Wiped out!

 Phew, what a roller-coaster the past dozen or so days have been. Dieting, exercising, counting calories, and trying to find a balance that fits me. Making sure I am getting enough food in to power the furnace, and making sure I don't over do the exercise and out the fire out. 

Yesterday was a busy old day, but before I get onto that, let me mention my highlights so far. 
Increased exercise load, or back to my old normal should I say (with exception to yesterday, but we will come to that)
Reduced food intake, more specifically reduced calorie intake. Ending most days with a 1500+ calorie deficit.

The result of which is a loss from between 14 and 19lbs, depending which starting weight you use. I will be conservative and call it 14lbs. But that is in 10 days, so I am not complaining at that. As usual all weigh-ins are dry. Post activity, post pee etc. Dropping from low 240s to high 220s in that time makes me happy.

I am of course mindful of a couple of things. Early days in weight loss are always productive, seeing a big drop off, then it tapers, but I am OK with that. Even OK with a couple of fluctuations along the way. I am not expecting the same from next week, and would guess at 224 by the end of next week, 222 would be amazing. 
I am also well aware that I carry a lot of muscle mass too, so getting anywhere near what some of the guides recommend. For example, after a weightloss program I did before, I was down to 196lbs. I was asked if I was seriously ill, and told I looked unwell.

So when you see the chart below, it is a bit of a concern. The 132-167 is normal range. 174-202 is overweight, then the next 2 are obese and severely obese. OK 278+ is a bit of a reach even for me, but if I was 174 I would have lost a lot of muscle mass and be wasting away, and somehow still be overweight. Another great reason to ignore science at times.

5 ft 10 in (70 in)	132–167 lb	174–202 lb	209–271 lb	278–376 lb

Next up is blood pressure, when it was tested at a job assessment recently it was quite high. Obviously stress of the situation wasn't helping, but on checking when I got home, it was indeed high. In 2 months I have brought that down to a much better place, and can feel the difference.

Also resting heart rate is a good measure for me, as the weight has gone on, the resting HR has risen. For my weekly average to be 45 or more is a sign I am not doing great, and that is roughly where it has been of late. However the last few weeks have seen that decrease too, and I am back around 40-41bpm average now. Again my body feels in rhythm and unstressed like this. 

However that brings me on to yesterday and today. Deciding to push myself a bit yesterday, I was off, the weather was nice and all that. I first did a 4.5 mile dog walk, then came home and went to the park to do 3 miles of running, including a 10 min benchmark run at high intensity. Then I came home, had a bowl od porridge, and went out for a 30 mile bike ride. The calorie deficit for yesterday was 3,300 by the end of the day, so massive!

I went to bed knowing sleep would not be great, and I was right. Lately my sleep score has been high 80s, last night, just 57. My resting HR was also up to 43, and I woke feeling lethargic. As expected really then. 

So today I need to take things a bit easier, nothing big planned, just a walk in a little while, then maybe a turbo session this afternoon just to loosen things up and keep things moving. Amazingly from all that, I have no aches and pains that I didn't before the day started, so that is nice.

Now if I can just wake up a bit, I can go for a little walk, stretch the legs, relax the mind, and get some fresh air. 

Thanks for reading.

A night shift with the Met

So last night....

I went for a ride along with a response unit from Lewisham Police to get a look behind the curtains of what the job takes.

Shakey start with the front desk not knowing about the arrangement but after one of the sergeants running about a bit I was assigned to 2 officers for the night.

Quiet start to the shift, leaving the station just before 11pm. A bit of a look around the patch, nothing much happening.

Just before 1am we got our first chance to run on blues to reports of a fight. After a 5 mile blue light run, with some absolute terrible driving by members of the public, we arrived with other units, to find it had been stood down as a play fight.

Shortly after assigned to another call, not i-grade. Encountered some more interesting driving along the way, with words of wisdom offered to them for their poor driving.

Just before 2am the officers suggested food at 2.30..

Obviously at 2.20 a car came onto our radar, and after a couple of short bursts of speed, and what seemed it was going to be a fail to stop, a car was stopped. Extra units called for, good quick show of numbers, resulting to one being taken into custody.

To complete the experience I was then permitted to go to custody to see how the processing of someone who has been arrested works. Having seen it all on TV, I was shocked to see just how much longer the process is. Not in a bad way, but it's really not like you see it on TV. Very thorough indeed.

Even seeing the evidential breathalyser machine being used is nowhere near as swift as they show on TV. Just the process of leading up to taking a sample takes a while.

Once the person was safely in a cell, it was time for the paperwork. That is where the real surprises came in. A large pool of hot desks for officers to do their "paperwork" at. A very detailed and long winded system to get everything on record in body cam footage.

Obviously I realise this is VERY important and needs to be done properly, but seeing so many officers at desks having to get all the paperwork done before returning to the streets really highlights how much time is spent on this process. To add insult to injury, after almost 2 hours of doing the report, inc time taken to grab some food, the system decided to crash and the whole report was lost.

As he started it all again, the sergeant came over and suggested it might be a good time to call it a night. I would be lying if I said I wasn't relieved.

It was a real eye opener, and something I would love to do again one day. I would genuinely recommend it to anyone, especially those who have questions about policing and how it works.

Huge thanks to the officers I spent the shift with for answering all my questions and giving me a genuine view of how the streets are policed. And the challenges the police face.