Fun Week

Well, I could start by complaining about various failings in my exercise regime, but instead I'd like to bask in the enjoyment of seeing not one but two great concerts last week. The reformed Pulp were in cracking form and Jarvis Cocker is a spindly inspiration of how to throw shapes will into your forties. All the old favourites were out - funny to think I was listening to these 17 years ago.

Elbow presented a very different concert. Live, their music is quite anthemic and yet retains the complexity that makes it, as I thought a few times in the concert, not shit (unlike other anthemic rock bands such as, oh, I dunno, let's say Coldplay - fucking shitty cunting Coldplay - who I hope never to see live, unless equipped with a sniper rifle). Yes, Guy Garvey is not exactly a PCP-like inspiration but his voice is astonishing and I found it hard at first to believe it was emerging from this fat Manc.

These were very buoying events in another cloistered PCP week. I managed to have one beer between both concerts which you could argue is one too many, but it was nice all the same. And now, here we are ending week nine and skating towards the end times.

So, now to the bad bits. Workouts are still showing some troublesome signs.

Skipping is still plagued by trips and stops, but all I can do is immediately reset and restart. I do try to keep to 100 a minute but if I've not done 400 by the end of 4 minutes, will finish them out (obviously if I do more, I do more). I also find myself accelerating for the last 50-60 in the set and in some ways this produces a better rhythm - but for now, it's unsustainable for 4 minutes. I am disappointed with all the stops but I guess if I'm sweating by the end of set 2 and buggered by the end of set 4, I must be doing something right.

For the strength exercises I've noticed a pattern in things I find hard to make progress on. I have a chronic rotator cuff looseness in my right shoulder which tends to cause me pain or screws up my form before I've really failed the target muscle (or so it seems). Most affected are chest dips, tricep dips and if I try to do Kung-Fu sit-ups with an overhand grip, I can hardly stand the pain after about 15 seconds (thankfully I can do a side-grip using some parallel rings). I have yet to complete a full pull-up and apart from being (a) puny and (b) fat I think the bodgy shoulder can again be somewhat implicated in this. Obviously on actual shoulder exercises I notice an imbalance between left and right too, but it's improving.

The other thing I find excruciating is the seated bicycle (but not due to shoulder - more due to these being ri-cock-ulously difficult). Thoughts pass through my head during these like "death cannot come soon enough". Planks are a stroll in the park by comparison. On both of these, I've noticed the fatigue in the thighs from the leg-work the previous day is a factor too.

So, what do I enjoy? Biceps are good. Triceps are decent notwithstanding the shoulder pain mentioned. Push-ups are variable (sometimes I knock out almost all reps on my toes, other times, I fail to knees half-way through the final 2 sets). Ovations look great in the mirror as do all shoulder exercises. It's great in Da Vincis to see a mass of shoulder-muscle gathering up the band. Leg-ups and V-sits are improved dramatically though the 3rd and 4th sets of V-sits are still a bit ragged. Side crunches are too easy which tells me I'm not doing them right. Leg exercises are obviously very hard (especially last few reps of floor jumps and creeps) but doable.

And that's about it. Nutrition plan is going 95% fine. I have the odd lunch out at weekends to pretend I'm a normal person - compliant lunches are easier to attain than any other meal. I don't find myself being hungry very often so have found myself eating an afternoon snack late now and then after forgetting. But I'm trying assiduously to stick to the prescribed quantities of everything. Weight-loss seems to have settled at about 1kg per week, which is awesome. More about that later.