Tag Archives: health tracking

Tracking training

Leave a reply

I’ve got to say that I love my new watch, the Garmin Venu 4. I’ve been very interested in tracking my training, but have only been tracking my number of training days until getting the watch. Now I get to see what my speed and heart rate are during my workouts, among other things.

I try to do most of my workouts in Zone 2, but my watch says I’m actually in Zone 3. My next bit of research is determining if I’m going harder than I should or if I am just in good condition for my age. More data needed before I decide.

Today was my second time with my watch on an interval run. I do a warm up walk then 8 intervals, high intensity for 1:15 and low intensity for 1:10 eight times, then a cool down walk. The high intensity is really just for a minute and about 3 seconds because it takes 12 seconds to get the treadmill from 3.4 at low intensity to a range between 8.6 to 9.4 for my progressively faster high intensity intervals.

What’s really awesome is getting the data about my workouts from my watch. Here is just some of the data:

This is just my second data point for intervals so I’m creating a baseline from which I can hopefully see progress. Until now my only data has been how tired I feel. Now I can dig a lot deeper and actually see gains. I can also make sure that I’m training at the right pace. High intensity intervals aren’t exactly fun. Collecting data on them and getting results to compare over time will make them just a little bit more enjoyable.

In and out

Leave a reply

I joined a gym, and I took advantage of a deal to get 5 sessions with a trainer, for a great price. My trainer had me download MyFitnessPal, an App to track my calories and macros. I’ve been using this app for 10 days now and it has taught me a lot.

What I’ve learned first and foremost is that I have been totally clueless about my food intake. It’s such an important part of living healthy and yet I have had no idea what and how much protein I eat daily. I’m oblivious to how many calories I eat, and have zero sense for volume or weight of the food I eat… which makes knowing the benefits or consequences of my food intake impossible.

I’ve ranged from 1,104 calories with 65g of protein to 4,554 calories with 186g of protein daily: Basically from subsistence to gluttony eating almost 200grams of fat on my ‘big’ day.

I’ve done this with zero connection to how much exercise I’ve had in a given day. My lowest day also included an hour and 16 minute workout going up and down the Coquitlam Crunch with a couple extra loops of the 457 stairs section.

I need to understand what I’m putting into my body, and also how much energy I’m outputting. I want to know what I do to fuel my body and ensure I’m doing so in a healthier way than I have been. Tracking is a start, knowledge is power, but it’s only a start. Tracking has taught me that I’ve got a lot more to learn.

Completely unaware

Leave a reply

I recently joined a gym and got a few sessions with a trainer. It’s interesting being taught by a guy younger than my daughters, although I have to say he has an impressive amount of knowledge. The first time I met with him he asked me to track my food, and suggested the app MyFitnessPal, which I dutifully downloaded that night and started using it.

I know how important food is in taking care of myself. I saw the impact of supplementing my protein with a morning shake and paying attention to how much protein I take in. The results have been impressive. And yet I have been blissfully unaware of both the nutritional value and portion sizes of my meals until I had to track what I ate in an app.

I had no idea what 2 cups of pasta looked like on a plate? Not a clue what 2oz of pistachios looks like? Not a hint what the calorie or protein amount is in a Booster Juice Açai Avalanche Smoothie?

I was clueless.

Today I finally figured out how to connect my new Garmin watch data to MyFitnessPal. I had some issues with signing into both accounts to get them to speak. And now that I’ve figured it out I can identify if my calorie expenditure is more or less than what I’m burning. Again, something I know very little about.

So I’m actively doing something about my cluelessness, and hopefully heading in an even healthier direction. I have already been on a good path… yet I still have a lot to learn, and I think diet and tracking of my food has been the missing ingredient in my health journey.

My new watch

1 Reply

I bought myself a new watch. This is the first time that I’m going to be regularly wearing a watch in over 20 years. I chose the Garmin Venu 4, for a few reasons, mostly related to health tracking. I would have chosen the Apple Watch, but I want sleep data and my family members all have the Apple Watch and end up having to charge it every night. The Venu 4 has a 12 day battery life, and even if I use it on full brightness, I’m sure it will last well over a week, which is something I really wanted.

Right now I feel like I bought a race car and I’m only driving it in a school zone. This watch has so many capabilities that I’m not yet using. That’s because I got it late yesterday afternoon and I had a dinner function to go to, so I really haven’t had time to play with it and set up all the fancy bells and whistles it comes with.

So far what I like is that I can easily check my heart rate. This is an important feature for me because I think that I’m not getting myself into the heart rate zone that I want to be in when I’m on the treadmill. Now I’ll be able to monitor this. Also, the sleep data from last night suggests that most the night I was in a light sleep and I woke up quite a lot. This is something I really want to monitor. I already tend to get only 7 hours sleep a night, I’m hoping I can figure out a way to use that time more effectively, sleeping more deeply. Monitoring my sleep data will help me on that journey.

I’ll be learning more about how to fully take advantage of all the features this watch has over the next few workouts and evenings. My only disappointment so far is that it isn’t compatible with Apple Music, because Apple doesn’t share music with non-Apple products. But this isn’t a huge deal since I keep my phone with me anyway. Other than that, I’m pretty excited to see what this watch can do, and how I’m going to use it to track my health living journey.