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Hello, everybody. I hope that you are well. My name is Christian and welcome to my channel Backpacking Bananas. Last year, I did something that I had been wanting to do for years. I managed to lose 10 kg over 12 weeks and I documented pretty much everything, what I weighed, what I ate, how I exercised, the good weeks, the bad weeks. Well, it's been about a year since then and I have put about half of it back on. I am a bit embarrassed to say that because I made weight loss my whole personality at the time. And I really planned on keeping up the lifestyle to keep that weight that I lost off. But for whatever reason, I have not been successful. Clearly, that lifestyle just wasn't sustainable for
me. And here's the thing, I don't want to do another weight loss challenge. I don't want my goal for this Australian summer to be as small as possible. I want to be fitter. I want to be stronger. I want to swim. I want to run. To be honest, I really want to actually make the most of living in Sydney, one of the greatest outdoor cities in the world. I did do a fair bit of running earlier on this year when I had races to look forward to. But what I've realized is that when I don't have fun races in the calendar, I actually don't love running at all. It feels like the biggest chore.
I also, on the whole, find the gym incredibly boring. And despite living in the Pilates capital of Australia, I am categorically not a Pilates girl. So, over the next days, weeks, I'm going to be auditioning different ways of getting fit to figure out what I could genuinely keep doing. Now, if you know me, you know I love a stat. I am a stats girl. And since the goal is to get fitter, stronger, I need some quantifiable data to go by. And I need to figure out exactly where I am right now so I can see where the improvements are that I need to be making. Last year, I was weighing myself every week, but weight alone isn't really the thing that I'm interested in anymore. Now, Hum Health
have kindly sent me their BodyPod 2, which is what I'm going to be using to track my progress. It's essentially like being able to do one of those in-body scans that they've got at the gym that are incredibly expensive machines, but at home. It's a full body analyzer. So, you stand on it, hold onto the handles, and it scans your arms, legs, and torso, rather than just looking at your weight. It actually measures more than 40 different health metrics. But, the ones that I am going to be paying the most attention to are my body fat and my muscle mass. Because this is where body weight alone can be really misleading.
start doing Bodypump, swimming, running several times a week, and generally just becoming a lot more active, I could potentially be gaining muscle and losing body fat at the same time. Which means the number on the scale might barely move, despite my body changing actually quite significantly. We hope. And I think last year I probably gave that number on the scale a little bit too much power. Whereas in the Hum app, I can actually see the breakdown of where I'm carrying muscle and fat across my arms, legs, and torso, and then track how all of that changes over time. other thing I really like is it's not just throwing around random numbers and expecting you to know what to do with
them. Because in reality, although I love a stat, if I don't know what it means, what am I going to do with it? The app uses AI-powered insights, alongside your body composition, things like your activity and sleep data to give you personalized feedback about the areas you could actually work on. So, over time I will be getting weekly insights that should hopefully help me understand what habits are actually making a difference rather than just guessing. Which is exactly what I wanted. And if you want to try Hum's Body Pod for yourself, my code Backpacking Bananas stacks on top of their current sale, so you can get up to 50% off. And that code is actually only valid for 7 days from the time of posting this video. So, I will leave all
the details linked down below. So, now I'm off to do my first activity. I am off to Bodypump. I joined Fitness First just last week, and they have a bunch of classes, and I'm really hoping that I like this. Because if building muscle is my primary goal and I typically hate the gym floor, I think this is going to be a really good place to start. So, wish me luck. It is bank holiday and I am worried it might be slightly heaving. That was truly a rude awakening. First activity I tried. So, I went for lighter weights than I thought I was capable of because I thought first session, let's just get into the movements. I haven't done a body pump in probably like five
or six years. And my legs were quivering. And I was like, do I not have any muscle here anymore? So, the class was really challenging but in a good way. I liked the instructor. I had lots of space around me. And I think I've just realized it's activity number one. That's what I need to go to several times a week. If I want to build my muscle, I need to be doing things that are making my muscles quiver. It was [clears throat] on the very top floor of the gym and you have to go down about three flights of stairs to leave the gym. And I kid you not, everyone else was breezing down and I'm walking down like this. Like, what has happened to me?
Okay, that has really been a reality check that I really got to work on this. But I don't want it to be boring. It's obviously not cardio. But I don't want it to be the only exercise that I'm doing. So, we've still got a lot to check out. Right, Pilates. Sydney is very well known for being very popular with Pilates. You've got all the girls on Bondi and the Eastern beaches and there are Pilates studios everywhere. Now, I feel like I've not made it a secret on my channel and publicly before that I am not a Pilates girl. So, I don't exactly have the highest hopes for this being something that I continue throughout the summer in Sydney.
However, my very pregnant friend Deanna has suggested that we do a Pilates class on ClassPass this morning and what the pregnant friend wants the pregnant friend gets. To be fair, we're going to a studio in Rose Bay called Sculpt and it looks absolutely beautiful. I think it's quite a new studio. So, I'm going to head there now. Yeah, I'm still unsure about Pilates. Do you know what it is? It's a few things. One, because my heart rate is not being raised and I'm not out of breath and I'm also not sweating, I feel like even though I know I probably am working out,
I feel like I'm not working out and like leaving the class not red-faced and sweating makes me go, "Did I even work out that hard?" And especially when you normally pay quite a lot of money for these Pilates classes. This one in particular, it was 11 credits on ClassPass, which is not loads, but it's also not nothing. And so, to walk out of there going, "Did I even do anything?" That's one reason why I'm not sure it's going to work for me. The other reason is because I feel like Pilates, especially on the reformer, it's either far too easy and I'm kind of going through the movements going, "Well, this is doing nothing for me at all." Or the complete other end of the
spectrum, it's just too hard and I'm doing an exercise and I'm like, "I can't keep doing this." Or, "This is really uncomfortable." What I particularly find difficult is the ab exercises, but you know what? Maybe that's a reality check. I'm saying it's no good because it doesn't feel good, but maybe that's exactly what I need. I know I have a weak core and I know I need to work on it. Maybe Pilates is how that happens. I'm just still not convinced that's going to be the thing that I'm really able to stick to this summer because I guess at the end of the day the activity I'm looking for is something that I genuinely enjoy and I look forward to
going to and I leave there going that was great and that's not Pilates. Right. This one I'm very excited for. I even went shopping. All of last year I really regretted that I didn't get into swimming. I have a few friends who just swim casually in Sydney either at the sea pools or in the ocean or even at the many swimming pools that there are around the city and I hated I didn't join them. And so this year before I even start I've already invested in a new swimsuit and I've even got myself goggles. I tried all of these on and I even got a swim cap as well. I got all of these from Rebel Sport, but they are all coincidentally Speedo. I wanted like actual swim stuff, you know?
The water looks absolutely beautiful. It's sparkling, but it's deceiving. It's still early in the season, so I think it's going to be really cold. I'm ready. Do you need to spit in swim goggles? No, that's just marks. Okay. A few revelations. One, that is not cold at all. I got used to the cold in the first 5 seconds. 2 seconds. So, I started doing front crawl. I was out of breath, like truly out of after like five strokes. And that's a really hard one to do when you're out of breath in seawater, especially because you're coming up for air.
You're And you want to gasp for air cuz you have no breath, but like the sea is right there. So, I did default to breaststroke in the end. So, I wasn't going very fast. I went 333 m. Okay. And it took me 12 minutes. That's not very good, is it? Good morning. like all the activities that I've done so far have been pretty normal and things that I've like done before at some point in my life, and I wanted to do something which I've never done before. So, I want to surf ski, which I can confidently say I have never been on before. It's like a very skinny kayak.
Look how wobbly I am. I've come to the Sydney Harbor Sail Club in Rose Bay, and they do beginner classes. You can book on ClassPass. It's six credits, which I thought was so good. Today is a really windy day. It's arguably not the best for doing something like this, but you know what? Throw us in the deep end. Why not? Oh, and by the way, it's 6:00 in the morning. This isn't early morning sport. Oh, no. Asher's fallen in. I think because it's so windy, Asher and a few others just keep falling in and getting blown away. So, our instructor is spending just the whole time doing search and rescue. So, I don't think we're going to go I'm far to
do today, but I'm really enjoying being out on the water. But look what I'm learning. I didn't know this when I first got in, but when you do this, it means that I'm going to start going this way. And then when I push my left toe down, it means that the boat starts going this way. Slowly. And actually, when you're paddling, it's very effective. And what I like about that is because whenever I've been kayaking or something in the past, if you want to go one way or the other, you're kind of like going way more on one side, but you don't have to do that here. All you do is just flip your toes and you start going in the right direction. That's pretty cool. So, you can just Your arms can just keep steady and you go quite fast and that's very satisfying.
Well, I think Ashley's just pulled it. And our instructor is still conducting his search and rescue with some of the other members of the team. Well, I think Ashley's low now. All I know is that he told us to stay close to the wall for now until he comes back. Oh, he's back. So, we ended up having about 5 minutes, probably less than 5 minutes of actual instruction, but it wasn't our instructor's fault. We just ran out of time with how much rescuing that needed to be done. He said that it was winds of 30 km an hour and gusts of 52 km an hour, which is the worst that he's ever seen. So, I'm really proud of myself that I actually
stayed inside the surf ski. I think I was the only complete beginner that didn't fall in and thank god cuz I think I was also the only person that actually had my phone on me. So, it wouldn't have been good if I did fall in. I'm glad I bought a change of clothes because your bottom half does just get completely soaked. And I was riding my scooter back home. But despite all of that, I really enjoyed that. And because it's so skinny and so long and so light, when you're going, you go really fast. And once I really figured out that pedal situation, I was like, "Huh, this is actually way easier than normal kayaking and more enjoyable in my opinion. So, I really want to go again. I'm going to go again
to that same beginner class on another day where I can kind of guarantee that the weather's going to be a lot better and maybe we'll actually travel a bit further. So, I'd actually say that one was a bit of a success. Now, I know I said I hate running. However, I only hate running when I'm like not working towards anything or not doing an exciting event. So, I thought I'll give it another go and I've come to a park run this morning. I haven't come to one in months and I've come to a destination I've not been to before. This is the Kamay park run. It's in La Perouse, like at the bottom of the Eastern Suburbs.
It's a little bit drizzly this morning, but oh, we're off already. Here we go. I feel like I should mention I've also not run since City to Surf, which was about 2 months ago. So, I'm just going to take it easy. I'm not going to try and push hard. I think if I just make it through the run and run a bit I'll be happy cuz this is one thing why I don't like running when you don't do it for a while, the amount of fitness that you lose is just so much and that's really demotivating and I'm someone who gets motivated from doing well, not from doing badly, unfortunately.
Thank you. Bye. Oh, listen, I'm really happy with my time. My average pace was 6:03, which I didn't think was even possible. However, I did the classic Christian thing. I didn't take it easy. I did push it hard. I don't know what my average heart rate yet was, but probably in the 180s. I'm glad I came. Like, this is that thing with running. Like, I kind of hate it and the idea of it, awful. Afterwards, you love it. So, will I continue it? Yeah, maybe. I don't want it to be my main thing this time, though. I want something else to get excited about that I don't dread. If there is one thing that I have been harping on to Ben about, it's the fact that I want an in-ground trampoline in
our future garden. And he said to me, "Christian, you talk about trampolines so much, and we're so far away from, you know, having our own garden right now. Why don't you go to a trampoline park or do something that involves trampolines to get it out of your system?" And I said, "You know what? That's a great idea." And I had a look around, and there's these like kids trampoline parks, but I don't really want to be surrounded first by little kids. Anyway, I looked on ClassPass, and in Bondi, they have a studio called Jump X. And it's not big trampolines, it's little trampettes. And it's like a cardio exercise class, where you're just
bouncing up and down these trampolines. And I thought, "You know what? May- maybe this will satisfy my craving, and maybe I will really enjoy that." I think it looks really fun, actually. So, that is what I'm going to do this morning. As my final activity, I have got not one, but two high-impact sports bras on. So, these girls are not going anywhere, cuz otherwise that would be very painful. But yeah, final activity. I am really looking forward to it. 1 2 3 4
1 2 Well, guys, I was not expecting that to be the best workout of everything I tried this week. I'm going to put my stats here. Look at my average heart rate and look at my maximum heart rate and the number of calories burned. That was unbelievable. Oh my goodness, and I really enjoyed it. It was a Brazilian style. So, this specific type of trampoline workout originated in Brazil.
We had a Brazilian instructor. And so, on one of the songs, she got us doing a little bit of samba moves and it was just really fun. And if I'm being completely honest, I would love to go again. She doesn't run loads of classes throughout the week in Sydney because she only started her business last year. And so, I think there's only two or three classes that run per week, but I will 100% go again. I feel like that is a fantastic way of exercising. It's fun and it is effective and I satisfied my trampoline craving. Or did I? Because now I just want to keep going. And that's the last activity that I am doing this week. So, my favorites, hands down, were the Jump X and Surf Ski. I'm
definitely going to be going to both of those again, which I'm really thrilled about because I feel like those are two slightly different activities which I hadn't tried before. And that's why it's good to always try new things cuz you never know what you're really going to enjoy. And it would be really interesting if I keep doing these activities to see how my body composition now changes over the next few months if I really stick to this. I really hope you guys have enjoyed watching this video, maybe got some inspiration to try some new activities yourself. Thank you so much for watching and I will see you in the next video.
Bye-bye.
