Today is day 30 of my "3rd Round" of P90X which is not actually P90X, but just lifting weights in a manor to build some bulk. Last week I took off (hense the Minus eight in my title), so I guess I can consider this day 22.
I meant to post this before the Thanksgiving long weekend, but I failed in doing so... but the advice can be applied to any major holiday... perhaps cristmas/easter/thanksgiving (etc.)
The question was "How can I stick to my diet over the holidays?"
The answers are:
1. You're in charge. You make the choices. You ultimately see the food, put it on your plate, re-pick it up with your fork, put it in your mouth, chew it, swallow it. Somewhere along that chain you need to ask yourself "Am I full?" and stop.
2. HAVE THANKSGIVING. Just be a bit prudish - take 1 slice of turkey, take 1 spoon of stuffing, take 1 serving of squash... but when you're finished - you're finished.
3. Most people eat until they are in pain. How many thanksgivings have you had where you just feel bl;oated because you're over-full? Don't get that way. There's no logical need to gorge yourself silly. Skip desserts and have a normal sized portion of food. You really only need 1 bite to get the flavor - the rest is all just going ot make you sleepy and crampy anyway.
4. Watch out for gravey. A little bit goes a long way. There is no need to drown your food in brown-liquid. It's super high in sodium and only excess calories to the already high calorie meal.
5. Don't let others serve you. They dont know your diet and passing them your plate could be the nail in the coffin. *More potatoes?* is a phrase you'll want to battle by saying "Sure send them down" at which point you take only a small amount.
6. If leftovers are offered - simply say "Thats okay" or suggest somebody else who has a bigger family that has kids.
7. Alcohol - most families (at least mine) tend to drink way more than normal on holidays. Wine, beer, liquors, etc... just go dry and if you're having a hard time - have a glass of wine with dinner but dont go overboard, not only does alcohol contain a lot of diet-busting sugars and calories, but you want to be able to drive home at the end of the night too. So keep it to 1 drink, maybe 2 at most.
8. Don't sit by the snack table. Youre going to nibble - it's the way it is. Stay clear of the chips, pretzels, cheese trays, fruit platters... they're all going to tempt you to no end.
9. Go for a walk! Get outside! Nobody's going to fault you for wanting to get some fresh air with the family all yelling/screaming at eachother (again another thing my family tends to do on the holidays - perhaps it's alcohol related?)
10. REMEMBER REMEMBER REMEMBER - if you screw up and you totally blow away your diet on Thanksgiving - don't give up on your diet and exercise. The faster you get back to dieting the better you'll be. Don't say "Oh Christmas is coming in 1 month why should I even bother" NO NO NO say "Tomorrow it's back to my normal routine and get myself back on track" Don't throw in the towel because you screwed up 1 night.
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Friday, November 12, 2010
Day 12^3: Why friends are bad for diets
This is when the blog holds you most accountable, when something neat happens, but you can't be too proud of it because then everyone will know you cheated on your diet/exercise. Well, I did. So here's my story.
Friday lunch, at work, typically involves eating out at restaurants that are not P90X approved. So, I'm a stick in the mud 90% of the time and bag a lunch and take it to where we're going (obviously mom + pop shops are out of the question, but I don't mind plunking down a bagged lunch at McDonalds or Taco Bell or Pizza hut. And frankly they seem to understand). But today we went to My Tomato Pie.
This fine little Italian place in the Northern region of Buffalo is pretty well known and has some of the best pizza around. Knowing pizza is my kryptonite, I decided I might just stay at work and eat my bagged lunch (which is still sitting on my desk - hence I ultimately decided to go). A couple people wanted to split a pre-ordered pizza so we wouldn't be waiting for hours to get our food and they needed me to complete the split... the long and short of it, I went and left my lunch at work.
Well we sat down, there were 9 of us. We each ordered our drinks (water for me of course) and then ordered our food. When our food came, 8 people got their pizzas and calzones... except for 1 person. The waitress came back and asked if anyone needed refills and didn't realize 1 person didn't have anything (it also didn't help most of us were sharing). Eventually he spoke up and asked "I was just wondering - what's the status of the small chicken finger pizza?" The waitress said she'd ask and came back very apologetic "I'm so sorry, it's just being cooked now, it must have gotten mixed up... we're going to bring it out as soon as we can, and by the way it's on the house. Would you like a soup or salad to hold you over, also free?" He accepted a soup.
About 10mins later, after everyone else was pretty much done eating, his pizza came out. it was presented by the manager, or perhaps the lead-waiter. He was holding some cards in his hand. Three $10-gift cards to My Tomato Pie. He apologized and said he hoped this would make up for it. At this point, my friend was sky high - sweet free food AND $30 to come back and have some more!
The waitress was about to bring us our bill and she said, with one final attempt to make sure everyone was okay "Just to be sure, I want to offer everyone at the table an opportunity for a free dessert, if you're still hungry" she then gave us the choice of two mightily sugary options: snicker + oreo pie or a heath + kit-kat pie. Needless to say 9 out of 9 hands went up for one or the other. Dessert was served, insulin spiked, and I was very content.
I'm letting everyone know about this experience for a few reason...
1. I know I stick to a pretty hard diet, but even the temptation of friends and free food get the best of even the strongest willed now and again.
2. Fun stuff like this is always nice to talk about and I hope everyone had some fun reading about it.
3. I think the service at My Tomato Pie is outstanding. The fact they went head over heals to make sure we were content with our meals definitely makes me want to return there, even if our order got messed up.
4. Remember, cheating on your diet is like skipping an exercise. If you don't confess and get back on your diet right away things can get really slippery. Admit guilt, get over it, and get on with your fitness!
I hope everyone has a great weekend! I'm slipping into a sugar-comma...
Friday lunch, at work, typically involves eating out at restaurants that are not P90X approved. So, I'm a stick in the mud 90% of the time and bag a lunch and take it to where we're going (obviously mom + pop shops are out of the question, but I don't mind plunking down a bagged lunch at McDonalds or Taco Bell or Pizza hut. And frankly they seem to understand). But today we went to My Tomato Pie.
This fine little Italian place in the Northern region of Buffalo is pretty well known and has some of the best pizza around. Knowing pizza is my kryptonite, I decided I might just stay at work and eat my bagged lunch (which is still sitting on my desk - hence I ultimately decided to go). A couple people wanted to split a pre-ordered pizza so we wouldn't be waiting for hours to get our food and they needed me to complete the split... the long and short of it, I went and left my lunch at work.
Well we sat down, there were 9 of us. We each ordered our drinks (water for me of course) and then ordered our food. When our food came, 8 people got their pizzas and calzones... except for 1 person. The waitress came back and asked if anyone needed refills and didn't realize 1 person didn't have anything (it also didn't help most of us were sharing). Eventually he spoke up and asked "I was just wondering - what's the status of the small chicken finger pizza?" The waitress said she'd ask and came back very apologetic "I'm so sorry, it's just being cooked now, it must have gotten mixed up... we're going to bring it out as soon as we can, and by the way it's on the house. Would you like a soup or salad to hold you over, also free?" He accepted a soup.
About 10mins later, after everyone else was pretty much done eating, his pizza came out. it was presented by the manager, or perhaps the lead-waiter. He was holding some cards in his hand. Three $10-gift cards to My Tomato Pie. He apologized and said he hoped this would make up for it. At this point, my friend was sky high - sweet free food AND $30 to come back and have some more!
The waitress was about to bring us our bill and she said, with one final attempt to make sure everyone was okay "Just to be sure, I want to offer everyone at the table an opportunity for a free dessert, if you're still hungry" she then gave us the choice of two mightily sugary options: snicker + oreo pie or a heath + kit-kat pie. Needless to say 9 out of 9 hands went up for one or the other. Dessert was served, insulin spiked, and I was very content.
I'm letting everyone know about this experience for a few reason...
1. I know I stick to a pretty hard diet, but even the temptation of friends and free food get the best of even the strongest willed now and again.
2. Fun stuff like this is always nice to talk about and I hope everyone had some fun reading about it.
3. I think the service at My Tomato Pie is outstanding. The fact they went head over heals to make sure we were content with our meals definitely makes me want to return there, even if our order got messed up.
4. Remember, cheating on your diet is like skipping an exercise. If you don't confess and get back on your diet right away things can get really slippery. Admit guilt, get over it, and get on with your fitness!
I hope everyone has a great weekend! I'm slipping into a sugar-comma...
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Day 11: I'm still here!
Work has been busy, I apologize for missing some posts in the past few days. I haven't exactly been doing P90X since my last post where I swapped out YogaX for weight lifting + cardio. I've actually been hitting the weights a lot recently.
I've been asking around and a lot of people think I need to bulk up a bit more, so I am taking that advice to heart and I am hitting the weights more and more each day. I'm finding that the Jack3D is a huge bonus supplement to have right before a lifting workout. I find I can lift more, for longer, with less recovery time than if I just wing it on my own.
My current benchpress "Max" (I say max in quotes only because it's not a 1-rep max) around 195lbs. We'll see if I can get that number up to the 250range. I've gotten back on the chinup/pullup bandwagon. I've been doing brett's patented 100's. Which is 10 chinups followed immediately by 10 pushups until 100. I typically skimp a bit on the pullups, but I maintain good pushups the whole way through.
Last weekend I cheated a little on the diet. I had my parents come up to visit so we had some food that I wouldn't normally eat: Pizza, scones, muffins, etc. But my weight spiked, and then came down once I got back onto my normal diet.
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Day 3^3: Would be yoga - but its not!
Since I am still going for the more-bulky, less-skinny, look. I think today I will pass on YogaX and perform one of the many other weight-lifting workouts today. I know I know, I'm bad. I keep saying I'm going to go back to the basics - legit P90X, but I just can't abandon my desire to get a bit larger muscles. I think that is still my "weakest link" so to speak.
I do want to incorporate some non-weightlifting activities again though, I don't think I will cut out plyo and kenpo like I did last round, since I do really want to solidify the six-pack that is kinda there, in the right light, from the right angle, if you know what I'm saying. So cutting the % body fat for this first month is still super important. I figure if I can drop below 10% I'll be golden. But it's definitely hard!
I don't know if I have talked about cold-water yet on this blog. I know I toot my horn all the time about REALLY COLD WATER and how good it is for you. Not only is water better than juice/soda/milk, but cold water is better than warm water. At least for the sake of dieting/fitness it is. Perhaps I shall explain.
It's quite simple in theory, the cold water being good for you stems for the whole definition of a calorie. Or as chemist and physicist think of it "The amount of energy it takes to raise 1cm^3 of water 1degC" And a Calorie (notice the subtle capital C) is the same but for 1000cm^3 of water = 1liter. So drinking 1 liter of body temperature water (37degC) burns 0 calories. But drinking a liter of water that's 1 degree cooler than the human body (36degC) burns 1 calorie. This is because your body cools down when you drink the water, and your body expends energy to heat everything back up to "normal" temperatures. Okay captain science, that seems pretty measly for 1 liter of water. I'd have to drink 50 liters of water to burn 50 calories...or, let's add a ton of icecubes to that water, shall we? That makes the water approximately 0degC. Which means for each liter of water you consume, you're effectively burning 37 Calories! Drink 2 liters of water a day? I know I do... that's 72 Calories burned! Drink 3... you get the idea. The point is, you never pee cold urine, so that water needed to be heated by something. And that something is energy, in the form of calories. Go and impress your friends, and tell them how many calories you're burning without lifting a single dumbell!
I do want to incorporate some non-weightlifting activities again though, I don't think I will cut out plyo and kenpo like I did last round, since I do really want to solidify the six-pack that is kinda there, in the right light, from the right angle, if you know what I'm saying. So cutting the % body fat for this first month is still super important. I figure if I can drop below 10% I'll be golden. But it's definitely hard!
I don't know if I have talked about cold-water yet on this blog. I know I toot my horn all the time about REALLY COLD WATER and how good it is for you. Not only is water better than juice/soda/milk, but cold water is better than warm water. At least for the sake of dieting/fitness it is. Perhaps I shall explain.
It's quite simple in theory, the cold water being good for you stems for the whole definition of a calorie. Or as chemist and physicist think of it "The amount of energy it takes to raise 1cm^3 of water 1degC" And a Calorie (notice the subtle capital C) is the same but for 1000cm^3 of water = 1liter. So drinking 1 liter of body temperature water (37degC) burns 0 calories. But drinking a liter of water that's 1 degree cooler than the human body (36degC) burns 1 calorie. This is because your body cools down when you drink the water, and your body expends energy to heat everything back up to "normal" temperatures. Okay captain science, that seems pretty measly for 1 liter of water. I'd have to drink 50 liters of water to burn 50 calories...or, let's add a ton of icecubes to that water, shall we? That makes the water approximately 0degC. Which means for each liter of water you consume, you're effectively burning 37 Calories! Drink 2 liters of water a day? I know I do... that's 72 Calories burned! Drink 3... you get the idea. The point is, you never pee cold urine, so that water needed to be heated by something. And that something is energy, in the form of calories. Go and impress your friends, and tell them how many calories you're burning without lifting a single dumbell!
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
P90X Round 3! Bring it! Day 2^3
So yesterday I started round 3 of P90X. I did not put out a post, as recently I have been getting into work early to work with Germany/Belgium on some upgrades, and my work-load has been particularly high. It's amazing how hard it is to blog when you're actually busy at work! Who would have thunk?
I took a nice long, well deserved, 1-week off after finishing P90X round2... It was fantastic. I ate whatever I wanted, drank copiously, and I didn't once lift up a weight. Spectacular. Well, all of that changed yesterday. I started with a 30min run @6.5mph and then busted out a chest/back. Numbers were a bit lower than normal, but that's okay.
My diet has changed a little bit again. I am eating home made trail-mix (nuts+raisins) for breakfast instead of the regular almonds, instead of the powerbar, instead of egg whites. That's the breakfast progression. Almonds are PRETTY EXPENSIVE. So I'll have to see how long this lasts. But they're easy to prepare and are very portable for those swing-days when I need to come into work early.
I do feel like I should get back to the core of P90X and start watching the videos again. I feel as if my timing is getting too lenient and I'm not working as hard or fast as I could be, but I do prefer the gym weights and company that I have been getting at the gym, so again, it's up in the air as to how things will pan out.
Halloween? For Halloween I was a Mighty Morphin Power Ranger (the black one) I have pictures somewhere, I'll have to upload them for everyone to see. I think my costume came out really good, I put a lot of effort into it, so hopefully posting any pictures is justified.
My starting weight and photos are my Round 2 finish photos + weight (153lbs).
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