unlimited streaming and unlimited DVDs.

These prices will start for charges on or after September 1, 2011.

Screw you Netflix.  If you’re going to do this work harder on streaming.  I could have been ok if you limited DVDs to 2 a month or something, but you lost your Showtime and Sony streaming and now you think this is a good idea?  Why would I pay you 8 dollars for 1 dvd out at a time when I can go to Safeway to those 1 dollar box kiosks.  Screw you guys.

 

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On Cable TV

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2011 Goals May Update

This comes a bit late, but finally found some time to do this.  May was good, mostly a bit of recovery from the relay then back into the usual.

Diet:
This month was an improvement from last months attempt at Paleo.  Caloric intake seems to have normalized a bit this month, still on the higher side.  I blame the beer more than anything else.  I also found and purchased some raw milk to try.  Really good, but also really expensive haha.  I have more thoughts on this, but I’ll save it for another post.

Sleep:
Average Sleep for May: 6.28 hours.  Keepin it real.

Workout:
Got 21 in 31 days month.  Had a rough start to the month when I was still recovering, but work has got Ultimate goin every Thursday which gives me a lazy out day.  Summer is coming up and I’d like to try working some swimming into my workouts (first gotta learn to swim though haha).

Body:
Bounced a bit more this month 11%-14%.  Still more or less the same though.

Stretch:
22 times…what?  More than I worked out.  Nice!  Will try to keep it up.

Social:
16 times this month.  Ultimate counts =)

Image:
Work has made this earlier by bringing on the Onsite Haircuts.  Now I have no excuse for not getting a trim!

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2011 Goals April Update

Another month goes by.  To be honest this was a pretty tough month.  Lots of work and lots of…well work.  As the month played out I didn’t expect it to be a progress month and I was more or less right.  I also swapped to a single sport schedule and a taper for The Relay event.  I’ll be going back to multi sport for May.

Diet:
Let’s just get this out.  During The Relay I was not Paleo at all carbs and stuff galore.  I think my average caloric intake has gone up.  Part of that is due to some beer consumption.  I also slipped and had desserts a few times.  I want to experiment with the quality of the food I eat a bit more rather than just controlling the kind of food I eat.  I’m also interested in trying out raw milk, but have to look into it some more.

Sleep:
Average Sleep for April: 5.81 hours.  So it’s the first time I’ve dipped below my quota.

Workout:
Worked out 22 times in 30 days. Not bad considering the taper at the end of the month.  Biked a few times and even gave Old La Honda another crack.  Made it up a bit faster, but still not where I want to be.    I’m starting to consider that I need to up the quality of the workouts I do.  I’ve been pretty good at being consistent in doing them, but based on my performance at The Relay something is still missing.

Body:
As I thought, no change here.  Still in the 12%-13% range.  Might try consuming more water?

Stretch:
Stretched 19 days.  Feels like I’m still not getting enough in.  Chiro suggested possibly booking massages to work out tension in muscles.

Social:
Social 15 times.  Basically no Halo play, but I’ve been trying to get out more.

Image:
Total fail.  Didn’t have time or energy to spend on groomage.

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Fitness Health

On The Relay 2011

Basic overview of this event.  12 people run a relay across 199 miles from Calistoga, CA down to Santa Cruz to raise money for organ donations.  This past weekend I was fortunate enough to be able to participate in The Relay with Team Palantir.  The team and I want to thank my roommate Dang for filling in on a last minute volunteer swap.  We’re grateful that you helped out and showed up on time so we didn’t get DQ’d.  For the race I was assigned Legs 4, 16, and 28 which wasn’t the hardest set of legs at all.  Overall though it was a harder than I thought it was going to be, but also way more fun that I had imagined.  Who knew you could have have such energy running ~17 miles over 3 legs on ~1 hour of sleep.  It was an adventure for sure (our van having a bit more adventure than the other team van).  I’ll be going over a smattering of some of the highlights that stood out for me.

Our Start aka (Breaking and Entering)
Our official start time was April 30th 2 p.m. We arrived a bit before to sign in, decorate the van, swap runners, and redistribute provisions between the vans.  As 2 rolled around our first runner took her spot with the other 2 p.m. teams and took off.  We sent her off to cheers and hoots then headed back to the van to start our journey…only to find it was locked and we left the keys inside.  After some confusion, panic, and consideration of just breaking the window, a multitude of plans went into action.  We called AAA, some of us began pulling on the side window so that someone else could stick his fingers inside to pull the lock up, and another guy went off to get a coat hanger…(a few mins pass).  The coat hanger is steps away, AAA is getting our location, we’re almost touching the lock…just need a bit more room…pull a bit more…BOOM!  Broken glass everywhere…some minor cuts and a lot of shocked faces.  No more need for the hanger, thanks AAA, but we solved our problem.  Uh…time to roll out.

First Leg Runners (The Lost Lambs)
As we’re finally driving we get a call from Runner 1…she thinks she’s lost…wait wait…yes she did miss the turn.  We drive over to the turn and cheer her on.  Her and about 5 other runners miss a poorly marked turn…sad times.  She’s pissed, but we tell her just wait till she sees the van.  We’re thinking this is a great start =)  Our van name is now No Aplologeez.

Fourth Leg (Ditched)
This was my leg so I didn’t get the story till after.  It was a longer 7.4 mile leg going towards Yountville and man was it hot.  The van gave me a water boost at mile 4 which I asked for.  I didn’t give them my long sleeve shirt (stupid me) which they asked for.  Luckily they stopped again.  This time cheering me on and telling me not to worry about the van…which was pulled over to the side of the road and at a precarious 45 degree angle down to the right.  I continued running and hoping they were ok.  As I approached the handoff point I saw the van speed by me and the next runner already in place.  Apparently another van brought our next 2 runners to the exchange just in case our van didn’t make it in time.  Also there are photos of about 10 people trying to push the van up to no avail.  Luckily a truck driving by just happen to have a tow and tow our van out.  Already feeling the spirit of comradarie in the event.

Break Time (Birth of Pizzabox Van)
As we pulled into the van exchange some people asked if we were the team from Palo Alto.  We answered yes we’re hte broken window, towed out of a ditch team.  They laughed and shared the stories with others around them.  Notoriety up!  We met up with our second van of runners and told them of our adventures.  They were there for the broken window incident and thought we were joking about the ditch incident.  Our 6th runner had a short detour when he hit a dead end in the residential area and a kid and his dad playing ball told him he was probably in the wrong place =)  Still an awesome time on that run.  We went off to try and grab dinner.  After being rejected by a few places we found a small food court type area that had a Gott’s, Pika Pika, and Filippi’s Pizza Grotto & Fine Wine.  We each went to get our own dinner and eat outside Gott’s.  Filippi’s was even nice enough to give us a pizzabox to cover up the window as long as put their ad facing out.  Done Deal!  A short stop at home depot for some tape and we had ourselves a new pizzabox window.

Start of the Night Runs
Our 2nd batch of runs were basically all night runs.  We more or less had awesome runs here and began seeing and passing some teams.  Our first runner even found a running buddy in Team Grind’s runner though our second runner smoked their guy.  For my 2nd run I decided to use hte Vibram’s.  I was feeling good and it was not hot.  My leg took me down Sir Francis Drake through an area I had driven before heading up to eat Tomales Oysters.  Some highlights from my run are having my teammates rile up some bar goes to cheer for me and having them tell me there was a girl up ahead I needed to pass because she looked weak.  To be fair I got passed by A-Team’s runner at about the same point too.

Golden Gate Run (Fastest Way to get DQ’d, Karaoke, and Eye of the Tiger)
This leg was for our 6th runner.  We had an awesome start by having the volunteers tell us we can’t cheer due to the start being in a residential area.  Our driver then yelled out his cheer to the shock of the volunteer…oops.  During a couple of his climbs we drove next to him singing him some requested songs.  Unfortunately we led him astray and he had to climb the hill up to the Golden Gate twice.  I think we more than made up for it by finding him on the bridge, slowing down to his pace, and blasting Eye of the Tiger for a good 5 minutes.  Luckily there wasn’t much traffic and the few cars we did see passed us on the right lane.

Break Time 2 (Sleeping at the Office)
We headed into the exchange point, met up with our second van, and got some free soup being handed out by volunteers (so good).   After chatting a bit we bolted off to the office to get some shut eye.  Getting at the office I think everyone thought about showering…but weighing that with sleep we stuck with sleeping.  After about 1 hour of sleep we were up and off to meet up for our final legs.  As we pulled into the van exchange we heard some excalmations by onstanders, “Pizzabox Van!”  We’re famous =)  When we got out we noticed a magnet slapped onto our van.  It said “You’ve been tagged by the A-Team Sucka!”  Touché A-Team touché.  Their van had the big red stripe and was blasting the A-Team song.

My Final Leg (Death by Hill Climb)
We were going pretty strong on the final legs.  Basically coming down 280 through Palo Alto, down into Cupertino, and up the mountains to Skyline.  My run was actually through Cupertino into Stevens Canyon Road.  I actually biked this with Dang and Joe a few weeks go.  I was going pretty strong into Stevens Canyon Road, but about 1.5 miles into the climb I just gassed.  It was so hot and I was so tired my pace dropped significantly.  I ended up finishing just under a 10 min pace.  Sorry team!  Note to self, more hill climbing training.

Up the Mountain (Rocket Runners)
The next 2 runners after me had the luxury of climbing about 1000 ft each in 3 miles.  They rocked it coming in at under 10 min/mile paces each and passing about 8 teams each as well.  We made multiple stops and blasted music.  At one particular stop we were blasting Venga Boys and dancing.  One of the runners stopped and danced with us haha.  One of our runners even passed a bike (he said he didn’t know what to say to the cyclist).  I think we were all just so happy to be officially done we were having a great time cheering people on.

The Finish Line (Finished and Finally Showers)
We passed off to the other van for their final legs and took off to hit the house of a family friend of one of our runners.  They were so nice and so gracious to let us use their place.  We all took our showers…it was glorious.  We even snacked a bit on some chips and guac and salsa.  Sooo good.  We continued to chill for a bit and then headed off to meet with our other runners at the finish.  We saw them pull up around 4:20 and ran with our final runner across the finish!

The After (Dinner and News)
We went back to the family friend’s house and everyone hung out and got ready for dinner which was awesome.  Quinoa, fruit salad, salmon, chicken, corn bread, mac & cheese…oh so so good. We found out we finished 28/220 overall and 1/15 in our division of corporate mixed!  Way better than we thought we’d do.  Then we also found out Osama had been found and killed.  Wow what an end to a weekend!

Thanks
Thanks to all the runners on the Team and for the friends that hosted/cooked/volunteered for us!  Had an awesome time with you all!
Van 1: Ann, Kim, Tom, Ashling, and Ryan 
Van 2: Chris, Amy, Amanda, Courtney, Shreyas, Lisa
Volunteers: Dang and Shreyas’s parents
Others: Bagels and bananas that gave their lives.  Random ppl who helped get our van out.  Filippi’s Pizza Grotto & Fine Wine for the pizzabox.

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2011 Goals March Update

March is gone and now it’s time for an update.  I also officially turned 30 which made my body fat meter add a percent for me =)

Diet:
Still not quite as strict as I should be, but overall being conscious of it has been helping.  Only downside has been a couple days of gluttony with food and beer.  Strangely this has correlated with a certain roommate being back from his trip.

Sleep:
Average Sleep for March: 6.15 hours.  Still within limits, but it feels like I’ve been sleeping less the past month.

Workout:
Worked out 24 times in 31 days. Still excellent.  I’ve been concentrating more on runs vs other cardio due to the The Relay at the end of next month.

Body:
A stall here this month.  Basically still in the 12%-13% range.

Stretch:
Stretched 20 days. Doing much better.

Social:
Considered social 18 times.  Had a wedding to go to, but Halo play has been down the past month due to copious amounts of work.

Image:
I won’t lie.  I slacked.  At least I got a haircut.

 

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Health

On Habits and the People Around You

I’m now almost 3 months into my workout/diet changes.  Generally, I’ll start flagging a bit in the willpower area around now, but this time around things seem to be going a bit better.  I think a large portion of that comes from the affect of people around me and I wanted to call that out.  I think keeping the company of individuals that also participate or at least acknowledge and support what you’re trying to do is pretty key to staying on task.  It reminds me of one article that took a lot of flak for back in the day Obesity is Contagious.  While the tagline is pretty inflammatory, I think the basic idea makes sense and can be applied to a more constructive end.  The more people around you that can help motiviate/keep you honest the more likely you are to stay on track for whatever your goal is.  I think it applies to workouts, diets, saving money…pretty much anything.  It’s why there are clubs and interest groups.

I have the benefit that many of my coworkers subscribe to some sort of diet that includes cutting out processed foods, low carbs, etc.  We even recently created an internal mailling list to share ideas/tips/whatever.  Aside from that we have a lot of people who also have some sort of workout routine like Crossfit/P90X/Insanity.  I even had a coworker start doing the same workout program after sharing my thoughts about it.  I think having a partner is also pretty key.  You’re less likely to ditch a workout when you know someone else expects you there.  It also keeps both parties motivated to stick with it and for some it adds that extra push of friendly competition.

Now I’m not saying to ditch people who don’t agree with your changes, but I do think it’s a good idea to inform your friends of what you’re doing and to share your experiences, triumphs, and setbacks.  The more they’re receptive to what you’re trying to accomplish the more likely you’ll be able to reach your goals.  This is the power of those around you and it goes a long way into turning your goals into habits in your lifestyle.

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Fitness Health

Running in the Rain

This past week I have had the pleasure of running in the rain not once, but twice.  I can thank my coworkers for that and in my defense I agreed to run before it started raining.  I’ll be honest, I’m usually a pretty fair weather runner.  Now while I can say I wasn’t thrilled with the idea of getting out there I’m glad I did.  I learned a couple things about rain running.  Lessons learned and ready for the next rainy day to hit the road.

First lesson: Dry fit clothing > cotton pretty much any day of the week no matter the conditions.  This difference is even bigger when it’s wet outside.  With cotton you start getting weighed down with water pretty fast and it can start getting cold.

Second lesson: Rain is less interesting than the actual temp.  I went on two runs out in the rain this week and the first time it was more rainy and less cold.  Second time it was less rainy, but colder.  Personally, I prefer more rain and less cold.  This is probably a point of personal preference, but at least I can give you my opinion.  I’d rather run in rainy warm weather than dry cold weather.

Third Lesson: Rain running is going to be messy.  Don’t kid yourself about it.  I specifically did the run both days in normal running shoes this week because I knew my Vibram’s would get soaked and I didn’t feel like getting them muddied up right after I washed them.

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Pedo bear @ the office?

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