WOD: Jump rope side swings/switches

Been practising this technique for a while, maybe a couple of months or so, and finally cracked it yesterday.  Before then, every attempt seemed to look messy or I would end up lashing myself up in the jump rope, whipping myself in the face or throwing the rope across the gym - accidentally of course!  The thing that seemed to help with practising this routine, was to practice the manoeuvre without the rope, visualising foot placement and timing in my head.  This approach seemed to pay off and it all came together very quickly within the past couple of weeks.  I have only been using the rope once or twice a week lately, figuring that less is more when it comes to allowing your brain time to memorise the routine.  Anyway, here's a video of yesterdays session, including some of the less desirable instances, of which includes the rope throwing incident.

IF: Hunger spikes

Not been long since my last blog entry, but just wanted to log this hunger spike I am having right now, namely to make a note of the time but also to help take my mind away from it.  Hunger spikes typically occur about 4 - 5 hours after eating.  Sleep will typically throw this askew, since we would generally sleep for longer; hopefully 7 - 8 hours or more.  I have often wondered how long it would be after the first surge in hormones before the next surge of hormones occurs that makes you get that hunger feeling.  At this point, I am not starving, so the feelings are completely psychological, developed by hormonal changes occurring in my body.  These feelings will gradually subside over the next couple of hours and I will forget I was ever even hungry.  I am expecting to get another hunger surge right before I eat, since the psychological act of cooking will no doubt stimulate a hormonal response again.  According to research, when I eat, my body will overcompensate with growth hormone production, to maximise on nutritional uptake.  This is where some of the benefits to IF are to be made!

Anyway, lets set this as a 14 hour precedent, which means you will experience hunger 14 hours after having eaten your last meal, when fasting through sleep, and 5 hours since awakening.  I woke up at 5 am this morning, as I do every morning, and I was at work by 6:30 am.  I am planning on going to the gym for some last minute rehab (light cardio, stretching), in preparation for tomorrow's lifting programme.

Summary so far (to be continued...):
Eat -> Stop (8:30pm) -> Hunger (10:30am) -> (...) -> Eat (6:30pm)

IF: 22 Hour day

Today is a very sedentary day, with little exercise, so it's perfect to throw in a 22 hour fast.  Essentially, I haven't eaten anything since 8:30 last night, which was some dry roasted peanuts that followed the chilli con carne I made with a smal sweet potato (Meal 2).  Although I only had two meals yesterday, they were substantial and I must have gotten around 160 g of protein and 50 - 60g of carbs, with all the macros from the kale, onions, peppers, beans and whole eggs I consumed.  It is now 9:45 am and I haven't eaten for over 13 hours.  I have another 9 hours before dinner.

I had been supplementing my fasts with whey protein isolate (pretty much pure unflavoured whey), but this is not ideal since it's calorific and thus is technically breaking fast.  Now I have opted for BCAA powder, which is virtually zero calorie and is much smaller doses (5g) compared to the whey (20g).  So all I have consumed this morning is a multi-vitamin tablet, cod-liver oil, black coffee (no sugar), water and my BCAA powder (5g).  I will be dosing up with another 5g of BCAA at about 2pm, and there after it will be just water until about 6pm, when I will hit the food.

When breaking fast, it's important to consume fibrous foods first, to ensure that digestion does not become congested with protein dense food, having been emptied during the fast.  I will be supplementing with ground psyllium husks, to improve my fibre uptake.  Other than that, my fibre intake this evening will come from kale and onions, with my first fasting meal being liver, bacon and onions with sweet potato mash.

Reference Day:
Until now, my reference day has been on a Monday morning, first thing.  I will be moving this to a Friday, since I will be making Thursday a consistent extended-fast day, with every other fast day being 16 hours instead of 22.  In theory, since I consume lots of carbs on the weekend, versus carbs I am consuming during the week, a Friday morning reference day makes more sense.  So tomorrow will be my first point of reference for Friday's, tailing from Monday's reference.  Let's see what fat loss it will show for this week.

Lower and Upper Body Conditioning Drills

I have blogged about this workout before, so won't go into too much detail.  If you want to know more, then look through my historic posts for "ICT 4".  This is the first time I have videoed the routine, so just wanted to post the new video.  I have condensed the video into a split screen to make it more interesting and reduce the running time.

Of note, it's worth watching around the 8:06 mark when my son decided to come and get in on the action.  I have no intention of actively encouraging him to participate in the future, since I believe it will be far more effective to allow him to see me exercising and want to participate.  Child psychology works in funny ways, usually when you don't want them to do something, they will do it and vice versa.