Butterthebean

Well I have my fingers crossed for you my friend. You've been a big inspiration to me and many others. We don't want anything to happen to you.

I've gotten a bunch....and alot of them from the guys because there aren't too many around. Often they want tips on maintaining muscle or maximizing their loss. I think my total weight loss sometimes makes people think I have some secret. My only secret was being extra fat so I had more to lose. Of course, in the past I've been more than willing to wade into some of the more heated debates, and even start a few. That behavior has gotten me many PMs saying "that a boy" and a few saying "go f*** yourself."

Did they by chance discuss if you're enlarged heart could have been the result of being obese for so long? Out of curiosity what is your RHR? My doc had a mild panic attack recently when he saw mine was 42. He did 2 EKGs and practically drove me to the cardiologist office. The cardiologist did 2 more EKGs, a carotid ultrasound, an echocardiogram and had me wear a holter monitor for 24 hours. They found nothing wrong and the doc told me it was likely a result of being very obese yet fairly active for so long. I was active until the last year before surgery, when it got too painful and I basically became a couch potato. He said the heart muscle basically hypertrophied like the leg muscles of an overweight person. It grew bigger and stronger due to the extra workload put on it. Once I lost so much weight so quickly, plus took up a lot of cardio training, it had no problem supplying blood to my much smaller body with fewer beats per minute. He said it would likely adjust and grow smaller, much as my leg muscles have, unless I continue doing rigorous endurance training (like triathlon training for instance). But he said as long as I stay active, eat right and do not have or develop any type of heart disease I should be fine, even with the lower heart rate.

We might be able to meet up that Friday night....I think it will be the 15th. I might get to Dallas kinda late though, depends on work. Then the workshop is 9-430 Saturday then I'm driving back home afterward. But hey, come take the workshop. You might like it.

I wanted to come back to this post after just having done my first real organized race last weekend. There were 15,000 runners total in the 5K and the 10K. And I can say without a shadow of a doubt, there was every size and shape of humanity out there running. Now granted, the lead pack, yes they were all tiny, skinny, long legged people. But you have to ask yourself....are they skinny because they run so much or can they run so much because they are skinny? I doubt any of them ever weighed 300 lbs. I saw many muscled up strong men running as well as quite a few senior citizens running even faster. You truly cannot tell who's the better runner just by looking at them but you can bet that runners can manage to add lean body mass or reduce it depending on their personal goals and abilities. So my point is, I wouldn't decide not to run based on a fear of losing lean body mass. Even if you lost a couple of percentage points of muscle, the cardiovascular benefit would far out weigh any small loss in strength.

Oh Mass...I feel you. I hope everything turns out to be okay.

I use an iPod shuffle. You can't beat it for $50.

I couldn't do it either at first. In fact, the first time I tried it I couldn't run for 2 weeks. But I reluctantly went back and very slowly got better. Yesterday, I ran a 10K and I'll tell you....the feeling of pride and accomplishment is unbelievable. You'll get there if you keep at it. And at some point you'll realize there are really no limits. You can do whatever you try to do.

It will get easier. No problem repeating weeks. You are smart not to go too fast.

Ran my first 10K yesterday. They had 15000 runners so needless to say it was quite crowded. A little too crowded for me. But my official time was 1:11:20. We did have a great time.

I've just been doing a lot of reading about Maximum Aerobic Function (MAF) zone. It was developed by a guy named Phil Maffetone who has trained many endurance athletes including Mark Allen who is a 6 time Iron Man triathlon winner. He preaches that if you stay in your aerobic zone you will burn fat for fuel rather than glycogen and you will be able to sustain it for so much longer. The interesting part is they claim that if you train in that zone your performance will gradually increase over time but your heart rate will stay the same, meaning you can go farther and faster with less effort while still burning fat. The MAF zone is a basic equation of subtracting 180 minus your age and that gives you the upper end of your zone. The zone is a range of 10 beats per minute so you subtract another 10 to get the lower and upper zone to train in. There are also a few other contingencies like you subtract another 10 from both totals if you are completely out of shape and have not been training. The end result is you train at a relatively easy aerobic effort that keeps you strictly in the fat burning zone and out of the sugar burning zone (anaerobic). I personally can't say for sure how well it works but if anyone is interested in training for endurance events it's worth researching.

It's always a reason to celebrate when someone hits goal. Happy day.

Way to go. Either way you were flying.

I'm close to goal and I eat 1500 cal and around 60-80 carbs usually.

What a great job you've done. Thanks for that update. I know what you mean about carrying around food. I almost need a lunchbox to go anywhere. But it's the smart thing to do.

Yeah, when I do my planks I have to wear an under armour shirt or it ain't pretty.

Thanks guys. I've got a Garmin and it gives me my current pace. I keep an eye on it in the first couple of miles every time I run. After that I usually get in a good enough groove I don't have to worry about it. But you can bet I'll be watching it tomorrow making sure I don't go too fast.