Greg's Running Blog

Today was just perfect again in terms of nutrition. I have managed to eat 20% fat, 40% carb and 40% protein which is fantastic. My saturated fat was only 2.2% which is also superb. I’m very happy with today’s food intake. The morning was my well established boring yogurt with nuts, I just can’t find a lot of alternatives that give me similar protein/carb/fat intake. I guess one slice of 100% wheat bread with 2 eggs would come close but I don’t have time in the morning to prepare eggs all that often.

Today the roads must have been iced over early in the morning as the school district decided to remain closed it’s not often that it gets this cold here. It was 21 Fahrenheit, -6 Celsius. This meant that I had to stay home with my kids as their daycare follows the school district’s closing schedule. So we went to Central Market, the roads were fine, to get some meats for the weekend. The also have a sushi place inside that makes sushi right in front of you to go. Often when I go got Central Market I also get the sushi there. I usually stick with the rolls (Makizushi) and Philly rolls are my favorites. They are rice, avocado, tuna, cream cheese wrapped in seaweed. It’s very tasty but thanks to the avocado and cream cheese it’s high in fats (23g), especially saturated fats (10g) and low in protein (15g). I still like it nevertheless. The place is pretty nice because they have nutrition guide for all their sushi. Had they not had that I would not have imagined trying any sushi just blind, it’d be a nightmare to try to estimate their nutritional value.

So I got their nutrition guide and looked through it. I was looking for the highest possible protein content and I found it! It’s a Nigirizushi (piece of meat on top of rice) combo on brown rice. Yep, I had brown rice sushi. Since I ordered brown rice they had to make it on the spot and I couldn’t buy one of the prepackaged ones which is good. The fish were raw tuna, raw salmon, raw yellowtail, cooked shrimp and cooked eel. Since this stuff is essentially raw fish with brown rice in nicely done dollops it is very high in protein (32 g) and very low in saturated fats (2g). I’ll get it next time as well for sure. It costs $12 for the meal but it was worth it.

For dinner I cooked up my brown rice with grilled chicken and peas and carrots for veggies. Since my calories were pretty low for the day I could eat a cup of raspberries with my whey protein as my snack.

I took another set of pictures tonight. My chest and thigh went down a bit and my hip went up. I must have measured it wrong the last time. My hair is getting longer and I can’t take a decent 45 degree shot for the life of me, especially now that my father-in-law wasn’t around to keep me entertained. I can definitely see more definition in my back and my love handles seem smaller too. I’ll have to get a haircut before the next set I’m sure.

Another thing that I had to do today was I had to remove a link from my watch’s bracelet. It seems like that even my wrist has shrunk. I’ll have to adjust my other watches too but for now I’ll just wear this one. My wedding ring and my school ring are practically falling off my fingers now, I don’t know what I’m going to do about them.

Today I have also received two unsolicited compliments from co-workers who didn’t know that I have been working out and reducing my calories for the past two and a half months. It felt pretty good that people who see me every day also starting to recognize my weight loss. I can actually see a visible difference even from my December pictures to today’s. I also asked a co-worker to help me punch some extra holes on my belt as I’m all out of holes. We joked around saying that he buys longer belts on purpose just to have to take them to work and ask co-workers to punch holes in them so it looks impressive. Needless to say that is not the case with mine, I really needed a new hole and I punched a second one for the future.

01/06/2010 Transformation Picture

Today’s eating was great. Until I have decided to eat dessert after dinner. It was stupid peer pressure from my wife who made something called Raspberry Delight. It’s basically Graham Cracker crust, raspberries in raspberry jello and finally covered with a marshmallow whipped cream topping. I added up all the ingredients and it came out to be 288 calories for a serving. Last time she made it I had at least three servings in one sitting then some more later. This time I had one serving and I felt bad even about that. Had I not eaten that dessert my food intake would have been perfect. Since I had the dessert it was basically a bunch of extra saturated fat and carbs. Don’t take me wrong, I still came in at 1689 calories, hardly a binge under any standard. But I just feel a bit bad that I got suckered into eating dessert that I didn’t really need. The good thing is that I have resisted the temptation last night. The bad news is that we still have half the pan in the fridge. I won’t be eating any more of it.

I had to buy a new tub of the GNC AMP Wheybolic Extreme Protein last night as I have finally ran through the tub I got. I figured I’d buy two so I won’t run out before the end of the month as the GNC card scam that GNC pulls only gives you the 20% discount on the first week of the month. But then I lucked out and they also were running a buy one get one half off special on it so it made the price of the tub $36 each instead of the $60 that they normally retail for. $36 for this stuff is a pretty good deal. I might go back tomorrow and buy two more tubs, this thing has a shelf life like canned tuna. I have checked the tub and it’s good until August 2011. I doubt I’ll still have it then. I also doubt  there will be a better promo coming along any time soon. Another thing that I have been trying for the past two days is not to mix it according to the instructions with 8 oz water. I only use enough water to turn the protein into a paste which looks and tastes kind of like molten fudge. I have found it pretty palatable and I’m not that big on these shakes to being with. I might start eating my protein shakes instead of drinking them from now on.

I did do my lunchtime cardio just fine today. But I have skipped my evening one. We’re supposed to get some massive cold front tomorrow and I thought it was coming tonight so I spent the evening cleaning the garage to be able to park both our cars inside, I’m just not a big fan of cleaning icy windows in the morning. Then I also went ahead and wrapped our sago palms with some cloth and Christmas lights under the cloth to keep them warm. Their leaves died off when we got the snow storm on Christmas Eve but I’m worried that the roots and the rest of it would die if I didn’t wrap them. Sagos are not very cold resistant and it’s supposed to get down to 10 F (-12 C). After doing all that I just didn’t feel like putting in any time on the elliptical.

Elliptical

• 30 minutes
• 131 avg heart rate
• 317 calories

Today was legs and abs day. I haven’t had one for 2 weeks. I have skipped the twisting oblique, with the extra rest between exercises that I’ve been taking I just didn’t have time for it today. I’ve also felt a bit weaker than usual even though I have used the same weights. I’ll need to keep an eye on my lifts and see how I perform next week.

Today was almost the mirror image of yesterday. The only exception is that instead of the bacon and the lima beans for dinner I had a 10% fat burger patty. Other than that my meals were identical. The beef patty had a bit more protein than the lima beans and the bacon combined so I had 6 more grams of protein today than yesterday. Fat was just a gram more today so carbs had to cover the extra fat and protein. I can see the benefits of eating the same thing every day. It’s easy, there is really not much thought that has to go into it and it ensures that you stay on track. However, as easy and convenient it sounds it’s just as boring. I like eggs but if I had to eat four of them for dinner every day for the rest of my life I’d go nuts. Two identical days in a row is OK. 20 of them? No thank you. Since I’m out of tuna I’ll have to mix it up a bit tomorrow anyway. I’m already thinking chicken.

Today was the first time I have actually managed to put in two cardio sessions in one day since 12/23/09. I’ve been on vacation and yesterday I have skipped the evening one for a movie. I did two pretty decent cario sessions and the both felt fine. I was watching Biggest Loser while doing the one in the evening. That show is just getting out of hand. 500+ lbs people on it? Come on! It is becoming a freak show! I’m not sure what kind of message this show is sending now but I’m starting to dislike it. Jillian also pissed me off today, I saw her in an ad on TV at lunch on the Food Network advertrising her 12 day cleansing formula. What kind of BS is that? She refused to do product placements on Biggest Loser because she didn’t believe in the product and now she’s selling supplements that must be utter garbage! Everyone knows you can’t do much if anything about your weight in 12 days. It has to be a lifestyle change. So It was a double let down today as far as Jillian and the Biggest Loser goes.

Today was my first back day in a long-long time. But it went great. I really had a good time, I concentrated on having plenty of rest between sets, time permitting, and my lifts were good. I did 120 lbs on the lat pulldown which felt just right and I did my usual 130 lbs on the seated row which also felt good. I forgot about the chest supported row but I’ll just do that one on Thursday. All in all I was pretty pleased with today’s workout.

Lat Pull

• 3×10 @ 120 lbs

Seated Low Row

• 3×10 @ 130 lbs

Today was another perfect day on calories. That is if you don’t care about sodium and cholesterol. Sodium was a bit high with 2,500 mg but not terrible. Cholesterol was through the roof but I’m not too concerned with cholesterol I eat, I’m more concerned with cholesterol in my blood and I’m not convinced about the correlation between the two let alone causality.

My breakfast was my usual yogurt almond combo. For dinner I ate two cans of tuna, a bit of brown rice and broccoli. Then for dinner I had the sodium and cholesterol bomb. Four eggs with bacon, baby lima beans and some whole wheat bread. All this have still left me with a good 200 calorie deficit so I had a protein shake before headed out to the movies. My total protein for the day came in at 148 grams which I am very happy with. It was pretty much an excellent day.

Today was the first day that I was back at work and I did my lunch time 30 minute cardio session. I just remembered how much more I like the Precor machine at work compared to the Sole that I use at home. Then again it cost 4x as much so it makes sense that it feels better. I’m not knocking my home machine too hard but if I had the choice I’d use the Precor any day over the Sole.

The workout went great, I had almost the highest average heart rate ever and I burned a good amount of calories. But then I skipped cardio in the evening. Since my father-in-law is leaving on the 6th me and my wife had to use the time and opportunity to go to the movies. We watched Up In The Air. It was enjoyable and we were the only two people in the entire theater which was kind of weird. I guess on the first Monday night of the year at 10:00PM not a lot of people go to the movies. By the time we got back it was way too late to do any cardio so I had to live with the 30 minutes I got in at lunch. Since I have hit my diet perfect today I felt it was a good sacrifice for the day. I won’t get to do it again for a long time, not until we visit my family in the summer and can leave the kids with the grandparents.