Greg's Weight Loss Blog

• Just got back from a Birthday party. Resisted the burgers and the cupcakes. Munched on carrots and peppers instead. Off to eat my filet now. #
• Last night I had a beer. I hardly ever have one and I just confirmed again that beer is an acquired taste that I just never acquired. #
• Couldn't take it any more. Went and ran an easy 3 miles in 24 minutes. Felt good and the "boys" were behaving fine. Gonna run again tomorrow #
• Today even the scale says I'm "normal". 19.9% Body fat. Caliper says 13%. I'm going with the caliper on this one… #
• This morning at the dentist my blood pressure came in at 116/67 with a pulse of 47. Doesn't get much better than this. #

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

After four days without running, I am back and running again! I ran an easy 3 mile run on Wednesday in 24 minutes and I ran a pretty good 45 minute fartlek run on Thursday night averaging 7:19 minutes/mile pace. Today I ran another easy run; 4 miles in 31:34 (7:53 minutes/mile pace). Apparently I’m running just as fast as I did before the break even though my knees certainly felt a bit more sore for the first two runs. It’s amazing just how little of a break can de-train your ligaments.

The first run was a bit of a bag of mixed feelings. I wasn’t feeling 100% and I wasn’t sure if I should do it. I also wasn’t all that crazy about the running in general and for a moment I even thought about not running any more just keeping my calories in check for the rest of my life. But then I abandoned that thought and I realized that I actually do enjoy the running and I was just really missing it is all. I think the difference between missing the running or not feeling like ever running again can be a couple of days. So I better not miss more than a couple of days of running otherwise I just quit for good again. It’s certainly a lot easier to stay with the habit of running than to try to pick it up again and again. Hopefully this was my one and only break in my training and I can complete the rest of my spring training plan with success. If everything goes as planned I might even get up to 27+ miles in this week which would be just great!

“So when are you going to be done with your diet?” I get this question quite often from friends, family and co-workers. And when I tell them that I have another 6-8 or maybe even 10 lbs to go they all act surprised or tell me that I’m fine as I am and I really should stop the weight loss right now. They consider me skinny now. They think I’m about to turn anorexic and fall on the other side of the spectrum of unhealthy. But I know that they are wrong. I think most people making these assessment of my fitness and body composition are wrong simply because of two reasons.

The firs reason is relativity. Relative to my old, 237 lbs size I look pretty darn skinny now. But that doesn’t mean that I’m skinny, it just means people around me are overweight. I’m currently weighing in around 171 lbs (77.5 kg). I remember when I was a sophomore in high school I just surpassed this weight for the first time and they started calling me fatty. They were making jokes about my weight and how I was growing bigger by the minute. I used to be a lean 135 lbs when I started high school and relative to that, 175 lbs was indeed fat and overweight. I remember my stepmother and the rest of my family telling me that I should really start watching my weight and stop eating all that food that I had been eating. And I barely weighed more than what I weight now at the very same height yet the perception was that I was getting overweight and out of control. Boy, were they right! But I paid little attention and kept on gaining weight until I have reached my all time high of around 245 lbs. So while I think I am getting close to my target I’m not quite there yet.

The other and probably more important relativity is my relative weight when compared to people around me. Compared to them I look pretty darn lean and skinny too. I think most people have no concept of what fit or skinny people look like nowadays. A bit of a gut hanging, 10-20 lbs extra here and there does not seem to be a big deal nowadays. And relative to obese people those folks who only carry an extra 20 lbs around all day every day are downright skinny. But it doesn’t mean that they are fit. They might be fitter than most people but I would not consider them fit. If you want to see fit people you have to go to a local 5K or 10K race and check out the top 10 male finishers coming in under 19 minutes for the 5K and 38 minutes for the 10K. Chances are, those folks are pretty fit. Your average office dweller who does nothing all day long is probably not fit at all even if they’re skinny.

And this is the other misconception or lack of concept in the general population. Most folks have no idea about the difference between body weight and body composition. Body weight is simply the amount of mass you carry around on your frame all day long. Body composition is the percentage of this body weight that would be considered bad weight, AKA fat. There are guys in my office who weigh 10-15 lbs less than I do yet have more body fat than I. There is also a guy in the office who weighs 30 lbs more than I do yet looks a heck of a lot better than I. Now, I’m not a fan of huge muscles. I really prefer a slimmer look for myself but you can be skinny and still fat. It’s called skinny-fat. You can weigh 160lbs with a normal BMI and I’d still consider you fat while others would consider you skinny. I can show you people at my office who weight less than I do yet they would not fit into a 31″ size pair of jeans, the very size I have been buying for the past month. I can also show you guys that are 10 lbs heavier than me and still fit into the size 31″ waist. So what’s the difference? The difference is in body fat percentage, or body composition.

OK, so what do I consider ideal body fat percentage? My goal is to get to single digit body fat percentage. I’m currently hovering around 13-14% at 171 lbs. It means I have 147 – 149 lbs of lean body mass, stuff that is not fat; muscles, bones, internal organs, ligaments and the like. It means to be at under 10% body fat I need to be around 163 to 166 lbs. That means I need to lose another 6 to 9 lbs of fat. So when people ask me if I’m done I usually tell them I have another 6-9 lbs to go which should take another 6 weeks or so. And why did I pick the sub 10% body fat as my target? Because 10% is the place where six-pack abs start showing up. So you could say that my ultimate goal is to have six-pack abs showing. And that, I would consider fit and done. So hang with me for another month and a half and watch me transform from lean and skinny to ripped and fit!

I’m sidelined. I can’t run. And it’s driving me insane! Last Friday I had a small medical procedure done that involved me deciding not wanting more children. I have two beautiful kids, a lovely wife and I’m very happy with my life as it is. So the bottom line is that because of my decision of not wanting more children I had to take some time off from running. I have been running a lot since I began running mid-January. I have logged 390 miles (627 km) in close to 58 hours. And I have enjoyed every minute of it. And now I can’t run.

The weekend felt really empty without my regular running. Sure, it was a busy weekend, my son had two soccer games, we went shopping on Saturday and attended a birthday on Sunday but with all the business it still felt incomplete without me running. Monday was another day when I would usually run but instead I met with a friend and had a beer and dinner. I have not had a beer in probably close to a year. I’m not much of a drinker, I don’t even like the taste of alcohol and if I drink a 6-pack in a year that’s a lot of beer for me. I’m also not a fan of any other liquor but I will drink Bailey’s on the rocks on occasion or my favorite sissy drink, mudslide. But I did a favor for the guy so he wanted to take me out for a beer and I went with it. So instead of my easy 3 mile recovery runs on Mondays I was sitting in a bar sipping an amber ale that I wasn’t all that crazy about but it gave me a good buzz as it was on an empty stomach at a much lighter weight and after a year of hiatus from alcohol in general. But if I had my choice of running versus beer I’d go for the running any day of the week.

I’m not supposed to run for a whole week which means I have another 3-4 days of sitting on the sideline. But based on how I feel I just might start running a bit sooner as it’s very hard to resist not to. Running is very addictive and I love the addiction!

26 weeks! I have been working on my transformation for 26 weeks! Considering that I have been overweight for almost half my lifetime 6 months seems like nothing. But when I look at yesterday’s photo update it blows my mind just how much I have changed in the past 6 months. It’s almost surreal to see this kind of transformation. Sure, I have seen other people do it but I never thought I would be one of these people who actually get a hold of their weight and get back to living and eating healthy. As much as I don’t consider my transformation complete just yet, 6 months is a huge milestone so I think I am going to do a bit of celebration. So how did the last week of my 6 month transformation go? Let’s see….

Diet has been good. As you will see on the chart, I am easing up even more on the calories than before but it’s on purpose. I am gradually trying to switch over to maintenance mode from weight loss mode. I have been upping my calories for the past 4 weeks and this week was the highest average weekly caloric intake by far during the past 6 months. And when I say high I’m talking about 2,070 calories on average, still well under my maintenance calories. I had 115 grams of protein on average which is a good, solid amount of protein. Less than before but still well over the USDA recommended ridiculously low amount. I am still very pleased with the way my diet has been going especially since Monday and Tuesday I was out of town and ate out every single meal for the days. I even had ice cream on Tuesday on the way home and it was a fine treat to share with the kids and the whole family. But while I would have had a two scoop portion for myself 6 months ago, this time the whole family share two one-scoop orders instead.

I have not hit the gym during the week at all. Monday I was out of town and by Friday I couldn’t due to a medical procedure that I might or might not write more about at a later time. Bottom line is I could not work out on any of my workout days. Plus I actually pulled my chest muscle the week before and it still has a bruised feeling on the left which does seem to get better but is still not 100% fine. So taking it easy was probably a good idea.

Running went great this week. I only ran 5 days, but it was planned that way. After Friday I could not run due to the medical procedure but because of it I have moved my 10 mile long run to Friday morning instead of Sunday. And to boot, I tried to run it at a 10 mile race pace. It was a success in failure. I ran the first 10K (6.2 miles) in 43 minutes but I ran the last 3.8 miles at 8:15 mile/minute pace for a total time of 1 hour 14 minutes and 35 seconds. It was still a solid run and I am very pleased with it but it wasn’t quite the best run I had hoped for. Overall I have burned 3,268 calories with running this week and ran 28.1 miles which is not bad for 5 days only.

Weight loss, as expected based on the reduced number of calories out and increased number of calories in was less than before. Based on my rolling average I have lost 1.2 lbs (0.5 kg) this week. That is the lowest amount of weight loss for a week so far. But based on these numbers my calculated BMR is 2,203 which very accurately reflects reality. The more I’m switching over to maintenance mode with the diet the lower the weight loss rate is going to be.

• Did my 10×400 today. I felt like I was about to puke. It means I did them right. Averaged 5:34 min/mile for them which is pretty awesome! #

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

Last weekend I ran another race. It was another 10K and I did alright. at my last 5K race I ran a 19:29 which means that in theory I should be able to run a 40:32 10K. How do I figure this? There are calculators on-line that do just that. They predict race pace from race pace. So if you put in that you ran a 19:29 5K it would show that you should be able to run the aforementioned 40:32 10K or a 5:41 mile at full blast. This is the theory. Practice can be a bit different.

The race I ran was the 13th annual Fort Worth Zoo Run 10K. I have looked at previous years race results and based on my predicted time I was hoping for a top 3 finish in my age group and I was secretly hoping to break the 40 minute mark. So how did I do? I did fine.

The race started at 7:00, bright and early. This race is predominantly a 5K race, the 10K distance has only been added in the past several years. This meant that the 10K was the first race in the morning with just under 800 finishers while the 5K race had close to 2,000 runners. The weather was a bit warm at 63 degrees and it was cloudy with rain about to hit but we got spared and only the 5K racers got dumped by the rain.

The start was pretty fast at 6:07 and 6:18 for the first two 500m splits. The third split was still a 6:23 so the pace was certainly very fast for me even though I concentrated on keeping it easy, not going out too fast and letting the leader pack go. I clearly need more work on not going out too fast at the beginning.

By the 3rd km we were hitting some pretty good hills and my pace slowed down to slower than 7 minute miles on average and I started getting really worried about not hitting my target time or finishing in the top 3. I could worry all i wanted but my legs were just not getting any faster. My 5K split was actually 20:02 so I was still right on target to hit my goal as long as I could finish my race strong.

But the second half had even more hills and I was falling apart big time. I have tried to hold on but every step was harder than the last one. I wasn’t sure if I could even finish at this point, let alone meet my target. At one point I was contemplating walking and never running ever again. My legs felt like lead.

I event attempted to use one of the water stations at the 4 mile mark but my attempt ended in failure. I picked up the water cup, lifted it to my mouth, poured some of the water in my mouth and I could not swallow it. I ended up spitting it out and that was the last attempt at getting water. It was only a 10K so getting water during the race is unnecessary especially in the weather conditions we were running in but I figured since I’ll be having longer and longer races, this practice run was a good place to try to work on getting water. Well I failed. I’ll need to work on getting water into my body more at a later time.

There was a 48 year old guy who was passing me at the beginning then during a long straight in the middle I passed him back. Coming down the final downhill he passed me again. I am just not fast enough on the downhill. I’m too worried about letting myself go and really picking up the pace downhill. I will really need to work on it more.

The other problem I had was that I got disoriented and I thought we had much more left to go than we actually did. It wasn’t until we took the final turn and I saw the finish line that I started my final kick. Had I realized we were that close I would have started on it a good bit sooner.

Regardless of my sucking on the water station and the downhills I still managed to get a 40:55 in bettering my previous PR by almost 5 minutes from 1.5 month ago. I finished 22nd out of the 793 and got 3rd in my age group. I’m pretty happy with my result and I certainly know what I need to work on before my next race.

I have two more 10Ks coming up in this race season before I switch gears and start working on the longer races. I hope I’ll get two new PRs between the two races. And I know that I need to work on:

• not going out too fast early (I’m getting better at it)
• running downhill fast
• drinking water while running

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