Ben's Fat Loss Diary

Scale went down to 177.85 this morning, down 0.55 from yesterday. First back-to-back days under 180 since 2013. Woot!

Worth noting: out of curiosity, I just checked my food logs for December 2013, and...wow. No wonder I went off the rails and eventually gained the weight back. In 2013, at this same weight and similar level of exercise, my plan was to eat only 2150 calories per day. Right now I am averaging 3251 calories per day and am consistently losing weight. Sure, looking at the logs, when I STUCK to that plan back then, I'd lose weight, and lose it faster. Sheesh, at one point I dropped from 188.1 on 11/11/2013 to 171.0 by 11/22/2013. What on EARTH was I thinking?????) But I definitely remember being wayyyyyyyy more hungry/on the edge then than now, and the numbers bear that out as well: to GET to that 188.1 weight, I went from 173.5 on 11/1/2013 to 188.1 by 11/11/2013.

And I had NO idea at the time how insane/unhealthy that was.
 
Last edited:
The exact number dropped put of your message and now I'm so curious to know how much you were planning to eat... Eating enough definitely makes a big difference!
 
Llama said:
The exact number dropped put of your message and now I'm so curious to know how much you were planning to eat... Eating enough definitely makes a big difference!
Click to expand...
Oops. Edited. 2150. And trying to train for a marathon. No wonder I overate like crazy every couple of weeks or so, got sick, and then eventually overate my way back over 280.
 
Cate said:
No wonder indeed. Isn't it good to have all that data & be able to see where you went "wrong" before, but also be able to correct it now & look after yourself better?
Click to expand...
Absolutely! And given that I've learned from that mistake, I'm not going to beat myself up TOO badly! ;)

Good day today so far, especially the run. Easy run. 4.5 miles. Same distance/route as Monday. On Monday my average pace was 9:58 with a 132 avg HR. Today's pace was 9:40 with a 130 average HR.

And now after typing that last little bit, I looked back and realized I never shared about the treadmill run yesterday. Um, it was really, really good.

Shockingly good.

Yeah, I was shocked at how fast I ran it. I've gotten so used to running all the hills around here, I haven't done a "baseline" type test on the treadmill in quite some time. Both the HM race in November and the full are on MUCH flatter courses than my area, so I really should do some of my speed work on the treadmill. (And I'm sure I'll just naturally do it more often as it gets colder.)

Anyway, it's typically recommended that to get a feel for your "outdoors on relatively flat land" time, you should set the treadmill at a 1.0% incline. I didn't do that initially in my run yesterday, because I was wanting my legs to start to get more used to little/no incline for an extended period of time. But after a nearly mile at a 9:25 pace, my heart rate had MAXED (not average) at 125, which is considered "Warm Up"/"Zone 1" for me--like SUPER easy--which it was--I was barely breathing.

My inner monologue: "Oh, must be the lack of incline, but I should keep it flat. This run is scheduled for one mile easy, 4 miles fast, 1 mile easy. Let's do the second mile and see where we are." So I set it for an 8:04 pace early in mile 2. Heart rate never got above 140...which is near the top of Zone 2/Easy...Definitely not in the "strong effort" category I was going for. At that point I thought about not having tested my true flatland speed in a long time, and decided that I wanted to, so for the third mile, I did a 1.0 incline and set it to an 8:00 pace per pile. Heart rate climbed a bit, but was still only in the mid-140s by the end of that mile, which I ran in 8:00 even. Typically for a "tempo" run like this, I'm rolling along in the low 150s or higher for the entire "fast" portion of the workout, so I increased it some more and kept the 1.0% incline in place for mile 4. Finished that one in 7:41, with the heart rate finally in the low 150s. But again, low 150s is typically the *bottom* of my harder workouts, so I let it rip for that final hard mile, and finished it in 6:59! :oops::oops::oops: Did the last mile of the run much faster than a typical cooldown, but I set the incline back to 0, so I did get three miles of flat running in, and 3 more with only a small incline. But those 3 miles with the 1.0 incline averaged out to a 7:33 pace. I was NOT expecting that. I guess my aerobic base in quite a bit stronger than I realized. So, yay for that!
 
Llama said:
You are going from strength to strength dude, that's awesome!
Click to expand...
Thanks. My lingering concern is for what the future holds. Weight loss should be over within a matter of weeks, so the momentum/motivation that comes with seeing the scale go down will be removed. My running is improving, and that is SUPER motivating, and should continue to be so even after I'm not trying to lose anything. I’m getting faster. However, I'm approaching my 54th birthday. At some point—even if I do everything right—I’m going to start getting slower, and I need to be mentally prepared to deal with that. My motivation needs to be general health, and while it’s partly from there now, I’d be lying if I said that was #1 at the moment. Qualifying for Boston and hitting a HM PR are great goals that’ll help me stay on track nutritionally and with exercise, but then what? That’s what I need to do well.
 
You could keep setting new goals once you reach one, ones that requitlre general fitness but aren't as tied to maximum power. A new style of dancing, swimming, specific hikes... whatever you can find enthusiasm for.
 
Llama said:
You could keep setting new goals once you reach one, ones that requitlre general fitness but aren't as tied to maximum power. A new style of dancing, swimming, specific hikes... whatever you can find enthusiasm for.
Click to expand...
Oh, sure! I was more pontificating there than looking for ideas, per se. At least it's a while away, I think.

My HM race is 5 weeks from today and the marathon is 19 weeks. As mentioned, both are on wayyyyyyy flatter ground than what I'm used to dealing with here. I just checked my last few runs that were in the 13 to 13.5 mile range, and the ones where I leave on foot from near my house have around 800 feet of climbing, and even the one recent one on the greenway had a little over 500 feet of climb. The HM has a little under 300. So, I decided to look around some local maps and find a relatively easy route to follow that would be more flat, then I remembered that there's a pretty long road that might fit the bill that isn't all that far away. It's more of a long, gentle slope than the gentle rolling hills I'll face, but at least at 332 feet of climbing, the overall is pretty close. So, I ran that this morning and things went really well. Did 2 miles easy to warm up, then intervals of 3 tough miles followed by a mile of easy/recovery running. I ran pretty much exactly HM distance and had plenty left in the tank. Very pleased with it! Details are here https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/9751202157

Scale was up to 179.8 this morning, which isn't surprising: I eat more on Fridays (and Saturdays,) and yesterday I went heavier than normal on carbs to help fuel for this morning, so I'm sure the glycogen kept some water around. Oh, yeah, and it's recovery week, so running mileage was less than it has been in a month. No worries on that. I'm still hitting my calorie goal within 2% every day.

Next week is scheduled to be my highest-mileage week before the HM, including a 20-miler on Saturday. I'm a bit nervous, but everything in the training suggests that I should be fine. Just gotta convince myself to trust the process, I guess. :)
 
Ben_In_NC said:
Next week is scheduled to be my highest-mileage week before the HM, including a 20-miler on Saturday. I'm a bit nervous, but everything in the training suggests that I should be fine. Just gotta convince myself to trust the process, I guess.
Click to expand...
“At this point I think everyone on the forum assumes you'll do it easily ;)” ~Llama
Ah, that would be a yes 😊
 
Ben_In_NC said:
So, I decided to look around some local maps and find a relatively easy route to follow that would be more flat, then I remembered that there's a pretty long road that might fit the bill that isn't all that far away.
Click to expand...
That sounds good to find some varied routes to try. Good just for that variety anyways.
Good luck with the 20 miles!
 
That extra training takes extra time! Sorry no posts, but I did get all the scheduled runs in last week, including the big 20.

8BADC00A-6002-46D4-B27D-52BB31356AE0.jpeg

Only variance from plan was that I had no run scheduled Thursday, 7-miler Friday. I decided to split that 7 miles into two runs instead so I wouldn’t go into the 20-miler quite as tired.
The Wednesday run was especially good: 8x800m fast intervals with 400m slow recoveries in between. 7 of the 8 hard intervals were completed in under 3:30.
404D78D4-A11A-42AF-A4FC-E2990C73E1BC.jpeg


Weight is up a bit. Lower 180s, mainly due to a couple of unscheduled family meals out. Not a major concern at this point. Will post more later this week most likely.
 
Oh, and the 20-miler had a bit of “spice” to it:

13 easy
3 up-tempo
1 recovery
3 up-tempo

6311CE44-6E37-40F9-A7FF-E8C5AA724D2F.jpeg
SUPER thrilled by that effort as well as the Wednesday workout. Body was pretty tired on Sunday, but feeling pretty good today.
 
Awesome work @Ben_In_NC ! I was hoping you hadn't quit posting so it's really nice to hear from you again and wonderful achievements with the running!
When do you run that half-marathon race again?
 
I don't even want to think about running 20 miles! Great work though. Also: having those meals out and getting right back on track is the best practice for maintenance.
 
Sorry I haven't been around. Best laid plans and all that: I work for a good-sized company and we had a significant RIF about 2 weeks ago. I kept my job, but quite a few friends weren't so lucky, but my workload has been CRAZY since then due to re-allocation of projects, and I haven't been able to track/plan like I'd prefer. I haven't missed any scheduled runs, but did have to cut some short, and mainly because of lack of time to track/need to eat whatever I could, I've gained a few pounds--nothing major and no real binges, but just enough (into the mid/upper 180s) that I won't be able to PR on Saturday in my HM race. As a reminder...

Ben_In_NC said:
1:50:00 or slower--Disappointed. A time here would likely mean I binged a fairly significant amount between now and then, or ran a really poor race.
1:47:30-1:50:00--Content. This would be 7+ minutes faster than the 1:56:56 I ran in April 2022.
1:45:00-1:47:30--Pleased
1:42:42-1:45:00--Very Pleased
1:41:41-1:42:41--I SHOULD be super pleased if I wind up in this range, but let's be honest, given that it would mean "one lousy minute or less from a PR," I'd probably play the "WHAT IF" game far too much to actually be super pleased. :D
1:40:00-1:41:40--Modest PR, Super Happy!
Anything 1:39:39 or lower--YEAH BABY!!!
Click to expand...

My best guess is that I'll be in the 1:45-1:50 range. This morning was my last run with any hard effort in it prior to the race. I went to a relatively flat nearby neighborhood and did 10 minute warmup, 20 minutes at around threshold effort--which ended up being 7:40 per mile for 2.61 miles--and 10 minute cooldown. Depending on the weather--and there's a good bit of potential variability in the temperature forecast due to Nicole heading this way and exiting late Friday night--I'm thinking I can probably hold a pace somewhere in the 8:00-8:30 range for 13.1, which translates into somewhere between 1:44:48 and 1:51:21, thus my narrowing it down to that 1:45-1:50 guess.

Our offices are closed on Friday, but I'm going to work some to get caught up/ahead, so perhaps next week I can return to reading/posting regularly here.
 
Always nice to hear a progress report even if things are too busy to check in regularly.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top