7 months, 10kg

seamus

Right. So. My last log actually worked pretty well. But then I got to my goal, and eh, that was it. I faffed last summer. Did my 80km and then probably got in 8 - 10 more spins of around 60km. Never really pushed myself to get faster or stronger.
It was only when I firmly set my sights on the WW200 this year that I properly got into doing decent distances and concentrating on the important things like eating and resting and hydrating and so forth.

Last two sportives were 100km+ at 30km/h, there or thereabouts. I'm happy with that. I think I'd be going to unnecessary lengths to improve that when there's something much more obvious and much easier to fix, which will yield huge performance improvements.

I've lost weight before. In fact I've lost a fair chunk before. I lost 3.5 stone, 5 or 6 years ago. And I kept it off. Then I started cycling to work, dropped another half a stone, but for the last 3 or 4 years I've had a stubborn hanger-on of around 10kg that hasn't left.

I know how to lose it, but I've been happy with my fitness level from the bike, plus I'm old enough now to not give a balls what anyone else thinks. So the extra paunch has not left me feeling negative.
I also promised myself two years ago that I would enter my 30's in a state that I wasn't in for my teenage years or my twenties: normal weight.

And now 30 is 7 months away and I have this 10kg to lose.

My plan is to ignore any exercise as an excuse to up my food intake. I'm pretty sure this is why I've not shifted anything. That's not to say that I won't eat properly after a spin, but 5 hours on the bike is not an excuse to have an extra 4 roast spuds on Sunday
Plus my bike regime is fairly routine, I think my body has gotten wise to it, so I'm not burning an exceptionally large amount on my commute. So I'll say my exercise is a bonus and just work off my basic BMR for the purposes of tracking. Lots of people say calorie counting doesn't work, or is the wrong way to do it. Well it works for me, so I'm going to do it

I'm going to cross-train to a certain extent. My wife has started jogging, so I'll look at joining her or doing it on my own about 3 days a week. Good thing about jogging is that it's quick. No getting ready, no packing the jersey/bike, just gear on and run out the door. For me at the moment, a 30 minute easy jog is worth about 2.5 hours on the bike (or at least that's how it feels). Hopefully some light jogging will catch my body on the hop and do some good calorie burning.

Also looking forward to getting on the single speed when I have it built (all parts are en route!). It means that I can't wuss out and take it easy on any day, I can only work with what I have. It also means that I can just swap out the cog after a couple of months to increase the intensity of my commute in a controlled and measurable way. Maybe it'll work, maybe it won't.

Current weight is 88.9kg. Loss goal is roughly 1kg every 3 weeks. I know most places will say that a healthy weight loss is nearly 1kg per week, but I also know that 1kg every 3 weeks is actually quite ambitious for my body. It likes this bit of fat, it's been holding onto it for 18 years. But it's not too ambitious to make it seem impossible, nor is it so easy that I'll rest on my laurels.

Long-term I want to see the effect of a 10kg drop in the sportives next year, particularly the hilly ones.
Even longer term, if I'm particularly happy with how next year's sportives go, I might look at some A4 racing in 2013.

But I have 10kg to go first.

carrielou

Looking forward to following your thread, best of luck with it

seamus

Down 1.2kgs since last week. Allegedly. Despite having been drinking both Saturday and Sunday (though in my defence I tempered my intake and avoided getting takeaway/Charlies with everyone else).

I know that the first week or two always see the most dramatic weight loss, so I'm not jumping for joy. Though it does mean that the full 10kgs has become more achievable.

Went for a 3.75km jog on Tuesday evening. Easy pace, around 25 mins. Only a tiny bit of aching after so I'm good to go again tonight. My only concern is that I went with my wife on Tuesday and she went at a much easier pace than I would have. But I realised at the end that if I'd gone my pace my legs would be in bits afterwards. Aerobically I'm fine, it's not too difficult, but I need to hold myself back or I'll injure my legs. I'm going out on my own tonight, so I need to be careful.

I'd like to get out for a spin this weekend, but it's going to piss rain on Saturday. Might see if anyone wants to go MTBing instead.

seamus

2.3kgs down in total.

Still not holding my breath, I'm expecting to plateau this week. The running's getting a bit easier and it's only been a couple of sessions. It's been a couple of weeks since I got out for a proper spin on the bike, but this weekend isn't looking ideal

carrielou

over 5 lbs, well done, keep it going !

seamus

So I step on the scales this morning.

I've been generally feeling good about this. All of my pants feel a little looser. I can comfortably now use the next notch down on my belt. I'm not sure if this is because I'm losing weight or because there's consistently less food in my stomach.

Overall controlling my intake has been a lot easier than the last couple of times I've done this. I'm not getting any cravings to go down and get a few chips with my lunch, or get some chocolate at 3pm with my coffee. I occasionally feel peckish after dinner, but with nothing really at home to snack on, I might have a small handful of nuts, but typically I'll just make a cup of tea and I'll be grand.

I've plenty of energy, don't really feel hungry at all. Dunno, maybe it's cos I know there's a log here to be updated. Any time I lost weight before, I can remember the motivation, but I also remember the hunger and the occasional pang for a piece of chocolate or a big dirty bag of chips. I've only made two changes, which seem inconsequential to any diet, so shouldn't be making it any different this time;

1. I don't drink coffee any more at all. I used to get a large coffee when I came into work, and then have 4 or 5 tiny cups of decaff coffee through the day. This would lead to caffeine withdrawal headaches at the weekend. That was my main reason for stopping with the coffee, but I also calculated that my morning coffee was costing me €250/year. So I went down and bought a €2 mug in Dunnes and now I drink free tea all day instead. Headaches gone, and I don't get any kind of afternoon slump. It also means that when I get real coffee, it tastes all the sweeter. Like a fricking heroin injection.

2. I switched breakfast. Breakfast is a relatively new thing to me. Even back as far secondary school, I didn't really bother with breakfast. Sleep was more important. Lunch would typically be my first meal of the day (and it would be a whopper). This continued on up till I started cycling and started actually feeling hungry after cycling into work. That's when the coffee (and a muffin) started. A few months back I realised the muffin is no good, so I started having muesli before I left the house. But that would leave me with indigestion when I got into work, probably the milk sloshing around in my stomach. So now it's an egg sandwich. relatively filling, no indigestion, but theoretically shouldn't make any difference.

Jogging is getting easier too, even though I've only gone out like five times. The aches are going from my bones, and I'm getting to the stage where I'm looking at a football pitch and considering doing a lap around it before continuing on with the rest of the jog. First session was a 6:39/km pace. Fifth session 6:01. Though a 50kph tailwind probably helped there.
Aerobically, still not a problem. I finish the jog and I've recovered in about 60 seconds. My legs are a little stiff for the rest of the evening, but nothing major. I really like getting in off the bike and straight out for a jog. It means I don't suffer through those first five minutes warming up. I'll do my usual route of 3.7km tonight and then start with a 5km route next week to up it a bit.

Dubs match on Sunday, only means one thing. Whether I manage to bag tickets or not, I will be drinking beer and eating crap from lunchtime till sometime Monday morning. So I have to get out on the bike on Saturday, even if it's only 50k.

Anyway, the scales this morning read 85kg, which is a 3.9kg drop in 3 weeks. Which still sounds suspect to me. I don't think I'll be convinced that I'm losing "real" weight until it says 83kg.

carrielou

Well done, u are flying it Seamus..............started 1 myself and I have a good bit to lose but little by little will do me. I, for some strange reason, have stopped the lots of coffee too...........1 in morning and 1 in evening now and that is it, trying to drink lots and lots of water............... only started last monday but have decided lots of short hard spins on the bike during the week and i will put in a long one on a Sunday, means i will work harder on the short 30km and am hoping this will improve my general performance overall. I find the evening times hard also and i have 5 kids in the house so the cupboards are full of stuff but all i can do is try to stay away from the rubbish. your goal is so on the way, keep it up, well done

Killme00

seamus wrote: »

1. I don't drink coffee any more at all. I used to get a large coffee when I came into work, and then have 4 or 5 tiny cups of decaff coffee through the day. This would lead to caffeine withdrawal headaches at the weekend. That was my main reason for stopping with the coffee, but I also calculated that my morning coffee was costing me €250/year. So I went down and bought a €2 mug in Dunnes and now I drink free tea all day instead. Headaches gone, and I don't get any kind of afternoon slump. It also means that when I get real coffee, it tastes all the sweeter. Like a fricking heroin injection..

Why?
Do you think a reduction in caffeine is going to impact your weight?

seamus

Killme00 wrote: »

Why?
Do you think a reduction in caffeine is going to impact your weight?

Nope. As I mentioned, I was getting withdrawal headaches on the weekends (had been for a couple of years tbh), and when I realised how much it was costing me on a yearly basis for coffee that's not even any good, I just cut it out.
It also causes one's digestive system to be less....how do I put it....reliable.

seamus

Couple of heavy weeks with no weekend spins, and plenty of eatin and drinkin going on. Weight bounced about a bit. I blame the Dubs for winning Sam.

Back on track now though. Total loss now stands at 4.5kg, nearly 10lbs. Not bad. I can feel it in my clothes and on the cold mornings!

Running goes from strength to strength. Started on 30th August doing 3.75km @ 6:39/km. Increased now to 4.69km @ 5:32/km.

Have to get out with Orwell this weekend, it's been more than a month since I had proper long spin.

seamus

Jaysus, I though I updated this more often.

6.5kg down this morning, tipping the scales just below 13 stone. The plateau I expected to arrive two months ago never really did. I'm starting to suspect that "plateau"'s occur when you take your eye off the ball and just assume that your diet is OK

Been actually a bit iffy for the last couple of weeks. I seem to manage to get 3 or 4 good weeks in, lose a chunk of weight, then I fall off the wagon for a weekend or two, go for lots of beers, have a takeaway and a bit of cake somewhere, and manage to lose nothing (or gain a little). But it seems to work OK, so long as I keep remembering to reign it in and focus again for another few weeks.

Been shying away from the club spins in favour of going out on my own at the weekend. I've realised it's because I'd rather do 60km with stupid amounts of climbing (and therefore descending), than just spinning along at 30km/h on the flat for 3 hours. Also because it's hard to get out of bed on a Sunday morning before 10am
I do need to get more into them though as they're my best chance of getting me out on the road when it actually starts getting cold.
Singlespeed is fun for the commute. I have no option but to work hard on the spin home, though I would like to have just one other gear for the trip into work, so I'm not freewheeling half the way

Running still going well, still getting quicker every time (not easier). Roughly 5.8km now @ 5:10/km. That includes running up the initial climb on Stocking Lane (which is easier than cycling it, believe it or not). I've discovered new pains where I never had pain before and how to adjust my gait to compensate and all sorts of other interesting stuff. No doubt the improved times are helped by the weight loss as well as strength improvement.

The Stocking Lane run though has a significant downhill which is causing ACL pain in my knee, so I'm going to do it another 2, maybe 3 times (I really want to do it in less than 30 minutes, I'm 16 seconds off that right now) and then leave it alone in favour of doing longer, flatter runs which don't cause me any knee problems. I'd like to hit 10k before Xmas.

thehamo

with all the cycling and running you're doing, you should look into doing an adventure race. Something to work to, which I always find helps, especially with the running. Wicklow WAR or ROAR are good ones. I started doing them a couple of years back and im addicted

Carpenter

Man you did not look overweight to me last week not @ all

smacl

Great log Seamus, time I lost a couple of KG myself.

seamus wrote: »

The Stocking Lane run though has a significant downhill which is causing ACL pain in my knee, so I'm going to do it another 2, maybe 3 times (I really want to do it in less than 30 minutes, I'm 16 seconds off that right now) and then leave it alone in favour of doing longer, flatter runs which don't cause me any knee problems. I'd like to hit 10k before Xmas.

If you're in that general area, I find circuits of the inside wall of St Enda's park way easier on the joints for running while still being quite hilly in spots. Slightly rougher terrain leads to somewhat lower impact and less repetitive strain. Scenery is also quite nice.

seamus

thehamo wrote: »

with all the cycling and running you're doing, you should look into doing an adventure race. Something to work to, which I always find helps, especially with the running. Wicklow WAR or ROAR are good ones. I started doing them a couple of years back and im addicted

I'll see. I'm not sure how much I'd be into proper endurance runs or duathlons. My knees might also not be capable of longer events. I'll try a 10k fun run or two and see how I get on, and whether I enjoy it.

smacl wrote: »

If you're in that general area, I find circuits of the inside wall of St Enda's park way easier on the joints for running while still being quite hilly in spots. Slightly rougher terrain leads to somewhat lower impact and less repetitive strain. Scenery is also quite nice.

I know it well, never thought about it, twould be a nice run alright. Though it's closed now in the evenings which is generally when I go out.

cameramonkey

seamus wrote: »

I'll see. I'm not sure how much I'd be into proper endurance runs or duathlons. My knees might also not be capable of longer events. I'll try a 10k fun run or two and see how I get on, and whether I enjoy it.

I know it well, never thought about it, twould be a nice run alright. Though it's closed now in the evenings which is generally when I go out.

hop over the wall. its quite low beside the gate.

smacl

cameramonkey wrote: »

hop over the wall. its quite low beside the gate.

That's been by exit strategy for getting out when I stay there too late. Bit embarrassing having to do it with the kids, though

seamus

OK, December was a total write-off. Xmas seemed to start on 1st of December and not end until yesterday. Net result is that I did no running while I was waiting for my knee to heal itself and haven't been out on a proper bike spin for a month cos I was wimping out of the windy December.

I also ate all around me, so I'm probaby up 1-2kg over that time. I won't know where I stand till I finish a detox week this week, weight is always unpredictable until I've done that.

I managed to get myself to stop stressing about eating/drinking so much and moving so little over Xmas by resolving to hit the training hard for ten weeks, starting today. I got a few pieces of clothing over Xmas which fit, but which would be ideally comfortable if I was half a stone lighter. So there's my motivation. I knew it was a good idea to give myself 7 months to lose 10kg

Plan for the next ten weeks is to be rigid as hell. This is always a good time for it; there's usually very little on the in the way of events or holidays. I've used Micoach to do me up a training plan for that time for the running, just to mix it up a bit. I also need to get off my ass and send a draft into Orwell to pay for membership and get out for more Sundays with them.

Goals for 2012 generally:

1. Put in 3,000km on the road bike (in addition to the normal commuting miles)
2. Do at least 5 sportives over the Spring/Summer/Autumn. I plan to look at the list from last year, I'll post up the ones I plan on doing this year
3. Put in an 8-hour (rolling) time on the WW200. A sub-goal of this is to do 160km in less than 6.5 hours beforehand. Did 9 hours (I think) last year, so this is very doable, but it's a psychological goal more than anything.

seamus

OK, 600g weight increase since the start of December, just over 1lb. I can handle that.

Club spin last weekend, utterly dead, but then so was everyone, and looking at the stats it turns out that we were actually pushing quite a hard pace, so I don't feel bad about it.

Enjoying the micoach app. It basically sets out a time in which you run and then changes your target pace every now and again depending on the workout type. Has voice instructions and such telling you how far you've gone and prompting you to speed up or slow down. Monday was intervals, last night was a long run at optimal pace, tonight is a slow recovery run. Much more enjoyable than just running a route as quickly as you can.
Plus with new runners and a knee strap, I've had no issues with knee pain, so I'm going to stick with what I'm doing.

Keeping a strict diet is hard with some post-Xmas goodies still lying around the place...

Cookie_Monster

seamus wrote: »

Keeping a strict diet is hard with some post-Xmas goodies still lying around the place...

the trick there is to scoff it all in one go and it's not an issue any more :D

seamus

Odd week. Unintentionally did the commute 4 times last Thursday, then went out for a run afterwards and still felt strong on Friday. Intended to go out for a spin on Saturday instead of Sunday as I promised a mate I would meet him for beers.
Woke up, couldn't get going, just felt tired. Chalked it down to getting too much sleep (oh the humanity :pac:). Decided I'd take it easy on the booze and do a hard short afternoon spin on Sunday.
Wake up Sunday, oh wait, I'm sick. Feck it anyway. So first day back commuting on the bike today (walking into work is fun for about 15 minutes) and still a little fragile, so no running for the rest of the week, and probably no club spin on Sunday. Though I might consider a solo spin over the weekend at my own pace so I don't destroy my lungs.

Despite that, 800g down this morning ~2lbs. Xmas weight + a little extra gone.

seamus

Urgh. Bloody cough wouldn't go away, Friday morning was the first day I woke up last week and didn't feel like I had lungs full of crap.

Wanted to do a short spin yesterday (didn't think I'd be up for a full club spin), but then I got lazy with the rain, and didn't even get out for a run cos of it. So the last two weeks are being struck from the record, I'll be back to running this evening.

Still managed a 600g weight loss by the end of last week, though I didn't have a good weekend so we'll see.

seamus

Little to report. Got out for a good club spin on Sunday, been getting the running miles in, 9.5km on Tuesday and planning a 5km event at the end of Feb and a 10km at the start of May.
Tipping the scales at exactly 8kg lost this morning. 2kg to go in about 8 weeks, it'll be down to the wire. I've let the diet slack a bit, typically, so have to get back on focus again.
Incredible how much a bit of a chest infection knocks you off course.

Edit: Also considering changing the singlespeed back to having a few gears on the back, commute is just hilly enough that I miss having a fast gear in the morning and an easy gear in the evening. Working out a bit expensive though to convert as I've hamstrung myself with the drop bars - bar-end shifters are not cheap and only seem to come in 9-speed, not 7 speed.

smacl

2kg over 8 weeks should be very doable if you can keep the calorie intake under control. Probably come straight back after the first feed of pints and kebab though.

If you're finding the weather getting in the way of your running and cycling, I find kettle bells to be a great way of tearing off the extra couple of pounds. According to my old Timex HRM, a 40 minute KB session is close to the same calories as the spin up Cruagh road, across to Johnnie foxes and back, or 3-4 circuits on the inside walls of Endas. Less pleasant than either though.

Good luck with it!

seamus

Anoth half kilo down. Chippin away, as a corkman would say.

Great spin on Sunday with the club. We were fairly hammering it and there were a few climbers in the group. I happened to be leading the group going up Devil's Glen, and I managed to stick with the climbers until about 300m from the top when the lead trio started accelerating as the road got steeper :eek:
We took a short break at the top then and our group of 13 dropped to 8 as five lads decided we were a bit hardcore and went ahead to join a slower group who were going to stop in Roundwood.
So that felt good, I probably would have been one of those five, 6 months ago.
Don't think I'll ever be much of a racer though. Descending in a group, my motorist spidey sense takes over, and I can't help but to hold back and give myself tonnes of distance from the guy in front.

Been tired this week though. Running intervals on Monday, killed myself. Previous intervals had been 3 x 60s sprints broken up by 120s very slow jogs. This week it was 4 x 60s sprints broken up by 60s of normal jogging. Haven't done any other running this week for various reasons, but my legs still felt tired when I got on the bike this morning. One of the first things I tell people who start training is to "listen your body", so I'm going to heed my own advice and stay away from the running for the rest of this week.

There'll be no fallback in fitness if I jump back into it on Monday (bloody intervals).

seamus

So I wasn't tired, I was sick.

Though that was a result of not getting enough sleep. It did mean though that exercise was out for ten days, and as usual I probably ate a little too much in an attempt to make myself feel better.

I've switched to running on flatter land rather than up around the hills around my house. As much as I want to be able to say I do all my training on stocking lane, intervals on hilly roads are a fucking cunt. They're not a walk in the park on the flat either but at least I don't feel like I want to die before running the last interval.

I was going to do some smaller 5k runs, but I think I'll look at the great Ireland run in the park for my first running event. Might just be easier and more relaxed with more of a field of fun runners rather than a small 5k event run by a running club.

Nice flat midlands club spin on the weekend too. Bit too easy, but that was OK, my legs were tired from running on Saturday. Actually dying to get back into the hills proper now, haven't been over Sally Gap yet this year.

Any road, tipped the scales under 80kg this morning. That's a nice little milestone. I have 800g to lose and just over 4 weeks to do it. Easily done, but in reality I'd like to be hitting goal this time next week or the week after.

seamus

800g in 4 weeks, easily done? Yeah, they all say that.

Probably have around 600g to go now in two weeks. Weight has been fluctuating quite a bit over the last 3 weeks, but all other measurements are going in the right direction.
A fitted shirt I got from the mother-in-law at Xmas now fits. Fitted shirts have always been a running joke with me because they never fitted me, ever.
I'm also apparently now a size medium in M&S t-shirts. I have never been a medium anything.

So it appears that I'm either gaining muscle mass or I'm fooling myself. The former is possible, my running training has been going exceptionally well. Signed up for the 10k in the Phoenix park on 15th April, hoping for a time under 50minutes, but will probably be more like 51-53 minutes.

Cycling has been, well, going anyway. Whatever way I've managed to get onto the club spins this year they've almost all been flat-ish since January. So I went up over Stocking Lane & Sally Gap yesterday for the first time this year. Headwind was a bitch but I enjoyed getting some hard climbing in. Found a nice route which gives me 900m of climbing in around 50km. So that's a spin just under 2 hours long - good for getting out during a summer's evening for some climbing.

In any case, losing 600g in two weeks has to be possible. It's like 1.5lbs. And I'm utterly stony broke until the end of the month, so no reason to be going out for dinner or pints. Keep the head down, keep tighter rein on the diet and I should get there...

seamus

So when I talk about weight fluctuating, this is what I mean:

Clicky

So I'm going to take that as a win with the caveat that I need to stabilise it over the next two weeks. I could easily check again this time next week and be 1kg up. It doesn't change the fact that I'm broke, so I still won't be out partying and ruining it

12 days till I'm 30, so I'll just keep my eating under control. Then I'm off the week of my birthday (yes, I am ten years old ), I'll loosen the reins a bit, take the time to get out on the bike and go for a few runs.

After the great ireland run on the 15th I'll come up with a new goal. I still wobble in places, which means I still have more to lose, so maybe 75kg is a good aim, a nice round number. But that can wait...

Lumen

Win!

Since you're looking for a goal maybe it's time to focus on going faster.

"Even longer term, if I'm particularly happy with how next year's sportives go, I might look at some A4 racing in 2013."

Do you have a local club?

seamus

Yeah I'm with Orwell, so no better place to be I suppose for club/league races.

Going faster, 'twould be nice alright. Over the summer I might look at more structured training with intervals and the like, though everyone keeps telling me that there's no training like just going to a race and destroying yourself.

Lumen

seamus wrote: »

Yeah I'm with Orwell, so no better place to be I suppose for club/league races.

Going faster, 'twould be nice alright. Over the summer I might look at more structured training with intervals and the like, though everyone keeps telling me that there's no training like just going to a race and destroying yourself.

Right then, 2012 club league for you!

I sort of disagree with the "the best training is racing" thing. It may be true for high level competition (which I wouldn't know anything about) and racing is a good way to learn to suffer and definitely gives a bit of an edge, but if you start trying to use club races as training you'll struggle to develop good tactics. It doesn't take much effort to sit in a bunch and you're unlikely to win anything by going off the front all race.

If you can cope with an hour or so on your own at 30kph you should be able to handle the limit group no problem.