Days 2 and 3: The day the machines stopped and the day they started again

 

You're Fitbit, My Gosh Don't You Know It
by The Streets
(Well, close enough)

You can't log onto Twitter without, before long, encountering some conspiracy theorists predicting that machines are on the way to taking over, and that humans will be under thrall to our new techno gods any day soon. This is, apparently, being accelerated because we've all been infected with nanobots in the Covid vaccines and something about 5G towers. Of course, anyone who's had to sit for a few hours whilst their PC uploads a new version of Windows might disagree, or anyone whose tablet has dropped its WiFi signal or their phone has dropped down the toilet and the only rice you have to hand is super expensive Italian artisan Arborio that you bought because you fancied trying that Asian fusion risotto recipe from Yotam Ottolenhi had in the Guardian, but never got round to trying because you couldn't get the right brand of boutique Bhutanese organic yak cheese, so you don't want to waste it rescuing your phone. 

Fantastic Voyage
featuring the Proteus submarine,the original nanobot
Source: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060397/

Rather than being overtaken by technology, we might actually be learning to embrace it as we, as a species, seem to be increasingly turning into cyborgs. This is not least the case for people into fitness. The down side is that fitness technology fails with alarming frequency. The dodgy mic is the curse of groupe exercise classes, along with the misfiring sound system. Or you'll be soaring along on the trail, blissfully ignorant that your tracker packed in 6km ago, but you won't find out until you get home and despite your runner's high, you crash, Icarus-like, back to earth when you realise it wasn't on Strava so it doesn't count. All your effort will be lost like tears in the rain, because that's what happens when cyborgs die. I mused on fitness tech previously here.

Roy coming a-Cropper
Source: https://gfycat.com/gifs/search/tears+in+rain

So, onto the RED Janury bit. There weren't any gym classes on the timetable to attend and I was still still feeling some DOMS from my parkrun the day before, so I took to the faux-jo once again and did a Body Combat session in my son's room. I had a crack at release 82, the 55 minute version. It took longer because the smaller laptop kept buffering so switched to using a tablet (a tech fail). It was a decent workout all the same.

The struggle was real
(compare time active with calories burnt)

A couple of action shots from BC 82
A roundhouse from track 2 kickboxing and a jumping knee from track 8 Muay Thai
(or are they one from the big musical finale and one immediately after I saw a spider on the floor?)

In my prelude to kicking off RED January, I mentioned that I'd got a new Fitbit Charge 4 for Christmas. On Day 1 for parkrun that it hadn't recorded my run. On Day 2, I discovered, after the event, that my new Fitbit had decided, firstly, to disconnect from my phone and its app, and, secondly, not record the data correctly. It told me I'd done 55 minutes in an active HR zone, but it only said I'd used up 39 calories for the whole hour working out. I was not feeling the love for this new device.

For Day 3, gain there was no decent gym class to go to so did yet another Body Combat session. This time I did the 45 minute version of release 77 (I think). A decent workout yet again. Not much else to report about it, other than I started my Fitbit manually, rather than let it auto-detect my workout (a feature it has that I thought would be a good idea as I have forgotten to start my tracker when I've started a workout). This time, everything worked as it should, so maybe I can live with it after all.

Finally a successful activity feed

Channeling my inner Joe Exotic with the Tikiboo White Tiger capris

 
My first video clip
A bit of boxing from track 9