Practice and More Data

Practice went well. I used the Fitbit in exercise mode for the first time at practice, and it was pretty neat! I really wish I had thought to do this during the tournament at Roses, but I didn't. I'm not planning to post this for every practice, but it's a Cool New Data Nerd Thing, and I want to post it at least once.

I am excited by data!

So, let's take this from the top.

My first set of fights were against a fighter who had been gone for a few weeks. They were as close to Maximum Effort as I could do while still trying some of my new Fabris-influenced things. I've found that the rules for single rapier are more universally-applicable than the ones for sword-and-dagger, even when using a dagger - as such, I ended up using those more.

We stopped fighting and bullshitted around some in the middle of our passes, because I was tired and she was probably tired, so there's that dip in the middle of the first set of passes.

After that, there was a long discussion about how to fight a particular class of fighter. I remember getting exasperated at one point, and that's probably the down-tick in my heart-rate in the middle of that rest period.

After that, I fought someone who presents lots of difficulties for me. I realized that either I wasn't presenting my dagger at the appropriate 45º angle to his sword, or I needed to get closer to a 90º angle, or something. I also used my new Fabris-inspired version of my "backwards" stance to perform sword-based opposition in places where I had previously thought it impossible. It was a very educational set of passes, which I will need to think about a lot.

The highest spike of my heart rate came from fighting someone who had requested my 100% Tournament Game. Since I was fighting my 100% Tournament Game, I didn't get a chance to learn anything really. Tournament Game means I make lots of extremely conservative choices, and those aren't the choices I learn from. It was fun though. I realize now how clipped and to-the-point I am when tourney-fighting.

During my last set of fights, I started to wane a bit. I was fighting the best game I could, I really was. But my ability to fight that game was vanishing. I probably should have taken a longer break before those fights, but oh well.

*****

I like having data, and being able to confirm things about myself using this data. It is interesting to see how my heart rate can go from my resting heart rate of 49 to a peak heart rate of 186. I have heard that Fitbits tend to under-report heart rate data.

If that is true, it is a concern - I should not be going over a heart rate of 190, given that I am 30 years old.

If the Fitbit doesn't report lower than reality, then I am slightly surprised at how low my resting heart rate is.

It's very possible that if the Fitbit is inaccurate, it's inaccurate in a way that isn't strictly linear. It could, say, be reporting 20 bpm too low at rest, and then 20 bpm too high when active. In any case, I don't care as long as it's consistent. And apparently going over maximum heart-rate isn't *that* bad, if you don't already have cardiovascular problems, and if you don't end up significantly over-training.

Oh well. More overthinking.

*****

That's all I have for the moment.