I’m Back!!!

Hey everyone,

I realize it’s been quite a while since I’ve made any kind of post to this blog but I’m going to change that all today!

There’s a lot of catching up to do I’m sure but I wanted to give you all a quick update on where I am and what I’ve been up to.  Instead of trying to pick up from where I left out, I’ll start out with a quick recap of 2010 up till the present day.

Fitness wise, it was a great year.  For you guys interested in the numbers, I started the year at 202 pounds and finished up at 192.  My body fat percentage started at 19.7% and finshed the year at 16.2%.  I consider this great progress.  I’ve always felt better at around 190 so I was happy to be at that level for most of the year.

I ran a total of five races during 2010 – a 5K, two 10Ks, a half marathon and my first ever triathlon.  I set a personal record in my first 10K at 48:23 and followed it up a week later with another PR at the half marathon distance of 1:57:50.  Conditions were fantastic for my first triathlon (a sprint distance) in July but I found out pretty quick that I wasn’t as prepared for it as I should have been (especially in the swim) and sort of staggered to the finish line in 1:38:54.  Hoping to rectify that in a big way in 2011.

I continue in my 4th year of martial arts training and was invited in the beginning of 2011 to test for black belt in June.  I’ve been taking candidate classes for the last two months and am just two short months away from achieving my ultimate goal that’s been almost four full years in the making.  Very excited!

I’m looking forward to catching up with all of you again and hear about how you’re coming along with your goals.  Feel free to drop me a line or comment!

All the best……..

Pewaukee Sprint Triathlon…..Registered!

Just registered for the Pewaukee Sprint Triathlon on July 11.  Might as well get into at least one of the races I want to today.

.25 mile swim, 16 mile bike, 5K run.

Can’t wait!

Bradford Beach Triathlon Cancelled

Bad news!

I just found out that the Olympic distance triathlon that I’ve been working up towards – the one that’s really been the end goal of all of my training up to this point – has been cancelled.

This race made the most sense because it covered the distance that I was looking for and was right in town so no travel involved.  Now, it looks like I’ll need to search for another option.  There are plenty of sprint triathlons in the Milwaukee area this summer but there seem to be few at the Olympic distance.

The search begins……..

I’m Buying A Bike!

It’s almost that time to pick up a road bike for the triathlons this summer.  There’s a bike expo in town this weekend (advertising “1500 bikes on site and ready to ride home!”) and I’m going to check it out and quite likely purchase my bike.

I’m staying on the lower end of the price grid (no need to drop five grand on a bike right now).  The bike I’m leaning towards is a 2010 Trek 1.2 road bike.  My only concern is that there are a number of good bicycle brands like Felt and Gary Fisher that I just don’t know anything about.

Does anybody have a preference towards a Trek, Gary Fisher, Felt or some other brand of road bike out there?  I’d really be interested in getting other opinions.  I’ll probably be looking to drop the hammer on a purchase on Thursday or Friday.

Weigh-In Results – Week 15

This week, I knew my weight wouldn’t be down.  Not that I’m complaining about it at all because that was sort of my strategy for the week.

Let me explain.  I finished my run a week ago and I felt absolutely wiped out.  I shot for 5 miles at 7.5MPH and ended up stopping at 3.1 miles.  Just didn’t have the energy.  I noticed that I was starting to feel hungry so I made a beeline back to my desk to eat lunch.  I’ve been feeling like I’ve been doing a good job up to this point of balancing running a calorie deficit to achieve weight loss and getting enough food in me to fuel my workouts.  This time, I didn’t feel so good about my balancing act.

Weigh-In Results – Week 12

A big weigh-in was looming this week.  After last week’s 0.6 pound increase, it was important to get momentum moving back in the right direction again.

Last week, I got several solid workouts in including a couple of sessions with the personal trainer, four days of karate, a 4 or 5 mile run and 45 minutes doing circuits on the spin bike.    I paid special attention to managing my diet as I felt that food was really my Achilles heel to keeping things in check.  I felt good going in but only the scale will say for sure.

And the results…….

Guess The Lie Challenge

Hey everybody!  It seems a little wild that it’s the middle of the week already.  Seems like the week has been flying by.  Hope it has for you too!

I wrote about yesterday’s run here already and I’m just not sure what to write about fitness-related so I’m taking a page out Marathon Maiden’s book and today will give you the “Guess The Lie Challenge”.  The idea is that I give you a list of nuggets about me and my past and you try to guess which ones are fact and which ones are fiction.  Ready?  OK.

I’ve listed a total of 9 items below.  Of them, 6 are true and 3 are false.  Can you guess which is which?

Weigh-In Not So Bad After All?

Happy Tuesday all!

So I’m thinking that maybe yesterday’s weigh-in wasn’t as bad as it seemed yesterday.  I weigh in every Monday with my personal trainer, as you know, but I also weigh in on Tuesday mornings with a group of co-workers for our own little “Biggest Loser” challenge that started at the beginning of the year.

I weighed in this morning at work and the result was that I was down another pound since last week’s weigh in.  That kind of flies in the face of yesterday’s result of going up 0.6 pounds.  I’m not sure which is a more correct reading but it does give me the sense that maybe I’m being given a second chance, so to speak, of continuing the weight loss momentum.  Diet wise, this week so far has been going well so I think as long as I keep up at this rate I should be in for a good number next week.  I hope at least.

Weigh-In Results – Week 11 (Uh Oh!)

I had a nice little streak going.  Emphasis on the past tense of that word in there – had.  I had gone 10 straight weekly weigh-ins either losing weight or holding steady from the previous week.  Alas, that streak is now over.

I weighed in today at 194.2 pounds.  That’s up 0.6 pounds from last week.  My body fat percentage came in at 17.5% which is down a whopping 0.9% from last week (which leads me to believe that it’s more of a fluke reading than an actual result).

I’m disappointed.  Not in the result itself because I don’t think it’s terribly surprising given my activity of the last week but it’s disappointing nonetheless.  The ironic thing is that I think overall I ate healthier this week than I have most weeks up to this point.  I think I just ate too much of that healthy stuff.

Cop Out

So, I had the best of intentions Wednesday for getting in the pool and doing a few hundred meters.  It just never happened (just like posting here never happened but that’s another story).  Motivation escaped me.  My excuse is that instead I spent my lunch shopping for my wife’s birthday gift that’s coming up in about a week and a half.  Marriage points are worth more than fitness points!

My sole workout Wednesday came at karate class.  We spent the better part of the class doing lunges with medicine balls and stance work so I can’t say this didn’t come without the physical demands of its own!  Yesterday was another session with the personal trainer (more lunges!) and karate in the evening.  Today, I finally made it back in the pool for that swim that I missed on Wednesday.  I’m glad I get at least the one obligatory swim in this week but I can tell that this is going to be the greatest challenge for me of the three triathlon events.