My Journal

Today is a weigh-in day!

So far for the week I am looking at about 6.5 pounds down with the weekend to go.

My morning workout was with 3 machines today. The first elliptical machine was for 10 minutes. It is a machine I do not like. the range of motion for my legs is wrong so 10 minutes was enough. I switched to the stair master for 20 minutes and felt good there. I finished up on the lower body cross-trainer elliptical (lbxtr) machine. 60 minutes of cardio and I felt good.

Next came breakfast after showering up for my work day.

Breakfast was nonfat pineapple cottage cheese, a serving of part skim ricotta and an apple. Light and easy, and I felt good after it.
Morning snack was a chicken breast, half a sweet potato and a dole fruit cut. Again I felt good.
Lunch was a bowl of lettuce with chicken breast, onion, red pepper, portobello mushrooms and sticky fingers barbeque sauce. This was left over from the night before and it was too saucy and did not sit well in my belly. Oh well I was better after about an hour.
Afternoon snack was an apple, Yoplait light yogurt, Special K strawberry bar and some Pringles Pizza Stix. The Pizza stix may not have great nutritionally but were all I needed instead of going to the vending machine for junk.

I am not doing an afternoon workout on this Friday. I had some errands to run and my gym partner was off work today.

I hate to say it but I am looking forward to Monday morning so I can see how my weekend activities will reflect on the scale.

Another day gone by. Another good day! I am still not getting enough sleep but am chugging along. I don’t know how I could fit another hour in the day.

This morning I did 2 different elliptical machines for 30 minutes each. I will try to do some time on each different one so I can benefit from the unique range of motion each has. Some do changes in elevation height some don’t. There are 4 different ones that do upper and lower body and one that does lower body only.

Meals today were easy again since I packed. I did notice as I was tracking my calories and the ratio of carbohydrates , protein, and fat and realized that my protein was low. This was because I did not do hard boiled eggs for breakfast. I plan to have then 2-3 times a week for breakfast. To help shift things into a better balance I had a can of tuna with low fat mayo as a morning snack and as an afternoon snack. The second can was tough to eat. I would have put 2 or 3 times the amount of mayo in it, but that does not benefit my body so that’s a no go. I went shopping today so I can have some chicken for extra protein if I need it.

My body is feeling good. I have lifted heavier and harder this week and have not had the soreness that I had some months ago when I picked a day to push it.

The afternoon workout was a good one. I did 15 min on the stair master to get my heart pumping and followed it up with leg presses and leg extensions. Today I set 2 new max workout weights for leg exercises. 10 reps of leg extensions at 190 lbs and 10 leg presses at 540 lbs. Neither may be much to some folks but a few weeks ago I was experiencing knee discomfort/pain with leg pressing 270lbs and 360 lbs caused me not to complete 10 reps. This gives me hope once I drop some more weight jogging could be in my future!

Tomorrow I will be weighing in again to see what 5 days has done for me and to gauge what the weekend will do to me since Mondays will be the new week weigh-ins.

I feel Great! I had a really good workout this morning. I did 30 min on an elliptical cross trainer (heart rate between 120-137 level 13) and 15 min on a Stair Master. I varied the level one minute at a time from level 8 up to level 20 (Max of machine).

I am finding my happy place with healthy eating at work.

For breakfast I had 1 package of instant oatmeal, 3 egg whites and one yoke, a banana, and a Yoplait light yogurt for a total of 441 calories, 7 grams of fat, 73 grams of carbohydrates, and 23.6 grams of protein. I felt satisfied. I did not miss my Mountain Dew soda at all.

My morning snack was under 170 calories with raw carrots and a can of tuna with 1 table spoon of light mayo.

Lunch was a fresh made salad with some strawberries and blue berries topped with 8 oz of steak and drizzled with balsamic vinegar and a splash of orange juice. I had an apple as well. Grand total of lunch calories: 622.

I did 30 minutes on an exercise bike after work to keep me active since I skipped lifting at the gym with my buddy off work today.

I might get on the scale tomorrow to see if two days of eating better has had any impact on the numbers. I would think not eating until full and cutting out soda and potato chips might account for up to a 2 pound difference already. My plan is to do official weigh ins on Fridays and Mondays so I can see what my weekends are doing to my progress. It is winter here and cold weather does make the couch that much more cozy with my wife.