Rain, rain...you're okay, you can stick around a few more days

It's easy to complain about things, like the rain in Vancouver; the seemingly incessant rain that ruins the snow for skiing and mucks up the roads for cycling. But, before doing that, remember that the rain is why Vancouver is so lush and green and amazing looking! The rain is not freezing cold snow like in Southern Ontario winters. And the rain lets you know how fast you're going when it hits the skin on your face as you pedal along on your bike, whipping up the pace with your heart pounding in your ears; it makes you feel alive! So in a moment of inspiration, don't let the rain stop you from getting outside to do what you wish you were doing...Get into it!

Now, let's begin with my most recent weigh-ins:

Wednesday: 163.0
Thursday: 162.0

WooHOO!!! The Christmas pounds are dropping like flies and I'm slowly fighting my way back into sending shape. I'm hitting the climbing gym tonight for a high volume, low intensity workout and might even tie into a rope for the first time ages if I can drum up a belay partner...Beno?? Last night I also did a cool core workout with my friend Andreas which was a nice change from my regular routine of what Max Sr. and I refer to as Ab-Busters. I think I need to make up about three different sequences that I can switch between since I'm pretty sure the more you do a given exercise, the more your body adapts to it and becomes more efficient. Correspondingly I think the gains you make are proportionally smaller and smaller.

Next; Car and I have our 2nd dance class today and I'm really looking forward to it! We practiced our sequence a bunch over the past week and although it doesn't look all that pretty, I think we've got the counts down so hopefully that will make a difference for today's instruction.

Finally, I practiced my chanter last night for the first time in over 3 years and it was super fun! For those unaware, the chanter is the practice instrument for the bagpipes. It enables you to practice the same tunes and fingering without the noise and bulk of the pipes as it doesn't include the bag or the 3 drones. I was really surprised at how much my fingers remembered upon testing out a few tunes that I had originally had quite dialled. I think our bodies are incredible machines and these are a few of the things that I find absolutely amazing:

1) That our muscles can learn and memorize movements such as in climbing, and that for each successive attempt at a move as you get closer and closer to sticking the next hold, your body is recruiting more and more fire power in the form of muscle fibres firing. So awesome!

2) That our bodies can heal themsleves...I think that's amazing.

3) That our hearts are essentially pumps with, in some cases, a 100-year design life...try and find another pump made that doesn't need any maintenance for that long. Incredible!

Ba-doop, ba-doop...that's all folks

Happy Birthday DZ and Kudos to RM

Saturday: 163.8
Sunday: 163.4
Monday: 164.2
Tuesday: 164.2

Ok, now that my weight updates are out of the way...I don't really have too much to say! Har har har.

Actually, there are two things worth noting this morning:

1) Happy Birthday to Dave Zabriskie; Dave turns 31 today and we all wish him a successful cycling season in 2010 with Garmin-Transitions.

2) My friend and colleague Renee Morrison kicked off her future as one of Vancouver's proud cycle commuters today with her first 30 min ride from her new home in North Van into work. Nice one!

Weekly Average

Well I'm pleased to say that my 1st week average for my New Year's resolution weight loss program has been a very respectble 164.7lbs. I was assuming it would ring in around 165 like Max Sr.'s so I'm happy to squeak in just below and clinch the Week 1 Champion belt! Har har har...

I got on the trainer again tonight for an hour and watched Paolo "Il Falco" Salvodelli sew up the Giro D'Italia from 2005 for his second time victory in the grand tour. Excellente!

Tomorrow night is my next session at the Edge and there is an entire wall of new problems I haven't touched yet so I'm psyched to start hammering them out!

Success!

I had a super session last night at the Edge, producing two big sends: pink tape and blue tape. I was super psyched to send since both were super desperate right up until the last move…very satisfying. Man, there are some super strong climbers there…it’s crazy when you watch someone warm up on your project by doing a number of laps on it just to get the blood flowing; impressive.

Prior to my climbing session though, Car and I attended our first hip-hop dance class! It was super fun and a great workout. Car bought me three private lessons for my 30th birthday this year and based on my first impression they’re going to be a smashing success. It’s really fun, very difficult and something we can really enjoy together; and I can see how it’s especially nice for Car since it gives her an activity to do with me that I’m not way better at…har har har; kidding!

Anyways, maybe if the hordes of viewers of my blog are lucky I’ll post up a video of us thrashing about after our next lesson…

Weight: 164.4

Hip-hop-o-potamus

Last night was a total write off for any physical activity since I felt like a truck had hit me after Tuesday's climbing session. I'm always amazed when I get back into bouldering, after even a short two week hiatus, at how full-body and strenuous it is. So as a result I laid on the couch and watched Italian Ivan Basso crush his competition (if you can even call them that) in the '06 Giro D'Italia. He won by the biggest margin in over 40 years in a style reminiscent of the great Eddy Merckx and Fausto Coppi by holding all three jerseys (Race Leader, KOM, and Points) at certain points throughout the race.

Tonight however, is going to be a bonanza! My lovely wife got me three private hip-hop dance lessons for my 30th birthday and the first one is tonight after work. I'm really looking forward to it since even though I know I'll suck, I think it's going to be a real gas dancing around like a maniac!

After that I'm pedalling over to the climbing gym and hopefully will have the energy to send at least one of my current projects, pink tape and blue tape. My upper body still feels as like it was used as a punching bag but hopefully I can dig deep into my suitcase of courage and produce.

My weight this morning was a demoralizing 166.2, up 1 lb from yesterday's 165.2...ouch!

Weighing in...

Monday: 165.8
Tuesday: 164.4
Wednesday: 165.2

I had an amazing session at the gym last night! After taking 2 weeks off you feel a bit sloppy on the wall, so I expected that, but man, I was just super psyched to be climbing again!! I wasn't able to do the pink problem I'd tried before we left for the holidays, but I did make progress on it so that was good. Also it didn't hurt my finger so that's improving. The other awesome thing was that I tried two other problems that I had previously passed off as being too difficult and I sent the one, a V7 with a monster wall-to-wall dyno as the last move, and I made it well into the blue problem at the end of the night so hopefully tomorrow I'm feeling strong and can make progress again on that one and maybe send the pink one.

I'm going to give myself two weeks back into the gym before starting back to the weighted hangs once a week also...I'm not sure how my finger started bothering me this time so I want to be careful with the really finger-intensive workouts.

Alright, have a gooder!

Happy New Year

We're back from our sojourn to Ontario to visit family over the Christmas holidays and Vancouver is just as amazing as it ever was!! Before getting back to the grind we also got to shoot down to Seattle for a few days to celebrate New Year's and my birthday with my brother and his lovely wife which was awesome.

So, now that we're back, I'm starting up my climbing membership again and am hitting the gym tonight for my first session back after the holiday gluttony. I'm about 5 lbs over my sending weight right now so hopefully by the end of next week I'll be right back in contention with the lightweights!

I've still been feeling my finger a bit also so hopefully tonight proves that it's healing up. We'll keep you posted...