May Training Update

Well May turned out to be a good training month and a good month for weight loss.

As of last week I now officially weigh 12 stone something, currently weighing in at 180 pounds. In round numbers, this means that I have lost a fraction over 4 stone (58 pounds) since the beginning of the year which is a result I'm quite pleased with.

I was curious to try and find a visualisation of what 58 pounds would look like and found this photo of a pike that weighed in at 60 pounds when it was caught.

What does 58-60 pounds look like?
Imagine carrying something that big around all the time.

I personally find it quite amazing that I was carrying that the equivalent of that pikes weight around on a daily basis at the beginning of the year. No wonder it was hard work trying to do any form of exercise!!  



The effect of this weight loss is really noticeable when I'm training with longer duration sessions for running, rowing and cycling being much easier to achieve.

May's target for total training was to continue to complete 5 hours a week of mixed training consisting of running, rowing and cycling.    

The second half of May was spent pretty much exclusively on the bike with the aim being to get in 5 or 6 sessions on the bike a week, and to gradually build up the duration of sessions and mileage covered. By the end of May, 20 +mile  sessions were coming pretty easy and the pain in the rear end has become much less of a problem. The goal for June is to be completing 30-35 miles a day regularly, 3-4 times a week and to complete a couple of 50 mile rides. 

The end of May was busy at work with quite a few days spent commuting into London for early morning meetings, which meant that early morning training sessions were difficult to fit in which is why the number of sessions completed peaked mid month (see figures below). This was off set to some extent by the fact that the sessions on the bike have been increasing in duration as the month has progressed.

The actual training numbers for May were as follows;

• 30/04 - 06/05: 8 training sessions, total of 5 hours 55 minutes
• 07/05 - 13/05: 8 training sessions, total of 6 hours 44 minutes
• 14/05 - 20/05: 12 training sessions, total of 9 hours 13 minutes
• 21/05 - 27/05: 9 training sessions, total of 7 hours 24 minutes
• 28/05 - 03/06: 7 training sessions, total of 7 hours 53 minutes

All in all, May has been a pretty encouraging month and if my cycling fitness continues to improve throughout the summer at the rate it has improved this month I should stay on course to achieve my target of completing a 100k sportive event by the end of September or early October.

Many thanks for taking the time to read this and I hope you are able to find the time to come back and check the blog out on a regular basis.

All the best

VP