As we're already one third of the way into this year, I thought I'd do a progress report on my training. Well, I've not reached the lofty heights of a consistent 10 hours a week that I was aiming for, but I'm averaging more hours than my lazy alter ego managed last year. It seems I'm doing on average around 6 hours a week, which is roughly one hour a day. There's two ways I can look at this. Being a perfectionist I can berate myself and say it's nowhere near enough, and certainly not as much as I could easily do. But also being a postive person, I can see the value of setting targets that you don't hit. If setting a target of 10 hours means that although I don't reach it, I'm still doing 3 times as much as I was before, how can I complain?

The Cardio Connection

One way I am changing my training routine is by adding some cardio exercise. My wing chun training doesn't give me enough aerobic exercise and I know I need it. I've found a way to integrate some into my training so that it actually helps the Wing Chun aspect. I thought I would start doing two long siu lim tau sessions per week (maybe 30 minute ones). The problem is, I really need to be warmed up for them or injuries prevail. So, in order to both warm up and get my aerobic exercise I'm going to precede my long siu lim taus with maybe 20 - 25 minutes of cardio work. Win win.

Also, I like having the muscle tone I used to have when I weight trained so I've started doing a mere 5 minutes of pressups and situps at the end of my Wing Chun training. Just as a compromise. Without breaks in between I do 5 pressups, 5 situps, 10 pressups, 10 situps, 15 pressups, 15 situps. I then have a little break to avoid passing out before doing 20 pressups and 20 situps. It's not much for now (certainly not much compared to what I used to do), but I'll aim to keep increasing that last pressup/situp cycle.