For reference, here’s last week’s data. Curious what this post is about? Click here.
Summary
As mentioned earlier, I may have a stress fracture or tendonitis in my lower right leg. Things are feeling better, but the pace of recovery is making my coaches think it might be tendonitis (NOT GOOD). I did my first (very short) bike ride since the injury on Sunday without any follow-on pain. Swimming, lifting and eating are all going very well. The marathon and bike-ride plans are still in danger, but I’m optimistic on the bike ride. The marathon is a long shot now, but I’m going to still ramp up slowly. Never give up J
Also, I signed up for another silly fitness challenge: Read the Assessment below for details on the “Six Pack Charity Challenge”.
Subjective Data
- My leg feels better, but the fact that I reinjured it last week swimming (which is non-impact) suggests tendonitis not a stress fracture. That’s not good news.
- Swimming felt good this week, and on Sunday I got my first bike ride since the injury in. It felt very good, and there was no pain.
- I had a fantastic lifting week. Good lifts, good intensity, and measurable progress from prior weeks.
- Weight and body fat headed in the right direction again.
Objective Data
Click here for a PDF version of my dashboard.
Assessment
I am definitely but slowly getting better. I’m starting to ramp up leg work. I did a short (13 mile) bike ride on Sunday at a relaxed pace (16mph average) and I felt fine. That said my coaches think (given the fact that kicking while swimming last week aggravated my injury) I am probably dealing with tendonitis. I’m choosing to not believe that. I’m focusing on the bike ride in 4 weeks for training right now since that minimizes the impact on my injured area, and I’m optimistic I can do that. I hope to try light running in 2-3 weeks.
My swimming is getting much better, and I’m hoping to start integrating kicking this week. I’m getting much more efficient and the breathing is becoming natural. Assuming I remove the floats this week I expect my yardage to drop a bit while I learn kicking. We’ll see.
My lifting was so much fun this week. I mentioned last week that I switched programs to a more intense but shorter program. It’s fun, and I’m amazed at how tired I feel afterwards but how much more power I’m getting. For the record, I’m not doing it to add tons of weight; I’m doing it to improve muscle power. On Saturday I worked my right leg again for the first time in 4 weeks and as I write this, my right quad is very angry with me. But wow, it was so much fun!
I had another great eating week, and my weight got down to 153.5 pounds with 15% BF. However, my father in law is visiting this week, and I allowed myself to way overeat on Saturday and Sunday. I’ll see that reflected in the numbers this week, so my challenge is to be excellent the rest of the week. Why?
Well, I have a new fund-raising-goal / stupid-egomaniacal-challenge that I’ve signed up for with some friends: The Six Pack Charity Challenge. The idea is each entrant puts up $250 and names a charity they’ll donate to. Then all contestants (you can enter at any time provided you do not have a six-pack when you enter) work hard to get a six-pack. On the week of November 5th, we all take and post photos online for the Internet community. Whoever collects the most votes by December 5th gets to donate not only their own money, but the money of all other contestants, to the charity they signed up for. And I aim to win.
As usual, if you have suggestions, leave a comment, or reach me at “art (at) abclarke.com”.
Plan
I’m tweaking the plan slightly as I start adding in leg work again:
- Start slowly ramping up work on my right leg. I’ll hopefully get some spinning and biking in this week.
- Keep swimming and start adding kicking work. Target is 3 times this week (to make room for biking).
- Keep doing the upper-body and core lifting, and start ramping leg work back up.
- Keep 2,000-2,250 calories-per-day target to keep weight under control.
- Keep smiling.
Presentation Notes
No changes to data presentation this week. As with last week, data is presented in SOAP Note format.
– Art
Help me raise over $10,000 to help people suffering from cancer
A. B. Clarke 
Regardless of how strong your abs are, I’m pretty sure you can’t have a six-pack without a body fat percentage of 8-10%. Just FYI. I could be wrong.
I think you’re right, and I know the fact that my scale is reading 15% suggests it’ll be tricky, but I have hope. Why?
1) “When Numbers Lie”: my scale is clearly over-counting body fat (but I’m sticking with it because photos, trends and directions matter more than the actual number). On “athlete” setting on the scale I’m consistently 8-10% and via caliper test I’m 10-12% right now. When I look at photos, it’s hard to believe I’m actually 15% (and my wife agrees).
2) “The Law of the Bear”: As in the old joke about some guys trying to escape a marauding bear, I don’t need to have killer abs, I just need to have better abs than my competitors. So, I’m planning to send “secret-admirer” chocolate boxes to all my competitors 4 weeks before the photos. Bwah-ha-ha!!!!