Wednesday, April 12, 2006

Tic toc tic toc tic toc

Time.
I wasn't planning on getting verbose this evening. But I can feel the words are going to flow a little bit better than usual, so I might as go with it. I'm going to talk a little about time management. Yea, I know one or two of you have smirk on your face, just hear me out.
It's said that the average working Joe actually has about 8 hours of free time each and every day. The problem is that free time comes in a little chunks throughout the day, thus it's difficult to get a long stretch of free time. This makes it easy to put off stuff we know we should be doing but just don't have enough 'time'. Going for workout is a good example. Making excuses not to do something is the easy way out. Anyway, back to the topic. Where do you find time???
My trick is get as much as free time in a row as possible. Here's a typical day/example. Up at 5:30. Out the door in 15 minutes and at my desk working by 6:20. No lining up at Tim's for 10 minutes to get a coffee, no stopping to read the paper - all of these little things cut into my quality time. I eat at my desk, while working, I work through my breaks and lunch and I sure the hell don't go outside for 10 smoke breaks a day. I snack on the go and eat in the car on the way home. Within 15 minutes of arriving home, I'm out the door and doing my run workout. Yea it can be tough - but that's just mental, just suck it up and get it done.
Bam! Workout number 1 already done. Next I eat, do some chores, grab snack and get ready for workout number 2. If I'm lucky, I can grab a 20 minute nap. Do workout number 2, get dinner ready, get all my stuff ready for the next day. Food, coffee, uniform laid out, showered etc. If all goes well, I have an hour to chill with Sally or fart around on the computer. Then it's off to bed.
The point is. YOU have the time - just stop wasting it. No excuses and nothing is impossible.

Ok, let me climb down from the soapbox and tell you what I did today. Yesterday was a bit of leg frier, so today was an 8k easy run and a pretty hard 4600m swim session. Here's the swim details:
1000m warmup
6X400m on 6:15
5X200m on 3:15
cooldown
Other then my arms getting a little tired, I have no complaints and I'm pretty happy with the day's workout. Cheers!

3 comments:

Cliff said...

Darren,

I find that eating while driving saves a lto of time. No i ain't eating a sandwich. Just snacks like cushews or carrots or tomatoes grape.

What time do u get off work?

For my schedule, I usually workout before and after work. Yes, it is not impossible. If you want it bad enough, you will find the time. :)

Darren said...

Hey cliff
I'm fortunate enough that when my work is done, I'm done. I don't have to sit around and invent stuff to do and look busy. When I'm done actually varies .. the workload is never the same. Some days are better than others.

By the way, I read your blog regularly - sorry due to time constraints I haven't posted yet, but I am following your journey with interest. I hope you have a great ride on Sat - looking forward to your report.

Reddog said...

I am always looking for excuses, I may change my blog to "Excuse Man".

I know this stuff can be done, you do it! What did that famous quote say?

Ninety percent of this game is physical...the other half is mental".

Cheers, Reddog