MAYhem Monthly Step Challenge--MAYbe it's time to step it up and get a little crazy with your goals

[Baltoscott]

So April was a reset month, a restart of the January goals you dropped in February ;-).  For the MAYhem challenge this month, get a little creative; sure, get your steps — always gotta do that — but add some floors, or do a 5K, or post a pic of something 2 or 3 miles away from your couch! You get the idea, it’s MAYhem!!

   
How It Works:

The primary purpose of these monthly challenges has been to keep track of your daily step goals for the month; though many of us track other things as well, like body weight exercises, sleep, trips to the gym, logging food, etc. This is not a competition to see who can do the most of whatever, instead it is a challenge to measure your consistency. So whether you do 1k, 5k, 10k or even 40k steps a day, this is measuring how many days out of the monthly total you can hit your goal.

Some might have a constant goal of 10k steps every single day and others might have a variable goal throughout the week, (and some might even plan days off!) for example.
Monday -> Friday = 10k steps a day
Sat & Sun = “6k steps a day,” or “not tracking”

Regardless of how you structure your daily goals, the only thing that matters for the monthly challenge is whether or not you reach what you set out to do.

Suggested Posting Format
1) Post either your constant or variable step goal.
2) Keep track of the # of daily goals achieved out of the monthly minimum and or monthly total

Although you certainly don’t have to post daily, you’ll likely stay closer to what you set out to do by updating the thread several times/week and that will give the rest of us incentive to update our own progress.

Injury Notice
If you injure yourself during the month and need to scale back due to the injury, then all you have to do is adjust your goal for that period. If you normally do 10k steps a day but pull a hamstring and decide to do minimal walking (2k steps a day), then all you have to do is change your goal.

[GershonSurge]

@Dominique,

If you copy your reply over to the nutritarian topic, I'll be able to reply in depth to your post. It wouldn't be on topic in this topic. I think I can do it without needing any references to research. Just plain old common sense will do. 

[Ennay]

All goals except high day are weekly.  All weeks begin on Monday

	April	May	Week 1	Week 2	Week 3	Week 4	Total
steps per week	106393	105000	95373
burn per week	19990	21000	19475
weights per week		3	2
HIIT per week	0	1	0
High day	25031	25000
Weight loss	6.8		3.6

9 K Saturday, 8 K Sunday. 

Baseball tournament, ended up scoring all 5 games so not as many steps as hoped but I noticed my NEAT burn was up quite a bit from standing and cheering and being squirmy.  NEAT is part of why my burn has dropped off in the last month, I am getting my walking in but returning to more sedentary practices when not exercising. In March I was doing better at being active when not exercising.

Weight loss was high this week, but I suspect I am somewhat dehydrated from 2 days of sun and not enough water and some of it will come back in the next couple days.

[Jotex]

May 7

10,000 steps a day average - 7/31

15,000 steps a day x 5 - 2/5

Made my 15,000+ step goal again today! Whoop!

[Baltoscott]

May 7

-15K steps/day for all 31 days.     7/31
-1 pushup/day for all 31 days       7/31
-13 weight-lifting days:                   4/13

- 50 floors or more for 20 days:      5/20

-Sleep 6+ hours 12 days:               2/12

Good workout in the gym this morning, but my sore shoulder is looking forward to a “deload” week next week.

[GershonSurge]

Food cost was a little high at $5.18 because I had too many servings of fruit and also because I burned more calories I had to replace. 

[NellyG]

8 May

Steps 10,000 per day                                       7/20

High step day over 20,000                              1 👍

Swim twice per week                                       1/2     3/8

Fitbit Coach or bike ride - one per week      -/1      1/4    

Dance 6 hours per week                                 2/6     6/24

[rylohnes]

Good morning, Good morning, Good morning!!!! Remeber, whats worth the prize is always worth the fight!!

I hope everybody is ready to own Tuesday!!

So far:

87000 steps/wk - 18144 - On track for 87000

15000+ steps/ day - 4/8

[Ennay]

12K steps yesterday.  Got home from taking my mom to the airport and just collapsed.  Was on track to have my lowest day since getting the fit bit but I dragged myself out for a post dinner walk. Need to catch up on a full week of work now. 😛

[Baltoscott]

May 8

-15K steps/day for all 31 days.     8/31
-1 pushup/day for all 31 days       8/31
-13 weight-lifting days:                   4/13

- 50 floors or more for 20 days:      6/20

-Sleep 6+ hours 12 days:               2/12 

-sign up for or do one organized event:   The sign up part of this goal is accomplished.  Wife and I will do the DC Bike Ride on May 19.

[A_Lurker]

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@A_Lurker wrote:

1) 10,000 steps each day

2) some other form of exercise (rowing, elliptical, strength training... may include gardening)

3) 7h sleep average each week

4) checking in each day

---

1) 8/31

2) 3 (rowing), 3 (elliptical), 2 (resistance)

3) week 1 (6hr31m), week 2 (so far) 7hr 50m

4) 7/31

Was getting ready for bed last night and realized that I had skipped checking in.  Was tempted to come back downstairs and do it, but decided I was sleepy enough that I should head for bed instead.  I'm not sure it's my longest sleep (in one stretch) but it's close.  Okay, I went back and look - Jan 21st I did longer, but I hadn't slept at all the night before.

[GershonSurge]

 

Steps were a little low because I burned calories doing work that didn't involve steps. I'll need to eat more food today to gain a little bit of weight. That means a couple extra meals. 🙂 Time to make my second breakfast. 

[Jotex]

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@GershonSurge wrote:

Steps were a little low because I burned calories doing work that didn't involve steps. I'll need to eat more food today to gain a little bit of weight. That means a couple extra meals. 🙂 Time to make my second breakfast. 

---

That will never be the case with me = the NEED to eat more and gain weight!!! Your second breakfast reminded me of Merry and Pippin in Lord of the Rings! 😂

 https://youtu.be/XkzvHtjnNOs

[NellyG]

9 May  I did my first audio Coach workout today (with my flyers) and it was good. I did the walking interval medly. I think Im going to be a bit stiff tomorrow. I'll definitely do more of them

Steps 10,000 per day                                       8/20

High step day over 20,000                              1 👍

Swim twice per week                                       1/2     3/8

Fitbit Coach or bike ride - one per week      1/1      2/4    

Dance 6 hours per week                                 2/6     6/24

[rylohnes]

Good morning, Good morning, Good morning!!!! Remember, whats worth the prize is always worth the fight!!

Lets have a kick a** Wednesday!!!!

So far:

87000 steps/wk - 37292 - On track for 87000

15000+ steps/ day - 6/8

[rylohnes]

Good morning, Good morning, Good morning!!!! Remember, whats worth the prize is always worth the fight!!

Lets have a kick a** Wednesday!!!!

So far:

87000 steps/wk - 37292 - On track for 87000

15000+ steps/ day - 6/8

[GershonSurge]

@Jotex,

Let's change the way of looking at things, and you will see you need to sometimes gain weight. Anytime a person loses too quickly, their body demands more food. If that demand isn't satisfied, they will get hungry or lethargic or both. I suggest targeting one pound a week and setting a goal of losing 1/7 pound a day. I'll use one of my old plateaus as an example.

 Set up a table like this in Exel if you know how. If not, do it on graph paper. The green row is the target weight for the day. The yellow bars are a pound above or below, and the red bars are two pounds above or below.

Anytime the weight is above the green bar, it means the person has excess energy reserve. If they are below, they have an energy deficiency.

Don't panic either way. Just eat a little more or a little less that day. Because of the presentation of data, it will psychologically feel like you need to gain weight on the days you are below the target.

You can count calories like I'm doing now for non-weight reasons. On the days you need to lose, you can wait until you feel real hunger before eating. On the days you need to gain, eat when you feel like you have enough room. Or just eyeball the portions a little bigger or smaller. 

Soon, I'll be using a similar method to increase my calories burned. The byproduct will be increased work accomplished.

By the way, the term second breakfast did come from Lord of the Rings. 🙂

[Jotex]

@GershonSurge — I knew it (TLTR!)! 😄

You are so thoughtful to explain your system and the hows and whys. Thank you! The thing is, I never lose weight too quickly {I wish!}! After all the dieting overvthe years, the ups and downs, at age 63 my body is resistant to big changes — particularly in the area of weight loss and getting fit. But I will save your post just in case this changes! 

[Ennay]

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@GershonSurge wrote:

Anytime the weight is above the green bar, it means the person has excess energy reserve. If they are below, they have an energy deficiency.

Don't panic either way. Just eat a little more or a little less that day. Because of the presentation of data, it will psychologically feel like you need to gain weight on the days you are below the target.

---

But this is entirely ignoring the most likely cause of the fluctuation which is water fluctuation.  If it works for you psychologically that's fine, but if your weight spikes or drops from day to day it is very very unlikely to be excess or deficient energy reserves vs. water shifts. Even something as small as a shift in humidity can cause water changes. Rather than adjusting on daily numbers look at the big picture.  I weigh daily but I dont make adjustments based on the weight.  I will eat a little more if I burn a lot more that day, but other than that I just hold the course.  I've had 11 day periods where I've lost nothing and 11 day periods where I lost 5 lbs.  Over time it averages out.

[Ennay]

~17K yesterday.  Got in a long walk with a friend, brought home a lost puppy (and found it's owner - facebook does have its upsides) and then had a short walk before my sons baseball game.  Weird game last night.  We played this team on Sunday in a tournament and it was a tough game  - went into extra innings.  Last night it was like they didn't care at all and the game got mercy ruled after 4 innings at 15-0.  This is a team that is rather famous for being kind of jerks and over the top competitive so it was extra weird.

[Baltoscott]

Agreeing with @Ennay that daily weight change is mostly a shift in water retention and not a good indication of whether you were in an energy surplus or deficiency for the day.  It would be much better to weigh in daily, but look at changes in weekly averages of weight readings (as calculated in the fitbit app), or moving averages of weight readings (as calculated by TrendWeight).  For the most part, water change will even out over the course of the week and changes in the weight average or moving average will more closely represent energy surplus or deficiency.

[Baltoscott]

May 9

-15K steps/day for all 31 days.     9/31
-1 pushup/day for all 31 days       9/31
-13 weight-lifting days:                   5/13

- 50 floors or more for 20 days:      7/20

-Sleep 6+ hours 12 days:               2/12 

-sign up for or do one organized event:   The sign up part of this goal is accomplished.  Wife and I will do the DC Bike Ride on May 19.

I think I've mentioned that my normal wake up time on commuting days (Tue, Wed, Thur) is 4:45 am.  I hardly ever get my 6+ sleep hours on those days, but if I can get into bed by around 9:30 pm I've got a chance (I usually have 45 minutes of "awake" time in my sleep record, so I need to be in bed close to 7 hours to get 6 hours of sleep).  So I shoot for a 9:30 pm bed time, and usually get to bed around 10 or 10:30 undermining my chances.  But lately, even getting to bed at 9:30 hasn't been early enough. Hawthorn (old dog) started barking for breakfast at 3:45 am Tuesday morning and I wound up with just over 4 hours sleep that day.  He slept in until 4:00 am this morning, and I got to bed a little earlier, but still wound up with just 5 hrs. 2 min sleep.  Grrr.Hawthorn — March 2016

My sleep nemesis -- March 2016