Sounds like an easy question – right? I mean if one is healthy does that mean the BMI looks good or he can run a marathon? Or does it mean ones cholesterol levels are good or one’s blood pressure is 120/80? What about ones endurance levels even if one is fat? What about one’s fighting [...]]]>  

Sounds like an easy question – right? I mean if one is healthy does that mean the BMI looks good or he can run a marathon? Or does it mean ones cholesterol levels are good or one’s blood pressure is 120/80? What about ones endurance levels even if one is fat? What about one’s fighting ability even if she is old? What if one is nutritionally deficient – gets sick often but has a normal BMI?

I’m not trying to deflect here but I’ve found there does not seem to be one answer (honestly I’m not trying to re-write the definition so I come out ok). When I was younger I thought body builders did not make sense because they did not do well in fighting (the only thing that mattered to me as a young adult). I thought boxing was unless because they could not kick. I thought fat people could not fight!

You see I did not realize as a young man that there were trade-offs in life that everyone had to deal with that often defined them. In this post I will talk about my health challenges – not to elicit sympathy or to diminish my responsibility in the outcome so far, but rather to take stoke of what seems to work and what does not work… as well as what I’ve tried in the last year or so.  First take a gander at Roy “Big Country” Nelson – a fighter that should put to bed the myth that a fat man cannot fight!

Roy Nelson as other fat fighters I’ve know is in good aerobic shape but has hard as he works out – he also likes to eat. You see to be a good fighter – it is not only the good, physical, cut, strong fighters that win but also those that have kind of a spare tire but lots of savy that can win.

I am not saying that being in good physical shape is bad but rather it is not the only way to be a good fighter. Just like having muscles is not always bad even though you don’t see many great fighters that are muscle bound. One example I always say is if you check out the worlds strongest man contest – you see plenty of guys that have pot bellies. Muscles grow best if you don’t starve them.

Ok – up to know it sounds like I’m trying to say fat is good. No but I don’t think it is all bad. Take me for example. I am almost as fat as I’ve ever been this year (245) but I’m working out four to five hours a week with moderate aerobic exercise (bike and walking with some higher aerobic bag work, jogging, and hill hiking).

This year I no longer have muscle aches that plagued me at the end of 2010. I think stress and statins played a role as well as over exercising (I put in 10 plus hours working out back then a week).

I’ve tried low-carb diets as well as the blood-sugar diet (the food bill about broke me) in the last year but found every time I changed my diet (that was already nutritious and moderately caloric) – my body whet haywire fast. At first things went well but then I started craving bad food and sweets!

My blood pressure is good  and my cholesterol off the statins are only slightly elevated. I’ve had to stop taking the baby aspirin the doctors recommended as my blood was not clotting easily anymore.

It is real funny to me but in my younger days whenever a girlfriend would ogle at a tall muscle man – I would simply say I could kick is butt. I would then launch into an explanation of why muscle bound is bad (I guess trying to make myself look better).

I think I was a bit jealous of the physique and who knows after I cannot fight well in old age – I may just take up body building.

As far as health I have just weight loss goals as well as my continuing reduced stress commitment. My wife and I are supporting each other as if either one of us starts into the sweets – the other partakes.

So I am over half-way to my heath goals. I exercise without injuries (had to stop sparring). I eat well but not too often in excess. I stopped taking medicines that were making me sick. My blood pressure is good and my cholesterol is almost where I want it.

The thing I have to work on is continuing this trend of weight loss. So long as I can exercise and keep the stress down – what I am already doing  with diet (just eating 1800 calories or so a day) will eventually get me where I want to be – weight wise.

So while I had ballooned back to to 257 – I’m now back on track and am not going to make the hare’s mistake but rather take the tortise’s path.

In closing I’d like to say I am fat, dumb, and happy… soon enough to be just dumb and happy!

Welcome back to leananmean.com. I made the decion last March to close this website down but over the the many months I’ve missed the oppertunity to speak out on various goings-ons around me. I guess I have a big mouth and I need an outlet to expouse my views.

What you can expect from [...]]]>  

Welcome back to leananmean.com. I made the decion last March to close this website down but over the the many months I’ve missed the oppertunity to speak out on various goings-ons around me. I guess I have a big mouth and I need an outlet to expouse my views.

What you can expect from me is the occasional post about anything that seems interesting – especially if I think whats out there is not the whole story. I should have pleanty of fodder. I will continue to speak about heath and fitness too as this is an interest of mine.

What’s happened this year of interest in my life? I was promoted to Rokudan (6th degree blackbelt) in Kenpo. That was totally unexpected but perhaps should not have been. Let me explain. A few years back I received our organizations lifetime acheivement award and a couple years back I was entered into the Kenpo Hall of Fame. I created a website for the karate school here so I guess it should not have been surprising that 10 years after my 5th degree promotion (where I had to write a thesis), that I would get the largely honorary (no specific deliverables) promotion to Rokudan.

Anyway I am happy to have the new degree and I’ll try to live up to the standards of this honor.

On the weight loss plan – I am not focusing on any diet anymore (as that seems fail mostly) but I am going to try and achieve a balance of mind, body and soul. I’ve never had a problem keeping my mind sharp. I have an MBA and I received my windows 2008 system administrator certification from Microsoft this year (3 tests).

As far as my body, injuries and appetite have been my downfall. Interestingly enough working out at the karate school (specifically sparring) and bag work at home (throwing punches incorrectly) have actually kept me from working out. I’ve inured my wrists, hands, knee, and feet over the last year and had to take time off for recovery. Although I’ve tried to do different exercise – it was a challenge this year.

As far a soul – I’ve reconnected with my Catholic roots and I’m trying to reconcile the child understanding of the faith with the adult version. The child version was far easier… all I had to do was go to church with my parents. Now I have to actually study the bible and ask the Lord for forgiveness as well as find time to worship, help the needy and pray. Whew… I actually find it all very rewarding and I feel like I’ve plugged a missing dimension in my life.

As far as the plan forward – mostly it is the body that needs work. I am not dieting any more but simply going to eat healthy meals (yes – fewer calories than I actually need but I’m not counting) with the good tasting foods I grew up on. For instance I’ve started drinking whole milk (from no milk since I was a kid) because it is very satisfying and helps be stay full.  Many more examples but in a nut shell I am feel satisfied all of the time now and should slowly take off the inches.

I’m steadily working out again since my last sparring session. I re-injured my knee and cut my face. The face injury healed fast but the knee still smarts. But I am able to bike, hike, walk and do bag work. This year I am going to stop sparring for the most part as 80% of the time I get injured. I don’t really need to spar to stay in shape for self defense and I’m not going to fight a MMA match anytime soon so why go overboard. I’m not anymore. I’m gonna be smart about this now.

Welcome back and I hope you stop by from time to time. I also wish all a happy new year!

Whats more I would hazarda guess and say that fad diets of any genre do [...]]]> The word “diet” is becoming passe like vampire movies. Everywhere I turn there are diet pills, commercials, books, websites (yes this I guess is one more to a point) and people espousing the latest, greatest diet! I am sick of diets!!!

Whats more I would hazarda guess and say that fad diets of any genre do not work. Now wait a moment – I’m not saying you cannot lose some weight with many of them, I am saying that if you are trying to reverse obesity – diets are not going to do the trick.

Here is what I have found to work. Eat or burn less calories than you take in. Now how you decide to do that is the only trick. You can pay some company the big bucks to “do their plan” or figure it out for yourself. The cool thing is if you figure it out for yourself (hopefully) you will find a compromise (yes – there will be some hard decisions) you can live with!

Now I happen to like eating less and exercising more because this is a good strategy for getting fit. But the devil is in the details. In this post I will go over how my diet is helping my overall fitness level and will not focus too much on exercise (see other posts for that). To start the conversation I found a couple of videos stating that diets do not work for your perusal.

While I agree with most of this video and really like how the focus is not on diets, I will say that one can try and eat healthy, love them self, increase activity levels, lose weight slowly, and still love themselves! I do understand that liking/loving yourself is the first step to making healthy changes.

I also agree that diets do not work. If the focus is short term to loose the love handles to strut your stuff at the beach and then go back to the “normal” way of eating – that is an unhealthy attitude I think (I’m not a health professional).

I think making “lifestyle changes” is the proper approach. This includes moving more and eating less calories than one burns (assuming you need to lose some fat). I don’t think anyone should starve themselves because how can someone eat like that for the rest of their lives? No what I am talking about if changing your food choices from high calorie to lower calorie choices (cumulative over the whole day) that meet your needs. If you need to lose fat, then you would eat less calories than you use reasonably.

What is reasonable? I would guess a pound a week for most people is doable without too much pain after they get used to the idea. Exercise should make this easier too such as walking for 30 to 60 minutes a day. Most people have tons of down time they use up watching a tv show they don’t really like. Why taking the dog out for a walk daily would accomplish exercise for you and your dog!

Here is what I ate yesterday.

• Breakfast
  • egg sandwich with cheese and low-cal margarine
  • glass of orange juice
  • banana
  • orange
  • coffee with half and half & splenda
• Lunch
  • 1/2 torpedo roll with 3oz roast beef, slice of cheese and low-cal mayo
  • diet root beer
  • banana
  • orange
• Dinner
  • turkey burger with slice cheese on full torpedo roll
  • two red potatoes
  • two carrots
  • diet orange soda

The calorie totals are about 650 for breakfast, 450 for lunch, and 600 for dinner or a grand total of 1700 calories. You see I am shooting for 1500 to 1800 calories a day. I was not hungry all day and I did a 45 minute boxing workout on the bag.

The trick is consistency for me. I find if I jump off of the reservation too many times a week – I will have a wash in calories but the way I eat is not really a diet (I don’t count anymore while I am doing it) but rather a way of eating I’ve grown accustomed to doing. We have junk food for my son but I mostly stay away from that.

This doctor makes a good point about seeing a health professional for advice. If the doctor does not feel comfortable making recommendations he or she can refer you to a nutritionist. The main point here is if you find yourself obese, you probably have not been making good food choices so you will have to “adjust” what foods you already like to ones you CAN eat for life!

Another good point is to visit USDA website for approved dietary guidelines so you can see the latest recommendations for healthy eating choices!

So I say Diet Smiet! Go figure out how to transform your diet into YOUR healthy living plan.

I remember back to the fifth grade when my mom enrolled me in dance classes at a local studio. At first I did not want to go because as you all know at 11 years old – Girls Have Cudies!!!

Well let me just say after the first couple of lessons my mom did not have to [...]]]>  

I remember back to the fifth grade when my mom enrolled me in dance classes at a local studio. At first I did not want to go because as you all know at 11 years old – Girls Have Cudies!!!

Well let me just say after the first couple of lessons my mom did not have to drag me down to the school anymore and I really liked dancing with girls (they turned out to be ok).

Later in the sixth grade I found even though it was kind of corny – square dancing in PE was ok too… Unfortunately or fortunately by the time I got to high school – all you had to do to dance was to let it all hang out. Needless to say any dance moves I was taught were soon forgotten.

In this post I am going to talk about a fitness goal and reward the wife and I are talking about doing when we are close to being in good shape – Salsa Dancing! Here is one example I found on youtube.

Isn’t that cool? Did you notice that letting it all hang out would not work? Yes there is a nice Latin beat but one has to have a certain continuity with your partner to make everything happen.

Our goals as we we lose weight are to find activities that we can do to have fun and keep in shape. My two left feet and losing a bunch of weight are the initial hurdles. Once we are near our goals we will look for a dance school that fits into our schedule (and budget).

We expect that learning how to dance will be fun but a lot of work. It should not be too bad in a dance school with at least some other beginning students.

After we are semi-proficient, our plan is to take monthly outings at some classy night clubs! While I have always envisioned having my own karate dojo in my back yard along with a koi pond in the Japanese garden – I guess I’ll have to make it double as a dance/fitness/gym space too.

Hold on a minute – can one really have fun and get into shape? Can you find something both you and your partner can enjoy?

Well in life people do best if they help each other out I’ve noticed. My sweetheart and I have cooperated with our diets and exercise idea so far.

She likes the new weight watchers plus points because she can eat all of the fruit and veggies she wants without it costing her. My honey still makes the turkey, boca, black bean or veggie burgers as well as the occasional chicken breast sandwich for dinners so I am still able to count calories easily.

You see I have noticed that when my sweetie pie is happy – I am happy so it is good to stay on similar pages. We are helping each other with exercise along with the pooches occasionally by walking around Santee Lakes (it is next to our house).

Today we decided that sometimes we are going to rent a paddle wheel boat and do that instead of walking.

Now the wife and I still do plenty separate of the exercises we like individually – for instance I did an hour of bag work today and my son and I did 3 1/2 hour mountain hike the last two Sunday’s but we plan activities together too!

I don’t know if my baby and I will ever get this good but as Nissan so aptly says, “Enjoy the Ride!”

I hope you have enjoyed this look at just one of our ideas of how to make exercise fun and exciting!

Disfrutar de la danza!