Some of the comments left both in my blog and in the review of my post warned that I was losing the weight too quickly to be healthy. In most cases, these comments said I would almost surely regain the weight once I started eating again. It’s been over four months and I have not sustained significant weight gain. I also have not been ill this entire season and I’ve had relatively good strength endurance while snowboarding. Coming off of my one hardcore week, I did the following:

• Slowly increased my calorie intake. This was easy because my stomach shrank a bit.
• Continued to eat a veggie heavy diet.
• Continued to exercise regularly. I snowboard nearly every weekend and hit the gym irregularly.
• Monitored my weight and made adjustments if I began to slide. Sometimes I would eat unhealthy and start to gain. If this happened, I spent about a week focused on eating as healthy as possible.

There are no real “tricks” going on. I’m not counting calories anymore. I’m not working out a whole lot outside of snowboarding. Keep in mind, snowboarding can be a huge calorie burn. A friend of mine tracked her heart rate on the mountain and noticed that 55% of the time she was in the “fat burn” zone (it’s just below “cardio gain” zone). Consider that some days of boarding last 6 to 8 hours.

The one thing I’m not doing is gaining any significant muscle mass. Sometimes I will lift free weights at the house; however, I’ve not been dedicating enough regularity to really modify the shape of my body significantly. My current goal is to simply maintain the gains I’ve made during the season. I do intend to focus more on personal training some time in the future.

As a side note, I’m shocked at how popular my last post turned out to be. It’s inspiring to see my post affecting so many people!

I really cranked it up starting on October 9th. In 7 days I went from 164lbs to 158lbs. I also went from a body fat percentage over 19 to 18.2. The attached photo shows the physical results. I’ve gotten a number of congrats followed by inquiries as to how I made such a rapid change. So much so, that I thought I would share it here. Simply put, I ate less food, I ate better food, and I exercised more.

Diet

I tracked my diet online for about a week. Unfortunately, now that my free trial has expired, I can’t log in and get actual samples of exactly what I consumed. Generally speaking, I did the following:

• consumed around 1000 calories a day
• ate a lot of veggies – and a wide variety of them
• consumed as little fat as possible
• ate only enough carbs to maintain my energy levels
• drank a lot of water and only water, I even cut coffee out (don’t know if it affected anything)
• reduced my meat portions a little
• took a time release multi vitamin every day and a calcium supplement almost every day

That said, a typical day’s meal might look something like this:

• Breakfast: Either Kashi cereal, Bare Naked cereal, or a granola bar. I would eat about a cup of cereal with just a splash of soy milk. Note: after the 7 day rush, I started to include a splash of orange juice. Vitamin C is a great metabolism booster.
• Lunch: Sometimes nothing but raw veggies. Broccoli was common. I would also eat celery and carrots. Beware of carrots, they contain some sugar. I would continue to eat on a couple of cups of veggies through the day while drinking lots of water. This would easily sustain me through work. Other days I would have small meals such as fish tacos with lard free tortillas or a small helping of noodles. Still, I would eat them slowly over the course of a couple of hours.
• Dinner: I usually grilled my dinners on the George Foreman grill. I would include a small portion of lean meat such as bison (very low in fat), salmon (good fats), or chicken breast. I would grill a wide variety of vegetables including zucchini squash, asparagus, onion, red bell pepper, broccoli, and egg plant. Finally, I would include a small helping carbs such as a half piece of pita bread or small helping of rice. A few nights I replaced the carbohydrtes with a salad consisting mostly of leafy plants with a light misting of sesame seed oil and balsamic vinegar.
• Snacks: For the most part, I didn’t snack. My lunches felt like snacking all day. I went to bed early because I was getting up early for the gym. I did eat a few nuts and some beef jerky from time to time. Keep in mind, I was also drinking large amounts of water on a regular basis.

Exercise

I signed up at my nearest gym, which worked out well because I had an old membership on freeze. I got a special deal on 5 personal trainer sessions for $50. This wasn’t crucial, but the support and advice did help. During the rapid development phase, I hit the gym every day. On a couple of days, I went both in the morning and the evening. After the phase, I dropped down to about 3 times a week. A typical session at the gym would include:

• Stretches: Some basic startup stretches to loosen my leg muscles. This was less than 5 minutes worth.
• Cardio: I usually would run an average of 15 minutes on the tread mill to get my cardio up. When I started, 10 minutes was enough. Near the end of the week, I would run 25 minutes. If it was my second visit to the gym for the day, I would do about 10 minutes on the stair machine instead – just to mix things up.
• Original Floor Routine: With my heart rate up, I would hit the floor routine for around 15 to 20 minutes. My original floor routine included:
  • 20 straight crunches plus 10 crunches to each side
  • 10 straight leg lifts plus 10 leg lifts to each side
  • 15 per side of these crunch like things propped up on my elbow (works your side, no idea what they’re called)
  • a fast count of 100 while holding myself up on my elbow and toes
  • the same fast count of 100 while resting on my hips and belly and keeping my feet and shoulders up off the floor
  • a 30 second back bend and 30 second side twists to stretch out my ab muscles
• New Floor Routine: My trainer gave me a whole new and improved set of routines that included the use of a yoga ball. I integrated these new exercises into my routine – trying to change it up each day. These new routines included a mix of:
  • Holding the yoga ball between my feet for the leg lifts.
  • Placing my back on the floor, feet on the yoga ball and lifting my hips.
  • Lifting light free weights above my chest while laying with the back of my shoulders on the ball, knees bent, hips up, and my feet close together.
  • Squats while standing on a half ball (hard to balance) and holding light weights out in front of me.
  • Torso twists with those strechy elastic rubber things for resistance.
  • Most painful of all, holding myself up on my elbows and toes for 45 seconds – while squeezing my abs as hard as I could.
• Weight Training: After my floor routine, I would hit weight machines for another 10 to 15 minutes. I generally picked 2 or 3 machines and did 20 to 60 reps at various weight levels. I focused on my core, but did spent time on my shoulders, arms, and legs.

In addition to this, I’ve also been taking the occational yoga class. I believe I took 2 1-hour yoga classes during the 7 day push. Before and after the 7 day push I did a bit of outdoor activity including biking, hiking, running, and – of course – snowboarding.

The results were rapid and impressive. It took being in the right frame of mind, but it didn’t take a lot of time. After my 7 day push, I still continued to burn fat and build muscle while going to the gym less and eating more. I figure that’s probably because of a boosted metabolism. I suspect that if I don’t maintain regular physical activity, I could easily relapse and see rapid weight gain. Thus far, that has not been an issue.

Most importantly, I feel a lot better both mentally and physically. It is more than worth it.

I’ve also made an effort to eat more ‘good’ food. I still eat a lot of crap, but not as much as I had been. I’ll eat a really heathly dinner right after the gym only to eat a p b & j later on that night. Since I’m more focused on being strong and having endurance, I don’t mind eating a few extra calories. I’d rather eat a little too much than not have enough calories for my muscles to grow.

All this working out isn’t as fun as it was at first. It’s taking more and more effort to get up and go to the gym. Hopefully, it will enable me to ride harder without getting as tired. I was particularly out of shape one trip, and I spent far too much time laying on my back in the snow, panting. While I’ve exercised before most of my trips, this is by far the most effort I’ve put into it. When I get tired on the treadmill, I just keep thinking about carving… or I look at the pretty girls in the gym ;)
A nice side effect is the fact that I do still seem to be loosing fat and gaining muscle mass… so I’m looking a bit different in the mirror.