So far this week, I’ve had three great workouts in a row.  Today’s treadmill session at the gym went longer than it was supposed to because I felt so good running that I just didn’t want to stop!  The plan was for a short 15 minute treadmill warm up followed by a 30 minute weight lifting session.  But after the initial 15 minutes, I felt great–like I had just warmed up.  So I stayed on the treadmill and ended up running 4.6 miles in 39 minutes on a fairly challenging “all terrain” program that consisted of rolling hills.  I didn’t have time to hit the weights when I was finished because I still needed groceries before picking up the kids.  Either way it was a great workout.

It seems as if my eating is also mostly under control and my weight was down a bit this morning when I stepped on the scale.  Maybe things are settling down a bit in my head.  That for me is the biggest battle–wrapping my mind around what needs to be done in order to attain my fitness goals.

Whenever I take a hiatus from the gym, I always find something to write about when I return.  Yesterday was no different.  I was running on the treadmill (which are elevated in a loft above the rest of the gym so you can see everything going on in the gym below you) when a  woman walked in the door carrying a diaper bag and two infant car seats containing her twins.  They looked to be about 6 months old.  The woman dropped the babies off at the in-gym child care, walked up stairs and hopped on the treadmill.  20 minutes later, she rushed down the stairs.  When I got off the treadmill and went downstairs to shower, I passed by her.  This time, she was sitting on a recumbant bicycle with a blanket, a bottle, and one of the twins.  She took turns feeding the baby and using the baby as a weight to get an upper body workout at the same time she was peddling the bicycle.  Talk about multi-tasking.

I came away from the gym that day with two things:  a really good workout and a really good feeling.  Watching what this woman was going through to get her daily exercise really put my trivial trials in perspective.  I have no excuses for not working out.  If she can organize her life and time to get it done, then it should be a piece of cake for me.  Right?

Yesterday, I woke early and ran a hilly, 6-mile course around my house in just under 54 minutes.  Today, I ran a hilly, 4.5 mile treadmill workout in 40 minutes and did the elliptical machine on hill setting for 20 minutes.

I’ll give you one guess as to where my weight was this morning after yet another weekend of socializing and eating crap!

I’m sore and it feels good!

But this morning, I found no typos.  In fact, I found an article that stared me down and screamed, “Hey Mac!!!!!  Read Me!!!!  I’m what you need right now!!!  I’ll remind you how to be successful again!!  I’ll get you back on track!”

So here they are.  6 tips for losing weight without dieting.  6 tips for the lifestyle that I’m supposed to be living these days, but am struggling with mightily…Until today that is!

• More Spice–It’s no wonder that people on diets fail when they choose to eat food that doesn’t taste good to them.  In a world of fried and fatty foods doused with mayonnaise and ranch dressing, who wants to eat carrot sticks and celery for every meal.  You don’t have to if you know just a little bit about seasoning your healthy foods.  Use some cumin, turmeric, chili powder, cayenne pepper, or even some salt!  All of these things will make your food taste better and not add any calories to them.  Give it a shot!
• More Breakfast–You’ve heard it before, but the research really backs it!  People who eat a healthy breakfast are more likely to maintain a healthy weight than people who don’t.  Enough said.  Eat some granola and fruit in the morning and kick start that metabolism for the day.
• More Protein–Your body uses more energy digesting protein than it does while digesting carbs or fats.  Plus, eating protein helps to build muscle and increased muscle mass also boosts your metabolism.  It’s a win-win situation.
• More Volume–Just because you’re trying to save calories during the day doesn’t mean you have to eat small amounts of food.  Try finding some foods that have a lot of volume, but not a lot of calories.  Foods do this in two ways:  having a lot of empty space, and having a lot of water.  Try some popcorn (full of air), or some grapes (full of water).  Both of those foods are more filling than a lot of other snacks that may have more calories.
• More Sleep–New research suggests that lack of sleep triggers hormonal shifts that boosts hunger and appetite.  People who get only 5 hours of sleep have been found to have 16% lower levels of the hormone leptin (lower levels of leptin have been linked to obesity) as compared to those who get 8 or more hours of sleep per night.
• More Satisfaction–Get more pleasure from your food.  Don’t be in a rush while eating and don’t be distracted.  Enjoy every bite of food you eat.  Eat mindfully always.  This is hard for a lot of us and if it is for you also, try the following.  Make your meals a big deal.  Set the table and get out the good silverware and dishes.  Put on some soothing dinner music.  Make your meals an experience to remember and you’ll feel more satisfied.

Think about these 6 points every day and you’ll be back on track in no time.  It worked for me today, and hopefully I remember to think about them tomorrow as well!

At the grocery store the other day, the cover of the latest issue of Woman’s World caught my eye. “Walk off 15 lbs by July 4!” the cover promised. My brain dismissed the hyperbole and I paid for my food.

But as I was driving home, I thought of that bold claim again. Fifteen pounds in just a few weeks? That’s insane! Under what circumstances could Woman’s World possibly promise to make this come true. I drove back to the store and bought a copy of the magazine.

The promise
So what’s the secret to walking away the pounds? The teaser at the head of the article promises: “Take some advice from a top walking expert, and you can free yourself from flab! — as much as 7 pounds a week!”

Here’s the magic formula:

For starters, you put one foot in front of the other. Dr. Stutman [a Philadelphia physician] calls for a brisk 30-minute walk six days a week; three of those days, you’ll also carry light hand weights. As far as food goes, “all you do is eat at least 30 grams of fiber and no more than 30 grams of fat each day. Follow those two rules, get your walking in, and you’ll lose weight without counting calories,” promises the author of Dr. Walk’s Power DietStep.

“That’s all there is to it,” says Woman’s World. “Get going right away, and you even have time to lose 15 pounds by Independence Day!”

The truth
That’s the promise. Let’s look at the truth. Let’s cast aside all of the article’s mumbo-jumbo and squishy math to look at what it would really take to lose fifteen pounds as quickly as Woman’s World promises.

First, let’s establish the timeline. Woman’s World is a weekly magazine. This article was published in the 22 June 2009 issue, which means it went on sale 15 June 2009. (For those who don’t understand magazine dating, the cover date generally indicates when the next issue goes on sale. With comic books, though, it’s arbitrary.)

There are 20 days between June 15th (sale date of the magazine) and July 4th (the goal date in the article). This article is promising that you can walk off 15 pounds in 20 days. What would it take to really do that?

Let’s do some fitness math:

On average, there are roughly 3500 calories in a pound. For you to lose a pound of weight, you need to burn 3500 calories. So, to lose 15 pounds, you’d need to burn 3500 x 15 = 52,500 calories. To do that in 20 days, you’d need to burn 2625 calories per day.

2625 calories per day? Are you kidding me? That’s more than my daily allowance! Basically, I’d have to starve for 20 days and do a little exercise to make this work. Or I could walk, I guess. But how much?

On average, walking one mile burns about 100 calories. (This is very rough. If you’re not very heavy, you’re going to burn fewer calories.) So, to burn 2625 calories per day, you’d have to walk 26.25 miles per day.

Yes, that’s right:

In order to achieve what this article promises, you would have to walk a marathon per day for twenty days. And that’s assuming you did not increase your calorie intake!

The bottom line
This kind of bullshit makes me angry. I’m sure that Dr. Stutman isn’t making these preposterous promises; I believe that it’s the Women’s World editorial team taking his advice and molding it into hype. I guarantee you that you cannot lose 15 pounds in 20 days by simply walking 30 minutes per day while maximizing fiber and minimizing fat. Not going to happen. Not on this planet, anyway.

This summer is rapidly going from a blissful break from the hectic grind of the school year to a MORE stressful time where I’m yearning for September.  Last night while talking before bed, Pam and I were discussing our busy summer plans.  We’ve already been gone for two weeks, taken two weeks of swimming classes, and had visitors for a week.  Still on the agenda are two more weeks of swimming lessons, one week of summer camp, a weekend camping trip, a weekend trip to the beach, two weddings and several races of epic proportions.

Pam said to me as we were turning of the light, “I just want a summer where we do nothing.”

I replied, “Then you’ll have to stop racing” 

But seriously, I feel a little bit stressed out with all that is going on these days.  I’m not finding the time to exercise properly, and I’m not eating very well.  My weight is inching up slowly and I don’t like it all.  It’s time to get back to the basics of eating small meals, counting calories, and getting on that treadmill if I can’t get outside for a run.  But I seem to have forgotten how to turn the momentum around.  Once I get back on track, keeping up with the plan is easy for me.  I need that switch to flick in my brain.  Or for someone to hit me upside the head.  Any volunteers?

Well, it probably is good enough.  Many people have told me that I have lost enough weight and that I should stop.  But there are a few reasons that mandate that I continue with my final push.  First of all, it’s important for me to have my BMI be in the “normal” range.  Please don’t come at me with all that “BMI is a crock” rage.  I don’t want to hear about your “athletic” cousin who has a BMI of 37 because he has so much muscle.  I’m aware of the flaws and shortcomings in the system, but it’s the system that we currently use.  If my doctor wants my BMI below 25 then I’m OK with it.

But more importantly, I want to get down to 175 because that’s the goal I originally set for myself.  I don’t want to stop short of it–I’m a goal accomplishing machine as long as I actually have a goal.  But here’s the real reason behind this post.  My weight has me a little bit scared right now.  You see,  I’m currently at the same exact weight that I was at when I stopped my last major (drug facilitated) diet endeavor way back in 1996.  I never reached my goal weight of 175 then either.  Within a year, my weight was creeping back up and by November of 2007 I was back to 221.   A big part of me feels that if I don’t accomplish the goal that I set for myself this time that I may start to gain weight again.  I’m not going to let that happen.

So the goal of 175 stands.  I’m not going to hit it by mid June like I wanted to.  Maybe I’ll reach it by the end of July.  In reality, it doesn’t matter when I get there because I know I’ll get there when I’m ready.  For now, I’m concentrating on fun and fitness and enjoying the summer.  It’s a nice time of the year and I don’t want to be stressed out about my weight right now.

When I was a boy, my mother sprained her ankle. She hobbled around on her sore ankle for weeks, but didn’t go see a doctor about it. Dad mocked her when she suggested it might be a good idea. Eventually, though, she did have somebody look at it, and she was told to rest it, which she did. Sort of.

During my freshman year of college, I came home for Christmas break. I played a game of touch football with a bunch of guys one Sunday afternoon. I jammed my finger trying to make a play, and it hurt like hell. No matter. I just worked through it. I went out to the box factory and I made boxes. But every time I flipped a box, I was in agony. I didn’t say anything. Eventually, I went to see the doctor, and he told me I’d broken the finger.

Several years ago, I played in a recreational soccer league with Mac and Pam. Our team was awful, but we had fun. I was the (awful) goalkeeper. During one game, I was tracking down a dribbling ball near the endline. No problem. I planted my my right leg and turned. But I was on a sort of an inclined patch and when I straightened my leg, I heard a pop in my knee and I fell to the ground. I was in agony. Still, I wanted to stay in the game. Cooler heads prevailed, and I was pulled from the match. But, of course, I didn’t go see a doctor.

I hobbled around for months on that sore right knee. It was only once I realized that I had no stability on it that I became concerned. I would step down from a curb, and my knee would be like rubber, unable to support me. I saw a doctor, and he told me, “You have no ACL. It’s gone.” I had surgery to repair the damage.

Last year, I decided to train for the marathon. I made it eight weeks into the season before I began to experience terrible pain in my left knee. (Not the one on which I’d had surgery.) My doctor told me that I was experiencing iliotibial-band syndrome, and that I needed to rest. I wasn’t supposed to run. I rested a little, but of course I tried to run as soon as possible. The results weren’t good. The pain came back worse than before. It was so intense that it forced me to stop.

That brings us to this year. So far, I’ve been fortunate. I’ve been training for the marathon again, and have been much more diligent about following proper form. I’m stretching. I’m doing the required mid-week runs. With rare exceptions, I’m not pushing myself.

Still, I’ve had a variety of aches and pains throughout the season: sore quads, sore calves, sore knees. This week, however, I have my worst pain so far. My left heel hurts. The back of the heel — too low for Achilles tendinitis, I think — hurts in the morning. When I run, the heel hurts for a few minutes, then the pain goes away — until the last couple of miles. And when I’m done running, the pain is back.

So far, I’ve just been “working through” the pain. But why? Haven’t I learned anything? Would it really be a sign of failure if I were to simply say, “Okay, I’m resting.” I’ve come to love running, it’s true, and I dearly want to do a marathon, but maybe a gradual approach is better. Maybe it’s time to back off of that goal for this year, and to aim for something different.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do yet, but it’s possible that I try to ease into an easy routine of 20 miles per week: two runs of two miles each, two runs of four miles each, and one long run of eight miles. If I just did this, and made it my regular workout, I could allow my body to become acclimated to the effort over the summer and autumn. (And, I hope, the winter.) Then, next spring, I could have a base of fitness that would allow me to push forward, confident that I had done my best to defend against possible injury.

But this still feels like quitting. And I still want to work through the pain.

Thanks for your patience.

A lot has gone on in the last 27 days.  I’ve been totally swamped:  two weeks out of town,  a little volunteer community project that turned well, not so little, not to mention the hacking of Get Fit Slowly.  All of these things have kept me away from Get Fit Slowly.  I still have problems allocating my time and staying on track when things get a little bit hectic.

But, I’m proud to say that I haven’t let my new lifestyle erode back into my old lifestyle.  I won’t lie to you by saying that everything is perfect.  I haven’t been eating perfectly, or exercising perfectly, but I have been doing ok and I’m proud of that.

2 vacations and 1 pound

3 weeks ago, we packed the kids into the car and headed out the door for Lincoln, CA.  I was dreading the road trip part of this trip, but was really excited about the destination.  The driving actually turned out great.  The kids ate a lot of snack food in the car and watched a lot of videos, but they were great.  Lincoln is about 30 minutes northeast of Sacramento and is the home of my inlaws.  A week of golfing, tennis, walking, running, swimming, and hiking was highlighted by evenings out (with and without kids), massages, and oh yeah, did I mention golf?  I played golf (unfortunately with a cart) 4 times, tennis with my mother in law once, and ran about 12 miles.  The rest of the time, we hung out in the yard, rode bikes, and went to the park or the pool.

My wife’s exercise plan for the week was a little bit more ambitious.  She attended the Western States 100 training camp.  Three days of running on the Western States 100 course that included shuttle buses, aid stations on the course, and lunches after the days’ runs.  All told, she ran 72 miles during the camp.  72 MILES IN 3 DAYS–did I mention she’s a little bit extreme?

The week was great, the activity was great, but the food was difficult.  I once wrote about the difficulties I have with my mother’s pantry.  But if my mother’s pantry is a piece of cake my mother in law’s pantry is the bakery.  For example, the drawer in her refrigerator that is supposed to be full of vegetables is actually full of candy bars.  Needless to say, I struggled with food a bit.  But when I returned home, I had only gained a pound and the scale said 180.

Last week, after a normal week at home, we again headed out of state.  This time, we packed the kids up and flew to Washington, D.C. to visit Pam’s sister and her family.  They recently moved away from Tacoma, WA and added a new member to their family so it was important for us to get over there to see them.  Traveling out there totally sucked.  Our flight was delayed by thunderstorms and tornadoes in Denver.  So we missed our connection, spent the night in Denver, and then flew on to DC (via Dallas) the following morning.

We had  another great week.  I set a goal of running 20 miles for the week and managed 25!  I completed a 5-miler and an 8-miler and the rest were smaller runs on my brother in law’s tread mill.  I was ecstatic that I set a fitness goal and completed it.  Ever since the Eugene Half, I’ve been struggling with maintaining my fitness goals–mostly because I don’t have any right now.  We also packed the kids up and headed to the Baltimore Aquarium, and various parks around Alexandria.  We did have a great time, but I’m glad to be home and back into the swing of things.

This week, the kids have swimming lessons, and we have visitors from my family (including mom, sister, soon to be brother in law and his son) staying with us.  It will be a great week.  But mostly, I’m glad to be home and settling back into the routine.

Even after all that time away from the house, I weighed in at 179.4 this morning.  I’m very happy about that.

Stop the Strip Mine

Another thing that has been taking up a lot of my time–way too much in fact–is a little community project.  The landowner across the street from the entrance to our subdivision is trying to get his land rezoned so that he can open up a gravel quarry.  As you can imagine, it’s caused quite an uproar.  Our neighborhood, and the surrounding ones, have united to stop this pit from eroding the way of life that we’ve become accustomed to.

I’m a little bit torn on this issue.  In general, I feel that a person should be able to do whatever they want with the land that they own.  But the environmentalist in me doesn’t want to see another scar on the surface of the Earth.  And the the realtor/homeowner in me especially doesn’t want to see one so close to where I live.

Since this issue has hit so close to home, I’ve volunteered to design, build, and maintain the website dedicated to providing information to people in the area.  The design is simple, the content is simple, but the amount of email that I have to deal with (personal communication is not one of my strong suits) is very daunting.

Hackers Be Damned!

So our site was hacked–again.  We think we’ve taken care of the problem this time.  But things definitely aren’t back to where they were.  I’m not sure about the design.  I haven’t activated all of the Wordpress plugins that we used to have.  In fact, I’m not even sure which ones are missing.  For now, we can post and you can comment.  You can tell who wrote the post which is something that has been requested.  These are the important things.  I’m sure there will be some changes in the future, but I’m not sure what they’ll be.  But for now, we’re back up and running again.

I even have a few ideas of things to write about.  And so does JD.  Right JD?