May Update

Well another month has passed and its now been 152 days since I committed to the primal lifestyle. To say that it required a rethinking of what I do and how I eat is an understatement. When I started back in trying to lose the 30ish pounds I had gained I didn't realise the improvements I would make and where I would be now.

When I started I had crept back up to 268lbs (my pregnancy weight LOL) from 232. Now as most know 232 is not where I want to be that is another 30-50 pound lower so that being said it meant I was 70-90 from my goal but still a good 50 lbs less than I was. Even with that good news (what good news) I was not happy being heavier again. 152 days later I can happily report that I am now down to 229 lbs that is the 36lbs I gained plus 3 *grin*. For the month that means I lost 7lbs for the month.

Its not just the weight that has changed thankfully. I am seeing it in other areas also. For the first time in ohhh 20ish years I am in a size 36 Jeans. I will admit its a loose size 36 but hey its 36.  I am also working out more than I used too. Not as much as I should really be doing but I am trying to rectify that. In the 2-3 months I have had gym membership at NFC I have visited it more than the last one (3 times in a year erk). Most times it is to work with weights with Jen but on those times she is with her PT I instead do cardio. Cardio for me is still the bike and if I can get 30 mins on even a stationary bike it means I still get 30 mins.

On the food front I have been fine tweaking what I eat, a good example being that at the start of the year i was eating way to much red meat, and have been trying to vary the primal foods that I can have. We purchased coconut and almond flour to assist us and these have resulted in "alternate" cooked foods that are primal. Over the last few months coconut flour pancakes have become a regular breakfast food at the weekend (more for ember as she LOVES them LOL) but my most recent discovery was primal banana nut bread which I baked a couple of days ago and it has been a huge hit (just need to reduce the amount of salt in it though) and use the almond flour. Given time I am also looking at trying some of the almond flour breads just to see how they work. For those interested the nutrition info for the pancakes and banana nut bread are as follows

	Cals.	Fat	Sodium	Carbs.	D.F.	Sugar	Protein
Pancakes per pancake (14 per batch) we include a banana	92	5g	39mg	8g	3.5g	3g	4g
B.N. Bread per slice (assuming 20 per batch)	142	11.5g	135mg	6g	2g	3g	5g

Laters peeps
S.

This weekends ride

Well we went out for a 12 mile ride at the brentwood area greenway. This was the maiden voyage of Jens new Giant Defy 2 (plus upgrades). Overall a nice ride and fun was had by all.

Weigh in is I believe 263lbs and I really need to start monitoring my intake so I know how I am doing. its the continuation of motivation I think.

Link to route

Time taken was about 55 mins and Speed was about 11-12mph

Steve

Slow update

So we got out last Sunday (yeah I know its Friday) and did 2 hrs of mountain biking at Rotary park. It was fun by all although hard and I was whining like a little girl due to abuse by my pedals on my shins *LOL*. Details for the ride are below (first recording with Iphone app).

Weigh in on Sunday was 251 so I had a loss of 6lbs for the week but am still 8lbs from getting back to my restart point *le sigh* to continue on the journey. I can but keep trying.

Stats For the Ride

Distance :- 3.54 miles
Elapsed Time :- 1hr 57 mins 01 secs
Speed :- Ave : 1.8 mph Max : 8.7 mph
Altitude:- Min : 331ft Max : 443ft

Link to the Google Maps output from the App.

S.

update

Ok School is out for summer. Time to get myself back in shape and get myself riding again.

Its been a harsh 6-7 months. I just have not been motivated to do much. Don't ask me why I just don't know. Hell I think I still have motivational issues but I got to get past them.

I weighed myself midweek and I'm up to 255 lbs. UNACCEPTABLE

Today is my first attempt at drawing the line and saying enough. I have tracked my food intake today (approx 1000 cals) so far and hope to keep food at or below 2000 cals. My goal is to get back to 1500 - 1700 cals a day. I also took today to walk down to visit Jen at work, thankfully will power was there and I did not get ice-cream from the store next to her work (Scott I'm looking at you). So in theory I have burned some cals.

My next task in hand is to get back on the bike. I may not be able to get out and ride for the next few days due to commitments and crappy weather this weekend but I want to try set up the trainer and get 10-15 miles in. I think I have figured out why I didn't over the winter months (apart from the motivation) and will try the mods to see. I have also purchased an app (shock horror me spend when there are free apps) for my phone to track distance speed, mapping and altitude to try to improve my output on here and give me a 2nd source for stats.

Another task is to get to the Gym. I am paying for a membership that is not used. (cant get out of it *LOL* damned 1 yr contracts) I need to use it and get the strength training started. My final goal for the season is to ride the Clarksville Sunrise Century in September. IT will probably be my first century but I think it is the most logical (it is one of the flattest).

Hopefully updates will be forthcoming. Talk to you soon
S.

Weigh In

Ok First post, its 4 days late but its been hectic. My weigh in for the week on Sunday 14th at 8am was 245lbs. That's a loss of 1.5lbs for the week. I am hoping I can continue the downward trend I have started again. Exercise has been suffering a bit though and it looks like I wont be able to till at least Monday. Either way I am hitting the Gym next week and my goal is every night. It may not happen but shoot for 5 and get 3 or above I'm happy. Emails will be sent to arrange with Reggie and my PT (hey Reggie heads up *LOL* hope you are ready).

Times they are a changing

So I worked harder at not eating bad last week, especially as I could not work out due to other commitments. I felt that I did better and it reflected it when I weighed in on sunday morning. I am at one of those points where the needle was perfectly in the middle so weigh in for Sunday at 8am was 246.5lbs.

I think the change has been made for me to be finally on track again. My mind is more focused and my body is not rebelling as much. I visited a personal trainer for a free session at my gym and I have a plan of action that meshed with Reggie's will give us a good work out plan for a week (alternating our plans as PT suggested). Along with this I want to make sure I keep going to Mandy (my primary PT) and actually show improvement instead of the static I have been. It seems to have been the way of things that when I'm with the PT nothing happens, and then when they have issues and we cant meet my brain gets focused *sigh*. I have an appt tonight which is stopping me from going to gym but for the rest of the week my goal is to get to the gym every night after work. Even if its only for 30 minutes it is still an improvement on what I have been doing.

In other news Jen and I have been discussing a vacation in May. Our idea (well Jens idea since she rode on a section) is to ride our mountain bikes on the Katy Train in Missouri. Take a week and attempt to ride the full trail and then back to Neil and Loris. I have to admit I am excited about the prospect. A week of riding and camping out sounds fantastic and I cannot wait. I have looked at some sites and it looks to be a fun trail. Plans are afoot to get our bikes tweaked / checked and modded (add panniers) to be ready for May. I also love the fact that we are being organised about having a vacation instead of ending up not doing anything and just hanging out around Clarksville.

Well that's it for now. Post more soon.

S.

Weigh in

Ok so I was right in my guess-timate No weight loss this week, and very almost a 1lb weight gain. Scales were a little unsure and were closer to 248 than 249. So official weigh in is 248 lbs. It looks as if I am going to have to do a lot more work at staying focused when in company. I know I can do it at lunches but it seems if we have a gathering of some type my body looses its focus.

Thankfully its through knowing these issues that allow me to move past them. Personal training is a bit stagnant Just now as my Trainer has had to change her life a bit and is working and doing school so we are having to schedule different times. I however do not want another trainer if I don't have to, she is the most effective trainer I have had. To combat this however I am scheduled to look at a Gym Reggie is using to see if I will join and go with him. I would go with Jen but she is a morning worker outerer..... I on the other hand have to be an evening worker outerer, it works perfectly with Reggie *LOL* and I do need someone else to join with or I will not do it.

Ok back to work (not really Mike is here ...hey Mikey)

S.

week before Christmas

and I am going to try again to get focused. I weighed in this morning at 250lbs. My Goal for sunday is 248lbs.

So far monday has been bad but I am looking to improve the rest of the day with P.T. I finally started doing as she asked (30 situps and 10 pushups last night) and I am looking to get on bike trainer also (Jen has the one who has been taking advantage of this tool but I need to also)

This weekend ended up a weekend of some mechanical woes... My car gave me a low coolandt warning but looks to have been fixed with $7 dollars worth of coolant. The bike on the otherhand had a more expensive issue *sigh* I cleaned spike and took her to the post office on Friday. When I got back I looked at the rear tire and thought to myself *WTF* as I could see the wires of the tire in the central tread. After calling around and checking online I ended up riding to midsouth motoplex in clarksville (15 miles at 50-60 mph speeds) and paying 170 for a tire (170 FOR A FRIGGING TIRE.... ONE.....ONE not four ONE) then paid 45 for it to be mounted and balanced. This was not me being ripped off though this is the standard price...... WALMART if you can hear me START DOING MOTORCYCLE TIRES only just to get the price down *LOL*.

Ok rant over... see you at 248 Sunday I hope

ps mountain bike still in for repair.... poor thing

Steve

Weekend updates

Well weigh in for the week is 244lbs a loss of 2lbs which after some of the eating I am happy with. Coupled with this I have officially broke one of my goals which was to get out of the 40's for pant size. This message is brought to you today by a Steve in a pair of size 38 Jeans (courtesy of Old Navy who parted with them for a whopping 4 dollars after tax *LOL*) so this is officially a Red, Green and Blue letter week.

This weekend Jen and I headed off with the new tent and bikes to Montgomery Bell State Park. The goal was to see how well the new tent would cope with both of us in it and to take in some trails we had been told were really good for biking.

I was really surprised when it comes to the new tent Jen picked up. It looks small, it is small but it did fit both of us in it. The fact that we both slept about 8 hours ok wise is a testament to either us being tired or it being comfortable *LOL*. The major issue we think was using my CPAP in the tent as it created condensation in the tent and everything started getting damp. Also by the time 6am hit I was getting sore and could not stay in the tent any longer. I crawled out got dressed and dozed in the jeep till the sun came up and I could start a fire.

The funnest part of this weekend does have to go to the mountain biking. We had a blast (the whole weekend, camping, cooking out and biking was brilliant - Monty Bell campground is perfectly situated). On the Saturday after we set up we did the red route of the trails (see image below).

Image copied from Montgomery Bell trail pdf. All copyright the State of TN

Sunday we decided to do a longer route before heading home. Knowing that there was a downed tree towards the end of the trails we decided to do a route in reverse. We headed off down the blue route (intermediate trail) and rode that till we hit "4 Points Junction" on the map. From there we rode a little of the red trail till it hit marker 6 of the white trail and headed down that. This consisted of what is classed as the white pine trail and the storm track and of the 3 trails we had been on I think this was the coolest. We were unsure how long the rabbit run (white) was towards the end so we omitted it and returned back to the trail head and civilization. Totals for the weekend are a guess, but I think it is about 2 miles on Saturday and about 8 or 9 on the Sunday.

One good point is that we met a guy as we were packing the bikes up who we gave a copy of the map to and who told us about another trail near Columbia so we may be heading there to try it. Its a loop of 8 miles and starts at easy and builds up.

Grump Grump Grump

Ok Weighed myself after vacation (this morning) and I am 295lbs . WTH, WTF, GTH, MFW and a few other expletives. I feel fatter, My stomach feels bleh, and I feel generally unhealthy. Stupid vacation food (it was yummy though). This is a minor setback for me, (note: minor i will be back down to 284 SOON), the vacation did what I needed it to do, I feel rested, I feel ready to take on the world and work. For my health I have already started my vacation food healing process. Its a 3 step plan.

• Get back to low carb eating (effective this morning)
• Get at least one 10-15 mile bike ride in this week ( I would prefer a 25 mile ride or 2 15 milers)
• Focus on how I eat (Jen told me the following: I eat too fast & I don't know when to say enough: I need to fix this).

Coolest part of the vacation bike related was that we found this cycle company (we though it was a store) that makes custom bikes. We talked to the guy that builds them and he gave us advice on making Jens bike more road like (plus he gave us a nice set of hand made road tires for free which were installed on her bike last night) plus he gave me some good advice on ways to fix a numbness issue I am having due to my cycle seat (common issue in cycling due to trapping of perineal nerve). I recommend if you read this blog and are cyclist who wants a bike made around yourself for a very reasonable price you need to go here: ELITE BICYCLES

Weekly Update

Ok so this week has been a figuring week for me. I know I need to eat more carbs when I exercise but I think I have the problem that I don't know when to say ok I have had enough carbs. As you can see from my weekly posts I did 3m, 10m, 5m on the bike Wed, Thur, Fri. On Wed Jen Made Chili and after the ride we made some Frito chili pie. One bowl would have been fine, I had two, 2 portions of chips, 2 portions of chili and 2 portions of cheese n sour cream. Thursday it was O'charleys and if I hadn't ordered the wrong side I woulda been fine, as it was I ended up with 39g of carbs for one meal (15g for the salad and 17 for the broccoli cheese casserole).
Friday It was spaghetti and once again I had two bowls. Add to this mix that we ended up with a couple of people at the house Saturday and did a BBQ (not one of our usual cookouts just an oh people are here so we'll do a cookout type thing), I ended up eating a couple of chips, from a couple of bags, had some potato salad and then had some of the desert that was brought (damned cheesecake type desert its my weakness) I think I had carbs in the hundreds. I woke up Sunday and I just felt fat. This was confirmed with the fact that I was 294 on Sunday morning.
I changed my outlook Sunday I looked at my mistakes and saw what I have to do. Yes I can have a little more carbs on days I exercise to assist in the delivery of the proteins to my muscles (per Jen) but I need to know how many I am having. I also know I can have bad days (to visit the old friends I still like) but they will be when I reach goals. I focused Sunday, had some carbs but I think I kept track on, although I was unable to mark them down. I woke up this morning not feeling so fat. and reweighed myself. This week I will have 2 official weigh ins.

• Fat Sunday weigh in : 294lbs
• Not so fat Monday Weigh in : 293lbs

So no weight loss for this week. Depending on which day to look at I even gained *grimmace*

Otherwise This Sunday we went for a mountain bike ride on a rails to trails trail down at Ashland City. It was 8miles in total and was a fun relaxing ride. It took us about an hour to do.

We also visited 2 Cycle shops. Trace Bikes and Halcyon bikes, halcyon being really cool in that it is all used bikes and range to 80's styles. Jen picked up a super cool pair of gloves for the bargain price of 10 dollars.

Weekly Updates

Well it has certainly been a week to remember. Things seem to have been going at break neck pace and up untill today I had not worked out since Monday. Jen and Reggie came down to Nashville and picked me up from work. First we visited Cumberland Transit, what Reggie would call a mom n pop outdoor store (for us a bike store). Our goal for the evening was to look for a bike shirt for Jen and to look at pedal extras and bike computers (with Cadence ) for our bikes. After visiting here we crossed the street and visited The Bike Pedlar. In both locations we could not find acceptable accessories. No Red bike shirts for Jen and the only Cadence computers we could see were the Catseye CC-RD200 which knowing I could buy them for 34 dollars on Amazon were not acceptable to buy at 50 dollars. Before heading to our final destination we stopped off at the Bombay Palace for dinner. Sad to say I did not keep to my low carb diet on Thursday but that the food was amazing, coming a close second to the Tandoor here in Clarksville (NOTHING has beaten the tandoor in the US for a good curry so far). For our final destination we headed to REI armed with 7 dollars in dividends (a lot less than the 70 odd we were expecting but didn't get because Jens bike was on sale at the bargain price of approx 700 dollars WTF - partially softened by a discount coupon for REI.com) and a 20 percent off 1 item coupon. After a bit of searching I found the toe clips shown below for 5 dollars each (even cheaper than Amazon)
I grabbed two for our bikes. No luck on the Cadence computers the catseye was still 50 and a Sigma wireless I saw for $60 was selling for $90 at REI and damn them if they don't price match. Jen had waaaay better luck though. She hit the Jackpot and found her Jersey. (shown below) and I decided to leave the cadence computers and buy online so we could use the discounts. We saved over 20 dollars on the sale which was excellent.

On this same day as Jen was leaving to go to Reggies we had a visitor. Of the four legged variety. It was a stray puppy and pretty young. We named him charlie while he stayed with us and we proceeded to try first to find an owner then find a home. None of the people we know wanted a dog but we were lucky enough to find Precious Friends Puppy Rescue which is a no kill shelter that will find him a nice home with peeps to love on him (plus I donated 75 bucks to help with his vet and grooming bills). If you want a loving cocker spaniel who is good around dogs and cats get in contact with them cause he is up for adoption people. Who cant love this face

Saturday was a weird day. I forgot to eat till about 4pm... I got up did a few things then studied for a final. Finished studying and took the final (got a 90) by this time it was hitting 2pm and I pottered around and realised and said to Jen I thought I hadnt eaten. Man did she look at me funny. We put the toe clips on the bikes, added the saddle bag to Jens bike, raised my seat and took the bikes out to test the clips. One circuit of the sub division (0.75 miles) later and we were both happy with the result.

Sunday was the big test for the clips though. We met up with Reggie and took the bikes for a 10 mile run. First thing I noticed was that with the seat higher my leg muscles no longer get sore plus it feels more comfortable. Also we were able to do our trip with very few stops. Route taken is shown below.

View Larger Map

Weight for this week :- 293lbs
Total lost since I started keeping track :- 16 lbs

Workout

Ok so 2 posts in one day. last post was too damned long *grin*. Update on health matters. I have personal trainer tonight (edit: he called out sick - Personal Training rescheduled till Tuesday) and worked out last night - Jen and I played about 40 mins or racquetball, worked out legs for about 30 mins then finished with 4 laps on indoor circuit - 2 walking, 2 running

Weight post tomorrow.