Tag Archives: seawall

I Didn’t Sweat

18 Jun
notice she isn't actually sweating?

notice she isn’t actually sweating?

You may or may not have seen the above image, or one with the same message. They always make me feel a bit guilty, like I am not working hard enough if that day I didn’t have a sweaty messy I-almost-collapsed workout.

Yesterday I kind of worked out…I’m not really sure what I would classify it as, it was hanging out with KL, we went to the seawall and I biked while she roller skated. I biked for 13.25km (she skated for the same distance, obviously lol). Now, if anyone had told me they did that I’d be all “wow, great workout!” and KL for sure seemed to feel like she got a great workout, but me? I didn’t feel it. 😦

I am used to being all sweaty after a really good workout, but this time I wasn’t.

There is a belief (myth!!) that the more you sweat when exercising the better in shape you are…unless you are super obese then it’s a sign you are way out of shape. Now, this sucks for me cause my body has never liked to sweat, ever! I remember, years ago when I was in shape, I worked out all the time and the first day I had an actual bead of sweat drip down my arm I totally stopped what I was doing and just stared at it in amazement thinking “finally! proof I am pushing myself hard enough to make this workout count!”

As with many things I thought about fitness back then, I was wrong. sigh. *rolls eyes*

Our bodies sweat so we don’t overheat. The sweat glands, all 2-4 million of them, are either from the eccrine or aproccine gland and they produce moisture on our skin that then evaporates, cooling us down. If you watch sports you’ll probably have noticed that professional athletes sweat like crazy during their game/sport. Can’t really make the argument that they aren’t in shape right? So what does the amount you sweat when working out mean?

The more you sweat the better your body is at regulating your temperature and managing itself. If you are working out at a level that you think means you should be sweating but you aren’t sweating it isn’t that you aren’t working out hard enough, it is that your body is not so great at keeping itself at optimal temps.

For most people all this means is that you should keep working out, keep trying your best and keep hydrating! Your body is smart (and sometimes stupid lol), but in this case smart and will eventually figure out how to regulate your temp and keep you cool while you work out. You’ll become a sweaty mess one day, honest! Until then, enjoy the working out sans icky sweat, cause those days sure won’t last! 🙂

For me, I hadn’t been keeping myself hydrated for the past week or so, I had cut down quite a bit on the amount of fluids I was taking in (not on purpose, I just sometimes forget to drink, oops!) which means my body didn’t have a lot of fluids to release to help keep me cool. Also, I tend to be cool-cold almost all the time so it takes a while for my body to work itself up to feeling warm, then hot, then feel like it needs to cool itself down. Weird huh? Since we were outside and I was biking I was being constantly cooled down by the rush of air as I biked, pretty much insuring my body would not heat up.

I would have liked to of been sweaty at the end of the bike ride, it would have made me feel I had a good workout buuuuut I wasn’t which left me reflecting on the bike ride and trying to figure out how to push myself harder the next time. After having some time to reflect on it though I don’t think I should be quite so hard on myself, biking for 13.25km is better than doing nothing, right? Being out in the warm evening weather, enjoying the feel of the air on my skin, seeing all the different people that were also enjoying the seawall, getting to hang with KL, those are all good things. And sure, I could have gone to the gym, ran on the treadmill then done some weights and known exactly what I got out of the workout but switching things up is a good thing, keeps the body guessing, keeps the brain from getting bored lol 😛 And who knows, maybe if I was someone who wasn’t perpetually cold and I had been hydrated I would have been at least a bit sweaty after that bike ride…I was certainly tired! 😛

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Hello Seawall, I’ve Missed You

27 Mar

Ahhhh, today was a day of getting back to activities I haven’t done since oh, last summer, and I’m so happy to be doing them again! 🙂

The day started with brunch, well ok, that isn’t an activity I’ve neglected over the winter months lol but it’s always a nice way to start the day. After that I went for a 3 hour walk along the north shore seawall/ambleside area. It has an off leash dog park area which I care nothing about but since the person I was with has a dog it was good for them…and the reason we went to that area. I enjoy dogs in the you-are-so-cute-I-want-to-take-you-home-omg-don’t-get-me-dirty kind of way. 😛

Here is a pic I took while we were chilling mid-walk and letting the dog run around like the little nut ball she is lol

I don't know any of the people or dogs in this pic lol

I don’t know any of the people or dogs in this pic lol

Then I went and met up with KL and we went to the other seawall to go get our fitness on lol. She is awesome, she got accepted on to a roller derby team and could surely kick everyones ass but she unfortunately had to leave the sport due to other obligations (she is a super busy wonder woman!) but even though she’s not on a team anymore she still loves to skate and keeps in shape so she was roller skating the seawall and I was being more boring and biking it. This is the first time this season I have pulled my bike out and while I haven’t physically been missing it (it lives in my living room so I see it everyday) it was so nice to actually take it outside and get to use it!

We got a later start then we had planned on, and even though the weather is nicer now it does still get darker semi-early-ish so we couldn’t go around the entire seawall. Before you get all judgmental and say we could have let me point out not all areas of the seawall are well lit (or lit at all!) and neither of us have night gear which means no reflective clothing and no lights which as it was getting darker and darker I think was pissing off other bikers who were on the seawall, oops!  We ended up biking about 8km (that’s almost 5 miles) so not a crazy huge distance but pretty decent. 🙂

As much as I wish we could have gone the entire way I think having to cut it short was maybe a good thing for me, well, for my knees. I always forget over the winter months how much biking hurts my knees, sigh. I don’t get it, I have great shocks on my bike but I always end up with killer pain. Not cool. 😦 On a kind of funny note, my ass is killing me! Also due to biking! lol I have a gel filled bike seat cover and a lot of shall we say “natural cushioning” on that particular area of my body but despite all that riding a bike hurts my butt! Always has. Probably always will. I don’t know how long distance bikers can stand it, I stand up in the pedals sometimes just to avoid sitting while going over a little bump cause I just can’t take it anymore, lame and wimpy I know. *big epic sigh* My butt may be wimpy but you just try taking a jab at me when I’m boxing, I can take that and hit you back without a problem!…which I guess means my face is stronger then my butt? Now that’s a weird sentence…

Here’s a view from the other side of the water from the above pic, from the other seawall, notice that it really did get darker and I didn’t exaggerate? *raise eyebrow*

same bridge but from the other side of the water

same bridge but from the other side of the water

So now I am home, and relaxing, and as soon as my laptop is off my lap I will have my heating pad on my knees in an attempt to ease their suffering…it won’t help but I hafta try, lesson in futility I suppose lol 😛

My eating was a bit weird today, as I suspected it would be what with being out of the house from about 10am onwards. I had wanted to eat a healthy brunch but we went to this place that has a yummy breakfast, served all day, that is $3, I can’t bring myself to order something more expensive when that super cheap option is there lol. Only thing is they don’t have turkey meat so the meat options for the dish are ham, bacon or sausage, yuch! I don’t eat pork so this is a yuck not only on a holy-fatty-meat level but also on a yuch-I-won’t-put-that-near-my-tastebuds level. The only items I could swap out for were another egg (there are already two on the plate though so no way am I eating a third!) or mushrooms, which were not an option I was expecting but I took em. So my brunch was 2 eggs over easy, two pieces of brown toast with margarine, hash browns and fried mushrooms. I mean, it was tasty, but it was basically two eggs and a whole lotta carbs, sigh. I’m trying to cut back on those! It actually left me feeling a bit um, icky? Slightly unsettled tummy, which is unfortunate. I don’t know that the unsettled tummy is due to the food, it could be cause of anything but regardless, it happened after eating which is now leaving me with the association of that dish and not feeling well which I’m not gonna lie, I don’t mind (even if it is wrong) cause it’ll help me resist ordering it if I go there again…which I might not since I can’t get a turkey meat option. shrug. Later I had a vegan organic power bar, home made (not by me! lol) from a coffee shop, it was tiny, and had no nutritional info, and was weird, I got it cause I really wanted some protein but was still full from brunch so I wanted the protein to come in a small package lol. After the ambleside walk but right before the seawall bike ride I got a six inch turkey sub from Subway, hey, don’t judge, I needed actual food otherwise I wouldn’t make it through the bike ride! Even with the sub in me by the end of the ride I was quite hungry so KL and I split a chocolate covered pretzel we got from Starbucks on our way back home and I guess I’ll confess, I also got a grande half sweet peppermint hot chocolate made with skim no whipped cream. I hate having such a long order request, makes me feel like a snob lol. By the time I got home I wasn’t hungry anymore (totally thought I would be) so I decided not to eat anything but now it’s almost midnight I of course feel hungry and want food, which is so not gonna happen, it’s way too late to be eating, so I’ll have water instead and hope the hunger pains are a signal fat is leaving my body. 🙂

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Can Knees Just Fall Off?

27 May

Holy crap my knees freakin huuuuuurt! I decided in honour of summer being officially here (in my head that is, I have no idea if the actual official first day of summer has already come and gone, I don’t really keep track of stuff like that lol) I would unlock my bike, drag it off the balcony, drive it to the bike store to get air in the tires and then go ride the seawall, wOOt! I have never ridden the seawall, I have lived here since September 2007 and I have never ridden the seawall, disgusting! and uh, yeah, I have had my bike here that entire time…*sheepish face*…although, in my defence, I have walked the entire seawall, I feel that should be taken in to account when I am being judged…just sayin…

This summer is about being more active, getting out there, exercising but also having fun, finding ways to be social while getting fit…basically an extension of last summer lol 😛 So out came the bike! Let me just say, I looooove my bike. It took me months to pick, I was not just gonna buy any ol thang, I wanted a sweet ride…which, admittedly, when I started the shopping experience was mostly about the colour lol *rolls eyes* I know, how like a girl right? 😉 In the end though I didn’t pick it based on colour, although the colour didn’t hurt (it’s blue, silver and black), I picked it based on what was a good fit for me, my activity level, what I was planning to use it for, ya know, all that important stuff, shrug.

My poor bike has been so neglected for so long though, lol, I haven’t ridden it in I don’t know how many years, eek! All that money spent and I barely use it, lame. I was considering selling it this year so I could buy a paddle for dragon boating instead of using the paddles at the club buuuuut I figured at least give biking a shot before selling her…yes, my bike is a her, deal with it. 😉 lol oh, and no, she doesn’t have a name, I’m not a complete freak, eesh.

Well, it was soooo much fun today! Such a great experience! I biked to the seabus and while waiting for the seabus started talking with another girl who had her bike with her, we were talking about biking trails, helmet vs non helmet wearing, all kinds of biking talk, who knew having a bike with you made you someone people were more willing to talk to? Weird. Well, we were getting along quite well so we decided to ride the seawall together. Normally I hate exercising with other people (unless it’s in a class, like my boxing, or training with the boating team) so part of me was a bit ‘aw man, now I won’t be able to listen to my music while biking, sigh’ but part of me was all ‘hey, someone to bike with, less chance of me getting on the wrong path now’ lol. I warned her that this was my first time biking in years and there was a good chance at some point I’d be exhausted and need to stop or at least slow down or possibly walk the bike for a bit, she was all cool with that and said she’d only been biking a short time too so she might have the same trouble as she hadn’t done the seawall yet – talk about a great match! What are the odds of that? 🙂

I am proud to say we didn’t have to stop at all! There are parts of the path you have to dismount and walk the bikes so we were off them then cause we had to be, and during one of those walking sections she needed to check her phone cause she was waiting for a call so we ended up pausing for a minute or so and well, ok, the view was amazing so once we paused to take pics…crap, ok, fine, we stopped a couple times I guess, damn! But we weren’t stopping due to exhaustion or being unable to go on, we stopped uber briefly twice and really, I don’t feel those pauses negatively impacted our results, so there! 😛 lol

While biking I have a tendency to just go, I stand on the pedals a decent amount to help absorb shock when going over bumps or curbs etc, it’s just reflex, it’s how I always used to bike. I think I’m gonna hafta be more careful with that from now on cause I am now regretting that, sigh. My knees! I feel so old complaining about them but seriously man, they hurt soooo badly! I’ve been going up and downstairs doing laundry and each time I have to get up from the chair, and then go on the stairs, and then sit again I want to cry. I have arthritis in my left knee from the injury I had all those years ago so I’m used to that one acting up and I sorta expected it would protest while I was biking but it didn’t so I went hard the entire time, didn’t really pamper my knees at all…guess the knees need pampering while biking, although how the heck I do that I have no idea!

I’m actually tempted to put a heating pad on my knees they hurt that much but I’m not sure if that will actually help…I know I am having trouble sleeping cause of the pain, hence my writing this post at 3:30am…and I’m kinda concerned cause I have plans tomorrow that involve a lot of hill walking and since just going down my hallway is painful and making me limp I’m not so sure how I’ll do on the hills, guess I’ll find out in the morning! lol

I know I am bitching, and yeah my knees do really hurt, but I think it was worth it. 🙂 I made a new friend (we swapped info and plan to go biking again), I got outdoor exercise (something I don’t get often since I hide from the sun a lot lol), I got to use my bike instead of neglecting it and I had fun. Really, what more could a person ask for from a Saturday? 😀

view of the seawall in one of the pedestrian only sections

 

pretty sunset

 

just one more awesome view from today

 

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