I think anyone with pre-existing health conditions would be wise to be cautious and seek medical advice before any vigorous exercise or other regime.
There are plenty of their ways of improving weight, blood pressure, cholesterol.
The only bit I’d ask @mickbald to consider is the statement ‘I am overweight… so I need to do a lot of exercise’. Exercise will help but as I’m often found repeating, you can’t out-train your diet. However you can adjust your diet so that you get a better balance between things you enjoy and the benefits of reducing some empty calories. That way you’ll also see the benefits of your long walks etc.
Agreed Wayne. I started dieting seriously about 3 weeks before lockdown when I touched “obese” on the BMI for the first time. I cut down drinking a fair bit but not totally, cut out my normal sandwich before bed, have low calorie meals for breakfast and lunch and still have a decent evening meal.
I’ve lost just over a stone since I started.
My blood pressure is 144 / 77 and pulse rate 77 at rest this morning. Never checked it while walking.
I’m aiming to loose another stone and ideally a 1 1/2 stone but that might be a bit ambitious.
Sandwich before bed That’s what my nan used to do for me plus a pint of milk before bed time to try to bulk me up as a young teenager!
The thing I always come back to is don’t deprive yourself or eliminate things that aren’t replaced with better options, otherwise its not sustainable. Its about finding a new diet that you can live with over the long term.
You could lose your extra 1.5 st it’s just a matter of time and being consistent. 2 lbs loss per week at the start is normal and then 1 lb per week after would see you where you want to be in roughly 3 months time.
Back to Wim Hof, I would say that maybe instead of holding breath, maybe controlled breathing/ meditation using an app etc might help with reducing blood pressure and easing your resting heart rate down? Oh and reduce salt and increase fibre intake.
Yes wim hof breathing is a hormonal stressor as is the showers and if you are doing fasting or anything else like that, then it’s a heavy toll on the body.
I do 5-10 minutes meditation after the breathing exercises. Does me wonders.
True, but I like to stress my body, it’s how I get my kicks. Realistically comparing to others is helpful to see what you can achieve. The problem is the word realistically, very easy to look 500 steps ahead rather than 1 or 2.
I’ve some recent experience, may or may not be relevant
Despite getting fit after taking up cycling more seriously I stayed a fairly stable weight. I found that a bit strange, whether I rode 100 or 250 miles in a week there was little fluctuation. Bumped into an old friend who’d also taken up cycling, he’s a good deal bigger than myself and pointed out the exercise is important but it’s the intake that’ll determine weight gain or loss.
A couple of years back I had the opportunity to ride a big event in the Alps. 5000m of climbing over 110 miles. Every kilo makes a difference in that sort of terrain so I determined to drop from my usual 73-4 kilo’s down to under 70 assuming I didn’t notice an impact on strength.
I ate breakfast and dinner as normal, cut out snacks and dessert, chopped alcohol to no more than a G&T or glass of wine at the weekend and stuck to a protein shake and the odd energy bar at lunch. This while ramping up the mileage to a consistent 200+ a week. Shed that weight in about a month or so and was able to easily maintain around 69kg. It was tough initially and not snacking required real will power but within 2-3 weeks I got used to it and felt a good deal better sans alcohol.
I’m in a similar position now. For various reasons I did nothing over winter except eat and drink. 78.5kg the consequence. Getting going again you don’t half feel it in the hills. I’m only doing a hundred miles a week at the mo and not as strict on the diet as last time but I’m back down to 76.3 since the start of lockdown. 3kg to go, not finding it easy.
I’ve not looked into Wim Hof before. The breathing is interesting, I remember reading that the early TdF riders would advocate controlled deep breathing in the 5 or 10 minutes before a big climb. It never really worked for me, I tend to feel lightheaded. Greame Obree has espoused during extreme physical exercise take a deep breath, fully exhale, then on the next take a half breath and fully exhale before your next full breath. He reasons one deep breath saturates with oxygen and if you take another straight after you’re mostly dealing with the CO2 without really adding to oxygen levels. I’ve used this on big climbs and it does seem to help. I find it hard to concentrate on keeping it up for any length of time and revert to type as the pain increases… I guess it ties in with WH’s basic breathing principles?
As for cold, I guess it depends on what you’re looking to achieve. SKY cycling did a good deal of research into ice baths and abandoned them when they saw that while there could be benefit it also had down sides from a training point of view. They felt the effect similar to taking ibuprofen, the anti inflammatory action undoes much of the benefit of actually doing the work.
Will take a closer look at WH over the next while.
The cold side of Wim Hof is not for muscle recovery, its about a better immune system, production of brown adipose tissue, improved sleep, fat loss & reduced inflammation. The last one is interesting to me, I was starting to get arthritic symptoms in my knees (years of abuse and several dislocations in each knee cap) gone now. A study just came out on axial spondyloarthritis and the reduction in symptoms and pain from wimhof.
We have been on a new diet and changed a number of things. For the main evening meal, one day veggie, one day fish, 2 days pasta of sorts, 2 days curry and 1 big roast. Breakfast a bowl of cereal or porridge instead of nothing and low calorie soup for lunch instead of large sandwich.
I’m quite enjoying it actually.
I have been loosing 2lb a week up to now so expect it to drop to 1lb a week soon which I would be happy with. I’m just below 13 stone now, aiming for 11.5.
That’s what my nan used to do for me plus a pint of milk before bed time to try to bulk me up as a young teenager!
