I am really sorry that this is late, it should have gone up on Sunday, but as I’ll be leaving for England on Thursday to do a 10 week (fulltime) diploma in personal fitness training I have been rather busy!

I’m down 2lbs this week brining me to 216lbs (15.6st). I’d hopped for more as I had ran my first half marathon (13.1 miles) on Saturday, but hey a loss it a loss.

I will put up a video later of how my half marathon went.

Since I started running with Jennifer from AlanStrachanPersonalTraining.com got me into running I wanted to run a half marathon.  My life is pretty busy so the amount of training needed to make a worth while marathon attempt is out of the question, purely as I don’t have the time to train and all those months of training would kill my muscle gains and send my metabolism to basement levels.

But a half marathon (13.1 miles) was definitely appealing to me.  I had set my eyes on a half marathon or a triathlon for a big goal to motivate and inspire me to keep moving with my fat loss goals, but then I set my gaze on going to Premier for a diploma in personal fitness training, which I’ll be leaving for next Thursday (Aug 19th 2010).

But that darn half marathon has been chewing on my mind since April, you’d think it would have been finished by now!

I just can’t get it out of my head, I have to get it out of my system. But until there is a breakthrough in mind transplantation then I’ll just have to RUN A HALF MARATHON!

Now looking at when to do this; as I have said I leave to fly down to Bristol next Thursday, 10 weeks in Trowbridge; studying like a maniac and working out like an athlete, then after that I am going to be in need of a holiday (my wife and I are hoping that we can go to Indonesia for Christmas)…. So when to fit in a half marathon??

How about this Saturday? Sounds good!

Now as this is my last Saturday before leaving my family I have planned a route just a little over 6 and a half miles and then I’ll turn around and head home reaching the 13.1 mile target.

Here is my route;

CLICK TO ENLARGE

This week I have relaxed my running schedule and I have been carb loading to make sure that my glycogen tank is full for the run.  I will go for a 2 mile run tomorrow (13/8/10) and then the next day I will set off for the 13.1 mile haul

My initial goal for this is to start it running and continue running until I finish.

I haven’t set a time to do it, so if it takes me half the day, so be it

I will be doing a video journal for this one and then will work on having it up on YouTube and embedded here by Monday wish me luck!

CLICK TO ENLARGE!

The skeletal system is divided into two sections; the Axial and Appendicular.

The Axial skeleton consists of; the skull, the rib cage and vertebral column.

The Appendicular skeleton consists of; the shoulder girdle, the arms & hands, pelvic girdle and legs & feet.

I worked really hard this week, but I am not disappointed that the scales didn’t go down.  You see 32 years ago today I was born, so it’s my birthday today yesterday I was at a Chinese buffet with my wife and son, and today I was out for a big chunky steak with my all my family

These are the times when losing weight you just have to take a deep breath and know that you’ll be back on track tomorrow and it’s ok to let go (just a little), I was very pleased with myself, I did eat some normally forbidden foods but I stayed away from the beer LOL so this makes me feel good… I am sure that I’ll be out for a beer upon graduating from Premier at the end of October

HIGHS

This week my high is I am just happy that I didn’t gain any new weight

LOWS

I am beginning to feel the time get close that I will have to leave my wife and son, so this feels very heavy on me at the moment I know that we’ll get through it and it’ll all be worth it in the end.

The FiveFingers by Vibram keep cropping up all the time.  Now a little about my feet; I walk around on my metatarsal pads quite a bit so the skin is like rock solid so I really need to look after my feet.  So for that reason I’d be really pushed to try these.  But I guess the biggest reason that I haven’t tried these would have to be the cost, yeah I am not financially up there to splash out £100 for footwear that I might not be able to wear

But I keep on coming back to them and they are quite appealing to me, and the thoughts of trying barefoot running. So if anyone from Vibram is reading this, a pair would be nice for an in-depth product review

Have you bought Vibram’s FiveFingers? If you have give me your views, comments, etc!

Now like any one on a mission to lose lots and lots of blubber I have my good days and bad days and I want to share with you how I deal with the bad days.  I take every day as a new start; my mission before was to make more healthy food choices than bad ones, my journal of falling into binges or pigging out on the wrong foods helped me discover how I got myself into those situations and then I planned safety barriers so I wouldn’t make those mistakes again.

Like I said, every day is a new start for me.  And I start my day the same way 24/7!

• 4:00am – The alarm sounds! I go into our spare room where my little office is and I will have a devotional time (praying/reading my Bible)

• 4:30am – Deep Breathing; now this to me is not meditation; the science behind it is very logical so nothing mystical or fruity Over the next 5min I will sit in my office chair and close my eyes and focus on deep breathing exercises. Breathing in deep (mouth closed) and then exhaling long through my mouth.

• 4:35am – BREAKFAST! 60g of oatmeal, 250ml hot skimmed milk, 1 tablespoon of organic peanut butter, chopped banana washed down with a cup of black (sugarless) coffee Yum!

My reason for deep breathing exercises is simple; we function better with oxygen LOL actually that’s why we function at all! Deep breathing exercises increases your oxygen intake and benefits your whole body; brain, lungs, heart, blood, etc.  If you put this into practice then you should feel the benefits not only physically but mentally too, when the body feels good, you feel good.  For me this helps me think clearly and be sharper about the choices that I will make in my new day.

Now lets get back to my 4:00am appointment, every morning I meet with God, I am not ashamed about this, (Rom 1:16) this is who I am. I once read in Men’s Health magazine that people with a spiritual life had a higher success rate in getting healthy/losing weight than those who did not.

I hope that I am not sounding judgemental or preachy but when I started Discipline Or Regret I made a decision to share everything I believe that are the keys to my success and my relationship with God is such a strength in my life to not share it with you.

We are now in the middle of the week; read over your goals, look at your workout and nutritional program and rest assured that you are on the right track to a healthier you!

The time has flown in very fast but I guess that’s because I have been running I go into running when my personal trainer (Jenniffer Almiento) suggested we add it into my workouts.  I had always been worried about running due to it being a weight-bearing exercise and my ever aching left hip (I had hip surgery in my youth, due to a dislocated hip), so I always avoided running.

The first time out with Jennifer was tough to say the least; I struggled with a jog-walk-jog-walk pattern for most of the times we met up for a run.  But this is the best way to start getting into running with the hope that it becomes a long-term practice.  A lot of people start off running as though they are being hunted and sprint themselves to injury, then give up; it wasn’t running that caused their injury, it was training without tact.

I was lucky starting with Jennifer, I was in good hands; so I started running at my own pace. I can’t imagine what my facial expressions looked like especially on hill climbs, I am sure it looked as bad as it felt. My first circuit was 1.85 miles and I completed it in 27 min and I-don’t-know-how-many seconds   Now I can do the same circuit in 19 min and 7 seconds.

I ran with Jennifer for about 2 sessions per week for about 4 weeks and then I was on my own.  Jennifer had set me a challenge to finish the circuit sub 20 min so I started working on increasing my pace, which was the wrong move.  I would start off with power as if on a world-changing mission only to tire into jog then shift down some more gears into a walk.  This went on for weeks (running 3 times per week) and I really got fed up at not being able to increase my pace, but further more not being able to finish the circuit by running the whole way.

Then I had a brainstorm (actually it was more like a brain fart) I thought about forgetting about my pace and just focus on being able to run the whole circuit regardless of how long it took me.

This was my new goal; run from A to B that’s simple, right!?

On my first circuit I pin pointed 3 ‘block points’ were I always stopped, so before I arrived to them I would talk to myself and prepare myself not to stop. This worked really well for me and it only took one week (3 runs) to get this right.  So if you are out on a run and there’s a hill that you always stop at the top just start saying “ok there’s a block point coming up, you can’t stop, you know deep down that you can do this, keep pushing through, dig deep, etc…….. Simple ……..Not really, especially when you are big and chunky with lots of love lumps and with every foot strike your weight triples! LOL

Once I could run my circuit without stopping/walking I took 2 weeks just to build that up and then I started to look at my pace.

My pace back when I started was 14.57 min mile and I got it down to 11.04 min mile, boy did I feel quite the athlete, I was on top of my game….. and THEN!!!! I met up with some one, we can call him Gandalf… HE said that my minute mile was pretty pathetic LOL

Now I like a challenge, and I am also grateful when friend’s just tell you like it is (thanks Gandalf ) and Gandalf was right, it was a lame mile pace.

So I spent a week doing speedwork, fartlek and hill runs.  These have really paid off and I have now got my minute mile down to 9.08 and it’s still a work in progress.

Since I have gotten serious about running I have been collecting lots of data about my runs using (initially) Nike+ for my iPod Touch and then more recently I have added the Polar RS300X (with foot pod). And I will be starting to read ‘Total Heart Rate Training’ by Joe Friel this week to work on getting the best out of my Polar heart rate monitor and developing a progressive running program.

One of the major things, and the most surprising thing about my running is my hip. During the first and second month I was getting a twinge of pain during my runs BUT then on the third month nothing, no pain.  Not only during my runs but I haven’t had hip pains now for 4 months!  As I have said running is a weight-bearing exercise and it causes your bones, joints, tendons to strengthen, and I believe this has what has happened to me.  Now if you find yourself in a similar situation with an ache from a previous condition don’t just assume this will work for you; go to your doctor (as I did) and get it checked out.  I went from my GP to a specialist and was given the green light for any type of exercise, she did say take care while running (and I did).  So please do the right thing and take the time to get checked out before you hit the road.

CONCLUSION

I have definitely caught the running bug, and I will continue to run.  With my current goals I am running to blast fat along with lifting weights and a healthy nutritional program, so for this reason I run short, intense runs and not high mileage, endurance runs.  But once I reach my weight loss goal I really want to do a half marathon (why not a full marathon?) I will if I can fit the training required into my schedule

Well that’s it, watch this space for more tails from running the trenches!

SOME RUNNING STATS (March 13th to Aug 2nd 2010)

• Number of Runs: 59

• Calories Burnt: 27,225

• Miles Ran: 150.89

• Total Run Duration: 30 hours, 16 minutes & 04 seconds

• Furthest Run: 5.43 miles

• Running Shoe: (initially) Nike Pegasus 26+ (Now) Asics Gel 2150 (magic, I love them!)

That’s better! Stepping on the scales this morning was a joy to look down and see 218lbs (15.8st) that gives me a loss of 3lbs this week.  It took meticulous nutrition and I stepped up my game with my workouts and running this week, and it paid off!

With three weeks to go before the Premier personal training diploma course starts I am still confident I can reach my 210lbs (15st) goal If I can keep up this 3lbs figure, I don’t know but I’ll give it all I have!

HIGHS

I really took my running up a notch this week and I blasted a new PB for every run. My current goals for running are focusing on getting faster over 2 mile circuits. So this is going very well.

LOWS

My wife and I have been feeling the heaviness of time getting closer to my departure, so this has been difficult. I have only spent one night away from my wife since we married so the thoughts of 70 nights is really tough.  I have been trying to encourage my wife (and myself) about the positive impact this will have on our future, especially Daniel’s future.

Check out the graph of my fat blasting efforts from January 2008 until now (Aug 2010)

CLICK TO ENLARGE!

Well don’t forget to check back next week for weigh-in 97 and lets hope I can smash another 3lbs off!

That’s it almost 3 weeks left to go before I start my Premier personal fitness training diploma down in Trowbridge.  I am nervous but it’s an excited, positive energy nervousness not a scared to death nervous

I have already got myself a nice new pair of running shoes (Asics Gel 2150) which are proving to be a running dream you I feel I have made a good choice there.

Actually I got a nice surprise this morning while I was out on my run.  I was walking up to an empty retail building and I was very excited to see that Sports Direct (sportsdirect.com) are opening up shop there.  I find Sports Direct prices unbeatable, yet they sell good brands (no I am not working for Sports Direct.

Ok lets get back on topic, so three weeks remaining, but I have less time as I will be flying down to Bristol on the 19th (Aug) so I have about 2 and a half weeks to have everything organised before leaving.

I feel I am on top of most things and I am hoping Sports Direct will be open before I leave so I can get some gear, most of my clothes are too big for me now.