I’d like to start with an apology. This blog has been three weeks coming and has proven to be quite the difficult one to write. I’ve deleted and re written every word countless times, dismissed events and topics that I didn’t think were quite what I was going for. But here we have it, the latest chapter in my ongoing life commentary...
This summer has been exactly the opposite of what I was expecting – three depressing, slow months in a quiet welsh town after the constant buzz of life in Nottingham looked to be on the cards but what a pleasant surprise it’s been so far. In a bizarre programme of fitness and self improvement I’ve managed to lose a stone in weight. We’re not talking pebble weight or even a Joss Stone... moobs have begun to disappear and beer belly is terrified of what it’s become, almost literally a shadow of its former self. I’d like to share with you, my lovely readers as to how I’ve managed it. Today will see part 1, with parts 2 and 3 following next week
Stage 1: The Swimming Pool
A month of visits to the chlorine infested rectangle of water will do everyone good, I’ve been hitting the dizzy heights of 1500m swims three or four times a week. Fitness wasn’t the object to overcome... every swim became an obstacle course of the overweight and the old swimming in much less than straight lines. One woman thought she’d jump in the pool right in my lane and swim ridiculously slowly in a sort of pattern only seen on heart monitors in films.
Some would have been stopped by these small obstacles, but it takes commitment and heart to manage to overcome what followed. This poor woman swam for twenty minutes before getting to the end and having a breather [something I don’t have an issue with. For once.] but it was at that stage i noticed a verruca sock. Not cool. There’s a place for people with verrucas and associated footwear... they call it Quarantine and there are plenty of people in white coats to keep you company. Get the hell out of my swimming pool. Combine that with the smell of death when one old boy gets in the pool and struggles to swim four lengths before stopping & going home... a true test of will and desire to get fit.
If you can overcome this and complete a decent distance then you’ll see the benefits. In the five weeks of the pool stage I went from struggling to swim 800 metres with breaks to doing an uninterrupted 1500m marathon with... dare I say it... ease. I don’t just think it’s the exercise I was doing that caused this change, the potent mix of all the things we don’t want to know about in the pool combined with chlorine strong enough to melt all the fat from my body is more likely to mutate me into some kind of fish-man than aid in my quest for fitness. But there we go... the dirtiest clinically clean place in the world has worked its magic.
So that’s stage 1. Groundwork to raise fitness levels and by combining this with a bit less beer and kebabs the quest is surely underway. Think Lord of the Rings with a fitness programme for “stupid fat Hobbit” Sam. Yeah, something like that. Coming up: Part 2 – Running & Football teams. Tales of teamwork, sport and fitness work to the point of being sick.
