12 WEEK WEIGHT CHALLENGE

We are all different, each of us have different stripes.  Yet we all at times have similar challenges.  Some of the challenges relate to what we eat, how we exercise with the result of how we look.  At times in your life, you are comfortable about how you look and feel inside.  At other times you are not pleased with how you look and feel.  I was ready to make some tweaking about how I look and feel.  I follow a pretty good diet and in previous posts I have written about eating food that matters; the food industry and the layering of sugars, salt, fat and protein in processed food; the corn industry and how corn is used in many different products; and, the benefits of eating more plant material.

I want to look more like a cheetah - lean, muscular and in great shape.

 I don't want to have the shape of a gorilla - but I do want to be strong like a gorilla.

With the objective of wanting to feel less chunky, I enrolled in a 12 week challenge with a local company owned by a dietician and certified fitness trainer.  One of the features of enrolling with weight control programs is the accountability component.  Being accountability and having to report each week is a great motivator.  The accountability aspect is important for me to be successful.  This company designs an individual program that focusses on losing fat and increasing your muscle mass.

 


Some diets are designed with the results that besides losing fat mass you also lose muscle mass.  The program I am on incorporates a well balanced, clean eating diet with strength training and cardio.  Following the diet has not been hard, I am actually eating more than I had been before starting this program.  Doing the strength training has not been difficult either.  I am following a strength training program and I am doing pilates twice a week.  From my running days, I know I am built for endurance, not speed.  It is not hard for me to add lean muscle mass.  What is harder is losing fat mass.  For me to lose fat, I need to increase my cardio.  It is as simple as that.  Walking every day, strength training and pilates does not increase my heart rate enough.  During these past several weeks, I have had to make friends with the elliptical trainer and the rowing machine.  Come spring, I may be doing some of this again

but I won't be doing this -->

After five weeks on the program, I have lost 2.4 pounds of fat mass and gained 1.8 pounds of lean mass.  I am pretty close to the top of my target of lean muscle mass but have work to do to lose at least 12 to 13 pounds of fat mass.  For the first two weeks of the program I was on holidays and I had a goal to not gain weight which I was able to do.

I will post over the next number of weeks on how I am achieving my goals.