So, it finally happened, the lockdown due to Covid-19 is finally over and we can go back to work. I should really be happy and of course I am, I’m thinking of making money again and actually interacting with people again, which is going to feel very strange but in a positive way.

I’m also reflecting where I was in the middle of April wondering if my breathing problems were due to silicosis or due to me being overweight and not being aerobically fit. It seems like so long ago and I remember having such a different mindset then, even though it was only 10 or 11 weeks ago, it actually feels like I’m remembering a different person. That reads back a little bit dramatic but it’s really how I feel – the spin bike coupled with the exercise plan my friend gave me has changed me. I used to think of exercise that other people did because they had to but now I think of it as something that I do because I want to because it improves my health so makes me feel better.

So, off to work I went, and it was a bit of a wake-up call, straight into it at full speed and that didn’t stop for 6 days. I never had a Fitbit when I was tiling before so I had no Idea about the number of steps and my heartbeat etc, to be honest I never really thought about it – that’s a part of what I meant about having a different mindset because I think of those things now. I knew that tiling kept me physically strong, constantly lifting 20kg bags of adhesive and 30kg boxes of tiles all day would put muscles on anyone, but I never knew how far I carried them – until now.

During the day on Monday I was working and my friend called around midday, I looked at my Fitbit and it said I had already done 10,000 steps, I was amazed, because I wasn’t only walking that far I was also Kangoing up a 40m2 tiled floor too and removing the debris. I actually ended up doing 21,730 steps. As the day and the week went on I was constantly surprised about the amount of steps I was taking, the Fitbit was also automatically recording the time of physical activity when my heat rate went over a certain level, below are a few pictures from the Fitbit dashboard for you to see.

So, as you can see tiling is a fairly active and physical job. I averaged 13,300 steps for the 7 days and 188 active minutes for the same time. Considering on Sunday I did nothing that’s quite a lot, it was enough to tire me out anyway.

But the chart that makes me think is the last one. Each day I averaged 714 minutes which is 11 hours 54 minutes in the fat burning zone, which to me is remarkable. The reason I think that is because that is a normal work week when I’m tiling, I don’t tile all the time by the way. So, if that last chart is correct, I should be a slim, trim and fit man but unfortunately, I’m not, I’m overweight – so why the anomaly?

I’m not an expert in this field but over the last few weeks I’ve learned a bit about exercise and health from my friend and that along with a life of experience says to me that exercise which is in the low intensity range, which is what the exercise I do at work is, is of little value in burning fat. I know this because the weighing scales tell me when I stand on it. I now think that in order to actually burn fat my heart rate has to be in the vigorous zone, which for me is over 127 beats per minute. The Heart Rate chart above shows that I only get into that range, which is the red part of the chart for a very small amount of time.

So, I need to keep to my exercise plan and continue doing my spin bike exercises if my desire is to continue to improve my breathing and to reduce my weight. Oh, and by the way I weighed myself this morning and I am now 110.9kgs. That’s a loss of 3.4kgs or 7.5 pounds since I started just a few weeks ago and my breathing also continues to improve. This for me is amazing and is my real Covid memory, it’s the time when I got an exercise plan and stuck to it, and I’m thankful to my friend and quite proud of myself for doing that.