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Would you believe that despite being on MTM land for nearly two years, I’ve never done a 100 Days challenge? Mostly, I felt I didn’t need it: I was moving enough as it was, and my weight was steady (or even going down). But I’ve been lax for the last two or three months, and I gained a few pounds over the holidays, so I decided now was the time to dive in.
I’ve got a secret, though. Today (Jan. 2) is actually Day 14! I started logging on my computer to post in the new year.
My plan is to do lots of walking and pick up my karate again. I’m doing drills at home and will be starting classes at the dojo again tomorrow.
Oh, and why 100 days of “snow”? That’s because this winter has been crazy with snow here in Montreal! We’ve had 3 major snowstorms (or is it 4?) in the last month. Crazy! And I doubt it’ll let up before the 100 Days do!
Like I said, today is actually day 14, so I figured I’d give you a rundown on days 1-13. I’ve been trying to do 15-20 minutes of karate every day, and at least some walking most days. I’ve been mostly successful so far.
Day 1 (Dec. 20)
- 20 min karate
- 3.5 km walk
- 20 push ups, 50 crunches
Day 2 (Dec. 21)
- 20 min karate
Day 3 (Dec. 22)
- 14 min karate
- 4.75 km walk
Day 4 (Dec. 23)
- 18 min karate
- 1.5 km walk
Day 5 (Dec. 24)
- 17 min karate
- shopping downtown (I power-shop—no slow browsing for me!)
Day 6 (Dec. 25)
- 14 min karate
Day 7 (Dec. 26)
- 20 min karate
- 1.7 km walk
- 25 push ups, 60 crunches
My goodness, my body is feeling the karate class today. I’d been doing drills at home, but not the physical conditioning. My shoulders are protesting from the push-ups! (If I do them all—which I rarely can—we do 15 with our hands in diamond shape, 15 on our knuckles, and 15 on either hands or fingertips. And this is *after* lots of cardio, so you can already do less than normal.) Ouch!
And now I must be off to campus again. Time to spend $300 on school-books—ouch for my wallet!
It is so great to see you on this board!!!! Your karate class sounds brutal!!! (Um so does the 300 bucks on books too!!!) Hope you give those muscles some good ol TLC.
Hey Julie, Welcome to the 100 day challenge. I don’t venture out of here much so we haven’t crossed paths too often. Karate sounds like it would be a good stress relief from classes… is it?
No karate today—the delayed onset soreness (and lack of time) was killing me. I’ll get back on it tomorrow.
Zookie: karate isn’t actually that hard once I’ve been doing it for a while. Like I said, I’ve been doing the drills but on the P.T. Once I’m back for a few weeks, my body will adjust back to where it was.
Kim: I love karate. I’ve been doing it on-and-off since I was 11, and it’s always been my personal favourite form of training. I love the discipline, the learning of new stuff, and how when you’re doing karate, it’s really hard for your mind to wander. If you’re doing 30 minutes on the treadmill, you get bored fast. If you’re doing 30 minutes of karate, you’re focused the whole time through.
Amy: Congrats on your progress so far! The push-ups aren’t so bad when you get used to them. The problem is really that they come after cardio when I’m already tired. I can do a decent amount of push-ups when I haven’t been running for 10 minutes first. *grin*
Shawn: I’m managing. It was tough for a while. I’ll just chalk it up to “balance exercises” and leave it at that. Did you hear it’s supposed to go up to +10 (C) next week? Crazy!
Glad to see the snow isn’t slowing you down. Karate’s wonderful isnt’ it? Hope you had some $$ left over from the books. Congrats on starting the 100 day challenge.
Around 1 pm, a friend who I know to be perpetually late said he’d call me back in an hour to get together. Well and good—I was planning on doing schoolwork for an hour anyway. 2 pm, no call. 2:30 pm, no call. 3 pm, no call. I call him but get his machine and leave a message. 3:20 pm, and I decide to make some productive use of my time and do some karate drilling (I try to do 15-20 minutes a day, but I was trying for extra today to make up for my lack of drilling yesterday and Thursday).
I put on my workout clothes. I stand in the centre of the room. I bow. I do the very first move of the very first kata.
The phone rings: “hey, you ready to get together?”
Day 17 (Jan 5)
- 90 crunches
- unintended rest day
It turns out that I spent most of the afternoon and evening taking care of a friend of mine and never found 15 minutes to do the karate. (Really—I got home around midnight and collapsed into bed.) Thankfully, today I’ve got a friend coming over to do a martial arts swap-meet (she does kick-boxing). Should be fun.
Shawn: Almost, almost! It’s like a limerick I’ve heard:
There once was a lad from Quebec
Who was buried in snow to his neck.
When asked, “Are ye friz?”
He replied, “Yes, I is,
But we don’t call this cold in Quebec.”
Brad: Thanks for the welcome. I love karate and intend to keep doing it for the rest of my life. I do have some money left, but tuition’s gonna be killer, since I don’t really have any income coming my way until mid-February unless I go job-hunting first.
M: Thanks! I’m sorry, too, but at least I’ve been doing *something.* (Well, except for yesterday...)
Day 18 (Jan. 6)
- 15 push-ups, 55 crunches
- 17 min. karate
- 45 minutes light martial arts training with a friend
- 4.3 km leisurely walk
It seems like I did a lot today, but most of it was quite light impact. I also ate more than I should, so it sort-of balances out. All told, I’d have liked to do a few more push-ups and crunches, but I’ll work on that tomorrow. I’m still feeling the after-effects of a very mild asthma attack, so I’m taking it relatively easy.
Day 19 (Jan. 7)
- 20 push-ups, 48 crunches
- 9.3 km walk
- 10 min. karate
So, a number of notes for today: first, the walk was not done all at once, but two shorter ones over the course of the day. That’s normally what I’ll do, though in my log I’ll only put the total: I’ll log any single walk longer than a kilometre, and then add them all together for the Challenge.
The push-ups / crunches were an experiment: every half-hour I was at my computer (well, for a while, anyway) I would drop down and do 5 push-ups and 12 crunches (6 regular, 3 of each oblique). I’m not sure how much it was working; further experimentation may be required. On the other hand, my lower abs are really sore today, probably from the crunches for the last two days.
Finally, how’s this for accountability: on Saturday I’m going to be modelling for a friend’s photoshoot… nude. No, the photos won’t be up on MTM (or anywhere else, for that matter). Yes, I’m excited. And terribly nervous. I’ve never done anything like this before. But it’s definitely helped me be good this week: no dessert for me tonight. *grin*
Brad: This is actually my second dojo. I used to do kyukushinkai style karate, and got to brown belt. I was actually about 6 months away from getting my black before I left, because I felt I wasn’t ready. Now I’m doing chito ryu karate and I’m green belt. (I started back from white belt). The dojo was recommended by some friends of mine (blue and green belt, respectively), and the sensei is utterly amazing.
I did kyukushinkai in college! If I remember right, it was Lebanese Karate and totally amazing stuff. Only did it for a semester, and an injury stopped me.
Now I do Kenpo. Very practical, very deadly, self defense stuff. Also known as American karate. My sensei is Jack Morris. He is awsome too. It really makes a difference when you have a good one.
You got lots of guts, kid. I had a chance to pose nude in college for a fellow artist but I was just too shy to do it. I still wouldn’t do it!
Good for you!
You go girl! That’s wonderful that you are confident in yourself to pose! Big Kudos!!! And you should post the pictures, just use those little black squares to cover the nudie parts!! LOL!!
I definitely have to start working on push-ups myself. My upper body strength needs improvement as I have very weak shoulders and neck. But I think I will try them before all the cardio! I’ll keep you posted.
