Hi geeks!
I’ve been going to the gym for about a month so I’m not an expert on anything. It took me the longest time to start any kind of activity - I always thought that gyms are for bodybuilders and sporty people and dieting is what supermodels and cheerleaders do, not us nerds. When I eventually went to the gym (and it DID hurt at first), I found that my natural curiousity was a real asset in terms of motivation.
So, cardio (longer periods of activity, like walking or riding a bike) is what you need to burn fat. The heart is the best fat burner there is BUT it starts using up the fat tissue after some time, so be prepared for long sessions (more than 30 minutes). But - as I hear even fit people say - cardio is boring! Who can walk for more than 30 minutes at a time? Well, with a proper approach, you can.
1. If you’re a geek and you love to push all the buttons (ooooh buttons!) on a new gadget until you know all its hidden features, play with the treadmill. Set it to different modes - fat burn, intervals, rolling… Try a mode for a couple of sessions, try another, return to the previous, but with a different level etc. You can switch machines. I found a bike that has a “constant watts” setting. Despite the name, it’s far from boring. I’ve been tinkering with it for the past week. I still have some other machines to try.
2. It helps if you take something to read and set the treadmill to a fast walk. Yes, it’s hard to read while walking so take something you either HAVE to read (lecture notes or documentation) or enjoy reading (lecture notes or documentation). Take printouts so you don’t have to switch pages too often. The trick is - you cover the displays with your reading materials and focus on reading. Once you get in the rhythm, you can read, walk and ignore background sound at the same time. If you feel like you need a break, run for a while. I walked for over an hour at a time, learned a lot, felt great.
3. If you have nothing to read and you’re not in the mood for tinkering (the rare ocasions), think of your new active life style as overclocking your body. I’ll explain. When you have a computer or a car or any other sufficiently complex device, you want it to run smoothly. You buy new parts, change oil, defragment the hard drive, compile the kernel. Now, the most complex and hackable machine you own is your body.
This kind of approach lets you learn about anatomy, the whole theory of dieting (you’ll be surprised about how many misconceptions people have) and you know how you like accumulating encyclopedic knowledge. Just check the Wikipedia for Carnitine. The usual warnings apply - don’t eat or drink anything unless you know what it’s for. Do some research. Also, you can shop for footwear like you shop for compuer or car parts, shoes have parameters too. Optimize.
If you get your body used to hourly periods of activity, it’ll run like a quad-core CPU on wheels and you’ll feel like a fresh install. It’s been a month and I breathe better, sleep better and climb stairs like I don’t know which way is up, no sweat.
Leszek ‘Lorn’ Rybicki
