A few days ago I discovered a blog that I found to be  inspirational in my own adventure in weight loss. The site was Run4Change and it details the weight loss journey of the site’s owner Jason.

Since 2006 Jason has lost over 130 pounds, and went from being overweight and un-athletic, to fit and trim and running ultra-marathons. That’s quite a switch!

Here’s a quick bio from his site:

My name is Jason. I have lost 130lbs and have transformed myself from a roly poly to an athlete. I am married to an absolutely wonderful woman named Audrey.  She inspired me to be more creative and start this blog. Since I am a former fat guy who has lost 130 lbs I hope to inspire you to become healthier and happier. I am a new person, I might say I am an old person since I weigh the same as I did 16 years ago.

Although I have lost all of my excess weight, I still have fat guy fears..I am moving and running on to enjoy my life even more. I have found a new love called running. I once feared this activity as painful, hard, and boring. Now I see it as an outlet, an emotional and physical recharge. I will never be the same since I started running. I guess you could say that I am running away from my old self.

My blog is my unique angle on health, running, weight loss, and life. My blog, is here to inspire you. To let you inside a regular guy who yearns to do amazing things and live an amazing life. Hopefully you can learn about health, running, weight loss, and me.   Life is an adventure.

I contacted Jason and asked if he might be interested in a quick interview about all his success on this blog, and he was kind enough to oblige. I know his story will inspire and motivate all of  you!

Interview With Jason, 130 pounds later!

Quick to fit: Tell us a little about yourself, and your fitness & weight loss journey?

Jason:  Well, I started weight watchers in Dec. 2006 and I have lost 130 lbs using that program.  It took me about a year and I have kept the weight off for a little over a year also, but I don’t plan to go back to deep fried burritos any time soon.  My exercise started with 12 minutes on a stationary bike 3 times a week.  Every time I lost 10 lbs I would increase the time and variety of exercises that I did. I started running after I lost 60 lbs.  My life has been completely changed by losing this weight and starting to run.  I have learned so much on this journey and I hope to inspire others that it is possible for them too.

• I might fail
• If I do lose the weight I probably won’t keep it off.
• What will people think to see someone so fat like me.
• Will I be the only guy at weight watchers.
• It is going to be so boring and hard.

Anyways, I overcame these fears by accepting the fact that change is uncomfortable. There was no way I would ever attain weight loss if I was not willing to be uncomfortable.  So I dove right in.  I endured the journey until now by setting written goals for weight loss as well as running, not letting guilt pull me down if I messed up, and understanding that it is not cheating if you count what you eat.

Jason: Oh yeah.  I couldn’t even count how many times I got discouraged and wanted to give up.  To beat this I talked about it.  I talked to my sister, my wife, my WW leader, and God.  I also learned so much from running.  Being a person who never exercised to finishing marathons, I learned that feelings (although very real) really have nothing to do with our ability to keep going.

Jason:I still follow weight watchers the same way I did when I started except I eat my extra points and activity points now.  I still go to the meetings faithfully because if I could have done it by myself I would have done it a long time ago.  This is a big factor in making it through those hard ups and downs we face during our journey.

Jason:  Since about 1996 I wanted to run a marathon and ultra-marathon.  I read a magazine article about a guy who ran 50 miles and I thought to myself, “Wow, I did not think that a human could do such a thing.”  I started running at that time but quit very quickly.  So after losing 60 lbs this time I started to train for my first marathon and I accomplished my first finish 7 months later.  I feel in love with the long runs.  They made me feel good mentally, physically, and spiritually.  My confidence went up a lot and I started to believe that I could do things that I never dreamed or imagined were possible.  My long runs grew.  In February of 2008 I ran my first ultra-marathon (31 miles) and in July 2008 I finished the White River 50 miles trail running championship race.  I did it in around 11 and 1/2 hours.  It was a great experience.  All in all, I finished 7 marathons and 4 ultra-marathons from Oct. 2007 to Oct. 2008.

Jason:  I think that there are two things that are totally essential for us to understand as we walk in this weight loss journey.  First, we need to change how we think about “cheating”.  Cheating is the use of deception.  If you eat something that is not “on plan”, just count it however you count in your program and it is not cheating.  Finish the day off accordingly.  You have your whole life ahead of you and 1 day of bad eating is just a blip on the radar.  This thinking will free you up and finally allow you to have that “life change” perspective so that you can live the plan.  The second thing is to never give up.  So what if you mess up.  I know it is depressing, angering, maddening, etc. (it is for me at least), but it is not the end of the world and it certainly should not be the end of your program.  I learned in the ultra marathons this:  There is a guarantee that when things are going great, watch out because they are going to get bad.  When things are going bad, all the better because they are going to get good again. This happens over and over and over during an 11 hour race. You cannot escape these surges of good and bad.  If you just take one foot and put it in front of the other, regardless of the pain or guilt or mistakes, you will make it to the finish line.  Good luck.

Now That We’re Properly Motivated..

Thanks again to Jason for agreeing to do the interview, and for sharing his amazing story.   If his story won’t get you motivated, I don’t know what will! I think I’m going to go and run a few miles now!

Don’t forget to check out Jason’s site at  http://run4change.wordpress.com.  Subscribe directly to his RSS feed here.

photo credit: Celso Flores

2008 was a year filled with ups and downs.   My wife was in and out of the hospital a couple of times, and at one stretch was hospitalized for 3 weeks straight with a blood clot. We had tons of other things going on during the year that made it a hard one, and we were relieved to start a new year relatively unscathed.

With the new year beginning I’ve set some goals for myself in the coming year, and one of them is related to my health and fitness. I’d like to lose another 30-35 pounds this year, to get to my desired weight of around 200 lbs. I’ve come close to that goal before, but I’ve never completely reached it.

In 2007 I started my journey towards becoming fit. I started the year at 255 pounds, my heaviest weight ever. I wasn’t happy at that weight, and I knew I needed to lose weight. Since I had turned 30 the year before I began reflecting on my health, where I was, and where I wanted to be. 255 pounds and unhealthy was not what I was shooting for.

That year, 2007, I lost 40 pounds to get down to 215 lbs. I was proud of that accomplishment, but because I wasn’t focused on living and maintaining a healthy lifestyle, I started reverting back to old habits. I started eating out at fast food restaurants again. I started getting a coffee and donut on my way to work. Finally, I stopped working out again.

My problem? I was living from the mindset that there are two ways to live. First, you can live healthy while you’re on a diet. Second, you can live “normal life”. The problem is, if you want to live a healthy life you have to make eating healthy and exercising your “normal life”. It has to become your new paradigm.

This year, my goal is to lose the weight, and to KEEP IT OFF. I want to change the way I view the world so I can get to the point where living healthy is the “new normal”.

How about you? Are you working towards a fitness goal this year? Once you reach your goal will you continue living healthy? How are you training yourself to think about living healthy as the new normal?

Over the Christmas holiday I got a new Ipod Touch through some work I did for another website.  Since my old classic Ipod was stolen a few months back I had forgotten how much I loved having an Ipod.   It was useful in so many ways,  but then again it was limited for some applications.  It was mostly just a music/movie/game machine.

Now that I have an Ipod touch, I’ve realized that it can be oh so much more.  It can do email, surf the web, play games, and use custom apps that can help you do anything from keep a shopping list to track your workouts.  I realized that the touch can help me fulfill my workout and weight loss goals I’ve set for the new year! What is my fitness goal for the new year? I’ve set a goal of losing 35 pounds by July 1st. Wish me luck!

Helpful Health and Fitness Apps

I’ve downloaded some useful health and fitness apps, and I thought I’d give a quick review of some of my favorites.

• Weightbot from Tapbots:  The weight tracking app is one of my favorite new apps.   The app is extremely simple, but has a beautiful design.  What does it do for you?  You can enter your weight daily through a simple interface, and watch as your weight decreases (hopefully) over time.   It’ll show you your BMI, and after you enter your goal weight it will show you a beautiful graph showing your progress, or lack thereof.  Basically, it is a great way to motivate yourself.  You can also make backups of the data through your wi-fi connection, and in the future you’ll be able to export your weight data.   Also, if you want to make sure that no one else views your data, you can lock it with a passcode!  Not bad for .99 cents!
• Gym Buddy: This app provides a nice way to keep track of your workouts. Define your own exercises, set up your own workouts. Allows you to keep track of your workouts by time, repititions, weight and notes. Also includes a way of tracking your cardio after a recent update. Only $2.99, and a good replacement for a workout notebook.
• PushupFu: A while back i was doing the 100 pushups challenge. I’m not doing that right now, but if you enjoy pushups, here’s a fun little pushups app. The application allows you to do pushup training, compete against others, and get scores for your pushups. Hard, but fun! $2.99
• Run Chart: This little app allows you to time your run workouts, as well as gives you audible cues as to how long you’ve been running. Set up specific routes in the software and setup goal split times to reach. The software will give you audible cues when those times are reached. Nice little piece of software for $2.99.
• Ifitness: A nice fitness app that shows you over 115 different exercises that you can perform, categorized by body region. Also allows you to log your workouts. Affordable as well at only $1.99
• Ipump Free Workout: Try out a free workout from Pump One, created by fitness professionals. They’d like to you to buy one of their paid apps, but give the free one a try first. Includes pictures of exercises, logs, exports via email. Can’t go wrong with free.
• Fit Phone: Another workout log that helps you keep track of your workouts, and then has some nice graphs to help you see how you’ve been progressing. $4.99
• Ishape: Calorie, nutrition and exercise diary. Set weight loss goals, and use the app to help you achieve them. Currently on sale for .99 cents!

So there you go, there’s a handful of good fitness apps for your Iphone or Ipod. They are certainly only a few of the apps that you can use to work towards your goals, and there a ton more waiting for you to discover them at the Apple Apps Store.

Do you have any Ipod or Iphone apps that you’re using to help further your fitness goals? What are they?

photo credit: shoothead

Life gets busy

The last couple of weeks I’ve noticed that I’ve only been able to exercise a couple of times per week.  We’ve been extremely busy buying a new car, teaching a class on personal finance at our church, dealing with family issues, and just being busy.   I know most of you probably know what that’s like.

Through all of this I’ve found that it isn’t easy to keep on the path towards fitness, but if you set up a plan, and work that plan – you can succeed.  Even though I’ve been working out less, my nutrition has been better and I’ve been more active, and because of that I’ve still been losing weight.

How are personal finance and fitness related?

The title of this post talks about personal finance and fitness and how they’re related.  Many of you know that I also have a personal finance website at http://www.biblemoneymatters.com.  Because I write about finance on a daily basis, it has become second nature for me and my wife to do our budget, stay within spending guidelines, and save.  We have set up a plan, and we’ve been disciplined in that plan.

By the same token, if you’re going to succeed in the area of fitness, you’ll need to make a plan, and stick to it. I’ve setup a workout and nutrition plan for my fitness, and when I’ve stuck to that plan I’ve been able to feel myself getting healthier, and watch as the pounds drop off.  When I’ve had discipline, it has paid off.

In the areas of personal finance and fitness, having a plan, and having the discipline to work that plan are key.  Without the stick-to-itiveness (is that a word?) you’ll fail every time.

Do you have a plan to succeed and have you been disciplined in executing that plan? If not, why not?

Last night I did my upper body weight workout for the first time in a couple of months. Whenever I go that long without doing a weight workout, the first time I lift again I get really sore. This morning, I am really sore – I can barely lift my arms above my head!

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photo credit: Gio JL

Today, since I am alternating between cardio and weights days, I am once again back to a cardio workout. Today I’ll be doing some interval training, or better known as high intensity interval training (HIIT). Here’s an explanation of what it is from Wikipedia:

Interval training is broadly defined as repetitions of high-speed/intensity work followed by periods of rest or low activity.

This training technique is often practiced by long distance runners (800 metres and above) although some sprinters are known to train using this technique as well.

Distance runners often practice intervals on tracks, running hard at a certain pace for a specified distance (or, less often, time) and jogging, walking, or resting between (for a set distance/time.) An example could be 12 repetitions of 400 meters with a 200-meter jog between each. Distances can also vary; one example would be a “ladder” workout consisting of a 1600-meter, two 1200-meter, three 800-meter, and four 400-meter repetitions, each at an appropriate speed and with an appropriate amount of recovery.

Interval training is a favorite of coaches because of its effectiveness in cardiovascular buildup and also its ability to make more well-rounded runners.

More generally, it can refer to any cardiovascular workout (e.g. stationary biking, running, rowing, etc.) that involves brief bouts at near-maximum exertion interspersed with periods of lower-intensity activity. One popular workout that incorporates this methodology is so-called “walk-back sprinting,” in which one sprints a short distance (anywhere from 100 to 800 meters), then changes directions and walks back to the starting point (the recovery period) to do it again. To add challenge to the workout, each of these sprints may start at a predetermined time interval, e.g. 200 meter sprint, walk back, and sprint again every 3 minutes. The time interval provides just enough recovery.

It is believed by many in the fitness industry that this method of training is more effective at inducing fat loss than simply training at a moderate intensity level for the same duration. This has been confirmed in at least two studies

As mentioned above, HIIT is an excellent way to maximize your workout if you are limited on time as I often am.   I know it works from experience. Last year I lost almost 40 pounds using a combination of weight training and HIIT.  Unfortunately I stopped doing it and I’ve gained 15 back. But now I’m back on course and looking to lose that last 25 or so pounds.

Wish me luck!

Earlier this week my wife and I decided that we needed to finally start exercising again, and actually watching what we eat.  We had slipped into a bit of a malaise where we didn’t care much what we were eating, or where we were eating.

So this weekend we made a pact with each other that we’re going to get back to exercising 5-6 days a week, and eating healthy.

Monday evening I re-started my fitness routine by doing the high-intensity cardio from a DVD put out by the TV show “The Biggest Loser”.   Normally I can’t stand doing workout routines via DVD – but this one is actually not too bad.  It features the trainer Bob from the hit TV show, along with contestants from season 2 or 3 of the show.

What does the workout consist of?  It starts out with some back and forth skating motions followed by some tire runs (lifting your knees high running in place) and football runs (moving your feet as fast as you can).   Then you do some shadow boxing and finish up with 1 knee lift and leg kicks.

Every time I do this workout I go in thinking its not going to be that bad, but every time I am finished I am drenched with sweat, and panting for breath.  And it feels great!

Yesterday I re-started my weight lifting routine.  I started with a lower body routine with some squats, followed by some hamstring dead lifts.  I finished up with some calf exercises and some ab exercises.  Once again the workout left me tired.

I’ve learned that if I haven’t lifted weights for a while I tend to get really sore the first 2 or 3 times I lift weights, and then the soreness isn’t as bad.  As expected, I’m pretty sore this morning.

So I’m off to a good start this week, now I just have to stay motivated in the face of all the other stuff life is throwing at me this week. Transmission problems on my car, teaching a class, just being fatigued in general. Just another week!

What kind of workouts are you doing right now? Are they working? Do you feel like you need to try something different?  Tell me about it in the comments!

photo credit: Bob Jagendorf

Well I’ve been back from our cruise for about a week now.  The trip was amazing, we had a wonderful time, and we saw some of the most beautiful places in the world during our 2 week cruise.

I also ate some of the most amazing food while we were gone.  The cruise ship that we were on served food almost 24 hours a day – and the food wasn’t half bad either.  There was a cafeteria that had 3 meals a day, plus a pizza bar and ice cream stand that was open most of the day.   There was also several restaurants on board serving delicious meals every night.   I took advantage of all of these places. I ate – and I ate a lot.  I think I gained a few pounds back that I’ve lost over the past few months, so it’s going to be time to get back on the wagon – as soon as I can kick this flu that I’ve had for the past week or so.

On the last day of our cruise in Venice I started getting sick.  Ever since then I’ve been all stuffed up with headaches, off and on fevers, and just an overall feeling of achiness.  It’s not a fun feeling.  I’m finally starting to feel better, and I think I’ll probably be able to start working out again near the end of the week.

Boy do I need it!

So stay tuned for a renewed sense of purpose, and new workout updates coming soon. Maybe not today or tomorrow  – but soon and for the rest of the year!

I’ll sometimes talk with people I know about their weight loss plans, and how they expect to lose weight. When I ask them what they’re doing they’ll give me a report of drastically reduced calories, and a workout plan that involves a few situps and walking once or twice a week.  In most cases I don’t think that type of a plan is going to be successful, just for the small amount of exercise they’re doing, and because their diet will cause their metabolism to shut down, and harm their prospects for weight loss.

In an article I was reading today people were having a different issue.  They were exercising for too long, using a exercise that wasn’t as beneficial as they thought.   One reader of the MSNBC site emailed in:

I exercise every weekday morning in my hot tub, doing 2,000 forward bicycles, 2,000 reverse bicycles, 2,000 frog kicks and 2,000 reverse frog kicks. It takes me almost three hours. Am I doing too much exercise? I’m trying to lose weight this way because I have leg problems that keep me from doing any other type of exercise.

doing leg kicks in a hot tub for 3 hours?  Are you kidding me?  Who does that?  I know some people  do have some physical limitations that preclude them from performing some normal exercises, but there has got to be something better out there for this person to do.  I seriously doubt they are getting much actual impact from their bicycle and frog kicks!

photo credit: Tigerzeye

The fitness expert answers the question:

There’s a lingering misperception in fitness that if 20 repetitions of an exercise are good, then 200 — or 2,000 — must be better. But sometimes — such as when doing 4,000 frog kicks and another 4,000 bicycles consumes your entire morning — exercise may just not be worth that much time and effort. In fact, you may be pleasantly surprised to know you can restructure your program so that you actually work out for less time and get more bang for your buck.

The person writing in probably needs to look at some other options for their workout plan.  Some low impact whole body workouts like swimming in a pool, riding a stationary bike, or something along those lines.   Even though they’re exercising quite a bit currently, the exercise that they’re getting really isn’t that helpful – especially since  it takes so long to complete.

Sometimes we all need to take a look at our workout plans, and decide for ourselves if the work we’re putting in is worth it.  Is our plan well thought out?  Will it actually have the result we’re looking for?  If not, it may be time to sit down and come up with a new plan of action with someone who knows what they’re doing like a personal trainer at a local gym, or a friend who is a fitness guru.

Set goals, make a plan of attack, and carry out the plan in such a way as to attain positive results.

Have you ever had a workout plan that didn’t work? What was the reason for the plan’s failure?

One thing I used to just hate doing was running.  I would rather die than go running.  Running is hard, it makes you sweat and it always leaves you as a heaving sweaty lump on the floor.

Well that’s how I used to think about it at least.

Since I’ve been working out and trying to lose weight and get fit I’ve found running to be an addictive form of exercise that is crucial in helping me along the road to dropping the pounds.  Once you’ve been running for a while you get to the point where your body craves the running high, and you can’t wait to go running the next day.

What has been especially effective for me is engaging in high intensity interval training (HIIT). Basically what HIIT involves is a warmup period, several short, maximum-intensity efforts separated by moderate recovery intervals, and a cooldown period. The period of alternating effort and recovery intervals typically lasts a total of 15-20 minutes for me.

photo credit: tanakawho

While I’ve come to enjoy running (to a certain extent), I’ve found at least one other blogger who enjoys it a whole lot more than I do.  Shéamus over at Irun365.com is on a journey to run every day for a year, and so far he’s done just that! What are the rules of his challenge? He needs to run every single day for a calendar year, for at least 20 minutes a day. So far he is 50 days into the challenge, and going strong!

Right now there is a competition going on over at Irun365.com for a $30 Amazon gift card. All you have to do to enter is leave a comment, subscribe to his site by email and/or write a post on your own blog about his contest. Not a bad deal, eh?

Check out his site today for some inspiration, running tips and some great writing.

As for me, I’m going to go for a run!

Indoor workout routines

During the winter, and when the weather is nasty outside I have to find a way to exercise indoors. Usually for me that means one of a couple of choices. My first choice is usually running on our new fuel treadmill. It has a high intensity interval training (HIIT) setting where I can get a great cardio workout – without thinking too much. My preferred choice for many days, however, is a workout video.

I know, I know. Workout videos are silly – guys don’t use workout videos, etc. Personally, I’ve had that kind of thinking  in the past, and have shunned workout videos.   Now, after using this video I’m rethinking that whole paradigm.

Using the video

The first time I used this video (I only have the first one – the one on the left), I was thinking that it was going to be easy and that I wouldn’t get much out of it.  Boy was I wrong.  By the time I was done I was huffing and puffing, and I had sweat dripping down my forehead.

The workout I enjoy doing the most is the high intensity cardio workout.  Basically it takes you through a regimen of high impact cardio exercises.  You do everything from tire run, football quick steps and boxing to kicks and leg lifts.   It was a lot of fun, and only after doing it for a few weeks last fall was I able to complete it without almost killing myself.

The Biggest Loser the Workout Volume 1 & 2 DVD Video 2 Disk Set

The DVD also has several other great workouts you can do including low impact cardio, boot camp (pretty hard too) and several stretching exercises.

So, check out the The Biggest Loser Workout – it’s a workout that both men and women can enjoy!  I give it 4 out of 5 stars!