FormicaLinoleum

Friday 20 Jan 2012

Exercise

Led a 2-hour team practice

Food

Breakfast: my usual smoothie

Snack: tea and toast

Lunch: veggie burger

Dinner (pre-practice): salad (romaine, cuke, carrot, red onion, tofu)

Snack (post-practice): crisps and hummus

Thursday 19 Jan 2012

Exercise

None--rest day

Food

Breakfast: pancakes and rashers

Snack: latte and a biscuit

Lunch: veggie burger

Snack: tea and some chocolate covered pumpkin seeds

Dinner: big meal at Loving Hut

Notes

It was my partner's birthday so we took the day off. I didn't do any exercise and ate a whole bunch of junk!

Wednesday 18 Jan 2012

Exercise

2-hour into judo session

Food

Breakfast: my usual smoothie

Lunch: food from health food store hot bar: chickpea curry, some veg thing, brown rice

Dinner (pre-judo): potato/spinach wrap

Post-judo: grilled cheeze sandwich

Notes

I've been really bad about cooking this week. I've done barely any so have eaten out for lunch a lot.

I just realised that I have practice on Friday so it actually works out fine for tomorrow to be my rest day for the week (due to it being my partner's birthday I have it off from work and everything else).

Tuesday 17 Jan 2012

Exercise

Morning speed skater stance

2 hour derby practice, all drills

Food

Breakfast: my usual smoothie

Snack: small bowl mini wheetabix with soya milk

Lunch: salad (romaine, cuke, carrot, red onion, tofu, soya dressing), Fry's chicken-style nuggets

Dinner1 (pre-practice): leftover spag bol

Dinner2 (post-practice): veggie dumplings

Notes

Worked at home, so didn't cycle anywhere. It has now warmed up so I don't have an excuse (not that cold was a good one) not to cycle any more.

Yeah, I haven't posted very many in the 6+ years I've been on here!

I have a fair bit of info on my past and current training in the first post of my training log, so I won't repeat it all here.

I've been vegan for just over 6 years and veggie for close to 18. I've never been slim; I'm 5'5" and since I finished growing I've not really been below 140 pounds, and generally above that. I'm 39 years old now. Once I hit 30 I gained a bit of weight and have never really lost it. I don't have any desire to get back down to 140 as I think I'd have to be far too restrictive to reach that. I also seem to hold a fair amount of muscle (with fat too) so I think I look OK at somewhat higher weights and my main goal is to be fit and strong rather than a certain weight.

That said, there are points at which I decide I need to lose a little bit. A couple of years ago I managed to hit a new high without really realising it. Most of the time I don't weigh myself regularly, though looking back at photos it's pretty obvious. I was around 75kg/165lbs!

I followed Eat to Live to lose some weight and lost 5kg/11lbs in just a few weeks. This was a couple of years ago. Since then I've been pretty steady in the 69/70kg area. Over the recent holidays I got to 71kg so decided to be a bit more careful. I'm right around 70kg/154lbs now and hoping (should say planning) not to go up again and ideally to go down just a bit more.

I'm attaching some photos. First is of me at around my highest weight. Then me in the same outfit after the weight loss. And then a not very clear photo of me now.

I'm digging up some past photos, but I think I'll put them in the progress photos forum.

My outfits for lifting weights have recently been unflattering and embarrassing, so I haven't taken photos on weights days (as I work out at home, I throw on any old thing). But I took a couple yesterday, as I was getting ready for practice. In the second I was trying to get my shoulder/trap.

Monday 16 Jan 2012

Exercise

Morning core exercises

Lifted weights (all weights in pounds):

Cleans: 74x5, 79x5, 84x3

Overhead press: 69 x3/1/3

Deadlift: 158x5

Plank

Speed skater stance

Food

Breakfast: smoothie, now with blueberries (apple, pear, banana, blueberries, spinach, protein powder)

Snack: soya latte

Lunch: falafel from Maoz

Snack: cup of tea and Nakd choco mint bar

Snack: bag of crisps

Dinner: salad (romaine, cuke, red onion, tofu, soy dressing), bit of leftover spag bol

Notes

Managed to get up a bit earlier and do my new morning core routine. I just did 2 rounds of three different exercises, so I did exercise 1, exercise 2, exercise 3, 30-second rest, then repeat. Next time I'll do three reptitions. I think that's probably enough. Tomorrow I'll be doing speed skater stance, aiming for 3 reps of 90sec each.

I forgot to weigh myself this morning, so will have to try to remember to do it tomorrow morning.

Still got a latte today. I won't get any more this week, though. Oh, I also didn't ride my bike as it has suddenly got colder here in London and I couldn't face it this morning. So that wasn't good, but I'll still be doing some exercise today, and that's the only allowance I'm going to give myself for this week, so if it stays cold I'll just have to suck it up and deal with it!

Let me know if you're ever in the UK, Robert! I might make it over to the US in 2012 for some derby--we'll see how that goes.

There are a few of us around!

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Sunday 15 Jan 2012

Exercise

3-hour derby practice. There weren't many people there (one team was away playing a game) so I got to scrimmage the whole 3 hours and got lots of track time.

Food

Breakfast: bowl of mini wheetabix with soya milk, 2 cups coffee (made at home)

Lunch: spaghetti "bolognese"

Dinner pt1: salad (romaine, cuke, carrot, red onion, coriander, peanutty dressing)

Dinner pt2: pizza (with broccoli and peppers, no cheeze)

Week Summary, 8-14 January 2012

Exercise

My exercise went pretty well and according to schedule. I exercised 6 days out of 7. I did miss one derby practice due to work, but at least still rode my bike that day. Overall I am pretty pleased and am feeling pretty good.

Food

My eating was OK. It can certainly be better, but it's already improved a bit, with a bit less eating out a bit less junk.

Upcoming week

Hoping to continue to stick to my exercise this week. Thursday is my partner's birthday and we have plans, so that will be an additional rest day (missing a derby practice) with an indulgent meal out. I might be able to sneak in a workout on Thursday or possibly on Friday night so that Thursday is my only rest day. I'm planning to add some short morning workouts if I can manage to pull myself from bed. Mon, Wed, and Fri I plan to do ab work and Tues and Thurs I'll do speed skater stance. I'm going to try to continue to improve my diet. My two main aims for this week are to cut down on buying coffee out and continue to cut down on sugary snacks.

Saturday 14 Jan 2012

Exercise

Lifted weights (all weight in pounds):

Front squats: 104 x5/4/4

Bench press: 89 x3/3/3

Bent over barbell row: 99 x3/3/5

Stiff-legged deadlift: 99 x12

Plank

Speed skater stance

Food

Breakfast: 2 pancakes, 2 Redwood rashers, cup of tea

Snack: hot almond soya drink

Lunch: Amy's Daiya mac 'n' cheese

Snack (post weights): watered down choc soya with protein powder

Dinner: big salad (romaine, cuke, carrot, red onion, balsamic dressing), Fry's chicken-style nuggets

Friday 13 Jan 2012

Exercise

None--today is my rest day

Food

Breakfast: My usual smoothie

Snack: Soya latte

Lunch: Selection from Planet Organic food bar: brown rice, veg stew, dahl, chickpea/spinach; some dehydrated kale 'chips'

Snack: Cup of tea and Nakd choco mint bar

Dinner: Big meal at Loving Hut

Notes

Today is going to be my rest day. Though Saturday is my rest day on my schedule, I'll probably be switching it around because my partner (my girlfriend, that is, not my workout partner, though she is actually also my workout partner) likes to go to the pub with her coworkers after work on Fridays rather than go home and lift weights (imagine that!). So I'll be lifting weights tomorrow instead of today. As I'm lifting weights only 2x per week, I prefer to try to spread them out a little more instead of doing it Sat and Monday, but what can I do--I need someone there to spot or at least watch and help in case something goes wrong (we lift weights at home, so don't want to be all alone while lifting). But it's probably good timing for the rest anyway, as I was really tired after last night's practice. Scrimmage was very physical and tough.

Starting Monday I am going to try to get up slightly earlier in the morning, for two reasons. One, I'd like to get to work a little earlier so I can leave earlier and have more evening time on non-practice days. Two, I'm going to try to do a short routine for my core three weekday mornings (Mon, Wed, Fri). It'll probably just be about 10 minutes or so. I am NOT a morning person, so we'll see how it goes.

I also need to try to give up coffee other than the stuff I brew at home myself once or twice a week. It'll save me money and lattes are obviously useless calories.

One thing about London is that it's big and can take a long time to travel around. We have practices in two different locations and neither is very close to home. Sundays we have three hours practices but with travel it takes 6 hours out of my day. For weeknight practice (2 hours) I head there right from work around 6:30-7:00 and get home around 11:00-11:30. So getting 7 hours of skate time in a week takes 15 hours out of my week. It's like that for most of us. But it can make it hard to fit in other things, like cooking meals.

Thursday 12 Jan 2012

Exercise

2 hour roller derby practice. Half drills, half scrimmage.

Food

Mini wheetabix with soya milk

My usual smoothie

Coffee (brewed at home) with soya milk x2

Bagel sandwich with vegideli slices and tofutti slice

Salad (romaine, carrot, cucumber, red onion, balsamic dressing (homemade))

Bagel sandwich with vegideli slices and tofutti slice

Crisps and hummus (was really hungry after practice so grabbed on way home)

Notes

My eating has been kind of weird today. I'm working at home and have just been eating something every couple of hours, so I didn't bother trying to label things as specific meals. Was really craving sandwiches today.

Muscle does not weigh more than fat (five pounds is five pounds)...

I've heard someone else say that, but it's missing the point of what people mean. What's implicit in "muscle weighs more than fat" is a given volume of muscle weighs more than the same volume of fat. Or, to put it the other way around, a given weight of muscle will take up less volume than the same weight of fat.

I think everyone (ok, maybe I should amend that to most people) understands that five pounds of any given substance weighs the same as five pounds of any other given substance.

Can anyone tell me why when I'm typing, it seems if it's somewhat lengthy, I can no longer see what I'm typing..like the screen won't go down that far as I type and I start to not be able to see what I'm typing, yet it allows me to keep typing and to see what I've typed I need to use my scroll bar to move down the page to viiew it but the second I start to type again, it kind of flickers while I type and doesn't let me see what I've typed ...

 

does that make ANY SENSe? It's sooooo annoying.

This happens to me occasionally. I don't know why or how to fix it. Sorry!

Wednesday 11 Jan 2012

Exercise

Cycled to and from work, to and from plyo (~9-10mi)

1 hr plyo and stuff

Food

Breakfast: my usual smoothie

Snack: cup of tea and nakd choc mint bar

Lunch: food from health food shop food bar (potatoes, chickpea/spinach, brown rice), mint cheesecake thing

Snack: little veggie snack sausage type thing

Dinner: big salad (romaine, bean sprouts, carrot, cuke, coriander, red onion), veggie dumplings

Notes

One of the skaters from my league, who is also a firefighter, has put together a plyo workout that led for some of us tonight. It included stair running and jumping, all sorts of jumping around, press ups and dips, and ab work. It was pretty tiring, and I enjoyed it.

Tuesday 10 Jan 2012

Exercise

Cycled to and from work (8mi)

Food

Breakfast: my usual smoothie

Lunch: lentil shepherd's pie thing, shared a slice of apple/pear cake, soya flat white (really full now!)

Snack: cup of tea

Dinner: leftover ginger bok choi/soba/tofu

Dinner2 (after getting home from work): Salad (romaine, bean sprouts, red onion, fresh coriander, peanutty dressing)

Notes

My bike was finished yesterday, so I was able to pick it up this morning and ride it in to work. Yay!

Unfortunately worked until 9pm so didn't make it to derby practice. At least I rode my bike so I get some exercise today.

Took a few crap pictures today. My partner was falling asleep so these are mirror shots and not very clear. I don't look much different, but I thought I'd attempt to take some that would show some muscle. One day I'll get pictures of my legs.

I'll start by saying that I'm no expert. (I'm around your weight but 2" shorter than you, so probably don't have the figure you're aiming for. But for me and my goals it's not too bad and I'm not aiming to be much smaller.)

I don't know anything about these diets that you mention. But my guess is that they are rather strict, short-term diets? I imagine you're kind of desperate to see change so are going for quick-fix, but if you want lasting results you should go for something that is a long-term plan and will perhaps have slower results.

I suggest a few things.

1. Forget about any kind of diet. Just try to eat well. Eat as much whole foods as possible and avoid processed stuff. Eat as much veg as you can. If you want to read a book with guidelines, I like Eat to Live.

2. Do strength training, ideally lift weights. Do basic compound lifts to increase your overall strength and ensure that you don't lose too much muscle mass.

3. Find some other form of exercise (more along cardio lines) that you actually enjoy doing so you'll look forward to doing it and stick to it.

Though I warned that sensible changes will probably lead to slower results, when I did Eat to Live strictly, I lost around 10 pounds in 3-4 weeks. So it can be quite effective.

Monday 9 Jan 2012

Exercise

Lifted weights (all weights in pounds):

Cleans: 69x5, 74x5, 79x5

Overhead Press: 69 x5/4/4

Deadlift: 153 x5 (took weight down because I hurt my back last time)

Food

Breakfast: my usual smoothie

Snack: soya latte

Lunch: leftover spag bol & broc/chickpea, three caramelized biscuits

Snack: cup of tea and Nakd mint choc bar

Dinner: Ginger bok choi & soba w tofu, veggie dumplings

Notes

My bike's in the shop getting new brakes, so couldn't cycle today. But it's now done and I can pick it up tomorrow morning so will cycle tomorrow. Not feeling too bad from last night's practice, but it definitely is hard on the body being knocked around in a way that just exercising doesn't quite match.

I weighed myself today; I plan to weigh myself weekly, always on Monday morning. Scale hovered between 70 & 71 kg (it's analog, so it can be hard to get a really precise reading). So I haven't lost much of anything but I'm actually pretty pleased with that start because I at least didn't go up! And my exercise is going to be higher starting this week, so I expect it to get a bit easier.

I might take more photos tonight... maybe I'll do that each Monday. I don't know if I'll always post them.

Another goal I need to set for myself is to drink more water! I know I drink nowhere near enough. Yesterday I had a soya/almond drink, then a cup of tea. Then shortly before leaving for practice I realised that I hadn't had any plain water at all, so gulped down a glass before leaving (long commute, so that was close to 2 hours before starting to skate). I then had a small bottle of water over the 3 hours I was at practice. That's it. I do get water from my smoothies and the couple of cups of tea I have, but as the tea is also a diuretic, I know I should be getting more.

Sunday 8 Jan 2012

Exercise

Roller derby practice! Just over 2 hours of skating (it's a 3 hours practice, but structured so that teams take turns so not many people get to skate the full 3 hours).

Food

Breakfast: Mini wheetabix with soya milk

Snack: Hot 'soya almond protein drink'

Lunch: tortilla with tofutti slice, broccoli/chickpea/garlic dish

Dinner: Spaghetti "bolognese"

Snack: Another cup of hot soya almond drink

Notes

Was our first practice back after holiday break. It's been 4 weeks off. I didn't feel bad fitness-wise, but felt a little sub-par awareness and strategy-wise. Overall it was a bit scrappy. Not too bad for the first practice after a break though. Feeling a bit achey now.