Greg's Running Blog

Me and Chris from Polar

Last Monday I ran the 115th Boston Marathon. But for me it wasn’t just a race it was an entire event packed family vacation. There is so much to write about that I will break my story up into several segments.

Our journey started with an AirTran flight out of DFW and into Atlanta and after a two hour layover finally into Boston. This already upset me for several reasons.

1. The original airline schedule, when I booked the flight in November, only showed a 30 minute layover but since then they changed their schedule which meant us missing the earlier Atlanta to Boston flight and having to wait 2+ hours.
2. AirTran charges $20 for each checked bak plus an additional $49 for each oversize bag. Anything over 61″ of the sum of dimensions is considered oversize. On American Airlines the size limit is 62″. My bags were 63″ so I paid $138 extra each way to get two suitcases from Dallas to Boston, the same suitcases that have traveled to and from Europe a dozen times at no cost before. It’s my bad for not checking the new, very carefully chosen, luggage limitations but it sure left a bitter taste in my mouth and left a close to $280 hole in my wallet.

Regardless, I sucked it up, paid the fees, waited the wait and we were on our way to Beantown. The first sign that it was no ordinary trip came in Atlanta where I saw several runners already waiting for the Boston flight. I could tell they were runners because one of them wore a 2006 Boston jacket while the other, an older guy in his 60s, had a marathon finisher shirt on and a marathon cap from another event. We started talking about Boston and whether we were ready to run it. I asked the older guy when they were returning and he said Tuesday, the same day we were so we parted ways saying we’d probably see each other coming back.

Once we landed in Boston we took a short cab ride to the hotel, grabbed a quick pasta dinner at Salvatore’s at the Seaport then hit the sack.

Next morning we grabbed a quick breakfast from the hotel’s Café and this is where I met Doug, another marathoner from Texas who was also planning on running his first Boston Marathon and he also had his entire family with him. I asked how his training went and if he was going to race Boston for a PR or hold back and enjoy the event. He said he had no plans on running a PR but he wanted to run a BQ time. I asked if he was going to run that night as a last run before Monday’s race or if he was going to run Sunday morning. He said Saturday night was the plan, we exchanged phone numbers and we were planning on running a quick 3 mile run after the kids went down to bed. We also decided that we’d share a cab to the bus pickup on Monday morning.

After we parted ways with Doug I told my wife that we needed to head to Boylston Street so I could get my bib and race packet at the Expo. This was the moment where it dawned on me that I left my bib pickup sheet in Texas. I was hoping that they’d have a solution for guys like me. We took the Silver Line, the Red Line and the Green Line of the “T” until we finally made it to Boylston street and the first thing we saw was the huge scaffolding of the finish line going up. The official finish line was already painted in the BAA signature blue/yellow combo and I realized things were getting really real. This race was going to happen. By this point we’ve seen a ton of people on the subway in Boston Marathon jackets and I couldn’t wait to buy mine. We stopped for a short photo shoot at the finish line where we bumped into the same runner who I chatted with in Atlanta. It runs out he’s from DFW. Such a small world we live in.

We went to the expo just down the street and the place blew me away. It was the biggest expo I’ve ever seen. I’m not a big fan of expos. They’re OK for the most part but it’s usually the same old crap that I’ve seen at the running store and in on-line ads and chances are I don’t need any of it. I had four goals at the expo:

• Pick up my bib# and packet
• Meet with Chris Zoller from Polar
• Buy the Boston Marathon Jacket and get the free poster.
• Buy a ticket for my wife for the pasta party

First step was already problematic without the race number pickup sheet so I had to stand in a special line to get a new pick-up form. The whole thing took less than 5 minutes and I was on my way to the bib and packet pickup which was also very quick and painless. The whole process felt like it was a well oiled machine and it truly amazed me just how smooth everything went despite the 26,000+ registered runners. The race packet was plain and simple, the cutest thing in it was a BAA cowbell that I gave to my son and I instructed him to use it if he gets lost in the mass of people. There was also a Boston Marathon 26.2 bumper sticker which I will probably not use, the long sleeve Boston shirt, couple of food samples and the thick official program booklet. All in all it was a nice packet in a nice bag which was meant to be used as your bag drop bag on race day.

After I took care of the official and most important business of packet pickup we went to the expo room. I quickly realized that it was way too crowded and way to busy for me to have any chance at browsing  with a 6 year old son who I had a tough time keeping near me, a 3 year old daughter whining in a stroller and a wife who hated the whole thing and wanted to get out of there. Luckily we found a big screen TV that played historical moments from previous Boston races and it kept my kids occupied for a while so I also got to enjoy it. Watching some of the footage made me teary eyed and it was an amazing feeling to know that I would be part of this history soon myself. They also played a course review video which included a drive-by of the entire course with commentaries from elite runners and Boston veterans. Watching the video the course did not look too bad and it did not look very downhill either. It was a great video, very well done.

After the video I found the Polar booth and finally met Chris Zoller, Polar’s Customer Experience Manager. I am a Polar Ambassador and I’ve been in contact with Chris for 9+ months but this was the first time I finally met him in person. He’s just as awesome and nice in person as he is over twitter, e-mail or over the phone. We had a quick chat, snapped some photos and we had to part ways. He was busy with people asking about Polar heart rate monitors and I was busy with my family having a complete meltdown. I wish I had more time to visit but I had to take what I could get. Hopefully next time I’ll get a longer visit in with the Polar guys and gals.

The next item on the agenda was the Boston Jacket. There is nothing special about this jacket. It’s a plain Adidas jacket, this year it’s pretty obnoxious green/white/black, but what it represents makes it a coveted garment. I had to have one even if Adidas dropped the ball this year and the order from China got screwed up. You see, the jacket was supposed to have fully embroidered logos front and back just like prior years but this year it ended up being silk screened. I knew this long before, people have been pissed off about the whole jacket situation ever since they hit the shelves a month ago. Adidas lowered the price by $10 but they weren’t going to throw out 10,000+ jackets and they had no time to order in a batch of embroidered ones in time for Boston. I still wanted the jacket. It’s a status symbol. It is a sign to the rest of the world that you are a Boston Marathoner. While I was in town anywhere you looked the streets were full of Boston Jackets from various years and various colors but they all represented the same thing; someone who ran our about to run the Boston Marathon or maybe both. It was a public display of marathoning and strangers would come up to you and wish you good luck on Monday’s race as long as you wore the jacket. You would get approving nods from fellow runners on the subway. You felt like you were part of this enormous fraternity of runners. It was an incredible feeling that lasted throughout my entire stay in Boston. I don’t think there is any other place on the face of the Earth where you would be treated this way only because you are a runner.

So I went to the Adidas floor at the expo, got the jacket and thanks to my daughter being in a stroller we got a speedy checkout. The other item we picked up was the Boston Marathon poster. It’s a pretty ordinary poster until you look at it closely. From the distance it’s a so-so poster, not something I’d pay money for but since it’s free I’d take it. But if you look at it up close there is a layer of screen print on it that has every single registered runner’s name on it. It took me a while to find my name but I’m on it. I also looked for my co-worker’s name who was also running Boston and found his one too. The poster is pretty cool and a must have souvenir for any of the Boston runners. I picked up a couple extra ones for the family, I’m sure my dad wants one.

After the expo we were going to head out and go sightseeing and take a bus tour around the city to see what we should try to visit the next day. As we left the expo we stopped at the oldest fire station in the city and took some photos of the bright red trucks. I used to be a volunteer firefighter for 2.5 years in my town so shiny red trucks are still kind of close to my heart. I kind of wish we had more time but the family was impatient so we went and waited for a tour bus at a hotel and once we got on it we went around town with it.

It was nice to finally sit down and not have to worry about where my kids are or wondering whether all this walking and standing is good for my feet or not. While on the bus I realized that I forgot to buy the ticket for the pasta dinner. A lot of places told me that I should probably skip the official dinner but I wanted to get the whole experience, good or bad plus I had other plans with the pasta dinner, namely to meet some runners from Hungary. So I had to go back and buy the ticket. With ticket in hand we stopped at the Boston Commons park area and let the kids play on the playground until it was time to head back to the hotel. We had dinner at the hotel’s restaurant and I ate a juicy burger Beantown style which meant bacon, cheese, egg and beans on top of the patty. It was an awesome burger! I haven’t eaten anything this unhealthy in a long long time so I felt I could afford a binge before the marathon.

I was supposed to run with Doug but he called me and said that he would do the treadmill instead and I would be on my own. Given that I just had a heavy dinner I didn’t really feel like going for a run myself so I shelved the idea and went to bed instead. So this is how my Saturday in Boston went. I took care of business and I was good and ready for the big race on Monday.

Update:
Day 2 Recap
Race Day Morning

Well this is it! All good things must come to an end. My 18 week training was finally coming to a culmination on 10/10/10 at 7:30AM when I ran the Inaugural Tyler Rose Marathon in Tyler, TX.

The Cliff Notes version is that I ran a 7:09/mile average for a 3:07:26 which is indeed a BQ time. All that hard work and training has paid off and I’m on cloud nine. For the longer version feel free to read on.

Here is a video of me at mile 16.5 and 25. I was looking and feeling a lot better at mile 16.5 than I was at mile 25. 3:07:26 finish was awesome though just as much as my family cheering me on!

I have arrived in Tyler Saturday around 4:00PM with my wife and two kids, picked up my bib, t-shirt and goodie bag at the sponsor hotel. They also had the medals and age group awards on display and they all looked very nice. The goodie bag was rather Spartan, a couple of coupons for New Balance and some free music download, it was nothing like the bags celebrities get at the Oscar’s. But then again, I was there to run a marathon not to load up on freebies. The shirt was a nice technical New Balance shirt, nothing special.

I ended up with bib 220 which my wife liked a lot; her favorite number is 22 so 220 worked out to her liking. The bib numbers were in alphabetical order up to 260 or so and the rest of them were scattered all over the place. On the registration sheet the highest bib number was 274 and unless some more people registered Saturday that was going to be the final count. There was no race day registration.

Once we picked up my bib and shirt we drove to our hotel and checked in. A fellow runner who I see in the mornings as he lives real close to me was also running the full at Tyler while his wife was running the half. They were also checking in and we went out to drive the course together just to get a feel for it. The full course was basically 15 miles on a large loop then it connected up with the half marathon course and the two were running together to the finish. When you go to the Tyler Marathon website they describe the course as “There will be some rolling areas and a few hills on our course”. Well they weren’t kidding. The course is actually extremely rolling and there is really no flat in it at all. You’re either going up or coming down. And while the mapped course on mapmyrun.com indicates 430 ft of elevation they’re clearly lying. My Polar RS800cx with the barometric altitude measured 1,100 ft of elevation on the course which was not at all surprising once we drove the course.

During our course drive we found a great location for my wife and kids at mile 16.5 that we also hit at mile 25 on the way back so they had a chance to see me twice and there was a nice park with playgrounds right next to it. I told them to expect me to roll by around 9:30 and again around 10:20 and be on the lookout.

Once we drove the course I had serious doubts about whether it will be a BQ course for me at all, it just seemed way too daunting with the constant hills and slope changes not to mention the dozens of turns in the second half of the course.

I also checked the weather forecast and it promised a scary 56F start with temperatures steadily rising to mid 70s by the finish. The hot weather combined with the rolling hills was a recipe for disaster. So I thought that I should get at least my nutrition right.

I had been eating pasta dish after pasta dish for the past 2 days and Saturday night we went to a great little place where I had a nice bowl of pasta with mushrooms in marinara sauce and a dinner roll. I was also going to get some sweetened tea to get some more carbs in my system but it was so sweet that I could not drink it and had to order an unsweetened one instead. Then I sipped on some Powerade Zero throughout the evening to get some minerals in me.

Race day nutrition plan was one 100 calorie gel pack at every 4 miles with taking a cup of water at every water station. I ran a 22 mile long run with this setup and my stomach did well with it so I figured it would work on race day too.

I went to bed at 10PM but woke up at 12AM and kept awake for a while thinking that it was close to morning and the alarm was about to go any minute but once I checked the time I realized that the morning was far away so I fell back asleep only to wake up at 3:30 to take care of No. 1 as I drank way too much Powerade the night before. The alarm went off at 5:15. I had no BM on Saturday which gave me a major concern as I’m usually not shy when it comes to No 2s. I woke up at 5:15 on purpose to hope that I could take care of things before the race and luckily I did so that was a big relief that I did not have to worry about mid-run “runs”. I ate a plain bagel for breakfast; I’m not a big breakfast guy on race days.

I went down to the hotel lobby where a bunch of other runners were getting ready and sipping on coffee or having toast or a bagel. I talked with a couple of them. One of them ran 117 marathons so far. He ran his first one in 1976 and 50 of the 117 were sub 3 hour finishes. He also ran marathons in all 50 states and ran the big 5, Chicago, Boston, New York, London and Berlin. His goal was just to get one more marathon under his belt.

A lady was running the half but told me that he had two friends who were running the full and one had a 3:17 finish from last season and wanted to better that while the other guy was shooting for a 3:05-3:10. I figured he’d be my guy to run with if I wanted some company.

My neighbor, his wife and I headed over to the start where I hit up the port-a-potties one more time, with success, checked in my sweat pants and compression shirt with bag check, put on my nipple guards, applied copious amounts of Body Glide to all parts of my body whether they were prone to chafing or not and headed to the start.

15 minutes before the race start I had another 18 Oz of Powerade Zero and a 100 calorie gel pack. At the start I saw Kiplimo Chemirmir, a local elite runner, and I figured he’d be the one to win this one. I also talked with two other guys. One said his goal was 6:52 pace so I knew he was going for the sub 3 marathon finish. He said he’d been trying for 3 years with no success. The other guy was a 38 year old lawyer who said it was his second marathon and he was hoping for a BQ time but he was going to go at 7:00 pace at the beginning to “bank” some time. I knew there was no such thing as banking so I tried to talk him out of that idea and I figured we could probably run together, at least for a while.

There was no bullhorn or air horn or gun, just a “Runners Ready, Go!” at 7:30. And we were off. Me and my newfound lawyer friend stuck together and after the first straight’s 6:20 pace we slowed it down to a more manageable pace.

Mile 1: 6:53. I knew it was fast and I knew that it was not the pace I wanted to run but it felt easy. I thought there were about a dozen people in front of me at this point.

Mile 2: 7:05. That’s more like it. It was still fast with some rolling elevation and by now we were stretched out pretty far and were just me and lawyer guy. We had a good conversation going, I felt like I was doing a long run with a friend. We also had a women pass us at this point and I thought to myself some people are going out way too fast.

Mile 3: 6:58. Another rolling section and we were just talking away. Turns out that my lawyer friend did not drive the course the day before so I thought he was in for a bitter surprise. I tried to warn him and told him that things were going to get ugly and these rolling slopes were nothing compared to what the second half was going to look like.

Mile 4: 6:50. Another fast mile. This one was pretty much downhill the entire way so I felt good about the pace. Legs felt fine and refreshed at this point. Took my first gel.

Mile 5: 7:06. I felt good about the pace, 7:06 felt certainly doable at this point and it was a mostly flat mile. At the end of it we finally got off the major highway and started running on a narrower one lane farm road with much less, practically non-existent, traffic.

Mile 6: 7:05. Another great split, or so I thought. This one had two little humps but it was nothing major at this point in the game. We also found our first group of supporters who yelled and screamed at us. They were carrying signs that said “Go Ashton” so we told them that they should relax as we were not Ashton. Waving back and cracking jokes was fun at this point, things were in smooth sailing.

Mile 7: 7:11. You would think I was fading rapidly by now but it wasn’t the case. Mile 7 had some massive climbs and this is where I realized that my lawyer buddy was more of a constant pace runner than a constant effort runner. He was pushing hard on the climbs but he was running slower on the downhill. I let him get ahead on the climb but I caught him on the downhill. I felt that I had to run my own race and I wasn’t going to jeopardize my finish just to keep with a stranger on some hills.

Mile 8: 6:57. Mile 8 was mostly uphill and apparently I was getting dragged along for the ride. I took my second gel closer to mile 9 right before the water stop.

Mile 9: 6:57. It was mostly flat with a bit of downhill running. Just before the mile marker we had a water stop where we caught up with the 6:52 guy from the start. We told him that he was running 6:59 average and his sub 3 was dwindling away. He said he was aware but he wasn’t feeling it. We stuck together and we were a pack of 3 at this point as we turned back onto another major highway heading back towards town just passed circling around the airport.

Mile 10: 6:46. My fastest mile split. We were running into the sun heading east and apparently 6:52 guy was still hoping for that sub 3. I told lawyer guy that we should let him go as he’s still trying to shoot for that sub 3 and it would be foolish to try to hang with him. We also saw the “Go Ashton” cheer group again and we clapped and yelled “Go Ashton” as we passed them to everyone’s great enjoyment.

Mile 11: 6:52. We were still hanging with Mr. 6:52, he was surging ahead but he’d walk the water stops where we’d catch him.

Mile 12: 7:24. Me and lawyer guy were talking about our half PRs, I told him I ran 1:31:20 and he said he also had a 1:31 PR. We felt like a good match and we were thinking about how we just might break that PR today if we keep up the pace. That was until we came up on the 4% incline at the end of mile 12 that killed our split. Took one more gel, little did I know that this was going to be my last.

Mile 13: 7:05. After that tough climb it was mostly downhill for Mile 13 where I picked up some momentum and started pulling away from my lawyer friend. Then just as mile 13 was coming to an end we hit another 4% climb and he started catching up. I asked if he was still with me and he assured me that he was.

13.1: 1:31:59. Not a PR but that wasn’t the goal. It’s still blistering fast and much faster than what I probably should have run. It was a 7:02/mile pace up until this point. They say unless you feel like things were too easy so far you’re already in trouble. I felt things were going easy so I thought I was doing well. Lawyer guy ran the split at 1:32:03.

Mile 14: 6:51. This mile had a massive 6% climb at the beginning then a -4% drop. By the time I hit bottom I never heard of lawyer guy again. He was behind me and so was 6:52 guy. They checked out so it was my race from here on out, no small talk, no BS, just running my own race.

Mile 15: 6:59. Mile 15 ended with a massive climb. I saw the Ashton cheer group one more time and I ran into the back end of the 5K race. They were at mile 1.5ish into their run and they were slow and walking. I was dodging them and hoped that the cops would stop traffic if not for them but at least for me. Luckily they did and I managed to run through the rough patch without much issue.

Mile 16: 6:56. My hams were starting to get a bit fatigued but I knew that I have “banked” an incredible amount of time for my BQ goal. I knew I needed a serious bonk to screw this one up. I was getting to the point where my stomach wasn’t feeling all that hot so I switched from water to Powerade and stopped taking gels.

Mile 17: 7:01. By now I was picking off the walkers at the back of the half marathon group and I was running pretty good. This mile was great as I finally got to see my wife and two kids by the playground as I ran by them. They waved at me and made me feel pretty darn good. One of the best miles on the course despite the fact that my hams were getting really worn out.

Mile 18: 7:03. The calves were cramping. They started cramping pretty bad and I was a bit worried about my run. I still had a whole lot more to go. This was the fastest 18 miles I have ever run and it was getting pretty toasty. Temperatures were in mid 60s by now and I could definitely feel it. I was passing more and more half marathoners and I passed a full marathoner as he stopped to take a walk. I knew I wasn’t the only one hurting at this point.

Mile 19: 7:10. This was definitely fading. The alternating 4% ups and downs were getting more and more miserable and my calves were killing me and I wasn’t even at the 20 mile point.

Mile 20: 7:13. More of the same except mile 20 was mostly uphill. I also almost sprained my ankle on a tight corner as I passed some half marathoners. For a moment I felt like it was going to do me in and my chances of finishing were gone but luckily the ankle held up and I kept running.

Mile 21: 6:57. You might think this was me getting a second wind but I wasn’t. I just happened to run down some steep 6% grades for a little while that helped my pace along nicely. This was the point where I knew that I would BQ. And this was the point where I almost sprained my ankle a second time. This one felt a lot more severe than the first one but it still ended up being nothing.

Mile 22: 7:18. This mile had two steep and persistent hills that were killing me and my pace. I kept thinking that these hills sure sucked ass. But there was nothing to do but run them. I tried to mutter a “thanks” or “keep it up” every time I ran by a group of half marathon walkers but it was getting harder and harder to say anything to them. The times of waves and jokes and claps were long gone. Running was no longer fun.

Mile 23: 7:14. I was inching up on another marathon runner and I finally passed him on this section. I really contemplated to just sticking with him but when I got next to him the momentum just carried me away from him and I never looked back.

Mile 24: 7:42. A miserable split. But this was the split where I had to be thankful for some nice people who decided to run their sprinklers in their front yard so I could run through it and enjoy a much needed shower. Temperature was 70F at this point and everyone around me was hurting just as much as I was.

Mile 25: 7:53. Getting close to that magical 8 minute mark. It was downright pathetic but that is all I could muster at this point on some tough 4% elevation grades. I saw my family one more time, I was much less receptive of the cheering and I barely waved at them, I was ready to check out.

Mile 26: 7:57. Worst split of the day. I was done. My legs were done, mentally I was done and I just wanted to call it quits. I knew I had the BQ in hand even if I ran a 9 minute pace and I no longer cared about my time or anything else other than finishing the course. The last climb was another killer and while the elevation chart indicates a mostly downhill mile it didn’t feel that way with the two short but sweet climbs in it.

Mile 26.2: 1:42 I had a tiny bit of kick left in me and when I heard over the PA my name and that I was 4^th overall I could not believe it. I hoped that I finished in the top 10 but to be 4^th it was just awesome. 3^rd would have been better but I’ll take what I can.

When I stopped my Polar it read 3:07:28 and I knew I BQd. It was a fantastic feeling but I needed a good 15 minutes of walking and stretching before I had the guts to sit down without the fear of cramping up to the point of no return.

If you had asked me at that moment whether I was going to run another marathon I probably would have said that you were out of your mind. I felt like that even though I BQd I’d never run Boston or any other marathon. I was done with this stupid distance forever. But 30 minutes later I was already contemplating whether I should run a full or a half next month, under ideal conditions at the Fort Worth Marathon where the course is straight, it has +200 ft of elevation in the first half and -200 ft of drop in the second half on an out and back course by the Trinity river that I run every week.

My family made their way to the finish by then and I learned that I finished 4^th overall out of 252 runners and 246 finishers. I got 2^nd in my age group out of 16 and I got 3 out of 145 for men. Top women ran an impressive 2:54:15 with an awesome negative split (1:28:16 at 13.1). I was 9^th at the half marathon point, one guy DNF and I picked off 4 guys. My age group winner finished with a 3:06:45.

Lawyer guy ran a 3:56:13 after that 1:32 half. I’m glad I didn’t stick with him for the second half and I didn’t bonk as hard as he did. I think “6:52 guy” finished with a 3:19. My neighbor was shooting for a 4 hour marathon and ended up running 4:08. The guy that the lady at breakfast mentioned running for 3:05-3:10 ended up running a 3:28:26 after a 1:24:15 half, another serious bonk. “Go Ashton” ran a 1:38:42 half and ended up with a DNF. I was wondering about him and the lack of his supporters after mile 14, he probably threw in the towel shortly after the first half.

According to my GPS I ran 26.39 miles but we all know that I ran 26.2. It was a tough course with tough weather but I still managed to run what I planned to run. A BQ at 7:10. I wish I had achieved it with more even pacing but I take it either way.

Some other aspects of the race besides the incredible amounts of rolling hills and elevation and the high temperature worth commenting were the road quality, the number of turns and the race organization.

Roads for the first half were very coarse highway asphalt where I could feel every single gravel packed into the tar. It was a choice between that rough texture and running on the tight camber of the concrete curb. I chose the rough surface to save my knees. Once we were back in town running through the historical Azelea trail the roads turned into red brick that had zero give or cushioning but in return they were perfectly uneven.

When I thought of road racing I never considered the number of turns and how it might affect your run. That was until I ran this race. The first 15 miles had 7 turns and some mildly winding roads. Things were perfect. The second half was an utter disaster in terms of turns. I counted them on the map and there were a whopping 42 turns in the last 11 miles which means that on average we had to make a 90 degree turn every quarter of a mile. It was utter misery. Some of the turns were well manned and marked while at others I was hoping to see some half marathon runners in the near distance to know which way to go even though I already drove the course the day before and had some recollection of which way the race was meant to go.

The organization of the race was great. Start was prompt and friendly, port-a-potties were abundant, and the water stops were well manned and stocked with ample warning about which side had which kind of refreshment. Post race food offerings were plentiful 3+ hours after the half marathon start even though I only had a banana as that is all I could stomach shortly after the race.

So there you have it, my first marathon race report. Thanks for reading and hanging with me throughout my training, it was a great experience and I can’t wait to do it again!

It’s been over a month since I last posted an update with photos. I was very diligent with the picture taking until I got down to the point where I started losing fat at a more conservative 1lbs/week rate. There was just really no point in posting an update since then. But I’m still tracking my progress and ultimate body composition goal based on looks so I’m going to stick with the one photo session a month plan until I get there. So here is June’s photo, taken on June 1st. It is not much lighter than May 1st, only 4.7 lbs (2.2 kg), but it clearly shows.

I’m definitely in the home stretch now. My veins are popping out on both my bicep now without flexing, my legs are getting really lean with strong definition in them, you can see details in my shoulders now, my back is certainly coming along nicely and finally I think my abs will start showing soon.

If you ask my wife she’d tell you that I not only finished my transformation but already ran the victory lap and started another race altogether which she’s not a big fan of. She thinks I’m getting way too skinny and there is just not enough meat on my bones. Well we just have to agree to disagree and hopefully once my transformation is complete in my eyes as well she’ll like the final results.

06/01/2010 Transformation Picture

As you probably know by now I had taken a photo session of my progress every four days for 6 straight months. These updates have gotten a bit tiring and I have decided to change over to a weekly progress update instead. Well guess what? I don’t think I’ll be doing that either. I just skipped last weekend, I did not really have time nor did I feel like taking pictures while I was stuffing my face with cake growing my gut. So I have decided that there will be no scheduled photo updates any more, I look pretty good as it is and the last 8 lbs will probably come off at a pretty slow pace so even a weekly update would make no sense. But I didn’t want to leave you without photos of me for too long of a time so here are some photos.

Me and my wife attended my boss’ daughter’s wedding this past weekend and for the occasion I had to get a new suit. I didn’t actually have a suit before, I had a jacket and some slacks but that was about it. I did have a tux from my wedding but for reasons that will became obvious in a moment I could not have worn that to the wedding. So we went to Banana Republic’s outlet store and got me a new suit, tie and shirts. I had to buy an entire new wardrobe pretty much in the past month and I’m very happy with it but it sure cost a pretty penny. The suit is the crown jewel of my new wardrobe and this is what I look like in it. I think I look pretty sharp if I say so myself.

I have tried to look for some recent photos of me in the monkey suit for comparison but I have failed. I could not find photos of me from recent years because I never wore one. I didn’t have one and I remember that I could not even wear the slacks that I had because they were so tight. So for the last couple of years I was wearing jeans even on holidays like Christmas or Thanksgiving. I had to go all the way back to 2000 to find photos of me in a suit and even then it wasn’t trivial.

Here is me in my wedding tux from August, 2000. What a disgusting fat blob I was! I can’t even believe that my wife actually married me looking like that. She keeps telling me that she loves me fat or skinny but I’m still shocked that I looked like that on my wedding day. I distinctly remember that day. It was in the middle of August in the heat of the summer, temperature was over 95 degrees (35 C) and I was sweating my balls off in the heat. I felt very uncomfortable and unpleasant in the suit on my wedding day. I still have  the tux and the shirt I wore that day. The shirt looks like a circus tent on me and even if I would take the waist of the pants in they would still look like pants McHammer would wear, the legs are so wide and the bottom is so huge.

And if you thought I could not have looked any worse, here is a photo of me in slacks and a shirt with a tie around my neck from Christmas, 2000. My gut is huge and it’s rolling over my pants. I seriously have no idea how I could live like that. These photos just really hit home now. Looking at them makes me feel like I have wasted 10 years of my life being big. Who knows what kind of permanent damage I have caused with being this big for this long? Hopefully I still have managed to reverse most of it with my transformation and I can go on and live a happy and healthy life from now on.

So there you have it. A photo update of me in some pretty dapper suit and a walk down history lane just to compare how disgusting I had been looking for the past 10 years.

With this week’s photo I kind of cheated a little bit.

1. I took it Sunday morning instead of Saturday night
2. I took it right after I ran 10 miles
3. I’m flexing even in the relaxed photos because I needed after shots for a challenge and I wanted to look the best

So there you have it. These are my regular one week update shots but they’re not 100% realistic representation of what I had accomplished in a week as they are a bit more posed than last weeks. Even with the posing I can’t see a whole lot of difference which, considering that I was unable to exercise for 4 days and I ate close to maintenance is no surprise. My hips are actually a quarter inch wider than before and my bicep dropped to a 12.5″ size. I have lost over 2″ from my bicep in the past 2 months but they look better than ever even at the smaller size.

05/01/2010 Transformation Picture

Believe it or not, this is the 6 month anniversary of me starting this transformation. I have come a long long way from the ugly 237 lbs (107.5 kg) fat guy. And for the past 6 months I have taken a photo of my transformation status every 4 days without missing any one of them. But this streak of photos is coming to and end with this set. Am I done? No, I’m not. Is it redundant to take this many photos? Yes, it probably is. Does it take a whole lot of time to take and process these photos? Absolutely yes.

So with this, I’m presenting the last installment of my 4-day photo update. I think 6 months is a good place to end this part of my transformation. But don’t worry, it doesn’t mean that I will no longer post photos of me in my briefs! Oh no! You don’t get away from these beauties that easily! It just means I’m switching to a weekly schedule instead and I’ll take them every Saturday from now on. And this new schedule will follow on until I am officially done with my transformation.

This set is just as good as the last set, I think. I’m looking pretty lean even if not as defined as I did in the last set. My dimensions are holding steady, this time my thigh measurement has dropped 0.25″ but that’s about it.

04/24/2010 Transformation Picture

And here is the very first photo I have posted on this blog on 10/26/2009 that has started it all. I’m 66 lbs (30 kg) heavier in this photo. If you enlarge either one hit the left/right arrows on your keyboard to alternate the before/after shot. Pretty shocking! At least it was to me.

10/26/2009 Transformation Picture

I really like today’s photos. All the bloating is gone from the last one and there is no signs of water retention from the excess sodium over the weekend either. All in all I think this is the best set of pictures so far which is great as it shows I’m still heading in the right direction. As far as measurements go, my neck is now a 14.25″ which means Medium dress shirts fit me very nicely now with plenty of room around the neck. Other than this, there is not much else to report.

04/20/2010 Transformation Picture

Here is another installment of “Greg in his underwear”. This picture looks worse than the last one and there is a reason for it. I was carb loading in this picture meaning I was eating excess amounts of carbohydrates on Friday. The reason was that I have a race on Saturday and I wanted my glycogen stores to be at least somewhat full so I would stand a better chance at running a decent race pace. When you load up with carbohydrates the muscles also tend to absorb water along with the glycogen so they look fuller and I look bigger. This is why my abdomen area looks less defined and this is why I look overall more pudgy than I did in the last set of photos. My measurements are very close to the last set, I’m down to 12.75″ on the flexed bicep which is another 0.25″ lost and my chest is down to 38.50″, another half an inch dropped. Everything else is the same as it was 4 days ago.

04/16/2010 Transformation Picture

I took the 4 day photos again. As far as looks go, they’re close to the last set with a bit more definition going on pretty much everywhere. I can see it in the triceps, hams, back and abs. It is true, that the closer you get to lean the quicker you see the changes in definition. I still have about 8 lbs (3.5 kg) to go but I think these last 8 lbs will be the most interesting in terms of visual change. My measurements haven’t changed much. I have also done a 3-point caliper measurement on myself and I’m coming in at 14% with it. I’m getting better at using the caliper and getting more consistent results. It’ clear to me at this point that my BF scale is more of a BS scale. The scale is telling me I’m still 20.6% BF but there is no way that it’s even remotely correct.

04/12/2010 Transformation Picture

Well this photo update didn’t quite make it on the site in time (the date is set back, but it wasn’t posted until much later). I’ve been extremely busy but I still managed to take the pictures on 4/8/10 just as I promised to myself, but they never quite made it on the blog the same day. These pictures are actually looking pretty darn good now! My ribcage is starting to show more and more, I can see more and more veins, even in my upper legs now. As far as dimensions go, everything is down from the last set by 0.25-0.5″ which is great. I’ll just have to keep at it for the final 10 lbs to go. I’m getting so close, I can almost taste it!

04/08/2010 Transformation Picture