Turbulence Training 5th Transformation Contest – end of week 9

Week 9 of the 12-week Turbulence Training 5th Transformation Challenge has been OK. Well over the 7-week blues but sleeping erratically and very tired. Nothing much else of note to report.

Exercise:

Did three TT workouts this week – 2 to finish off my previous programme and my first workout from TT Fat Loss Fusion Intermediate. Also managed an hour of badminton (despite only three or four hours sleep), an hour of light exercise through my job, and 20 mins of a Latin Rhythm DVD. Didn’t manage a pilates workout. Total 4 hrs 36 mins. Not overly impressive on the intensity front.

Intend to get my act together this week, increasing my total workout hours to at least 5, and getting at least an hour and a half of moderate intensity activity on my off days.

Nutrition:

Av cals: 1636
Av deficit: 750 (range 350 to 950)
31% Fat, 17% Protein, 51% carbs, 1% alcohol
Micronutrients: FitDay had me coming in a bit short this week, although in actuality it is likely that I got more than I was credited for because I used a number of quorn and tofu products in the evenings that I didn’t have micronutrient information for. For the record, I averaged over 100% of everything except vitamin E (42%), pantothenic acid (90%), magnesium (93%) and iron (60%).

Lifestyle:

Only so-so here. Did manage to get to bed by 11.30 twice this week, but one day it was 3am! Meditated once but not twice, only did bonus cardio twice, and didn’t do a mind-body workout again.

Body:

Been showing quite good weight loss for this week, but as of yesterday it is that time of the month again, and this morning I recorded a gain in weight, but still some improvement on last week. Anyway, here is the list:

Weight: 14 stone 3.4 Down 1.2 lbs.
Body fat: 43.5%. Down 0.5%
Waist: 108 cm. Down 0.5 cm
Hips: 127 cm. No change
Thigh: 65 cm Up 1 cm (Obviously a measuring error last week)
Knee: 43.5 cm. Up 0.5cm (Ditto)
Calf: 40 cm. Down 0.5 cm
Bicep: 39 cm. No change

I’m going to remove my nutrition goals this week. Overall my eating is pretty good and I will continue to try and make improvements. But this week I want to concentrate on exercise and sleep, although not necessarily in that order.

So with that in mind, here are my goals for the coming week, although they are likely to remain pretty constant for the next four.

Specific goals for week 10:

1. Get at least five hours of exercise in this week
2. Out of that, get at least 90 mins of moderate-intensity exercise on non-TT days
3. Do at least 30 minutes pilates this week
4. Go to bed no later than 11.30pm at least 4 days this week
5. Do 20 mins Transcendental Meditation three times this week

Two down, one to go

Official blog weigh day today and another new low at 14 stone 2.6 (198.6 lbs, 90.3 kg), down two and a half pounds on last week. But I missed a meal yesterday since I didn’t get up till mid-afternoon (!) so I may rebound a bit tomorrow.

I am now eight and a half weeks into the twelve week Turbulence Training 5th Transformation Contest. Last night I did my final workout from the TT For Female Strength 2 programme. I have never finished a TT programme before, and now I have done two in a row! And only a few days late.

Sadly, it was not a great workout. I was really struggling and not coming near to my achievements previously. I felt really sick, too. As in, nauseous. But I did what I could then got on the treadmill. During my warm up I noticed my heart rate was elevated, and after my first interval I had to stop and sit down with my head between my legs until the room stopped spinning. End of workout. Not a great note to end on. But I feel much better today and am looking forward to getting started on programme 3 for the last three and a half weeks of the challenge. I am going with the one I originally planned to – the Fat Loss Fusion Intermediate that came with the original manual. Click here to download the original TT for Fat Loss manual.

I had to decide whether to go with Craig’s special eating plan for the workout, to get him lean. In the end, I decided not to. I have made it my guiding principal throughout this year that I would not do anything that I could not sustain. No extreme eating plans for short-term gain. This contest is not really about the contest for me. It is just a medium-term time frame to help motivate me. Thus, I will continue with my generally-eat-less-crap eating plan and just do the workouts.

Oh chin up, where art thou?

This morning I dipped below 200lbs for the first time in years. Woohoo!

Last night I did my last of six Workout A’s from the TT for Female Strength. The one where I was supposed to do my first chin up at the start of my first set….

Alas, the elusive chin up was, well, elusive. I let go of the floor, and pulled with all my might and budged not a centimetre.

Well, I finished the superset, but then on my third set, on my first rep, I actually shifted a fraction. Maybe an inch. No more than two. It was probably the most exciting inch of my life.

I have four weeks left in this challenge, although I’ll be doing a different workout. Not decided which one yet. But I say this as a fact… there is a chin up somewhere in my future.

Turbulence Training 5th Transformation Contest – end of week 8

Week 8 of the 12-week Turbulence Training 5th Transformation Challenge has been a bit rubbish. I have had ongoing trouble with my back, which is thankfully better now. This has impacted on my workouts and I am now two TT workouts behind – I should have finished my current programme this week but have two more sessions to do. Eating has been mostly good, but took a bit of a hit round my birthday. Eek.

Exercise:

I only did two of my TT workouts this week. I increased my reps on a few exercises in workout A but had to drop a few in workout B, which I did with a still-complaining back. I am seeing continued improvements in my aerobic capacity on interval workouts but didn’t manage to get in my increased endurance workout C this week. Also didn’t play badminton or do pilates. Did manage to Wiiiiii, though, and also a 50 minute Aerobox workout from a DVD. All in all, I still managed 3 hours 50 mins of exercise this week (although a lot of this was much lower intensity stuff) – that is now a quiet week for me! I guess I’ve come a long way.

Nutrition:

Calories a little higher this week, for the second week in a row. Only managed 5 servings of fibrous veg 3 times, and still not drinking enough water.

Av cals: 1873
Av deficit: 440 (range -1100 to +1400)
32% Fat, 19% Protein, 46% carbs, 3% alcohol
Micronutrients: Over 100% of everything (although it was close for a few nutrients) except Vitamin E (57%) and iron (70%).

Lifestyle:

Pretty poor here. I didn’t get to bed by 11.30pm at all this week. Didn’t meditate, didn’t do a mind-body workout and only did bonus cardio twice. One plus – I only watched four hours of TV this week.

Body:

Two weeks with slightly higher calories has taken its toll, I think. Although my average calories were not way out – 1873 this week and 1891 in week 7 – there were a few days where I was well over 2000 or even 3000 on one day! Also, the bad back has hit me, impacting on the exercise I could do and reducing the size of my deficit. I think the combination of the increased calories and the decreased exercise has taken its toll on my results. Here are my results for weeks 5 through 8, figures in bold are changes in the last four weeks and the ones in brackets are changes since last week.

Weight: 14 stone 4.6 (200.6 lbs, 91.2kg). Down 5.2 lbs. (Down 1lb this week)
Body fat: 44.0%. Up 0.4 since week 4 (Up 0.6% this week)
Waist: 108.5 cm. Down 1.5 cm (No change)
Hips: 127 cm. Down 2 cm (No change)
Thigh: 64 cm Down 2 cm (Down 1 cm)
Knee: 43 cm. Down 2 cm (No change)
Calf: 40.5 cm. Down 0.5 cm (Up 0.5 – must have got the reading wrong last time)
Bicep: 39 cm. Down 1 cm (No change)

Overall, these are pretty good results, but I am quite upset that my body fat has not come down too. So while it is nice that I have lost another 5 pounds this month, bringing my total this challenge to 10 lbs, I was gutted that 80% of that was lean body mass. As my BF% readings have been pretty consistent over the couple of weeks, I can’t even use that as an excuse.

Really there is not much that I can change – obviously cut out the birthday cake and three course meals. And skip the takeaway – but as that was my first one in six months I don’t feel too guilty. I am maintaining a good rate of exercise, held back only by an injury, and I guess, the take home message is just to keep up the good work. I am not prepared to take extreme measures – this contest was never about winning for me, so I don’t want to do anything that might derail my long-term efforts either physically or mentally. I am certainly a much healthier, happier person than I was at the beginning of 2009. Plus, my thighs are much thinner too!!!

So with that in mind, here are my goals for the coming week, although they are likely to remain pretty constant for the next four.

Specific goals for week 9:

1. Get 100% RDA vit E and iron from food
2. Drink a litre of water every day at work
3. Get 5 servings of fibrous veg at least four days
4. Get at least five hours of exercise in this week
5. Do at least 30 minutes pilates this week
6. Go to bed no later than 11.30pm at least 3 days this week
7. Do 20 mins Transcendental Meditation twice this week

Taking it easy…a bit

My back is still bothering me and I was a bit nervous about doing my TT workout, which was already overdue. But since there wasn’t much in the way of back flexion or extension, and mostly it was about maintaining good form, I decided to give it a go. I did get through it, but had to reduce my pace a little, increase the rest time between supersets and reduced the rep count on a few exercises. Decided not to pound out my intervals too but to do some Wii-ing instead for a bit of light cardio. Very frustrating, but I think this is probably the sensible approach.

Intermediate goals

Weight was up a tad this week but body fat was down so am pleased about that. It was my birthday on Thursday and due to a combination of treats and logistical problems, my calories have been up and my exercise has been slow to come. I will have to make it up in the next week.

In the last month I have crossed off my top three weight loss goals, two of them in the last week. While this is great, the only problem is that I have a long way to go till I reach my next goal – around 16 pounds worth, and I can’t think of any good intermediate goals. Any suggestions would be welcome. It could take several months to lose another 16 pounds and it’d be nice to have something to strive for in the meantime.

Ooh, just thought of one – to get my body fat below 40%. That’s probably another 8 pounds or so. Will slot that in there.

The incredible health benefits of losing 10kg

There is a temptation, when you are very overweight, to dream of a return to some idealised distant past, perhaps when you were in high school, and you think you looked really good – although chances are you hated your body then as much as you do now – ah, the benefits of hindsight. If only you could lose those 150 pounds you had gained, your life would be perfect and everything would just fall into place: professionally, personally, financially and so on ad infinitum. The hugeness of this goal generally causes people to attempt whichever new completely useless, or even harmful, wonder diet or diet pill is being touted as the solution to all your problems, and/or to discourage you from even making a start as the task just seems too overwhelming.

But other than people who are trying to sell diets and/or diet drugs, the general message in health promotion these days seems to be that small changes can make a big difference to your health. Most commonly touted figures cite a 5-10% weight loss as conferring real benefits in an overweight/obese population. For those of us with significantly more to lose, this might seem like something of a cop out, but I recently came across the research behind this figure. And it was a real eye-opener, so I’d like to share it with you. This data is based on a review conducted in 1997. The full reference is available free online, for those who are interested in such things, here: Jung, 1997.

The numbers are for a 10 kilogram weight loss, which would be around 10% for a person starting out weighing 15 stone 10 (220 pounds), interestingly enough, pretty much where I was at the start of 2009.

The Benefits of a 10kg Weight Loss
Mortality	20-25% fall in total mortality 30-40% fall in diabetes related deaths 40-50% fall in obesity related cancer deaths
Blood pressure	Fall of 10 mm Hg systolic pressure Fall of 20 mm Hg diastolic pressure
Angina	Reduced symptoms by 91% 33% increase in exercise tolerance
Lipids	10% fall in total cholesterol 15% fall in LDL (“bad”) cholesterol 30% fall in triglycerides 8% increase in HDL (“good”) cholesterol
Diabetes	Reduces risk of developing diabetes by >50% 30-50% decrease in fasting blood glucose 15% decrease in HbA1c (an indicator of blood glucose control – higher means poorer control)

So there you have it. As of this week, I have now achieved my 10% weight loss goal and am now around 20% less likely to die, over 50% less likely to get diabetes, should have a significant reduction in my blood pressure – I will get back to you on this, and a significantly improved lipid profile. This is 90% of a BBG signing out.

Turbulence Training 5th Transformation Challenge – end of week 7

This week was week 7 of the 12-week Turbulence Training 5th Transformation Challenge. It’s been a bit of a mixed week. I weakened my back at a training course over the weekend, and because of that, I couldn’t do all my TT workouts this week, putting me a workout behind. I also had my first takeaway in 6 months – Indian food, of the creamy and fattening variety – but didn’t half suffer for it. And it absolutely wasn’t worth it. Otherwise it has been a pretty good week. Here’s the roundup.

Exercise:

I only did two of my TT workouts this week and one of my interval workouts, although the interval workout was my new workout C – trying to extend the time I spend jogging and reduce the time I spend in walking recovery. I ran 8 of my 20 minutes. My longest ever, even if it was only at 7kph!

On the resistance front, I increased the number of reps I did on 1-leg stability ball leg curls, bodyweight rows, spiderman lunges and push ups with feet on the ball. I also hit 30 seconds on two sets of side planks, although couldn’t quite make it the third time round, and managed cadences of 5-0-0, 4-0-0, and 3-0-0 on my first set of eccentric chin ups.

I played badminton with hubby, although I had to get out of bed to go do it; did at least 60 mins of advanced pilates (if you’ve never tried it, you wouldn’t believe it – the human body is just not intended to do those things!!); did a bhangra dance workout, a little Wii Fit, and over an hour of walking. All in all, a total of 5 hours 20 mins of exercise this week.

Nutrition:

Hit most of my nutrition goals with the exception, yet again, of water and vitamin E intake.

Av cals: 1891 (up a little this week – mainly due to that chicken pasanda)
Av deficit: 520 (range -750 to +600)
Macronutrients: 24% Fat, 20% Protein, 56% carbs, 1% alcohol
Micronutrients: Over 100% of everything except Vitamin E – only 71% again, despite really working on this one.

Lifestyle

Much better here. I went to bed by midnight FIVE TIMES this week, but didn’t do any meditation.

Body:

And yet another milestone this week – I am now down a size to a UK 18. I will be having a wardrobe purge this weekend. I never intend to be a size 20 again. Ever.

Here’s the rest of it.

• Weight: 14 stone 5.6 (201.6 lbs, 91.6kg). Up 0.8 lbs
• Body fat: 43.4%. Down 1%
• Waist: 108.5 cm. Up 1.5 cm
• Hips: 127 cm. Down 0.5 cm
• Thigh: 65 cm. No change
• Knee: 43 cm. Down 1 cm
• Calf: 40 cm. Down 0.5 cm
• Bicep: 39 cm. Down 0.5 cm

My waist measurements are all over the place. I’m not sure if I’m supposed to breathing in or breathing out, but really should make up my mind and do it consistently (I have been breathing out, or at least trying to).

I am not too bothered about being up 0.8 lbs on last week as I am absolutely delighted to see my body fat back in the 43% range. Well, in relative terms at least. Small changes practically everywhere else, and down a clothing size. What’s not to like?

Specific goals for week 8:

Mostly the same as last week, but bring bedtime forward a bit, and really concentrate on water intake.

1. Go to bed no later than 11.30pm at least 3 days this week
2. Get 100% RDA vit E and iron from food
3. Drink a litre of water every day at work
4. Do bonus cardio on three days
5. Use my WiiFit for exercise on one of my ‘off’ days
6. Get 5 servings of fibrous veg at least four days
7. Do 20 mins Transcendental Meditation twice this week

Paying for my sins

My back is much better today and I managed my Turbulence Training workout this evening. I even made some progress, increasing the number of press ups with feet on a stability ball, and holding my side planks for 30 seconds for the first time. I didn’t manage my intervals since it was getting quite late, but will try and do those tomorrow. God bless the people who make Tiger Balm is all I can say.

I paid for my indulgence yesterday with a gain of nearly two pounds on the scale this morning, but worse, awful tummy ache and rather embarrassing residual side effects. A rather rough estimation and a bit of educated guesswork suggests I ate around 2800 calories yesterday. Talk about re-feeding!! Back to proper food today and starting to feel more human again. All in all, I’d have to say that it definitely was not worth it. Must remember that next time I’m tempted.

Back ache, missed workouts and chicken pasanda

It is Sunday evening. I have been on an advanced pilates instructor course this weekend and my back was killing me this morning. As a result, I have had to skip my workout, which was already late, so I won’t get in all three this week. Hoping I will get at least one more though. Roll out the MacKenzie exercises and the Tiger Balm and hope for the best!

Also, because of the course, hubby and I did not get ourselves organised and do the shopping we would normally do at the weekend in advance. (Hubby cannot be trusted to go grocery shopping on his own).

Anyway, I have been eating out a bit, and while I did the best I could, I have found myself craving junk for the first time in a while. Caved in today and ordered in dinner – Indian food. The creamy rich variety. Yum. But damn, I have an upset stomach now. I’m not used to eating like that anymore. Hard to believe we used to do it several times a week.

I have now ordered groceries to be delivered tomorrow and am looking forward to getting back on track after a bit of a slack weekend – my first really this year!!!!