Yesterday was "UH" day as I described in My Current Training Plan. My heart rate variability reading was in the yellow, "exercise with caution", but I felt fine so I was still able to go pretty hard. Average HR was only 94 with a max of 120L This is interesting because it sure felt like … Continue reading Hard Training Day For Upper Body →

I've tweaked my training plan many times over the years and finally have one that is pretty good for me. I'm not a competitive athlete so what I'm after is optimizing the effect of my training on health. Occasionally I'll have some sort of event or challenge I am pointing towards and will adjust to … Continue reading My Current Training Plan →

Yesterday was hard day training for my legs. With my current schedule (which I'll describe soon in a post), that consists of: Long warmup. at least 15 minutes. I usually do this with easy spinning on my stationery bikeHip physical therapy exercises (continuing rehab of my right piriformis injury, but I do these on both … Continue reading Hard Training Day For Legs →

I've gotten some odd results, especially when working out at higher heart rates, from my Whoop strap: it can give what seems to be spurious high heart readings. It is especially bad when doing exercise with moving arms, like using my kayak trainer or walking with hand weights. But it even happens while bicycling. I … Continue reading Heart-Rate Accuracy Revisited →

I headed north through the Coyote Valley on Santa Teresa Boulevard towards San Jose today. It was a beautiful day with a slight breeze from the south (south-southwest, to be precise), the weather report predicted about 7 mph. So I tried to account for that by turning around a little sooner. I'm building up my … Continue reading Three Hours Riding, Mostly Standing →

There are various fun dirt paths accessible off of the Coyote Creek trail, and today was a nice day to check them out. I rode for a total of about two hours, maybe an hour of that on unpaved or gravel trails. These are good at my skill level, not too technical. One of the … Continue reading Some Fun Off-road Riding →

People say, “What is the sense of our small effort?” They cannot see that we must lay one brick at a time, take one step at a time--. Dorothy Day I think the great social activist Dorothy Day meant this in the context of changing the world. It reminds me of the story of an … Continue reading Tiny Steps Add Up →

With my BP now under control I was confident to go on a brisk long ride. That and the fact that sunny weather is back, at least for now, prompted me to visit Coyote Creek trail for the first time in a while. Cruising on a Crisp Spring Day. Loma Prieta and the Santa Cruz … Continue reading Nice Long Ride on Coyote Creek Trail →

I learned of this interesting study on Alex Hutchinson's column "Sweat Science". It it soon to be published in Plos One but here is a link to a preprint. If you do one set of strength training, once a week, on several exercises that cover major muscle groups, it will lead to significant strength gains … Continue reading Once A Week Strength Training Can Be Effective →

I saw my doctor on Friday and got my test results. Most of the usual "lipid panel" results were great, like total cholesterol, hdl, and Triglycerides. Ldl was 107, slightly above target of 100, But here is where some of the extra tests my Doc had run came in handy. Oxidized ldl was low. The … Continue reading Blood Pressure and Other Health Markers Revisited →