Start of Week 6

Attempting to change your lifestyle can be... sporadic. I feel like things hit me randomly throughout the days, weeks, and months that I've been doing this. This week I was struck with a realization. I'm am, without a doubt in my mind, an athlete.

This is what I've been shooting for since I started on this journey. I wanted to be an athlete (again...?). I was always athletic. You know that fat kid on the playground that could shoot a basketball and knew how to throw a frisbee before a lot of his peers? That's me. I have good eye hand coordination. I have quick reactions, and I believe in my ability to feel where my body is in space. Along with that, I feel like I know where my body SHOULD be in space, so I get there. I can cut down angles. I can read a play. I don't mind laying out in the mud to stop a ball or catch a frisbee.

Having all of those abilities doesn't mean squat unless you have endurance. As a kid, I played soccer. I was the goalie. I didn't have to run much, but I could be active for about 10-15 seconds at a time, wind myself, then I'd get a break as I punted the ball down to the other end of the field. It worked well for me. I got to be a part of the team. I got to hang out with friends. I even got to have my dad coach me... so at least I knew I wouldn't be riding the bench for being the fat kid.

This week I'm coming to the realization that I am an athlete. Now, I'm not saying that I have ridiculous endurance or anything. I'm still not fast. What I do have going for me, though, is that I'm not afraid of going the distance.

When I signed up for the Marine Corps Marathon a few weeks ago, I knew that I was getting myself into something that was going to test me physically and mentally. Honestly, it just seemed like the next logical step after running a half marathon. Why not a full?

I've found that when it comes to endurance sports, distance is all relative. If the farthest you've ever run is 2 miles and someone asked you to go run 5, you'd think they were crazy! 5 Miles? That's so much! It's over twice as many as you've ever done before. As I build to the half marathon I'm doing with my wife (and some of her family), I don't fear 10 mile runs anymore. I've done 5-10 runs over that distance already. Sure it hurts sometimes, but it's not bad, and I live. So when I think about running 13, it's just 3 more... and 3 miles is no big deal anymore. So when I think about doubling my half marathon to do a full... here's how I see it.

After my rest week, I have 29 weeks to build up to the 26.2. I could start at 0 and add 1 mile per week and I would get there. That's not scary to me. But I'm already at 13.1, so why start at 0? I won't. I'll start at 13.1. And then I'll build. My plan is to run 20 miles on July 20th. That gives me 14 weeks to maintain my endurance and build my speed.

Between now and the marathon in October, I'm planning on 3 bike rides (50 miles, 75 miles, and 100 miles) at least 5 foot races of varying distances (5k's to half marathons). I also want to do a Duathlon.
(run, bike, run). Not only does this stuff not scare me anymore. I'm excited for it.

As I go into my last week before the half marathon, I'm on the end of my taper, which means I'm totaling about 8 miles over three runs. I'm used to 20-26 miles per week right now (when the marathon training really picks up, I'm expecting 35-45 miles per week). The taper means I'm burning less calories which doesn't help with weight loss, but it does help with recovery which should allow me to run my best half marathon.

I want a sub 2:05:00 finish time. But more importantly, I want to finish with my wife.

All that stuff said, I'm already bored with my runs this week. I have two 3 milers and a 2 mile walk scheduled. I may or may not take the walk... if I do, Yahtzee can come.

I'm not happy about my weight loss as of late. I'm not completely sure what's going on with me. Regardless of if I'm eating too much or what, with the amount of running I had been doing, it shouldn't be a problem. I think I might have the appetite of someone running 25-30 miles a week but I'm only doing 15-20 over the last couple weeks because we're tapering for the half. What that means is that I'm burning 2000 calories in exercise instead of 2500, but I'm still eating like I would have when I was running more. I just need to get it under control.

With that in mind, I'm REALLY worried about this week and next week since I'm barely running this week and I'm taking a week off next week to let my body recover. My ankle has been screaming at me, so I'm gonna give it a break.

This week, my weight was 232.5. Again.

Start of Week 5

I spent a lot of time in reflection this week. I decided to look back at my life and really evaluate where I am right now. What's changed? Why does this feel permanent when nothing ever has before?

Well, first of all, I have a supportive wife and family. Not that I didn't have my families support before, but my parents can't physically do what I can/could, and although my brother can, we didn't live close enough to each other any of the times when I got serious about weight loss. My wife is with me now. I can talk with her about ANYTHING. Having support is extremely helpful.

In the past, when I lost weight, I think I looked at weight loss as a finish line. I had a goal, and I was going to accomplish it. It was a race. I dropped weight as quickly as I could and once I crossed the finish line, I didn't have to do this crap anymore. That's what it felt like to me. Crap. Lifting weights is BORING. Is it cool to see your body change, physically? Hell yeah! But do I want to spend an hour in a stinky gym a few times a week? Hell no! So once I was done, I was DONE.

Then the weight would come back. Sometimes slower than others. Sometimes I would sit comfortably... about where I am right now... but it wouldn't last. The weight came back. And every time I got scared that it was coming back, I'd "lose weight" again, drop down to where I was comfortable the last time, and call it quits. I would try to maintain by going back to what I had always done, eating whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted. I had already done the work, why wasn't I maintaining?

Well duh, Matt! Just because you're lighter doesn't mean you can eat like a fat man again. Eating like a fat man makes you fat!

So this time, things are completely different. I'm taking it slow. I'm not racing to the finish line. I'll get there when I get there. I'm also changing habits. I feel gross on rest days. I know I need the rest, but I'm finding that I don't think to myself, "Thank God I don't have to work out today!" Instead I'm thinking, "I really want to work out, but I can't because I don't want to hurt myself or have a setback in my training."

I'm also changing my palate. I often think that I really love chips and fries and other junk food, but once I'm eating it, I realize that it doesn't really do anything for me anymore. In fact, the other day I went out for brunch with some friends. I had a healthy sounding burrito... grilled chicken, black beans, vegetables, some salsa... but I ordered some sweet potato fries as well. I knew they were going to be deep fried, but I thought I wanted them.

I was wrong.

I ate them anyway, but I found myself eating them because I felt guilty for spending the extra money, not because I was hungry or because they tasted good. Shit, I covered them in katsup... I didn't even taste the sweet potato fries.

Sure, I guess I enjoy junk food sometimes... the occasional slice of pizza or Chinese food is nice, but I wouldn't say I get out of it what I used to. I certainly don't crave that stuff very often anymore.

The other thing that's really changed in my life, is exercise. Winter is by far the hardest time to exercise for me. That's why I decided to do p90x on my last cycle. To push me through the winter. I've found joy in exercising. I think that I stopped cycling in the winter in the past because it was too cold to do it. I don't have the gear. But I certainly have stuff to run in the winter, and there's no excuse not to. Is it pleasant? Not always. But it works, and I do enjoy running.

Now that it's been warm out and I'm training for a half marathon, I'm encouraged to keep going. Last week, I signed up for the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington D.C. It's on October 28th. I have 7 months to train for it. That's 7 months to stay in shape and continue losing weight.

Over the weekend, my wife and I ran a 10 mile race in Margate as a warm up for the half-marathon on April 1st. We finished in 1:33:51 (9:23 pace). That's a personal best for me. We're looking at finishing the half somewhere around 2 hours. I'm hoping to get under 2, but I'll be happy with under 2:05.

Despite sitting on a plateau at 232.5 pounds, this is my life now. I eat well. I exercise a lot. I have goals. I keep pushing. And I will continue this process until I'm where I want to be. Then I'll keep pushing forward. Because if you're not moving forward, you're standing still. And I'm not ok with that anymore.

Today's pictures:

Start of Week 3

So I have a disappointing start to the week. I weighed in and gained 2 pounds. Like I said last week, I thought I had lost a bunch of water weight... after this weekend... I'm pretty confident I'm holding water again. There was a lot of beer and salty meat, potatoes, etc. YES, there were vegetables too.

This morning, I was 234.5

Like I said, disappointing, but not the end of the world. My weight loss goal is still attainable. Especially with the training we're doing. This was just a bad week for weight loss in general. I only ran 3 days this week, I also ran less mileage than I was supposed to. This week, we're busting out 12 miles on Saturday. That will be my high calorie day, and I'm not anticipating having another one this week.

When I started this blog, I decided to name it The Matt Train because that's what I wanted to be on my bike. A train. The steam engine, pulling my group along behind me. I've always been a leader, but I don't physically look like guy who's gonna do all the work. I want to look like that guy. I even said to my wife the other day that I'm starting to get self conscious of my stomach again. Which is weird because it's so drastically smaller than it used to be.

I also haven't been so in to cycling lately. I'm finding it hard to even think about getting on my bike and going out for a ride. Running has, for better or worse, replaced cycling as my passion for the time being. Over the weekend, I had a friend here for our party that is really great with bikes. He looked at my bike and tuned it up for me a little bit and told me what repairs I need to make... new chain... new shifter... etc. Another friend send me a new pair of bib shorts, which I'm pretty excited about wearing.

Once my bike is repaired and ready to go, I think I'll enjoy it more. It might also be a winter thing... it's too freakin cold outside to ride!

I'm looking at signing up for 4 big bike rides this season. Hopefully they all fit into my schedule. Plus the half-marathon, and the full marathon at the end of October (I'm signing us up on Wednesday!!!). Maybe there is something like a triathlon in my future. Who knows?

In the mean time, I'm going to refocus, and get my eating and exercise back on track for the week. I don't have any weekend distractions scheduled for the next few weeks, so I should be able to drop a decent amount of weight in this time period.

I feel like I should talk briefly about how my body feels lately. My wife and I ran 8 miles on Friday evening. When we do our long runs, it's usually in the afternoon. So I expected to not feel so great on the run. Oddly, I felt fine. I also felt fine at mile 4, despite the rain. And at mile 6. And 8. I could have kept going, but it was raining, and I wanted dinner. haha

I did not like how I felt this morning or yesterday after all of the drinking and eating I did. Although I stayed under my calorie limit, I didn't eat well. There was a lot of starch, and not a lot of vegetables. I laid in bed thinking about how terrible my body felt.

When I'm working with clients and we're talking about nutrition, I talk about how important fueling your body with the right kind of fuel is. You don't want to fill a high performance engine with low-grade gasoline just like you don't want to fill your body with low-grade food. I don't usually forget about this, but when I do, my body remembers and lets me know.

The Matt Train is back on track from this point forward and we'll be chuggin along until we reach our destination. At this point, it's inevitable.

This week's pictures: