A quick vegan protein shake for easy protein intake. 25g pea protein 1 tsp cocoa powder 2 tsp fructose powder Plant alternative milk Add the pea protein, cocoa powder, and fructose powder to a shaker or blender. Add plant alternative milk to your preferred thickness. Shake or blend until smooth. Number Change Date v1 Initial recipe 31-Jul-2026

I just got back from a three-day trip to the Budawangs with Sydney Bushwalkers, and thought I would write down what each of the days looked like while it is still fresh. I am going to keep the exact location vague, both because that was the intention of the trip leaders and because part of what made the area special was how untouched it felt. No GPS points, no detailed directions, and hopefully no accidental breadcrumb trail.

For many years this website ran on Django. It worked well, and at the time it made sense. I wanted to learn Django, run the application myself, and generally understand every part of the stack. Last year I moved the site to Hugo, hosted on GitHub Pages, with GitHub Actions handling the build and deployment. I had been wishing to move to a static site for ages, and Copilot made that much easier.

Q2 2026 was a better recovery quarter than Q1: stress dropped, body battery improved, steps came back up, active calories increased, and VO2 max started to recover. It was not a clean win. Sleep stayed just under target, May had a noticeable dip, and weekly intensity was still well below the 800-minute goal. But after the injury-disrupted Q1, this looks like movement in the right direction rather than another quarter of drift.

A short set from Kaikoura.

A short set from Nelson and Tasman.

A short set from Arthur’s Pass.

A short set from Aoraki Mount Cook National Park.

Q1 2026 was a rebuilding quarter from a training and recovery perspective. The data shows reduced training load, lower daily steps, higher stress, and lower body battery relative to late 2025. As usual, there are four areas that I wanted to focus on: Improve fitness by training more. My goal is to maintain 800 intensity minutes on average per week. Sleep better by improving my sleep hygiene and experimenting with meal timing. Reduce stress by examining meal composition and avoiding anything that might impact my sleep. Improve biomarkers by looking at my nutrition, as well as the above items. Overall most metrics moved in the wrong direction this quarter, as we can see with the following key metrics.

2025 wrapped up with another hard quarter, unfortunately. Coming off some travel in September there were some events at work in October and November that were especially challenging, and in late November I got a little sick. Even worse is in early December I managed to break my ankle at the local Parkrun. This was well timed for a long road trip towards the end of December, which suited me well given my condition, but did mean exercise slowed down.