Subscribe in a readerJanuary 4, 2008
How I Lost Weight and Kept it Off
Yesterday I talked about my foray into what I will refer to as the modern era of my athletic endeavors. In that I mentioned that I dropped about 30 pounds in the course of 3 months back in early 2004. Some of you may wonder my secret and I will tell you that it was a product called Diet Power 4.0.
Diet Power was a product that someone like me could really get used to. I can wrap my brain around things that can be measured, tracked, and influenced. I put in my height, weight, sex, and dietary concerns and it would figure out a base metabolic rate for me. As I ate something, I logged it. If I worked out, I logged it. Every day I weighed in and logged it. With Diet Power, I could tell whether I was eating more than I was burning.
The real key is being honest with yourself and eating things that you can log and logging them accurately. This did three things for me. First, I had to look up the things that I was eating when I ate out. There were things that I thought were healthy that I found were cooked in all kinds of butter and were calorie laden. Through this self-discovery process, I found foods that I had to enjoy in moderation. Second, it made me prepare meals at home more. Third, I became concious of everything I put in my mouth. I'm surprised I didn't try to log the toothpaste I brush my teeth with.
Diet Power would then figure out based on how much I ate, excercised, and weighed, roughly what my metabolic rate was. As long as I ended up burning more calories than I took in, I lost weight. 265 to 235 went pretty quick. The next 30 pounds have taken 3 years.
Now I know it sounds strange that a marathoner and triathlete has trouble dropping weight. At the end of the day, I have to fuel my workouts. If you're going to do a 20 mile training run or a 70 mile ride, you have to replenish your glycogen stores or you will bonk. So I continue to log my excercise and my nutrition. I try to stay even or a little under, but sometimes hunger gets the best of me. Hey - I'm human.
Let me leave you today with this in mind - eating 100 calories more than you burn each day for a year will result in an overage of 36500 calories. 3500 calories = 1 pound. You'd gain over 10 pounds that year.
What does 100 calories look like? How about 4 Jolly Rancher candies (1 serving = 3 pieces = 70 calories). Or even 2/3 of a 12 oz. can of Coke (1 serving = 8 oz. = 100 calories).
You can try DietPower FREE for 15 Days and see for yourself.
Posted by Mike at 8:00 AM | Comments (0)
December 16, 2005
Simple Rule for Weight Loss
Here's an easy first step for those of you looking to lose some weight in the coming new year - don't eat (or take in calories) after 8pm. That means no Coke, popcorn, peanut butter sandwich, or whatever your favorite midnight snack is. Your body won't be able to metabolize it since you're going to bed, so don't take it in. Drink some water - it is a remarkable appetite supressor.
Obvious exceptions - following illness, long day-missed meal, etc.
Of course, I'm not a doctor, nor am I offering medical advice. I'm just telling you about one technique that worked well for me. Consult your own physician before beginning any exercise or weight-loss regimen.
Posted by Mike at 11:30 AM
November 20, 2005
Cool Tool for Fitness-Minded Travelers
One of the tough things to do while traveling is to get in your exercise routine. And while I'll blog more on fitting in 20 miles a week + 3 days of weights later, I thought I'd share a great tool with you in case you're traveling over Thanksgiving.
It's an online pedometer that is powered by Google Maps. Read the instructions, zoom into the area you're in, and you can start click way-points along the roads that make up your potential route. You can toggle between miles and kilometers, and it will show you a reasonably good estimation of the distance. I tried it today for a new 8 mile out-and-back lollipop near my house and it worked just great.
So the next time the hotel staff looks at you like you're crazy when you ask for a good 5 mile jog from the hotel, you can just go to this website and create your own route.
Posted by Mike at 12:27 PM
November 17, 2005
CVS Strong Legs Run Results
A few people have googled me looking for race results. So without further adieu, here's a link to the Atlanta CVS Strong Legs Run 2005 results.
Here are my results from the race.
Posted by Mike at 10:32 PM
November 1, 2005
Running Stats for October
Welcome to November, my friends. Here are the stats for a rather successful October:
- 66.95 miles
- 28:08 time in the Run for the River 5k (that's a 9:03 min/mile for those w/o a calculator handy)
- I've hired a trainer for strength training & nutrition (more on that in a post later this month)
- Tammy has started running again
What's on tap for November?
- CVS Strong Legs Run 10k
- Break 70 mile threshhold
- Try not to eat the whole turkey on turkey day
Posted by Mike at 8:31 AM
October 17, 2005
Mondays are Hard Enough
Sure, Monday Night Football makes life a little easier in the Fall. But by and large, Mondays really stink. Today I realized another reason Mondays are terrible - my training log. It's great on Sunday to look back at the past week and see the mileage logged. 19.2 miles last week on the pavement. Today, I look and see a big goose egg, along with 18 miles planned for the week. How depressing.
Now I'm looking forward to Sunday so I can look back and see how trivial this line of thinking is. But then Monday will come. Oh, the vicious cycle.
Posted by Mike at 8:17 PM
September 25, 2005
The Duluth Fall Festival 5K
Today I ran the Duluth Fall Festival 5k. Not a bad day for it - it was overcast and around 70 at race time. I'm not sure how many people ran, but it was quite a large crowd. No - I did not see Jennifer Wilbanks (the infamous "runaway bride") there (not that I looked for her) although someone did mention her name while we were lining up.
My time? 33:49. I was shooting to be under 30 minutes, but running with a crowd is different than running from home. First, when the timer starts, you haven't started (unless you're keeping a 5 min mile pace and are on the starting line). Second, depending on the width of the course, you are going to lose a little pace. Third, if you take water, that is going to slow you down. My first two mile splits were just under 10 minutes each. I took water at mile 2 (against my better judgment) and that killed a little time when I inhaled it into my lungs instead of drinking it. And then there was that hill just .3 mile past there. Oh well - it was a learning experience to say the least.
For those of you who like to see the course route ahead of time (nice to pick out landmarks), here is a map of the course my Forerunner captured. I'm also including the elevation chart, although it is deceiving. I'm not sure why the elevation is screwed up right at the end unless it was the trees at mile 3. It should have returned back to the 1050 ft elevation. Oh well. Turn by turn directions are below the charts.
| Route | Elevation |
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Turn By Turn
Start on Hill St directly behind ampitheater. Head up hill and turn left on W Lawrenceville St. This becomes McClure Bridge Rd. Turn Right on Howell Springs Rd (1 mile mark right at the turn). Follow this until right before it ends, turn right on Howell Mead Drive. Follow this road around, it will change names to Irvindale Rd after it goes around a 90 degree bend. After the bend, it's a short distance to mile 2. Then up a hill, down a hill, and then the road will dump you back out at W Lawrenceville St right by Joan Glancy Hospital. Hang a left here to head back to the start finish line. Yes, it's up hill here, but you're almost there, so kick it in!
Posted by Mike at 5:07 PM | Comments (2)
July 5, 2005
What is Stopping You?
Dr. Michael Gonzales has a manifesto up at ChangeThis on Barriers to Health and Fitness. There are a lot of good takeaways from his post, but one has particular synergy with me - Your body is smart enough to avoid things it doesn't enjoy.
This is a big motivation killer. I have specific long-range goals that require a certain level of fitness, but the physical changes between here and there are tiny. It's easy to blow off a day and say "My body needs a break." But that's bunk - at least for me. My lower body may be fatigued from mountain biking all weekend, but my upper body still has something to give. So, I guess I'll go to the gym and focus on an upper body workout today.
Dr. Gonzales' point about making fitness and excercise routine is fantastic advice. Don't let your body tell you to blow the day off. Remove the psychological barrier to fitness by putting yourself into a position to excercise every day.
Posted by Mike at 8:47 AM
March 19, 2005
Running
Check out NikeRunning. They have a free, online training app that lets you track your routes, personal mileage, shoe mileage, etc. They also have different training programs that allow you to train for 5k, 10k, halfs, and marathons. The training program will let you specify what level you're currently at, and will schedule runs that get you to the level you want to be at. You then fill in the calendar with your actual results and track your progress.
Definitely a cool app. I felt halfway guilty plugging in my New Balance shoes. Now if they could just make it accept files out of my Garmin Forerunner, all would be terrific.
Forerunner update - they came out with the 301 model. The cheapest I've seen it for is $285 on Amazon.com. That's over $150 more than I paid for my 201 model, and I don't see any benefit other than the heart rate monitor. What gives?
Posted by Mike at 3:35 PM
January 2, 2005
Smart Eating at Ruby Tuesday
We had lunch at Ruby Tuesday today. I was pleasantly surprised to find full disclosure of the nutritional content of every meal. Some restaurants will only show you the stats on their healthy choices. Ruby Tuesday has taken the step of showing all. From their low-calorie/low-carb choices all the way up to the colossal burger - 1667 calories.
Check out their nutrition guide here. I think Tammy and I will try to choose RT more often when we have (want) to eat out.
On a similar note, the Atkins fad seems to have winded down, but I think that people are going to focus more on watching their calories, etc. Ruby Tuesday (NYSE:RI) closed at $26.08 on December 31, 2004 and pays a .17% dividend. Let's put this on the watch list and see what happens.
Posted by Mike at 9:32 PM