Losing Now

I mentioned earlier that I was going to start riding a bicycle as part of my FUN and exercise. My eventual goal is to commute to work, a 20 mile round trip endevour. Yesterday I finally finished putting my new bicycle together and took it out for my first ride. What utter joy it was to have the wind in my hair again, allowing me to utilize old cliché’s.

My bike is built from a Surly Long Haul Trucker road frame that is a wonderful steel blue color. I had the wheels hand built to extra strong specifications to make sure they supported my weight. She rides as if floating through time bringing me back to days before worry and stress. She liberates my soul as I we ride together. She is my Big Liberty Blue.

Mauia used to weigh 380 pounds — pretty big, but especially big for a guy only six feet tall. He went on a diet, lost more than 100 pounds and became a fullback. Here’s the secret to Mauia’s diet: no sugar, no carbohydrates, extra helpings of dedication and Samoan pride. He now weighs 270 pounds, runs the 40-yard dash in 4.8 seconds and answers to the nickname ”Juggernaut,” a reference to a comic book character who, once given even the slightest amount of momentum, can plow his head and body through any object.

At times I have felt that I was too far gone to do anything about my weight. Those times fed my excuses to quit trying, to get off an exercise plan, to eat a gallon of ice cream. Reagan Mauia could have used those excuses. He was even bigger, with more body fat than I am. Click here for a bit of his story.

Another milestone was reached today. I began walking on our treadmill, formerly known as the place to pile cloths, when I began my current quest to begin losing weight. The treadmill has a feature that monitors your heart rate and keeps it in a targeted zone. You can set the zone for the best exertion level to lose weight. The treadmill will then adjust incline and speed accordingly to maintain that exertion level for the entire period of the workout.

This feature is terrific. One of the problems I encounter with my current mental understanding of my physical abilities is that I don’t know what is exercising too hard or too light. If I exercise too hard I may not continue to exercise due to fatigue or even injury. It is important to continue to steadily exercise for best affect. If I exercise too lightly I am just wasting my time. Too lightly here means not enough to burn more calories than I normally would have without performing the exercise.

The first day I walked on the treadmill using this feature I walked for 30 minutes at 2.5 miles an hour. Before the 30 minutes were concluded my speed had been reduced to 1.7 miles an hour to keep my heart rate in my target zone. That first day was May 1st, 2007. Today I just finished walking for1 hour at 3 miles an hour with a 3-degree incline. My speed never decreased and my incline only dropped one degree. More impressive to me was the fact that I am growing more aware of my body’s stress levels and needs. I knew when I was out of the zone without looking at the output screen and could slow my heart rate a bit by focusing on breathing control. This is fantastic progress and I am quite proud of the accomplishment. I did not achieve this change in physical ability by over exerting myself. I kept a consistent exercise going for several weeks while slowly increasing duration and intensity. Don’t kill yourself. You will just quit, and quitting will eventually kill you yet again.

If I can do this you can too. Even if you don’t have fancy equipment just monitor your time and distance. Every 5 minutes check your pulse rate for 15 seconds and multiply by 4. If your heart rate is higher than you want, simply slow down. If your heart rate is lower than you want, pickup the pace.

Here is a good link about heart rate training and how to find your target zone.

Here is an article that does not believe that heart rate zone training is the best thing to do.

Obviously I do not agree with the article that does not promote heart rate zone training. It is obvious that you will lose more calories with higher intensity training. More calories lost means that you will lose more ‘fat’ calories than you would with a lower intensity workout, but you lose other calories from your body as well. Calories are just units of energy and all energy needs fuel. If you are not using fat for the fuel you are using protein and that means muscle or useful tissue. The other downside to exercising at a great intensity is that you may fail to stick with it. Consistency is the key to losing a great amount of weight. We are not in a sprint. We are in a marathon. This is why I train in a target heart rate zone best suited for losing fat.

Yesterday I tested my blood sugar and it was 113.  That is the lowest it has ever tested.  What is more amazing is that I have failed to take my injected medicine two nights in a row.  I was at the 113 level without my major sugar controlling medication!  That is a miracle.

Yes, I have lost 11 pounds and I am eating a wonderful diet of food, but this is still a miracle.  The little changes that make huge changes in our lives are miraculous changes.  Do the little changes and be patient.

Being a typical guy I hate taking the time to read directions. I think that reading food labels is the same thing as reading the directions. For a few weeks now I have been “monitoring” my caloric intake. I was not measuring or being overly strict about the calorie count. I just wanted to keep myself 500 cals below my BMI. Well, my world came crashing down on me as TRUTH forced its ugly head into my serene reality. Read the rest of this entry »

A couple of things occur to me as I sit here typing on my laptop:  Why do I feel fatter now after eating right and exercising for two weeks than before I started?  Is it sinful and selfish to be spending all of this time focusing on nothing but myself? Read the rest of this entry »

I have dumped quite a bit of cash preparing for my bicycling life. My 19-year-old son is doing his best not to allow his eyes to roll around in his head as I yap excitedly about my bicycling dreams. The poor guy has heard it so many times before. The habit of hyping my near future endeavors has taken its toll on my credibility and my son’s patience. Thankfully my wife sees a new spark in my eye and is willing to believe this one more time. Read the rest of this entry »

Charles D’Angelo is now a personal trainer in the St. Louis area. I met him in person after hearing about his experiences through a local radio program. Being an old man I can say this, Charles is a great kid. He is taking the knowledge that he has gained and the remembrance of being severely overweight to help others in a similar position. Read and enjoy.

So we were talking about exercise the other day. What exercises should you do? What you like silly. Read the rest of this entry »

I have been between 350 and 375 pounds for the past several years. What in the world made me decide to lose weight now? In a way I ‘decided’ to lose weight the moment I gained more than 10 pounds over my military fighting weight. I ‘decided’ but I never came to grips with the reality of it. Life issues, and all those other issues that give me excuses to start next Monday, or next month successfully kept my action in check. Then there was this show that came on TV the night of my last doctor appointment. Read the rest of this entry »