This week on social media I have seen arguments about the Chris Rock and Will Smith incident. It seems there’s a Team Rock and a Team Smith thing going on. But I’ve tried to stay away from making comments myself because I am undecided and I’m not fully convinced that either of them look particularly great from this. But here’s my thoughts anyway…
Chris Rock told a pretty crap joke aimed at someone with alopecia. It wasn’t even funny. But then I am not the oracle on what is funny and what isn’t. Is comedy the same as any art? Subjective? Was Jimmy Carr’s Holocaust joke funny? I didn’t laugh, but others might.
Anyway, funny or not this joke was aimed at Will Smith’s wife who then felt obliged to give Rock a slap. I’ve told some crap (probably not politically correct) jokes in my time but I’ve also given somebody a slap for being insulting to me or my family. I’ve been Chris Rock AND Will Smith before. Maybe I haven’t been at the Oscars and my jokes or my aggression hasn’t been in front of the viewing world but for a split second I can put myself in both of their shoes.
I’m hearing so much about cancel culture these days and this does worry me. I grew up watching Love Thy Neighbour, Fawlty Towers, Rising Damp, Carry On and Only Fools And Horses. I had DVD’s of Chubby Brown as a teenager and I read Viz. They all discriminated against gender roles, race, religion, sex, wars and abilities. These days I prefer Ricky Gervais, who somehow escaped a slap at the Golden Globes and has spoken out about cancel culture himself. His series After Life is so innapropriate at times yet one of the most poignant things I have ever seen . A part of me wants to blush and turn to my wife and say “he can’t say that!” But in the next scene I’m tearing up at the sadness his character is going through.
Did Love Thy Neighbour make race relations in 1970’s UK better or worse? It wasn’t its role to educate it’s viewers but does it have a responsibility to do so either way?
Will Smith has probably sat in an audience listening to Chris Rock many times and laughed at someone else’s expense. Rock is hardly the type of comedian that will talk about his Nan’s cute catchphrases like Peter Kay. Rock is edgy and becoming a famous black American comedian in the 90’s at the same time as Will Smith becoming a famous black American actor I’m sure that they are aware of each other’s work. So does Smith usually laugh at Rock’s jokes but just not the ones involving his wife?
When does comedy become innapropriate? Yeah we have all heard of bad taste humour and we seem to be ok with that. But what if a joke is about the Holocaust, slavery, a religion or rape? When should it be cancelled? Should it ever be? With hash tag campaigns and voices that previously went unheard these days, there are certain topics that seem to be ‘no go’ areas when it comes to comedy. Yet Carr recently pushed it’s boundaries at a live gig recorded for Netflix.
And maybe it needs comedians like that who are willing to test these boundaries. If we see it as an act rather than a person speaking their opinions, then we can continue to discuss the seriousness of the subject matter. For as long as these topics are in the forefront of our minds, whether on stage at the Appolo or in Parliament, then we will keep having serious discussions on how to be a better society. Perhaps these comedians are actually, intentionally or not, becoming the scapegoats. They receive the world’s attention and get paid for it and we disect their subject matter. Win/Win?!
I have no answers and that’s why I am not Team Rock or Team Smith, but perhaps it just comes down to a man doing his job as a comedian and a man doing his job as a husband. Even if they both did a bad job at them.
I’ve just finished training at the gym. It was a tough one today as I like to start the week heavy after a couple of days rest. I can feel that my blood sugar levels are low and I will need to eat when I get home.
My drive home was filled with meal ideas, but I had a big problem. Over the weekend, due to two kids birthday parties, lots of driving my family around to various errands and a great barbeque at the in laws, my eating habits had become a case of grabbing what I could here and there and plenty of it. The chips at the kids party that I snaffled into my mouth as none of the parents were looking were delicious but having had a Full English the day before I felt that I probably should try and have something a little less fatty and greasy. Anyway, young Joshua from class 9 shouted ‘those chips aren’t for you!’ so that put paid to anymore chips.
Also, it was Mother’s Day on Sunday. My wife had baked a cake to take for a mum. So after my three cheeseburgers and potato salad I ended up with a huge slab of sponge cake for dessert. Undoing the jeans belt isn’t a done thing at your in laws so I waited until I got into the car. I knew that tomorrow would have to mean some sensible meal choices.But then tomorrow came.
I’m not one for actually sitting and eating fruit. Sitting in itself would be a massive achievement on a morning getting two kids ready for school. So my wife and I have a good routine for getting in our fruit and veggies first thing. We invested in a Nutri Bullet some time ago and it’s been really useful to us. This morning in went a banana, spinach, blueberries, oranges and protein powder before I went to the gym. A good start. But by the end of my session I needed food again. The problem was that the meal ideas were not good ideas considering my weekend meals.
Weekends (or any time away from the norm) is usually a time where we can relax the diet or have a few extra treats without guilt. We should never feel bad about a little over indulgence from time to time. But it is important to attempt to readdress the balance when we can. My go to food on a weekday lunch time is quinoa and mackerel. It takes minutes to prepare and I can quickly eat it and continue my work. But my brain kept taking me to all of the weekend food I’d been having!
I was determined. Down came the tin of mixed beans from the cupboard. These are another staple in my diet. And to my delight, right at the back of the cupboard was a can of corned beef. Now, it’s not an exaggeration to say that it is not something me or my family eat. In fact, I can’t remember eating it since I was a kid and my mum rustled up a corned beef hash. But there it was saying,’Pick me! Pick me!’
So I did.
A bowl of mixed beans and a few slices of corned beef would do the trick. It was a compromise. I had the healthy stuff in there mixed with a can of processed cow meat resembling dog food.
‘But what’s this?’ I thought as I held the can aloft like the FA Cup. It was a key to open it up. Had I been transported back to the 80’s? Had it been in the cupboard so long that it actually WAS from the 1980’s?! Surely we have tin openers or ring pulls for this sort of thing these days. Reluctantly but feeling a bit Hangry by this stage I began to use the key. I wanted that processed meat and this bloody key wasn’t going to stop me.
I got to the half way mark of opening the can. It was a slow process. At one point I tried squeezing the can to see if the meat would slop out at the open end. It didn’t. It remained solid. But now the bulged can became so much harder to open. Eventually, I had managed to open it without any cuts or too much swearing. I could have my mixed bean and corned beef lunch at last.
Corned beef is processed of course and it isn’t the type of food you should be eating too much of for it’s quality protein value or it’s vitamins, but there’s worse things that I could have gone for. It satisfied my mind when what I had given my body for the past 48 hours was white bread, oil and fat. Corned beef was actually a better option! And I had to start somewhere.
For the past 15 years I have carefully planned my eating habits to include the type of foods that experts and headlines say that we should avoid. It’s not just the gym goals or the aesthetics that are at stake, but we must consider our overall health. I know that I can’t live off poor nutritional foods for this reason, but I also know that I can balance the occasional poor nutritional food choices with the foods that are considered highly nutritious.
I want an occasional beer without running to the scales. I want to enjoy a family meal with cake for dessert. I live in Scarborough. The locals would hunt me down if I banned fish and chips! These meals can be enjoyed with the right attitude and a healthy relationship with your food. Sometimes we are so busy trying to fix our physical issues that we forget how to work with our mental issues. And yet if we can beat our anxieties around food I know that the physical issues are so much easier to fix too.
It might be another 30 years until I have to go through the trauma of opening up a can of corned beef again, but at that moment it scratched an itch that had been left behind from the weekend. Now I can move on!
I’m very careful how I use the term ‘slippery slope’. Has anybody told you that it’s the start of a slippery slope just because you have done something that goes against their agenda. They are suggesting that just because you have done something against what is perceived to be the right path that this will become an unhealthy habit leading to the slippery slope. It is commonly known as The Slippery Road Fallacy.
An example would be an arguer suggesting that if we ban rifles this will lead to banning hand guns, and then cap guns, then water pistols and before we know it snowballs have been outlawed.
Another example of this is how many of us develop this anxiety around our own diets. You restrict or ban certain foods in an attempt to lose weight but when you deviate from this diet and eat a food outside of the ‘rules’ you are annoyed that you allowed yourself to do this and you feel like a failure. The self fulfilled prophetic nature takes over you and you believe that because you have deviated once that you will do it again…and again…and again.
You tell yourself that you will write today or this week off because you over ate anyway. You start to binge all of the foods outside of the rules of your diet. In the end you don’t even want to eat it, but you continue to do so anyway. It’s almost like self harm. You feel a release as you eat it but feel pain and depression afterwards. The cycle continues. You have entered the slippery slop fallacy.
Now imagine an alternative. There is no diet that will take us on the right path, but there’s no slippery slope either. There’s just a path. Your path.
As you walk down your path you discover that there’s a huge selection of foods to pick from. There’s lots of great tasting, nutritious foods here but you also see the foods that you thought were forbidden. A sin. The foods with added sugar, salt, fats and ultimately calories. Foods that the headlines tell you to ‘avoid if you want to lose weight’. But as you continue walking along your path here they are, harmlessly growing amongst the stuff we’re told that you should eat. Nothing is restricted.
You know that, on your way, the occasional bit of extra sugar or calories will not alter your path . It won’t lead you onto another direction nor one that becomes slippery. Your path stays the same. No up hill battles. No unknown detours. Your path remains constant.
Having tried so many different approaches to dieting myself including not eating anything at all for long periods, I know quite a lot about the psychological impact that food anxieties can bring.
I am beginning my Balanced Plate Challenge on my fitness app next month and I am determined to show as many people as possible that there is an alternative to feeling shame, disappointment, anxiety and depression around their diets. There’s a path that they build, that they walk down and with the foods that they enjoy.
If I have to run from a zombie in the event of a zombie apocalypse, I now know that I have a good 12 minutes in me at an average pace of 10.8 km per hour. I think I can outrun a zombie, although it does depend on whether it would be an original George A Romero slow type or a zippy kind from the remakes. But with the cost of petrol at the moment I’ll take my chances on foot with either type of the undead. Like I say, I now know that I can outrun them.
This morning I did the Cooper Test. Something that I didn’t consider when I set up my Fitness App is that while I’m sat at home in my undies watching Corrie on an evening instructing everyone else to do these fitness tests that I would have to do them too. I really should have thought this through.
That was a long 12 minutes
I’m joking of course. Well, half joking. I don’t jump out of bed on a morning thinking ‘how far can I run today?!’ Instead I jump out of bed thinking ‘what can I lift today?’
Most of my own training involves resistance. I firmly believe that to get the most out of your fitness journey you must do what you enjoy and what you are good at. For me, my motivation comes from a hypertrophy and strength programme. My goal is to be as strong as I can be and remain lean. I don’t necessarily need to run to get that. Or at least, that’s what I tell myself.
But in telling myself that I am avoiding the bigger picture and the bigger picture (hopefully) isn’t a zombie apocalypse, but the ageing process. I’ve written and spoken about the human needs to run, swim, climb, lift, throw and push. The human body has evolved to be very good at these things and denying my body any of them will potentially cause me issues in older age. Like it or not I need to experience running. What’s the point in lifting a PB deadlift if I can’t run for the ball as I play football with my grandkids? Training should include functional and practical stuff too.
I use the 80/20 rule for my own fitness. 80% is the training that I enjoy and excel in and the 20% is what I have to do and what I might not enjoy so much. It’s a decent compromise.
I vary my workouts with phases so I often ‘rep out’ and do supersets and circuits throughout my programming so I rarely just lift a weight for one rep and then scroll Facebook for ten minutes. So I know that I have good fitness levels. And in fact I used to be a champion runner for my school, although beating Pete Slowbottom in 1994 doesn’t count for much now.
I’ve only ever done two official Cooper Runs before. Both were fitness tests for the Army and then to become a PT. I passed with ease and I have no problem at taking on any fitness challenge or trying out any sport. But it doesn’t mean that I like every aspect of fitness or like every sport. It was reassuring to know that I could still get a good score in my latest Cooper Test though.
If the zombies take over the world, I’ll be way in front of most of the population…for at least 12 minutes anyway.
If I can’t outrun a zombie my plan B is to pretend to be one
Progressive Overload is a technique used to avoid training plateau and to meet set goals. Whatever your goals might be it could be that this needs to be incorporated into your schedule as this can enable you to become stronger and more flexible, increase endurance and make you feel pretty good about yourself which will keep you interested in going back for more!
Here’s my top 10 tips for Progressive Overload…
1. Add extra weight. Probably the most common way of Progressive Overload is to add more weight to the bar once you have mastered a certain weight. Be careful not to rush this though, there are other steps you might want to take first…
2. Add extra reps. If you feel comfortable after a while with a set of 16’s for 12 reps then challenge yourself at 15 reps.
3. Add extra sets. You might have benched X amount for 12 reps and 3 sets for a while now. Adding an extra set, just like adding extra reps, is adding volume to your routine.
4. Reduce rest periods. You don’t have to time yourself or have a stop watch, but being mindful of how long you are resting can help. Reducing your rest will challenge your next set.
5. Run instead of walk. Whether on the treadmill or in a park decide on an interval routine such as Fartlek training to mix things up.
6. Increase endurance. Make your workouts longer. If you have been used to a 30 minute routing then add a little bit of extra time on.
7. Slow the reps down or Time Under Tension (TUT). Your downward phase of a bench press is the eccentric phase. This increases the pressure on your muscle for each rep. Lowering a weight for 3,4,5 or more seconds adds better technique and good progression.
8. Add a different exercise. Its not advised to change your whole routine with every gym visit. You need consistency for your body to learn and adapt, but throwing in something different along with your current programme can help you come through a plateau. Challenge yourself with a Cooper run or a deadlift PB for motivation.
9. Perform supersets. Instead of doing a bicep curl routine and then a tricep routine, complete sets doing both together. So as soon as you finish your bicep curl for 12 go straight into 12 skull crushers.
10. Add an extra training day. If you are currently training 4 days a week, move to 5 days. This could be something that you do just to overcome your plateau as it might not suit your lifestyle in the long term, but you might also find that it does and you enjoy fitting in an extra session!
The general rule is that volume should come before intensity. In other words, adding more reps, sets or lowering rest periods should be done before adding more weight. With any progression, ensure that you are happy with your current form before advancing. There’s no point adding more reps or plates to a poor set of bench presses.
Contact me for further advice on your goals and ask about my training app for more workout ideas!
I’ve been having a bit of bother in getting my lads motivated for school in recent mornings. At a certain point in the term this can happen. Tiredness creeps in and I find myself repeating the same prompts.
“Are you dressed yet?”
“Have you brushed your teeth?”
“Please just get your shoes on!”
Everything is operating on slo-mo. Although I have found a technique that currently works, at least for this week, which is giving marks out of 10 for their efforts. Whether that’s their morning routine, tidying up or meal times. The higher the score the more of earning stars for the weekend, which is usually based around the Switch and Xbox time or VBucks.
This morning my eldest asked me if he had done better than his younger brother. I had noticed that this comparison has become more prominent in both of their mindset, yet I’m very careful in not giving any extra points to one over the other. I assist them on both managing to earn the same points out of 10. This morning was a strong 9.
What I replied to my eldest was the same response I used to have to give myself and what I have to say to many trainees I have worked with…
“Concentrate on making sure that you do your best job and don’t worry about anybody else”.
It’s easy to lose your way when you compare yourself to anybody else. You are you.
I used to pick up the 30k dumbbells because Biceps Brian on the next bench to me had just pressed 28k. I was trying to prove that I could outlift them, even if my form was horrible and it put my shoulder out. I should have focused on my weight and rep range. I should have looked at yesterday’s me and tried to better myself. Nobody else. I found this out eventually which is why I became a PT, but I also need to teach myself this outside of the gym too.
Bob lives opposite with his wife and two kids. Each morning as I am telling the kids to get dressed for the tenth time and I draw back the curtains I notice Bob pass the window going on his morning run. He waves. I feel like putting the middle finger up but I wave back with a half disheveled grimace on my face.
Bob
“A wonderful morning for it!” Bob shouts as he canters down the road. Is it? I think to myself as a worn pair of undies slaps me in the face. The kids are finally getting dressed.
Bob’s kids get into his new sports car effortlessly as I bundle mine into the Juke. Off Bob goes to school with his children while I’m sifting through the crisp wrappers to find the seat belt buckle to strap the youngest in. His wife Berni gets into her car to get to work early for her very important meeting.
I see the kids are finally getting dressed
On Saturday evenings I often see Bob and Berni going out for the evening all glammed up. They head off in a taxi as their kids and child minder wave them off. I look at the clock. Its time for Ant and Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway, I’ll get the kids to bed and pour a glass of wine.
What I don’t know is that Bob won’t be drinking alcohol when they go out for the evening because he is a recovering alcoholic. His sports car is on finance and his midlife crisis made him get it and this has caused daily arguements with Berni because they can’t afford it. He goes on his daily runs because that is the only thing that gets him out of bed and his children can’t wait to be driven to school so that they don’t have to listen to mum and dad argue anymore. Berni gets to work early so she can meet up with her office fling.
We all know Bob and Berni. Their lives look terrific. But all we have managed to do is create a story in our minds that we begin to believe. You know your life. You live it every day. Warts ‘n’ all. The grief, the battle scars the daily bloody grind. So we begin to imagine that Bob and Berni have the most perfect lives.
Yet when we stop comparing ourselves to anybody else we can see that our own life isn’t so bad. Yes there’s still the ups and downs and curve balls that life throws at you, but you are owning this shit. You are not just managing to survive each day but you are thriving through adversity.
Life can be tough. Sometimes you just need to get off of the carousel. But make no mistake, Bob and Berni are no better off than you. Look at yourself and be proud of yourself today and see what you can achieve tomorrow.
It feels like I’m sat in a school hall at lunch time. No, that’s being kind. I’m in the middle of a borstal canteen. I’m waiting for a young Ray Winston to come at me with a sock full of pool balls.But it’s me who is the daddy now and I’m sat with my two boys in McDonald’s.
Two big promises that my wife and I made when we had kids is that we won’t buy our kids toy guns and we won’t take them to McDonald’s. So after a trip to The Golden Arches full of Ket they’ll be sure to go home and shoot each other with NERF guns or ‘head shot’ some kid on Fortnite. There goes that promise.
Each year, our kids are given guns for their birthday presents from other kind parents. And after much consideration my wife and I realized, perhaps with resignation, that children have always played with toy guns and probably always will. I played with cap guns, spud guns and water pistols but I didn’t grow up to be El Mariachi. Nor do I try to blow Roadrunners up with TNT because I watched Wile E Coyote and I’m not a Satanist because I went to a Marylin Manson concert as a teenager. So maybe we need to lighten up.
Since kids were having birthday parties at McDonald’s and mine were invited, which enabled their palette to taste such..erm,,delicacies then we have decided that they can go now and again as a ‘treat’. It might only be a quarterly event, but it fills me with dread with every visit. I had a mare today.
The first thing I noticed is that it felt like I was walking into a nightclub. Two security guys looked me and my lads up and down as we walked up to The Arches. Now, my youngest had just downed a bottle of fruit shoot which can make him seem a little tipsy but I was sure we would get in. I held his hand to stop any swaying and gave a confident nod to the doorman. He opened the doors for us. We were in!
The nightclub feel continued once we got inside as a bleeping noise akin to an electronic dance anthem was heard above the euphoric noise of revellers. But it was just the ubiquitous noise from the serving area.
And since when did Maccy D’s have touch screen to make an order?! My kids have very specific requests when it comes to how they have their burgers. It’s not something that I can get across on a touch screen. Chicken nuggets it is then.
As we sat down, brushing away a few courses of food on the chairs from the previous customer, I glanced around the room and my initial description of a school lunch hall was pretty accurate. Except instead of teachers telling the kids to get down from the tables it was the security guys. At one point they told a teenage boy to stop vaping or he’ll be thrown out.
Bleep!
McDonald’s food has always reminded me of toy food. It looks and tastes fake. I’m not a food snob. I’ve had many cold kebabs the morning after and I buy fake Pringles. I’ll eat most things as long as it’s not looking at me and I’ll even eat seafood sticks (formerly known as crab sticks) and I don’t know anybody else who will touch those! I’m not too fussy. But a McDonald’s burger has left my taste buds feeling empty except for a saltiness that I’m hoping my seventh pint of water will get rid of.
As we walked back to the car I was pleased to hear that my boys didn’t really like their burgers either. We all left feeling a little awkward that this ‘special tea’ experience was a bit crap.
But I can’t deny the influence of this global patty giant. Like the chain or not, it’s 850 restaurants closing in Russia is as significant today as it was it’s first opening 32 years ago. Yet every time I eat there I refuse to believe that it is their great tasting menu that makes it what it is. As McDonald’s grew in popularity in the USA the rest of the western world all wanted to eat like Americans, smoke, drink, wear jeans and drive cars like Americans. And this obsession stretched to the rest of the world too.
1950’s American McDonald’s
My kids pick up lots of accents and ‘isms’ from YouTube influencers. There’s an Irish guy who is popular at the moment but the majority seem to be American. Our leftovers go in the trash according to our kids. They put their pants over their underwear and they fall on their butts. It just seemed like yesterday that they were watching Paw Patrol on Channel 5. Today it’s YouTube channels. Their intrigue into new accents, cultures and languages don’t bother us, they can watch it but the content on YouTube is obviously closely monitored by us. Every decision like this is always discussed by my wife and I. Is it the right decision? We dunno.
Should YouTube be banned in our house? Do toy guns, statistically, cause future violent men? Do McDonald’s burgers affect healthy eating choices?
I was allowed to watch horror movies at a fairly young age. Maybe I was Jonas’ age when I watched Friday The 13th. And as I pointed out earlier I’m not an axe wielding murderer. Yet as much as I tell myself I need to lighten up our children have much more access to sex, violence and ‘swears’ as my kids call them with just the wrong click of a button. Maybe it’s different from a scary film from Blockbusters.
I’m a great believer that people need the opportunity to realise their errors for themselves. Having studied theories like Rogarian Therapy I understand how important it is for an individual to come to their own conclusions about their own life, even if these individuals are my young children. Maybe the next time we have a spare hour in town they might suggest somewhere that they actually enjoy eating at.
Last season I cringed as Jonas took his coat off during a football training session. It was a cold and wet November evening. The other kids were dressed as the Michelin Man but, despite the coach’s attempts for him to put his coat back on, Jonas refused saying that he was warm. I understand his coach having Jonas’ welfare in mind, but I also understand that until Jonas experiences a freezing cold November and can’t go back on his decision to put his coat back on in front of his mates, he won’t learn how to make the correct decision the week after. He knew it was a bad call to take his training jacket off, but bravado had gotten the better of him and it was too late for him to eat humble pie. But he has always worn his jacket on cold nights ever since. He won’t be making that mistake again.
If I don’t allow my kids to make measured mistakes now, in ten years time when they are met with much greater decisions to make they will struggle. Those who work with me will know that I embrace failure. Failure, or bad decision making, should lead to reflection on how to make better decisions next time around. If I tell my kids not to put YouTube on, or that McDonald’s is not an option, then the desire to eat the forbidden fruit will grow. I’d rather that they taste it now and hope that they realize that the forbidden fruit isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. YouTube channels of people playing on computer games are tedious after a while and a McDonald’s burger is nowhere near the standard of one that they can make at home.
But this is all a ‘hope for the best’ situation. I’ve trained people for longer that I have been a father. I’ve taken a journey with hundreds of trainees, whereas I’ve only been to McDonald’s with my kids half a dozen times. I’m qualified at training people with their physical and mental wellbeing. I’m not qualified at being a dad. Maybe a few lessons and an exam would have been helpful. As it is though I’ve got to wing it, like all parents do. In my job I know every given situation and how to deal with it. Eating disorders, self harm, depression, athletes with Olympic dreams, bodybuilders, fat loss or weight gain goals, I have a plan for every person who approaches me.
But in McDonald’s with their touchscreen ordering, two hungry kids, doormen chasing unruly customers and an incessant bleaping noise coming from the tills and I’m a nervous wreck by the end of it.
Being educated in three strict Catholic schools growing up my thinking time, or ‘thoughts and prayers’, were done in a church.
Perhaps being taught by strict Nuns didn’t help my views on religion though. Religious Education was all about Catholicism and I grew up with a very blinkered view of faith.
As a teenager I bought and read the Quran which maybe proves my rebellious nature more than it does my intrigue into religion. Spanish was taught in my GCSE years, so I learnt German in my spare time. I was taught Shakespeare by my teachers so I read and quoted Leonard Cohen instead. I was sent out of a History class once for questioning why we weren’t taught black history. In a 1995 Catholic school you didn’t question their teachings. My name in the staff room was probably mud.
I’m slightly envious of a person who has faith in a God. That must be a deep and profound relationship which holds reassurances I cannot even begin to imagine. Sometimes, if we watch the 10 0’Clock news too much, reassurance is important. But I can’t pretend to be someone I am not.
I need some time to think.
My eldest son, who goes to a Church of England school, says that he is a Christian. He knows that his mum and I are not and I admire his independence in making up his own mind. I’m trying my hardest to get him to support Liverpool instead of Aston Villa! But I’d never try and change his mind regarding his faith. He is his own person and I will try to guide his beliefs whilst being honest to myself too.
On the occasional Sunday it is ‘update’ time on their game Fortnite. This is when the whole gaming community start climbing the walls as their console screen reads ‘Server not responding’. A new chapter in the game is downloading and it can take a few hours before it can be played. If I’ve lost you in this last paragraph then don’t worry. Fortnite is lost on me too. But the important thing here is the window of opportunity to drag the kids away from the computer screen and take them to my place of worship. After all, I’ve been to Jonas’ many times.
I need some time to think.
As we walk along the cliff edge at Cornelian bay I find my time. There’s something satisfying in looking out to where the sky meets the sea. The spring sunshine shimmers across the cold North Sea as it crashes against the rocks below. The smell of the salty waves and seaweed is fresh as it reaches my senses way above the cliff top. The breeze mixed with the occasional gust of wind waters my eyes. Or at least, that’s what I tell my wife as she catches a tear from my cheek. I’d be a rich man if I could bottle that moment and sell it. But I’m richer still by telling you about it for free. That moment is there for anybody to feel.
Fortnite is back on now. The boys only get console time over the weekend so I don’t mind their enthusiasm to get back home to play on it. Not only did they accompany me to my thinking place but they also helped forage for gorse and nettle, so they deserve their free time.
Whether we pray, meditate or walk and think it plays a crucial role in our mental health. Another of my thinking places is at the gym, but it is a very different experience of course. Thoughts are often interrupted by conversations about macros and deadlifts. And I’m fine with that. My schooling might not have been my greatest learning experience, but one subject I do know is macros and deadlifts.
I need some time to think. And you do too. Wherever you go to get that time, make sure that you prioritize it as much as you do your eating, sleeping, training and breathing. It can keep us healthy. It can keep us alive.
I can sense the anticipation from the home crowd as the number 6 receives the football just inside the opposition half. He always looks to thread a pass through to his striker or take it past a defender or two and get closer to goal and have a shot himself. But this is decent opposition and he is snuffed out this time. He’ll have another moment of magic before full time. I’ve been to enough games to know what he can do.
Football is a sport like no other. It brings out an emotion in people that I wouldn’t usually see in their every day life. My latest game I went to see had the referee being taunted by the away fans. I’m sure that these fans were educated folk who were hard working citizens throughout the week, but then on this day as the whistle blew to start the game, they were football fans. Shouting stuff at somebody for a couple of hours becomes acceptable.
I’m sure you’re wondering the importance of this game. What significance did it have in the run up to the Premiere League title? Was it City and Liverpool at the Etihad Stadium? The Merseyside derby? No, it was the Scarborough under 8’s match played at home in a field in Filey. The little number 6 wizard happens to be my son.
“he’s our number 6 and he’s full of tricks la la la!”
I love football. I’ve been brought up on it. I’m a passionate Liverpool supporter and I’m a passionate supporter of my son when he plays. But I can honestly say that standing in the cold listening to swearing, abusive language and wannabe Klopps sharing their tactical know how is not my idea of pleasure. Its hard enough every Sunday morning watching my son, I don’t want to pay £100 for a Premier League ticket for the privalage.
But the dilemma is that my kids love football too! Jonas, my eldest, is obsessed but there might be hope for Finlay. He seems to enjoy other sports and seems to show an interest in different activities away from sport too. I would travel to wherever it takes me with my kids to give them the opportunities to progress in their interests, but it’s going to get a little bit more challenging in the years to come.
It’s not just the fact that I find freezing my arse off in a field on a Sunday morning, plus the two training evenings, a bit tedious each week. But if Finlay wants to follow in his brother’s footsteps at football that’s double the training plus a different venue to travel to on the Sunday.
Just before the pandemic my wife handed in her notice at her job to start her new business. Exciting times. We took out a loan for my wife to get a car as she had recently passed her test. This would open up new opportunities for us and our kid’s extra curricular opportunities as we could both take them to their chosen activities. But unfortunately, as my wife had put in her notice at work weeks before the first lockdown she was not entitled to any financial support. And as the gym’s had to close, we knew that the money we had could not be spent on a second car.
A second car has always seemed as a bit of a luxury to us. Due to the extra costs and the environmental impact we were getting a second car totally out of necessity. And with fuel costs going through the roof I cringe going to the petrol station as it is. But buses on a Sunday morning to some random village outside of Scarborough aren’t very regular, so we were prepared to bite the bullet.
As always we will find a way for our boys to be able to do what they want. But I’m still encouraging them to discover new things. I can’t imagine parents screaming at the guitar teacher like how they do at football with the ref. “Oi, teacher, that’s a D major, mate. You don’t know what you’re doing!”
Or an angry dad with a hand gesture to the gymnastics instructor and certainly not barking orders to the Kickboxing champ teaching little Ocean how to Roundhouse.
Football is a different breed. My respectable dentist could easily be the dad throwing coins onto the pitch and heckling the man in black at next week’s under 8’s match. Who knows?!
I really wouldn’t want to be here, even it meant seeing Salah score a worldy.
So for the foreseeable, possibly at two different football pitches each week, I could easily be nodding to the parents next to me saying, “It’s allus parky in this bloody field”. And if my boys manage a top bins or two, deep down I’ll be more than happy to do it.
What is a Deload, do you need to do it and if so, when?!
A Deload is a period of time that is structured within a resistance programme to either stop your regular training routine or lower your weights considerably. During your programming, you will lift weights at around 65-80% to 90-100% of a 1 rep max depending on your phase. During a Deload this can be reduced to below 50%. Other activities might be introduced such as walking, light running, cycling or swimming. It is sometimes known as a Deload Week, however this can be for a longer period if you need to.
Not everyone needs to do it. If you think of the average gym goer with muscle hypertrophy and weight maintenance goals, they will encounter the Christmas period, illness, vacations and other commitments that take them away from their training programme. In essence, life provides most people with a Deload whether they want or need one. But once their unforeseen Deload has ended, I would recommend not going straight into the training that they had prior to their time off. It might take a few sessions to get back to where they left it.
A clever programme designer, however, can plan the year to allow for certain events such as vacations. This is known as microcycling, mesocycling and macrocycling. Each week, month, year and beyond can be considered. For the average gym goer I would stick to a 4 month period though. Years of planning is generally used for athletes, Olympians and bodybuilders.
My own programming consists of hypertrophy (4-6 weeks), strength (4weeks), power (4 weeks), peak performance (4 weeks) and Deload (2 weeks). This has been designed to end during the warmer months when I tend to eat less naturally and I can feel my best in a T-shirt. Hitting my peak during the winter seems a little pointless when aesthetics plays a part in my goals. I eat more and wear big coats when it’s cold!
Deload or not, you might find me having a glass of wine
During the peak performance period you can hybrid your workouts to meet your Deload needs too. This would entail scaling the weights back and focussing more on your form in certain sessions. Regression, as it is known, allows your body to recover before hitting it again through beginning the programming process again. The muscles, so the research suggests, adapt and grow due to the new load subscribed.
So to avoid injury and to strategically schedule a period of regression might be something to consider for your hypertrophy goals.
Never Give Up PT 