Mark's got too fat blog

This weigh in hits a lot of goals / milestones:

1) - Lost 5 Stone in total.
2) - Healthy BMI
3) - Just started to weear 30" Jeans

My BMI works out as follows:

Height: 5 feet, 7.5 inches
Weight: 161 pounds

Your BMI is 24.8, indicating your weight is within the normal range for adults of your height.

That 1/2 inch makes all the difference! I used the CDC BMI Calc.

My new Goal is to lose 7 lb more before 22/07/2006. I may not be able to make this - 2 lb a week is ambitous this far into my weight loss, but its worth a try. I think I have 7-10lb to go before the love handles are gone - MUST do a body fat % measure again.

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Posted by Mark at 9:14 am | 3 comments

Week | Weight | Loss | Total loss
Week 0 - 167 lb
Week 1 - 167 lb (-0 lb)
Week 2 - 163 lb (-4 lb) (-4 lb)
Week 3 - 163 lb (-0 lb) (-4 lb)
Week 4 - 161 lb (-2 lb) (-6 lb)

2lb loss is enough for me :-)

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Posted by Mark at 9:12 am | 0 comments

Week | Weight | Loss | Total loss
Week 0 - 167 lb
Week 1 - 167 lb (-0 lb)
Week 2 - 163 lb (-4 lb) (-4 lb)
Week 3 - 163 lb (-0 lb) (-4 lb)

No loss this week :-(. WOnder if this means a good loss next week?

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Posted by Mark at 1:19 pm | 0 comments

The weekend went well - Saturday was spent walking in the lakes - covering 11 miles with around 3000ft of climbing. My legs still hurt, and I did get a bit sunburned, but I can now keep up with everyone on the climbs. I am still slow coming down hill, and I need to work on my flexibility for this.

Ate out for sunday lunch, but cut back in hte evening so should be on target for the week calorie wise.

This week I probably wont be riding in to work - 50mph winds are forecast, so some extra cardio sessions in the gym or swimming pool may be called for.

The weigh in is tomorrow.

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Posted by Mark at 9:10 am | 1 comments

Went to the gym for the second time last night, and rode in on Wednesday. I decided not to ride in today, as my legs are a bit caned, and I have a 10-12 mile high level walk on tomorrow in the Lake District - will be doing a 12 mile walk tomorrow. Eatings been pretty good as well, so combined with a good weekend, I am hopeful of another good week.

Theres been some changes over at the diet HQ - Colin has brought the diet chanell on board as a sponsor. I have yet to make up my mind about this - the cynical side of me sees it as a link building effort. The prizes dont really interest me, so I wont be posting links to the diet channel on my entries just yet.

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Posted by Mark at 9:40 am | 0 comments

I have a couple of milestones coming up very soon -
1) Healthy BMI - My BMI is around 25.2 at the moment, so a few more pounds should make me officially healthy (until I start on a muscle building mission)
2) 5 Stone lost - only 2 pounds to go to this goal.

In terms of Goals, I wanted to lose 2 lbs a week for 6 weeks - so far I have lost 4 pounds in 2 weeks, so I am on for this Goal. Went to the gym yesterday, and have cycled in today, so everthings on plan. At the end of the 6 week challenge, I am off to France / Belgium / Holland for a weeks camping. No set plans and I will be driving, so we can pretty much pick and choose where we want to go.

After that, my goal is 10% body fat, or when I can see my abs. Not entirly sure what weight that is, I will have to measure my BF% again soon.

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Posted by Mark at 9:30 am | 0 comments

A good week :-)

Week 0 - 167 lb
Week 1 - 167 lb (-0 lb)
Week 1 - 163 lb (-4 lb)

As predicted, last weeks lack of a loss translated into a good loss this week. I will continue with my program as is and hope for a 2lb loss in the coming week.

My weight loss graph returns:


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Posted by Mark at 9:29 am | 2 comments

The weekend went OK - had healthy options at a BBQ on Saturday night, after cycling 35 miles. Sunday I was out all day and had a nice Chicken in Dijonaise sauce for tea at a good pub. No desert or starters though, so everything worked out OK. No beer this weekend at all. We will see if this gets me the results I want.

Gym night tonight.

Total cycling for last week: 125 miles ;-)

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Posted by Mark at 9:17 am | 0 comments

This weekend, there will be no beer, so I might record a good loss this coming weigh in!

Feeling the cycling a bit now - my shoulders ache from forcing a singlespeed bike up a hill - got to get out of the saddle and honk. On the plus side, it stops you being lazy, gearing down and pootling up climbs, so my fitness will go up quite fast :-). I have done 97 miles since Sunday, so I will ride to the gym on Saturday morning - just to break the hundred miles in 7 days. I will continue to ride to work twice a week next week - and see how I feel. Hopefully, I can reach a point where I ride in most days, as this will save me £20 - £25 a week in fuel (a US gallon is $6.70 right now in the UK!).

Posted by Mark at 10:39 am | 0 comments

Finally remembered to weigh in - and I have not lost anything. D'oh!

Week 0 - 167 lb
Week 1 - 167 lb (-0 lb)

I will continue on the same plan as before - previous experience suggests that next week is likely to be a good loss. The next weigh in will be Tuesday to bring me into line with every one else.

I have just arrived at work after riding in again, and I am feeling good. 16.5 miles in 1 hour 18 mins.

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Posted by Mark at 9:05 am | 2 comments

Got up a bit late, and had to rush out. Will weigh in tomorrow :-).

On another note, I feel fine after riding to work yesterday, and will be riding in again tomorrow. I have also made a few changes to the blog, signing up to technorati,

Posted by Mark at 11:11 am | 0 comments

This is the first weigh in on my new challenge - and I forgot to do it this morning. I will have to do it tomorrow.

On a plus side, I rode the 15-16 miles into work today. Its mostly off road down the canal, with a bit of road (including a short, nasty climb) at the end. It took me 1 hour 30 today - my goal is to knock this down to 1 hour eventually. What didnt help today is I crashed on the canal and mashed my knee a bit - should pay more attention, out of practice on a rigid bike.

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Posted by Mark at 10:09 am | 0 comments

As usual, the weekend was not as good as it should have been - the food was pretty healthy, but I drank a fair few beers on Saturday night, not getting hammered, but certainly it was horribly close to 1000 calories extra. I really want to go at this last phase of weight loss full bore, so I will avoid going out next weekend. I have a friends birthday coming up, and that will involve a few drinks as well, so no more until then!

On Sunday I ate well and rode 30 miles on my new bike (work and back to check my route) - a single speed MTB built from mostly old bits I had / scrounged. With slicks on, it should allow me to commute the 16 miles to work in about an hour or so, starting tomorrow. The route is 90% off road on the towpath by the side of a canal, so the chances of being crushed by idiots in cars is tolerable. There is only one short sharp climb, near the end as you pull away from the canal, and I managed it with my one gear yesterday, so it should all be fine. The weather here is great now, so I am looking forward to my first go. I will be commuting twice a week.

Weigh in tomorrow.

Posted by Mark at 9:50 am | 0 comments

Last night I went for a run for the first time in a while. I was intending to do a Half Marathon, but as that's tomorrow I thing its off. The organizers have kindly deferred my entry until 2007 anyway.

My last attempt at training resulted in crippling shin splints, which also hurt when walking and mountain biking. This time, armed with new trainers and running off road on the canal, I made it through 20 mins of 1 min running and 1 min brisk walk with no shin pain. I intend to do this once a week and build up very slowly so that my legs toughen up.

My actual training plan goes like this:

Monday - Gym, 30 min HIT weight training session, 5 mins on bike to warm up / down
Tuesday - Cycle or swim or Rest
Wednesday - Gym, 30 min HIT weight training session, 5 mins on bike to warm up / down
Thursday - Running
Friday - Gym, 30 min HIT weight training session, 5 mins on bike to warm up / down
Saturday / Sunday - 15-30 mile off road cycle ride on one day, other day is rest. If no cycling, may do 10-15 mile hill walking.

The weight training sessions are based on HIT - High Intensity Training. I do 8 exercises, with one set of each exercise, performing at least 8 reps. I continue to failure - where I cannot move the weight any further at all. The trick is that you take 4 seconds to raise the weight and 4 seconds to lower the weight. This is pretty intense, making each set around a minute in length, and lifting slowly prevents you cheating and using momentum to lift.

A typical routine for me is:

Leg Curl
Leg Press
Calf Raise
Bench Press
Lat Pull down or Cable Row
Shoulder Press
Back Extension
Ab Crunch (Machine)

I try to adjust the exercises every month or so. I plan to design a program which leaves out leg work on Friday - as I am now running on Thursday and often cycling on Saturday, and I need more recovery time.

Posted by Mark at 9:54 am | 1 comments

I have just joined up with an ever expanding list of bloggers on a weight loss challenge. You can find all the info at The diet log, and a list of participants here.

Some support and maybe a little competition sounds good. I have been ultra good on my eating plan so far this week and went to the gym last night. I have had to stop wearing the ring I got for my 18th Birthday as it got so loose it was falling off - I shall put it in for alteration on Saturday.

I have a more detailed post on my goals and my story so far in the works as well - stay tuned.

Posted by Mark at 1:50 pm | 0 comments