Latest guest visit: David Ayre

Last weekend, my friend Dave came out to visit PaulssonPaleo. I have known Dave for 20 years, so was really keen to show him our place and to quiz him on farming. Dave comes from a farm in Devon in the south-west of England where his parents look after 400 or so sheep.

The weather was pretty rubbish the weekend Dave came, but that didn't stop us getting outside and doing some manual labour (something all our guests are keen to do!). The temperature has risen a little lately, so the snow had disappeared and allowed us to progress with getting the land ready for spring. We are further testing out hugel culture (see blog post 'Everyday is a School Day' - 5th October) so have decided to use our paddock to build a series of hugel beds. It has the perfect orientation and is sheltered from the strong winds, so could be a good area to grow produce. Firstly, we dug out the base of the hugel bed to about a spade depth and then started to collect and drag fallen tree debris to the paddock. Some of the logs we found were pretty big, so it turned out to be a great work out.

Dave was also keen to get in a bit of running as he is training for his first marathon in April, so on the Saturday I took him for a gentle trail run up and around our nearby lake, Simlången, this included the notorious 'Murder Hill'. On the Sunday, Dave nervously agreed to join me for my weekly club run which, this week, turned out to be a hilly 22km road run. So, we amassed a pretty good 36km of running in 2 days, good training for the Brighton Marathon and a bit different from pounding the streets of Basingstoke!

Hanging Tough

Dave also topped the leader board for our 'Hang Tough' competition. He stayed on the rings for 2 minutes and 8 seconds. Thankfully, he did this before he polished off 2 Semlor at a cafe in Halmstad before his flight back to the UK!

'2 Semlor Dave'

Born To Run Workshop

Last weekend I attended the aptly named 'Bulletproof Runner Workshop' organised by Born To Run, in Gothenburg. The course is designed to help improve your running technique, performance and injury prevention and is a stepping stone to Lee Saxby's legendary coaching course.

Those that have read the book Born to Run, by Christopher McDougall will know of the barefoot phenomenon. This influenced the popularity of minimalist running shoes, essentially stripping away your big fat-cushioned, inflexible jogging shoes to something which allows your 200,000 + nerve endings in your feet feel the ground again. I read the book and bought the minimalist shoes, but have always been conscious that I may need to improve and change my running technique to suit. This was the weekend!

Joseph and Gourgen were brilliant hosts and taught us loads over the two days. The first morning we ran through various drills to compare our technique against a 'Bulletproof Runner', these consisted of squatting, hoping, bouncing, uni-ped stances and running drills on a treadmill. These tested our ability of the 3 fundamental skills of Posture,  Rhythm and Relaxation which are all important to improve your running efficiency and reduce injury risk. These 3 skills were the catch-words of the weekend!

Watching yourself in slow-motion.

We were filmed both on the treadmill and outside, running at various speeds so that we could watch back at slow motion and discuss how we could improve our running techniques. It was fascinating to see how you move, break it down to the fundamentals and then rebuild a more efficient style. At the same time we were discussing the theory behind why the drills are so important to build strength through the elasticity and reactive ability of the neuromuscular system.

On day 2, we started early with a group recovery run. I am particularly bad at these and find it hard to go out for low-intensity runs and always end up pushing myself too hard. So, to prevent this happening Joseph gave us all a piece of tape and told us to stick it over our mouths! This essentially makes you solely breathe through your nose, which ensures you only run at a pace which suits your nasal inhalation. If you run too fast you will want to rip the tape off and gasp air in and out through your mouth….fail! The theory behind this is that your body requires a certain amount of CO2 to allow O2 to pass from your red blood cells to your muscle tissue, so by breathing through your nose limits the amount of CO2 you exhale thus allowing O2 to pass to your muscle tissue and aid with recovery. It worked a treat and although you look slightly odd with your mouth taped shut, it does make you concentrate about your breathing and running pace.

Tape makes for a quiet run!

All in all it was a great weekend and I learnt a lot about how to improve my running technique and the theory behind introducing some drills into my daily workouts to help build strength and prevent injury. After meeting so many interesting and inspirational runners during the weekend and in a moment of madness after the event, I signed up for the Hallands Ultra 50km race next June! That should be a good test of my running efficiency!

11th June 2016!

Visit the BTR website for more information on this course and Lee Saxby.

Double Digging

For the past month we have been double digging our produce garden. This time honoured technique of digging will provide us with an excellent topsoil, deep rooting zone and well drained vegetable beds. However, this method of cultivation should come with a health warning, it is back breaking work, especially when you have large boulders scattered just below the surface!

So, what is double digging and why are we taking on the challenge? 

This year, we have planned out 6 equally sized vegetable beds, 7 metres in length by 1.5 metres wide, this will give us just under 100sqm of planting area. The double digging process we have pursued is as follows:

- Mark out the vegetable bed; [1]
- With a spade cut the turf layer into small squares; [1]
- Remove approximately 500 cm width of turf layer and put to one side; [1]

- Dig out the soil to approximately two spade depths and also put to oneside (preferably on a tarpaulin), at the same time remove any large stones or boulders; [2]

- Loosen the soil at the bottom of the trench with a fork; [2]

- Scatter organic matter (manure) in the bottom of the trench to about one third of the depth; [3]

- Place cuttings of twigs and branches over the top of the manure; [4]

- Replace the turf dug out at the beginning, but upside down; [5]
- Place a covering of newspaper over the turf; and (finally) [6]
- Cover over with the soil you dug out. [6]

Quite a lengthy process, I think you would agree, but this will be worth the effort. Double digging loosens soil to a greater depth and therefore adds air deeper into the soil which enables roots to grow and the microbes to create good soil structure. This is key to creating the most productive vegetable bed.

Hopefully we will be able to reap the rewards later on in the year...watch this space.

Hard Labour

So, the first week in Sweden has been pretty energised. Apart from getting used to living in a completely different, even alien environment, we have kept ourselves busy by jumping head first into some essential manual labour. This comes part of the package when you live fairly remotely and have a bit of land to look after.

First job was to cut back and clear any debris, such as twigs, branches and trees from the electric fence that surrounds our property. Presently, this is used to stop unwanted creatures in, i.e. the wild boar! They have been burrowing in one of the fields, so keeping the fence live to prevent entry is key. This job gradually turned into a tree felling exercise, so brandishing a saw we started to remove some of the trees that were too close to the fence. Fun! We still have a way to go but the pile of logs is pretty big and should make for a good Easter bonfire celebration.

Second job was to start thinking about the Produce Garden. This is a key element of our self-sufficiency plans and we want to be ready to transplant the seeds and seedlings come the beginning of April. We agreed on a perfect location; slightly sloping ground facing south and within close distance from the house. We set out the beds in 7.5m x 1.5m bays and started to dig. The actual technical term is 'double digging' but we'll go into more detail on that in another post. Anyway, this turned out to be really hard work, as the top layer, just beneath the surface was littered with large stones and the odd boulder. We persevered and reached halfway along the bed. Unfortunately the weather turned for the worse, so we will be hitting it hard again this coming week when the freezing rain disappears.

All in all a good first week and the sign of times to come, my body has that satisfied achey feeling all over. Bring it on!

Trying to Keep Fit

I am not exercising much at the moment and I could blame parenthood in combination with office working, but that wouldn’t be very honest of me. Let’s face it, I am being a bit lazy. Until the day comes that I am feeling less lazy, I am sticking to a few things that easily slot into my everyday life:

1. Active commuting: I cycle to and from the office everyday, which adds up to 56km a week.
2. Mobility WODs: We have recently been inspired by MobilityWOD to do more stretching. So far, I am squatting and doing the ‘couch stretch’ while watching television.
3. Playing: Yesterday, I played tag with my 5 year old nephew, hung upside down and climbed up a kids’ climbing frame. This is particularly easy to incorporate once the little ones start running and climbing around.
4. Yoga: A few sun salutations go a long way, especially in the middle of a working day to clear the brain fog and get the blood flowing to the brain again.

All in all, I think I am keeping relatively fit and when the day comes for my next run, I think I will be ok… in pain, but I’ll survive.

Outdoor Gym

We've got some awesome entrepreneurs out here in the sticks. Two local teenage girls decided to organize an outdoor gym, I'm impressed! Check out the HUGE tractor tire in the background. Can't wait to attack that one. 

Now I just need to figure out what to do...

Unfortunately, we've had some less productive "entrepreneurship" in the woods lately, with half of the woods being fenced off by a pissed off builder. After a fair few angry articles and interviews in the media as well as some local vigilante action, the builder has at least taken down the gates. This leaves some rather lonely looking ladders. Perhaps they can be incorporated into some kind of obstacle course? Wouldn't want them to go to waste, they are awfully sturdy.

So very wheelchair friendly

Kettlebells

Our crossfit friends Sevan and Darren recently introduced me to Russian Kettlebells. Essentially, they look like large cast iron cannon balls with a handle on top.

8kg and 12kg Kettlebells

What sets the kettlebell apart from the trusty dumbbell is that they are far more versatile and take up a small amount of space, which is great if you are working out from home. I have subsequently learnt that they have been around far longer (300 years) than the standard dumbbells seen in most gyms.  

One thing I first noticed about the kettlebell, is how it feels slightly heavier and a bit more awkward to hold than a dumbbell. This is down to its centre of mass being extended farther out from your body, so making it harder to handle and manoeuvre. This ensures that when you do lifts or swings you have to concentrate more on your form to keep the kettlebell stable, thus improving your technique.

I am still learning new routines, but so far I have been able to target all the main muscle groups and core.  One of my favourites is called the Kettlebell Get-Up. It works the entire body and begins with you laid out on the floor and standing up with a kettlebell raised in the air. It's not as easy as it sounds.

At the moment, we only have an 8kg and 12kg kettlebell, but as we become more confident in the routines and stronger we will be adding to our collection.

For more information, have a look at the really informative blog by Ben Greenfield.

http://www.bengreenfieldfitness.com/2014/04/more-endurance-in-less-time/

Instead of a Workout

We're still knackered after the CrossFit workout, so Cat and I skipped the morning run. Weaklings, I know. Instead, we spent most of the day working in the garden. Raking grass, cutting branches, lifting roof tiles, digging holes, refilling holes, playing with daddy's axe...

Posing with weapon

As pappa is still recovering from his surgery, he had to resort to giving instructions. More difficult than you think, as he'd rather do everything himself. Cat put him in his place though.

Always a pleasure to boss your dad around 

I have a feeling we'll be sleeping well tonight. And probably aching some more tomorrow. 

Checking Out Swedish CrossFit

Today Cat and I checked out our first Swedish CrossFit box, making friends with some lovely ladies in Ängelholm. Coach Kitt (the deceptively sweet-looking lady in the middle) showed little mercy to the newbies, testing our thigh pain threshold... Oh yeah, Cat and I will be doing some rather awkward walking tomorrow.

It's called the "red face gene", be proud 

Showing Some Skin

I went for my first barefoot run of the year today. As the soles of my feet need a few weeks to get used to running without protection, I took it easy, running for 30 minutes in the park followed by an hourlong walk along the canal.   

Sidestepping daffodils and dog doo

I've been running and walking barefoot or in barefoot shoes (Vivo and Luna Sandals are my favourites) for close to 3 years now. As with a lot of things that I have changed over the years, it started with a problem. 

I've always been told that I have extremely high arches and that I should be wearing insoles. I caved in my late teens and got tailored insoles from my German podiatrist. He tutted and pointed out how my arches were already collapsing. Lucky me for finding him and his magic insole wand! 

The years went by and I would always choose flat, cushioned shoes over high heels, use ever more advanced insoles and buy top of the range running shoes (the models were always chosen based on my hideous pronation).

Despite my best intentions, a few years ago, my rather modest running habit starting giving me knee pains. At first, it took me a few days to recover. Then it took me a week. Then two weeks. Then a month. You get the picture. How could this be? I was doing everything right! 

So I found a physiotherapist to sort me out. She diagnosed severe ITB and started me on a program of foam rolling. Makes grown men cry. Trust me. She taped my legs and massaged and kneaded and I slowly started recovering. 

The next step was to do a gait analysis and then to create a new set of insoles. This is where my alarm bells went ding DONG and I started stalling. It seemed to me that doing more of the same would just be idiocy. At the same time, I had also come across the concept of barefoot running via Born To Run. Although I don't think we all should be running ultra marathons in leather sandals (way too much cardio, but that's a different story) there was something very alluring about the simple notion of chucking your shoes and healing foot, knee, hip and back issues. 

So I went for it. I threw out my expensive insoles. I bought new shoes. I started running tentatively both completely barefoot and in my new shoes (CAUTION: if you want to try this, start extremely slowly, your body will thank you). Slowly but surely, the last bit of my ITB disappeared. My arches strengthened and stopped aching from my hourlong walks. My toes stopped going numb from my weakened arches. My hips stopped clicking and getting "stuck". And my knees stopped hurting. 

Funny that. What if I had listened to my physio? The physio who prided herself in having started all her children on insoles as soon as they started walking? Who wondered how people in the olden days coped with ITB? It never struck her that maybe they didn't have it???

Ok, so going completely barefoot is perhaps a bit controversial. Even nuts. Especially in London. Camden is a bit gross, I admit. People look at you funny/ point at you/ laugh at you. So barefoot shoes are a pretty decent option. 

Although I don't mind being called crazy (thanks for the compliment!), shouldn't it be the other way around? Look at your own feet. The shoes you squeeze them into. Have you considered how they may be contributing to your foot, knee, shin, hip, lower back, shoulder pains? Aren't you the crazy one? ;-)

You've lost that squishy feeling, oh-oh that squishy feeling

CrossFit Poster Girl (Kinda)

My recent session with Officer M in the SE11 gym was "immortalised" in a blog post on beginner's CrossFit:

http://crossfitse11.com/taking-personal-responsibility/

I love that the post is called Taking Personal Responsibility, as I immediately took it personally and yanked out the broomstick from the closet to start practicing the various lifts that I struggle with. Plus asked RifRaf to order another resistance band for me on Amazon. And constructed a workout to keep the sisterly competitive spirit alive.

I guess sometimes egocentricity can a good thing. :-) Bon, the running track is waiting for me.

My First WOD

Getting up this morning was a bit of chore, to say the least. Those two glasses of wine might as well have been a triple espresso, because I did not sleep at all last night (is this just me???). However, lovely officer M, the CrossFit instructor, had to reschedule our first proper training session for early this morning, so I gladly sucked it up and downed my egg coffee and bacon & eggs and set off through the early morning mist to Vauxhall.

My first ever WOD included the following (to be down with the CrossFit kids, you need to learn an awful lot of acronyms, WOD means Workout of the Day):

20 x squat
15 x sit-up
10 x hang power clean
5 x pull-up

The goal of this particular WOD was to see how quickly I could do 3 of these sets in a row (and not croak). Overall time was 9 minutes and a bit and I actually felt pretty damn awesome afterwards. Not sure what it is about this stuff that just gives me a kick!

About to die during last set

After trying out a few more exercises (box jumps being my new favourites for trying out in the park), I walked home again. What took me 1 hr and 10 in the morning probably took me more than twice as long. Not sure if I should blame that on being unfit (how hard can ten minutes of exercise be?) or the sunshine. :-)

Wild Swimming

I love water! When I saw that there was a river close to the castle, I got it into my head that I wanted to go for a swim. The daughter of the house clearly thought I was nuts, but kindly showed me a lovely bend in the river at the bottom of one of the fields on our morning walk. 

To give you an idea of the weather, check out the layers I was wearing before the skinny dip (not even the dogs would join me...):

The complicated undressing in the mud was well worth it though. Betting I will be sleeping well tonight. 

Mummy Workout

Russian twist with wiggly baby

Last weekend, we had a visit from our lovely friend Sevan who happens to be a personal trainer and mother to a six month old little charmer. As usual when we meet, we talked about nutrition, training and babies. It is no secret that I am not in the same shape as before pregnancy and I struggle to fit any kind of workout into my daily routine. As the good friend that she is, Sevan won't let me get away with those kind of excuses and had a great solution to my problem: doing mini workouts with baby, i.e. either keeping eye contact (and making funny noises) or using baby as a weight (similar to working out with a medicine ball!).

Here are some exercises that I can do in the comfort of my own living room:

1. Squats with or without baby
2. Lunges with or without baby
3. Front raises with baby (straight arms)
4. Plank next to baby or above baby lying on the floor
5. Press ups, like the plank
6. Bench press with baby (definitely laugh inducing)
7. Sit-ups while lifting baby from behind your head to the front of your body
8. Russian twist, lifting baby from side to side
9. Calf raises with or without baby

The possibilities are endless! Lil T's favourite seems to be the sit-ups with her flying over my head.

Attempted press up

Holiday Workout

Looking for any opportunity to squeeze in a workout, we found a novel way of utilising the infinity pool on our recent trip to the Philippines…..tough I know!

Using the wall of the lower pool, we could jump up and grab hold of the top of the wall (overhand grip) and then complete wide and close arm pull-ups. Obviously, due to being half submerged in water this meant that we were not pulling our full body weight, but increasing the reps and super-setting with 5-10 lengths of swimming between each set, meant a decent workout.

A typical circuit was:

10 x wide arm pull ups;

10 lengths front crawl;

10 x close arm pull ups;

10 x lengths breast stroke;

10 x wide arm pull ups;

10 x length back stroke;

10 x close arm pull ups;

10 lengths front crawl;

Easy swim to warm down

We even managed to get other family members involved in some infinity pool pull-up action!

Sprint Addiction

I don't always practice what I preach, I'm afraid. I was planning to go to the gym last night, but backed out when I saw the tiny cramped room. Doing weighted squats with someone's armpit in my face? Think not. This is a pic before the arrival of all my colleagues, but you get the idea....

Instead, I went for a run in the lovely surroundings, covering a golf course (some lovely grass to run barefoot on), a few side walks, and eventually turning up on the beach. And then I couldn't resist: I did some more sprints, this time in the sand.

It is perhaps a bit of a luxury problem, to get hooked on sprinting, but this is something I notice with a lot of exercise-related things. I end up wanting to do them every day because of the boost I get, then try to pace myself because I don't want to get injured, then fall out of the habit. This time I figured that Mosley will be my guiding light, as the sprints felt fantastic and there was no pain during exertion. Perhaps running up a hill and running through wet sand require the use of slightly different muscle groups?

Post-Christmas Circuits

Our first circuit work-out over the Christmas break was in the nearby woods where there is a small outdoor gym with pull up bars, sit-up table and shoulder press. It was a relatively simple workout focussing on core, leg and a small amount of upper body.

Circuit work-out included:

3km warm up trail run

10 x burpees

10 x overhead weighted squats

10 x box jumps

5 x chest to bar pull ups

AMAYC in 4 mins. We did the workout twice.

Cecilia pushing out some overhead weighted squats

The outdoor gym was perfect and we were able to forage in the forest for a recently cut log to use for the overhead weighted squats (not sure on the weight). We also used a rubber band (Christmas present for Cecilia) to aid with the pull ups.

The heart was racing by the end, but we both felt great afterwards.

Autumnal Benefits 2

A week or so ago, I wrote about my leaf clearing workout and the disappointment of just putting the leaves out for the garbage men to collect.

Well, in the last few days the final load of leaves fell off the lime trees into our garden and this time it was Cat who went to get some fresh air and sweep them up. After a comment one of our readers made about using the leaves to feed the soil, Cat swept the leaves up and dumped them in our nearly empty veg patch (beets, chard and leeks still going strong) and turned them into the soil.

Cat working the veg patch!

Hopefully, the leaves will decompose in the veg patch by feeding worms and give us a rich soil for next years garden produce.

Autumnal Benefits

With autumn well and truly underway and the trees shedding their vibrant leaves, last weekend I finally found a spare hour or two to tackle the mounting leaf coverage in our garden.

We have two large Lime trees in our garden, that seem to hold an enormous number of leaves and which come autumn turn a vivid yellow and then promptly fall to the ground. For a short while, this yellow blanket transforms our garden until the rain comes and makes the leaves a slip hazard.

So, I spent Sunday morning sweeping and clearing up these leaves. This made me think about the benefits:

I was outside. It was a brisk morning (5-6ºC), the sun was shining and there was not a cloud in the sky, so this made me feel happy;

I was burning calories. Sweeping and clearing leaves gets heart rate up, so I was keeping fit;

I was tidying the garden. With the leaves gone, the garden is back to looking fairly respectable and the borders are clear;

I was removing the hazard. No-more slip-sliding down the path, especially treacherous when you have a young baby.

In total, I had filled 3 large refuse sacks full of leaves which I left out for refuse collection on the Tuesday. I thought afterwards, there must be a way of using all of these leaves for our benefit. A much better scenario would be, for us to have a composting bin ready for the leaves, so that we could turn them into leaf mould, ready for feeding our garden the following year. 

It goes to show, that even the seemingly most mundane chore of clearing leaves can provide health, well-being and garden benefits. The leaf blanket has returned, so I am sure I will be out in the garden again this weekend!