Not bad

Well, i didn't post yesterday so i think I'll just hit the what happened items today rather than the usual rant about stuff.

Yesterday was running day. got up at 5 and started by 5:30. Running partner is not here so i was on my own. Started nicely but my mp3 player ran out of batteries and then at the half way point i just had to stop. But i kept walking and then ran the second half of the third lap. Then for the fourth lap i cut it in quarters - walk, run, walk, run.

i felt like I'd copped out of the run by the time was only 8 minutes more than the first time we ran so i am pretty happy. also, after 5k i really felt like there is not way I'll be able to run the actual half marathon - but after doing a little walking etc. i really feel that it wont be so hard - and there are still 8 weeks to go.

Today is fast day, had a good workout this morning and best of all i weighed in at 98.2kg. this is the lowest ever - now i know that Monday will be higher so i don't want to be too excited but it still is a milestone of sorts.

I will end today with a low carb meal and then stick to low carbs for the rest of the diet, which ends on the 6th. I intend to do two 30 hour fasts in this time - i know this will be hard but I'm sure the result will be great.

Exaggeration

In an attempt to remain motivated i like to read as much on nutrition, exercise and fat lose as i can as well as following blogs and listening to pod casts. I also subscribe to many discussion groups on this subject and have a great interest in the responses to the various topics.

I am astounded with the amount of BS and misinformation as well as the incredible contradictions of 'studies' and common knowledge. I've been wondering for a while what this all means and how it came to be that we could know so little about such an important subject. As we decode the genome and CERN's LHC seeks the boson how is it that we have an obesity pandemic that we don't seem to know the slightest thing about?

I've come to the conclusion that it's all a matter of exaggeration. This happens for a range of reasons, firstly that it is human nature to overstate things, secondly that it is human nature to look for the easy option and thirdly that marketing nutrition relies on the first two reasons to a large degree in the fight for a piece of this multi-billion dollar industry.

If all the methods of weight lose being touted had the results claimed then combining them would make the international concern 'underweight' rather than obesity. Plus we'd get there with no effort and everyone would be happy. As this isn't the case let's look at some of these elements and what i feel about them.

• Multiple meals per day - often we hear we need to eat six small meals, sometimes more, to burn fat and gain muscle etc. Doing this will increase our BMR while not allowing us to get hungry. Sounds logical as the body always has something to burn it should keep burning and easy as the glutton in us likes to eat more often and the lazy person in us does not want to be hungry. But really, how do you lose weight if you always have food to burn and how do you restrict how much you eat at each session if you don't want to be hungry and like to eat so much. This approach might help but only a little and it takes more discipline, not less.
• Interval training - old steady state cardio sucks and interval training is the new thing, it is apparently 9 times more effective. Really? if it's that effective there should be 9 times as many slim people as before, or something seriously visible as a result. If i lost 10kg in two months before using a steady state approach then now with intervals i should have lost more than 90kgs (wouldn't that be nice). Personally i do believe that intervals are better than steady state for me but my reasons would be different and you cannot say that steady state is bad either. For me personally i like intervals because i can burn more (because i work harder) in a shorter period of time, i really get the feeling of making progress by pushing as hard as i can an increasing that each week and it is not boring like steady state cardio. I like it but 9 times more effective is just plain BS.
• BMR - we often hear that if your intake of calories is less than your BMR you will lose muscle rather than fat. Every one will like this because if sounds like you shouldn't go hungry (remember that hungry is only a state of mind, you can be hungry while eating many times you BMR). This 'fact' makes no sense. If you eat at your BMR and then exercise then your caloric deficit would be less that BMR - what makes this number magic? It is relevant only to when you are doing nothing.
• Keytogenic - Dr. Atkins popularised the no carb revolution which we see resurging time and time again. He didn't invent it, nor did he study it and outside of this element he was a total quake. But it does work, he based the whole diet on studies done by two other doctors who proved that it does work. The principle is simple - burn fat as the only kind of energy (keytones) and when you run out of what you've eaten the body doesn't need to switch formats it just continues with the stored fat. Many don't like it because it is high in fat, many say that it's just water loss (but that's just the first five days) but really this is not healthy because it is so low in fibre and other nutrients one would get from other vegetables and fruits. Low carb is good but has clear down sides as well, plus you just can't do it for long periods of time.
• Carb Cycling - this one i find funny. it's trying to be a keytogenic diet but gives back carbs on "refeed days". The theory is that by having re-carb days you will not get the completely lethargic feeling of a full Keytogenic diet. BUT the lethargic feeling is only on the first few days of such a diet and by not hitting total keytone fuel this completely misses the point. In fact it is proven that when running on keytones the body is more energetic and has better endurance. The US army is looking to develop Keytone MRE's to exploit this fact.
• Diet is a dirty word - we must think lifestyle and not diet because a diet will not last in the future. The problem with this is that diet just means 'what you eat' and therefore saying that diet will not help weight loss is like saying that food will not help life. This is great marketing though as diet implies negative and hungry situations that people don't like. However there is no weight loss without a restrictive diet.
• Protein Shakes - after a workout get liquid protein into your system quickly to maximise the recovery and build muscle. Sounds logical but how much protein does the body need for this, how quickly can it really break it down and build it up and do we really want more calories after we've just burned some? This is not only a waste of money but it might just have a negative effect. Maybe if you are a serious body builder it might be worth looking at but never if you want to lose weight.
• Starvation mode - this theory is in line with many above that if you eat too little you will stop losing weight. Wow, how did we get sucked into this one. If you ate nothing then you lose weight, people who do actually starve because of reasons outside their control do not end up in a (holding pattern) - they lose weight. People that fast for religious purposes and then eat at night do not put all that nutrition to their hips because they have put themselves in starvation mode (actually they lose weight in most cases). This is again the lazy option, i am feeling hungry so i MUST eat otherwise I'll go into starvation mode - what a joke.

It's not hard to see why we are all getting so fat. We are kidding ourselves into the easy ways and then eating like pigs.

We also suffer from short memories. As a boy my father working in a gym (mid seventies i guess) and i remember that the main thing he was doing was circuit training. Funny how this is now what we are told we need to do to lose weight and that 'science shows' that this is the break through we've all been looking for. Maybe it's just a case of 'it used to work and what we are doing clearly doesn't work so let's do that again'

Dad was also a runner, the main technique used at the time to train was Fartlek (spelling) which is very simply interval training - have we really come so far or just full circle.

Personally i like circuits - it just feels right. I like lifting weights and the heavier the better because it make me feel like I'm working out rather than just cheating the system. I also like intervals for the same reason - i work really hard and it feels good without getting bored.

But i do not believe that i will drop massive amounts of weight in a short period of time.

What do you think?

Official Obesity

Well it is official! i have not managed to maintain below the obesity level. Today's weigh in was 100.8 kg. I am not happy however given the weekend's activities and last night's eating frenzy i know why. While initially very angry i have decided to look on the bight side - so here goes with some positives.

• It is a loss from last week and officially my lowest in the past ten weeks (and lowest official weigh in for the past 10 years also i think)
• The loss is fat, definitely not muscle.
• Losing 1lb of fat is pretty good, if i did it every week I'd be down 52 lbs in a year.
• I might have lost more than 1lb of fat as i have pushed hard and increased strength this week.
• The anger i felt this morning was turned into a really hard core workout.
• Stuffing my face on special food brought by my mother in law must have pushed the weight to a high point which will swing down later.
• My clothes fit better showing also that I've lost fat.

But, we must not let positive thoughts lead to a feeling of success. So this week i will continue with the ESE (even though i have guests from out of town and it will be difficult), run a full 10k on Thursday (even though my running partner is not here), eat lots of Shiritake noodles to reduce overall calorie intake and do a little more in the evening (most likely WII Fit).

I want to see a monumental result next week!

And Then the Wheels Fell Off

Yesterday was not good, a little bit extra with breakfast. Then as we had a stock take there was cakes and biscuits etc. for the teams. While waiting for them i had one, which turned into lots. Even lunch was a little bit over the top.

Got home and the family wanted dinner and with no food in the house we went for Pizza. Not quite as bas as it sounds this is reasonably healthy thin crust pizza and i only had two slices. Filled up on salad etc before hand.

But with a little bit more for each meal and snacks in between i think i ended the day at about 2,650 - a lot more than planned. i hope this doesn't mean i weigh in over the hundred on Monday.

Met my running partner at 5:30. i was TOO SORE to run and only made 5k. Clearly over trained the past few days and as Sunday is my rest day i shouldn't have been trying to run. Hope i can recover and move on.

Had Shiritake noodles for breakfast and will eat a healthy lunch - i hope this undoes the bad from yesterday.

Fasting & Golf

Hi, just a quick one. i had an appointment today to play golf with one of my customers. It's normally fasting day but i didn't want to be explaining to them why i couldn't eat lunch. And as i have another similar appointment on Saturday i it was only logical that i fast the day before.

But then i had just run 10k and didn't think it wise to go without nutrition immediately after that. so i came up with the plan to stop after lunch and then i could eat with the golfers the following day. Only worry was not having dinner, this is historically very very hard for me.

Got through it, but the wife was very upset that i wouldn't eat her food - she thinks i decided to fast because i didn't like what she'd cooked. Between you and me it did help a little but wasn't the reason.

Workout today was good, no issue with strength or endurance considering i hadn't eaten for 16 hours. Golf was really really bad. I'd like to accuse lack of energy or fasting for the poor performance but i don't really think it had anything to do with it - i just stink and today really showed it.

didn't actually have much to eat for lunch and haven't had anything since so i'm looking forward to getting home for dinner. i have some Shiritake noodles and a good idea of what i will do with them - more low cal for me please.

skinny-fat-skinny-fat-skiny

I'm not one of those people that 'has always been fat' but i have been fat at different points in my life so i also can't say i was always skinny until ...... I'm not sure if I'm a fat guy trying to get skinny or a skinny guy trapped in all this blubber. Let me give you some history.

As a child i was very thin. I guess i was a chubby baby but i have seen some family Christmas photos that make me look like a cancer patient (let me see if i can scan some when i go home in October).

Later in life, about 12 on i had a serious chubbiness. i have some shameful family pics from a trip to Queensland, don't want to dig them out. This stayed with me till about the age of 15, lost a lot with some mysterious illness that put me in hospital for a week.

So from 15 to about 22 i was skinny, but it wasn't till i was about 20 that i felt thin, even just those few years as an early teenager had me so body conscious. it wasn't till i was about 20 and working out a lot (unemployment) that i was comfortable to have people see me without my shirt.

When i met my wife i weighed 62kgs (136 lbs) and when my second son was born i weighed 115 kgs (253 lbs) that's almost double. Now I'm not ever going to be skinny like that again but it's still the truth (really must get some pics going - i think i have some VDO of me at 62kg)

In contrast, I've been heavy for a long time now but only recently have i begun to feel like a fat guy. Previously i was a skinny guy trapped in my fat body - but once people start describing you at the fat guy and no one you know remembers or was around when you were skinny you have to accept it (or do something about it)

So what I'm saying is in line with the title. Not always fat or thin but struggling with my weight is something I've always done. I remember times when I'd be eating 6 full meals a day in hope of getting heavier or doing Atkins till i was hospitalised (2005).

Now i don't know where this is going - guess I've got some demons to deal with.

Anyway, ran another 10k this morning. it wasn't any easier, maybe even harder but having the confidence that i knew i could do it was positive. Big issue is chafed nipples - at the end my white shirt was red from the nipple down on both sides - very embarrassing.

Anyone got a fix for this issue or should i stop running?

Liz, thanks for the advice on equipment and the link. I've now decided to change the plan for the next few weeks. Why isolate one muscle group when i can work more and burn more fuel. Also the elliptical won't be touched unless i have very sore knees (like right now) - there are plenty of other machines in the gym, i wanna use them all.

Not Obese

I am no longer Obese!! While it is unofficial (official weigh in is Monday only) today i weighed in at 99.8kgs (219.5lbs) which at 6 foot nothing makes me overweight and no longer obese from a BMI perspective.

Never did i think the term Overweight would sound so sweet.

Now i must try very hard to keep to my nutrition plan as i never want to see the obese reading again. I think Brad's ESE Post today really sums it up on this front.

And a big shout out to my followers Geoff and Liz. Finally i have some comments and someone to be accountable to.