Let There Be Light

Light Is Good

Jan 05, 2023

Reflecting

There is no such thing as bad weather. But a solid week of clouds and rain in the 40s is close. This makes it tricky to get enough sun which is critical for vitamin D as well as your circadian rhythm. Getting direct bright sunlight in the morning is one of the best ways to help sleep at the end of the day. What to do? Everyone benefits from vitamin D and you can always take a supplement when free D is hiding behind rain clouds. Most people are deficient, especially people with dark skin or living in northern latitudes. Take a trip to the DWS capital of the world, Majorca, which is currently sunny and warm. But for an inferior to Majorca but more convenient solution, I rely on a number of artificial lights to start my day before the sun half-heartedly rises.

Wake up to light as well as sound with a wake-up light that mimics the sunrise* then spend a few minutes in front of a red light. Keep a bright headlamp charged up so you’re always ready for a run; the best one is Petzl’s Nao RL – light and balanced weight with an automatically adjusting beam. Never hit the snooze button because it is winter; instead of surrendering to we have the tools to defeat the cold, dark, and wet.

*This alarm clock recommendation is made in honor of each of the people who signed up for 5 AM CrossFit but were not, in fact, at 5 AM CrossFit.

Training

This morning’s white board:

6 Rounds

Run 3 Laps
6 DBall Over the Shoulder 100/60
12 Sit-ups

After that I worked on dynamic lower:

Trap Bar Deadlifts 8x3
Back Extensions 4x12 (weighted)
Step up negatives 4x8 (3 counts down)
Belt Squat 3x1 Minute March Holding Fat DBs Banded Hamstring Curls 3x50

Next run:

Fueling

Lunches this week:

Supplementing

Magnesium over melatonin for sleep; my favorite is Magnesium Acetyl-Taurate.

Measuring

I spent the day at the Pioneer Performance Center on Monday (they went above and beyond the call of duty to open it up on a vacation day for me) where I gave quite a bit of blood and sweat (no tears) to measure my body’s composition and performance as well as biomechanical efficiency. Results and analysis come in next week. Meanwhile: they validated my home measurements. Both InBody and Apple watch data were consistent enough to renew my confidence in their data. You only care about what you measure, so if you care about body composition and performance, both the InBody scale and Apple watch are useful tools (and quite good values compared with accessing professional equivalents that differ only to the right of the decimal).

Recovering

For winding down, try to give yourself a sleep opportunity window of an extra hour beyond your sleep target (for me that’s 9 hours). Keep it cold (at most 68 degrees), silent and pitch black. For silence. For darkness. I’ve mentioned these before, so please comment if they’ve helped.