Well my rower arrived a couple days ago and I've completed my first workout. The rower itself is absolutely enormous, it's so big it blocks the doorway to my lounge and means I have to turn sideways and squeeze past the flywheel to get in and out. A full sized racing canoe would have probably took up less space

Anyways I need the fitness so I'll just have to live with that. I completed what is called O'Reilly's test where you row as fast as you can for 4 minutes and record your distance. How far you rowed is supposed to be a good indicator of you areobic capacity and level of fitness and I managed an amazing 843 meters in that time, which is roughly average.............for a 70-79 year old lightweight man

Still I should have expected it what with my diseased lungs but I can't help feeling a bit gutted

Anyways I'm not deterred, if I allow it to discourage me too much I won't end up using it so I've just got to be realistic and set achievable goals, and hopefully my time will improve to almost average levels for age after a few months.

Following in Sharla's example I may start a training log when I start properly as I try and motivate myself to lose a good 14 lbs of fat and pack on another 14 lbs of muscle.

I'm going to add cycling and weights, plus some walking and stretching, that will probably be all my body can handle.

I may even put some 'before' pictures up so you can all have a laugh at my expense and spur me on to trying to build a respectable body!