A personal training & food journal. Read about our weight loss progress at Train With Ron in Chicago, our nutritional habits and the life changes we're making to get in shape and stay healthy!
January 12thI love competition. When I was younger I participated in several organized team sports – a lot of hockey (both roller and ice), lacrosse, soccer, basketball, flag football, baseball, and softball. I sought out good leagues with good teams and players and I loved competing. In hockey I played a decent quality game for an amateur, I was better at hockey than any of the other sports I played. There’s something special about hockey as a player – the game requires so much concentration and draws you in so much, that you simply cannot think about anything but the moment you are in. I loved competing so much, especially in hockey, that I forgot about the amazing workout I was getting while practicing and playing.
Me, turning it up-ice, circa 2001
Then I stopped with all the team sports. I got hit right in the mouth with a slap shot, which is by far the most painful thing I’ve ever experienced – then I moved to Chicago and, not knowing anyone here, lapsed into inactivity. Now, I’ve been working out very hard at Train With Ron for a year and a quarter, and lately I’ve been getting the itch to play a team sport again. I think I’m just about ready. I am going to try hockey, and see how my hips, knees, and especially ankles hold up. Hockey is a sport that really beats on you physically and I don’t want to do anything that will jeopardize my ability to continue with my workout routine at TWR, but I’m going to give it a go and see what happens. I signed up for a local roller league (coincidentally roller hockey is more physically difficult to play than ice). (more…)
December 22nd
Took me 8 months to accomplish this goal!
I did it!
After my third – and abbreviated – Pure Steel cycle, I bench pressed 250 pounds last night and got myself on the board at TWR! This was a major victory and big time progress for me. After my first full twelve week cycle, I was able to get 195 pounds up. After the second full twelve week cycle, I got 237.5 pounds, which would have been 240 except I screwed up and left a 2.5 plate off the bar. That’s a 22% jump, which I was really excited about. Well, that odd number is no longer my personal best… although I now check the bar before every lift since that incident. This cycle was 8 weeks long, but I went up another 5% in maximum weight. The total jump was about 28% over the last 6 months of the year. That’s a lot!
When Matt first approached me about joining Pure Steel, I was excited, but apprehensive, too. I had seen those guys over there, the “real” workout guys who were building muscle and lifting what looked, to me, like extraordinary amounts of weight. I’d seen guys at the gym doing it before, and I’d even lifted some weights earlier in life, but never in an organized, well run, documented, and planned program. (more…)
December 5thHi Gang,
Monika and I started this blog about 14 months ago. So much has changed since then – physically, mentally, and spiritually. We’ve made a lot of friends at the gym including – especially – Ron, Matt, and DB. We’ve settled into a routine of being at TWR regularly, taking that long climb up the steps, and sweating it out for an hour. We are glad to see new people coming all the time and we love seeing our friends and also the familiar faces of those we may not know as well – but who are on the same difficult path of working out hard and eating healthfully.
It’s gotten very comfortable – very comfortable, indeed… and that, for me, is a red flag.
Getting “too comfortable” was what got me into trouble physically in the first place. I stopped eating well and exercising because I was comfortable – comfortable in my relationship, comfortable with bad eating habits, comfortable with a sedentary lifestyle… and slowly but surely I got very UNcomfortable. Right now, I think that comfort level is manifesting itself in the lack of continual process of “body sculpting”… I’m working out twice as much and twice as hard as when I first got to TWR but have been stuck at around 225 lbs., the same waist size, and same body fat percentage for at least two or three months. When we first started I was eating very carefully at every meal – I’m still eating pretty carefully for breakfast and lunches, but with some dinners and certainly after dinner/before bed, I have gotten lackadaisical. As a result, I’m figuratively “running to stand still”.
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August 19thI weighed myself yesterday and I have finally dropped 2.5lbs under the lowest weight I’ve been the last month. I wrote about this a couple of weeks ago, how I’ve been struggling with 6-8 lbs just back and forth. Just couldn’t get under it. A lot of muscle building was in process as well, but I think you can relate when I say that I just want to see that number drop. Finally yesterday, it appeared on the scale and I was thrilled! The past 3 and a half weeks I’ve really put a lot of focus on my foods and DB has helped me refine it, adjust it and basically make it a success.
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August 3rdOk, so as the title says: let’s talk food. I’ve been working out harder and more than ever, but seem mired in a plateau and haven’t made much progress since late May even though I’m working out nearly 2x as much as I was when I started… which tells me that it’s the food I’m eating that is holding me back.
First let’s take a look back at the weight loss progress:
Oct. 5, 2009 – Jan. 9, 2010: During this period, I lost about 26 lbs, 4-5 inches off my waistline, and lowered my body fat% by about 11%, from 44% to 33%. I was going for sessions at TWR only twice a week, but eating very carefully. When I say carefully, I mean one “bad” meal a week – other than that, no refined or processed foods, tons of fruit and vegetables, whole wheats and grains only (whole rolled oats, brown rice, whole grain bread, etc.), and mostly poultry when I ate meat. I “grazed” a lot… carrots, nuts, raisins, celery… during the day. I reduced late night snacking to maybe 100 calories once or twice a week… quite a difference from my nightly ritual of polishing off a pint of Haagen Dasz.
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