Exercise Report 04/08 - 04/14

Monday - I took a quick walk at lunchtime.  1.5 miles in 30 minutes and jogged up the stairs to end it. 
Tuesday - Walk/Run 3.5 miles in 55 minutes.  Again, I mixed in running with walking to do a 1:00/1:00.  I ran over at the track and it was just lovely. 
Wednesday - 1.7 mile walk in 30 minutes ending with the stairs.  It was 40 degrees and had just rained a lot but I walked over to the library to return some books and then to 7-11 for some bananas.  Perfect walk for lunch time.
Thursday - 3.5 miles running in 47 minutes plus warm up/down.  I went to Pease Park and ran on the trails.  Still a 1:00/1:00 so I'm not pushing anything but I'm increasing mileage and calories. 
Saturday - 17.5 miles riding in 1:28.  A lovely day for a bike ride. I adjusted my read wheel and cleaned the brakes so that it was a really smooth ride. 
Sunday - 15.1 miles riding in 1:15.  It was windier and sunnier than the day before but I had a nice ride.  I usually ride in 10-11th gear depending on hills and occasionally 12th.  I noticed that this weekend I was riding primarily in 12th with a few downshifts to 11th for hills.  So I have to assume that my legs are getting stronger. 

I'm maintaining my calories and calorie count. I think I went over calories one day last week by maybe 100 calories. Most days I'm under by 100-300 calories.  I get a baseline allowance of 1500 from the app and then whatever exercise I do, I get 1/2 those calories.  My clothes feel a bit more comfortable but the needle on the scale hasn't moved yet. 

One of my co-workers came by my desk the week before last.  She was one of the people really interested in the stand-up desk and she asked about it.  Then we were talking and she said that she read that you really should get up every 15 minutes - that even every hour is not enough.  Thinking about that I installed a meditation bell timer on my phone. On silent, it lights up every 15 minutes (approximately) and I try to stand up (at minimum) or walk around a few minutes (at best). 

I also started using the Noom app to count my steps daily.  That has some limitations including:

• Obviously the app only counts steps if you have the phone with you.  If you're going to the bathroom or shower or whatever, no counting.
• The step count does not seem accurate when on a run/walk.  One day I calculated that my steps during my lunch time run/walk should have been around 7500.  The app counted about 3500.  It seems to do better in a walk without any running and seems to do better if the phone is in my pocket than if it is on the armband.
• It adds some number of steps to the count when I ride my bike but it's not a # equal to my cadence.  My riding cadence is probably 170-175 per minute (10200 per hour).  It probably added 3500 - 4000 steps per hour to my counts. 

That said, I think for me the two things - meditation/move around reminder and step counting are good for me.  My step counts last week (such as they are were):

Tuesday (partial day) - 8689 (only about 3500 steps for the run/walk).
Wednesday - 7927
Thursday - 12,741
Friday - 7,586
Saturday - 8,482
Sunday - 5,029

So obviously you have to take the #s with a grain of salt when considering the bike riding as well but I think it's a nice measure and incentive, particularly when I'm at work.  Perhaps my goal should be 4000 steps while at work?