The results for this week are very, very good. The first pounds of any diet are the “easiest” to lose – in my experience. It isn’t that it is easy to turn away temptations of food and beer the entire week, or the temptation to sit back on the couch and snack, or to just continually raid the fridge from the time I get up until I go to sleep. However, the first week is generally always a decent amount of weight loss. In 2006 I lost 7 pounds in the first week. So, how much did I lose this time?

I’m happy to report that I’ve lost 10 pounds in the first week on The Diet. I now weigh exactly 210lbs. This is extremely motivating but also I take this weigh in with a small grain of salt. Weight fluctuates and the first week is always a good week if you do well on your diet – so I expect next week’s weigh in to not be nearly as dramatic.

My goal for this week is to be down 3.3lbs or to weigh in at 207 pounds next week. During this first week I did very little exercise (2 sessions of playing basketball and one 3-mile walk in the freezing cold with Eliza). I’m going to try to work out at least 3 times this week, in addition to my normal basketball schedule, and to jog at least 3 miles. I’ll try to bring all of these numbers up each week going forward.

How does this week’s weight loss work into my goal? My goal was to lose 40 pounds in 12 weeks. This week I had the goal of only losing 3.3lbs (which is a good, solid week of weight loss on any diet) but I’ve managed to drop 10lbs. Since it took me 16 weeks to lose 40 pounds the last time I dieted I figure I just dropped 2 weeks off of that number in the first week. So, I’m on track to beat the 16 weeks. Can I make 12?

Today I weighed in at 189 lbs. which is down three pounds since I weighed in 15 days ago. I was hoping I’d be 188 or even 187 (which would have meant that I’d have finally beaten Pat Dryburgh in our little challenge) but I’m willing to wait for next week for that to happen. And it will happen.

Overall I had two fairly good weeks full of activity, a decent food diet, and no major setbacks. Even though I missed basketball last week I still managed to run over 9 miles that week and 6 the last week with basketball on that Monday. I’m currently working on bringing my 5K (or a 3.1 mile run) time down. My current goal is 28 minutes. I’m hoping to hit that this week.

Today Chris Fehnel and I did the Plyometrics portion of P90X, an exercise routine that he’s been doing since we re-started the diet, and it was intense. Fun. But intense. It is definitely a much harder workout than I would ever put together for myself. I’m considering doing this workout either every-now-and-then or even each week. We’ll see.

Next week will, more than likely, end the competition between Pat and I but I’m not going to stop there. I’ve decided to make other goals, besides actual weight, for myself. My 5K in under 28 minutes is my first goal, and perhaps “bringing it” to an entire PlyoX routine would be my second (since while I managed to make it through the routine I definitely didn’t “bring it”).

I know that Eliza, Chris, and I are doing great on our diets. How about all of you?

There are so many money-quotes in this write up that I wish I could just quote the entire thing.  Here are some of the extra-specially good bits.

“The point is: you need goals. You need to define a state you want to achieve. Otherwise you won’t know where you are and you will feel bad about it. Setting goals is therapeutic in itself – you aren’t taking on the whole universe anymore.”

[...]

“Compare yourself to you, not to other people. There is always someone who can run faster, lose more weight, be more one with the all. Measure your progress against your own goals.”

Seriously, if you are trying to lose weight, run a marathon, or just trying to improve your overall health, you need to read Mr. Gustow’s advice.

Source: Getting to happy.

Two factors spurred me to get back on the diet. The first was a trip to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with some friends to see a Monday-night Steelers vs. Dolphins game (you may have seen it on TV, it being perhaps, the worst Monday-night game in history). While in Pittsburgh we enjoyed going to a few restaurants where they seem to serve fries with everything. Have you ever been to Pittsburgh? Trust me on the fries thing, never order a side of fries with your meal. After a weekend of eating, drinking, and football, we all decided we need to shed a few pounds.

When I got home from Pittsburgh I jumped on the scale and I was 212.2 pounds. I weight I hadn’t read on the scale since July of 2006. So, I got right back into being on the diet by increasing my exercise and lowering my calories. The same simple plan I’ve had so much success with in the past.

Fast forward about a month. I began to slow down on the diet again, though I wasn’t gaining any weight, and my brother calls me up and we get to talking about challenging each other to get rid of the last few pounds. We chose 15 pounds, though in hindsight I should have picked a little less (more on this in a second).

So, now it is the 26th of February, have I made any progress since November 28th? Today I weighed in at 195.2 pounds, for a loss of 0.8 pounds since last week, and loss of 17 pounds overall since the trip to Pittsburgh.

My new challenge is to stay between 190-195 for 3 months. I’m going to attempt to lose another pound or two this week, and then maintain it for 3 straight months (all while building a little muscle and hopefully losing a little fat around the edges). It seems I never really have trouble losing weight, but I do have trouble keeping it off and staying focused. I’m charting new territory for myself here, I’m not sure what I need to do to stay motivated, to lose body fat (I assume I need to cut carbs a little and increase protein intake) – but I’m up for the challenge. I never want to see the scale read 200+ again.

An update on “the diet”

One of the things that continues to surprise me is the number of hits, google searches, links, and people in general that end up coming to my site to find information on the diet. A lot of times people find the BMI calculator post, or just the diet page, but there are still people picking up the reigns and beginning their weight loss journey as recently as a few days ago.

One person that comes to mind is Doug Meade, who wrote Becoming less repulsive wherein he states that he’s starting on the diet. Another one is David Meade (are these guys related?), where he’s already posted a few updates on his progress. Keep it up fellas, I can’t wait to see you two progress.

Every single week I get emails from people asking about information on the diet, or to be put on the list as participants. Over the next week or so I’ll be updating that list, but I’ll only be including people that have documented real, tangible, results. “Good examples”, if you will. By the way, this doesn’t mean you have to be losing weight to be on the diet, this just means you have to be documenting it – whether you lose or gain.

There is no time like the present to get on-board, so don’t hesitate to contact me if you would like to begin your road to health. There have been many that have benefitted from this public display of goals, reaching them, striving for them, and even failing just to get back up and try again. Particularly me. I have benefitted a lot from it, and I’m looking forward to the next three months – and trying out my new goal.

What is your goal?

Sometime last week we’ve finally made final preparations for our upcoming vacation and, as these types of things always seem to do, this spurred me to hop back up on the horse.

My weigh in today does not reflect my exact weight currently. It reflects my weight when I weighed in at the time I decided to start dieting again and when I set my new goal.

I weighed in at 196 pounds the other day. I’m certain my weight gain has more to do with me simply not keeping track of it than anything else at this point. I’ve proven my abilities to lose and maintain as long as I continue to monitor my weight. So that is what I am going to try to do – continuously weigh in.

My goal is to weigh in at 185 pounds on September 18th. Four Tuesdays from today. Eleven pounds in a single month is not out of the realm of possibility, especially considering I’ve already lost a little weight over the weekend.

This morning I awoke to seeing this comment on my week fifty nine weigh in:

“So… It’s 5 weeks later, Mr. “I’m a bad, bad dieter!” (”Hello, Pot.” “Hi, Kettle.”) How’s the diet going? I lost 2.6 pounds over the last week, since I finally decided to get serious about it after a string of bad weeks. How about you?” commented – Wally Hartshorn

This is exactly the type of “calling out” I need from all of you. Probably just as much as you need the very same from me! So lets try to keep better tabs on each other again. It worked for us before and it can help us all again (including me).

Thanks for calling me out Wally. Congratulations on losing a few pounds last week. Let’s chat again next Tuesday to check in on each other.

So instead of just covering the amount of gain/loss each week I’ll also toss in some of my other goals that I am working on at the gym, on the court, or on the field. However, just to keep up-to-date I weighed in at 189.2 pounds for a loss of .8 pounds from last week. The amount of weight that I lost does not reflect well to how good of a week I had on the diet.

At the gym

I was able to cover a few goals that I had for myself at the gym for this week. The first was actually timing out a sub-10 minute mile. Although I had never timed myself running prior to this week, I already knew going in that I should be able to accomplish this. So, this I accomplished pretty easily (and by easy I mean sweating like a pig).

My next goal was to be able to run 2-miles, since that was something I had not tried to do before. For those of you that do not know, running and I do not get along, in fact – I loathe it. But, I have goals and I am going to make them. So I ran two miles but I added the goal of making it in less than 20-minutes which I just barely made it. I actually had the opportunity to do this twice this week and the second time I came in at 19:20. I’m looking forward to giving this another try and coming in under 19 minutes before moving onto my next goal.

In my I ran one mile post I said: “So, what is my next goal? I’m going to run a mile in the seven-minute range.” Well, that is kinda what I am working on right now. I’m slowly building up my stamina for longer distances while simultaneously going a little bit faster each time. My new goal is 1 mile in 8-minutes and 2 miles in 18 minutes. I’ll let you know how this goal goes.

In the field and on the court

A small group of us went to the park this weekend to play frisbee, a little tennis (I am absolutely horrible at tennis, and I do mean horrible), and basketball. The weather was great (though we’re expecting bad weather this weekend, ugh).

Andrew and I playing frisbee – March 2007 – Photo credit: Eliza Devroe

It was nice to play at least a little frisbee again for the first time this season. One of my goals is to be able to play competitive ultimate this year sometime. I may have to find a local team or something since I don’t know enough people that would like to do this to create my own team. If anyone knows the best way to do this, hook me up.

Tennis seems like a pile of fun but I’m just horrible at it. Obviously it is because I’ve only played like 30-minutes worth of tennis in my entire life – but maybe I could try to play with Andrew a little this year.

The first game of basketball was a game of 21 with Andrew, Paul, and I. And I was shooting really, really well. Then, when we hopped into a larger game – my shot went into outer space for some reason. I was having trouble getting any type of rhythm back and I was starting to get frustrated – which is the worst thing to do. But I had a great time and it was good exercise. I love basketball.

That was my week of activity. Running, working out, some sports, and a fairly decent diet. The change in weather definitely helps me to keep on top of things and I’m looking forward to making and setting new goals on the scale, at the gym, in the field, and on the court.

[tags]weigh-in, diet, the-diet, andrew nelson, paul kozlansky, running, 2-miles, gym, ultimate frisbee, basketball, tennis, goals[/tags]

Fast forward to the weekend and we went to the Philly meetups and ate and drank foods and drinks that would not be considered diet foods by any stretch of the imagination.

Last week I weighted in at 199.0 and this week I’m 198.0. My goal is two pounds per week and so losing one pound is “ok” considering the week I had. Though tonight will be my return to the gym schedule that I once held along with a new cardio program that I’m starting.

My new goal weight is 180 pounds. The last time I achieved 185 I was not working out at the gym – I was merely doing cardio (in the form of endless amounts of basketball). This time however I’m hoping to build some muscle which should help to bring down the fat percentage a bit. So that is my goal – a wiry, stronger, and healthy 180. Then I will want to attempt to stay there from one Tuesday to the next forever.

At 2 pounds per week that means my goal is to hit 180 by the weigh in on Tuesday, April 24th, 2007. I look forward to trying to beat that goal.

Why not set a goal for yourself, like Daniel Nicolas has, since he has registered for the Carlsbad 5000 and has 5.5 weeks to prepare for it. I find it ironic that the most recent post on his “food blog” is a recipe for Homemade French Fries! I’d love to see or hear more about everyone’s goals. I know Mike is currently at the gym and has been almost every morning since he switched to the Body for Life program, the same one James is using, and it seems to be working for both of them. Mike’s day 30-update showed real signs of progress and I look forward to seeing what his next 30-day update shows.

There is definitely activity. Definite progress being made. Not only am I hoping that over the next few months I’m able to contribute to this again – but I hope that others find the time to do so too.

Side note update: I accidentally sent trackbacks to the above links with the wrong URI, so if you could edit those trackbacks to reflect /diet/ instead of /notes/ that’d be killer.

[tags]weigh-in, diet, the-diet, mike stickel, james mathias, daniel nicolas, carlsbad 5000, goals, gym, cardio, workout, snow, weather, body for life[/tags]

Had some family visiting – which obviously completely knocked me off my diet and exercise routine. I’m really looking forward to getting back into routine, starting today, but I’m not going to weigh in today because I don’t feel it would do too much good.

Only two results would come of weighing in after so long of being off routine. 1) I’m within a pound or so of my last weigh in. 2) I’ve gained a few pounds. Neither would surprise me. But my weigh ins of late are more for the purpose of keeping myself “on track” and not deviate from my goals – I know I deviated and I know I made little or no progress towards my goals. Weigh in = not needed this week.

So, hopefully next week – after getting back onto routine – will show that I leveled out and am back in stride to reach my overall goals on the scale as well as in the weight room and on the court.

2007 huh? Incredible.
[slug]winter06-vacation-over[/slug]
[tags]family, vacation, diet, weigh-in, the-diet, goals, gym, scale, routine[/tags]

When you are invited to a friend’s house for a party, or have one for yourself, and everyone brings “whatever” it seems that the “whatever” ends up being the worst possible stuff your body should ever consume. I think the next time we plan something, it will be a health-food energized event. Vegetable medleys, fruit salads, and water. Some party that will be! But at least I won’t feel as bad as I did on Sunday after having eaten like I did.

All of that being the way it is. The regular gym visits prevail on keeping my weight under control. I weighed in at 189.4 pounds, down 0.6 pounds from last week. These types of things really keeps me happy about joining the gym and motivated to continue to go regularly.

This week, my goal is to have a really great week on the gym front as well as my food in-take. What are your goals this week?

[tags]weigh in, diet, the-diet, gym, food, party, goals[/tags]

What are the top five reasons you started to diet in the first place?
For me this is fairly easy to answer because I’ve literally cataloged every step of my journey from the very beginning. The very first time I wanted to diet was in September of 2005, right before my 25th birthday, and just after a vacation in Florida with family. What were my reasons then? To quote myself:

“I’m fat. I admit it. I’m telling you, not because you care, but I’m hoping it will motivate me to become unfat.” … “While on vacation, we’d go back to our condo and unload all of our pictures from our cameras onto our respective iBooks. Each and every time a picture of either of us with our shirts off would appear, we’d grimace in pain. Our eyes becoming watery at the unsightly bellies which have formed on the front of our abdomens.” — “The biggest loser” – September 25th, 2005.

That particular diet did not last very long (on and off for 3 weeks I believe). My attitude and reasons for doing the diet were all wrong, and I think it is one of the major reasons I did not succeed. I would say things like “I only lost roughly 2 pounds this week.”. Which would definitely effect my attitude. Little did I know at the time that losing 2 pounds per week was the best possible way to lose weight and keep it off.

My reasons for starting my second diet, and the one that worked, were the following:

• Health
• Age
• Self
• Eliza
• Sports

Although there is no particular order in the above list, I did try to list them by what I felt was most important to me at the time of starting the diet.

My first reason for sure was my health. I was sick of feeling the way I did, and being overweight can definitely have a huge effect on your health. My back hurt, my self esteem was down, etc. etc. – and I really just needed to get out of the funk. Second was age I think. I really did not want to have to diet when I was older, as I know it would get harder and harder to lose the weight the older I got. Even at 25 you can do the things you could when you were 18, and I didn’t want to be saying that when I was 35, 45, or even 55. I figured “Today is the day to start, not tomorrow because tomorrow always turns into the next day“. Third was self, and I say self because I wanted to feel better about myself. Always hating the way clothes fit, the way I feel, the way my stomach would fly out of my shirt when I bent this or that way, or the way I felt I was being perceived was getting really, really old. So to not have this on the list would be lying – I definitely wanted to look better and in turn feel better about myself. Fourth was Eliza’s success on the diet. She had started her diet before I started on mine and she was incredibly successful on it, was looking great, feeling good, and it was a huge motivation for me to do likewise. I owe much of my success to her lead. Lastly, I really wanted to do better in sports. I love basketball and frisbee and the diet has really made my “game” much more enjoyable. No more chest pain! No more chest pain!

So, those are my main five reasons.

What was your biggest failure on the diet, and how did you overcome it?
Hands down: Obstruction of routine. I had a few small set backs during my diet the first being within the first two weeks of the diet. Obstruction of routine can come in many forms. In that first example we went away for the weekend, ended up eating whatever we wanted at a restaurant, going to a few bars, etc.

One of the largest obstructions to my routine was moving. Obviously it was the reason I stopped doing the diet for almost 8 weeks. It completely knocked my eating habits, posting habits, and weigh in process that I had come to rely on.

However, the way I overcome it is to not worry about those times, get back on track and move on. You can see evidence of this between week two, three, and four of my diet. I went from gaining 3 pounds to losing almost 3 and then almost 5 pounds.

Things come up. Things happen. Vacations are fun! Enjoy them. Going away for the weekend may not fit into your diet. Don’t worry about those times. If you gain a few pounds, that doesn’t mean that your diet is failing – it just means that you need to get yourself back on track to reverse those few pounds the following week or over several weeks. For me, I can still look back and say I’ve lost around 40 pounds overall – even though I had a few weeks that I gained. Routine, routine, routine.

Did blogging help or hinder your success?
For me it helped tremendously. I now have my own, personal and private, journal that I keep – which would have helped in a very similar fashion – but would have lacked the “social responsibility” I felt to keep weighing in. Being able to see my progress over time, and having people comment on my successes and failures – has helped me a lot. To give an example (and this ties in with the previous question as well and where I got my inspiration) was James Mathias saying “Continuing forward without dwelling is what makes the difference.” on one of my posts where I didn’t do so well. This really helped me to develop a similar outlook, and to continue.

What things did you do to help ensure your success?
Simple. I do what I find fun and don’t do the stuff I hate. I love playing basketball and as most of you know I played a heck of a lot of basketball during my diet. I ended up developing a love for Ultimate too, and so I also used that. If you hate walking on a treadmill (I do), then don’t do it. Get outside and walk. Walk at a mall and do some shopping. Whatever you do, get off the couch.

As for food, the same philosophy. Eliza and I really enjoy grilled chicken salads. And, they happen to be good for you! So, we’d often make them, along with other things that we enjoy. Tomato sandwiches for example.

Another note about food is to never deprive yourself of stuff you really really like, even if they are not good for you. The only thing you will do is make that longing for that food even harder on yourself and you might end up bingeing. An example of this is, in my case, Cheez-Its. I love cheez-its, and they are not very good for you. However, Eliza and I would buy 100 calorie bags of cheetos, cheez-its, and other little things – and this really helped us to combat the cravings while not going overboard and staying within our daily limits. These little bags were essential for us.

What is one recommendation you’d have for someone on Day 1 of their diet?
I have a few so I won’t be able to limit it to just one.

The first would be; have the right reasons to diet. You might be told that you need to diet, but unless you believe in the reasons for dieting you won’t actually want to do it.

The second would be; set small and large goals. I set incremental goals for myself as well as long term goals. That way I could always aim for the large goals while feeling good about hitting the small ones. And, if you miss a small one, you have time to correct your strategy to make the longer term ones. I liked having a goal of losing about 8 pounds per month, while keeping goals of 220, 215, 210, 200, and so forth, in sight as well.

The third would be; tell everyone you know that you are on a diet. Hiding the fact that you are on a diet only can lead to 1 thing – not being responsible for staying on it. The more people that know the more you’ll be motivated to live up to your word for being on a diet. Also, it will help notify those people of what to feed you, or that you may not want to be seduced by cake and ice cream all the time.

I really hope the above questions and answers can help everyone on their diets. However my perspective is definitely not the only one. I’m calling on Eliza (who has been a huge inspiration for the entire diet), Chris (who has had a ton of experience with dieting both “alone” and “socially”), James (who is the most consistent person I’ve run across and was a huge inspiration for me), and Scott (who has recently begun his journey and is making staggering progress). I hope they all answer this call, so that you might all be filled with their insight into this extremely rewarding struggle.

Update: If anyone else would like to answer these – please do so. Either email me or comment here or trackback this post with your answers – I’d love to read everyone’s perspective on this. I just singled out a few I’d really like to read – but I’d want to see whatever has to say about these five questions.

Update: James answered, Chris answered, Scott answered, and Eliza answered. Thanks everyone! If anyone else wants to answer these questions too, I’d love to read the answers.

[tags]eliza devroe, scott mcnulty, james mathias, chris fehnel, food, diet, the-diet, goals, excercise, sports, basketball, ultimate, frisbee, meme[/tags]

Me, after running about 3/4 mile (taken by Eliza with one of her anniversary presents)

I’m really happy that I was able to do it, even though I’d thought it would take a bit longer than it did to get up to that point. Running is difficult, no matter what short music geeks from Seattle say, and I’m proud of myself.

I didn’t do this on my own either. Eliza encouraged me during each “training session” that we had. She and I walked three miles a day, for a few days, and each time we tried to jog as much of the last mile as we possibly could. On the other days I’d run to the Post Office and back to get the mail, which is about two-thirds of a mile. This helped a lot, because small successes can help you attain a larger goal.

Then, yesterday Chris and I decided it was time I try for the entire thing. He actually helped me this time by not talking. Normally he is screaming in my ear like a drill sergeant in a Kubrick film – but this time he let me do my thing and I succeeded. I even had enough oomph to sprint the last few hundred feet.

So, what is my next goal? I’m going to run a mile in the seven-minute range. I haven’t timed myself yet, so I am not sure how hard this will actually be, I might even be close now. Once that is accomplished, I think I’m going to add some distance. Oh, I turn 26 on September 30th, and so I plan on doing the sub-eight-minute-mile before then.

[tags]running, jogging, the-diet, mile, goals[/tags]

Last night Chris and I went for a run, and while he had no trouble with the effort at all, I had absolutely no desire to run the entire mile. My lungs didn’t burn, my legs didn’t give out, nor did my heart ache – rather I simply gave up. Call it a lack of motivation.

See when I play basketball I have a goal – win the game. After 3 hours of basketball if the game is tied with one shot to go, I have no problem exerting myself. When running, even though I have a goal to finish, I don’t have the desire to overly exert myself. I can’t quite explain it. So I’m going to ignore my own thoughts and works towards a specific goal.

So I’ve decided to set the goal of being able to run (read: jog) an entire mile without letup before my 7th wedding anniversary (August 27th). Where I’ll go from there, who knows.

[tags]goals, running, exercise, jogging, the-diet, diet, anniversary[/tags]