Weight Training, Travel and Baseball
With any luck, we’ll be all smiles on our way to Hong Kong. Photo from Singaporeair.com
It’s been a crazy year, the kind where I’m looking at the calendar, realizing that we’re perilously close to the end of the first quarter and I’m wondering what the hell happened.
Weight Training
I started weight training at the end of January, super slow sets with a personal trainer. A sensible blogger would have taken body measurements or photos on day one to help quantify change (or lack thereof). I had every intention of doing so, but then it was March and… well, see the intro sentence for this post.
Pros: measurable increases session to session; slow sets mean that you get zero benefit from momentum; it’s really hard; I finish the sessions feeling completely spent, but not hurt.
Cons: weight/size gain (I’ll address below); uncertain about functional benefits of the weight training — will it make me stronger/healthier/better overall?
So the weight gain thing is weird. I assumed that there would be muscle gain, which I am seeing (more defined arms and back, for sure), but it seems like rather than becoming more defined all around, I’m actually retaining “cushion” (fat? water weight?) around my middle. Now, to answer your questions in advance, I’m not eating more food/less healthy, so it’s not like I’m compensating for the workout by gorging myself on fast food or compulsively snacking throughout the day. In fact, the workouts have an appetite suppressant effect, just like a long run does.
Regardless, I like the workouts and want to stick with them for at least a couple more months. I’m seriously considering a return to Team in Training this summer, so we’ll see if the weights are an off-season lead-in or an ongoing complement to the running calendar.
Baseball
For the third year in a row, I’m the assistant coach for my son’s little league team. That means that I’m out there on the field for two practices and one game per week. That’s a lot of baseball. This is the first year where it’s starting to click for the boys — 7, 8 and 9 years old — not necessarily the base skills but the rules and reasons behind different elements of the game, like waiting for your pitch, running hard through first base, or knowing when to tag back on a popup. One by one, you can see things start to click. I like watching it all come together.
Travel
Because I am somewhat insane, The Assistant and I will be spending spring break in Hong Kong on a combination business/leisure trip of my own. The Husband is on an extended multi-week Asian tour for work, and we’re timing our travel in such a way that The Husband and The Assistant don’t have to be apart for too long. This is either serious proof of my commitment to exposing The Assistant to as much of the world as possible at a young age, or it’s proof that I’m completely insane. Maybe both.
Tags: baseball, coaching, hong kong, Kids, personal trainer, strength training, travel, weight training
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