Tag Archives: fat

SE 3.0 – Interim Report – #6

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Almost four month after revisiting my personal “Straight Edge Project” it’s time to summarize several things.

Most importantly, this is the longest period of being “straight edge” since the very beginning of the project back in the days. Most, if not all, projects finished about 2 or 3 month and only a few things remained. For instance, to stop smoking was the most important thing and is still something I’m very proud of.

Several other things did not remain. Like doing sports continuously or eating healthy and more “efficient”. But these thing have changed. SE 3.0 was the first project that did not focus that much on strong rules and dogmas. This made it much easier for me to keep the pace and stick with it. I sure have schedule for my gym lessons and I do not eat like a pig each and every day, but there’s a spare room left for such things. Till one certain degree of course.

I’m aware of the fact, that one of these days I’ll have to face my very own motivation. This day has been reached and it does currently feel quite exhausting to do SE 3.0, but I’ll stick with it. No matter what. It’s very difficult, mostly because of the schedule my work day dictates me. I waste tons and tons of hours with commuting and my true spare time is limited to almost a single hour per day. I don’t count sports and such as spare time.

Most of the time at work I simply sit and don’t move around very much. So sports is something absolutely necessary to have, like a counter reaction. I have to do it, also because I see it as an prevention. I don’t want to suffer one of these office illnesses or drown in my own fat masses. I don’t do sports mainly for a fun reason, I do it because the daily life, especially at work and in offices, turns human beings into wounded, disabled soldiers of work.

It’s important for me to stick with the project, because my first milestone is still not reached. I wanted to get below 100 kg in August and currently I ply at 102 and 104 kg. I don’t really think that I can reach the mark below a hundred, but this doesn’t bother me that much. It’s way more important to get below the hundred to actually reach a first milestone.

On the other hand, it’s good to not have such a drastic drop of weight. What goes down pretty quick, goes up quickly as well. I want to avoid such things. What counts for me is the fact that I’ve finally managed it to have a continuity and a schedule I can follow without having a greater loss. The bigger loss is of course the commuting, which bothers me very much at the moment. But I don’t want my SE 3.0 get affected with the disaffection I have with my work day conditions.

It is exhausting and I’m very tired at the moment, but things gonna change.

SE 3.0 – Interim Report – #2

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Two weeks ago I gave you guys a short report about the current progress of how well or bad things actually are. First of all the good news, I’m still into sports and gym and I’ve managed to go at least three or four times per week, depending on the week’s schedule.

The second good news, my overall condition gets better and better. I’m getting more used to the cardio training and the training sessions are not as exhausting as they’ve been in the very first weeks back in May. My main focus is still on the the treadmill with sessions up to 65 minutes. I do not increase the speed, only the session time to have quite a good amount of fat burning. Increasing the speed will not happen before September or October.

Besides the treadmill my second machine of choice is the spinning machine with a moderate or high drag, depending on my condition. As a person who uses the bike for almost everything, I can easily handle higher difficulties. I also stick to a moderate speed that I usually drive out on the street. Difference here is, once again, the time and the continuity. Riding the bike for forty minutes constantly on the street and in the city as well is barely possible.

Apart from the whole endurance training comes the strength training in one training session per week. Until now it is not a training that I use to get giant muscles, it’s more to help the supporting muscles grow, like back, belly, legs, arms and shoulder. Focus here is the back and the belly. The most important thing to get good training results is to have a well trained centre. Well, that’s what I’ve heard from a fitness trainer years ago and I still stick with it.

My weight hasn’t actually decreased that much. The scale  bounces between 105,9kg, which was the lowest value after a training session, and 109,4kg, which was the highest value after the wedding feast last weekend. The current average is around 107,5kg. I wasn’t expecting and still am a drop of weight before the third month of this “project”.

Just a short reminder, this whole thing was meant to be something that could last for quite a long, long time in my daily schedule. The first two projects where set for a specific period and I then abandoned sports and got fat and unathletic again. I try to avoid this by finding a way to integrate sports and healthy nutrition in my daily life without feeling the lack of anything. For now, I can say, it’s running pretty smooth and good. Here and there are some things in my food plan that shouldn’t be there, but I’m aware of that and I try to avoid or replace them with something different.

As you can see, I’m making progress and everything looks very promising. Hopefully the weight will drop in about a month or so. We’ll see.

SE 3.0 – Interim Report – #1

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In mid May did I announce my new personal challenge or project or whatever you want to call it named Straight Edge 3.0

A few weeks have passed since then and I actually refused to post anything about this whole thing, simply because I wanted to ensure that it is actually rolling. And it does. I finally managed to get to the gym at least four times a week and follow my workout plan. It’s basically about doing fat burning activities like treadmill, spinning and elliptical.

 

Being a commuter makes this whole thing pretty damn exhausting and my spare is shrunken to an absolute minimum since doing sports during the week. But I’ve to face this challenge. I’ve put my strength and muscle training on Fridays and it costs quite an effort to actually get the workout plan done. But it’s getting better as time passes by. My stamina has improved since the beginning. The growth of muscles is currently quite low, but that’s logical regarding the fact, that strength training is currently a very small amount of my whole workout plan.

I guess, I’ll stick to cardio training as a majority of my training plan for at least another two month. It also depends on how I make progress when it comes to losing weight and developing a better stamina.

The strength training is pretty basic at the moment. It’s mostly exercises for my back, the legs and arms. I haven’t started doing sit-ups or crunches yet. This will follow up by the end of June/beginning of July.

In cardio training is my current main focus on the treadmill. Simply because it’s something that challenges me the most and on the other hand it burns the most fat. The elliptical is more a machine that I use to “cool down”. Spinning is something in between these two. In case that I’m quite satisfied with the progress I’ll add the rowing machine to my workout plan.

My nutrition has changed more to a healthier kind. I’ve also banned things like chocolate, candy and such from my menu. In addition did I cancel Coke and Pepsi as well. There’s one day per week where I eat more “taste oriented”. The menu for the rest of the week mainly consists of fruits, vegetables and food with a high amount of protein, like chicken or curd. Several meals also include very hot chili peppers to keep the fat machine burning. Actually, after cooking such things the kitchen feels like a chemical warfare and your eyes start to burn.

As you can see, Straight Edge 3.0 is going very well and I’m quite satisfied with the current results. I do not expect a massive weight decrease right now or an ultra high stamina in just three or four weeks. The main key to success in this project is patience. The previous Straight Edge challenged were more focused on quick results and I actually had no plan on how to continue for a longer period. I hope, I can keep this up for at least half a year now.