Things have been crazy for me the last few weeks. I’m finishing up one job with a major project that has been dragging on way too long. It’s the lynchpin that has held me to my old job – plus it really takes a significant amount of time and organization to move. Everything I own sans my road bike, clothing, and laptop was picked up Friday.
I’m evaluating where to live for my new job: sleepy town with a 5 minute walk to work, or big centre that is a 20 – 30 minute low traffic drive. There is a lot to things to think about going forward, but the big thing I’m interested in is getting back on a training plan.
Going forward I’ll be working more on sports and fitness technology. I really want to converge my job and my lifestyle, which is something that is commonplace in new, young, vibrant companies whereas there is less of that in older corporate companies. For me, that means that work can be a bit more flexible, but I don’t mind long days or testing a piece of hardware on a bike ride on my own time. In fact, the more sports tech I have access to, the better.
I’ve found that older style corporate environments are not ideal to a more physically active lifestyle. I won’t go into specifics, but the short of it is that it can feel more accepting of smokers than runners or cyclists. In some cases a lack of a shower or an open ideology to being active means can mean there is no chance of a physically active employee.
So what does this change mean for me:
It means a dedicated training (and food) plan. While some people use exercise and training interchangeably, I think of them as distinct and very different. Exercise is great but usually less structured and focus, while a training plan means something is planned with long term vision and each workout is decided beforehand – and you fight through an off day, or use a rest day as expected.
So this gets to something I’d like to do. I’ve been using several pieces of software and I haven’t found a good summary of them, their uses, etc. I kind of want to do something similar to what Ray does with his in-depth reviews, but for online workout tracking software. The biggest challenge is that they change – so a review 3 months old might not be valid. So here is a quick review and for reference TGI = Thoughts Going Into the Evaluation.
