Running #runchat #ukrunchat #virtualrunning @VirtualRunnerUK @POWVirtualRun @FullMedalRuns @MoonJoggers

OK so lets talk about....RUNNING!

Now let me be very very VERY clear........I have always hated running. Just the idea of it had me like blehhhhhhhhhh.

The first time I did 5k....it took me nearly 50 minutes! I am not really unfit but I have just hated it always...with a passion!

But over the last 10-12 months, I have really started to get into it, for various reasons.

• My GF decided she wanted to start running, and I am a firm believer in supporting anyone who is actively making strides to become better in whatever they do. It is too easy to sit around and whine, loads of people do that, but I respect and admire people who actively get up and do something...anything..just start.
• I went all in, I went and had a gate analysis (see how you run and get trainers accordingly) and started running with her and on my own. I have come to realise over time, that by investing and going all in, 
• I make it hard for myself to back out and I have to keep going.
• I am a firm believer that you should do stuff that you will find a challenge 
• Because I found it a challenge....I kept at it
• Because I was sooo crap at it, every-time I did it...I got better at it, and this made me want to do it again!
• I found other people who liked running, and joined them. At work we have a run club (I am one of the slowest guys btw)
• I have found that it is an incredible mental challenge, every bit of my mind wants me to stop...but pushing past that feels amazing.
• For me the overall time isn't as important as the distance!

I have found ways to keep it exciting and interesting, and one of these ways was to take up Virtual Running! So what is Virtual Running I hear you ask...well let me explain:

A virtual run is one where you sign up on-line for a specified distance, and then run at your own pace. Some of these runs are on based on an honour system, where they do not ask for any proof, so it is up to you to be honest with y ourself, while others ask for you to post your step count (from your fitness tracker), or screen shot your runkeeper app, or a picture of your treadmill time etc. You are responsible for submitting your time\distance. 

They arent bothered if you run the whole distance, or if you split it up into multiple smaller runs, no one cares about your time. The key is you get better, and you get some seriously cool bling! Some of the money goes to charity too. To me that is multiple wins right there!

I mean I am a nerd and you can get cool medals, I ran a 10k and got a Romulan Warbird medal! I ran another 10k and got a Martin Luther King medal!. You can find races that you think are for a good cause and now you have something to aim for and work towards.

I ran my first outdoor tarmac 10k for charity and ran a time of 1:04 and I got a cool medal for that too!

I have found that running on a treadmill isn't for me, I prefer running outside. Everybody is different, I have also found that I need to listen to music with a high beats per minute, it zones you out and your mind quietens down and any thought of stopping vanishes. I have also found an excuse to wear funky stuff while I run...I mean look at those leggings! Orange is my fav colour btw! hahah

My goal at the moment is to have more bling than Mr T! hahah and lets just say I am off to a good start!

I have used various virtual running sites, and the ones I have used personally are listed below:

@VirtualRunnerUK

@POWVirtualRun

@FullMedalRuns

@MoonJoggers

I have also signed up on my first Obstacle Mud Run course thing....and I hate mud and I hate cold water...so this will be interesting!

Improving Yourself Like in a Video Game @NerdFitness @artofmanliness @Dark_KnightUK

So all us guys/girls that work in IT are for the most part big fans of gaming! Be it console gaming or PC gaming and we pretty much all have fond memories of the Sega Gensis/Megadrive/NES/SNES etc.

This blog post came about after listening to The Art of Manliness Podcast @artofmanliness (which I have to say I have been a big fan of for over a year) and their podcast with the guy that runs Nerd Fitness @NerdFitness. I have been a big fan of Nerd Fitness for ages, esp the Nerd Fitness blog posts.

They covered many topics that I have mentioned previously, but from a gamers point of view, and I thought this is a way soooooooooo many of us could relate to.

For example in a game, you will start off with very little skill, and you have to do various mundane tasks that you may think don’t have any real benefit,  you level up so you can beat the end of level boss, after which you go on and do some more to fight the next boss. If you decided to jump right in and go for the end of game boss (your ultimate goal) you would fail, simply because you hadn’t earnt all the stuff you needed and obtained the skills you needed to get there!

Also if you get to a boss and you fail, you will restart and try a different approach. But it is amazing how in real life, so many of us don’t do this, we fail at the boss fight and then give up, but in the game we try again, even if it means loading a save from a bit further back so we can try something different. Why is it we are happy to do that in a game but not in real life?!

We will spend hours upon hours, playing the game building XP and moving forward, but we usually are reluctant to do the same in real life

. 

The podcast is brilliant and I have also pre-ordered the new Nerd Fitness book which is out in March.

So if you want to start running, you can start by walking. If you want to eat healthy, start by eating some fruit, small changes lead to big things if you keep going and build them up.

I have gone from not being able to run at all and hating it, to doing 5k and now I have managed to run 10k, it has taken time and I have had to level up....my original boss/goal was to start running, next level was to get a decent 5k time and the level after was to get to 10k...and so on. 

I rewarded myself along the way, when I reached 10k I bought myself some nice running gear, something that I can reward myself with, but will help me reach my next goal/boss fight, which is getting a decent 10k time!

The podcast can be found here: http://www.artofmanliness.com/2016/01/20/podcast-170-level-up-your-life/

Eating Healthy

Now Now don't just ignore this post!

You don't have to eat like a saint to be healthy...I love eating junk food lol

But it is all about finding a balance. If you are gaining weight that usually means you are consuming more calories than your body needs.

A simple rule about losing weight, eat less and exercise more. Basically if you are taking in less calories than you are burning, you will drop weight.

Managing a healthy diet can be a real pain in the ass, lets be real here. who here has all the time to plan all their meals out properly into nice containers and all the rest?!

If you can great and more power to you, but for me:

When I am wanting to drop some weight, what has worked for me is upping my exercise routine and using Diet Chef (I am not endorsed by them or anything). Basically you get good quality food delivered to your door, for the month and you just have to heat it up. You get:

Breakfast

Snack

Lunch

Snack

Dinner

Some people say it is expensive, but remember that's your meals for the whole day, and its portion controlled for you off the bat. If you are working out with it, you will defo lose weight, as you will be taking in less calories than you actually need!

I also supplement it with lots of fruit and water/tea. So whenever I feel hungry I have some fruit and drink some tea. It is amazing how quickly your body adjusts. The first week you'll drop a decent amount of weight, as you body flushes out all the rubbish it was storing and no longer needs. You will then continue to loose about 2lbs a week.

Bare in mind, there is no healthy quick fix, it took you ages to get fat (if you are fat) and till take a while to lose it. That is a fact and there isn't anything that can be done about it, so the sooner you start the sooner you'll get there!

Also what I do is when I am on diet chef, 1 day a week I will have a massive blow out and eat whatever I like on that day to excess, from KFC to Burgers to Pizzas. You will be amazed how crap you feel afterwords and how your body hates it, but having that one day a week, wont have a negative impact and will actually have a positive impact. You get to eat whatever you like and your body wont think it is starving so will continue to drop weight at a reasonable rate.

I also mainly eat soups at work in general, easy to make can be stored in my desk and its not unhealthy when compared to a lot of other crap out there! 

There is no reason why you cant enjoy food while being healthy. Hey and a lot of people get hung up that they messed up one day of healthy eating. One day wont make a big difference on its own. If you decide to write it all off...then that's bad, but realise shit happens and get back on it the next day....simple. We are only human!

Fitness Trackers - My Take on Them

Now I find fitness trackers pretty useful and they seem to be all the rage at the moemnt!

I have owned a Jawbone UP24 which I think has now been superseded by Jawbone Up2.

The main reason I bought the jawbone was because it came in orange lol, its my fav colour. But it has plenty of cool features.

Idle Alert  - so when you have been sitting around doing nothing for too long, it reminds you to get off your lazy ass!

Step tracking -  It counts how many steps you have done each day, you can set goals and the smartphone app will tally it all up and report back how much you have done.

Sleep tracking - It works out how much sleep you have had in total, deep sleep and light sleep and you can see over a period of time how good or bad you are doing ( This feature was one of the main reasons I gave up shift work!)

Food tracking via the app- I never bothered with this, but my brother and friends logged all their food and found it really interesting to see how much they were actually eating.

The app lets you log work outs you have done and the type you have done, and estimated calories burned etc, all very good and if your friends have it too you can be part of the same team and motivate each other etc!

The Jawbone app links to a lot of other apps too, like Run Keeper for example

The main issue with the Jawbone band, which may have been sorted out with the newer versions was that, they were pretty fragile and a bit unreliable at times. My friends lasted about 6 months on average, a year tops. Mine after a year started acting up and the button on the band stopped working, but I could still use it via the app. Sometimes it would just lose all power even when it was nearly full, and then would require a full recharge again (this happened about 5 times in the near 2 years I had it).

Also battery life was never 14 days, I got a week at best

After the jawbone, I decided on a Xiaomi Mi Fitband

This is super cheap like $20 all in, it has a good app, but it doesn't do a lot of the fancy stuff that the Jawbone does.

It does:

Idle Alert
Step Tracking
Sleep Tracking

So the key features, it can be used to unlock your mobile phone too, depending on what version of android etc you are using. It is pretty well built and the battery lasts 30 days...a realistic 30 days! I have used it for 30 days between charging, that is pretty epic!

There are plenty of fake bands about so just be careful when buying. For the price its a total bargain as far as I am concerned!

You can look back over the last week/month etc and see how much you've done on average, also there are other fitness bands, so find one you like at the right price point to get you going.

These are just 2 I have used so I can comment on.

The app isn't as invasive as the Jawbone. The Jawbone app would always give you updates and tell you , that you were being lazy etc and tell you at around midday how much you had or hadn't done. The App for the Mi Fitband doesn't do any of that, you have to go into it to get an idea of where you're at, and the app doesn't link to anything else apart from Google Fit App, which is OK but nothing special. But then again look at how much you are paying for it!

Exercising while having a desk job!

So all this exercising lark....I mean what is it all about?!

Working in any desk job especially IT related jobs, involve a lot of sitting around and usually with bad posture!

People seem to think that you have to have some bIg work out routine, or start big. Neither is true, trust me on this!

Now the stuff I am going to recommend I really like, I am not endorsed by them in any way, it has just worked for me.

I am a big fan of workouts at home, that are short and sweet and to the point, there are simple workouts out there for everyone. You can do them in your hotel room, on your lunch break, as soon as you walk in the door from work.

Insanity Max 30

T25

Les Mills Combat

DDP Yoga

RKS Kettle Bell

All these DVD sets have work outs that are around the 30 min mark give or take a few minutes either side. So no real excuse not to do them. I own them all and I randomly pick a workout and go through it. It probably isn't the best way to do it, but it keeps it fresh and it keeps me active.

For me I have to do the workout as soon as I walk in the door, if I do anything else, I most likely wont get round to working out. The key is always what is more important to you, as you'll either find a way....or find an excuse my friend!

Also you are doing it in your own home, no one can see you or cares that you have to stop 15 times during the workout, all you have to worry about is finishing it...that is all...just get to the end.

When I worked nights at around 1am I would take my lunch break and spend 30 mins working out, using one of these DVDs on my laptop and then jump in the shower. It was a good way to stay awake and to use my time wisely!

There are loads of other DVD options, find something that works for you...that is the key.

Start small, these workouts require you to train 5 days a week for 30 mins a day on average, that can be pretty daunting, or you will start and then find it too hard. The key is you don't have to do the 5 days, you could start doing only 2 and just make your way through the workout routine till the end, it'll take you longer but you can easily build yourself up!

SoME people prefer to workout at the gym, and that is fine too. Just make sure the gym is pretty close to your work or home, otherwise it'll be too easy to find excuses. Also hire a personal trainer for a couple of sessions at the start and every so often, so you have someone to show you whats up and to keep tabs on your progress. I don't know about you lot, but if I am spending money...I make sure I get my moneys worth out of it! Just bare in mind most gyms make their profit from the memberships...THAT NEVER GET USED!

Some people prefer cardio, some prefer weights, some prefer to mix it up. All are fine, just get busy doing something, trust me you'll work it out as you go. People always want a master plan in place, and time and again in my life, I keep realising the best thing to do is just start, and stuff will work itself out and you'll figure it out. Just make the decision to start getting fit and make those small continuous steps towards it...THAT IS ALL!

My first post about being healthy in IT!

OK first things first, thank you Ariel for giving me the chance to blog about this topic.

Being in IT, we lead very static working lives, in general we just sit in an office chair and do not move!

That does not mean we are not busy, far from it! The issue is we are not physically active, and we don't burn much energy in comparison! Also lets be real, how many of your office spaces, has quick and easy access to junk food of some kind?!...I know my office does!

I am not here to rant on about healthy living and shoving it down your throat, but I will over my time blogging here, share my experiences and what has and hasn't worked for me over the years.

Since about 2008 or so I have worked in some form of Data Centre environment, and the one thing I have seen and experienced first hand, is people gaining weight and eating junk food. I worked shifts for nearly 8 years. That is 2x 12 hour day shifts and 2x 12 hours night shifts back to back, this kind of role is notorious for gaining weight.

This simply comes down to the fact that we are awake during the night, sometimes with not much to do and we eat crap during that time and we sleep awkward hours and our body clocks are just a right mess. It is very easy to fall into the spiral and it took a lot for me to keep on top of it.

I am not much of a gym goer, but I love martial arts and I train BJJ (Brazilian Jiu Jitsu), it is a thinking mans martial art and it keeps you humble, your ego gets checked at the door consistently, from a mental and physical point of view this is great and I will blog more about that in the future too. 

It is very easy for us to get stuck behind the desk all day, it happens to me loads. One thing I would recommend is a fitness tracker of some kind, they all have idle alerts. I have had a jawbone UP24 in the past (which I will review at a later date) and I am currently using this Mi Band. It is super cheap and on android (and I think Apple) you can set idle alerts and it logs your sleep patterns etc (So at this price is a no brainer!). I will review that later on too.

Having a fitness tracker was one of the main reasons I gave up shift work, as I really did see how bad my sleep was and it just wasn't healthy any-more. Having that visual representation really made me think about it long and hard.

As with many things in life, it is good to have an over arching goal, eg get this certification, get a new job, lose weight etc. These are big goals and going from zero to 100% is tough and this is where most people fall short. There is no reason to start big, you can do small consistent steps. 

As a society we want instant gratification and quick fixes, but lets be real that isn't how it works! Lets say you have gained weight, that wasn't instantaneous, it happened over a period of time, so it will take a period of time to correct it. 

The journey starts with a single step. It takes a strong person to admit that they have made errors and to have the will to fix it, half the time it is your own ego that stops you, because it is tough to admit you messed up, you became lazy, you let yourself go. 

But you know what?! The real people who you see at the gym, put in all that effort, they aren't the ones who will laugh at you, most of the time they will respect you because...they know how it feels, 

They have been there but they made the same decision as you, the people that may laugh are the ones that don't like the idea of you becoming better, because it will make them feel uncomfortable and remember you are improving yourself...FOR YOU..no one else....it is YOU AGAINST YOU.

You want that certification, do a bit of reading every day. You want that new job, work on aspects of it a few times a week. You want to lose weight, start by going for a walk and maybe have a bit more fruit.

Anyway I shall return later, with more in depth posts, I just wanted to get started!

If you want to have a look at my IT/Virtualization blog please feel free my vBlog

New blog author, Bilal

Hi! This is Ariel. I'm very happy to introduce my friend Bilal, who read the first two posts and started reaching out on twitter and has now offered to put some posts with the wisdom he has gained. You will be able to click on label "Bilal" to only see his posts.

IT admin health is open for anyone that wants to contribute tips and their story. You can also send me a link to your own posts and a small intro and i'll feature your posts here.

I am very honored and humbled that somebody has reached out already without me going out of my way to promote this blog. It's a testament to how important and underserved this topic is. Please dont hesitate to reach out on twitter if you want to talk more about this topic @arielsanchezmor