And some results are in

I took a few days off (yesterday and today) to take care of some doctor stuff. Funny story actually - yesterday morning I went to the doctor for an unrelated (to fitness and weight loss) issue, and everything was ok, but she and I got to talking. I told her how I'm still smoke free and how I've been really keeping up with the exercise and diet routine. She didn't really hear me, as she had that glazed look in her eyes and nodded politely.

Needless to say when she went to print out my paperwork, she came back with a big smile on her face. She circled how much weight I had lost and decided that we ought to do my cholesterol rescreen now rather than waiting until the end of the year like we originally planned. That got me excited because it was a little bit of affirmation that yes, I have lost significant weight.

Fast forward to today.

This morning I headed in for the blood work. Ugh they took like 10 vials. Anyways, I got an email this evening that my results are in and wow! I dropped almost all of my levels by large amounts.

Cholesterol - down 40 points
Triglycerides - down 70 points
LDL - down 30 points
HDL - up 4 points

All of that is to say that diet and exercise really work. I'm feeling so great now that I have even more affirmation! It's more reason to keep it up.

Still going...

Did the shred again this morning. Last night I did the mini-ab workouts.

I'm going to do the ab workouts again tonight. Tomorrow? Day 2 of week 6 of c25k. Scary - this one is a bit longer with 2 10 minute runs. I've already done 20 mins straight so this should be a piece of cake, right? RIGHT?

Feel the buuuuurn

Ok, maybe not so much that, but I did have another good calorie burning day today.

Laundry, ironing, vacuuming, and level 2 of the 30 day shred.

My ability is up, but my stamina is down. Hopefully the next week will help that. Tomorrow starts week 6 of the C25K.

Another big calorie burning day

This morning, I ran the C25K. This was day 3 of week 5 and it was a pretty big milestone. This is the first time that I ran for 20 minutes straight. I was nervous heading into it, but really had no problem once I was out there.

Then, I mowed and edged our lawn. It was interesting because I used to dread that chore. I still don't like it, but I think now that I'm in better shape, it wasn't as bad. I did the whole thing and didn't have to stop (I stopped to drink some gatorade because on days where it's 90+ degrees out, I tend to sweat a ton).

When I added up all of my activity, I burned 1,400 calories. That's huge!

A quickie - the shred

I did the 30 day shred part 2 this morning. I tried to more of the unmodified versions of everything. I did the whole thing and almost all was unmodified. I was going to do the mini workouts this evening, but my Clear WiMAX modems came in, so I've been getting that set up.

Tomorrow is the last day of week 5 of C25K!

Hooray! C25K this morning and abs in the evening

I did the second day of week 5 of C25K this morning. If you didn't know, this is the first time that there's more running than walking. 5 minute warmup, 8 minute jogging, 5 minute walking, 8 minute jogging, 1 min 45 second cooldown. I actually kind of liked it. Maybe today was a good running day, maybe I'm getting used to it, maybe the moon was aligned properly. I don't know. But I can say that I no longer hate running. And I can see myself liking it. I was really nervous heading into today, but it was actually easier than I thought it would be.

That means it's time to register for a 5k! I haven't really decided which one yet, though there are a few that look interesting in my time frame. If you're in the Atlanta area and interested in running a 5k with me in the mid to late September time frame, drop me an email at myfitnessresults -at- gmail -dot- com. Or leave a comment!

Tonight I've done 1 full set (so far) of Jillian's "Ripped Up Abs" and "Upside Down Abs" mini workouts. That's better than I did yesterday! I'm guessing it's because tonight, I hadn't already worked my abs with the shred. I'll be shredding again tomorrow for my off day from running, but I'm liking throwing the abs in.

Finally, this morning I broke through my weight loss plateau with a loss of nearly 2 lbs! I'm glad I've kept up and I'm looking forward to more.

Back to the shred and more!

Thanks to my new tattoo, I won't be able to swim for the next 2 weeks. So I've started doing the shred again in between running days. I did level 2 tonight. It wasn't terrible, but to dive in after a few days off was harder than I anticipated. Good harder, but harder.

I decided to also try Jillian's Ripped Up Abs mini workout tonight as well. OW! This workout was intense. I love it. I couldn't do even close to the whole thing. There's only 3 exercises, but I could only do one set of the first, one set of the second (in 2 sessions), and none of the third. I think I found my next daily workout.

Tomorrow is day 2 of week 5 of C25K. For this one, I'll be jogging for 2 8 minute sets, and walking for a total of 12 minutes. This is the first time that I'll be jogging more than I'll be walking. I'm a little intimidated, but I think I can do it. There's no way to know unless I try!

Day 100 - Oy! I owe an update!

So sorry it's taken me so long to update. Last week, and the beginning of this I've been slammed with work stuff so the blog suffered.

I managed to complete day 1 of week 5 of C25K this morning. I wouldn't say I liked it, but for the first half, I didn't mind it. The second half was tough, but not unbearable. I can't really believe that I'm about to say this, but, I don't hate running any more. Don't get me wrong - I don't like it, but at least I can do it.

Yesterday I got the color work finished on my Grandma memorial tattoo. I LOVE this thing. It totally makes me smile every time I see it. So many pieces of my Grandma's memory are incorporated into it.

Grandma Memorial by Danielle Distefano
at Only You Tattoo in Grant Park, GA

If you've considered a tattoo and are in Atlanta, I'd HIGHLY recommend Danielle and all the artists at Only You Tattoo. They're professional, clean, creative, affordable, and will give you a tattoo that you want, not just a piece of flash (though they'll do that too).

Aside from this morning, I've kept up with the C25K for the past week and a half. The only challenge I had is that on Saturday, I tried to bring my dog running with me for the first time. Now, my dog Stoli is a Husky mix so he doesn't mix terribly well with hot weather. But, he loves to run. So I thought I'd give it a try. Bad idea. Stoli slowed down in every spot of shade, and even stopped to lay down a few times. Really messed with my groove. So I gave up and did it again on Sunday. It worked out to be 1.5 C25K days.

Sunday, after I ran, I did some normal house cleaning type stuff... laundry, ironing, vacuuming. Then I got the notion to rearrange the furniture and move our couches. When I say move, I don't mean I just pushed them around. My parents gave us one of their old sofas a few weeks ago and it had been sitting in the garage. So I moved our one large sofa downstairs (by myself). Then when my wife got home, I had her guide the 2nd one upstairs. I burned about 3,000 calories on Sunday!

So I've been getting my exercise in, but I really need to get back to shredding (I'm planning that for tomorrow morning).

I'm kind of at a plateau in losing weight, but the inches are still dropping off, so I'm happy with that. People are finally starting to notice without me prompting them!