Weekly Progress Report

Activity by Day - July 1 to August 11, 2012

It has now been 29 weeks of working out in the books - and 11 weeks since I last missed a workout.  This week's program has been to continue the elliptical machine for 35 minutes per day x 6 days a week.  And the results?  No weight lost, but no weight gained, either.  Last week I lost 4.1 pounds compared to the previous week, which is ridiculous, so I expect that this week was merely my body catching up with extra water weight lost the previous week.  Net weight loss is still favourable, so I am pretty content with how things have been going.

This week was a good one because of a few wins.  First, I have felt strong and good at doing 35 minute elliptical workouts 6 days a week.  Sure, I feel it in my legs at times, but I generally feel pretty good once the workouts are done.  Scratch that - I feel amazing when the workouts are done, but that's just because it's a whole day until I have to work out again [grin].

Resting Pulse Rate

Physically, though, my body is definitely getting stronger and more capable, which is fantastic.  I can definitely see the impact of all that cardio on my resting pulse rate, which has been trending steadily downwards.  I now regularly have readings below 50 bpm, although I suspect I will likely average out between 45 bpm and 50 bpm when I am in shape. 

Past Week's Weight Tracking

I had a couple of non-scale wins this week, among them my ability to walk 2.5 kilometers to and from our friends' house after Sunday dinner at a restaurant in town.  The other major victory was seeing my fasting blood sugar levels in the normal range twice in the past week, after having them be consistently in the pre-diabetic range. 

Fasting Blood Sugar

Having 2 isolated normal readings does not make me "normal", but it is very promising, as it suggests that as I continue to work out and watch what I eat, that the numbers can be managed down into the normal range more consistently. 

This week I will step up the challenge by actually putting the tension levels on the elliptical at the instructed levels.  I have been using the BeatBurn Elliptical app for the past couple of weeks and enjoying it.  The app tells me to set the tension at a level between 5% and 80%, while keeping my strides at a pace of between a low of 80 strides per minute to a max of 180 strides per minute.   Generally the lower tension goes with the higher stride rate, and vice-versa. 

For the past couple of weeks I have been halving the resistance, largely due to poor math skills.  For example, when I am told to put the resistance at 80%, I have been selecting "8" on the elliptical machine.  But my elliptical has resistance that goes to 20, so I really should have been putting the resistance at 16.  I have been feeling strong after my workouts, so I am going to try and set the machine at the actual requested resistance this week.  we'll see what happens, and if I can do it.  Wish me luck!