Year 2, Week 1 Check-In

This post is the first in a series of weekly progress that I am going to post as I go through my second year on my fat loss and fitness plan. Many weeks I see that I've made little or no progress and I think "damn, must try harder next week" but I don't really pinpoint specific issues I had or look at ways that I could do better. By blogging about it I hope that I will be a bit more diligent.

Weight GAIN: 0.25 lbs

Oh dear! Not a good start to my second year. I didn't just not lose but I gained weight! I didn't bother doing the measurements and bodyfat calculations this week as the results will not really change much with such a small weight change. I usually do that when there's been a change of around 1lb.

Changes in Exercise Routine

Last week I tried quite a different routine to the norm. For quite a few months I had a fairly regular routine of doing cardio weekday mornings, weights weekday lunchtimes, karate two evenings a week and nothing at all on the weekend. This routine had two drawbacks. Firstly it took 14 hours out of my week, phew! Secondly it was all concentrated into 5 days and then I did nothing on weekends and that is when I tend to overeat the most.

I've had a week of illness and then a week on holiday and around that time I also realised that I could no longer afford to spend 14 hours of my week on exercise so I've changed things around quite a lot. I now exercise daily, but no more than twice daily (cardio, weights AND karate in one day is just overkill) and I started replacing cardio at the gym for running near my house as that's something I want to improve.

Running Problems

My current routine has me running 4 times - both weekend days and also two mornings during the week. I had real issue with my mid-week runs as I was doing these straight after getting up at 6am. I don't like to exercise immediately after waking as I'm like a zombie for a while. Secondly, I am greatly dehydrated when I first wake up. Usually I'll have a big glass of water first thing but by running first I missed out on that. Lastly, I'm hungry and have no energy.

I was having a very hard time with the running, feeling terribly lethargic and I kept getting headaches. This week I'm changing the routine to overcome these problems. I'll still run on weekends but not straight away. I'll get up, have my water, have breakfast and wake up a bit before I go. I did that this morning and felt much better for it. During the week, I'm dropping the running and replacing it with two cardio sessions instead. I always workout very well doing cardio at the gym because I put in a solid 40 minutes and I monitor my heart rate the entire time and keep it pretty high.

Snacking

Last week I snacked quite a lot, mostly on sweets and chocolates but I also had peanut butter on toast in the evening twice. Snacking has always been a problem for me and I don't think I'll ever be able to completely give up sweets, chocolates, cakes biscuits etc. Well it's not so much that I can't give them up, as I don't want to. However, I need to do something about it so next week I'll try and compromise by allowing myself one unplanned treat daily. If I raid the receptionists sweetie bowl (she has toffees! how can I resist!!?) then no chocolate and no toast that day!

Those Indulgent Days

Unfortunately I've already got myself off to a bad start this morning by eating a cheese burger! I do my weekly shop on Saturday mornings (which I hate) and a few months ago they went and installed an in-store McDonalds! Usually it doesn't tempt me as I'm not actually a huge fan, I find their food pretty gross really but today I was just so hungry and I caved.

Not only that but in an hour or so I'm taking my son to Legoland where I will no doubt eat more crappy food like burgers. And we always have one of their scrumptious chocolate dipped waffles when we go there! Usually I take my own food with me but I'm just having one of those days today and I just can't be bothered! Lastly, I just know I'll be knackered tonight and I wont want to cook. I've already decided that we're having a Chinese takeaway - I even bought the crispy duck already as I can get it at the shops a lot cheaper!

I don't beat myself up about days like today even though they do tend to sabotage my progress for the whole week. It doesn't happen every week and I still get a life. The key point though is that I go straight back on plan the following day, I never lose sight of the big picture.