OzCableguy - Journey to fitness

The Bat Cave

2012-02-14T16:30:00.003+10:00

Bbanger took us out on an epic ride on Saturday to the other side of Samford to "the bat cave" (a former railway tunnel now closed to trains and home to a colony of bats being monitored by the University of Queensland) and then back home via House Mountain.

Bunya Bat Cave House Mt from Darb Ryan on Vimeo.

This time I only hit 81 kmh on Burns Road (you'll see me fly past around the 36 sec mark) but then there were a lot more people around me and I didn't want to be a dick and throw rocks up at someone or look like a douche if/when I crash and create a mushroom cloud big enough to be seen from space (thanks Wingadelic). On the other hand, my climbing is seriously sucking lately so I probably should show I'm good for something from time to time...

83kmh on Dirt

2012-02-06T16:56:00.004+10:00

Here's some helmet cam footage Darb took a little while ago on one of Bbanger's epic Saturday Arvo rides.

Ironbark and Samford Pony Trails from Darb Ryan on Vimeo.

Around the 3.30 mark I go around him and later found out my speedo had hit 83kmh there.

Meal Splitting

2012-02-06T15:34:00.003+10:00

Well, my plateau issues continue so I decided to pull the pin on Weight Watchers and give Tom Venuto's "Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle" program a go. So far I'm very excited with what I've been reading and I'm confident once I start to implement his principles I'll get past this dreadful sticking point and finally take it all the way home.

It seems I've been in a classic "starvation mode" all along and my metabolism has slowed so that now I'm not losing weight any more on the same (meagre) calories and if I eat more I start to gain, but if I eat less I don't have the energy to exercise so I still gain (or at least don't lose it). Damned if I do and damned if I don't...

The trick is to ramp my metabolism up by eating more. Not so much that I put on fat but also not so little that I lose the energy to work out and/or lose lean body mass. That sounds like it could be tricky but with some careful planning it's entirely possible (and probably the only correct way to lose ~~weight~~ fat anyway).

Tom, like may other fitness experts, recommends 5 or 6 small meals per day and each meal should contain a balance of carbs, proteins and fats somewhere around 50-55% carbs, 30% protein and 15-20% fat. Oddly when I punch my numbers into Calorie King it shows I'm a bit high on the fat and protein and not getting enough carbs. The fat comes as no surprise (getting fat intake below 20% is easier said than done) but I'd been expecting my carbs would be too high and I wasn't getting enough protein... Well, slap me with a slice of wholegrain (hold the ham & mayo)!

One method he recommends to change 3 meals into 6 is to just split your meals in two and eat half now and the other half 2-3 hours later. You're never full this way but you're never empty either so insulin levels are more stable, and you're always assured that the next meal is only an hour or two away so a bit of hunger is easy to tolerate.

I've found the meal splitting idea an awesome break-through for me. Splitting my lunch so that I have half around midday and the other half around 3 means I'm not looking for an afternoon snack. Splitting dinner means my belly isn't too full after dinner so I feel up to hitting the gym rather than slumping in front of the TV, and then later on I eat the other half when I'd normally be looking for a snack (read: having a nocturnal eating frenzy). All in all it means not only am I taking in less calories but I'm also getting into the gym regularly again so I'm burning a bit more as well as preserving and maybe even increasing my lean body mass a little too.

Has it made a difference on the tape or scales? Not yet but I need to be patient for my metabolism to get normal again and to also make the final break away from sugar/junk food. I'm confident though.

There's no such thing as failure

2012-01-09T22:00:00.004+10:00

Only results.

And the results aren't good so I need to rethink things.

Yes, I've been through the silly season and like most people have put on a little weight, and like most people I've also made resolutions and so far haven't seen many through.

I decided I needed a new evening routine to break the habit of nocturnal cravings so I thought I'd kill two birds with one stone and start a whole new plan for the gym in the evenings after dinner. Week one I came down with a cold and now in week 2 we have a heat wave and hitting the garage in >30C just isn't going to happen. D'oh!

Upping my breakfast and lunch portions hasn't worked as well as I'd hoped either, and now I'm thinking I may have been better off with what I was doing before. At least then I had a few more calories to play with when I did eat a bit more than planned of an evening.

I have been thinking about goals though and have some that are actually inspiring me -

To conquer night time cravings (short term goal - one month)
To run for 30 mins non stop (mid term goal - 3 - 4 months)
To bench press 100 kg for 6 reps (mid term goal - 3 - 4 months)
To get a waist measurement of 94 cm or less (long term - within a year)

The waist measurement is interesting. I've heard a lot of other weight watchers echo my own sentiments that the upper BMI limit just didn't seem realistic. Because I have so much muscle I've never been certain what my goal weight should be so it's been difficult to set a target in that regard. Well, a 94cm waist measurement is a realistic target. If I look at exceptions to the BMI chart, people who are technically overweight or obese but are actually quite fit like bodybuilders and rugby players, their waist measurements are still below 94cm. In other words you can be heavy and fit but your waist will still always be small.

Running and weight lifting are kind of odd goals for me because I'm not actually doing either at the moment. I am walking in the afternoons more as a de-stress and to get me away from food sources until dinner time and I was planning to do weights of an evening but circumstances have been against me in that regard so far. I am quite excited about these goals though so these things will change. I expect the walking will start to be interspersed with some wind sprints, leading eventually to longer and longer running times, and eventually I will make it back into the gym. It will happen!

The nocturnal cravings? Well, I will try going back to my old, smaller breakfast and lunch portion sizes and see if things are actually worse of an evening. Hopefully the end result will mean less overall calories for the day even if I do slip up a bit from time to time. I think the main problem there though is one of habit, my body is used to getting junky foods around that time, so breaking my routine is going to be the answer and I do hope that I will be able to substitute the gym for TV watching and then hit the sack a bit earlier than I have been to get more sleep which should in turn benefit the other aspects.

Success will be mine...

10 tips to prevent diet fail

2011-12-19T15:07:00.005+10:00

I came across a couple of interesting articles entitled "10 Things You May Not Know About Your Weight" and "10 Weight Loss Myths That May Ruin Your Diet". Well worth a read but I thought I'd add my own 1o points about losing weight that I've found beneficial or at least worth knowing.

We all know the energy balance equation: Calories In vs Calories Out. ie Eat more than you use and you gain weight, eat less than you use and you lose weight. Seems simple enough, but if it's so simple why do so many struggle with weight loss?

Because it isn't so simple. There are a myriad of factors that influence whether or not a diet will be successful or not. I should add here that when a diet "fails", it isn't the diet that's failing. Rather it's the dieter's failure to stick to it that's the problem. That could be the diet's failure if it's too restrictive but more often than not it's other factors in the dieter's life that need addressing.

Here's my 10 tips for why a diet could be failing:

1. Not recording food intake. A diet can fail due to eating too much but it can also fail due to eating too little. Undereating causes the famine response, making it increasingly harder to control hunger and cravings. The trick is to aim for a moderate calorie deficit of say 500 calories a day which should lead to a weight loss of .5 - 1 kg per week, and without experiencing excessive hunger. The only way to achieve that without going too far over or under is to write down everything that goes down the hole.
Remember, the slower the weight loss the more likely it is to stay off permanently. Also, it's a percentage game. The more fat you have to lose, the bigger the losses will be (especially at the beginning) and vice versa. The less fat you have to lose, the slower it will come off.

2. Poor nutrition. If your body isn't getting the vitamins, minerals and energy you need it'll keep prompting you to eat more until it gets them. Stick to real meats, veges and fruit that you might find on a farm and less food that comes out of packets with lots of numbers in the ingredients list.

3. Sugar. Sugary and fatty foods are addictive. The more you have the more you want, and there is a withdrawal process to go through when you stop them. If you're a chocoholic (ie can't go a day without it) you need to take your addiction as seriously as any other chemical addiction and treat it accordingly.
Sugar also doesn't trip our "full" signal like other foods do. Excessive hunger while losing weight is often caused by too much sugar and/or simple carbohydrates.
Artificial sweeteners aren't the answer either. There is evidence to suggest that our bodies react to these the same as a sugar hit, only we don't get the calories and our bodies react to that by releasing "hunger hormones".

4. Inadequate sleep. If you're tired your body will trigger hormones that make you feel hungry.

5. Chronic Stress & Depression. These two often go hand in hand. Constant stress and depression causes our bodies to release "hunger hormones". Jon Gabriel theorises that our evolved bodies can only respond to this kind of stress as either famine or cold and the best way to make sure we don't die under these conditions is to slow down our metabolic rates and prompt us to eat as much as we can find.
If you're in this category you need to find a way to cope better or change your life.

6. Self Sabotage. Everyone has a concept of self whether we're aware of it or not. If we see ourselves as successful, or nothing special, or complete failures we'll subconsciously work to fit that image. We tend to only do what we believe is possible. If we think we're doomed to be fat then we more than likely will be.

7. Poor hydration. Much of our cravings and feelings of hunger may actually be thirst in disguise. Makes sense, a lot of our primitive foods had a much higher water content than much of our modern diet. Next time you feel stupidly hungry or can't shake a craving, try a glass (or 3) of water first.

8. Exercising to "burn calories". Attempting to exercise to burn calories doesn't add up. Our bodies have become too efficient at that game. It's a losing battle. It's far easier not to eat the cookie than to try to exercise it off. However, what exercise does do is increase our muscle size or strength/density, and/or our cardio fitness which in turn increases our metabolic rates as well as reductions in stress levels, all of which make a big difference when it comes to losing ~~weight~~ fat.
Some women worry about ending up looking like Arnold in a bikini but that's only possible if you take lots of steroids, have the right genes (read freaks of nature) and spend 10 hours a day in the gym. Same goes for most men. Most of us on a good weight training program (ie heavy stuff that makes you grunt) will only end up nicely toned & buff rather than freaky.

9. The "All or nothing" attitude. If you blow the diet it's easy to beat yourself up and give up for the rest of the week. Diets needn't be so rigid and should be more about doing "just enough" to get the job done rather than trying to achieve some sort of "perfect" diet nirvana. Hey, this is the real world. Stuff happens. If you blow it just move on and get back on plan straight away.

10. Going it alone. Dieting is hard. You're going to get hungry and sometimes it's going to truly suck. Join a group or at least buddy up. A problem shared is a problem halved.

Rick Perry

2011-12-15T13:37:00.005+10:00

If you haven't seen this spiel by Gov of Texas Rick Perry yet, check it out before playing the second video.

Bad Lip Reading: Rick Perry's "Strong" ad - watch more funny videos

More here.

Exasperation

2011-12-14T13:54:00.004+10:00

I posted yet another gain at the weigh-in last night. This one I was expecting though. I'd basically thrown in the towel after last week's disappointment and pretty much ate whatever I wanted and didn't track most of it. Yeah, that made a difference...

It was only a small gain and because I was expecting it this time I wasn't too down about it. My WW team leader happened to be standing nearby as I weighed in and she felt differently though. She's been starting to get very concerned about my lack of progress over the last few months and knows that it's only a matter of time before I quit the program if it continues. (Crikey! She can read my mind). She's at a loss to explain what might be going wrong in my case though so she's going to have a pow-wow with some of the other leaders and email me some suggestions.

Yes, it is very strange to be so committed and so obsessed for so long and yet not getting results. That thought crosses my mind a lot...

She knows I exercise more than anyone else in our group. At the moment we're setting challenges for everyone to achieve 10-12 exercise points per week. I consistently do 80-150 per week. So exercise isn't the problem.

On the other hand maybe it is. Maybe I'm doing too much? Perhaps WW is designed for much lower volumes of exercise and the amount I'm doing is creating too much of an energy imbalance which is causing me to over-compensate?

That may very well be the issue I think. Most overweight people have fallen into the feast and famine trap of eating too little for a period of time (could be within a day or over a week or even longer) and eventually caving in and over-compensating, not just with too much food but usually the wrong types of food as well. "Starvation mode" is well documented as causing excessive hunger, cravings for junk food, lethargy, depression and a slow-down in BMR, which is me to a T. When I can take no more, I over-compensate with out-of-control pantry and fridge raiding.

The solution often given for starvation mode is to eat more, but with that being said if you don't create an energy deficit you won't lose weight so it's still very important to track everything. On that basis I still think WW is very useful for me but the way I use it may require a slightly different angle, a lot more effort and perhaps even a little tweaking.

What I reckon I need to do is:

improve the accuracy of my tracking
choose more natural (filling & healthy) snacks rather than anything processed
drink more water and cut back the coffees, teas and diet drinks
cut my exercise back and go back to using some of my accumulated exercise points to offset my daily total rather than ignoring them.
Keep my breakfast and lunch portions on the large size, especially on days where I'll be doing 2-3 hour mountain-bike rides.

I think if I do this, as long as I stay below my daily points target with my exercise points factored in I should be fine even if I do go a bit above my base daily points target. Hopefully that will mean consistent weight loss without the starvation mode symptoms (and the over-compensating).

**************

On another note, we also discussed last week's goal setting and I was surprised to learn that we were meant to set a specific weight loss target after all. I balked at that because I thought I'd be better off setting a goal that would lead to weight loss rather than the other way around but I think I get it now. Putting a specific number on the table for everyone to see should motivate us to do everything possible to achieve it.

Ok, I'm going to say 1 kg per week. I've done that plenty of times before so I know what it takes and I know I can do it. It does mean sticking fairly rigidly to the program but then that's the whole idea of setting the goal. ;)

Goal Setting

2011-12-06T22:39:00.004+10:00

I went to my weekly Weight Watchers meeting tonight. I knew I'd lost at least a kilo but and was curious to see how much more I might have done but the scales showed I was actually up 200 grams! I guess I might have expected as much knowing I'd been feeling lacklustre all day starting with a workout I just couldn't get into followed by a mega-stressful workday, but I did jump on my scales at home first thing and at that point I was 1.2 kgs under my weigh-in last week so it was most unexpected. It has to be just fluid retention I guess but still very disappointing.

The meeting tonight covered the silly season and the fact that most dieters will usually gain a little during December so they gave us pointers to prepare for the traps that catch most of us out. One exercise was for us all to set a goal we'd like to achieve by the end of December.

Most people went for wanting to lose specified amounts of weight or at least not to gain any weight, but that gave me problems and even now, hours afterwards, I still can't think of an appropriate goal.

My track record over the last 3 months tells me I might be being overly optimistic setting a particular number. I mean, I might achieve it, I might even blitz it, but I might not make any progress at all. It seems like it's a 50:50 bet and where will I be if I don't achieve it? Also, how is writing down a number going to make it happen? It seems to me that a better goal would be something that should result in weight loss rather than aiming for "weight loss" itself as a goal. Something like paying extra attention to portion sizes or staying out of the biscuit tin or sticking to an exercise schedule and so on.

Something else I overheard from one guy, quite a bit smaller than me, talking about his portion sizes. He knew he needed a certain size meal and any less wouldn't do, so he worked his snacks and other meals around those meals he couldn't compromise on. An example he gave was having 5 weet-bix for breakfast. 3 wasn't enough. It had to be 5.

5 weet-bix! Holy crap. I'd normally have 3, and I have at least 20kgs on him and I know I'm a lot more active!

Now that I think of it, my 10 year old son has 3. And, if I look at my daily points tally I'd see my normal day would be around 10 Propoints for breakfast, 10 for lunch and around 20 for dinner. I have 50~ish to work with and the other 10 usually get used up snacking at nights (and often then some because I'm so hungry), so it would appear that one of my mistakes is still not eating enough earlier in the day.

I also know I can do a lot more to prepare ahead of time. My wife has the evening meals planned out a week ahead on a whiteboard in the kitchen every shopping day and I more or less eat the same thing for breakfast and lunch every day.

So I guess that'll be my goal then. To plan my meals a week ahead and upsize my breakfasts and lunches, with a reduction in snacking, especially at nights.

Bike Ponderings

2011-12-02T12:31:00.004+10:00

A few weeks ago someone advertised a GT Peace frame for sale for $200. It was the same colour and size as mine too. I considered the possibility of buying it to keep as a spare and then it occurred to me that with all of the upgrades I'd done to mine I could reassemble the original bike with all of the original parts I still have, with only a few small items like handlebars needed.

Awesome! A cheap rigid single speed I can ride without spending 20-30 minutes converting mine back whenever the urge to ride single speed again strikes me.

This would also allow me the opportunity to get my frame repainted. I've liked the idea of painting it a bright green for some time, although with the existing yellow wheels it does take on the colour scheme of a certain famous tractor that way...

Unfortunately in the 24 hours that this all occurred to me someone else bought it and my searches for another one have been fruitless. I even contacted GT directly in the hope there'd be an old warranty frame in the back of a warehouse somewhere but no luck. :(

Making things even more difficult is that I specifically want the 2008 model. The 2007 model didn't come with disk brake tabs and the 2009 model lacks an EBB (eccentic bottom bracket). It has sliders instead to create the chain tension which I find less desirable. After 2009, GT stopped making the Peace.

So, that leads me to possible alternative (steel, gotta be steel) frames.

I looked at the OnOne Inbred. Just a little bit dearer at around $300, but then I'd also need a lot more parts like a headset, bottom bracket, seatpost etc + the shipping cost from the UK. But the mint green or orange colours don't work with my yellow wheels and they won't consider painting one for me in another colour like the "Sterling Moss" or "Glow in the Dark Lime" greens on their Pompino frames. There's no EBB either and the weird swapouts may or may not work with my Rohloff and aren't compatible with the fairly cool Paragon sliders designed for the Rohloff.

On to the Niner One 9. Hey, the "Kermit Green" will work. It has an EBB and the headset is even the same size as the GT's so my forks will fit. Unfortunately the $700 USD + shipping puts it out of range, especially considering I'd also need another ~$400 on other bits and pieces to make it all go together. May as well buy a new bike.

Which led me to discover the Marin Pine Mountain 29Er. It has:

an EBB
A RockShox Reba fork, which is a step up from my existing Tora 318
Avid Juicy Hydraulic Disc brakes, which is a step up from my BB7s
A carbon seatpost

And it's steel. All landed in Oz for around $1100.00 Bargain!

The problem is that drab olive/grey colourway, which means I'd either have to strip it down and get it powdercoated straight away in something more suitable for my yellow wheels...

Or maybe I could work with it with some Velocity "Snakeskin" image rims laced to the existing front hub and the Rohloff...

Food for thought... (Yes, I'm a bike bogan...) :)

Injury

2011-11-26T14:48:00.004+10:00

Well, after 2 months stuck at my usual 120kg barrier, I finally cracked it, dropping 1.5 kg 2 weeks in a row! I felt unstoppable. The end was now in sight and closing in rapidly. I was seeing faster times on the bike and doing great things in the gym.

But then last week I was having one of those weeks where my body seems to reject my efforts. I'm not quite sure if it's a physical or mental issue but it feels physical. I feel insufferably hungry all of the time and I just want to lie down rather than exercise. The flow on from these effects is depression, which is what makes me wonder how much of the problem might be mental.

My weight loss journey has been kind of 3 steps forward and 2 steps back, and this is my "2 steps back" phase. It usually goes away after a week or two so I know it's temporary, but I also usually gain back a kilo or two in the process and that pisses me off, particularly now that I'd finally started moving past the sticking point that has plagued me for the LAST SEVEN YEARS!

So this time I wasn't having a bar of it. It was time my body learned just who's in charge. I wasn't going to let it talk me out of skipping a workout and I wasn't going to give in to stupid food cravings.

So, I walked into the gym (tired as hell) on Tuesday morning. I've reverted to a 2 day push/pull routine and it was a pull day. Deadlifts were scheduled first up and without any warmup I got straight into it. I wasn't feeling it, but I told myself to suck it up. I even thought I'd try going a little heavier than I'd planned to. Punishment time! I'll show it who's boss!

I have gone up to 170 kgs on deadlifts before but lately I usually keep the reps a bit higher and settle for 120 - 140kgs. This day I went for 150 for 6 reps on my forth set. It took everything I had but I managed it and then finished the rest of the workout in reasonable time after that. For good measure I thought I'd do a quick lap around the block on my old road bike. I hadn't ridden it in ages and they've just re-finished all of the roads around my house to mirror-like smoothness so I thought it was high time the old girl was dusted off.

Towards the end of the ride my lower back felt a little achy. The frame on that bike is a little small for me so I just put it down to that but by the time I hit the shower I knew something bad had happened. The pain in my lower back was getting worse and was now agonising. At this stage I knew the bike wasn't to blame. This kind of pain could only be an injury, which could only have happened from the deadlifts.

Three days later the pain hadn't improved and the doctor confirmed what I already knew. I'd torn a muscle.

Tearing a muscle in the gym would usually only be a result of using poor technique so obviously I'd allowed my form to slip and it was time for a refresher course. I checked Stronglifts and found this site from googling and I now know exactly what I did wrong on those deadlifts.

I didn't warm up
I had the bar too far in front of me at the beginning of the lift
I started with my hips too high, forcing too much of the lift onto my lower back rather than my legs
I used my body to pull the weight up (almost a partial rowing action) rather than pushing it away from the floor with my legs
I over-extended at the top of the lift

At first I had thoughts that maybe the deadlift was "too dangerous" and maybe I'd be better off in future if I just eliminated them from my routine (while this is the most painful muscle tear I've experienced while deadlifting it's not the first time I've done it) but then I realised that I'd already identified the cause of my injury. The deadlift wasn't to blame. Me doing it badly was the problem. Do almost anything the wrong way and there's a greater risk of injury right? Then why cut out one of the most awesome exercises, second only to the squat for strength and muscle gain, because I hurt myself doing it incorrectly?

The other problem now is I can't do any exercise with this pain. At all. I can't ride my mountain bike. I feel every bump, even in pavement, and I hate to think what would happen if I had to twist to take evasive action after hitting a loose patch when I can barely put pressure on the pedals. Even walking slowly is difficult at the moment. And if I can't exercise I fall into a downward spiral of negativity and depression.

Exercise has been to the key to my weight loss success. If I can't exercise I'm going to fail anyway so what's the point now?

I could look at it that way, or I could see this as a new challenge. Without exercise I don't have my buffer zone. That's all. Now I just have to focus a little harder on my diet and that may very well be a good thing, perhaps even a necessary thing for me at this point in my journey. This could be more an opportunity for me rather than a setback if I look at it the right way, and it's only a temporary setback anyway. I should be healed up again in a week or so.

I hope so anyway. This pain is a shocker, and the rain we were promised hasn't eventuated so I'm sitting here at my PC when I could be out riding. I'm not sure which pain is worse...

Still Nuthin'

2011-11-02T14:47:00.003+10:00

I still can't get the scales to budge in spite the changes I've made, and looking over my weigh-ins since I started Weight Watchers back in May it's now looking rather depressing. I've been stuck going up and down the same 2kgs for 10 weeks now! And that's dragged my average weight loss rate down to a lousy .2kg per week.

Enough is enough!

Plateaus almost always happen due to creeping slackness. I say "creeping" because it happens so slowly that it usually goes unnoticed (until you notice the scales aren't moving), or it happens because the calories-in/calories-out equation has neutralised at your current weight. ie While you're eating less than you were, you're also smaller than you were, and what was sufficient to cause weight loss before is now the perfect amount to maintain the weight you are.

At first I thought there was no way I could exercise any more than I do already and there was no way I could possibly eat any less or easily make changes to what I was eating so maybe what I needed was to drop Weight Watchers and try something else for a while.

And then I realised I was full of shit.

I realised that when I first started Weight Watchers I found it fairly hard going. I was fighting hunger on a fairly constant basis (and whinging about it), but I was losing weight. At 130kgs, I was eating and exercising the right amount for a 120kg body and now I'm 120kg, and if I'm honest about it I'm really not finding it that hard going at the moment either (well, at least since I discovered I wasn't eating enough for breakfast and lunch anyway).

By crikey, I'm maintaining! To take this further I need to eat and exercise the right amount for a 110kg body, and then a 100kg body and so on.

I also realised as the plateau wore on I became more and more disillusioned and down on myself so I started being less and less accurate with tracking my points (calories). For the last fortnight I stopped tracking completely... Hey, it didn't seem to make any difference anyway!

Oh, but it does. I sat down and weighed and measured everything I ate in a "standard" day and discovered I was a whopping 9 points over my budget. Considering the average person gets 30-40 points a day on maintenance (once they reach goal weight), that's basically a whole extra meal per day I've been eating. And that's on a "good" day too. I hate to think what it could be on a "bad" day...

Sure I do an average 20-30 points a day in exercise so it should balance out, but I'm also very fit so I'm probably quite efficient with my exercise calories and better off ignoring them in the overall balance. Well, that's if I want to lose weight rather than maintain it anyway.

So basically I need to look at this as Day 1 of a new journey. A journey not from 130kgs but from 120kgs. Yes, it's going to be a pain in the arse to weigh, measure and record everything I eat (before I eat it), and I'm going to suffer and I'm going to be hungry but that's what it's going to take to get past this place and on to the next checkpoint.

Some people say weight loss is easy. They're either liars or arseholes.

Mixed Results

2011-10-25T10:33:00.003+10:00

After finally getting below my 120kg sticking point back in mid September I've struggled to maintain it, let alone reduce it further. While that bums me out somewhat it also comes with some noticeable improvements in other areas:

Eating larger portions for breakfast and lunch continues to keep my "eating disorder" at bay so I'm eating less at nights and not suffering cravings so much.
I have energy for the gym and I'm pumping iron regularly again.
I'm setting new PBs almost every time I head out on the bike.
My pants are looser but my sleeves are tighter around my upper arms so I'm obviously gaining a little muscle and losing fat at the same time.

But, I know I'm still at least 20kgs heavier than I think I should be and I need to get those scales moving again. While that might happen by itself anyway with the changes I've made already (and it definitely has been over the last 2 weeks) I think I still need to continue to make changes to boost things along.

This week I'm going to focus on some better substitutions for some of the naughtier foods I've been allowing myself. I definitely still have too much sugar in my diet and I know that stimulates appetite amongst a whole swag of negative effects that make losing fat more difficult so I'm going to switch to fruit/fruit salad instead of looking in the cookie jar or reaching for lollies.

Most sauces and even mayo have surprising amounts of sugar (let alone fat content) so I'll try living without condiments or using some alternatives like avocado or mustards.

I can live without so much dairy too. I don't mind black tea and coffee and if I leave butter off my sandwiches and veges I don't really notice anyway.

It might also be time for my weekly bag of chips to bite the dust. KidsCare Potato Stix have a low propoints value and come in individual packets which equal just 1 propoint. They're not as good as chips and they're still highly processed but they do give me a salty chip-like fix without blowing out my calories.

I haven't been experiencing any real hunger either so I could probably look at reducing the portion size of my evening meal a little too. I also know deep down that I'm not always accurate with what I write down for my tracking so I'll work on weighing and measuring my portions more accurately and being more honest with myself even when I do blow it. At least then I'll be able to see why I haven't lost weight and will know where to lay the blame. ;)

Figured it out

2011-10-04T13:03:00.003+10:00

I had an "aha!" moment out on the bike this morning and I think I've worked out the reason behind my "eating disorder". I couldn't work out if I had an actual eating disorder, if it was some sort of body-fat set point thing or if there were purely physical reasons like over-exercising or under eating behind my compulsion to eat more than I should (or wanted to). I'm now confident that under eating is/was the problem, well under eating at breakfast and lunchtime anyway.

My breakfast routine was a bowl of oats or weet-bix before my morning exercise and then follow up with a couple of boiled or scrambled eggs when I got back. A bit over a month ago I found myself strapped for time so I decided to forgo the eggs. That happened a couple more times and it didn't seem to be a problem so I decided to leave the eggs out permanently. I also cut back on my lunch portion to one sandwich instead of two.

Less calories has to be a good thing right? Well it was good at first. I lost 3kgs that week (a new record). Then the following week, and every week since, I've had the compulsive eating problem almost every night and I've been putting on half to one kg per week.

D'oh!

Well, at least I've worked it out rather than throw the towel in. It's probably also been one of the factors behind my drop in enthusiasm for lifting weights, although that one's been going on for a lot longer so it's hard to say. We'll see how an increase in calories and some extra protein goes for that one as well though. I feel keen to get back into it already but still deciding whether morning or night workouts are best (mornings are best to ensure it gets done but I have more energy of an evening) or if I should go for a push/pull split or an upper body/lower body split (the latter gives me the option of skipping the lower body routine when I know I'm too worn out but the push/pull routine doesn't).

It's probably going to take my body a good week or so before the compulsive eating problem goes away completely but hopefully I'll see some weight loss next week anyway.

Compulsive Overeating

2011-09-26T10:33:00.003+10:00

Lately I've been wondering if there might be an eating disorder behind my difficulty losing weight. I guess I've always had periods where I seem to be unable to stop eating even though I know I've had enough. This would usually be at least once per week, which isn't a big problem with the amount of exercise I do, but when it happens 3 or 4 times within a week I'll gain weight rather than lose it and that's a problem.

A fortnight ago I finally dipped under my 120kg nemesis and sure enough the binging episodes have increased.

The thing is, when it happens I'm powerless to stop it. I won't necessarily feel hungry but I'll be looking in the fridge or pantry for the "right" kind of snack and when I find it, it won't satisfy and I'll be looking for a second or third helping almost immediately. "Filling and healthy" choices just won't do. It has to be something sweet or "carby". Biscuits, cakes, lollies, chips, bread etc. If I can't find what I want I'll often duck down to a shop to get it. I'll feel helpless and out of control the whole time this is going on and guilty as hell that I'm sabotaging my efforts, but
I just can't stop it.

My Weight Watchers leader will tell me to track my food intake. Two problems with that - (1) it won't change a thing if a binge bites me because I can't stop it anyway so tracking will only serve to tell me just how much I've blown it by. (2) If I know I've blown my daily allowance I'll either stop tracking for the day or I'll lie about it anyway.

So I have pretty much all of the symptoms of being a compulsive overeater, except that I can't for the life of me imagine what the underlying cause of this condition might be. Sure I've suffered depression for many years now but that's also one of the symptoms of compulsive overeating and/or obesity and I can't say I suffered depression (at least to a debilitating extent) before I became overweight so I think the binging came first.

Then there's a probability that this could be a purely physical problem rather than a psychological or emotional issue.

Jean Antonello will say it's the body's natural response to undereating (or not eating enough quality food).
Jon Gabriel will say that the body's fat programs have been activated due to environmental stresses or undereating, tricking the body into thinking it's in a famine.
Tom Venuto in an article I read today about "getting ripped" says it's a natural response to weight loss and to be expected. "You have a smaller calorie deficit when you have a smaller body, your metabolism slows down as you lose weight, your metabolism adapts with prolonged food restriction, your appetite hormones turn on full blast, your brain goes into "food search" mode, and it just gets tiring to keep pushing all the way to the end point - ripped!"
David Gillespie will say it's caused by sugar addiction.

I also just read The Hunger Games where the main character talks about having "hollow days" where you just can't feel satisified no matter how much you eat so it seems most people would suffer the same feelings and symptoms that I do quite naturally from time to time and the key may be in how I deal with it...

All I can think is to attempt to force myself towards "filling and healthy choices" and avoid the sugary & fatty foods right from the get-go, and to try distracting myself with some other activities during the danger period between 5-9pm. Perhaps I could combine these two things by learning to prepare healthy snacks in more delicious and inventive ways? I noticed some interesting stuff in the Weight Watchers magazine.

It might be time I learned how to do stuff with food a bit more complicated than a sandwich. ;)

Definition of Need

2011-09-22T11:26:00.002+10:00

Need

Amercian slang, to want.

It Will Pass

2011-09-20T10:40:00.001+10:00

A student went to his meditation teacher and said, "My meditation is horrible! I feel so distracted, or my legs ache, or I'm constantly falling asleep. It's just horrible!"

"It will pass," the teacher said matter-of-factly.

A week later, the student came back to his teacher. "My meditation is wonderful! I feel so aware, so peaceful, so alive! It's just wonderful!'

"It will pass," the teacher replied matter-of-factly.

Wait a Minute...

2011-08-28T12:23:00.005+10:00

It stopped raining!

I woke up this morning to blue skies and sunshine. After an agonising day yesterday looking at my freshly installed Rohloff but not being able to ride it due to the crappy weather, I've never been so glad for the weatherman to be wrong.

So I got to finally experience my new (well, second hand) Rohloff, and I'm absolutely wrapped with it. It has truly exceeded my expectations and I'm one happy camper.

Some observations: Firstly, the famous whirring sound in gears 1-7. I was fully expecting this one but was still kind of surprised by it when I first heard it. Gear 7 is the noisiest and it's the kind of sound you'd expect is caused by resistance. However, when I turned up the iPod I couldn't feel anything resembling drag so it would appear to be pretty much just an auditory thing. After the initial surprise though I actually grew to like it and I reckon I'll like it even more and more as time goes on. To me it's the Rohloff signature. It's supposed to do that and it's the noise of straight-cut gears engaging and taking my power (without breaking).

The grip shift: I've never used a grip shift before so it's probably no surprise that it might take a bit of getting used to. I occasionally caught myself looking for a trigger shifter with both my left and right hands and I also would occasionally twist the shifter in the opposite direction to the one I wanted. It is dead easy though and I don't think it will take me long to train my brain to make the action second nature. BigTurtle had already cut down an Oury lockon for the job which fitted amazingly well with some GT stamped collars I had from a set of Odi Ruffians I bought on ebay a while back.

The grip shift should prove to be easier on my phalanges too. I have heard of a few people, especially endurance racers, switching to grip shifters by choice these days because they find they're less prone to RSI problems when in the saddle for several hours madly shifting gears the whole time. I already have a touch of arthritis in my mouse thumb so this should be a good thing, especially as (or hopefully "if") my thumb condition deteriorates in the forthcoming years.

Idiosyncrasies: Sometimes shifting up into 5th didn't quite happen properly and I had the sensation of missed shift on a cassette system with the chain jumping back and forth between two cogs. A quick up or down shift sorted this one out. (Not sure if it's a Rohloff thing or just operator error).
The shift into 3rd seems to happen early just as I start to turn the shifter. This one's no problem but it did surprise me several times.
The shift between 7th & 8th and back is weird. It's hard to describe but it seems different to all of the other shifts somehow.

Weight: The bike feels slightly more sluggish than it did before. I'm not sure if this is related to the approx 1.5 -2 kgs now added to the bike or because I have a tendency to pick a gear slightly too tall for the job now that I have a choice about it. (I'm pretty certain it's more the latter and that gives me something to work on in the coming weeks).

Granny gear: Mine came with the 13t cog fitted (which uses a 58mm chainline compared to the standard 16t which has a 54mm chainline). Rohloff recommend a 32t chainring with the 13t as the smallest permissible without risking damage to the unit, which coincidentally is the chainring I already have, and the chainline problem was easily sorted by moving the chainring to the outside of the spider.

This gives me the equivalent of a 22/34 granny gear which is the very same granny I have on my other derailleur equipped bike and have found to be awesome. However that bike is a 26" wheel and this is a 29er so I'm effectively riding one or two gears up on the 26er compared to the lowest possible gear on the 29er with the Rohloff. That's not so bad on my local trails but I think in hillier areas like Gap Creek Reserve I might want that little extra climbing ability. So, when I wear out the current cogs and/or my weight comes down to a safer range for the Rohloff to handle I might risk a 36/16 combination (incidentally a 36 is the largest 4 bolt stainless steel chainring I can find anyway), but we'll see how it goes as I practise my spinning.

Clearance issues: The first issue came when fitting the Speedbone adapter (which stops the hub from spinning in the bike's frame) with my Avid BB7 brakes. The hub came with a 160mm brake rotor which I was going to upgrade to a 203mm unit to match my existing front (and the single speed rear wheel) but I thought I'd save a couple of bucks and just run with the 160mm one, at least for now. It turns out that if I had have gone for the 203mm version I wouldn't have had problems but the 160mm bracket causes the brake unit to foul with the Speedbone. I ummed and arred for a while and thought about ordering the 203mm rotor but I couldn't stand the thought of waiting even longer to get the Rohloff operational so I decided some quick work with a grinder would be worth a try first.

Not bad for a guestimate if I don't say so myself. :)

I doubt I've weakened it very much in doing this but if it does break it was still worth a try and I'll be happy to buy a new Speedbone along with a 203mm rotor so I can use the longer bracket with the BB7s which will easily clear the Speedbone.

The other clearance issue came down to using the 13t cog with a fat KMC K710 Kool Chain (which I chose for its 1300kg tensile strength after breaking a few other chains in the past at the worst possible moment and hurting myself). I usually put the links on the inside but found that the link was hitting the Rohloff's hub-side flange in this case.

This was easily fixed by putting the link on the outside but if I change to a 15t cog this won't be a problem anyway.

All in all it's a beautiful thing to look at and to ride. I have a gear system now that can handle my power and weight so there won't be as much walking up hills. There'll be no chainsuck, no worn or busted derailleurs & freehubs, and no chain slap so it's still nice and quiet on the trails just like a single speed. Basically I get nearly all of the advantages of riding a single speed but with the bonus of gears, and I have something a little different to a standard run-of-the-mill alloy framed, derailleur equipped trail blaster.

I’ve also still got the matching yellow single speed wheel and can convert the bike back to single speed in about 20 mins any time that should take my fancy, but I have a feeling it might be some time before that urge strikes me again...

Peace and Rohloff

2011-08-27T08:47:00.006+10:00

I've drooled and dreamed of owning a Rohloff for a very long time, but I could never see it happening due to the cost, but the passing of a friend had one come up at the right price and now I have my dream bike.

Of course, what should happen with a brand new toy to play with, a whole day to myself, a backyard full of sweet trails, in a place where it hasn't rained since February?

Obviously it rains, with no end in sight for several weeks.

What a pisser! :(

10 KGs!

2011-07-25T14:25:00.003+10:00

It's taken nearly 12 weeks but I've finally cracked the 10kg milestone! My clothes are much looser, I've gone up 2 notches on my belt and hills that were once challenging on my bike now aren't so challenging. Crikey, I'm even running (a little). People are noticing I look different now too.

I've been a bit worried I might be letting myself go a bit too much on the weekends but because I've been continuing to lose weight I'm not sure if I'm succeeding despite my slackness or because of it... I guess the smartest/safest thing to do is to run with it and only worry about changing things if I plateau again.

My problems in the gym have continued though and that does need a change. Swapping to a shorter duration, 5 day split routine proved to be no better and adding a multi-vitamin also appears to have done little to change things. I wouldn't have thought I was pushing the energy envelope too far with an average 1kg per week weight loss but that does appear to be the case so I think my solution will be to back things off and/or at least give my weight training priority in my day.

I think my morning cardio workouts have just been a bit too taxing and leaving me with nothing in the tank later in the day for weights. So, I'll try shifting my weight training back to the mornings 3 times per week when I do have some energy (after a good night's sleep...) and alternate with cycling on the off days.

While this will form the basis of my exercise routine, I've really been starting to enjoy and notice benefits of my walk/runs so I don't want to give them up completely. It is just cardio though and fairly low impact (ie not too taxing on the muscles) so I think I should still be able to manage them in the afternoons after work just fine as long as I don't go too silly. Actually, being a bit empty and pre-exhausted might work to my advantage (fat loss wise) for this activity anyway.

I started this new routine this morning and finally got through a whole workout for the first time in many weeks, and it felt great too so I think I'm onto something. We'll see how it goes over the next few weeks though. I may still need to factor in a little more recovery time...

Nice Progress

2011-07-11T16:15:00.004+10:00

Well, I broke through my plateau with the changes I made with a nice 1.7kg loss followed by a more humble 0.6kg last week. I'm happy with that and the progress appears to be continuing but I have this nagging feeling that I'm becoming a bit complacent about it all and not putting as much effort in as I should be.

Part of that feeling comes from knowing that I'm letting myself go a bit too far on the weekends. On the one hand I've been getting away with it because of the amount of cycling I do most weekends but on the other hand I'm worried that I won't get away with it for much longer. Relying too heavily on exercise has been one of my mistakes in the past and weekend binging may also explain why I plateaued last month.

Another aspect is that I haven't been feeling as hungry as I have previously which either means I'm getting used to the smaller portions or I'm eating too much again...

But, I can't complain too much about continuing to lose weight despite giving it less than my best.

Something is still amiss on the exercise front though. I've noticed a lack of "oomph" which has been getting progressively worse over the last 4-6 weeks. On the bike it hasn't been too noticeable due to my lighter weight now and I've been pleased to find myself making it up hills that would normally get the better of me, but I have still noticed that my ability to put the power down and sprint doesn't seem to be there.

In the gym it's definitely still noticeable and I'm still tending to fade much faster than I should. I've been progressively dreading my workouts more and more, and everything I do once I'm in the gym feels forced and unnatural somehow. Usually I only last 10-15 mins before I catch myself staring at the wall while 3 songs go by on the iPod and I realise that I'm not going to get anything more done and I quit. Lately that's eroded even further to the point where I don't even make it through the first set (after getting in there and setting everything up) and now I haven't lifted a barbell in a week.

My mind does seem strong so I feel reluctant to blame the problem on a lack of motivation, and I haven't been feeling overly hungry so I doubt I've been pushing myself too far on too little energy, but I do know I haven't been getting enough sleep and there's a possibility I may be lacking certain vitamins and minerals on my restricted diet so I'll grab myself a multi and start making sure I hit the sack at a reasonable hour.

I also thought I'd try a 5 day split, dividing my workout into legs, chest, back, shoulders and arms on different days and also cut the number of sets so I can be in an out in around 30 minutes instead of the 45-60 mins my workouts currently take. I figure a shorter workout on one body part per day should be stimulating both physically and mentally and help take me out of the gym doldrums.

I haven't tried a 5 day split before and I'm not sure how it will go but at least it's something different and I know of the importance of mixing things up for progress to continue too.

Worth a try anyway. ;)

Plateau

2011-06-21T12:04:00.006+10:00

For the last fortnight I haven't seen any progress on the scales. Last week the numbers showed me very clearly why, I'd blown out my points and I hadn't done as much exercise as previous weeks, but this week I'm at a bit of a loss to explain it. I'm below my points and haven't even touched my weekly "party points" allowance and I've done heaps of exercise. I was hoping I'd catch up the previous week's blow-out but for some reason it hasn't budged.

Going by the numbers this is the best week I've had yet and I should have been spot on for a decent loss. That hasn't happened so I need to dig a bit deeper...

Possible causes:

Depression. I've been battling the blues for the last fortnight and it's known that depression can cause the body to react by conserving energy.
Solution: I need to find a way to have a holiday.
I haven't been as hungry. This could indicate that my tracking hasn't been accurate and my portions may have been larger than I thought, but on the plus side it could be seen as a positive sign that my metabolism is still switched on. Past experience has shown that plateaus usually go hand in hand with excessive hunger and lethargy.
Solution: (a) Watch what I'm eating as much as how much. Focus more on filling and healthy choices. ie lean protein sources and high fibre fruits & veg.
(b) Sit down with the Mrs and pick out some Weight Watchers recipes for our meals ahead.
I've let my sweet tooth have a bit too much free reign. That handful of jelly beans after dinner that I often allow myself may be elevating my insulin levels and causing the bulk of my evening meal to be stored as fat, but then where is my body finding the energy for my exercise?
Solution: Cut out all sugar and highly processed foods, especially in the evenings.
I haven't been in the mood to lift weights so I've skipped quite a lot of workouts and/or haven't put as much effort into them. I thought I was more than compensating with some extra cycling, including some extremely long and grueling rides on the weekend, but my body may be quite efficient with the cycling so I'm not working as hard as I think I am.
Solution: (a) Don't rely on exercise to get the job done.
(b) Use the 10 minute rule in the gym by giving it a good 10 minutes after starting a workout before deciding if I really am not up to it. There is strong evidence to suggest that resistance training may be more beneficial to weight loss than cardio (such as this recent blog post by Susie Burrell) so I might even need to back my cycling off to give my weight training priority.
(c) Instead of cycling every day I think I'll switch to a walk/jog on the mornings of my weight training days which will both mix up my exercise routine and give me some recovery time off the bike. I'll also schedule weight training 3 times a week instead of trying to do 4 so I get a recovery day in between workouts which will hopefully give me more energy in the gym and also keep my enthusiasm for it higher.
I 'bonk' fairly regularly about 10 minutes into my morning rides (before breakfast). This could be a positive thing if it forces my body to find energy from my fat stores but it could also mean my performance is suffering so I don't get the best out of the workout.
Solution: Try a small bowl of oats before heading out.

There's also a possibility that this plateau may be just a temporary hitch and go away as mysteriously as it appeared. Plateaus happen and are to be expected during a weight loss journey, but then the common reasons behind them are because the body has adapted to the routine or you've unconsciously let things lapse a little, so it's usually an indicator that it's time to change things or reel in any slackness.

On a positive note I've seen improvement in my cycling, my clothes are comfortable and I feel pretty good otherwise. Whatever happens, I'm not quitting!

Acera vs Alivio Chain Line

2011-06-09T10:36:00.004+10:00

It seems like only yesterday I had to replace the drive train on my backup geared MTB but it turns out it's closer to a year and a half which is excellent mileage and further reinforces my opinion that an expensive drivetrain is difficult to justify financially. It's just started jumping teeth on the cassette, especially in the 3rd, 4th & 5th cogs, whenever I put the power down and has become so bad I had to pull out of a ride much earlier than expected on Saturday.

Past experience has taught me to replace chain, chainrings and cassette at the same time but this time I'm finding the Acera crankset difficult to find so I've decided I'll upgrade to the Alivio FC-M410 which also has replaceable chainrings which should mean the next time to replace should be a bit cheaper and/or easier to upgrade.

The problem is the Alivio crankset has a slightly wider offset which means I also need to change my bottom bracket to a narrower one to keep the same chain line so my existing front derailleur will still work.

My Giant Yukon/Rincon has a 50mm chain line.
With the Acera FC-M191 cranks I need a 68mm x 122mm bottom bracket.
With the Alivio FC-M410 cranks I need a 68mm x 113mm bottom bracket.

They look prettier too -

Can you lose fat without feeling hungry?

2011-06-08T15:45:00.004+10:00

Short answer: No!

I once believed it was possible by only eating natural foods and avoiding sugar but that never actually worked for me. It does help with the cravings, but losing fat requires caloric restriction and when you restrict calories enough to lose fat you will feel hungry. That's how it is. Take it too far and you'll feel too hungry and cave in eventually but if you don't take it far enough and don't allow yourself to feel hunger, then you're not likely to lose fat.

I wanted to say that now so that one day when I'm browsing over my old posts in an effort to get past a plateau or figure out where I might be going wrong or even if I'm ever tempted to tell someone that weight loss is easy, I'll remember that the first few weeks on Weight Watchers I felt very hungry and I had a major battle with myself almost hourly to get through it. I was surprised by this because the points I was allocated were double what the average woman gets and I was warned I might find eating that much to be a bit of a struggle but to do my best anyway. As it turned out, eating that much was not exactly a problem and I quickly learned why I'd become so fat - If this is what it took to lose a measly 1 or 2 kgs per week, I've been eating way too much!

(sorry, Biggest Loser corruption. 1 or 2 kgs per week in the real world is awesome progress but it still showed me how much I had been over-eating previously).

5 weeks in now and I'm find I'm not struggling anywhere near as much as I did at first, but I'm also finding that if I don't consistently feel a wee bit hungry several times during the day, I know I won't see a good number on the scales come the weekly weigh-in.

Another lesson I've learned is Weight Watchers is working out to be absolutely perfect for me in every way. I'm getting the right foods (and stuff I like to eat) in sufficient quantities to adequately fuel my workouts. I'm getting the support I need to keep me motivated and I'm averaging a 1 - 2 kg loss per week so far as a result, and I'm still as enthusiastic now as when I started.

However, this past week I tried to tweak it up a notch (by eating less than my allowance and including some extra exercise) to catch up on some over-indulging earlier in the week that saw my weight go up somewhat. Yes, I caught up but there was a big price to pay after just two days of this punishment - massive hunger & cravings, and no energy in the gym for any big weights. But if I stick to my points I can do my usual cycling (45 mins most weekday mornings with a couple of 90 min rides on weekends) and weights (45-60 mins, 2 - 4 times per week) without feeling overly hungry or worn out.

What don't I like about WW?

Well, they're really hung up on BMI and with my muscle size I'm never going to get down to their idea of what my goal weight should be, which means I'm not likely to ever achieve free lifetime membership. Hopefully I'll have formed enough of a pattern to become successful at intuitive eating to maintain my weight by the time I get down around my goal of 10% body fat. Otherwise I'll have to pay for membership again if I start to gain a bit again.

The other thing is that it's largely geared towards women, particularly mums who do all the cooking for their families so there's a lot about recipes and cooking that I'm not quite getting into (at least not yet). I'm a total novice in the kitchen, apart from bare survival skills like a steak & steamed veges or spag bol, so I find the recipe choices a bit overwhelming and can't work out how or where to start. I don't do the shopping either so anything I decide to have a crack at is probably going to mean a trip to the grocery store. The other problem with that is the rest of my family has to eat as well and I feel somewhat obligated to go with the flow and not make a nuisance of myself with overly special requirements or to cook stuff that the others won't eat. Plus there isn't the space for two cooks: "This kitchen ain't big enough for the both of us".

I reckon a soup or casserole in the slow cooker that I can separate into portions and freeze could be the go for starters. All I have to do is pick one...

Weight Watchers ProPoints Analysis

2011-05-24T13:03:00.006+10:00

This past week I've had a cold so it doesn't really surprise me that I've watched my weight plateau and may have even gained a little. I've still been tracking my points faithfully though, and since I haven't gone over my allocation and I've been hungry (even light headed at times) and lacking energy (flat out standing let alone exercising) I've still felt a bit ripped off that I haven't seen any progress.

All up I skipped two gym workouts and my Sunday Afternoon mountain bike ride which I thought shouldn't be too bad in the overall scheme of things but the scales are not my friend this week.

As they say, there's no such thing as failure. There is only data, and the data over the last few weeks does tell a story:

Week 1
ProPoints used: 426
Exercise points gained: 154
Total: 272
Weight lost: 2.3 kg

Week 2
ProPoints used: 403
Exercise points gained: 162
Total: 241
Weight lost: 1.4 kg

Week 3
ProPoints used: 438
Exercise points gained: 115
Total: 323
Weight lost: well, I'm yet to officially weigh-in but let's say zero, or maybe up a couple of hundred grams going by the scales this morning.

Edit: I actually lost .9 of a kg (a poofteenth off 1kg) so I was worried about nothing as it turns out. Still, my progress has been slowing so the analysis was worthwhile anyway and I think I've identified the cause behind the slower progress, lack of energy and excessive hunger. Basically I don't think I've been eating enough for lunch (particularly carbs) so I didn't have the energy in the gym and I was getting too hungry later at night because of it.

Week 2 is interesting. I ate less and exercised more that week but lost less weight than I did in week 1. The main cause behind the eating less was a switch to canned soups instead of a meat & salad sandwich for lunch and I know canned soups contain a lot of salt which causes fluid retention so that probably explains that situation.

Week 3, well while I thought I was eating less going by my hunger levels, the points tell a different story. I get 56 points allocated a day and this last week I ate up 51 points above week 1 (after the exercise points are taken out) so in effect I've eaten a day's extra worth of food over the course of the week! Mind you I was so lacking in energy I found it impossible to lift weights and even though I spent some time in the gym anyway I didn't count it because the effort seemed so pathetic at the time. I guess I have to blame the cold for that rather than an undereating problem...

I made an observation yesterday after a similar pathetic effort in the gym after work. I discovered that I sparked right up about half an hour after dinner and was chasing the kids around the house, bouncing off the walls and felt like a million bucks. While, before dinner in the gym the tank was well and truly empty. So I think I might shift my gym workouts to after dinner, giving about 30 mins for the food to settle, rather than after work when I'm hungry and have no energy at the moment.

And I'll go back to my meat and salad sandwiches for lunch rather than the soups. I think restricting calories too much also slows down my progress, particularly with the amount of exercise I do, so I'll swing back to what I did in week 1 and see if I can duplicate my success.

Another plus in the coming week is that I've finally drank all the beer in the house so I won't have to factor any of that into my points any more. I'm not usually a beer drinker but for some reason bought a carton just before I started Weight Watchers and I've since been factoring in a six pack once per week to get rid of it. Now it's gone I can get on with things. ;)

Fructose/Insulin BS?

2011-05-16T15:54:00.005+10:00

I think I may have been fed a bit of a red herring with the whole fructose and insulin resistant concept. While those things certainly are factors in the causes of obesity for many, or even most of us, recognising that doesn't seem to do much to fix the problem.

The first spanner in the works for me (assuming insulin resistance as the primary problem) was the "Twinkie Diet" where Professor Mark Haub lost 12.5 kgs in 2 months and greatly improved his cholesterol levels.

Then, while watching a documentary about the pacific islands on TV, there was an extremely isolated, tiny Polynesian tribe that had no access to fast foods and bakeries yet there were still obese people there. It turns out obesity can be found pretty much anywhere and everywhere in the world. Sure, it's mostly where western diets have crept in but not always...

Many dieticians, like Susie Burrell also poo poo the idea, saying "sugar is sugar" and losing weight is all about the calories.

I have to say now that it turns out that they're right. Without an energy deficit you won't lose weight no matter what you eat. With an energy deficit you will lose weight no matter what you eat.

They final proof for me is that Weight Watchers is working very well for me and I still get to eat plenty of the "wrong" foods. (Mind you, you get much less to eat if you make poor choices). Sure I'm hungry at times but I'm not falling flat like I usually do when I try dieting off my own bat. The Pro Points system calculates how much I need to eat based on my weight, age and other factors so I'm not under or overdoing things and that seems to be making all the difference. I'll delay getting into too much detail about WW or the other factors I've changed until I start dropping below my damn 120kg nemesis but I am quietly confident I've found the solution at long last though...

Freshjive Moving Pictures - Bicycle Seat

2011-05-11T13:11:00.000+10:00

Freshjive Moving Pictures - Bicycle Seat from freshjive on Vimeo.

Crossfit

2011-05-06T16:19:00.005+10:00

To all the chicks who worry that pumping serious iron will make them look like Arnold Schwarzenegger in a bikini, check this out -

How hot is that!

Obviously you don't start out quite as strenuously. It takes a while to build up to that kind of level and they start you out at a level you can cope with. Crossfit is also the training style used by most of the trainers on Biggest Loser. When he's not on Biggest Loser "The Commando" runs a CrossFit Gym & coaching services.

I was shown Crossfit a couple of years back by a friend who runs a Crossfit gym in Coorparoo and lately I've started to get very interested in it. Unfortunately I don't have a Crossfit gym close to me or the time and funds to get to one right now but I've altered my weights routine to 5 times per week instead of 3, higher reps, more sets with little to no rest, and stepped up my cycling. I'm also thinking about throwing a few runs and some old school calisthenics in but at my current weight that stuff is kind of painful and hopeless so I'll take a raincheck on it for the time being until my weight comes down a bit.

I've done my first couple of workouts with this new style this week and crikey, I'm sore now!

Self Sabotage

2011-05-02T12:15:00.004+10:00

Related to my epiphany in my last post is another factor I'm beginning to think may be an even more important key to long term success. I've discovered something else about myself I'm surprised has taken this long for me to realise.

I'm a chronic self saboteur.

Knowing which foods are healthy and how to achieve an energy imbalance is a no-brainer and I know my exercise routines are pretty much spot on. So why haven't I won this battle once and for all? Why do I keep doing the wrong things, even knowing they're against everything I know will take me to where I want to be?

The answer lies in what's going on in my head. In my case self sabotage comes in one or all of the following thought patterns:

"I know how to lose weight so eating this junk food or skipping this workout isn't a problem. I'll make up for it when I get in the right mood again."
"I'm fat and that's just how it is. I'll never lose weight so all this effort is pointless anyway."
"Hey, I've lost some weight but this is probably the most I can hope for."
"Hey, I've lost weight this week despite eating the wrong foods and not sticking to my exercise plan. I can lose weight doing anything I want." (Check out this post on ScaleJunkie about the magical Frosty for more on this kind of thought pattern)
"Well I've blown it this week. I'll start again maybe next week."
"I suck anyway so I may as well pig out."

Most of these thoughts have no basis in reality yet for some reason my mind seems to believe them at the time, and that's the key - belief! The answer lies in what I "believe" to be true about myself whether or not those beliefs are complete nonsense or factual.

Tom Venuto comes to the rescue yet again in this article explaining that these erroneous beliefs lie in our concept of self. To change it we need to create a new image of ourselves in our minds and live to that image.

My epiphany in my last post was leading in that direction in that focusing on my athletic performance created an image in my mind of someone striving for success. I was goal-focused and always trying to better myself. That thinking had a bleed down effect into other areas of my life including my diet and tendency towards self loathing & pity.

So I'm taking Tom's advice and I've written down a detailed description of the person I want to be and I'm consulting it frequently, as a mantra if you will.

Other aspects I've felt have been missing are having a support network, accountability to someone other then myself and a more scientific approach to dieting. For those reason I've decided to join Weight Watchers. Weight Watchers' new Pro Points system appears to be a high protein (muscle preserving) diet specifically targeting fat rather than lean tissue, with the same support network as before so it should be ideal for me.

While researching the Pro Points system I also came across this article which explains how fat is more calorie dense than protein, so if you lose lean tissue rather than fat from a given calorie deficit you stand to lose up to 4 times more weight (on the scales). This may seem awesome when you stand on the scales but in the long term it's metabolic disaster so you end up eventually dieting to maintain weight, end up with the "skinny fat" look and an extremely high likelihood of putting the weight back on. I also know that the body's preferred source of stored calories during starvation is lean tissue rather than fat. This goes some way to explaining why the Biggest Loser contestants drop such huge amounts of weight on the show. (For more pros and cons of Biggest Loser check out this post on Tom Venuto's blog).

The solution to targeting fat rather than lean tissue is a diet high in protein, a moderate calorie deficit and weight training. While the results on the scales won't be as impressive, the clothes sizes will continue to drop, you'll look much better at the beach and the long term results are more assured. The end result will be more like one of the Biggest Loser trainers rather than a contestant. There's a reason the contestants stop taking their shirts off at the weigh-ins past a certain point...

Dr Mercola's eight foundational principles for successful weight loss and an epiphany

2011-04-16T09:46:00.007+10:00

A day of hard, sweaty work and perfect weather broke me out of my depression on Wednesday rather than hanging around for weeks like it normally would and that made me consider that I might have more control over this than I thought. Eating foods that raise my insulin levels and/or not exercising to reduce my insulin levels may indeed be keys to my physical and mental health.

Health gurus talk about "balance" but just what does that mean? I think it's a combination of eating the right foods at the right time and in the right portions, doing the right type of exercise at the right time, getting enough sleep, managing stress and drinking enough water.

I think Dr Mercola nails it with these eight foundational principles for successful weight loss:

The foundation of your nutritional plan should be eating for your Nutritional Type—beginning with taking my FREE Nutritional Typing test—then modifying your diet appropriately.
Eliminate processed foods, sugar, and starches, and replace them with fresh raw organic vegetables, organic meat and eggs.
Also reduce your grains and fruits, as their sugars will contribute to the insulin resistance that makes it difficult for you to metabolize fat properly.
Replace soda, fruit juices, and other caloric beverages with plenty of pure water every day. Increased water intake has been shown to accelerate weight loss.
Incorporate plenty of exercise, and make sure you include high-intensity burst-type exercises like Peak 8, which are far superior than any other exercise for boosting weight loss naturally.
Make sure you're getting adequate restorative sleep.
Manage your stress. Adopt a technique like EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique), which can help you nip cravings in the bud.
Whenever you are reducing weight and breaking down body fat, it's important to incorporate some sort of detoxification program. Your body stores many toxins inside fat cells, and when you break those down, toxins naturally enter your bloodstream and can actually make you feel sick if you don't take steps to "mop them up."

I know I've been falling short of the mark on pretty much every one of these points but in particular I think I need to push myself harder when I exercise.

I've had a bit of an epiphany this week. When I recall periods of my life when I've achieved peak fitness, over the last few years of failures I've been trying to duplicate the training plans and whatever else I was doing during those successful times, yet for some reason the formulas haven't been anywhere near as successful the second (or third or forth) time/s around. My epiphany this week is that I think I've been missing one key factor and everything else probably hinges around this key factor.

Whenever I've been successful I can't recall paying any particular attention to diet or stress levels, I had no special diet and the frequency and duration of my training varied wildly. It didn't matter if I was training once per week or every day or even what type of exercise I was doing. What I believe made all the difference was how hard I pushed myself when I trained and how focused I was on "winning".

I can remember during these times that nothing was going to beat me. I gave it absolutely everything I had. Every ounce of muscle, fury and passion I had in me went into it. Nothing else mattered.

I think that when I had that level of focus everything else fell into place. My body controlled how much and what I ate, I exhausted myself so that I slept properly and nothing else in my life could get in my way so stress wasn't a problem.

Time to move forward.

Melancholy

2011-04-12T16:27:00.003+10:00

Well I've been struck down with a bout of melancholy that bit in hard over the weekend and hasn't gone away yet. Round and round and round it goes. Where it stops nobody knows. It could last days or it could last weeks. Sugar cravings are through the roof and I've missed two workouts now. If previous experience is anything to go by it'll probably stick around just long enough to get my fitness back to square one again...

Poor me.

But it's made me think about whether it's a cause behind my problems losing weight or an effect brought on by pushing myself too hard or indulging in the wrong food or something along those lines.

Which led me to ponder whether Syndrome X is a cause or an effect.

Syndrome X, or metabolic syndrome, is a combination of high waist circumference, high cholesterol, high insulin and high blood pressure. (In other words, me). Does having Syndrome X cause you to get fat or does being fat bring it on? Who knows... but I was interested to learn there's an equine version and horses don't generally eat chocolates and chips so junk food isn't to blame. They do point the finger at insulin resistance but apparently only fruitcakes believe that one.

Googling "Why can't I lose weight" bought up this page on Oprah.com with several comments towards the bottom from people who have done everything right and still can't lose weight. I can so identify with all of them but apparently they're all liars. Everyone know it's all about calories in and calories out...

One thing I did notice about a week ago was I started waking up well before my alarm (several hours before in some cases) and I wasn't feeling tired at bedtime. Insufficient sleep can upset certain hormones that can cause cravings, fatigue and prevent my body from recovering from my exercise sessions adequately so this may very well be the cause behind the melancholy attack. I suspect my sleep issues may be caffeine related so I'll try backing off the coffees to see if that settles things down.

Other than that all I can do is eat healthy and get back to my exercise program as best I can and try not to use Syndrome X as a cop out. I feel certain that this thing can be beaten by detoxing myself physically and mentally on a daily basis and understanding that losing weight is a much slower process for me than it may be for many other people but hopefully eventually it gets easier as I go.

Carb Timing

2011-04-08T12:04:00.002+10:00

Looking at my meal plan and energy levels over the last few days, one tweak I've decided to make since my previous post is to time my carbs around my gym workouts.

I've found that if I restrict calories and especially carbs on the days prior to a workout I have a lot of trouble getting through the workout and my lifts feel flat. In the hours after a workout I get extremely hungry and have intense cravings for high carb foods and my calorie deficit for the day usually ends up much larger than it should be.

On the off days when I don't hit the gym, I'm eating calories that I don't need and I'll usually exceed my recommended calorie intake, so in effect I'm creating a famine & feast cycle within the same 2 day period which isn't ideal for an optimum weight-losing metabolism. One is canceling the other out, which explains why I've been maintaining my weight rather than losing it in spite of the effort I'm going to.

The solution is to time my carbs around my workouts so that I'm getting energy when I need it and not when I don't.

Being in a family of five it's not possible to be excessively choosy about what gets served up on the dinner table but we do plan meals a week ahead and we do have meals that can be easily modified to work with what I need to do. For example, we can reserve any pasta dishes or other high carb meals for my gym days, and the other days I can just do without the potatoes or any other carbs that might usually be served with the meat & steamed veges or salad.

For lunches I'll switch to a salad instead of a sandwich on the non-gym days.

Breakfast follows a morning bike ride so I can safely alternate between high protein meals or cereals depending on what I'm craving or how my body is feeling.

Other than that, the rest is just toughening up on the snacking to ensure I'm eating quality food and avoiding junk (if I'm actually hungry) and that seems to be going ok so far.

Winning... Somewhat

2011-04-05T10:55:00.003+10:00

The last 4 weeks since I switched to more of a "body controlled eating" format and altered my training program to hopefully maximise the benefits, I've seen some great progress. My squat has gone from 120kgs to 140, my deadlift from 120 to 150 and my bench press has finally exceeded 100kgs again. I've also lost a few cms around my waist according to the way my pants are fitting and I'm a little bit faster on the bike (although still not quite back to my old self).

The problem is the scales aren't all that different, which would go some way to explaining why I'm not yet back to my old self on the bike yet. Still, I have lost a good 2kgs which would work out to about half a kilo a week in weight loss. That's progress I guess but I'd like to bump it up closer to 1kg a week, or even more considering I want to lose about 30kgs.

Time for a little tweaking...

Doing a quick 40 mins on the bike before breakfast and 30-60 mins of weights 3 times a week is working out as well as I'd hoped so I don't want to change anything there, and cleaning up my diet has almost completely eliminated the night time cravings and binges that have plagued me. I could tighten things up somewhat though. I've become more aware of how much certain foods upset the applecart and I need to keep a tighter reign on those.

For example, sugar, artificial sweeteners and MSG tend to prime my body for fat storage as well as stimulate my appetite, and adding or eliminating milk from my diet often is the difference between gaining weight or losing it. Milk is an interesting one though because I think it's the optimum food source for gaining muscle. However, not so great when trying to cut body fat...

So, I think I'll go back to recording my calorie intake using Calorie King. This won't be about intentionally undereating as such this time though. It's more about vigilance so I can watch out if my calorie intake starts creeping up or if I start including too many "bad" foods (again).

"Vigilance" vs "intentional starvation" is an important distinction to make here. I've been thinking lately about body controlled eating (eating healthy and letting your appetite mechanism control the calorie intake to become "naturally thin") vs calorie counting, and the more I think about it the more I'm coming to realise that the lines between these two popular theories of weight control should actually be blurred and the real solution lies somewhere in the middle.

It's true that to lose weight there must be a calorie deficit, but if I put my focus on that alone I quickly end up hungry and lethargic and fail (like 95% of dieters who go down this path). On the other hand "body controlled eating" alone won't cut it either because it's still possible to gain weight eating healthy and it's all too easy to develop "food amnesia" and fool yourself about what you're actually putting in your mouth. The solution is to eat as healthy as possible while relying mostly on hunger signals but also record what you're eating (before you eat it) to ensure you are achieving a calorie deficit. If you're not achieving a deficit and/or not losing weight, your records should show why that is and hopefully indicate the necessary solution/s.

I've been reading Tom Venuto's blog with renewed respect lately. I previously had him pegged as an "eat less exercise more" proponent which I haven't been too enthusiastic about due to its poor success rate amongst dieters (including my own experience). However, it turns out that Tom does indeed blur the lines between calorie counting and body controlled eating and his methods are actually what I've come to feel to be spot on based on my research and personal experience over the last few years. Definitely worth checking out, starting with the "most popular" and "most read" posts linked on the right hand side.

Farmer Boy

2011-03-13T13:54:00.003+10:00

Following on from my most recent calorie counting disaster I reported yesterday (Yeah, maybe I didn't give it long enough but whatever. When I see my hunger go up and my energy go down and I start gaining weight when the numbers say it should be going down, I know I'm not going to last much longer) , the only thing I can even remotely imagine went wrong was the Pepsi Max. I had like 4 cans on Thursday and gained 2.5kgs by Friday even though my calorie count showed a 1000 calorie deficit. Something happened there that goes beyond calories in vs calories out and my weight hasn't gone back down since.

So, I've decided I'm going to clean out everything in my diet even remotely unnatural and eat like I would if I lived on a farm in a remote location. That means only fresh (or frozen) veges, fruit and meat and nothing packaged that might have added sugar, sweeteners, salt or MSG. Definitely no chips (fries or crisps), chain store pizza, packaged biscuits, crackers or cakes, KFC, Maccas, Chinese takeaway or anything like those things.

And definitely no more diet drinks! Nothing but water and with the odd tea or coffee.

Rather than calorie counting I'll let my stomach decide how much and how often I should eat. That's not to say I'll be stuffing myself though. I'll be using hunger as my guide and pushing the plate away as soon as I feel satisfied, before I feel full.

For exercise I'll do a quick 20 -40 mins on the bike before breakfast every morning but I'll be careful to mix it up between the mountain bike and road bike, and never do the same route twice in a row. Fast paced cardio on an empty stomach has been part of my winning formula in the past and it seems the main reason I eventually stopped was due to growing stale with the same old route each day. (Aside from stuff I can't help like periods of bad weather or illness).

I'll switch my weight routines back to the evenings 3 times per week with the same 2 day push/pull split I'm currently doing. I'm having great success (performance wise) with that and I'm enjoying it so I don't see any reason to change it. Doing it cold on an empty stomach wasn't really working well though so switching it back to the evenings should improve things.

I'll give myself a good 2 - 4 weeks this time before I change anything. It may take a while to get built-up crap out of my system and to get past cravings/withdrawals from the bad 'foods' before my appetite control mechanism starts to function properly. Hopefully then I will start seeing consistent results that will take me all the way home without bombing out and flat-lining or going backwards again. I'm going to have to be tough though, especially for the first few weeks while I'm detoxing and withdrawing...

Weirdness & Disillusion

2011-03-11T17:17:00.004+10:00

I've been carefully tracking my calorie intake, over-estimating if anything, and under-estimating my exercise caloric expenditure. Every day I've been at least 1000 calories under my recommended daily limit for weight loss (ie for 1kg per week) but I've felt comfortable enough so I went with it.

I've been weighing myself daily and noting the results with interest.

Mon: -1kg
Tue: -1kg
Wed: -1kg
Thurs: + .5kg
Fri + 2.5kg

So today I'm right back where I was at the beginning of the week and feeling really disillusioned. I have no idea what's going on here. I've vigorously and religiously tracked every morsel (without kidding myself) and the numbers say I should be losing weight. Lots of it in fact.
And at the beginning of the week that's what was happening.

Then by Thursday I became tired and damn hungry (which is the usual thing that happens when I restrict portions and over-exercise) but I didn't quit! Hey, if it works on Biggest Loser then why not me?

Still, it is only the first week and a bit early for an all-out dummy spit so I shall persevere.

Sigh...

Update: There was one thing... I drank heaps of Pepsi Max on Thursday and there's quite a bit of evidence that many bodies react to this stuff as if it was loaded with sugar anyway. Even though there's very few calories, the body primes itself for a sugar rush anyway by increasing insulin etc. The sugar rush never comes but the insulin is still there so any food that does get consumed is then converted to fat. I've also suspected that Pepsi Max may cause massive fluid retention in me which would also explain a large overnight weight fluctuation.
I've also noticed that certain foods that I suspect contain some form or another of MSG will cause a similar response.
Lesson learned. I need to eat and drink more natural stuff and give anything processed or artificial a wide berth.

One of the questions asked in a Biggest Loser competition this week did give me thought though -

"When is the best time to perform cardio?"

The answer being, straight after waking, before breakfast. I knew that already, but what gave me pause was the emphasis on "cardio".

What about weight training?

I did some googling and found out that athletic performance is at its peak between 4 & 8 pm and weight training tends to work best when there's something in your belly and cortisol levels are low. Which means weight training after waking and before breakfast isn't the way to get the most benefit out of it.

So, it seems I was on the money with my training formula a couple of years ago when I was doing a hard & fast spin on the bike before breakfast and weight training after work 3 or 4 times a week, which incidentally is also when I achieved my lowest weight ever within the last few years. I only stopped due to the most wicked case of the flu I've had since I was a kid. It took a couple of months to recover from that and by then my fitness had gone backwards so I never got back into the same rhythm.

So one change I will make is to shift my weights back to afternoon or evenings and get back on my bike before brekky. Hopefully I'll get back whatever magic I had going on back then, and this time it'll see me through.

On Track

2011-03-08T10:34:00.005+10:00

After spending most of last year slowly gaining weight and the last few months yo-yoing around the heaviest I've been since I started this weight loss journey, I finally feel like I'm on track again. There's a fire in my belly to succeed and I'm having small wins almost daily.

In the gym I'm powering on and am now squatting and deadlifting heavier than I have before. And it feels good. I feel spurred on to see what I can do each workout. My bench press is still leaving a bit to be desired but I'm almost back into triple figures (kgs) again. I keep thinking of the time I benched 170kgs but I was a lot younger then, and even in more recent times when I'd bench up to 120 kgs I now know I was cheating a fair bit...

On the bike my average times for a given route are slowly dropping and I'm back to making it up some of the tougher hills that have had me walking recently.

I'm counting calories again using www.calorieking.com.au. There is no denying that there has to be a calorie deficit if weight loss is going to occur but I'm mainly using it as a food diary. I'm certainly not starving myself by any means but in a strange twist I'm actually finding it difficult at the moment to eat the amount they tell me that I should be.

I've also commandeered Paula to help coach me. She's the main cook in the house so having her on board is vital if I'm to succeed. She's also going to give me a weigh-in each week and help make any adjustments necessary if I start to plateau.

Biggest Loser is inspiring but I still hate the whole Fat-Vivor elimination format. I'd rather see the show focus on weight loss where the biggest loser actually was the biggest loser and not just the last person standing after a series personality battles. And enough with the crying already! Still it's fun to watch and it helps to get me going when I don't have 100% enthusiasm.

More on Death

2011-03-01T13:36:00.006+10:00

Watching an episode of Stargate Universe recently two of the main characters had the following conversation while awaiting their possible deaths.

Eli: I remember as a kid, I was ... I dunno, maybe seven or eight ... my grandfather died and my parents took me to the funeral. Watching his casket getting lowered into the ground, it ... it was the first time that I realised I was gonna die one day. I mean, I knew people died. I'm talking about the idea that my consciousness was gonna end. I wasn't gonna see what happened to the world.
It was such an empty, dark feeling, like I was falling down a pitch-black hole. It was ... it scared the crap out of me.

RUSH: I take it you don't believe in the afterlife.

Eli: That fear was almost too much to handle. I guess maybe I thought I'd just get used to it.

RUSH: But you don't.

WALLACE: No. No. It scared me just as much every time.

RUSH: Most people realise their own mortality at some stage of the game, Eli. It's not a particularly unique experience.

Eli: I know.

RUSH: The question is, did it change you? Did it inspire you to make something of this short existence that we have?

Eli: Well, I'm here, aren't I?

I can relate to this moment of realising my mortality as well. I also experienced it at a very young age, probably about the same time as the character Eli's revelation. But in my case instead of inspiring me to make something of my short existence, it devastated me. My conclusion was that no matter what I did, it would all turn out the same way. Death would always take away anything and everything I would ever achieve or hold dear. I was going to end and everything and every one around me was going to end. I remember crying myself to sleep about it for a very long time.

The only conclusion to this thinking is that everything is pointless and life could only ever be a series of cheap thrills. Here for a good time, not a long time etc.

So how did I come to fall in love, build a home and start a family? How did I develop a business to support it all? How have I come to give a damn about my health now after years of overindulgence? Sure, I think for the most part up until recently a lot of wanting to lose weight was little more than vanity, but now it's more about wanting to live to see this out. To see these cycles of life through and enjoy each new one. To be fitter purely to get the most of of life.

Still, that dark part inside of me rages on...

The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.

Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity.

What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun?

One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever.

The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose.

The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits.

All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again.

All things are full of labour; man cannot utter it: the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing.

The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.

Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath been already of old time, which was before us.

There is no remembrance of former things; neither shall there be any remembrance of things that are to come with those that shall come after.

Ecclesiastes 1

The Last Meal

2011-02-20T13:38:00.003+10:00

I recently did a bit of googling about "fear of death" and was interested to learn that apart from the normal flight or fight responses necessary for our survival, the most common fear was to be forgotten in death. I found this quite fascinating because it had never struck me to fear such a thing. After all, I wouldn't exactly be around to give a damn. My fear (if it could be called a fear) is that the inevitability of death sours the whole life experience for me. ie Everything is essentially pointless if it all ends the same way anyway.

Watching a TV show recently, the same concept (of being forgotten in death) came up for one of the characters in the show and it opened up a discussion with my wife. She was surprised that I found it an odd thing to fear and was equally puzzled with my feelings of futility. We eventually came up with an analogy of being a death row prisoner and how much we could enjoy a last meal knowing we were to be executed straight after. She said she would savour every mouthful until the last. I on the other hand knew that I would not find any enjoyment in any of it knowing what was about to come, and could only see it as delaying the inevitable and therefore completely pointless.

So, while not solving anything in the analogy, we may have managed to identify and define the root cause of my difficulties in losing weight and many other problems in my life, if not all of them. These feelings for me are always just below the surface and completely oppose any positive efforts I may be engaged in. In other words I'm a walking paradox. On the one hand I want to improve my health and look better. On the other hand (and at the same time) I think it's all pointless because I'm going to die anyway.

These feelings of futility, whether acknowledged or not, lead to black depression and self destructive behaviour, often within the same day. I may start out getting a great exercise session in and eating right all day only to finish by staying up way too late, eating junk or drinking and smoking. I seem to be two opposing personalities fighting over the one body.

What to do from here? I have no idea. I'm not even sure if there's a term for this particular problem but surely I can't be the only one with this issue?

Enough!

2011-02-17T16:27:00.004+10:00

I'm sick of being fat. Sick. sick, sick, sick, SICK OF IT!

I've been on this mission for so long now and apart from dropping 30kg in the first year I haven't made much of a dent in it since. I've been up and down the same 10 kgs and nothing I have tried has given me a lasting result. This of course leads me to the conclusion that everything I've been blogging about for these last few years may in fact be crap.

What I do know is that there must be an energy imbalance for weight (fat) loss to occur, which is easier said than done of course... Take it too far and you lose muscle, worsening your metabolic rate and triggering a starvation response. eg If I exercise too much my survival instincts take over and I just get hungrier and lethargic within a short period of time.

And if I don't take it far enough I don't lose weight.

So I've been trying to break it all down into much simpler terms and forgetting about pills, potions and getting caught up in techniques. KISS. Keep It Simple Stupid!

get 8-10 hours sleep per night. Early to bed, early to rise.
spend less time at the PC
exercise daily, alternating weight training with cardio. Achieve something new with each workout though. Don't allow myself to just "go through the motions".
eat whenever hungry and stop when no longer hungry (ie before full)
eat mostly natural foods but don't deprive myself completely of foods I like. Everything in moderation.
drink lots of water
If I feel a little bit hungry sometimes, especially before meals, it's a good sign but if I feel extremely hungry that's a bad sign and I need to take steps to avoid that happening.

My new job has come to an end, at least temporarily. Strangely enough all of that extra activity didn't made a lick of difference to my weight on the scales. However, I was cycling to and from the warehouse for the last few weeks and did notice that the effort required out in the bush on the MTB has diminished a bit now.

Now I'm back in the gym full on and back on the MTB more frequently, and it feels great. I even did a night ride on Tuesday night. The lower temperature of the night air had me wanting to go harder and harder (until I copped a mouthful of spaghetti and stomach acid as I powered up a hill). It was great to feel power in my legs again though rather than just feeling challenged.

I've also been wondering if the whole low carb/high protein thing is everything it's cracked up to be. On the one hand, carbs cause insulin spikes which increase hunger levels so one trick to being less hungry and therefore eating less should be to eat less carbs. However, a meal without carbs just isn't satisfying so there's a strong temptation/craving for something "carby" that can persist for several hours after a meal which won't always be resisted...

Everything in moderation.

A Slight Change of Plan

2011-01-23T17:55:00.003+10:00

My attempts to wake up a little earlier each day to hit the gym before breakfast are failing miserably. Basically, trying to juggle two jobs means I'm having no luck getting to bed at a decent hour most nights and if I don't get enough sleep I find I'm completely lacking enthusiasm to lift heavy weights and my cravings for sugar go through the roof. (Something to do with raised cortisol levels apparently). Sleep might actually be my particular pivotal point in the chain of causation.

I also find the physical demands of my other job are leaving me quite sore and worn out some days so working out of an evening is difficult as well.

However, I am losing weight slowly but surely now so I figure maybe I shouldn't be so hard on myself and maybe I don't really need to work out on those physically demanding days after all. Hey, I've already had a good workout anyway muscling big lumps of steel and 180kg rolls of rubber around the place so why not just play it by ear and hit the gym of an evening or alternate with some nocturnal MTB rides if I've had a less than gut-busting day in the warehouse?

Sounds like a plan.

Susie Maroney

2011-01-12T11:51:00.003+10:00

Susie Maroney lost almost 30 kgs in just on 4 months, which is a bit under 2kg a week on average.

That's tremendously inspiring because not only is that roughly how much I'd like to lose, it didn't take her that long to get there and she also did it with an easily achievable diet and she started with just 30 minutes of exercise per day.

Her diet consisted of a couple of weekbix for brekky, a piece or fruit for morning and afternoon tea, a salad (possibly even a sandwich) for lunch and veges and a small piece of meat for dinner, AND 10 lollies as a treat each day. At first I thought, bewdy, maybe I can have some bread and grains in my diet after all but then it occurred to me that she's probably a carb type because she's also gone to some effort to keep her proteins & fats fairly low.

And that gave rise to another thought - she's an endurance athlete. I started to wonder if being a carb type was characteristic of endurance athletes while sprinters were more likely to be protein types. Endurance athletes are known to burn primarily body fat and need lots of carbs while sprinters are sugar burners and need lots of protein to build and maintain muscles.

This leads me to conclude that whether you may be a carb type or a protein type, you need carbs to replenish fat stores, and protein to build and maintain muscle. So, the less exercise you do, the less carbs you need. In my case I'm focusing on 30 minutes of weights per day and I'm fairly insulin resistant so keeping my carbs low is going to be the key for me to achieve my calorie deficit. The more carbs I have, the more my insulin levels will stay elevated which means I'll be hungrier, and I'll have to exercise more which means I'll probably end up over-trained (again).

I'm definitely a sprinter, good for an all-out explosive burst of force lasting a few seconds rather than running marathons. A marathon for me is like a series of explosive bursts of force over a long period of time without a rest break so I quickly end up burned out.

It's getting kind of obvious where the balance point is for me now. Forehead slap.
I envy Susie for being able to find the perfect formula for her so quickly.

The Chain of Causation

2011-01-09T15:12:00.003+10:00

Fitness god, Tom Venuto recently blogged "The #1 Fat Loss Tip For 2011" where he talks of excess calories as "the pivotal point in the chain of causation" to achieve fat loss. I like it, and it is absolutely correct that you must achieve a calorie deficit if you expect to get anywhere, but I'm not so sure about calling it the pivotal point.

In my experience to date I have failed repeatedly to lose fat permanently by placing my primary focus on achieving a calorie deficit. I've repeatedly over-exercised and/or starved myself and I've always eventually crashed and burned and put back everything I lost.

Why? Because I've been fighting against my body's natural survival instincts and there's only so long willpower can hold out against a body that thinks it's in mortal danger of famine or other life-threatening conditions, so it makes me hungry (and hungry for high-calorie foods) and it makes me tired so that even the very thought of exercising causes pain.

If I take into account everything I've learned from people like Tom Venuto, Medhi, Jon Gabriel, Dr Joseph Mercola, John Hussman, Jean Antenello, Bill Phillips, David Gillespie, Dr John Tickell, Susie Burrell and many, many others, and put it all together I get a chain of causation that looks like this:

1. Eat the right foods.
Grains, sugars and heavily processed foods both stimulate appetite are are more likely to be stored as fat due to insulin responses. Try to eat natural foods at least 90% of the time. Sylvester Stallone says "Anything with a face, that's what I eat, with something green next to it" which is good advice for us protein types.
2. Do the right exercise in the right quantities.
Weights are best with some aerobics like walking or cycling etc on alternating days. No more than 30-60 minutes per day and first thing in the morning before eating is best.
3. Get the right amount of sleep.
Most adults need 7 - 9 hours per night. Any less and you're unlikely to lose weight.
4. Reduce chronic stress.
If you feel like you're not living the life you were meant to then you need to figure out a way to change it or fix it. If you've suffered a trauma or feel like you're at the point of breakdown you should seek professional help. Our bodies may be interpreting our stress as famine or cold and may be trying to get us to gain weight to survive it.
5. Drink lots of water
Water flushes out the bad stuff and puts something in our bellies so we're not as hungry at meal times. Start each meal or snack with a big glass of water. Also, if you've been eating the wrong foods for some time you may find that you've been misinterpreting thirst as hunger, which is a fairly common problem.
6. A calorie deficit is the natural result and fat loss occurs.
If I do all the things above my body should shed excess weight quite naturally and effortlessly until it reaches a "normal" size and then stay there.

You see, our bodies have evolved over millions of years for survival. Eat foods it's familiar with and it will tell us when we've had enough. Stop sending signals to it that we're in harm's way and it'll stop assuming there's some type of famine happening and trying to store fat to protect us from it. If we work with our bodies rather than against them we should get where we want to be quite easily and permanently without ever "dieting" again.

Where am I at now? I'm still not quite over my sugar addiction but I'm making some very promising progress, and the weather has been against any outdoor activities for quite some time so I haven't been able to get out on the bike much. Us Queenslanders now appear to have an "off season" (instead of snow we get the big wet much like our northern counterparts) so I'll focus on weight training during the summer months from hereon.

Working 2 jobs has made me reluctant to cram in some exercise in the morning, and the physical demands of the new job usually leave me too tired to do anything in the evenings. My only choice is to make the effort and get up a bit earlier so that's what I'll be doing starting this week, and I'll be reinstating the strategy I developed for myself back in September that was working very well for me (until I decided to add calorie counting into the mix, then I quickly became tired, hungry and over-trained).

All in all I'm back on track but I guess still not quite at 100% enthusiasm yet.

Back to basics

2010-12-23T13:06:00.004+10:00

I've been reading over my posts for the last few months trying to figure what went wrong that led me to throw the towel in a few weeks ago.

Back in September I came up with a strategy that really seemed to be working for me but then I decided I wasn't totally happy with my progress on the scales so I started calorie counting. A couple of weeks after that I crashed and burned and shortly after that I quit it all as a bad joke. However, there were a few other factors that I believe contributed to the burn-out beyond just not eating enough, and that was sleep (I'd let that slip to just 6-7 hours per night instead of 8-9) and, erm... alcohol... which as it turns out was the problem behind my wild weight fluctuations and my dissatisfaction with the scales.

Yes, it turns out that alcohol is the culprit behind the fluid retention I was complaining about back in November. Mind you, this effect happens after just one beer so don't get the idea that I'm a big drinker, but on the other hand I had been having one or two ales on pretty much a daily basis recently. (It just tastes so good after a tough day in high humidity lugging heavy chunks of steel about in a big tin shed).

Sitting in one place for too long seems to cause some odema as well so I've been trying to get into the habit of getting away from the PC and walking about for a few minutes every half hour or so.

Anyway, I thought I'd revisit the strategy I came up with back in September and combine it with the tips in this article on Bodybuilding.com. Which means:

Get my sleep sorted out
Cut out sugar and salty or junk snacks
No more alcohol
Eat healthy foods but don't restrict portions. Let my appetite decide how much I need. (Which means stop when I no longer feel hungry not eat until I explode).
Watch the time I spend in front of the computer
Back to a 2 day weight split, 4 days per week. Mornings are probably easier than evenings for me. (My new job is quite physically intense so it's very hard to hit the gym at the end of most days).
Cycle to and from my new job (about 20 mins each way) whenever possible
Do some more serious bike rides on Wednesdays and weekends.

But first I'm going to enjoy the festive season. Y'all should do the same. :)

Steampunk

2010-11-22T16:16:00.006+10:00

My gorgeous wife recently introduced me to the steampunk artistic style knowing I would find it instantly appealing. I have a passion for old school mechanical things over electronics and an appreciation for workmanship and timeless styles over modern "throwaway" stuff. Steampunk blends fantasy with reality and shows what might have been if electronics and plastic had never been invented. Of course, it also goes a bit further than that -

Here's the thing...

2010-11-18T14:02:00.004+10:00

When it comes to weight loss the cards are stacked against us, and the more we have to lose, the greater our chances of failure.

Portion control/calorie counting? Good luck with that. If you deliberately under-eat, your body will sense a "famine" very quickly and trigger increased levels of hunger, cravings for high calorie foods and it will try to slow down your activity levels. Sure, calorie counting works but it's fueled totally by willpower and there's only so long willpower will stand up against the body's natural survival instincts. Any intelligent person in our affluent society is always going to be aware that there's food around anytime we want it and when our bodies are screaming for it there's only so long we'll be able to resist and then the weight comes back on faster than it was lost.

Eating the same amount spread out over more frequent meals? - Rubbish. Makes no difference whatsoever.

Exercising on an empty stomach? Do it if you want to but don't expect any difference on the scales.

Sugar free/fat free/low carb/high carb? Take your pick. It makes no difference.

Meal replacement shakes/supplements/whey powder? Good if you have too much money and need to get rid of some.

Steroids/HGH/stimulants? Yes, these work but they're very expensive, may not be safe in the long term so eventually you have to go off them so you're back to square one anyway.

Exercise more? The numbers are against us. eg There's roughly 100 calories in a Tim Tam, which is enough fuel to power 30 mins of walking so obviously not eating the Tim Tam is a smarter (and lazier) move than 30 mins of exercise. The body is very efficient with calories.
The bigger you are the more energy you'll burn in a given activity but that actually works against us too because our muscles may take several days to recover from a workout because of all that extra weight we have to move around and if we don't take a day or 3 off between each workout we tend to burn out within a few weeks. In other words it's pretty much impossible to keep up a great enough level of activity for long enough to get down to a size where large amounts of exercise can be sustained on a regular basis. In other words you need to be skinny before you can get skinny...

So, what am I left with?

I've concluded that the only solution is to find a way to "untrigger" my body's perceived need to be fat. I have no idea how to achieve that right now but I think it's all about stress levels, sleep, hydration, nutrition and the amount of lean body mass (muscle) on my bones. If I get it right my hunger levels should gradually decrease and my energy levels should go up so in due course it should be easier for me to lose weight than it is for me to gain it. (Which is the exact opposite of where I am now).

I think for now I need to back my exercise off to just 1 or 2 muscle building sessions in the gym per week and enjoy mountain biking as a sport or activity of choice rather than viewing rides as exercise sessions. That way I can enjoy myself and stop and appreciate the moment if I want to rather than trying to hammer constantly. I'll also try to increase my level of incidental movement by stepping away from the PC more often and spending more time with my kids outdoors, which should also help with the stress levels as well.

I've also found a part time job with a mate involving lots of heavy lifting which will not only help me physically but should also help alleviate some of the financial pressures on me that haven't been getting any better over the last few years of GFC and running a small business.

I also need to get real with my expectations. I have to accept that I'm not 20 any more. I'm a middle-aged Dad and if I look around the school yard at all of the other Mums and Dads collecting their sprogs of an afternoon they're all pretty much the same shape I am.

I seriously doubt I'll ever be skinny or even remotely "ripped" but I should be able to get a bit healthier. In any case, there's isn't a diet or exercise technique I haven't tried over the last 5 years and I'm still pretty much where I started so it's time for me to accept that my current shape might even be the best I can ever hope for and move on now.

Life has to go on.

Still Burned Out

2010-11-16T12:19:00.004+10:00

For the last couple of weeks I've been experiencing extreme lethargy. My performances in the gym and on the bike have been increasingly lackluster and I've started skipping workouts and have even pulled out of several bike rides. Standing up for any length of time is even an effort and my slow, slow weight loss progress has pretty much stopped.

At first I thought it was my body fighting against me losing weight and in the light of only having lost around 5kgs with at least another 20-30 in front of me I was starting to think I should just give this all up as a bad joke, but then I realised that the extreme hunger that usually accompanies lethargy under these conditions wasn't really there. While I have let myself off the diet leash a bit lately in an effort to get my energy levels back, it hasn't really helped and I haven't been experiencing abnormal levels of hunger anyway. So the extra calories have been the cause of the lack of weight loss progress rather than any decrease in exercise.

So what am I doing wrong?

The only thing I can imagine is that I'm over-trained and while I definitely have the symptoms (except for a couple like "excessive loss of body fat" [d'oh!] and "absence of menstruation"), it does come as a surprise because I thought my exercise program was pretty much spot on for me and I was getting enough recovery time.

I guess all I can do now is take a week or 2 off and then back off my weight training to 1 or 2 bigger sessions a week instead of 4 smaller ones, swapping the extra sessions for low impact walking or casual biking instead. This makes sense when I think back over my life too. The 3 or 4 times in my life when I have reached peak fitness have come about from eating right and performing just 1 or 2 heavy exercise sessions per week with little else.

Putting exercise second to diet while losing weight is also probably the best way to go anyway so I'll move back off the grains & sugars and step away from the grog for a while too. I'm all but convinced now that the wild fluid level fluctuations I reported a couple of weeks ago are either the alcohol and/or the Pepsi Max interacting with the diuretics in my BP meds in a bad way.

Rich Dude Gets Off Hit & Run Felony Charge

2010-11-10T17:54:00.001+10:00

From Treehugger.

The rich are different from you and me; they get to hit and run, almost killing a cyclist, but get off without serious charges because it is hard to be money manager for Smith Barney if you have a record. District Attorney Mark Hurlbert is not charging Martin Joel Erzinger with a felony, because "Felony convictions have some pretty serious job implications for someone in Mr. Erzinger's profession," which is managing billions for rich people.

Dr. Steven Milo, the victim, is not impressed.

However, before we get too outraged there may be method to this particular DA's madness.

From BikeSnob today:

The DA has dropped felony charges against Erzinger because such a charge would "have some pretty serious job implications" for him and "justice in this case includes restitution and the ability to pay it." (In other words, money is apparently justice, and the DA claims he wants Erzinger to be able to keep his job so he can pay Milo as much "justice" as possible.)

Calories In vs. Calories Out

2010-11-10T12:26:00.004+10:00

I'm slowly coming around to a complete backflip to my stance against calorie counting. The reason I've debunked it in the past is because I've tried it so many times and failed every time but I think the reason for my failures was because I was eating the wrong foods.

While Medhi from Stronglifts gives insulin resistance a bit of a ribbing in his latest blog post, there's little doubt in my mind that it has been a major factor for me and I would have no hope of achieving a calorie deficit without taking it into consideration (with the type of foods I eat). However, that doesn't mean I have to rigidly avoid all of the foods I like to eat all of the time. I just have to factor them in. Mark Haub's "Twinkie Diet" proves that.

Ironbark Gully

2010-11-06T14:40:00.007+10:00

I think I've finally got the handling difficulties I've been having with my geared mountain bike under control.

Long story short: I replaced the crappy 80mm fork with a better 100mm unit donated by a friend and promptly began running it at the recommended PSI for the 80mm setting which is about 20 psi higher than it should have been. (I'll wear my specs next time I try to read the chart). Consequently it changed the geometry of the bike for the worse, giving it a tendency to understeer alarmingly when pushed in tight single track and it was a bugger to keep the front down on the steeper climbs. Let some air out for a bit more sag and it's a different bike. The handling is now much more predictable.

So I thought I'd take advantage of some awesome weather today for a scoot around Ironbark Gully to test it out.

Ironbark Gully has some great single track, lots of rolling hills, a couple of big climbs and big descents with awesome waterbars, and a lovely rail trail.

The Lanita rail trail:

And then my fun ended (naturally at the furthest possible distance I could be from home) and I had to call the Mrs to come get me. :(

Progress

2010-11-02T12:22:00.004+10:00

Well, I'm making progress. Sometimes fast, sometimes slow but progress nonetheless. I find I tend to lose up to 1kg a day from Mon-Thurs but then gain it back at much the same rate over the weekend. I'm not sure why either of these rates are happening though because the science isn't adding up. There's roughly 7000 calories in a kilogram so I have to have a 7000 calorie deficit to lose a kg, or a 7000 calorie surplus to gain a kg, but my calorie counting isn't showing deficits or surpluses anywhere near that high on any given day. At the very maximum I'll be up or down 1000 calories. (My target is 2000 calories per day for weight loss).

Which means these large gains and losses have to be fluid related more than anything else and there are other indications that is indeed the case. The last couple of Mondays for example are when I'm at my heaviest for the week and I've felt definite signs of odema in my feet. (Nowhere near as bad as when I was up around 150kgs but noticeable just the same). This sensation dissipates over the next few days up to Thursday when I'm at my lightest weight for the week.

So what am I doing over the weekends to cause this fluid retention?

I'm not quite sure to tell the truth but I have a theory: The BP meds I'm currently on have a diuretic built-in which is supposed to get rid of fluid. I think my body is trying to compensate that effect by trying to retain fluid which is also making me sensitive to the effects of other diuretics like caffeine and also sensitive to the effects of salt. On the weekends I do quite often treat myself to a bag of chips one night and a half dozen or so Pepsi Maxes with a shot of Bourbon on a Friday and Saturday night. Caffeine and salt...

One other thing I do on weekends is I go for a couple of longer than usual bike rides which means more sweat (fluid loss) than usual, which is causing my body to try to compensate by retaining more fluid.

OK, so I need to drink more clean, fresh water (perhaps a lot more) and watch the caffeine and salty snacks.

On another note, I've noticed 3 basic levels of hunger:

Mild - "Yeah, I could eat".
Normal - "Oh boy, lunch time!"
Extreme - "EAT SOMETHING, ANYTHING, RIGHT NOW OR YOU WILL FUCKING DIE!!!"

And 3 basic energy levels when exercising:

Energised - "This feels awesome. I think I can go harder."
Fatigued - "I'm ok if I stay aerobic but if I dig a bit deeper there's nothing there."
Burned out - "I've got nothing. Everything hurts. I need to lie down."

Since mid last week I've been hanging around level 3 for both aspects. This has me seriously worried because that's what has happened to me in the past whenever I hit my 120kg nemesis so I've lost a little of my confidence. I mean, is this how it's supposed to feel and I should persevere with it as best I can or am I doing something wrong? On the other hand I'm out of options here anyway so what am I worried about?

I tell you what though, anyone who says weight loss is easy can suck my balls.

How to put on lots of weight really, really fast

2010-10-11T12:04:00.004+10:00

Step 1. Develop a dental anxiety and make an appointment at least a week away so you spend a whole week pulsing with adrenalin and not sleeping.
Step 2. Get stuck in the wettest month in years and spend your days staring out the windows wishing you could ride your bike.
Step 3. Spend a weekend doing the rounds of the relatives eating junk food and takeaways.

The last fortnight I've watched my weight go up at my official weigh-ins on Monday mornings but steadily dropping during the rest of the week. If my weigh-ins were Thursday mornings I'd be showing a steady weight loss but I seem to be blowing it over the weekends. Also, with the weather we've been having lately I'm more likely to miss a bike ride than get one, and being stuck indoors usually means I'm slacker with watching what I eat.

So I need to make some changes. I need to learn to take food with me when I can't be home to eat properly and I need to not excuse myself to eat food that I know I react badly to. ie Sugar, bread, pasta, rice, potatoes, milk, flour etc.
I've set up the stationary bike again now and will throw a few ~~HIIT~~* and solid state cardio sessions on that if the weather blocks me from going outside. Yes, it's boring but I need to just deal with it and do it if I'm going to get my weight down.

* Scratch the HIIT. Checking over my notes I've found that too much of that will quickly burn me out and lead to excessive hunger. So I'll keep the HIIT sessions to 1 or 2 per week and instead add 30 -45 mins of moderate cycling to my daily schedule to help keep the calorie count down.

Other than that I'm still very positive about my current strategy and know it will take me to my goals (as long as I'm consistant with it).

BSAC 3/10/10

2010-10-03T18:00:00.006+10:00

A swell but soggy ride today.

This lot were waiting at my house.

Which grew to this lot at the start.

And this bloke was a legend and made the rest of us look like pussies.

On the road again.

2010-09-29T15:56:00.003+10:00

We had a heap of rain overnight so I decided I'd dust off the old SS roadie for a bash on the bitumen rather than risk ploughing through mud out in the bush for my scheduled Wednesday morning interval ride. I haven't been road riding for ages because I started worrying that the risk might outweigh any benefits but I think I was wrong.

This morning it quickly became apparent that:

I wasn't concerned at all by the traffic around me, even through a section of road works.
It was a lot different and a lot harder than I remembered so it obviously utilises different muscles and energy systems than mountain biking does.
I can get a better cardio workout on the tar than I can on the much hillier offroad trails
It's an awesome amount of fun and quite different to mountain biking.

I reckon it might have to become my regular Wednesday morning ride. :)

My calorie counting is already providing some interesting data too. For example, on Monday I undershot my CalorieKing recommended target of 2000 calories per day by some 900 calories after I decided to do a nice long ride at night. By Tuesday afternoon I was experiencing extreme hunger and overshot my daily target by almost 1100 calories.

Lessons learned:
1. I probably don't need the extra cardio or I'll need to eat a bit more to allow for it.
2. I need to be careful to keep my daily caloric deficit under 500 calories a day or thereabouts.
Failure to keep to these points will lead to extreme hunger and over-compensation.

Counting Calories

2010-09-25T12:47:00.003+10:00

I've found a minor hole in my current weight loss strategy that needs addressing. This last week my exercise has been limited due to poor health and poor weather, and the passing of a friend and other stress and general slackness has led me a bit off the good diet path. Poor excuses I guess, especially when I know how crap I feel when I eat the wrong foods.

I'm still making great progress with my new strategy. I really seem to have hit the mark at last with a formula that really works for me both physically and mentally. I'm seeing great gains in the gym and the way my clothes feel on me but I think I need to do more planning when it comes to my meals. I haven't been exploring new tastes and learning more about cooking as I promised so I'm finding it all too easy to eat the wrong things out of boredom or whatever and I often find myself just eating too damn much simply because I haven't planned properly.

I know that calorie counting diets (ie forced under-eating) don't work, at least not for very long. It is however true that there has to be a calorie deficit for weight loss to occur. This article from Stronglifts points out that most people who struggle to lose weight are usually kidding themselves about how much they eat and/or burn (usually subconsciously) and calorie counting is a great way to find out if that's happening or not. It's also a useful way to find out if you're not eating enough and therefore causing your body to go into famine mode or burn out.

Calorie counting is a great way to measure what's actually going on and to record and plan meals and spot problem areas.

So in the spirit of being more scientific about my dietary efforts and to keep the all important food diary I'm kicking off my free CalorieKing account again. This one's better than FitDay for us Aussies because it has local foods and measurements. I'll also be using the weekly check-ins to chart my progress rather than a spreadsheet on my computer.

A small change but hopefully one that will make all the difference.

The Whats and Whys of what I'm doing

2010-09-20T16:25:00.005+10:00

Great success so far and it's almost effortless so I feel I've finally struck the perfect formula for me.

In the first week I dropped almost 3kgs. As fate would have it I was stuck down with a vicious chesty virus almost as soon as I started the new plan which bit particularly hard in my second week so my workouts weren't as intense and I ate a few too many comfort foods these last few days... So this week, no weight loss but I've lost a further 2 cms from my girth so I've gained muscle and lost fat. That'll do too, and reinforces to me that I can easily lose fat and/or gain muscle just with a bit of calorie manipulation with this plan.

Also, my weights are going up in the gym, I'm feeling stronger on the bike and my pants are looser so my physical makeup is definitely changing.

So I thought I'd go over the basic principles of my strategy and add some explanations.

1. Eat right for your nutritional type.

Us westerners are split fairly evenly amongst 3 groups - Protein types, Carb types and a mixture of both. Eat for the wrong type and you'll feel lousy and your diet may even work against you. This is why some people soar on Atkins and others feel lousy, while other people don't do well at all on traditional high carb diets. (Like me. I'm a protein type).

2. I start my mornings with 30 mins of hard exercise on an empty stomach. On Mon, Tue, Thurs & Fri mornings I do weights. On Wednesday mornings 30 mins of hard riding or intervals (HIIT) on the bike.

Working out first thing means nothing else is going to get in my way so I'm less likely to skip a workout
Doing it an an empty stomach should trigger my body to release some fat stores rather than burning blood sugar (but if you're too hungry when you wake up it's better to eat first rather than hurl).
Intense activity and interval training has been proven to release more growth hormone, even in old farts like me.

3. I have a smoothie for breakfast within 30 mins of my workout with 2 raw eggs, 1/2 banana, 1 scoop of protein powder, 2 tablespoons of natural yoghurt and water/ice.

Research has shown protein absorption rates are greatest straight after a workout so my body can take it in and do something useful with it for a change rather than make fat.
I get lots of vitamin A from the eggs and a bit of culture from the natural yoghurt.
Smoothies and thick soups make you feel more full for longer than the same calories in a solid food meal with a separate drink.

4. My other meals are meat or eggs with fibrous or salad veges. No grains, starchy veges, sugars, rice or pasta.

Sugars and grains are addictive, make you feel hungry when you're not and cause you to eat more than you normally would, and they cause the liver to produce more cholesterol. They also spike insulin levels, and insulin stores fat. Anything you eat while your insulin levels are high has a higher chance of being stored as fat rather than being used or passed through the system.

5. Eat when hungry. Eat until satisfied. No more. No less.

Undereating is worse than overeating when it comes to losing weight. If you don't eat enough, the body senses famine and will slow everything down to try to retain or gain as much weight as possible. People who say weight loss is about calories in and calories out are over-simplifying. Attacking the problem from that angle never works. Sure, that will be the effect once everything is in balance but if you try to make it the cause then you're fighting your body's natural processes and you will usually fail. When it comes to survival the body will win every time.

6. My gym workouts are a 2 day push/pull split. I do 2 exercises per body part with 1 warmup set of 10-12 reps at about half the weight I'm planning to do in the second set, and then one heavy set to fail in the 8-10 rep range. I focus on compound exercises using free weights where possible as these have the greatest core benefits. I also try to add an extra 2.5 kgs to the bar every workout. If I don't achieve at least 6 reps I'll drop it back to the previous weight but so far I haven't needed to do that.
Here's my current workouts:

Day 1

Squats

Leg Extensions

Bench Press

Incline Bench Press

Shoulder Press

Lat Raises

Tricep Pulldowns

Tricep Extensions

Day 2

Deadlifts

Leg Curls

Cable Rows

Lat Pulldowns

Preacher curls

Hammer curls

Crunches

Calf Raises

That's 16 sets per workout if you count the warmup sets, which is about 30 mins of work at a reasonable pace if I don't rest too much between sets.

Only one set? Yep! Research has shown that there's no real gain in extra sets. One set to failure does the trick and it really does seem to be working for me (it took a bit to get past my scepticism too).
The other advantage in low volume training is it's not boring so I'm more enthusiastic about hitting the gym, which means I'm less likely to skip a workout. Even with the flu these last 2 weeks I haven't missed a workout so it must work.

7. A big glass of water before every meal

As the body breaks down fat, toxins are released and water helps flush the system
It makes me feel full so I eat less
The thermic effect. The body has to heat the water (or reheat organs cooled by the water). Heating takes energy which means more calories burned.

8. Get 8-9 hours sleep per night.

If you don't sleep well or don't get enough sleep you won't lose weight.

9. I get on the mountain bike and hit the trails for some moderate cardio for 1-2 hours on Saturday and Sunday and usually on at least one week night.

This burns off any extra energy I have as well as being just awesome fun that gets me away from the worries for a while. De-stressing may possibly be the most important factor in a weight loss journey but don't underestimate the value of a cardio workout either. Getting the heart & lungs pumping is great for weight loss and plenty of people have lost large amounts of weight with little else. Just don't overdo it or you may trigger a famine response which means chronic fatigue and insatiable hunger for several days afterward. I aim to work at around 60% of my maximum heart rate for these and I focus on my breathing rather than speed and power. I usually come home slightly tired but mostly energised.

10. Make eating an adventure. Experiment with recipes and enjoy the experience of eating rather than just using it as a means to fill your belly or to satisfy needs other than hunger.

Food is not the enemy. Eating is a pleasure to be savored. The principles of French Women Don't Get Fat are well worth a read.
Become a food connoisseur and learn to turn your nose up at junk food.
Take time to prepare and eat meals. Make each meal an event.

Great Scott, It's Working!

2010-09-08T15:59:00.003+10:00

My new strategy appears to be paying off.

I've come to recognise the following symptoms appear when my insulin levels are high:

A prickly, tingling sensation on my face & scalp
Excessive hunger at nights even when I have a full stomach
Rapid weight gain that seems to go beyond the calories I'm taking in
Bloating
Trouble getting to sleep
Restless sleep
A mild but constant panic attack
Depression
High Blood pressure
Difficulty concentrating.

These symptoms have either disappeared or diminished substantially over the last 3 days. The secret really is to get rid of the sugars and grains and exercise the right way. ie not excessively.

Sure, sometimes it's tough. I still am getting somewhat hungry at night but it's nowhere near the levels I usually have to deal with. I can resist these urges now, whereas before it would have been easier to resist the urge to breath! I'm also to my surprise no longer feeling particularly tempted by biscuits, cakes & junk food. They can be put in front of me and I'm kind of indifferent to them (unless I actually am hungry). Perhaps deep down I now understand that the penalty I'll pay will be far worse than any pleasure I might gain from eating them...

I know the real test will come as the weeks and months start to drag by and then when I reach a healthier weight, but knowing what happens if I allow my insulin levels to go up I feel confident I can stay on the straight & narrow now. However, I'm also confident that this will get easier as time goes by as my insulin levels stay low and the weight starts dropping as my body's processes start to normalise. That is quite exciting.

A new strategy

2010-09-06T12:08:00.003+10:00

Lately I feel like every cell in my body is poised & primed for weight gain and I'm probably not far wrong. I think the reason milk makes me pack it on is whenever I have high insulin levels, and in my current state it doesn't take much to get my insulin levels up. A bit of bread or whatever could be enough to cause a spike so that everything I eat for several hours afterward has a high chance of being stored as fat.

Time to get serious, especially with the foods I eat and I have a new written strategy that I'm quite exited about.

Head wise I have an urgency to "fix this problem today"! No more "diet starts tomorrow" attitudes and no more shortcuts. A lot of people wish they could go back in time after they've had heart attacks or whatever to change themselves so I'm imagining a very sick me in a couple of years time being able to go back in time to talk to my present self to tell me to get my shit together. I'm drawing inspiration from people like Sally Symonds. If she can lose 50kgs, I can surely lose 30 or so.

I'm going to be recording my weight on a regular basis and I'm planning and tracking my diet & exercise with written records.

Diet wise I'm omitting the sugars, grains and starchy carbs. No exceptions! If I let my insulin levels spike I'll be ruining all the effort I've gone too. "Nothing tastes as good as being thin feels". Most meals will be a combination of protein and fibrous vegetables. I'm going to explore new flavours and cooking techniques and make each meal an event to be savoured per the "French Women Don't Get Fat" principles.

Exercise: I'm switching to a resistance training formula & principles from http://www.exrx.net/. Basically I'll be working a 2 day push/pull split, 4 days per week in the morning on an empty stomach. Two exercises per body part & one warmup set + one all out set per exercise. The workouts should only take around 30 mins. Research has shown that there's no real gain in extra sets compared to doing just the one set to failure for people at my level of fitness. This also should relieve some of the boredom I've been feeling in the gym lately and keep my workouts moving at a decent pace without needing excessive rest periods.

Once per week on Wednesday morning I'll do a 30 min HIIT session on the road bike or stationery bike, and 2-3 times per week I'll do long aerobic rides on the MTB at 50-70% of max heart rate.

This exercise formula should be a bit easier on my body so as not to cause excessive hunger but without sacrificing the benefits.

Lots of new principles and ideas here but mostly I think I have the right level of commitment now to really start making a difference and getting the body I really want once and for all.

Diet Fail

2010-09-01T16:13:00.003+10:00

Well, I can't say that I'm making any real progress on the weight loss front lately. Everything seems to have stagnated and I'm having the devil's own time making any progress at all both physically and mentally.

The symptoms of insulin resistance are biting me much harder than usual at the moment. Apparently the solution is to "control your weight" but the symptoms are exactly the reason I can't manage to do that. D'oh!

Sounds like I'm screwed! I'm not quitting though. There's got to be a way...

One mistake I do make consistently is I just plain over-do things. I'll over-exercise and/or under-eat and then inevitably burn out, over and over again.

I think it's time I took things a bit easier on my body and focused more on long duration aerobic exercise and forget about the HIIT stuff, at least for a while. Cycling in the 60-70% zone for an hour or so every day should be heaps. I'd like to do it first thing in the morning but because I'm suffering from insomnia lately (another symptom of insulin resistance) I need that extra sleep-in time, plus I figure since I get abnormally hungry at night after dinner (insulin again) if I exercise at night it'll give me a chance to burn off some blood sugar and get my insulin down and therefore probably sleep better.

But if nothing else at least I'll be away from the fridge...

Weight training wise I've been hating the gym lately. I force myself to go but I can't get into it with any enthusiasm for some reason. (Probably again related to insulin resistance). A part of me would like to forget about it for a while but I'm also concerned about maintaining as much lean tissue as possible to keep my metabolism up so I guess I need to find a way to get some in there...

I'm also considering a food combining diet. ie Don't combine proteins and starchy carbs in one meal. One interesting aspect is that everything in the starch food group (see the table about half way down the page here) I shouldn't be eating anyway according to Dr Mercola, so maybe if I do follow this type of eating and just eliminate starches I'll be laughing. ;)

The 4 Causes of Obesity

2010-08-19T12:06:00.006+10:00

Reading an article at mercola.com yesterday, down in Dr Mercola's comments towards the end there's a section entitled "Losing Weight by Addressing Obesity at its Source" which describes the "four tenets of long-term optimal health and weight".

This nicely summed up all of the things I've slowly come to understand these past few years of attempting to lose weight. Today, rather than being bummed about my repeated failures I now recognise that each failure has just been a step closer to my eventual success and understanding these key points is a great step forward.

The four causes of obesity (in no particular order) are:

Diet. Eat natural foods. Avoid anything with gluten, sugar/fructose, saturated fats, trans fats, MSG and watch the dairy.
Exercise. The human body was designed to move. Do exercises that both strengthen skeletal muscles (resistance training) and heart & lungs (cardio like walking, running, cycling and swimming)
Sleep. If you consistently get less than 7 hours a night or suffer interrupted sleep (sleep apnea) you have a problem that needs addressing.
Stress. Treat or learn to manage chronic stress, fear, anxiety and depression.

Each of these is equally as important as any other. A deficiency in any one will affect the others.
For example, a poor diet or lack or exercise will contribute to depression and weight gain. Untreated stress will affect sleep and trigger comfort eating as well as trick the body's "animal brain" into perceiving threat (famine) and slow down metabolism to cause weight gain. Poor sleep will increase appetite, heighten stress levels and make you less enthusiastic about exercise and so on.

The opposite also applies: Eat right and you sleep better. Exercise and you reduce stress and increase metabolism. Sleep well and you also reduce stress. Manage stress and everything works better.

These past few years I've tried all manner of diets and even when not officially "dieting" I've still been eating carefully. I've exercised consistently up to as much as 4 hours a day and yet I've never been able to get much beyond a certain point, which is still a good 20-30 kgs from where I want to be. This year my weight has even gone up quite a bit despite my best efforts and I've never completely understood why. Now I do. I've never learned to manage my stress and this year in particular has been a stressful one. No other factor has changed significantly to warrant a weight gain.

Two Steps Back

2010-08-17T10:49:00.003+10:00

Last week I ate too much bread and the weather and my mood turned fowl so I didn't get a lot of cycling in. It came as no surprise then to find my weight back up to where it was a fortnight ago. I knew it before I even stepped onto the scales.

On a positive note I have progressed in the gym though and I feel great on the bike, and I'm not down too much about the weight gain because I know how it happened. I can't now blame my body for being diet-resistant or whatever and fall into a hopeless mindset.

Diet wise I've learned my lesson and I'm back to low carbs but I might have to back the cycling off to shorter, more intense rides or skip a few in order to deal with the washed out, tired as hell feeling I get with this kind of eating. There's just no spare energy at all.

One new approach that I haven't tried before is to move my problems with stress and anxiety up to the top of the list of things I need to address. Everything seems to hinge off this so it makes more and more sense the more I think about it. If I feel stressed, I focus on negative thoughts, I don't sleep well, I turn to food for a quick fix and I'm far more likely to skip workouts, or at least not put the effort into them.

I'll start out with listening to some motivational speaking and I might even consider a therapeutic hypnotist. I basically need to focus on the things I can do something about (like eating right and exercising) and let the stuff I can't change look after itself.

Here's some great stuff from Anthony Robbins:

If you do what you've always done, you'll get what you've always gotten.

You are now at a crossroads. This is your opportunity to make the most important decision you will ever make. Forget your past. Who are you now? Who have you decided you really are now? Don't think about who you have been. Who are you now? Who have you decided to become? Make this decision consciously. Make it carefully. Make it powerfully.

The secret of success is learning how to use pain and pleasure instead of having pain and pleasure use you. If you do that, you're in control of your life. If you don't, life controls you.

Nothing tastes as good as being thin feels.

More here.

Is it better to train in the morning or at nights?

2010-08-10T14:15:00.005+10:00

I'm not a morning person. It takes me an hour or two after waking before I'm fully alert and I'm at my best in the afternoons and evenings. Because of this I find I get my best workouts later in the day. However, Thursday nights are chaos in my house and I only have a 1 hour window straight after work to fit a workout in. So if I run late at the office I miss out. And it's almost impossible to get excited about hitting the gym on a Friday night so skipping the workout then is all too easy as well.

The alternative is to train in the mornings. One good thing about training in the mornings is there's nothing else in my schedule to distract me so I'm less likely to skip a workout. The main disadvantage is that I just can't summon the enthusiasm to dig deep while I'm still half asleep so my morning workouts often lack intensity.

There is a solution though: I can do both.

Scoring between 1 - 10 for my enthusiasm to hit the gym (with 10 being my most enthusiastic) I find my week will usually pan out something like this:

Mon AM - 2
Mon PM - 9

Tue AM - 3
Tue PM - 8

Wed AM - 4
Wed PM - 6

Thur AM - 5
Thur PM - 5

Fri AM - 6
Fri PM - 0

So I schedule my weight routines for Mon & Tue nights, and Thurs & Fri mornings. Problem solved. :)

I'm happy to get on the bike any time day or night so no worries with my cardio.

I have found though with insulin resistance that getting in any sort of workout after a meal, even a half-arsed one, does wonders for my stress and anxiety levels so it's worth doing on that basis alone. With all else being equal, if I'm stressed I gain weight, if I'm not then I lose weight so the exercise still improves my fitness even if I don't get a direct benefit from it at that time.

Progress: Weight loss for the last 3 weeks has been steady but slow. I've been managing to knock off almost exactly .5 kg and 1cm off my girth every week which is good. However, if it continues at this rate it's going to take me a few months longer than Christmas to get into XXL territory which is a teeny bit disappointing but any progress is good progress.

New workout.

2010-08-02T13:23:00.003+10:00

I'm switching to a 2 day push/pull split routine starting today. In an effort to build some muscle I'll be attempting to work in the 8 -12 rep range with 2 exercises per body part, 3 sets per exercise, pyramiding the weight up as I go. If I can do 10 reps or better on the third set I'll add 2.5 kgs next time.

Exercises as follows -

Day 1 (Pushing)
Squats
Leg Extensions
Bench Press
Flyes
Shoulder Press
Lat Raises
Tricep Pulldowns
Tricep Extensions

Day 2 (Pulling)
Deadlifts
Leg Curls
Cable Rows
Lat Pulldowns
Preacher curls
Hammer curls
Crunches
Leg Raises
Calf Raises (superset with abs)

I'll fit this in after dinner on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday nights.

In 4 - 8 weeks time I'll change exercises or possibly switch to something like the routines mentioned at http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/6-fat-loss-rules-plus-hft-program.htm.

Cardio wise I'll pop a quick 30-40 minutes on the bike after breakfast each day. It'll usually be MTB for the peace and safety of the bush but once or twice each week I'll throw in some intervals on the stationary bike or maybe the road bike on my old "time trial" circuit.

Daily Goals: Complete my workouts with effort and intensity and stick to my diet.
Weekly Goal: Set a new personal best on the bike and in the gym at least once. Lose .5 - 1 kgs per week or 1cm off the girth.
Long Term Goal: XXL shirt by Christmas. (I can squeeze into one now but it's not a good look...)

The current plan

2010-07-27T14:19:00.003+10:00

I've learned a lot over the last few years. Unfortunately I'm not where I want to be yet but I feel that I'm closer than ever now. Each plan I've tried has left me with a few good ideas that I know will work and a new understanding of what causes me to fail.

I know that I respond well to hard & short bursts of exercise rather than long, solid state stuff like walking or casual cycling. I know that milk fattens me up quicker than any other food and it doesn't matter if it's low fat or standard. And I know that simple carbs like breads, cereals, cakes, lollies and potato chips spike my insulin levels and make me as hungry as a horse even when my belly feels full. I know that under-eating and/or over-exercising will cause me to eventually over-eat. I know that I'm prone to worry, self-doubt, stress, depression, anxiety and insomnia.

What I'm doing now is to eat lots of:
fish, beef, lamb, pork, poultry, eggs and above ground veges like cauliflower, broccoli, zucchini/squash, cabbage, spinach, salad greens, mushrooms, nuts, garlic and avocado.

Some:
cured meats (sausages, ham etc), cheese, root vegetables (potato, carrot etc), bread & pasta and fruit.

And avoid as much as possible:
milk, cream, sugar, white flour/gluten and anything containing trans fats or excessive salt.

Supplements:
A multi-vitamin, chromium, magnesium, a pro-biotic and fish oil.
The effects of the pro-biotic have been awesome but I sense no change from any of the others. I'll continue with them for a month or two though because they're supposed to be the way to go for high blood pressure, insulin resistance and other metabolic syndrome issues.

Exercise:
30-45 mins of weights or hard cycling half an hour after breakfast and evening meals and 1 or 2 longer rides per week.
Weights at nights works best for me and scheduling exercise after eating should hopefully help get my blood sugar down faster and assist with my insulin levels.

I have no idea what to do about stress yet. Everything I've checked out seems a bit wacky... but I'll start with some relaxing time before bed and to make sure I allow enough time for a good night's rest, and take time out during the day out of the office to get some sun and vitamin D. Hopefully spending time with family and paying attention to my diet will deal with the rest.

Last week I dropped about 4kgs by Thursday and then put 3 back on by weigh-in on Monday. I slipped up by under-eating a bit in the first part of the week which led to a bit of binging later on. Anxiety issues and going a bit overboard at the kid's fete on Saturday didn't help either but if I can continue with a steady .5 - 1 kg per week it's all good. :)

Blood pressure was getting a little alarming with the weight gain over the last few months but it's back down to the high side of normal again now so maybe those supplements are helping.

How to set the clock on an EF Fairmont

2010-07-19T15:29:00.005+10:00

Make sure the Clock is displayed. (If not, press Search or O/Speed as applicable until it is)

Hold the Search button down.

Without letting the Search button go, press the Reset button down and release it. The Hour will then start flashing.

Release the Search button.

Press the Reset button to change the number.

Hit the Search button to move the next sequence: Hour > Minute > Year > Month > Date > Finish.

More at http://www.fordmods.com/documents.php?d=32

Stand back. I may be an idiot.

2010-07-19T11:45:00.005+10:00

I've been depressed and disillusioned lately wondering why I'm putting on weight even though I'm getting plenty of exercise and not eating stupidly. I came to the conclusion that I'd crashed my metabolism yet again by over-doing things, and then in an attempt to weed sugar out of my diet I started drinking more milk in my teas and coffees, and milk as I know only too well makes me pack it on faster than any other food, even sugar.

Oddly I can find very little information about milk causing weight gain. I did find this study from 2005 which showed that milk caused weight gain in kids, even low fat milk, and even when they substituted milk for soft drinks (which flies in the face of fructose being the cause of the obesity epidemic). There's also plenty of advice out there for "hard gainers" (skinny people who have trouble gaining muscle and/or weight) to drink milk to get around it. So it seems milk can be an awesome way to gain weight and therefore should be avoided if you want to lose weight.

Now to me being an idiot. Reading my blog posts from last year, to my horror I've repeated the same sequences almost at the same times, come to the same conclusions and ended up at the same weight at the same time as last year with the same health problems.

Early in 2009 I crashed my metabolism by crash dieting, doing ridiculous amounts of cardio and lifting ultra-heavy. My solution then I decided was to do the opposite and eat more and exercise less with shorter but more intense workouts
Then in an effort to reduce sugar in my diet I found myself adding milk to my teas and coffees only to find that I was putting on weight even faster and then figuring out it was the milk causing it.
After freaking out about the milk weight gain I overcompensated and burned out again.
I decided morning training was better than the afternoon.
I finished up with weight, blood pressure and cholesterol all sky high just into the latter half of the year.

Which is exactly where I am now.

But now I'm not sure what to do. I've pretty much tried all of the diet and non-diet methods ever written and done all of the tweaking I can think of and all that happens is I just go up and down the same 10kgs time after time after time. And whether I'm gaining or losing at any given time seems to have little bearing on how hard I'm exercising or dieting at that time. I simply don't understand why I'm still fat.

I am confident though that my problems stem from insulin resistance and so called reactive foods. The worst foods for me appear to be milk and sugar so I need to eliminate them completely, or at least reduce them as radically as possible. Wheat products also, but to a lesser extent. My main foods need to be fresh meats and eggs, oats, and greens. I need to watch the starchy veges & grains and go easy on the fruit. I'll also supplement a pro-biotic to make sure my gut is functioning at its best, omega 3s for vascular function and magnesium and chromium for insulin function.

My exercise is fine. Mornings may have some advantages over afternoons in terms of less interruptions but I'm more mentally alert and able to exert myself a lot more in the evenings so I tend to get much better workouts then. So training in the mornings instead of the evenings means I'm missing out on my better quality workouts even if I am more consistent. The solution is to schedule myself to do something most mornings and most evenings and I'll decide what to do based on mood, weather, fatigue and recovery needed at the time.

I think I'll also try to find a good holistic Dr like Dr Mercola who will try to find out what's actually wrong with me and treat that rather than just treating the symptoms of whatever my underlying issue is. My current Dr wants to increase my blood pressure meds because my blood pressure is up, but it's only up because my weight is up. He's also threatening Beta blockers which slow the heart rate down but I already have a good heart rate so I know these will just make me feel like crap. I imagine once he finds out my cholesterol and blood sugar are high as well (due to my weight gain at the moment) he'll want me on drugs for those too, but I'm not confident that drugs will cure me or even extend my life by much and they may even compound the problem by making me feel terrible and unable to exercise as much.

Buying Chuck Taylors on eBay

2010-07-15T10:17:00.006+10:00

Back in March I bought 2 pairs of Chuck Taylor All Star Low Tops, size EUR45/US11 from a Chinese seller. They took about a week to arrive, fitted fine and I loved them despite their annoying habit of eating socks and that they were starting to get a bit shabby after just a few months use.

So, I thought it was time to order some High Tops to add to the collection so I got back on eBay and found a seller with them so cheap I thought it was too good to be true. It turns out it was. I received notification from eBay the day after that the sale that it had been canceled because the authenticity of the shoes had been called into question and they would get my money back.

Hmm...

So, a little more wary now I head back to eBay and search for a seller with lots of positive feedback, a more realistic price tag and with my size in stock. (For some reason most of the eBay Converse sellers only go up to EUR44, one size below what I need). I find one, confirm they do indeed stock my size and order 3 pairs. They arrive a week later and I discover that they're too small. The box says EUR45/ US 11 but they're clearly not.

I break out the tape measure and find that heel to toe they measure 295mm while my existing pairs measure 305mm. According the the chart at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoe_size#Adults they should measure 305mm over all so it seems I have been sent a EUR43/US10 size incorrectly marked as 45.

Comparing them beside my existing shoes the size difference is even more obvious.

Now, the seller claims that sizes are different in China and this is my fault. However, that is completely untrue. EUR45 is an international standard and the previous shoes of the same brand, model and size that I purchased from China were correct.
The seller did agree to give me a refund but the postage cost for me is almost as much as I paid for the shoes so that's not an option.
I attempted to go through the dispute process with Paypal but for some reason beyond my comprehension they sided with the seller.

Well, it looks like I'm back to New Balance runners bought through local shoe sellers. I can't complain about these really though. They fit perfectly, support the foot much better and last for years. They don't come in red or yellow or light blue etc but at least I won't be screwed over. Local retailers do have Converse All Stars but there's no way I can justify $90 for a pair of canvas shoes, especially that the superior quality New Balance runners only cost me $80.

Oh well, caveat emptor and all that.

I've managed to on-sell 2 pairs but I still have the red pair left if anyone wants them. Owes me $25 and let's say $10 for the courier if you'd like them sent to you. Buzz me at darren@ozcableguy.com if you're keen to grab them.

Update: Paul's Warehouse, a sports store chain that operates in our southern states but ships online purchases everywhere, have a "buy one get one free" special on shoes including Converse. The price for one pair is still advertised at the usual $90 that they seem to go for everywhere else in our fair land, but getting 2 for $90 is a lot more reasonable. Almost awesome in fact. Couple this with free shipping to me up in Brisbane and a quick delivery (2 biz days to process and pack, one day to get to me) and I'm pretty happy. The size is correct too!

I found out about Paul's Warehouse from a google search that lead me to a forum post made back in April '09 mentioning the "buy one get one free" special so it must be an ongoing thing. I reckon I'll be a regular customer. :)

Bella Knicks Review

2010-07-05T11:37:00.005+10:00

I recently grabbed a couple of pairs of Bella's Premium Black Knicks and a pair of their Premium Black Pants to help cope with the winter chill on the bike. After discovering even cheaper prices available on an eBay store I just couldn't resist the price at $39.95 for 2 pairs of knicks and the same price for one pair of longs (on clearance).

My first thoughts were that the longs were a perfect fit but the shorts felt a little big but on closer inspection the sizing is the same. It's just that the shorts tend to roll down easier without the aid of the drawstring in the longs. Nevertheless, the fit of the shorts just didn't feel right at first and I was always pulling them up while walking about. On the bike where it counts the most though they seemed to stay up ok.

The stitching and lycra quality seemed fine too.

However, after a couple of rides it became quickly apparent that the chamois was way too small (on both the longs and the shorts) and I ended up with a rash from the seam on both sides of my butt where the chamois ended but where my butt still touched the saddle.

Bottom line: Price is awesome and the construction is fair but the fit just isn't right for me. They'll still be fine to use on short training rides but I think I'll opt for something a bit up the price scale for the longer rides.

New Wheels

2010-07-01T14:03:00.019+10:00

My old faithful geared mountain bike (pictured under July '07 on the right when it was blue) has had pretty much everything replaced at least once, including the frame. Only the bars, stem, front derailleur and wheels remained. Most recently the spokes on the rear wheel had so many rounded off nipples it was impossible to get the wheel true any more and the freehub had become suspiciously silent which is usually a good indication it might be about to bite the dust. The bearings on the front wheel were also noticeably worn.

I tossed up whether to persevere with it all, patching and replacing stuff only as necessary until I had funds for a new bike to replace it or just grab a new wheel set. Obviously if I could get the right wheelset at the right price that would be the cheaper option but I had my doubts that would be possible. Wheels tough enough to cope with my weight and abuse usually don't come cheap... On the other hand, a new bike with wheels tough enough for me already fitted wasn't likely either.

Then one of my favourite bike shops had a clearance special on a DT Swiss E2200 wheelset for just $370 which is less than half their usual price. Bargain! These are a handmade wheel designed to be heavier duty than an XC wheel but not quite as heavy as a downhill wheel. Kind of in between for the best of both worlds, or just right as an XC wheelset for fat bastards.

And they're RED!

I must say with these wheels and the Tora 302 air fork with poploc kindly donated to the cause by good mate BigTurtle, I not only like the look of the bike now but it's actually not a bad ride. Perfect for Bbanger's Saturday arvo and Wednesday night bashes into the mega-hills of Ironbark where I really need a bike with gears.

As fate would have it my beloved yellow Velocity Blunts on my single speed failed on me at the same time. Cracks had started to appear around most of the spoke holes both front and rear and it was only a matter of time until catastrophic failure. :( The Velocity guys were good about it though and put the issue down to me being a big strong lad, the tough Alpine III spokes not flexing enough and a little too much spoke tension, and they upgraded me to a shiny new set of yellow Chuckers respoked with their spokes under warranty. These are a little narrower at 24mm compared to 28mm for the Blunts but the tyres fit fine. A slightly larger concern is the 32mm dish which means my existing 40mm valve stems only just poke through. 60mm stems are in order for the next set of tubes I buy methinks. In the meantime I'll make do with an adapter when I need to pump some air in.

Now it's a tough choice which bike to ride...

Conan the Barbarian: The Musical

2010-07-01T13:59:00.000+10:00

Progress Update

2010-06-28T12:37:00.005+10:00

I thought it was time to comment on my "no more diets" strategy.

Well, for starters it's downright depressing to be currently sitting on as much as 10kgs (I'm not using scales any more so I'm not exactly sure) over the weight I'd prefer to be using as a starting point and knowing it could take months before it starts to shift. The temptation is to starve myself and/or over-exercise to get things happening quickly but I know only too well from the previous few years of dieting that I will not win that way. Sure, I'd lose 5 or 10kgs quickly but that's all I'd lose before it would start slowly creeping up again until I burned-out, lost heart and succumbed to the terminal hunger.

After a few weeks of slowly introducing the "naturally thin" principles I did start to see some very positive changes though. Not on the scales or tape measure as such, but in greatly reduced night time cravings, and for the first time in as long as I can remember I was getting full! Yep, not hungry. Pushing the plate away before I finished it. And not because I was trying to eat less than I wanted either. My body was putting the brakes on and telling me I'd had enough. I couldn't physically bear the thought of eating any more.

Needless to say I was blown away.

After a few weeks of this I started wanting to tighten my belt up so it appeared I was starting to drop a few kilos too.

Then on a Wednesday night a couple of weeks ago we had pizza and for some reason I was HUNGRY. Now, I'd had pizza at a friend's house a week or two prior and found myself easily satisfied with 3 or 4 slices. This night that wasn't happening. Before I knew it I'd eaten a whole Eagle Boys double top supreme pizza and I still wanted more. The sensation was terrifying. I thought I was cured already!

I followed up the next morning with a big feed of pancakes as the bad old insatiable hunger trend continued. When I inevitably had to let my belt out again after a few days of this I lost all hope. I'd never felt gloomier. I was filled to the brim with self-loathing and I didn't know what to do. I analysed and pondered to try to figure out where I went wrong, or what the hell might be wrong with me to keep making this happen.

I couldn't put the blame on any particular mistake I might have made but I did realise I'd slipped a bit (well, perhaps quite a bit) on the insulin-resistant friendly foods, so I could tighten things up there. Milk also seems to bloat me and cause me put on weight extremely fast so I could back that off as well as the fattier cheeses, and I could also tighten up my sugar intake (again). Smallgoods are also fatty and salty so I'd try to keep to fresh meats instead. Obviously I'd pinpointed that pizza as the trigger for the relapse...

And after a couple of days of keeping the bulk of my diet to fresh meats, veges, fruit and eggs with minimal dairy, my appetite had returned to normal again and the bloated/beachball sensation was gone.

Ok, so maybe I can't eat whatever I want whenever I want, at least not in any great quantity.

The solution to avoid turning into a human hoover in future? Top up with healthy stuff prior to eating any poor quality fatty or sugary foods.

OK Go - This Too Shall Pass

2010-06-28T12:22:00.001+10:00

One of the coolest mousetrap sequences I've seen in a while.

Roadie Trials

2010-06-17T17:28:00.004+10:00

Validation

2010-06-09T14:14:00.003+10:00

Interesting to note Dr Mercola's article yesterday validates the same conclusions I came to in my last post regarding the way to achieve healthy weight loss.

More Metabolism-Boosting Weight Loss Essentials
Everyone’s metabolism is different, but you can speed it up or slow it down within a reasonably short amount of time by making the following commonsense changes to your diet and lifestyle:

Eat according to your nutritional type to ensure your body is getting the right fuel it needs
Avoid sugar and grains as they are the leading cause of insulin- and leptin-resistance, which affects your hunger levels, your weight, and your risk of any number of diseases
Listen to your hunger, and eat a healthy meal or snack when hunger calls
Implement a well-rounded exercise regimen that includes strength training to build muscle (for every pound of muscle that you gain, your body burns 50-70 calories more per day), as well as interval training, which has been demonstrated to significantly increase fat loss
Use healthy outlets for stress and negative emotions. Tools like the Emotional Freedom Technique/Meridian Tapping Technique (EFT/MTT) are your friend and ally when it comes to losing weight. For some, emotional eating or emotional traumas are more complex, and an experienced MTT practitioner may be able to help unravel some of these deeper emotional issues that are leading to overeating or junk food binges.

Meditation, prayer, journaling and even exercise can also provide positive outlets for stress.

Remember, the idea is not to deprive your body or starve yourself into a size 2. The goal is to establish a healthy relationship with food, one that will keep you satisfied, nourished and slim, all at the same time.

Read the whole article here.

He also posted an article yesterday citing research by Dr William Li regarding "angiogenesis". Angiogenesis is the process our bodies use to build blood vessels. Cancer and fat cells need and develop blood vessels to survive and grow, so anti-angiogenesis may be an effective means to prevent and treat these conditions. The good news is that many easy to get foods such as red grapes, strawberries, garlic and tomatoes can be as effective as the drug therapies. Check it out here.

No More Diets!

2010-06-05T16:47:00.005+10:00

If I've learned one thing from my many diet failures over the last 5 years (and most of my life prior to that) it's that diets don't work. It's commonly thought that the way to lose weight is to eat less and exercise more, but I now know only too well that is almost the exact opposite of what we actually need to do to succeed and regain our health. As David Gillespie points out in his recent blog post, "Perhaps this is why the best indicator that you will be heavier in five years is being on a diet now."

The human body has evolved to survive, and part of that survival process is to conserve resources when faced with a shortage. For example, it's well known that a dehydrated body will retain water and the cure is to drink more! Why then is it commonly thought that the way to lose weight is to eat less, even when it is well documented that more than 95% of dieters following this formula will fail and end up back at the same weight, or even heavier within 5 years?

Trying to eat less and exercise more have been the two biggest mistakes I've made over my life trying to lose weight. I've repeatedly starved myself and exercised up to 4 hours a day (sometimes more), until I could barely move and it always ends up the same. Sooner or later I end up burned out, terminally lethargic and maddeningly hungry until I regain everything I've lost (and quite often then some).

A feast always follows a famine.

It was also recently pointed out to me that one of the biggest factors affecting blood sugar levels is stress, and I'm a stress bunny... I worry about everything all of the time even though I know that it is completely pointless to do so.

So what do I know?

The body's natural appetite control mechanism must function correctly in order to maintain a normal weight. It will tell us when we've eaten enough or when we need to eat more. Using mind over matter (dieting) fights this natural process and the body is forced to assume we are experiencing a famine and over-compensate by slowing metabolism and triggering binge eating.
Fructose/sucrose is one of the worst substances we can put into our bodies. It interferes with our natural appetite control hormones causing us to eat more than we normally would, and causing more of what we eat to be stored as fat rather than used as energy.
Eat more, but eat healthy. Let the mind decide what to eat but let the body decide how much. Don't restrict portion sizes. Eat until satisfied and then push the plate away.
Exercising too much is the same as not eating enough. Exercise should be about improving strength or stamina, not burning fat! 30-60 minutes a day (depending on intensity) is plenty. Any more has the potential to trigger a famine response.
Food should be enjoyed, not feared. Judging a food as "good" or "bad" should have nothing to do with how many calories it has or how much fat it has. (How much sugar it has should be watched though. Sugary foods definitely need to be kept to a minimum).
I'm obviously quite insulin resistant. To get around it and hopefully improve things as I go, I need to keep my carbs fairly low, and keep them mostly to the mornings. "Eat breakfast like a king and dinner like a pauper".
Reduce stress. (Working on this one)
Get more sleep. "One hour's sleep before midnight is worth two after".
Drink more water.

So, I may not see weight loss like on Biggest Loser. I'll be surprised if I see more than 1 or 2 kgs a month. But 5 years from now I will weigh less than I do now, I will be fitter and I won't be thinking about food all of the time like I do now or consciously trying hard to achieve it all.

If I had to choose, I'd take that kind of freedom over 6 pack abs any day. :)

Over did it

2010-04-27T12:48:00.004+10:00

The recovery woes continue even after skipping a bunch of rides and workouts lately.

On the plus side I've definitely gained a heap of strength and muscle but unfortunately it's also led to terminal lethargy and hunger and an increase in girth. Not quite enough to have to let the belt out a notch but enough for me to feel, and enough for my Mum to notice and comment on (aren't Mums wonderful...).

Another plus is I have a few more mistakes to learn from:

I've learned that doing heavy squats every other day doesn't work with lots of long distance cycling. I just burn out very quickly.
If I ride too hard for too long I'll over-compensate with food for several days afterward and my muscles will be too tired for a decent effort on the bike for up to a week.
Insulin spikes give a fake sense of hunger so I'll feel desperately hungry even with a full belly, but I can fool it with water or waiting half an hour or so. The trick is being able to differentiate between an insulin spike and genuine hunger. If I ignore genuine hunger I'll send my body into famine mode which means lethargy, ravenous hunger and maximum fat storage.

The solution as I see it:

Back to a morning 30-45 min sprint session on the bike. Keeping these sessions short and hard so I really only burn sugar rather than fat is ironically the key to me dropping fat. I burn off blood sugar while not quite triggering the famine response so I can keep my eating in check easier. Plus it lifts my mood for the whole day and keeps my metabolic rate fairly high. I believe it was also responsible for the greatest weight loss I've experienced over the last 4 years of attempts.
Drop most of the long distance bike rides (sorry Bbanger. No more Monday nights or Wednesday mornings for me for a while but I'll still do the odd Saturday, and the Wednesday night and Sunday arvo cruises are still goers).
Weights 3 times a week with an intentional 2.5 kg increase in weight for each set, each workout, with a 20% "reset" if a particular exercise becomes ridiculously difficult.
Eat whenever I'm hungry. Stop when I'm satisfied (but not exploding).
Manage stress better than I have been.
Get more sleep.
Drink 2 glasses of water 6 times per day (with every meal or snack)
Eat more protein and fats. Manage my carbs for when I need them.
Learn to recognise the difference between an insulin generated craving/hunger pang and genuine hunger.

There's a sweet spot somewhere where I'll be doing just enough exercise to burn off extra energy without triggering a famine response or excess hunger which should mean permanent (non yo-yo) fat loss and hopefully better insulin responses in due course.

Hopefully this time I've got it right.

Recovery Woes

2010-04-18T12:58:00.004+10:00

I'm still mightily impressed with the Stronglifts program, and I'm making great progress. I've definitely seen my strength increase and I'm managing to drag my arse up some climbs on my mountain bike now that have previously had me whipped. However, every 2 or 3 weeks I'm running out of steam and I'm forced to skip sets on my workout (or even skip the whole workout) and I slow down on the bike because I'm just too damn worn out.

The reason I'm running down is because I have a conflict between all the bicycling I do and the heavy squats in Stronglifts. I just can't recover fast enough. So I either need to modify the weights routine or drop the cycling right back.

Dropping the cycling back might actually be a good idea for optimum fat loss as there's mounting evidence that too much cardio might actually teach your body to store more fat to compensate. So not only do you become an efficient fat burner but also an efficient fat storer... The solution apparently is 20-30 min HIIT sessions, where you basically burn up your blood sugar but haven't quite started drawing on fat reserves during the session. Your body then burns the calories afterwards replenishing the spent sugar stores. However, while I have certainly achieved great results following this sort of cardio program in the past so there's definitely something in it, MTB is my chosen sport and I love it too much so cutting it back ain't gonna happen.

Which leaves modifying the weights routine. Stronglifts advise strongly against modifying the program, but then they have the Madcow variation and plenty of evidence elsewhere of others deviating from the 5x5 formula once they've advanced to a certain point so it seems there's a limit to how far it can take you on its own. Still, it's definitely where aspiring bodybuilders or people embarking on a weights program for the first time should start and it's what I'll use to introduce my sons to lifting once they've entered their teenage years. Once the goals of being able to bench press your own bodyweight and squat 1.5 times your bodyweight for 5 sets of 5 reps (or close enough to it) have been achieved, it's probably time to move on to something more advanced.

While eventually (when I get bored with this program probably in a month or two) I plan to cycle between phases of more heavy compound exercises, less cardio and less carbs (ie Stronglifts) and more isolation exercises, more cardio and more carbs (ie Body for Life), what I'll do for now to get around my recovery conflict is modify my weights routine to work in better with my bicycling.

So my program now will be be somewhere in between, borrowing a bit from both Stronglifts and Body for Life with an upper body day, then a cardio day, then a lower body day, then a cardio day followed by a rest day. That way I can do all of those lovely heavy compound exercises on the lower body day and still get my recovery, plus on the upper body day I get to do the awesome pump sets that the Body for Life program gives, still using the Stronglifts progressive overload principle of adding 2.5kgs the next time you do the same exercise.

Cause and Effect

2010-04-14T13:01:00.006+10:00

One thing I'm becoming more and more aware of is to treat obesity as a symptom. The real cause behind the problem has been insulin resistance. If I attempt to treat the symptom with various diets and exercise plans, sooner or later my body fights back and I fail.

I've learned that naturally thin people don't really have anything magical going on that prevents them from putting on weight. What they do have more than anything else is a functional appetite control. They eat whatever they want, whenever they want. The secret is they only eat when they're hungry and they stop when they're not hungry. Combine that with what I'm learning about insulin resistance and the numbers start to add up.

The secret to weight loss isn't to eat less and exercise more, although that will be the natural result when you get it right. The secret is to eat the right foods in the right ratios and portion sizes that your body needs, and that varies from person to person. There's no one size fits all solution. The only way to discover what works involves a bit of time and trial and error. As Dr Mercola says in this article:

In general, you first start by eating the proportions of proteins, fats and carbs according to your taste and appetite.

Next, analyze your reactions to your meal and discover how well you did in selecting the right ratios for yourself. ... Finally, if you did not react optimally to your meal, change the ratios the next time you eat that meal and again analyze your reactions. In this way you can fine-tune each meal to the ratios of proteins, fats and carbs that are just right for you.

As an example, last night I had a home made chicken stir-fry with noodles. An hour after, I was famished even though straight after the meal I felt quite full. (Insulin spike from the noodles which may have also contained MSG. Next time more stir-fry, less noodles). As it turned out on this particular night I was off to the movies so I lashed out on a bag of chips and some Peanut M&Ms. Later when I got home I lapsed into depression. (Sugar crash. Next time I'll try some plain nuts instead of chips and chocolate).

Am I making progress? You betcha! I'm still not weighing myself but my pants are super comfy at the moment and on Monday night (thanks to Bbanger pushing me for the last few weeks and qman's "take it slow and don't stop" advice) I made it up the notorious "I Hate This One Too" hill in the Ironbark Gully Reserve on my MTB. :)

I'm also now squatting in excess of my body weight on the Stronglifts program. Woot!

Update on Infinit

2010-04-01T15:02:00.002+10:00

Further to yesterday's post, it seems there may be some variation in what constitutes a portion. Staminade say its $8.00, 36 portion container should make around 9 litres which works out to around $0.91 per litre. For Infinit, while the recommended serving size does vary depending on the formula, the 25 serves for $54.94 (which I now know is around 2kgs) actually makes around 50 litres which works out to around $1.10 per litre.

On that basis it may not be bad value after all and I'm certainly going to give it a try.

Sports Drinks

2010-03-31T14:17:00.003+10:00

Now that Staminade have changed the formula to use sucrose instead of dextrose as a sweetener I've been searching for an alternative. I'm really peeved that they did this because it's been awesome for relieving cramps on longer bike rides and gives a great little energy boost without the crash that happens with a sugar based formula, as well as avoiding the well known evils of fructose consumption.

In the interim I thought I'd try out the new formula as way of at least getting the much needed magnesium and there's good and bad news to report. The good news is that sugar doesn't dissolve well in cold water so it all sinks to the bottom where it's easy to throw away. The bad news is that without the sweetener it's a bit like licking a sweaty armpit, albeit with a lemon/lime flavour.

Please Staminade people, bring back the old formula!

One alternative suggested to me was Endura. However, while it contains more magnesium than Staminade, it's sweetened with fructose so it's out. (Still stuck in the 90's where fructose was thought to be a healthy sweetener alternative due to it's low GI rating I guess...)

Onwards we go to Infinit. Aussie produced. Contains electrolytes and magnesium. Sweetened with dextrose (glucose) and you can even customise the formula. It's ticking all of the boxes but it's seriously pricey. With Staminade I get around 36 serves for around $8.00. Infinit promises 25 serves for a whopping $54.94!

Hmm... I'll have to think about that one...

In the meantime I'll make do with a magnesium supplement and maybe hunt around for a suitable glucose tablet for an energy boost on the longer bike rides and maybe some sort of electrolyte replacement for the hot & sweaty weather periods.

Magnesium may have other benefits besides cramp reduction too. According to Mercola.com there's a relationship between magnesium and insulin resistance that drives up blood pressure in Syndrome X sufferers like me.

A less known fact is that insulin also stores magnesium. But if your cells become resistant to insulin, you can‘t store magnesium so you lose it through urination.

Intracellular magnesium relaxes muscles. What happens when you can‘t store magnesium because the cell is resistant? You lose magnesium and your blood vessels constrict.

This causes an increase in blood pressure and a reduction in energy since intracellular magnesium is required for all energy producing reactions that take place in the cell.

But most importantly, magnesium is also necessary for the action of insulin and the manufacture of insulin. When you raise your insulin, you lose magnesium, and the cells become even more insulin resistant. Blood vessels constrict and glucose and insulin can‘t get to the tissues, which makes them more insulin resistant, so the insulin levels go up and you lose more magnesium. This is the vicious cycle that begins even before you were born.

Eating to combat insulin resistance

2010-03-29T13:55:00.004+10:00

With my new plan to treat fat as a symptom and insulin resistance as the real problem I've found astonishing success so far.

I've cut carbs right back to only healthy stuff like fresh veges, fruit and whole grains and I time them so I only have them an hour or so before the bigger workouts. I've cut my bread intake right back, completely omitted anything with added sugar and I've raised my consumption of tuna, chicken and whey.

To my surprise I found it effortless to stick to the plan. I no longer felt hungry all the time, I felt energised and enthusiastic, and my depression lifted. Unfortunately on Friday night I decided to lash out on a bag of chips and a few scotches and all of those evils came back, but I was back on the plan on Saturday and by Sunday I was "me" again. I still haven't been weighing or measuring myself but I can tell by the way my pants fit and my performance on the bike that I'm definitely losing fat.

By crikey, it's been the carbs/insulin resistance all along and it started way back while I was still in my teens!

I'm now looking at weeding out soy products and artificial sweeteners like aspartame and sucralose from my diet after turning up evidence these may also be working against me.

According to Mercola.com, soy products contain:

Phytoestrogens (isoflavones) genistein and daidzein, which mimic and sometimes block the hormone estrogen
Phytates, which block your body's uptake of minerals
Enzyme Inhibitors, which hinder protein digestion
Hemaggluttin, which causes red blood cells to clump together and inhibits oxygen take-up and growth
High amounts of omega-6 fat, which is pro-inflammatory

None of which are desirable to the things I'm trying to achieve.

I'm a little concerned about calcium so I decided to change back to cow's milk for a daily cappuccino and it turns out I may not be so lactose intolerant after all. I still react badly sometimes to chocolate, but not cocoa so I'm blowed if I know what causes it. It's milk chocolate or cheap dark chocolate that sets me off and the milkier/sugarier it is, the worse I'll react. Within an hour or 3 I'll start belching with a strong sulfur smell and taste. The following day, well let's just say it's wise for me to stay within running distance of a toilet... Quality dark chocolate is fine for me though.

Artificial sweeteners are another one I plan on getting rid of. There's mounting evidence that these things may be quite dangerous to many people. Yes, there's every possibility that they may be quite harmless but with that being said there's no question about any being a natural food that our ancient ancestors would have been eating so why run the risk?

Giving up everything sweet is easier said than done though...

The growing case against fructose

2010-03-23T16:48:00.003+10:00

With my latest plan to tackle insulin resistance rather than weight loss as such (in the belief that insulin resistance is the cause of the problem and fat is the symptom rather than the other way around) one substance I absolutely must get out of my diet is fructose.

I've mentioned David Gillespie's Sweet Poison before but he seems to have a strong allie in Dr Joseph Mercola. In this article, quoting Dr Richard Johnson, professor of medicine at the University of Colorado (where he runs the kidney division and is in charge of transplantation and research in blood pressure) and author of The Sugar Fix, I read:

“If you give animals fructose, they develop diabetes, hypertension, obesity, and fatty liver. And in most of these conditions, if we lower uric acid, we can prevent many of these conditions, [although] not completely.

So lowering uric acid seems to benefit some of the mechanisms by which fructose causes disease.

So a very important point is that if you take two animals and you feed one fructose and feed the other one the exact same number of calories but give it as dextrose or glucose, its only the fructose-fed animal that will develop obesity, insulin resistance, fatty liver, and high triglycerides, signs of inflammation, vascular disease, and high blood pressure.”

A nice summary on the dangers of fructose here.

Insulin Resistance

2010-03-22T11:42:00.004+10:00

For one reason or another I've recently been researching the effects of insulin resistance and found a nice summary of everything I've learned at this site written by Dr Joseph Mercola who also has an amazing amount of information at his website at mercola.com.

Strangely, I was already aware of being in the insulin resistant category. My Dr is even considering giving me a diagnosis of being pre-diabetic. I also already knew that carbs would be the key to losing weight so I haven't actually learned anything new here. The mistake I was making was assuming the IR (insulin resistance) came about due to being overweight when actually it's probably the other way around.

What's the difference? Well, it's well known that that more insulin resistant you are, the harder it is to lose weight (gotta love it when I'm told the solution to this is to lose weight. Duh...). If you focus on the fat loss and the results are slow, or as in my case where I also seem to be locked into a tug-of-war with my body lasting several years with neither of us ever holding the balance of power for very long, it's hard to stay motivated for more than a few weeks at a time. That is, it's all too easy to cheat if you're not seeing results, especially when the effort is so great. However, start looking at fat as a symptom rather than the cause and it's a whole different ball game.

Looking at the symptoms of IR on Dr Mercola's site we have chronic fatigue, brain fogginess, hyperglycemia & cravings for high GI carbs, farting a lot, sleepiness, fat/obesity, high triglycerides, hypertension, depression and that "IR is also prevalent in persons addicted to alcohol, caffeine, cigarettes or other drugs. Often, the drug is the secondary problem, with IR being the primary one."

Bingo! A direct hit on every one, and now that I think about it I'm pretty sure I started showing these signs as early as my late teens.

Now I feel I know who my real enemy is at last and I can plan a battle strategy.

IR can also be called "carb intolerant". Stronglifts says that "70% of population is carb intolerant: they get fat eating excess carbs."

So, treating this is all in the carbs. I need to firstly reduce and/or eliminate simple carbs like sugar, breads and certainly biscuits, lollies and cakes. Only healthy stuff for me. Next, Bbanger had a brain wave and pointed out that I had my workouts all planned for the week so why not do a similar weekly plan for my meals and plan my carbs for only when I need them?

Why not indeed. I can taste success already.

Getting slower?

2010-03-15T15:39:00.003+10:00

For the last 4 - 6 weeks I've felt like I've been getting progressively slower on the mountain bike. I mentioned it to Bbanger and he agreed. Definitely a bad sign when someone else notices...

The good thing about a blog on the topic is I get to look back over previous posts to spot any trends.

Mid January I reported feeling burned out with the exercise schedule I'd set myself and I was also complaining about the Aussie humidity.
A week later I weighed myself and noted my progress had stalled since before Christmas and I felt seriously discouraged.
Mid February I reported a slight weight gain and that I was suffering distress from the humidity
Since then it's been raining pretty much constantly so I've been reduced to just one or two bike rides per week but even those have been slower due to the damp and slippery conditions, + riding on momentum sapping soggy clay is hard work and seriously demoralising.

Ok, so I over-trained and cooked myself in the heat, then lapsed into depression when I found my progress had stalled and I couldn't go any harder to do anything about it. I then tried self-medicating with some hard living so it's no wonder I soon found myself complaining that I wasn't recovering as well as usual and didn't seem to have the energy to exert myself any more. I also decided I'd try living without a daily multivitamin or any other supplements since I wasn't sure I was getting value for money even though I've noted in the past that I quickly feel washed out without one.

Time to put a stop to this crap, but what do I need to address?

What I know to work and how I rate myself out of 10:

Get 8 hours of sleep a night : (5)
Deal with any causes of chronic stress : (5)
Don't count calories or restrict portions : (8)
Eat whenever hungry : (9)
Eat until hunger goes away and then stop : (4)
Drink 2 glasses of water with every meal : (4)
Eat fresh food and veges 90% of the time : (8)
Don't eat packaged foods : (6)
Don't eat anything with sugar in it : (6)
Take a multivitamin : (0)
Have a protein shake after any strenuous exercise : (6)
Do strength training 2 - 3 times a week : (9)
Do high intensity, short duration (30-40 mins) cardio, 1-3 times a week : (9)
Do some low intensity, long duration cardio a couple of times a week : (9)

The problem areas are pretty obvious when I set it out like this.

Warning on Staminade

2010-03-11T16:48:00.000+10:00

According to David Gillespie's blog post today, Staminade have just changed the formula of their powder to be sweetened with sugar instead of glucose and artificial sweetener. This turns it into another crap lolly water like Powerade, Gatorade or softdrink, which are completely useless for sports hydration (but great if you like dentist bills, fat and high BP, gout, cholesterol and diabetes).

Please voice your protests at http://www.staminade.com.au/contactus.html

The best laid plans...

2010-03-04T13:27:00.005+10:00

The more I learn about the Stronglifts program the more excited I'm getting about it. So much so that I've now decided to abandon my idea of training and dieting in phases and just stick with Stronglifts now.

During my first month I more or less just dabbled with it but now the weights I'm working with are a bit more substantial and I can see and feel changes happening already so now I'm very keen to get into it in a serious way. Even though it's difficult mentally to get myself into the gym some days, and then pushing myself hard enough once I'm there, I'm starting to find I'm looking forward to my next workout and I'm really enjoying the challenges I set myself. Hopefully I'll get my old workout partner back soon which will help heaps.

Yesterday I stopped doing seated overhead presses and tried them standing with a standard barbell starting with a clean and jerk from the floor. (Previously I had concerns about having sufficient ceiling height to do this in my garage but that turned out to be no problem). I enjoyed it immensely and I can sure feel it today.

Stronglifts incorporates everything I've learned to be true over the last few years.

Diet wise it's not about counting calories or restricting portions but instead is about eating healthy, eating regularly and eating whenever you're hungry. Medhi says if you're feeling hungry you're not eating enough, which is inline with Jean Antonello's philosophy that most weight issues are caused by undereating rather than overeating, and Jon Gabriel's concept of eating "live foods" and not starving your body so it doesn't turn on its "fat programs".

The exercise is about strength training rather than making cosmetic changes as such (but with strength comes the cosmetic anyway) . Extra cardio helps and Medhi recommends long duration cardio rather than HIIT for beginnners (a beginner is defined as anyone who can't squat 1.5 times their own bodyweight for 5 sets of 5 reps), which fits in perfectly with my cycling.

Weighing yourself isn't a priority. No matter what you weigh, if you can squat 1.5 times your own bodyweight you're going to be fit and healthy so that's what to aim for.

Speaking of cycling, most of my rides are around 1 - 1.5 hours. A couple of times recently I've ventured out for 3 or more hours and on both of those occasions I've experienced excessive hunger for 48 hours afterward which I'm pretty sure has meant I've eaten back any weight I've lost during the ride so I might not have gained much from the experience at all. Hmm... Still, it's an adventure and worth doing on that basis alone.

Anyway, I've ordered my Chucks now and replaced the bouncy foam under my gym with high density matting (thanks Rustty) . Now I just have a few diet issues to tidy up but I've already started taking my teas and coffees without sweetener and am cutting back the milk and bread I don't need. I might also be able to mod my existing gym so I can use a freeweight barbell for presses and squats rather than the Smith Machine but the main factor is to keep adding weight each workout and I'm certainly doing that.

I feel like I'm on the right road at last. :)

Dieters Don't Crave Broccoli

2010-02-24T13:13:00.004+10:00

I recently saw a TV program produced by the BBC called "Why Are Thin People Not Fat?". Basically they grabbed a bunch of "naturally thin" people and made them overeat for a month to see what happened. They all put on at least some weight, proving that there wasn't anything physiologically different about them that kept them thin. What did set them apart though was they all had difficulty eating the required amount. Some even threw up in the attempts.

The conclusion was that it was their natural appetite control that kept them thin and not anything special about their bodies. Yes, they could eat anything they wanted and not put on weight, the thing was they didn't want to eat more than they needed. They only ate when they felt hungry and stopped when they felt full. Once off the experiment, they were able to resume their normal eating and they quickly returned to their old weights.

Further googling led me to naturally-thin.com written by Jean Antonello who firmly believes most diet plans have it backwards and the majority of people with weight issues are made that way due to under-eating rather than over-eating. The theory goes that intentionally under-eating causes the body to fight back with excessive hunger and cravings for sugary and fatty rubbish it can easily turn into fat stores because it thinks you're starving. Hence the reason 95% of people who lose weight on a diet eventually fail and put it back on again.

Most people who have dieted (attempted to deliberately under-eat) at some point in their lives will have a "disturbed" relationship with food and will consciously or sub-consciously try to eat less than their body asks for, which will eventually lead to excessive hunger which can only be fought for so long before it turns into a binge (usually junk food).

According to Jean, the reason you crave junk and not healthy food is because "when you go hungry, your metabolic rate drops by an estimated 15 to 30%. It’s easy to understand this if you picture yourself lost in a cave for several days. This is a serious boomerang effect for dieters. Then, as hunger is ignored, the appetite tends to soar, preparing you for a binge and the important fat storage that must follow—all this in spite of your determination to stay in control (this time). And cravings change to accommodate the increased need for fat. I like to say that dieters don’t crave broccoli. There’s a reason. Broccoli is a very poor food from which to manufacture fat."

For a more detailed explanation of this phenomena see truthaboutabs.com.

The solution is to eat whenever you're hungry, but only eat quality food. Do this and your appetite control mechanism will eventually start to function properly again and your weight will gradually return to a normal one over time. It won't happen overnight like Biggest Loser, but it will happen, and then you won't ever have to diet again. It's a cure for the whole disease, not just a treatment for one symptom.

Is it a vegetable?
Is it a fruit?
Is it a grain?
Is it meat?
If yes, then eat as much as you like whenever you feel hungry.

Is it junk?
Has *sucrose/fructose been added to it?
Don't eat this.

* Fructose needs to be avoided if you want your appetite to function properly. One experiment to show how it mucks up your appetite control is to cook up some protein pancakes one morning for breakfast. Eat them plain without any toppings and see how many you can get through before you push the plate away. On another day try them again, this time with syrup, jam or honey and you'll find you easily fit more.
Note: Naturally occurring fructose such as in fruit is fine because it's in much smaller quantities and comes with cellulose/fibre. See David Gillespie's "Sweet Poison" for more on this topic.

I'm excited by this and have ordered Jean Antonello's books anyway. Hopefully it's the cure I've been looking for. Thinking over almost all of the diet plans I've liked, I think the thing they have in common is the healthy eating part and it's most likely because of this that they're successful and not anything to do with portion control, food combining or calorie counting.

Exercising in Extreme Humidity

2010-02-15T14:07:00.004+10:00

It's a no-brainer that the more weight you have to carry around, the more energy you'll burn doing it. The more energy you burn, the more heat you're going to generate. Add extreme humidity to the equation so our evaporative cooling systems no longer work properly and it's obvious that there's going to be a exponential rate of performance deterioration as heat, humidity and body weight go up.

Fair enough.

What I don't understand is why I feel so much more fatigued after a given bike ride under these conditions, especially since I'm forced to go so much slower than usual, and why it takes so much longer to recover? I'm still feeling muscle tightness a couple of days after a ride lately when normally I'd be champing at the bit to go again after a good night's rest.

For a while there I thought maybe it was the new workout routine with the heavy squat component. I don't normally do resistance training on my legs so maybe I just needed more recovery time?

Then I blamed switching to suspension forks on my single speed mountain bike. Even though I felt like I'd gained speed on the single trails, I felt a bit bouncy on the climbs so maybe I was losing too much power on the climbs now springing up and down instead of all of my energy being used to push me forward. However, a road bike ride this morning produced a similar decline in performance so it has to be me not the bike.

My weight is fine. I went up a few kgs a couple of weeks ago with the inevitable tug of war that happens as I drop below 120 kgs but it appears to be back on track again now so that isn't it.

Damn humidity. Mid 30s with 65% humidity. No wonder...

Roll on winter!

StrongLifts

2010-02-08T13:44:00.006+10:00

I'm now into my second week following StrongLifts as my strength training program for my "building phase" for February. I haven't done squats (or any leg training other than cycling for that matter) for quite some time so I started with a conservative 60kgs on the bar so I could focus on my form and get that right before I move into maximum effort territory.

After the workout I didn't feel as exhausted like I normally would so I was thinking maybe as a workout it was a bit easy for me and maybe I'd need to look elsewhere. Still, I knew I'd gone light with the weights so I decided to see how I felt once I'd moved on to heavier stuff before I judged it too harshly. Also, the following day I was surprised to be feeling quite a bit of post-workout pain in my quads and hamstrings so I started to get a little more respect for it anyway.

By the next workout the pain had gone away and 60kgs felt just way too easy so I bumped it up to 80. This morning even 85 felt too easy but I'll play along with it and just keep adding 2.5kgs to the bar every workout as they recommend so that I keep proper form and allow my body to gain strength over time. Even so I definitely feel like I've had a workout today and I'm gaining greater respect for the program daily. It seems to be well suited to me. Rather than lots of repetitious sets of squeezing isolated muscles and getting nowhere, I'm instead setting my sights on overall power. My goals now are to be able to bench press my own body-weight and squat 1.5 times my body-weight for 5 reps each with good form.

Unfortunately my home gym equipment isn't exactly what they recommend so I've had to make adjustments. I have kind of a Smith Machine combo which is exactly what they don't recommend. I think it's been great up until now though and it's still the better way to go when I go back into isolated exercises during a cutting phase. I can do all manner of presses and rows with it and with its safety stops I can go heavy without a spotter, but if I had my time over now I'd probably start with a more traditional power rack. With that being said though, I don't really have the ceiling height to do put a chin bar up high enough anyway, or to do proper overhead presses even though I do have plenty of freeweights and a barbell for the job. So I settle for seated overhead presses and seated cable pulldowns. The main principle is to add a bit to the bar each workout and I can still do that.

I might have to ditch the rubber mats under my squat rack and training in joggers though. Stronglifts recommend bare feet or Chucks for greater stability once you start pushing serious weight. That's one change I can make.

More Bicycle Acrobatics

2010-02-04T16:46:00.002+10:00

At one point there's 16 on one bike. Whoever's pedaling that will have some idea of how I feel most of the time... ;)

Crikey, any one of those tricks would have had me flat on my face.

Happy Palindrome Day

2010-02-01T17:15:00.000+10:00

Happy 01022010!

:)

Arse Kicked by a Roadie

2010-01-28T16:33:00.000+10:00

Levi Leipheimer on a Mountain bike from Roger Bartels on Vimeo.

Custom vs Off The Shelf

2010-01-25T16:23:00.002+10:00

While considering a new wheelset for my old Giant Yukon (the originals are heavy with dodgy spokes and the hubs are getting a bit worn now) I figured I'd be up for say $100 for 2 Deore XT hubs, around $100 for a set of Alpine III spokes and around $200 for some lime green Velocity Blunts. Let's say $400-450 anyway.

If I look around I can find some slightly used downhill type wheels that should be up to the job for around $300 but is it the way to go? I mean, I don't know that they will be up to the job but I do know from experience that an XT freehub, the Blunts and Alpine IIIs can take everything I can dish out, plus they'll be a sickening colour I'll get off on so an extra $100 - 150 may be money well spent.

However, when it comes to my single speed road bike it could be a different story. I'd love to upgrade the wheels but then I look at the crankset, the old seat, the flexy frame and the fact that it's a little small for me I wonder if I get the same economy. I could spend $400 on a new wheel set but when I consider I can buy something like a Mongoose Maurice for under $600 with everything brand new and in my size with a black frame with lairy orange wheels & highlights, and then easily get $200 for the old bike I know what's better value for money.

And if it can take this sort of treatment I'm laughing:

One gear No idea from chris akrigg on Vimeo.

Well that sucks

2010-01-22T14:11:00.004+10:00

I've been avoiding the scales for some time. Not because I think I'm gaining weight or anything. Purely because I want to put my focus on being healthy and improving my fitness rather than worrying about what the scales say, but my clothes have been fitting better and last Saturday as I went about various social engagements at least 3 people told me I looked like I'd lost weight so I was optimistic that I'd see something exciting the next time I jumped on.

Not so. :( This morning I was still smack on 120kgs. All this extra training hasn't paid off after all and that sucks.

Logic says I've obviously been compensating with extra food and when I think about it I know I've done that but in my heart I still feel ripped off and disappointed.

Still, if people think I look different and my clothes fit better then something must have changed even if the scales aren't showing it. So I guess I should avoid the temptation to throw my arms in the air and get a big feed of KFC and chocolates. Hey, I can fail to lose weight with a whole lot less effort after all...

However, I've obviously traded fat for muscle and extra muscle means an increase in metabolism so even if I stick with what I'm doing and change nothing I should start dropping fat and seeing it on the scales very soon. If I also combine that with toughening up on the little snacks in between meals it should make for quite a bit of success. I know I could still be drinking more water anyway and I've also found that a protein shake within 30 minutes of a workout keeps the hunger away quite effectively and also aids in recovery.

So I think I'll take a raincheck on the KFC and chocolates for the time being.

February I'm going to back the cycling off a little and do some strength training in the gym for something different as a "building cycle". Then, come March I'll cycle back to lighter isolation exercises, less calories and more cardio. The results should be interesting.

One Gear to Rule Them All

2010-01-21T13:35:00.004+10:00

A few weeks back my Surly hub on the rear all but seized up on me. I couldn't understand why I was having such a bad day that day too. Everything seemed to be so much more effort than usual. I thought maybe I'd put on 10 kgs or so overnight but when I got off the bike and pushed it along at the end of one trail it suddenly became apparent why I was struggling so much. The back wheel had locked up. At first I thought something had gone wrong with the brakes but on closer inspection it seems that the locknut on the drive side of the wheel bearings and come loose and overtightened itself.

A bit of work with some long nose pliers had me mobile enough to get home to fix it properly and I thought that was the end of it, but damage had been done.

Incidentally the reason I hadn't noticed the loose locknut was because it's inside a recess in the freewheel body. You can see it but you can't get a tool or fingers in there to check the tightness.

Mechanical lesson No 1: In the process of getting the freewheel off (4 notch BMX style) I also learned a technique for getting it off too (after ripping my vice out of my workbench): Use the quick release skewer to hold the tool on the freewheel and get into it with a huge mother of a shifting spanner. (Something longer than the diameter of the wheel).

Anyway, last week I noticed a heap of play in the back wheel and it was all on the drive side so obviously the bearing had collapsed. Surly hubs use a weird 7901 adjustable cartridge bearing that I couldn't find from any of the bike shops or local bearing suppliers (those guys hadn't even heard of an adjustable cartridge bearing) so I had to order it from overseas.

While I was waiting for the new bearings I thought I'd take the opportunity to slap the old wheel on and try an 18t cog on the back instead of my usual 20t. The smaller cog means I can go faster on the flats and down hills but it's harder going up. Although now that I've run it for a while I think I'm better off with the 20t. While I have gained speed on the flats, the only flat sections I ride are on the bike path on the way to and from the trails. The rest is hilly, and on the downhills, because I tend to sprint at the beginning of the hill and then use my weight to coast I'm not really gaining anything with the smaller cog, and getting my arse up the climbs is my weakest point so a bigger cog tends to work better for me overall. ie If I err my gearing towards easier climbing I tend to end up with faster overall times on a given ride. I can also accelerate faster and wheelie easier so it's better in the technical stuff too.

Back to the 20t it is.

Mind you the 18t definitely suited the long flat(ish) Glasshouse mini-epic that I did again last weekend. That was a corker! It was an extremely hot and humid day and nearly everyone had run out of water around the 40km point. There were a couple of very stressed riders around that point. I made it through ok (or so I thought), finishing my last gulp of water around 2 minutes from the finishing line but then spent the next day and a half eating and drinking my own body weight in an effort to recover.

Mechanical lesson No 2: That collapsed wheel bearing disintegrated when I tried to knock it out from behind, leaving just the outer ring with no surface I could attack from the back. At this point I thought I'd be off to find a bike mechanic with a suitable bearing pulling tool but I was surprised to find no one had one and I all I got was lots of "Geez mate I dunno how you're gonna get that out of there". A phone call to my favourite bike shop revealed they didn't have one either but they'd seen this kind of thing before and reckoned they could fix it for me... in a couple of weeks! I didn't want to wait that long so they went on to say all they usually did was smack it with a sharp cold chisel. The metal used in bearing shells is hard and brittle and usually shatters if you hit it hard enough. I thought anything was worth a try at that point so I did it and was surprised to find it did shatter after just a couple of firm raps with the lumpy hammer with the other side of the hub on a block of wood.

Weird as it seems, there's something extremely satisfying in solving a problem that seems increasingly insurmountable right to the end. :)

Training on an empty stomach

2010-01-20T13:14:00.003+10:00

My new Dr wants to run another blood test to determine if I'm pre-diabetic and/or suffering metabolic syndrome. (I already thought I fell into this category anyway but I'll roll with it). Officially I didn't have to do this test fasted but I thought I'd skip breakfast and do my usual bike ride anyway and see what happened.

Normally of late I'd have breakfast straight out of the sack before any exercise. Some weight loss programs advise exercise on an empty stomach for maximum fat loss but others advise ending the nocturnal fast as soon as possible as the best way to get the hormones in balance for fat loss. Having tried the former without any great success, I subscribe to the latter theory these days. I find I'm more alert and have more energy during the exercise session that way. Just how much extra energy I had I wasn't so sure about though so this would be a good opportunity to find out.

Bbanger & Qman took me out on one of the hilliest mountain bike rides I've done in a long time this morning and almost out of the gate I was feeling like I had very little in the tank and found myself walking up the very first hill. Aerobically though I felt great, so provided I didn't have to dig too deep to produce any real horsepower I'd be fine. The problem is at my weight I need power for any sort of hill climb so I was hurting.

Interestingly I'd eaten quite a bit the night before so I expected my glycogen levels would be full up from that and I'd be fine on a ride the following morning. Obviously my body had stored that as fat and then feasted on my glycogen stores while I slept so I woke up with nothing more than my aerobic capacity to work with. Mind you, as long as I kept it down to no more than a 60% effort I felt like I could have ridden all day.

Which way would burn more fat though?

I think with caloric intake being equal, eating before exercise does. My body isn't in "famine mode" trying to conserve energy and I'm able to train at a much higher intensity for longer. Therefore I burn more and end up with a greater caloric deficit, and my body doesn't think it's starving so my metabolic rate stays higher. It certainly feels that way after today's experiment anyway.

Indoor MTB

2010-01-19T15:53:00.002+10:00

A helmet cam trip around Ray's Mountain Bike from Mark Heiman on Vimeo.

So tired...

2010-01-13T14:36:00.006+10:00

Well, I may have bitten off a bit more than I can chew with the exercise schedule I set myself.

For starters I've been heading out for 90 min rides instead of 60 minutes on Tuesday and Thursday mornings and I come home so sweaty in the current humidity and so absolutely spent that I just can't bring myself to do the pushups and situps I promised I would do. There always seems to be something on the bike bothering me that needs to be tinkered with as well.

The 90 minute Monday night rides have turned out to be well over 2 hours once my mate Bbanger gets through dragging me around Ironbark Gully. After following that up with another 90 mins in the morning my legs are protesting so badly I'm yet to do a Tuesday night ride. I've also been drawn into riding on Wednesday mornings instead of the short spin on the road bike followed by a gym workout as well.

Needless to say I'm doing way too much cycling for my poor legs to handle so I need to scale that back.

Ok, so I'll ditch the Tuesday night sessions for starters. I need to get at least 3 weight sessions a week which will work best spaced a day apart so the Wednesday morning ride might have to go as well. Tuesday and Thursday mornings will need to be scaled back to a neat 60 minutes so I can fit some core exercises in.

On a related note I found a great no-nonsense blog covering fat loss at http://stronglifts.com/fat-loss-101-how-to-lose-fat-fast-with-free-fat-loss-diets/. The methods described are very similar to BodyForLife but set out in a more basic and easy to follow format. I know the style described works the best for me (provided I stick to the plan) so I'm excited to go through the website in more detail and hope it will help refine my diet and training schedule further.

The training schedule recommended is 3 x 45 min weight sessions and 3 x 45 min cardio sessions per week. I know for starters that amount of cardio isn't going to be enough to allow me to lose weight going by past experiences (I firmly believe all obese people need at least an hour a day of cardio to lose weight), and at the same time I love my cycling too much to restrict it to just that much.

I've also started making a habit of downing a post workout shake after every gym routine and bike rides that last longer than an hour in an effort to promote faster recovery as well as curbing the hunger pangs that inevitably kick in an hour or so after a heavy session and so far it seems to be working well.

I weighed in late last week dead on 120kgs which may seem discouraging at first but then I know I put on a good 4 or 5 kgs over the silly season which I then lost in a little over a week so it's actually tremendous progress. If I can continue on with that sort of effort, 2010 will definitely be my year. :)

Schedules

2010-01-04T16:54:00.010+10:00

Further to the building and cutting phase epiphany it also occurred to me that it's really hard to create a training schedule that pleases everyone and everything that I need to balance with. For starters I'm stronger in the afternoon after work so this would be the ideal time to hit the gym but that's also the main time I get with my kids. The only evenings I have open are Mondays & Tuesdays but I want to get in at least 3 or 4 weight sessions per week so that just leaves the mornings, but if I leave a day in between workouts I'd need to do it on Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings and there's group rides on Wednesday and Friday mornings. Argh!

When I thought about it, it occurred to me that the answer was right in front of me and tied in almost perfectly with a building and cutting phase. Sure, I'd be sacrificing either the kids or some group rides during one phase or the other, but never both for more than a few weeks at a time. Compromise... I guess that will have to do.

This is the plan so far:

Cutting Phase
	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thur	Fri	Sat	Sun
AM	Road30 Gym	Bike60 Cal10	Road30 Gym	Bike60 Cal10	Road30 Gym	MTB180
PM							MTB120
Night	MTB90	MTB90	MTB90

Building Phase
	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thur	Fri	Sat	Sun
AM			MTB90		MTB90	MTB90
PM	Gym	Gym		Gym	Gym		MTB120
Night			MTB90

Basically during the cutting phase I work out in the mornings 3 times per week starting with a 30 minute road bike ride (Road30) as a warm up to get the cobwebs out. The workouts will be Body-for-Life style with upper body one day and lower body the next performed strictly with fairly low weight and minimal rest for 45 - 60 minutes. Tuesday and Thursday mornings will be a longer MTB ride (or road bike if the trails are too wet) followed by 3 or 4 supersets of crunches and pushups ("Cal1o" = 10 minutes of calisthenics). Then I've got some longer weekend and night MTB rides crammed around that.

During the building phase I'll switch to a 2 day split with pushing exercises (chest, shoulders, triceps) one day and pulling (back, biceps) the next. This will happen on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday afternoons when I'm also at my strongest. (The kids will just have to tough this one out and settle for me on Wednesdays and the weekends.) I won't be doing any leg exercises and will cut back the cycling mainly to just the group rides which should give the legs a well needed rest after all the cycling during the cutting phase.

Now to make it happen and hopefully end up with a lot less around the middle over the next few months!

New bits

2009-12-23T16:48:00.003+10:00

I thought I better order some parts after the chain-sucking experiences this morning. Thank the gods I noted some part numbers the last time I had to replace the drivetrain on the old clunker (which is essentially the purpose of this post too now). This time it seems the original bits are no longer available so I needed to make some changes.

The Shimano Acera FC-TX70 chainring set seems to have been replaced by FC-M191 (or at least it should fit ok anyway).
Cassette is Shimano HG40 8 speed. Comes in either 11-30, 11-32 or a stump pulling 11-34 ratio (thought I'd try the 11-34 since I only take this bike out on super hilly rides or if I'm feeling lazy)
And a Hyperglide HG-40 chain.

The good part in this "recreational use" end of the Shimano MTB drivetrain spectrum is I can get the whole lot for under $100.00 including shipping. Hey, it's only the back-up/beater bike and this stuff just wears out anyway no matter how much you pay for it. :)

I hate derailleurs

2009-12-23T12:12:00.003+10:00

Yes, derailleurs suck. Remembering how to spell "derailleur" is bad enough but when I have to resort to actually using one, just why I prefer single speed bikes these days comes rushing back to me.

Lately I've been feeling hungry and lethargic, which is my default condition whenever I start to drop below 120kgs so whenever I browbeat myself into going for a ride lately I've been tending towards the lazy option and grabbing the old geared MTB. Except it's not really the lazy option. When I have gears to choose from, the hills aren't really all that easier anyway but I feel like I'm cheating if I decide to hike-a-bike so I tend to push myself more. Plus with taller gearing available I feel I'm cheating if I coast downhill...

On the single speed I get to work a wider variety of fast twitch & slow twitch muscles and I get to coast downhill and get off and walk when the going gets too tough without any adverse affects on my conscience, so overall it's less fatiguing.

The other bonus is no chain suck! How I hate chainsuck.

The last few days we've had rain. Real rain. For the first time in a long time. Instead of choking on dust now I'm spitting mud. Real sticky, boggy stuff that eats derailleurs for breakfast and spits out the bones.

Now derailleurs are perfectly fine on road bikes but that's where they should stay, nice and clean. They have no business in the dirt. Add a bit of mud or dust and you learn all about chain suck very fast. I have no idea how people put up with them on mountain bikes. On a ride this morning I couldn't put any power down in either granny or middle ring without the stupid chain wrapping itself up. I was ready to toss the thing into the scrub!

However, I've also been venturing out into hillier territory over at Ironbark Gully where I really need a few more gears to choose from to take advantage of the blistering downhills and to make it a bit easier on some of the unavoidable epic climbs.

Back to that hub geared mountain bike project I think.

On another note, I've been roped into joining a 4 man team in a 12 hour dusk to dawn race. My first bike race! Time to get my shit together with this diet thing...

Bulking and cutting phases

2009-12-15T13:23:00.003+10:00

Up until this point, the methods of weight loss I've employed have revolved around principles of eating less and moving more. I've understood the importance of building muscle to increase metabolism and of eating less but not starving myself so my body doesn't go into "starvation mode". In attempting to do both at the same time I've achieved some success, but only ever to a point and then I crash. Pretty much classic yo-yo dieting.

In a bit of a eureka moment it occurred to me that I tend to flat line around the 4 - 6 week mark. Around this point any progress I've made seems to halt and my motivation goes out the window. I start losing interest in my training program and I start getting less particular with my eating.

The reason for this is my body has adapted metabolically. It has adapted to the physical loads I've been placing on it and it's learned to get by with the calories I've been eating. I'm bored mentally and I'm bored physically.

Bodybuilders talk of bulking and cutting phases. A cutting phase consists of a strict diet with fewer calories, isolation exercises and lots of cardio. A bulking phase consists of a more relaxed diet (but not so relaxed to put on fat), compound exercises and not a lot of cardio.

Other athletes have an "off season" where they relax everything and then build up to the racing season with "base training" and stricter dieting.

I've also been setting 3 - 6 month targets when I really need to reduce that down to 4 - 6 weeks (before I've adapted too well to it) and I need to have a clear idea of whether I'm dieting and training for fitness or if I'm dieting and training for fat loss.

Mind you at the moment we're in the full swing of the Queensland summer with relentless hot, humid weather which is probably killing my motivation levels more than anything else...