Tag: fitness Posts

Getting In Shape

 Journal

Strangely enough, most people in Vancouver probably don’t remember me as ever being super skinny. For whatever reason, I’ve always had a bit of meat on my bones. You can chalk it up to a slow metabolism, or crappy genes or whatever, but there are not many times in my life where I’ve been rail thin. The first time I came close though was probably around grade 11. I was playing three sports at the same time, getting lots of rest, and for the most part, lived a pretty stress free life. I couldn’t tell you what I weighed during that period, but looking at old photos I definitely think I looked fairly athletic. For the most part, I stayed relatively skinny during university. I’ve always sort of oscillated plus or minus ten pounds fairly regularly, so I’m sure there were times I was a bit chubbier, and times when […]

Gym: Week 2

 Journal

So this was my second full week at the gym. Other than Wednesday (where I missed going because I had to go to Vancouver), I was there every day this week. I’m definitely noticing an improvement in fitness, since my heart rate has come down while doing cardio, and I find it harder to get out of breath when I’m whacking a tennis ball around the court. I’ve been doing my normal routines in the morning, and also trying to get out and do something in the evenings as well (either go for a walk, hit some tennis balls, or rollerblade). I generally eat fairly well when I’m at home (depending on your definition of well I guess). I’m a pretty big low-carb advocate, mainly because I feel way better when I don’t eat a ton of carbs. I still splurge from time to time and eat a “normal” meal, […]

The New Routine

 Journal

Part of the reason I moved back to Chilliwack was so that I can finally have the proper time to eat decent food and hopefully get some exercise on a regular basis. While my current apartment is the only place I ended up considering, part of the reason I did so was because it’s only about a 5 minute walk from a gym. And while I did my best to go outside and get exercise in Vancouver, I generally worked a lot of hours and didn’t really have a ton of time. I’ve had a gym membership out here since about April, but haven’t really been going more than once or twice a week. My main problem is that I’m not really much of a morning person, and by the time the evening rolled around, I always found myself pretty tired. Last week I decided to try setting my alarm […]

Duane Reduction Program

 Journal

A few blog posts ago, I mentioned that I was going to do my best to return back to my pre-last-relationship weight. To that end, I have spent the last week hitting the gym from time to time and attempting to watch what I eat. The first week has been a bit rocky, and I hit a few tasty speed bumps at Rebecca’s Cinqo de Mayo party, but for the most part I’ve been on track. Since my life is a bit crazy thesedays, it’s challenging for me to always have access to “healthy” food, but I’ve been doing the best I can. So without further ado, the progress after week #1 is (RSS drum roll please): 5.5 lbs Now, I know as well as everyone else that it’s basically impossible to lose more than about two pounds a week of real fat. So, undoubtedly a huge chunk of that […]

On the downhill slide

 Journal

When I left Ottawa years ago, I was a pretty chubby guy. Two years of working crazy hours, drinking tons of beer, and eating primarily in restaurants had taken its toll, and my old university self had been replaced with your stereotypical software engineering stature. As soon as I got settled in Vancouver and started classes again at UBC, I decided to undo all the damage of my Ottawa experience — I started watching what I ate, getting a bit more exercise (mostly by rollerblading and hiking), and even sleeping in a bit more. In about six months, I had dropped 40 lbs, and ended up being substantially lighter than I was in university. I would even say that when I started working at my current job I was a bit underweight for my frame. That being said, ever since my last break up, and with everything that happened in […]

Low Carb Diets Vindicated, Once Again

 Journal

If you would have mentioned that you were trying to lose weight by a reducing your carbohydrate intake a few years ago, people would have dismissed you as crazy and told you that you were only hurting your body. However, that all changed sometime around 2003 when a prestigious medical school released a peer-reviewed study that basically showed Low Carbohyrate diets not only help people lose more weight, but also result in better blood-lipid profiles than their low-fat counterparts. Since then, I’ve read countless studies on PubMed that basically indicate the same thing. However, another fairly major study just came out that is of interest. Here are the key points: A study of four popular diets found that women put on the one with the least carbohydrates — the Atkins plan — lost at least twice as much weight as those on the others, researchers said on Tuesday. … Women […]