A Fitness And Weight Loss Update
It’s been a couple of days since my last update and I figured now’s a good time as any to tell everyone how things have been going. No, I’m not weighing in today but I will update you on everything else … my last weigh-in was on 05.26.2012.
It’s been about a week and half since Zachary arrived. Prior to that my workouts were good but my food was hit and miss because we weren’t up to cooking much at home like I should have. That meant a lot of simple meals for dinner like protein oatmeal, eggs & toast, and tuna sandwiches or the dreaded “eating out”.
During the week I was eating pretty well but on the weekends I made far too many poor food choices eating out more than I’d like. It wasn’t all bad but I’ll admit to being tempted more than I’d like. During the week my meals were more controlled and easier to pick whereas on the weekend they were wide open because I wasn’t planning them like I should have been.
Since our new baby arrived it’s been more hit and miss with more misses than hits. The food choices these past few days have been good but prior to that … well, I guess you could chalk it up as vacation eating. No, not the gorging kind but certainly not the healthy kind either. My wife hadn’t been able to eat anything with many carbs for a few months so after the baby came we had a desert each night which we wouldn’t have normally had and usually ate a bad meal out as well.
As for my workouts, in the past few weeks my workouts were going pretty well but last week I only managed a few. This week though I’m back on track and even managed a solid 24 mile bike ride on Saturday. With only 7 weeks until my big ride I’m a tad bit worried, to say the least.
I feel pretty strong in my workouts so that’s not what’s worrying me really. What is worrying me is my endurance over much longer distances. This ride is 200 km over hills (124.3 miles for those that aren’t metric inclined) which is twice that of the ride I did last year (the HHH) which took me around 5 hours. This means roughly 10 hours on the bike, a little over 3 hours longer than my longest ride. *gulp*
So over the next 7 weeks I’ll be focusing on adding as much endurance as possible. That means pushing my physical limits and really building my legs and lungs. I should be able to manage a few longer rides on the coming weekends, but certainly not all of them. So without those to work with I’ll instead improvise with shorter higher intensity rides, longer rides on the basement trainer, some interval runs & rides, and some of my favorite circuit training.
This should help continue to build my endurance, overall fitness, and hopefully continue the loss of weight I’ve been aiming for along the way.
As for the food, it’s all about planning and making healthy choices. We’re working on getting our cooking groove on again and I’ve been making better choices for meals. From turning down things I don’t need to choosing smaller portions it’s all about making sensible healthy choices, not about starvation or gimmicks.
I’m hoping my next weigh-in (hopefully Saturday morning) is good but honestly my hopes aren’t super high. Between now and then though it’s kicking butt and taking names!
