HAPPY NEW YEAR!!
Its been quite a while since I last posted a blog, but lots of exciting things have been going on! Kate and I bought a house and have been kept busy learning the responsibilities of being a home owner. Our new home is only 7 minutes from the farm which is a perfect commuting distance; I can still get to the farm in an emergency, but also far enough away that we can have our own space and freedom. Many people say they couldn't live with their sibling, but Kate and I get on really well and on evening we often compare our very different working lifestyles so it just made sense to invest and buy a property together. Hannah and Tom have also moved in to their new Barn conversion which is located on the farm, so there is also somewhere to skive if I have a spare few minutes!!
So back to the farming...
As we enter 2016, many people are discussing their new health and fitness plan for the forthcoming year. For me, fitness is part and parcel of my job...being young, healthy and active gets the tasks done quicker and more efficiently!
As most of you know, I am a keen sportswomen and will take on any challenge put in front of me, so adapting to the manually intense farming lifestyle came quite naturally. Whilst out on the farm last week, (and thinking about all the food I ate over Christmas!!) I decided to document all the physically demanding jobs and work out the approximate weight I lift during the day. This then gave me the idea to monitor my daily step count as well as calculating the number of calories burnt. To measure this, I used my Nike Fuelband (exercise gadget) and to my surprise the numbers just kept rising!
The graph below gives an overview of last Tuesday, it clearly shows the labour intense jobs compared to the relatively sedate breakfast and lunch breaks! On this particular day I burnt 2068 calories and walked a total of 18 453 steps. On average, its 2000 steps per mile so works out to be just over 9 miles.
So back to the farming...
As we enter 2016, many people are discussing their new health and fitness plan for the forthcoming year. For me, fitness is part and parcel of my job...being young, healthy and active gets the tasks done quicker and more efficiently!
As most of you know, I am a keen sportswomen and will take on any challenge put in front of me, so adapting to the manually intense farming lifestyle came quite naturally. Whilst out on the farm last week, (and thinking about all the food I ate over Christmas!!) I decided to document all the physically demanding jobs and work out the approximate weight I lift during the day. This then gave me the idea to monitor my daily step count as well as calculating the number of calories burnt. To measure this, I used my Nike Fuelband (exercise gadget) and to my surprise the numbers just kept rising!
The graph below gives an overview of last Tuesday, it clearly shows the labour intense jobs compared to the relatively sedate breakfast and lunch breaks! On this particular day I burnt 2068 calories and walked a total of 18 453 steps. On average, its 2000 steps per mile so works out to be just over 9 miles.
Throughout the day, I made a note of all the buckets I carried and it turned out to be quite interesting!
Since finishing University, many people have asked how it felt to go from a full-time Netballer to now, where I currently have club training once a week with matches on a Sunday. But after doing this number crunching, I would say that the physicality of my daily work is comparable to the training load I was doing as an athlete. Although I can no longer dead-lift and squat the same weight, I still feel just as strong when man-handling the calves! I love the manually intense nature of farming and would have it no other way! No matter how tired we are from a morning on the farm, it doesn't stop me and Steve from doing the odd long cycle on a weekend or entering a 10km mud race!
If you are wondering how active you are at work, it is definitely worth calculating and hopefully you'll be just as surprised as I was :) I hope you all have a great and healthy 2016!!
If you are wondering how active you are at work, it is definitely worth calculating and hopefully you'll be just as surprised as I was :) I hope you all have a great and healthy 2016!!