Tuesday

Today is Tuesday, isn't it?  I'm losing track of days here, but that's the nature of the beast.  Spent another day sitting around the house looking after my sister and visiting gran, mum was off at the hospital.  I'll drive tomorrow as it gets me away and we'll have a wander around Castlebar, grab a bite to eat somewhere, which'll help mum's mind too.

Anyway, training.

Whilst visiting granny I found that the old cow shed has a strong wooden second floor that I can hang off and do pull ups on.  So I did a few sets:
6, 2, 7

Later in the day took the dogs for a walk/jog which got a sweat on me.

Then got back and:

Same squat protocol as before (so that's 210 squats) with only one set of isometric holds as various angles.

Then did kicking practice:

20 rear push kicks each leg
15 snap kicks each leg
20 side kicks each leg
10 double side kicks each leg
20 set ups each leg

Finished off with 50 burpees, which were scarily easy.  Even did them 1-50 in my head as opposed to playing my usual mind games.

Humm...

Otherwise shoulder, pecs and lower back are all a little tender from yesterday.  We shall see how we feel tomorrow.

Training

So my dad is still sick and the hospital visits are crappy.  They've made a few mistakes with forgetting to scan him and feeding him at the wrong times and all sorts of stuff that does make you wonder about the Irish health care system.

Grr, wouldn't get this in super efficient Japan!

Anyway, today I stayed at home with my sister as the constant travelling just isn't fair on her.  Managed to have a look at the gym potentials:

This is an 80 litre bin half filled with rain water.

These are sacks filled with turf and that is an ancient rusty cast iron bathtub!  Fun, fun fun!

Short walk in the morning.

Mid afternoon was

Shadow boxing warm up

300 work out in 08:09:00!

Then outside to the gym!

Bin dead lift: 10 reps

Bin pick up to chest: 10, 10 (sort of a clean type motion with different angles, weird hand holds and instability)

Bath lift up (like a tyre flip, only no flip): 5, 5, 5, 5, 5

Bags of turf bicep curl: 5, 5, then change to hammer grip: 8, 8, 8

Farmers walk with two bags of turf: 39 sec and 45 sec

Over head clean and press with two bags of turf: 1, 1, 1

Press ups: 20, 15, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1

Got a good all round pump, especially in the lower back.  The awkward angles and general instability were good and those cleans and presses were real tough.

Went for 40 minute jog/walk/sprint with dogs cross country.  Erratic interval training, sort of. 

Saturday

So my dad's sick; probably Hepatitis.  He's in hospital currently and I'm running around doing stuff, but you do what you got to do.  He should be fine and I'm not really worried, but everyone's sort of on edge until we know for sure and he's definitely out of the woods.

My legs are currently killing me, but that shows what that squat work out was like.

I'm walking the dogs a fair bit, and trying to get Rusty to run with me, which he's sort of doing in a doggy way.  Very stop/starty, but it's good for me, running across the sort of moors.

Yesterday I did a variation on the 300 work out:

Press ups, Prison Squats, Alternate press ups, Scissor jumps, Burpees, Leg raises, Dips, Explosive press ups, V ups, Step ups.

30 of each, making 300 reps in 9:29:2

Then did 10 press ups, rested, 9, rested, 8... and so on down to 1.

Arms and chest sore today.  Also walked the dogs yesterday for a quick hour and a bit and walked them twice today.  My legs are still sore so if I get a chance tomorrow I'll sort something out with the massive copper bathtub that's lying around outside and those 80 litre bins half filled with water.  Hummm...

Bookwise the new John Connolly is very good, a few twists there I didn't see coming.  Am currently working my way though "The Secret History of the World".  Weird but interesting.

Ireland

It's cold here and wet, but there you go.  I've been on two long walks today, taking the dogs each time across the... well, if they were in the UK, you'd call them moors, but it isn't quite as grand.  An hour and a half for the first walk and about 45 minutes for the second.

It's good to be back in Ireland, seeing the family.  My Dad's sick, which is a downer, and it's probably hepatitis A, which is better than the things we were thinking it could be.

Training wise, what have I been doing?  Well, are we sitting comfortably?

Last Friday-
Shadow boxing warm up
Then
Chin ups
Clapping press ups
Kettle bell swings
Done in the following sets: 10, 9, 8, 7... you get the idea, down to 1.  No rest.  Total time: 8.14.62

Single leg squats: 2 sets of 10 per leg

Step up farmer's carry with 2 x 17.5kg: 2 sets of 10 per leg

KB cleans x 3 per side

Sat - off

Sun - Long walk + Jujitsu

Monday:
Jujitsu throwing with Mark Bloom

In the afternoon:

1000m row in 4 minutes

Pull ups: 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5: 35 in total

Up/downs: 8, 7, 6, 5 (3, 1, 1), 4, 3, 2, 1: 36 in total

Press ups: 10, 9, 8 (rest), 7, 6 (rest), 5, 4 (rest), 3, 2, 1

Independent bench press: (2x20k) x 8 (slow), 8 (explosive)
(2x28k) x 3 (slow), (2x20k) x 10 (explosive)

Shoulder press (20k x 1), 6 per side, 28k x 2 per side

Kettle bell snatch 5 per side

Tuesday: Jujitsu twice

Wednesday was travelling to Ireland, always more tiring than any other type of travelling

Thursday: the two long walks, obviously, then

Squat work out:
20 x Regular
20 x Heels off floor
20 x Regular
20 x Prison squats
20 x Lunges
20 x Heels off floor
20 x Prison Squats
20 x Lunges
20 x Prison Squats
20 x Heels off floor

Isometric contractions at 3 angles for ten secs each x 3

10 x squat jumps

Legs currently killing me.

Have been checking out my parent's place for equipment I cane use for training.  Watch this space.

Thursday

Getting back into it, slow but sure.  Just spoke to James who is up at ridiculous o'clock because of the heavy rain.  Poor guy.

Anyway...

Wednesday did the following:

Mobility warm up + stretching
Pull ups: 6, 5, 5, 5, 5, 4 = 30
Up/Downs: 5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5
Footwork between sets

Deadlift: 60k x 10, 90k x 8, 110k x 5, 130k x 6

Lying Pull up 6

Bicep: 20k M-bar x 30, 15, 9
10 sec iso hold then 21, 9, 6,then 15 sec iso hold

Thursday:
5.77miles Cassio Park run in 1.02

Evening was stick work, sai work and kicking practice.  Seem to be getting the hang of the power generation in the sai kata, only my right knee started to act up weirdly.  Good session working through strikes and playing with kicking footwork.

What else, what else...

Well, blog wise I'm slowed all down, clearly. But all those little updates I was going to do for my historic investigation will happen in Ireland.  And I'll get back into things there, as there'll be nothing else to do :P

Back in the groove

Hey gang,
sorry about the hiatus.  Been drunk in Spain and Portugal.  Hell of a holiday and an event, fitted some training in, but not a great deal, probably good to let my body rest a little bit, although I have managed to catch some kind of cold thing, probably from the bloody air-con.  Anyway, got back and did some training, here's the list:

Monday:
Shadow boxing warm up
Stretch
Up/Downs - 6, 6, 6, 6, 6 = 30
Pull ups -  4, 3, 4, 4, 3, 4, 3 = 25

Press ups - 25, 10, 10, 12
Bench - 50k x 10 e, 50k x 8 s, 60k x 8 e, 60k x 8 s, 70k x 5 e, 70k x 5 s

Tuesday:
Jujitsu in morning for 1.5 hours

Evening was going to be jujitsu again, but RL got in the way so went for a run, did 2 miles, got back and stretched out.  Kept on the balls of my feet for the whole run, which is good.  Feeling it in my body a bit today, calves and shoulders.  I'm back to sleeping on a bed and that niggly nerve thing is back.  Damn.  Going to grab some food now and then lift some weights.  Tomorrow will be a run day.

Transit

I'm currently sitting at a terminal in Narita airport. 

It's cold.

Well, I say it's cold here, I'm wearing my Gant cardy because it feels cold to me, now that I'm all aclimatised to Okinawa.  Looking at the thermometer, it's 22 degrees.  Humm. 

Anyway, yesterday, for my last day, I did the unthinkable and visited a cos-play restaurant!  I know, I know.  Terrible.  But it had to be done.  They sang at me and kept calling me, James and Steve "lord and master". 

And they drew little happy sayings on the food and giggled repeatedly in their costumes.  When I get time, I'll upload the pictures I took (I had to use my iphone as there was a no photo rule in the cafe).  As a side note, I learnt that it is against the law for any digital camera in Japan (including phone cameras) to not make a camera noise!  There's a reason for it...

Anyway, must dash. 

Catch you in the UK.