Loading ...I am Cookie Monster
By Kenny | February 6, 2008
I don’t know how it happened. It just did. For the last 3 days I’ve been on a junk food eating rampage. I am cookie monster.
Or whatever kind of monster that just eats everything in site. It’s crazy. Tacos on top of cookies on top of pizza on top of lord knows what else. It started on Sunday at the Superbowl party that I was at and carried over to Mon & Tues night after work. All day I eat good solid meals and drink water and stay the course. Then I get home and something happens where I grow blue fur all over my body, my eyes bug out, my penis falls off and I eat everything in site. I’ve fallen into the trap where I’ve limited my favorite foods so much that junk foods have become coveted treats. I’ve given pizza power over me because I’ve put it up on a pedestal and denied myself. Hopefully this little binge and run it’s course and I’ll be back on track. I did go and work out this morning and usually when I work out, I don’t feel as hungry during the day and I’m super motivated to not ‘ruin’ my work out by eating crap.
Just a side note, but cookie monster eats healthy now. Those of us that have kids that watch sesame street see cookie monster eating fruit and vegetables. Blasphemy.
Topics: Weight Loss Challenge 2008 | 4 Comments »
Kenny’s Week 5 Weigh-in
By Kenny | February 4, 2008
Here it is.
- Starting Weight: 230.6 lbs
- Last Week’s Weight: 218.8 lbs
- Today’s Weight: 214.8 lbs
- Week Weight Loss: 4 lbs
- Total Weight Loss: 15.8 lbs
- Total Body Weight % Lost: 6.8%
- Starting Body Fat %: 27.6%
- Today’s Body Fat %: 20.5%
I have a feeling that the superbowl festivities will have something to say about my 214.8 tomorrow; lucky for me that weigh-ins are Sunday AM, not Mondays.
Topics: Weight Loss Challenge 2008 | 2 Comments »
Thomas’s Week 5 Weigh-in
By Thomas | February 3, 2008
Sunday is here in Japan. That means it’s time for weigh-ins. Here are my week 5 scale pictures:
91.6 kg is equal to 201.5 lbs. Here is my chart for the week:
- Starting Weight: 218.2 lbs
- Last Week’s Weight: 203.1 lbs
- Today’s Weight: 201.5 lbs
- Week Weight Loss: 1.6 lbs
- Total Weight Loss: 16.7 lbs
- Total Body Weight % Lost: 7.7%
- Starting Body Fat %: 23.4%
- Today’s Body Fat %: 19.5%
- Total % Body Fat Lost: 3.9%
And my graph:
Topics: Weight Loss Challenge 2008 | No Comments »
Drop Your Snacks And Hit The Road
By Thomas | January 30, 2008
One obstacle to weight loss is overeating. If you are like me, you love snacking. I personally like chocolate, cheese, bread and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for snacking. I used to fill myself up on these things all during the day. If you have a snacking habit, it can be hard to kick. One avenue of attack against snacking is to schedule your workouts to coincide with the times you tend to snack.
The first thing to do is find out if there is any pattern to your snacking. Keep a little journal documenting when you get the urge to eat snacks during the day. Whether you give into your urges or not, just write down the time, what you are doing and how you feel. You don’t need to keep this journal for a long time. A week is probably enough to spot a pattern.
Once you have a week to two weeks of data, look over it and search for a pattern. Do you eat a snack every night at 9pm? Do you crave a snack whenever The Simpsons or Dexter comes on at night? Do you get the munchies right before you go to bed when you are sleepy? If you do the research, you will probably find that you can predict the times when you will want to snack.
So what do we do with that? Make those times your workout times. If you snack at 9pm every night, then go jogging at 8:50. If you eat a pint of ice cream every time you sit down to watch your favorite show, TiVo that crap, go do your jog and then watch your show after you’ve just finished a big meal. If you eat a snack at night right before bed, do ten rounds of Bas Rutten first and your arms will be too fatigued to lift the lid of the cookie jar.
Drop your snacks and hit the road. Not only will you not be eating snacks, but you’ll also be getting your exercise in.
Btw, Dr. Kal has a recipe for healthy peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Hell yeah.
Topics: Weight Loss Challenge 2008 | 1 Comment »
Kenny’s Week 4 Weigh-in
By Kenny | January 28, 2008
Here it is. 
I can’t believe it’s been 4 weeks already. Two more months to go! If we both keep going like this, we are going smash right through our modest expectations and confidentless predictions and have some amazing results.
I see what’s going on. I’m stepping up my game. I’m going to go ahead and put it out there. Here it is.
My new declared goal for April 1st is….
205
That’s right. I’m stepping it up and I’m going to make weight for the light-heavyweight division without “cutting” weight before the weigh ins.
There. I said it. I sure am glad I can edit my own posts for when this goes by the way side.
Topics: Weight Loss Challenge 2008 | 2 Comments »
Thomas’s Week 4 Weigh-ins
By Thomas | January 27, 2008
I had a very successful week, thanks to Bas Rutten and an as-of-yet unnamed secret weapon. Here are my weigh-in scale pictures:
92.3 kg translates to 203.1 lbs.
Starting this week, I’m going to borrow John’s (from JohnIsFit.com) weigh-in results reporting style, because I think it’s slick and easy to read. Be sure to check out his blog!
- Starting Weight: 218.2 lbs
- Last Week’s Weight: 209.2 lbs
- Today’s Weight: 203.1 lbs
- Week Weight Loss: 6.1 lbs
- Total Weight Loss: 15.1 lbs
- Total Body Weight % Lost: 6.9%
- Starting Body Fat %: 23.4%
- Today’s Body Fat %: 20.1%
- Total % Body Lost: 3.3%
Also starting this week I’m going to post a skinnyr.com graph of my progress. I found out about skinnyr from Israel’s great blog FatManUnleashed. Check it out.
Kenny’s weigh-in will come within the next 24 hours. Stay tuned.
Topics: Weight Loss Challenge 2008 | 5 Comments »
Lose Weight Too Fast and you Might get Raped by a Llama
By Kenny | January 25, 2008
We’d all like to be able to lose 20lbs by the end of January, but this is just not practical or healthy. To be healthy, the most weight you should be losing is about 2 lbs per week at first, and then maybe 1 pound per week after that, then less and less per week as you get closer to your goal/ideal weight. If you are losing weight faster than this, then you are headed for disappointment and sadness.
Your body has a very sensitive survival meter and if it senses that your not getting enough water, or not getting enough air, or about to be raped by an AIDS infected llama, it will react and adapt to help make sure you survive whatever plight or threat is looming. Your body really only cares about your survival. The same goes for food. If you body senses that you are not getting enough food, it will switch your metabolism to “OFF” and it will actually retain fat stores and burn muscle for fuel as a precautionary measure.
Screw that. If you are dieting and doing a lot of cardio, the initial results you are seeing (aside from overall water loss) are a loss of 65% fat (good) and 35% muscle (not good). This loss of muscle tissue is what will screw you in the end. Muscle is a metabolically active tissue meaning that your body has to burn extra calories just to sustain it. Not only that, but muscle weighs more than fat and is where a ton of water is stored so when you lose heavy, healthy, waterlogged muscle, you’ll definitely see it on the scale and you’ll tell yourself, “Good job, I’m losing weight! I rule! I want to have sex with myself!” but in reality, all you’ve accomplished is tricking your body into thinking there is no food around. So your body starts conserving it’s fat stores, burning muscle for energy and shutting your metabolism down. With your metabolism running slower and slower, you have to eat less and less to lose more weight. Your brain chimes in and tells you it wants you to eat more, making you hungrier, and it’s impossible to stay the course. Soon your so hungry, tired and weak, That you can no longer fight off the advances of that llama. 
Tired, depressed and limping, you go back to your old eating habits and with your new found slow metabolism, you gain all the weight back and get even more depressed and fat and you end up starting some bullshit blog.
Trust me, you don’t want to end up like this.
We need to commit to losing weight in a healthy manner that doesn’t force our bodies to adapt and put us in fat retention mode. Simply put we have to eat a little less and exercise a little more over a long period of time, if we hope to lose weight and keep it off. By ‘eating a little less’, I mean less calories with more protein and by ‘exercise a little more’, I mean a lot more using a combination of cardio and weight training. Yes weight training. If you are not training with weights as part of your ‘fat loss’ program, then you might as well strip down and climb into the llama pen right now.
More on that later. The weight training part I mean. 
Topics: Weight Loss Challenge 2008 | No Comments »
Bas Rutten’s Mixed Martial Arts Workout
By Thomas | January 24, 2008
On the weekdays, I don’t have time to go to the mountains. It’s almost dark when I get home from work and I want to spend quality time with my wife and son. So I had to figure out a way to get a quick workout in the evening on weekdays. Enter Bas Rutten.
Bas Rutten is an MMA (Mixed Martial Arts) Legend: former King of Pancrase, former UFC Heavyweight Champion, longtime PrideFC announcer and a former IFL coach. Now he is training Kimbo Slice for MMA and working as a sportscaster. This guy knows a lot about fighting and being in top shape.
Several years ago, he released a workout program on cd called Bas Rutten’s Mixed Martial Arts Workout. There are four cds: boxing, Thai boxing, MMA and All-round Workout. I’ve been working out with the Thai boxing cd. It has two tracks: track 1 is ten 2-minute rounds, track 2 is seven 3-minute rounds.
The workout is pretty straightforward. Bas Rutten calls out punching/kicking combinations, and you perform them. He insists that each punch, knee or kick be thrown with “100% knockout power”. Since every punch you throw is full power, it builds muscle strength and endurance and wears you the hell out. You wouldn’t believe how many combinations can fit into 2 minutes.
When I first tried Bas Rutten’s Mixed Martial Arts Workout, I was dead after three rounds. Now I’ve worked up to where I can do all ten two-minute rounds or all seven three-minute rounds (but not both! ..yet). If you do the math, one workout adds up to about 30 minutes, and it is an intense cardio workout. It’s extremely fun. And you can do it at home.
I recommend Bas Rutten’s Mixed Martial Arts Workout to anyone who wants to get in shape. You’ll lose weight, get stronger, build endurance and let out your aggression. You can get it here or directly from Bas Rutten’s website here. Those aren’t affiliate links. I don’t make anything if you click on them. This is a program I truly recommend from the bottom of my heart.
Topics: Weight Loss Challenge 2008 | 6 Comments »
Kenny’s Week 3 Weigh-in
By Kenny | January 20, 2008
Here it is.
Topics: Weight Loss Challenge 2008 | 7 Comments »
Thomas’s Week 3 Weigh-in
By Thomas | January 20, 2008
Wow, three weeks gone already. I weighed in this morning and was quite disappointed with the results.
95.1 kg translates to 209.2 lbs. This is exactly the same as last week! I didn’t lose any weight. Thankfully I didn’t gain weight either. I’m going to make an excuse and say that it’s because I had a 2-day work conference in Kobe, and with the commute time I had to skip some workouts. It looks like this is Kenny’s chance to steal the lead! I’m eager to see how he weighs in.
But don’t get sloppy Kenny. I’m making a comeback next week!
Topics: Weight Loss Challenge 2008 | 2 Comments »