Categories
Crossfit Daily Update Fitness Miscellaneous Ramblings Nutrition/Weight Loss Starting Strength

Still Alive…and Thriving

I’ve been meaning to write up a new post for so long, not because I feel the need to express myself on the topic of low-carb, LCHF, Paleo, or fitness anymore, but because I just went to update this site and saw that my last posts were mainly negative in terms of progress, and I didn’t want to give readers the impression that I had given up or that this wacky diet of mine doesn’t work : )

As you may have seen over the past year or so, there has been more and more research supporting lowered carbohydrate intake for health and weight loss. It seems that the message is finally out. When I started this “journey” five years ago, and particularly when I started writing this blog, I made a couple of mistakes. One of which was the tone I used in the writing. One reader wrote me to tell me to “quit mansplaining!” When I saw that I was quite ashamed and embarrassed, as I did not intend to come off as a know-it-all. But I did, so forgive my tone in many of the early posts. But, in my defense, think back just a few years ago and we were still faced with the following myths being considered conventional wisdom:

  • Butter is bad for you
  • Salt is bad for you
  • You have to drink 8+ glasses of water per day
  • Low carb diets or too much protein cause liver problems

Since that time, saturated fat has been the topic of hot debate as to whether it is healthy or not, with the research being pretty clear that it is health, or at least not unhealthy. The vegans/vegetarians are slowly losing their grip on the diet and fitness policies (yes, even fitness – they have successfully boondoggled most of America into thinking that slowly jogging around a track for X minutes a day is the ideal fitness routine….why? Because it requires no protein.). Anyways, you know where I stand on it.

Over these five years I spent the first two or three arguing with people who would, as I felt at the time, “have the gall” to question my diet when I clearly was losing weight and getting into the best health and shape of my life. Couldn’t they see/feel what I did? Hence my tone in those posts. After the first few years I stopped debating with people about diet completely. Not worth the time or frustration. One thing I’ve learned over the years is that debating diet and fitness with currently obese and/or unfit individuals is like debating the importance of going clean to a drug addict. They’ll argue you tooth and nail over it. With regards to diet and fitness, I’ve specifically found that overweight men over the age of 30 will insist they know what they’re talking about when it comes to diet and fitness. They will argue until they run out of breath (and they often do) that their approach is the best. Of course, they’re not actually following “their” approach but they apparently think about it. Nowadays, I simply avoid the subject. If I am really annoyed and don’t care for the person, then I’ll just look them up and down slowly and then reply, “How’s that diet working out for you?” Enough said.

My Current Status

Simply, I’m doing really well. I struggled for a long time with fitness – trying to dial in the right fitness program for me has been a constant and evolving struggle and will continue to be tweaked, but over the past year or so I’ve found what works and what doesn’t for me. More importantly, my weight is just about perfect. I am at 189lbs, which sounds a bit high to a lanky jogger type but I was blessed with a muscular, athletic build (large thighs, v-shaped upper body). Hypertrophy training (i.e., “bodybuilding”) is now my primary “workout” though I do sports as well, such as squash a couple of times per week, some basketball, and soon some soccer. I’m in the best shape of my life. And guess what? I eat a lot of carbs these days. My typical routine is to eat < 100g of carbs during the weekdays. Often less than that. One night per week, although I don’t plan on it, if I feel I need more carbs to fuel a more intensive workout, then I’ll indulge in something sweet or starchy. The weekends? I eat very low-carb during the day and pretty much whatever I want at night. Keep in mind that I don’t ever want bread or pasta, though I would give it a go if I desired it. But I enjoy beer and fried foods often on weekends. I’m able to do this now because I feel my body is working properly, and the weightlifting and squash really allow for this.

I’ll be turning 44 in a week. I started this way of eating back when I was 39. I somehow have been able to not only keep the ~80lbs off but continue to get in better shape. Not sure how I’ve accomplished it but I have. And I have learned a number of things through continual self-experimentation. Some quick thoughts:

  • Hypertrophy training is best for me. The “lift heavy” thing didn’t result in worthwhile change to me. What does “worthwhile” mean to me? Not adding more plates to the bar. It’s like when I talked about my now disdain for crossfit in an earlier post – I didn’t join a CrossFit box to increase my “Fran” time. I did it to lose weight and get in better shape. Neither happened as a result. So while I certainly do not regret doing CrossFit for 6 months, or my 2 years doing a heavy lifting (i.e., Starting Strength and/or StrongLifts) type routine, the bottom line is that after doing those protocols for long enough they did not result in worthwhile, positive change for me. Going to a 8-12 rep, higher-volume weight routine, coupled with some HIIT (in the form of squash primarily) has been the key for me.
  • I no longer buy into the bullshit that carbs are completely unnecessary. This is simply not the case for me. When I was obese and needed to lose weight, cutting out all carbs from non-vegetable sources was absolutely the best way to go. But once I lost the bulk of the excess weight and turned my attention to fitness goals, I unfortunately found out the hard way that our bodies were simply not meant to lift heavy things or run around at fast paces for extended periods of time without the extra fuel that carbohydrates provide. THIS DOES NOT MEAN THAT LOW CARB IS BAD. What I am saying is that, for me, low carb is the ideal weight loss approach. It is not the ideal diet for an athlete. If you are overweight, then I suggest you ditch your athletic goals and go on a very low carb diet until you lose the excess weight, then scale up your carb intake to fuel your athletic goals. There I go mansplaining again : ( …. but really, that’s what’s worked for me. And I learned this stuff the hard way. Believe me, I spent a year trying to do heavy lifting on low carb. Didn’t work.

So that’s it for now and probably for a while. I just wanted to give a quick update on my status. I’m alive, well, and thriving. I wish you all the same.

Categories
Daily Update

Danced with the Devil and I Got Burned

It’s supposed to be simple. Eat more calories than you “burn” and you gain weight. Eat less and you won’t. We’ve been told this so often that, no matter the evidence to the contrary, we refuse to question it. It’s like religion or politics. People mostly believe what they were raised to believe, and that’s that. Most people simply don’t question core beliefs.

You’d think I would know better. I’ve done self-experiments for years now – from caloric restriction, to high-fat/low-carb, to high-protein, etc. No exercise with diet, exercise with/without diet, 8+ hours sleep per night vs 6 hours, etc. I’ve done it. You’d think I’d know better. It pains me greatly to write that I have fucked up big time and went, in just about a month or two, from noticeably toned to a gut and flab all over. How did I do it? By falling back into the flawed approach of “I can have that small piece of cake, or that light beer with dinner, because I’ll still be eating less than X calories per day.”

2″ more of waistline and just flabzilla all over now as a result. It snuck up on me. Literally.

How It Happened

All this year I’ve been playing around with things like Carb Backloading, CarbNite, etc. Those types of carb refeeds/cycling can work for some people. I’m convinced of that. And I do see a value in a CarbNite like approach for me because I do lift heavy weights and especially now that I’m playing squash a couple of times per week.  I am pretty certain I should do a carb refeed once a week. But it can be a slipper slope. Here’s what happens, in chonological order:

1. Eat a junk food(s) or attend a happy hour and have a few beers, etc.

2. Wake up next day and notice a little extra energy. Feel more energized. Brain says, “Maybe I needed those extra calories. I workout so hard that I must not be eating enough to support it, and so this is my body telling me I need to treat myself more!”

3. Within a couple of days I add some more carbs into my diet, always replacing fat/protein calories with the carb calories, because everyone knows that it’s all about the calories! (bullshit!) Because I worked out extra hard the day before, I fall into the trap of thinking I can get away with it by ‘burning it off.’

4. After a couple of days of it I check the scale and mirror and don’t feel any fatter or weigh any more. I figure, “I got this! I can have my cake and eat it too!”

5. A week or so later I wake up to feel bloated, and notice that seemingly overnight my muscle tone is gone. Gone. I don’t feel as energetic.

That’s how it went. But this time it lasted over the course of a couple of months. Starting yesterday I went back to a pretty strict primal diet approach, limiting carbs to under 50g at least for a few days. I am more active now than ever before as I’ve started playing squash multiple times per week. That’s part of what caused the backslide – I figured I was playing such a grueling sport (and it is quite energy-intensive, trust me), that I could/should eat more to compensate. Maybe so but I now know my body and whether it’s a Snickers bar or too big of a sweet potato its the same effect – fat gain.

Next Steps

I’m on day two of a ‘detox’ (hate that word but you get the idea) from sugar/carbs. I’ll play squash twice per week, walk every day, and continue my fullbody weightlifting routine 2 or 3 times per week. I’ll be back to being pretty toned within a few weeks from now, so it’s not a big deal – it’s just so annoying.

So, as of yesterday, I weigh 198 pounds. I should be about 7 pounds less but even in my lean/toned days I wasn’t under 194. I’ll post back how I do over the next week or two.

Categories
Daily Update Fitness Nutrition/Weight Loss

Update – January 2014 – Happy New Year!

I guess I should start off by apologizing for not posting since October of last year, but my blog is no different than 99% of the other personal blogs out there: every post starts off with an apology for why they haven’t posted in forever, followed by a promise to post more often. : )

Regardless, let me update you on the important stuff.

My Diet

First off, let me be clear that I am using the term “diet” in the literal sense: a description of my day-to-day food consumption. I do not mean it in terms of a “Paleo” or “Atkins” or “Vegetarian” or any other type of “diet.”

I still eat a low-carb, high-fat, moderate protein diet. But the reality is, I do not track the fat or protein intake. And I only vaguely keep a mental note of the daily carb intake. I have a ‘no limit’ approach to healthy fats and protein. The latter, protein, can get overweight people in trouble as any excess is converted to glucose in the body, so I do not suggest that approach if you are trying to lose weight. Eat the protein you need, and no more. As for me, I am still weightlifting and have added one or two HIIT sessions per week using kettlebells/bodyweight exercises, so there’s no real restrictions for me regarding protein intake. I even drink a ‘protein’ shake every couple of days for fun.

I have relaxed my diet quite a bit, especially over the holiday season. With my favorite sports team having a fabulous season and 3 prime time games in a row, I treated myself to hot wings, beer, and a dessert of some sort on those nights. It was fun, I don’t regret it. The days of ‘regret’, and ‘guilt’, etc. in relation to food have been long gone for me. Food is and has been both a tool (to fuel my day) and a pleasure for me, and will likely continue to be based on my goals at any given time.

For breakfast, I often skip it these days. When I was trying to lose weight, especially in the beginning, I was eating a very large breakfast (3 or 4 eggs + bacon or sausage). Nowadays I usually am not hungry in the morning, so I don’t eat breakfast.

For lunch, most days, I eat a Big Ass Salad that is packed with tons of vegetables, along with a can of tuna. I load it with olive oil and some balsamic vinegar as well. These salads are huge – I prepare them in a big mixing bowl and am pretty stuffed after eating them!

For dinner, I make a meat and usually pair it with a vegetable but not always. I grill a lot, so throwing a package of chicken wings/thighs or a grass-fed steak on the grill is usually what I try to do, but with the recent winter freeze that isn’t as often an option lately. Also, the past couple of weekends I’ve spent Sunday afternoons preparing a mostly homemade tomato sauce/cacciatore (sp?) concoction. It is loaded with vegetables and spices, and then I pair that with either grass-fed beef meatballs or even just plain old sausages, etc. (While I try to eat the better quality meats I am not a stickler for it).

One probably bad habit of mine is nighttime snacking. I’d probably have a six-pack (abs!) if it weren’t for the nightly snack or some nuts, aged cheese, etc. Most nights I indulge in a glass of red wine as well.

My Weight

My weight has held steady for, really, the last year and a half. I’ve been between 185 and 195lbs. I’m 5’10 so that sounds heavy, but my measurements are excellent, and I have naturally large/muscular thighs (think football running back). The weightlifting has really helped in that regard. Prior to the weightlifting, I was ~188lbs and soft in the middle – kind of ‘skinny fat’ like you see on a lot of runners, with little muscle definition. Now I have pretty good definition in my upper body, and I have a “V-Shape” upper body now, where my lats/upper back/chest are wider than my waist, which is cool. I’m at 195lbs now and I estimate that I’ve put on about 5 to 7lbs of muscle in the past 6 months.

My Workouts

If you’ve read over this blog then you’ll see that when it’s come to exercise, I have struggled. Not in doing it – I have no problem with motivation. The problem is in the prescription. Like diet, I’ve found there are lots of inefficient or bad ways to achieve my goal: leaning out while building strength. Review google hits or ask 10 different personal trainers (and I estimate I have about that many over the past couple of years) and everyone has a different opinion.

I think a big problem with diet and exercise is that everyone naturally falls back to what worked for them when they were 25 (or younger). But those prescriptions did not work for me in my 40’s. Getting on a treadmill and running daily might result in 10 or 15lbs of weight loss, but won’t result in any muscle growth, and it doesn’t seem to work for long-term/large amount of weight loss. Just ask all of the fat people running marathons. The emaciated are up at the front of the pack, followed by a bunch of overweight people. Odd scene.

This past month I consulted with an excellent personal trainer who is very strength focused. He evaluated my progress with regards to my mobility, squat, etc. He basically recommended that I back off of the barbell squats and focus on kettlebell squats. So I started doing a 2 or 3x per week HIIT session that looks like this:

Repeat 5x (no rest/stopping in-between movements):

  • 15 two-handed kettlebell swings
  • 10 push-ups
  • 10 single-arm kettlebell swings (total of 20)
  • 10 kettlebell goblet squats
  • 2 minutes rest

The first two sets are fine but the remaining ones are killer : )

Doing this routine has really helped with my weightlifting. I do weightlifting routine once or twice per week now. I’ll try to post more about my thoughts on why later. I also walk daily.

So that’s it. 2013 was a good year but a horrible year in terms of injuries. I battled an achilles injury twice (I have a separate blog about that). And I was diagnosed with hearing loss in my one ear at the 4khz range. I’m told it is permanent. And I am pretty certain that it is due to listening to headphones/loud music over the years, especially the last two while walking. I’ve been warned to discontinue the headphone use or the hearing loss will get worse. Sucks.

Aside from that, all is good.

 

Categories
Daily Update Nutrition/Weight Loss

A Little Rant…

So yesterday started a renewed emphasis on eating clean and getting back on track. The other day I wrote a post with a title saying I was fat again….well, that’s not really true. But I have gained about 3 or 4 pounds. I’d maintained aSome diet gurus talk about a 5lb swing being fine, but I know my body and the fact is, it’s gotten soft over the past month. Mostly due to my diet slipping – it just seems like the last few months have been a constant pressure to eat shit on a daily basis. I know my family and others mean no harm, but you’d think after almost 3 years of my eating this way, and the amazing success I’ve had, that they’d let me be. Last night I got a somewhat snide comment at a friends’ house, where she asked, “You still not eating carbs?” in a somewhat negative tone.

Part of the problem is that I’ve been eating fairly stringent Primal/Paleo for a long time now, but I have been for the past year doing it in a very unorthodox, and calculated way: instead of mixing in good carbs (white rice, sweet potato, etc.) for glycogen restoration (which is necessary if you work out hard), I have been ‘carb-loading’ once a week on a junk meal. So it sends mixed signals to my family, who see me annoyed when I refuse to eat pasta but then the next night I’m sitting there eating ice cream with them. When I say I was carb-loading in a ‘calculated’ way, I know damn well it’s not optimal. But my rationale was (and, if I continue to workout hard, is) that it’s okay. Problem is, with the bad achilles, I stopped working out hard for a while, aside from the weekly soccer match.

Back to my point…What bothers me most is this:

I could care less what anyone else eats, yet everyone seems to analyze what I eat.

I get it. They’re simply waiting for me to ‘fall off the wagon’ and balloon up again. Every dieter fails. I am the first to tell people that. It’s because they start one way and then think once the weight is off they can eat differently. But how many years do I have to succeed at this, to maintain the weight loss successfully, before people will simply let me be and stop busting my balls about how I eat? Would they do it if I said I was allergic to wheat/gluten/dairy/whatever?

As I typed the above sentence it struck me that I need to give serious thought to that idea. Maybe I’ll make up a fake “went to the doctor and he tested me and I’m gluten intolerant” story…

On a positive note…I weighed in at 192.2 today, which is as heavy as I’ve been in a long time. I maintained at 188/189 for about 6 or 7 months pretty effortlessly. But with the carb-loading and especially with the achilles injury stopping all activity for a while and most recently a focus on endurance sports (running, and soccer) and not on strength or cross-training, I’m feeling an increase in body fat for sure. So time to tighten things up, both with my eating and my exercise.

With this year’s Girls On The Run 5k finished (I ran it last year and this year with my daughter, who is required to run with an adult partner), I’m through with running for exercise. I knew before-hand that it wasn’t a good idea, for a whole lot of reasons, but actually *doing it* and feeling the effects of it over the last 2 months proved it to me: running did nothing for my VO2 MAX, nor my body fat/weight, and completely sapped away my muscle tone. In fact, the only good thing it did for me was enable me to run longer distances, which is about as useful a goal to me as the whole CrossFit whiteboard/”PR” thing: I could give two shits. So running is pointless. Am I surprised at that? Of course not: look at your distance runners – they all have bodies that look like shit.

So today I started the clean-up process by writing up a shopping list of clean foods and stocking up for the week. I’m going to do some walking tonight, then tomorrow a strength/cross-training routine, then soccer Thursday, and then a ‘play’ day Friday, and then decide on a fitness approach for the next quarter. In the meantime, my focus is on cleaning up my diet. I also am committed to blogging more, even if it is just a short, stream-of-consciousness rant like this one. So watch out : )

Categories
Daily Update Inspiration Miscellaneous Ramblings

I’m Fat Again, But At Least the Achilles is Healed

I’ve been dreading writing this post. But after a 45 minute walk at my local track, where my usual “I’ve got life by the balls!” feeling was trumped by a pity party, it’s time I step up and admit it.

I’ve let junk food kick my ass. I went from feeling lean and muscular to sloppy fat, seemingly overnight.

Not sure if this post will come across as tongue-in-cheek but I assure you I’m not feeling very witty or funny. I’m downright sad and angry at myself.

A Slow, Downward Slide

To recap (for the hundredth time, but for those of you new to my story…) – I started eating a low-carb, loose Primal diet about 2.5 years ago. A year later, I’m down ~65lbs. In total, I’m down about 71lbs. From ~260lbs down to a steady 189lbs. It was great. I never felt better. My energy level went through the roof, and mostly remains that way to do this day in spite of recent mistakes. Of course, any of you who have read my prior posts know I’ve done everything in my power to screw it up. Like beating myself to a pulp doing that stupid ass CrossFit, or overdoing the stretching to the point of ripping a hole in my achilles tendon, in hopes that I could finally someday achieve a proper depth back squat, etc.

But in spite of my idiotic and obsessive compulsion towards achieving some serious level of fitness, things have been mostly good. Still a struggle to keep eating ‘clean’ while surrounded by continuous temptation and flat out scorn/disgust by those around me it seems. Allison over at PaleoNonPaleo said it perfectly in her latest post:

“I know your family thinks you’re crazy. I know you feel completely alone. I know you feel like it’s never, ever going to work.”

I never let that other people’s attitudes about this stuff bother me before. Well, it did. But I ignored it. For a while, I was right out front telling everyone and anyone about how to lose weight and feel great through Paleo/Primal, and particularly the low carb version of it. Over the past 6 months or so I’ve given up on that. People don’t want to hear it. And it’s always the obese guys who will want to debate with me about it, so I tend to keep quiet now when people ask me about diet. Some people just don’t want to hear it.

I also started questioning things about my approach to diet. Honestly, I’m really annoyed/sickened by the money grab that is Paleo these days. So many bloggers, podcasters, presenters, etc. coming out of the woodwork and Paleo is just so commercialized now. I guess that’s a good thing but I think it will ultimately lead to its demise as another ‘fad’. Someone will come up with a new name for the same way of eating and it will be over. It’s inevitable. But, back to my downfall: So thinking I had my body hacked and this thing called diet by the balls, late last year, sometime before Thanksgiving, I started ‘treating’ myself to a weekly splurge dessert. Often a pint of Ben & Jerry’s. Yeah, I know what you’re thinking. And as I type this, I’m thinking the same thing. As I’ve done for a long time now, I would try some new foods and then see how it impacted my weight. And, surprisingly, the weekly splurge treat didn’t have any effect. Then the holidays come around and a series of corporate happy hours/parties full of beer, then family parties full of beer and what-not, then the holiday dinners and the pressure there, because God forbid I say “no thank you” to some in-law’s shitty food and not receive a look of scorn…

Too Much of This Crap
Too Much of This Crap…and it didn’t even taste good.

All the while, I started indulging more and more. My occasional treats turned into twice a week, then more. About a month ago I even started partaking in the occasional grains, cornbread at a local BBQ place to be exact, for the first time in a long time.  All the while, I would check the scale and I wasn’t gaining weight. And I didn’t feel or look like I was getting fatter. And my waist size was no bigger and in fact, over time, was still shrinking (I’m now down to a 34). So I think I’ve got life good: I’m able to eat whatever I want, so long as I mostly avoid the grains. Mind you, I was still eating clean for breakfast (eggs, sausage, bacon) and lunch (salad). But because of the achilles issues I stopped lifting weights. And the cardio training took it’s place…..

About 6 weeks ago I got the go-ahead from my physical therapist to start running, in order to build up my legs for an eventual 5k race that I needed to run with my daughter. That race was this past Sunday and we did well. All the while during the training leading up to this race, I fell back into the mistaken mindset of, “I’m burning all these calories with all this long-distance running, so I can eat more junk!” And for a while it seemed I could. And then a couple of weeks ago I woke up one morning and went to brush my teeth and looked in the mirror and it’s man-boob city. And a gut that seemingly popped up out of nowhere. I felt fat again for the first time in a long time. And then my newly purchased Summer wardrobe of shorts and shirts in a size that was just right before, were now a bit tight.

After the 5k
After the 5k

I finished the 5k and am glad I did it. But I now know that Mark Sisson and so many others were right when they talk of how useless cardio training is when it comes to fitness and/or weight loss/maintenance. It has robbed me of the muscle tone I had, seemingly overnight. The cardio thing is complete bullshit. Will I ever run another 5k? Yeah, absolutely. I will probably start running them pretty often as a ‘fun time’. But will you ever catch me jogging distance at the track or training FOR a 5k by jogging? Hell no. And the sad part is that I knew better…

Starting now, I have to go strict on a 30 day challenge. It will be difficult. But I don’t have a choice. I’ve got to nip this thing in the bud. I’m seriously thinking about a Whole30. And back to the weight training, but this time I’m going to take it slow and focus just as much on mobility. Oh, and in case you still think I’m not completely nuts, I got a doozy for you: I recently bought a 1 month unlimited pass to a local Hot Yoga studio. LOL. I plan on going there for the first time this week and will surely blog about it. : )

The Achilles Is Healed!

On to a happy update…the achilles is healed! The physical therapy, specifically Active Release Therapy (ART), was what did the trick. Doing eccentric calf raises helped too I’m sure, but not until I found a physical therapist that understood that those like myself with insertional achilles tendonosis need to *alleviate* the stretched tendon and not stretch it out worse. A combination of some rest followed by heel inserts, along with the ART is what worked for me. But I’m not completely out of the woods – my other achilles has been sore recently, from the distance running. So I have started doing the calf raises and will be doing some serious mobility work to ward off messing that tendon up too.

Categories
Daily Update Fitness Starting Strength

What I’m Up To (and Insertional Achilles Tendinosis)

Been a while since I posted. I’ve got good news and bad news to report.

The Bad News

Back in the Fall I received a curious email from a post on Sportsvite. Sportsvite is a place where you can find sport teams to join, and teams can look for players. Most of the teams are former or current college athletes who are looking for athletes of similar skill level, be it soccer, basketball, baseball, etc. I signed up a year or two ago and forgot about it. Every few months I’d get an email from someone begging me to be on their hockey team or softball team, and when I’d respond with “I’m in my 40’s and have never played that sport competitively, but I’m in decent shape given my age and will hustle”, I’d always get the same response back, “No thanks. We’re looking for experienced athletes.” Amazing how their original tone of desperation changes so quickly.

Eventually I got an email asking me if I’d be interested in playing soccer. The first time I ignored it. A few months later I got a similar email from the same person. This time I responded stating that I’d never played but would love to. To my surprise, I was told to show up at a regional soccer training center and be ready to play. No experience necessary. I show up and the place is fabulous, and next thing I know I’m on a high-quality turf field with a bunch of 25 year olds. My team sucked and we never won. The other teams were filled with former college soccer players. Regardless, I loved it. So much so that when the season ended I made an inquiry with the center asking them if they have a league for older players. Sure enough, they have a “Men’s Over 35” league. Perfect! So I sign up for the ‘house team’. We suck, but it’s a good group of guys. Problem is, I was only able to play twice before having to temporarily retire…(more on that in a moment).

In the Over 35 league I was one of the faster players. Skill-wise I was average, on my team (again, since this was the ‘house’ team we’re not talking all stars here – anyone who is good eventually gets scooped up by an established team). Anyone who knows me or has read my posts regarding Crossfit, knows I have too much ambition and competitiveness for my own good. So I decide one day that, in addition to the Starting Strength program I was doing, I would kick up the cardio big-time to help my soccer game. So, after doing that day’s Starting Strength routine (heavy barbell back squats, some presses, and power cleans), I jump on a treadmill and ramp up the incline. That day I forgot my normal ‘running shoes’ (a pair of minimalist but still pretty well padded sneakers). A couple of minutes into the jog I feel a slight pain building in the back of my right ankle/heel. Like an idiot I keep jogging. About 8 minutes in I know it’s getting worse and worse and is not normal, so I stop. That night it got worse. And for the next 2 weeks it didn’t get any better at all. I start looking around on the internet to figure out what it could be. Basically, my achilles was sore as hell. Especially in the morning but pretty much all day. The only time, during that 2 weeks, where it didn’t hurt was when I played a soccer match (bad idea), because I stretched the living shit out of my legs/ankles before playing. Looking on the internet the prognosis was sketchy. Basically, stretch and stretch and hope to hell it goes away. Eccentric stretches/strengthening, etc. I decide this is too important to screw around with and I go see a sports foot/ankle specialist. He x-rays it on the spot and then tells me I have insertional achilles tendinosis, and says it’ll probably be fine in a few weeks but if not call him and we’ll try physical therapy.

A week later and it’s no better. I am concerned and call and tell him let’s not wait – let’s get the ball rolling on the physical therapy. He agrees and so I started that a week ago today, going twice per week. Every day since then I’ve been doing a serious mobility routine, which I’ll share in a separate post. Honestly – after a week of it I’m thrilled in that my squat depth and mobility overall have improved immensely. But my achilles is still sore when I first wake up in the morning, or after sitting for a little while and then standing. It’s not pain – it’s a soreness, and it goes away after a few minutes.

So What’s the Good News?

The good news is that the physical therapist did quite a bit of diagnostics on me and told me what I have been told by numerous specialists/coaches already: I just may be the most inflexible dude on the planet, and it’s holding me back physically. I told him I’d been doing a lot of barbell squats, etc., and after struggling for close to a year now in trying to get my squat depth below parallel (or even parallel comfortably) he is now working with me to fix it. And a week later my squat depth is drastically improved. Last summer, when starting Crossfit, I did 50+ squats per day (usually more) for 60 days just to try to get it right. I saw some improvement at first but then nothing. A week of these wacky stretches he’s got me doing and I am not way better than ever and am optimistic.

During today’s PT session I made it clear to him that I’m getting very worried that this achilles problem is not going away or getting better. I *love* the stretches and am back to working out hard (no running, which is fine with me) so it’s no longer holding me back from anything aside from soccer. He assures me that it will go away but will take time – likely a few months. That sucks. I was originally told that this was a “couple of weeks” injury. He didn’t make me feel any better when he said I’m one of the lucky ones and that my injury isn’t anywhere near as severe as most who have it. I guess I should be happy about that.

That’s all for today. I have a few post ideas and will write more this week. Been a while.

Some miscellaneous stuff

Had some emails asking me about my weight. Honestly, I think they’re from angry vegans who hate this low carb/pro dietary fat approach and want to “expose it” as some kind of fraud. I’m happy to report that I’m holding steady at 189lbs. It fluctuates of course, but always within 5lbs. I took about 5 weeks off from any exercising due to the achilles problem and my weight didn’t budge, but I lost a lot of muscle tone. And I just felt like garbage. That’s the main reason I work out – to feel better. It certainly doesn’t do anything positive for me in terms of my diet and, in fact, makes my eating tricky. I have to make sure I have the fuel needed without overdoing it. And when you exercise hard you get hungrier – your body wants to compensate. I’m working to get that back now.

How is Starting Strength Going?

Let me say this: Starting Strength is great. And if I can get my mobility/squat depth right, I’ll be doing those lifts again. But I now have to spend roughly 40 minutes on just the physical therapy stretches/movements daily (I’m supposed to do them 3x per day!) that I’ve decided to take a break from SS for now. Twice a week, starting today, I’m going to do a full-body kettlebell routine. For once, I’m going to pick something for which my body type is seemingly perfect for – swinging kettlebells.

My PRs on SS are presently at:

Back Squat: 205lbs x 3 (I could go heavier but I have no spotter,and when you can’t get to parallel in your squat it’s downright not good to have that much weight on your back)

Deadlift: 255lbs. I am certain I could get to 300 quickly but, believe it or not, there just aren’t enough weights at my gym! At least not all in one place. But, no excuses, I need to man up and setup in the main weight room area. It’s full of machines and so people will get annoyed with me for taking up a big space by deadlifting, but oh well.

Power Clean: 135lbs – but my form was off. I’ve since reset my form (after watching more video tutorials about it) and have been going at around 100lbs with perfect form.

Like I said, I’m going to take a break from a strict SS program for a while.

How’s Your Cholesterol/Lipid Test Results Nowadays?

I’ve had some emails from readers who came to this site by way of one of its more popular posts – my lipid test results from a while back. Everyone wants to know: how are your lipid test results after doing low-carb long-term?

I haven’t had them tested since late last year, but they were similar from the original post except one thing: my HDL went up, which is fabulous. I’m now in the 70s. I meant to post the complete results at the time but forgot. Definitely will next time.

 

Categories
Crossfit Daily Update

Yes, I’m Still Alive!

First off, I apologize for not posting in a while. This blog now gets an average of 130 unique visitors per day, and based on some of the emails I’ve gotten recently asking me if I’m still alive, I wanted to get the word out about how things are going.

I’m Alive and Thriving! : )

I actually had a post outlined and half-written about a recent business trip to attend a conference. Mainly the post is about the types of food offered during the included breakfast/lunches and then dinner while on the road. I’ll get it posted soon. In the meantime, an update:

My Weight

Today I broke a milestone that I was beginning to think I would never hit and really wasn’t bothering if I didn’t, but it sure is great to have achieved it: I got on the scale this morning and weighed in at 189.8 pounds. I got under the 190 mark! That is the first I’ve seen that on the scale since I was 18 and in the Navy. I’m 5’10” and have big thighs, so while I haven’t been ‘fat’ in many months (aside from being able to pinch a half an inch of visceral belly fat), being in the 180’s is probably ideal for my body type. A month ago I was weighing in around 197. Earlier posts reflect that I was hanging out in the 191 to 192 range for months and then, as soon as I started CrossFit (see below), I quickly tacked on about 7 pounds and stayed there. I attribute the weight gain to muscle increase but possibly also because I was eating more to compensate for the increased workload, even though I likely didn’t need to.

Then, at the start of this month, my CrossFit box started a September “Zone Challenge” – basically a large number of folks, including myself, got weighed and then calipered by the coach, and then given a body fat percentage. I was utterly dismayed to receive a 24% body fat number. While it’s better than the ~40% I was at less than 2 years ago, it’s still disappointing. I attended a seminar at the box about The Zone diet. I’d of course heard about Zone before – it’s one of the few diets that has maintained a loyal following for a long time. Based on my knowledge of nutrition in relation to weight loss, it looks like a fairly effective plan, but I had two concerns that steered me clear of it:

1. I lost and have maintained 70 pounds on a low-carb Paleo approach. No way will I change things up and wind up jeopardizing that.

2. The Zone appears to me to be a big pain in the ass. Everything gets measured. Everything.

I’m sure Zone is great, but I decided to stick with what my low-carb Paleo approach but do a Whole30. As with the last time I tried a Whole30, I failed. But, I did get to about 2 weeks before failing : ) How did I fail? Alcohol (while out of town at a work conference), and dairy. I find it impossible to avoid dairy completely. BUT…I’ve successfully avoided the blatant sugar bomb ‘treats’ that I was indulging in 2 to 3 times per week: an ice cream, or a banana-laden smoothie, etc. I cut that out for this month.

But I wasn’t losing any weight at all the first week and then, the past 2 weeks, I suddenly started dropping weight again. Why? I attribute it to one thing: I’ve purposefully de-stressed.

Cutting Back the CrossFit for Now

I’ve been *very* stressed from work the past 4 or 5 months. I can’t go into the reasons why here obviously. Regardless, things have chilled a bit. I know this sounds like whiny bullshit and goes counter to conventional wisdom, but I honestly think that 3x per week CrossFit was also not doing me good. I was physically just not able to do CrossFit 3 times per week *properly*, so I switched back to twice per week. Now, when I go those two times per week, I’m truly performing at my best and at the right intensity, whereas before I was killing myself both physically and mentally and still not giving it my all. More on that in another post, but let’s just say that a few weeks ago I was seriously considering quitting CrossFit but now I’m starting to really see and feel the benefits and have broken through the ‘mental wall’ that I had built up for myself in regards to pride/competition.

I still maintain a 3x per week membership, but I’ll only go that third time if I am feeling great and motivated. Otherwise, my goal is to keep building muscle and aerobic capacity and, eventually, start incorporating in that third WOD per week.

That’s it for now.

Categories
Daily Update

Recap of Beginning CrossFit, and Paleo Low Carb Weight Maintenance

This is more of an update on how I’m doing post, as it’s been a while.

Weight has gone up some since starting CrossFit. I’m around 195, up from 191. I would be concerned about that if it weren’t for the noticeable loss of body fat as well as the addition muscular definition and lean mass. That’s after just a couple of weeks of CrossFit, doing two WODs per week. I’ve surprisingly ‘leaned out’ pretty quickly – noticeably in my belly. My shoulders have toned up as well. I had some folks who haven’t seen me in a while come up to me recently and comment that my overall build has transitioned to more of an athletic one, versus just a ‘not fat anymore’ one.

But it’s not all been positive. I’ve struggled mightily with aches and pains. And I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that I’m concerned that during one of these WODs I’m gonna pop a tendon or dislocate a shoulder or something. After not doing anything physically active for the majority of my life to then, over the last year and a half doing the occasional medium-intensity/cardio stuff like orienteering, or running in that 5k, my body just isn’t able to cope yet with the rigors of a hardcore CrossFit routine. I think I’ve been too ambitious with regards to my approach to the WODs and activity outside of the WODs. My body was so sore and I just felt lethargic and shitty in-between WODs. That’s not cool. But the strained hamstrings, starting with just one and then the other, were the final straw. To the point where I had to take this past week off from CrossFit. I didn’t want to, believe me. Admittedly, my brain was telling me to lay off, but my ambition was telling me to push through and go, even though BOTH hamstrings were stinging and obviously strained. Fortunately, the decision was made for me as a relative asked me to help him work on remodeling his kitchen, so I took a couple of days off from work and spent them tearing up a combination tile (including concrete backerboard and old linoleum underneath) and hardwood floor. It was pretty arduous work. Then the family was off to Hershey Park for a couple of days (no, I didn’t eat much of the chocolate). Then back for another day of kitchen remodeling, this time removing 30+ year old wallpaper. Anyone that’s ever done that knows it absolutely sucks. But it wasn’t all that physically demanding compared to the other stuff. There was no way I could fit a WOD in this week even if my hamstrings weren’t yelling at me.

Yesterday I was tempted to go running or do some type of workout, but decided to take one more day to let the hamstrings heal. Plus, honestly, I was burnt out. So today I’m doing absolutely nothing, as evidenced by two blog posts in one day!

Tomorrow I’ll start back up again and do the WOD, and then tomorrow evening there is a nutritional seminar at the box. I’m pretty sure it will likely be an intro to Paleo, which I certainly don’t need, but I am the type that learns something no matter how many times I go to a class, listen to a topic, etc. Plus, I love meeting other people who geek out on this stuff like I do. I will have some questions regarding ‘fueling up’/post-workout recovery strategies, etc. But my guess is that the other participants will be completely new to paleo and thus I’ll step aside and let them ask the, “But don’t you need healthy whole grains for fiber?” and “Don’t you need to eat pasta or oatmeal before a 5k?” type questions.
So that’s where it’s at these days in regards to CrossFit and my weight. This coming week will be pivotal – I am hoping that this week will see a reduction in the time it takes to recover from the WODs. If not, I’ll question whether it is worth it. I am also going to start trying to think through the approach so that I’m not dying one round in anymore. I’m so weak and inflexible (physically!) compared to everyone else at the box that I have been reluctant to scale *too* much but I’m going to take it easier this week as much as is possible given the situation.
Lastly – I’ve secured a new domain name: paleolearning.com
It makes sense. With the transition from fat guy to not fat guy to now athletic/CrossFitting guy (hopefully, eventually), I am squarely in the Paleo (really Primal, as I still do some dairy) camp and ultimately I think that’s where everyone should be aiming to be diet-wise. Not to take anything away from the pure low carb approach – it is absolutely essential to losing and maintaining weight loss and overall health. But, for me, food quality is now as important as carb counts.
Categories
Daily Update Uncategorized

Update – Changed Gyms, Then Quit Gyms

It’s been a month since my last post, and I apologize for that!

So what’s been happening?

Well, let me start by saying that I have not regressed, and have noticed a marked improvement in my overall health, as judged by the simple question I ask myself multiple times per day now – “How do I feel?”

The answer? I have been feeling GREAT! I have been for well over a year now. But I assure you it’s not just because I dropped ~65 pounds and have effortlessly maintained it for the past 6 or 7 months. It’s because I’m constantly tinkering and improving my lifestyle choices around:

  • Diet/nutrition
  • Fitness activities
  • Daily activities
  • Sleep
  • Stress levels

A month ago, I was focused 100% on really hitting the weight room hard. I cancelled the membership to a nice but pricey local squash club (I was playing squash for a while but my partner, once I got good enough to start winning more than half the time, punked out on me and decided he didn’t want to play anymore). I switched to another local gym that was half the price and offering a 30 day trial. The weightlifting area of this new gym was far superior, and I was very enthusiastic to start doing the Stronglifts routine. Problem was…I learned that I just can’t do a barbell squat. I know the proper form, but physically my body is not flexible enough to do it correctly, or even close. It is downright painful. So I switched to doing body squats, under the guidance of Mark Sisson’s site/fitness recommendations. While I don’t get as low in the body squat as I’d like, it’s getting better. And what I found was that, particularly with the mostly great weather here now, I just don’t need a gym. With constant baseball/softball games (3 days a week) that I have to bring my kids to at a local park with an awesome track, fields, etc., there’s just no reason to pay money to a gym.

So I canceled the membership trial (had to jump through some hoops – boo to you, SWEAT Fitness). I’ve been more active the last month just keeping busy with the usual stuff. So much so, that I try to avoid just ‘sitting at a computer’ much. Hence, no blogging. And my day job has been so hectic, so busy, that I can’t even sneak in a post during the day.

Enough with the Whining…What Have You Done This Month?

Sleep – I’ve been making sure to get to bed by 10pm. Usually I can’t sleep until closer to 11, but that’s okay. I’m getting 8+ hours per night. I’ve noticed a definite better overall feeling when doing this.

Introduced “Safe Starches” and Greek Yogurt – when I was still weightlifting, I introduced a routine of eating a big ass sweet potato within an hour of finishing a heavy lifting routine. That infusion of quality starch/carbs did wonders and my body tolerated it just fine (gas aside). Since I’m not doing the heavy barbell work anymore, I don’t need to eat them and haven’t, but have added more quality carb sources like greek yogurt (the Fage brand, with some honey squeezed into it, is incredibly good). It’s hard to find the full fat greek yogurt (or any full fat yogurt for that matter), but it’s worth the hassle. It is great tasting stuff – with the honey it is basically a desert and tastes like ice cream. Love it.

My weight is at 193. I’m guessing I’m in the 16% bodyfat range, but have no way to test that. I haven’t weighed myself very often – maybe once every 10 days. I am so active, and so in tune with my body, that I just don’t worry about it. At all.

So that’s the latest.

Categories
Daily Update Fitness

Success in Using Performance-Enhancing Drugs

Just kidding, but perhaps, based on Dr. Attia’s latest post, where he asks the question, “What do anabolic steroids, EPO, and carbohydrates have in common?”, I think he’s onto something.

Do we need carbohydrates to sustain an exercise routine?

The above question is what this post is about. And, for me, I must sheepishly admit that, yes, I have to ingest complex carbs in order to sustain a workout routine. Particularly an anaerobic (i.e., resistance) routine. After a year of stopping and starting a resistance routine, and having to always stop within a week not due to lack of drive but due to lack of energy, it turns out that I am one of the unlucky ones that cannot replenish glycogen reserves either enough or quickly enough to sustain a routine. I’ve tried numerous times a simple, relatively easy full-body resistance program consisting of just a handful of compound movements, only to feel completely exhausted after the first or second set of chest presses, or, if lucky, it wouldn’t hit me until soon after the workout. And then the next workout (3 days later) was worse in terms of the lack of energy.

While I have repeatedly stated the fact that working out and losing weight are mutually exclusive, there is no doubt that working out is both good for you and, more importantly to me – I just feel much better when I do it.

It appears, based on the countless discussions on the topic of glycogen reserves/replenishment, that the vast majority of people can do fine without having to resort to ‘carb refeeds’ after a workout. Unfortunately for me, I’m not one of them. How do I know?

Well, as my prior recent posts outline, I decided to try a new approach and took the risk of adding some complex carbs, in the form of sweet potatoes and greek yogurt, back into my diet on weightlifting days. I started this a week ago and, so far, it is more than just working. I’m feeling phenomenal. I did my second weightlifting routine this week today and am energized. I am following the typical advice and making sure to do the ‘carb refeed’ within an hour of the workout, in order to replenish my glycogen reserves.

My Weightlifting Routine

So that no one thinks I’m over-training and hence that’s what caused the need for the post-workout carbs, here is the routine so far:

  • 3 x 8 Chest Press
  • 3 x 8 Squat (not real squats though, for now as I ease back into it – I’m using a Precor squat machine)
  • 3 x 8 Back row (the machine thing with the cables you pull straight back)
  • 3 x 8 Lat Pulldown
  • 2 x ? Crunches

That’s it. All compound stuff, and believe me – not extra heavy weight as I’m a weakling. Trying this same routine before adding the extra carbs in would always cause a crash.

My Weight Is Back Down

My weight is back to 195.5 today. I had put on a few pounds earlier in the week, likely as a result of the increased water weight from the added carbs. I expect, and hope, that with the added energy and confidence to really start pushing the workouts that I’ll start gaining some serious muscle now and will begin to ‘lean out’ in terms of bodyfat over time.

As a nice bonus – a year ago it was hard for me to fit into size 44 pants/shorts. I was at the ‘no-man’s land’ of needing to go to the ‘Big & Tall’ section/shop to get some trousers. Tonight I ran over to JC Penney to grab some shorts and I now comfortably fit into size 34 Dockers : )

I’m sometimes hitting 100+ grams of carbs daily now, particularly on the lifting days. But I will keep it to under 100 for sure. And make no mistake – I’m avoiding the simple carbs still. While I never resist stealing some of my kids’ french fries or snagging a bite of their ‘kid meal’ pizzas while we’re out to dinner, or the occasional ice cream/frozen yogurt trip, these are incidental indulgences and never planned.

So watch out. I may start exhibiting ‘roid rage’, uh, I mean ‘carb rage’.