I've been very happy with the results I've had during this competition. But I amn't done (yes, I made up my own conjunction or whatever that was). The goals after this competition include losing another 20-30 pounds, then focusing on adding muscle. I also have a goal of being able to ride my bike to work all four days in a week, which I have yet to accomplish. The best I've done so far is three days (Mon, Tue, Thu). I haven't strung three in a row together yet.

I got my first flat tire on my bike commute yesterday. It wouldn't have been so bad if I had remembered to pack a spare tube, but I didn't (rookie mistake). I was five miles from home when it happened, so I walked two of them (with my bike) before a Williamson County sherriff's deputy stopped and gave me a ride. I didn't mind so much since walking those miles is still good exercise. I fixed the flat when I got home, and got ready and rode up this morning, logging another 18 miles. I must say, there are a lot of land mines waiting for me everyday on the road...lots of sharp gravel, glass, and nuts and bolts sitting on the shoulder of the road. Of course I hit most of them when its dark in the morning. In the afternoons I can usually avoid most of it. I'm guessing flat tires will be a common occurrence for me, but I have my spare tube in my saddle pack, and I'm ready to go. Bring it on!

Rode into work today with a heavy heavy backpack. Long story...okay I'll tell it. Last week at work we were notified that we are getting new carpet and our walls painted over the weekend in our offices. This is fine, but it means we had to completely pack up and clear out our offices. My office had a good amount of things in it, so it was quite the job. Okay, so I get that done. The work happens over the weekend. I have to pack in a lot more stuff than normal due to this situation, hence the heavy backpack. I get to work today and I find that they haven't even started carpeting or painting. This means I have no place to work. It's going to be a looong day. At least I got a good workout coming into work, and it should be a great one this afternoon going home. Another 35 miles to log today! T-minus four days and counting...

I attempted to climb a huge hill near my wife's parents house in Jonestown on my bike yesterday. It was 3/4 mile long with a 300 foot elevation gain, a significantly steep gradient. I can't really say I was successful, but maybe I was. I made it to the top, but I had to rest twice. After my second rest, I took a different approach on the bike, and that is I intentionally went as slow as I possibly could without falling over. I have a feeling if I tried it again with that approach the whole way, I'd make it up without stopping. Oh well, it was a heck of a workout nonetheless. I'm pleased that the weight is still coming off quite well.

When this competition is done, I have no intentions on quitting losing the weight, much less gaining it back. I have worked very hard to obtain the great results I've had, and I will continue it. Now that I'm getting closer and closer to my ideal weight, I will probably pull back a little bit and focus on losing weight a little slower and adding muscle faster, but that's the only change. So far it's been an awesome journey, and, win or not, I'd call it successful. I look better but more importantly I feel better (mentally, physically, emotionally).

I've learned that with a little effort and patience, I can lose this weight. I've also learned that splitting a meal in half when I go out to eat still leaves me satisfied, and then I get another meal later. Losing weight and eating healthy is cost effective. I've also enjoyed the renewed confidence I have (not arrogance, though). I am not afraid to go see people in fear that they'll say something about my weight. I've always lived a pretty active lifestyle, but I got myself in trouble with my diet. Not, I've learned to put both together, which is a great combo.

I had a pretty good weekend as far as weight loss is concerned. I got in two great weight lifting workouts, and ate pretty well. It was my wife's birthday, but even so I was able to stick to eating well and creating a calorie deficit. The most fun thing about all of this is learning to just be active instead of forcing "workouts." Mountain biking, road biking, volleyball, basketball, swimming, etc., and I don't even feel like I'm working out, instead I'm just having fun. Well, time to really kick up a couple extra notches through the end of this thing. I can do two weeks hardcore, and here it comes...in fact, it's already started this morning. I beat my fastest ride into work by a lot (about 10 minutes to be exact, which on a 1.25 hour ride is a lot).

Two weeks to go in this thing. I've been kicking into high gear, and will be even more intense the next two weeks. I rode into work for the third time this week the whole way, which is the most I've ever done. Next week, barring any unforeseen problems (like lightning, injuries, etc.) I will ride in all four days of the week. Nothing has been more effective in helping me drop the lbs than logging 35-36 miles a day on the bike.

This morning was a significantly harder ride into work than yesterday. I could tell during the ride that I was moving slower. It did feel like I had greater headwind this morning compared to yesterday. I checked the weather for yesterday and today, and sure enough, this morning's ride had south winds at 12 mph gusting to 17 mph, and yesterday morning was south winds at 5 mph. Well, I look forward to having that wind pushing me home this afternoon! Oh, and today I'm going to throw in a nice tough strength training workout.

I went up a little in weight this morning...no worries though, I know for a fact it wasn't bad weight. I may have been a little dehydrated going into the weekend due to the nature of my work last week outside all day everyday with little access to water. I loaded up this weekend on water. I also successfully (and quite easily) made the 17-mile bike ride into work today. I know the ride home is harder, so we'll see how that goes. It's hotter, there's more cars, and I have to gain elevation on the way home. At least the prevailing winds from the south will give me a little push from behind! I'm looking forward to biking to work pretty much permanently, not just for the competition. It will save a lot of money, I will get massive amounts of exercise without having to have structured workouts (other than lifting weights), and I get to see the sun rise every morning. How cool is that?

Well I'm home for good now. The rest of this competition will be conducted here at home for me, and I am going to kick things up another notch for the last three weeks. I am ready to start biking the whole way to and from work everyday (36 miles round trip per day) as well as intensifying my weight lifting workouts. Good stuff, time to sprint to the end!

Watch out for those birds people, I had another attack encounter today in Laredo. That's right, 4 times in the last two months. Oh well...So I've done well this trip so far, eating enough but not too much, and working out on top of physically demanding work. Not to mention the brutal sun and heat. How are things in Austin? Any rain yet? Looking forward to weighing in on Friday to see if my efforts this week will be rewarded.

I'm off to Eagle Pass, Laredo, and South Padre this time. This time it's for work though. I'm not complaining because I've been able to do really well with eating and working out on trips, I think I have it down by now. I plan to eat Subway a lot (yes, I know I've been fooled by their "healthy" commercials), and to work out faithfully (which hasn't been a problem). During my work trips, the work I do is outside and physically demanding, so that will also help. I will not allow that as a substitute for official workouts though, just as an added bonus to weight loss. I will not have a scale with me, so I won't be able to weigh in again until Friday. I'll be aiming for a great number that day. See you all then!

Wow, it has been a busy week getting caught up at work. And it seems the travelling just won't stop. Although this weekend's trip to College Station is going to be fun. My wife and I are celebrating our anniversary there. Kind of hard for a Longhorn like me to enjoy myself in CS, but with my wonderful wife, it's doable. Of course, all this travelling also means eating out a lot, but I've been doing really well splitting meals with my good-sported wife. I've actually been more successful losing weight on the road than I am at home. Imagine that!

Today I am tired. Between biking, running, and lifting on a daily basis, my body is feeling good, but very fatigued. The good news is it's impossible for me not to get a good night's sleep. I lay my head on the pillow and I'm gone. I had a slower ride in to work today, working off some of the soreness after yesterday's ride. Because of my vacation, I had not sat on a bike in a little over two weeks, so my bum has to get used to it again. Guess I'll be falling asleep to the MLB All-Star Game tonight!

Is it just me, or are the birds around here more aggressive than ever right now? I had never been attacked by a bird before in my life until about a month ago. Now I've been attacked three times since then, including once on Saturday and once on Sunday. I'm just innocently walking/running along, and out of nowhere, a bird dive bombs me. What's the deal?!?! Maybe this heat and/or lack of rain is making them a little cranky.

Today I'm off to Decatur, TX to attend a triathlon my wife, sister-in-law, and sister-in-law's boyfriend are doing. I did one back in early April in Galveston. I'm still fighting off sickness, spent most of yesterday with a fever. Hopefully today I'll be fever free. I am obviously still not working out to give my body all its energy to fight off this illness. I will pick up workouts again on Sunday most likely. In the mean time, I'm making sure to eat, and eat well. A lot of people will forget to eat while their sick, which makes them lose a lot of weight quick, but they only gain it right back when they're better. I'm okay with no weight loss during my sickness because it means I'm getting the full nutrition I need to help get over it.

I ended the vacation getting a little sick. When I got home from the airport, I had 100.2 fever. Gonna take today off from workouts to prevent further sickness, though I a little feel better this morning. Oh, and this is about the halfway point of the competition!

Today will be an interesting day, as we'll be eating out for all meals. We have reservations at a fancy restaurant in Times Square before we go to the Broadway show. And then we catch a plane back to Austin tomorrow morning. Let's finish this vacation strong!

Go on vacation!

So today is my off day from workouts, but my buddy here in NYC decided it would be good to run...so we did 4 miles non-stop. Not bad, considering that's the most I've ever run non-stop ever. It will sure make my "normal" workouts seem easier now. That on top of the 5-8 miles per day I'm walking around DC and NYC, things are going quite well. The weight is still dropping, I'm watching portions but still eating a lot of great local cuisine. Today we'll be heading out to Coney Island (yes, I will have a hot dog from Nathan's) and hanging out on the beach.

Well, yesterday my wife and I spent the day in DC as tourists. We went to the National Mall and checked out the capital, Washington Monument, and the Lincoln Memorial (with a few museums, Library of Congress, and Supreme Court sprinkled in for good measure). Moral of the story - those things are a lot further apart than they look. I got back to the apartment we're staying in and pulled up Google Maps distance measurement tool. A conservative estimate says we walked about 5.5 miles. The feet and back hurt, but the pounds came off. Now that we've got the tourist stuff out of the way, today will be a little more low key. We will go walk to the White House, but then spend the rest of the day shopping and swimming. Well, off to the gym to get that out of the way...

So far so good...a moderate rise in weight over the last day, probably attributable to the major amounts of water I drank right before bed last night (I was thirsty after all those planes, trains, and automobiles). Here in DC, I will get to do a lot of walking, which I am looking forward to. Also, while getting official workouts in will be a little inconvenient, I am going to do it (in fact, I already got two in this morning). So, off to see the sights in DC!

Catching a plane this morning for Baltimore/DC. Got my workout clothes and shoes packed, I'm not budging. It will be nice to have a change of scenery though. Here's to a great vacation!

I notice a lot of people are going on vacation, and you can add me to the list. I'm leaving tomorrow with my wife to DC and NYC. There is obviously some delicious cuisine to be had in those places, but I am committed to not messing things up. I plan to run and lift while I'm there, even though it will be inconvenient. I will enjoy the taste of the good food, but I'm going to limit my portions. Hopefully weighing in and blogging won't be too difficult either. No matter what, this will be a good mental break (or at least change of scenery) to cut this competition in half, even though I'm not actually giving myself any extra freedoms.

So I accidentally typed ten pounds more to my weight when I entered it in this morning...not trying to mislead. I guess I had become too accustomed to being in the 250s. :)

I love to bike. Whether it's mountain biking or road biking, there's just something about it that seems so primitive (ignore the fact that today's bikes are state of the science technologically advanced). Road biking is dangerous, a lot of car drivers just don't like bikers and like to scare them (i.e. the random scream out their window as they pass you as closely as they can). Why do people do this? Here's something I noticed: vehicle drivers are much more forgiving of you as a biker if you are obviously commuting somewhere. I owe a lot of my weight loss success thus far to biking part-way to work. I wear a big old honkin' backpack, a normal t-shirt and shorts (no spandex), and have an oversized ugly helmet on. I do not fit the "biker" stereotype, and I think people see us commuters and think "Hey, they're helping the environment, they're not getting in my way, I'll give them a break." Not to say there aren't exceptions to this. But by and large, when I go riding for workout purposes, drivers are a lot less patient (and seeing some biker's bad habits, with good reason). So, if you bike, do it safely, predictably, and courteously. If you drive, give bikes a break, don't scare the living daylights out of us by randomly screaming or honking, and above all, drive courteously.

Now I'm done. (Brady Quinn commercial....anyone?)

I kind of understand the frustration of the contestants on the Biggest Loser when they feel they have done all they could possibly do to lose weight, but the scale just doesn't cooperate. I went up in weight again this morning (three times in the last four days). Luckily my one day of loss was a good one. As I keep saying, it's probably just incidental weight fluctuation, or better yet muscle gain. I suppose the daily fluctuations aren't that frustrating, I am losing weight overall. I feel like I am losing weight in a healthy way too, with lots of weight lifting, drinking a ton of water, and eating enough food to sustain my daily routine (including intense workouts).

Oh, by the way, Hook 'em Horns! Deauxn't Mess With Texas!

So I did my body fat % again this morning. The results show that over the last week I've lost 5.5 pounds of fat and gained 0.9 pounds of muscle. I'll take that anyday! In the mean time, I'm working hard to maintain workout intensity (shin splints creeping into my run today). Lifting is a priority. Oh by the way, I calculated that whoever wins the $1,000, when just taking the amount of time to workout into account, they are essentially making $16.67/hour for each workout! That's a one hour workout per day for 60 days (60 hours total). Interesting...

This weekend was a really good but really bad weekend. I was the most active I've been over a weekend in a really long time (mountain biking, road biking, volleyball, running, lifting, swimming). While I only had 2 "structured" workouts, my focus was on being active and just moving (as well as continuing to eat well). Well of course I put on half a pound again. I'm not too worried about it since it is probably just water weight or added muscle. But I would like to see a good loss over the next couple days. I will be biking to and from work part of the way again this whole week to help the process along. Oh, I bet the problem was two extra Father's Day meals (one with my dad and one with my dad-in-law), which of course means MEAT (yummmm).

I know this is about the time when losing weight that things start to move slower. I've already seen that earlier this week with my weight actually increasing one day. But all that means is its time to focus and work harder. I've been doing well of finding fun things to do to get exercise. I don't like workouts (you know, structured stuff). Today, played and little two-on-two sand volleyball (won two games, lost one) and did a fun 8 mile bike ride. Tomorrow me and a few friends are going mountain biking. That's the good stuff. Of course, I have to do structured workouts for strength training. It's risky to be so focused on building muscle through all of this, but when it's over, I'd like to be in a better position and not have to catch up all over again.

The last few days have been insanely productive for me. I've eaten perfectly and worked out hard and long. Well, this morning I woke up to an almost one pound gain in weight. Pretty deflating after all the work I'm putting in. Maybe it's stubborn muscle increasing (which in the end is a good thing, better than winning this competition). Or maybe my body is starting to rebel and hold on to its energy (the dreaded starvation mode). Maybe it's the two pieces of pizza I ate two nights ago. You never know. Today's game plan is to keep things normal and not abandon my routine, we'll see what happens tomorrow.

I have one of those Body Fat Analyzer scales. Who knows how accurate they really are, but apparantly if you use it under similar circumstances (i.e. first thing in the morning) each time, it is right within a couple of %. Anyways, I took my body fat at the beginning of this, and now, one week in, I took another reading. I have lost 3.2% body fat! I've also added 1.7% muscle mass, which amounts to about 3 pounds of muscle. It's tough to lose weight and not lose muscle mass (and actually add muscle on top of that). So even though I could have faster weight loss results for this competition by not focusing on adding muscle (and in turn losing water and muscle weight), that's not my ultimate goal. I'd rather lose this competition and gain muscle if that's what it takes. When this is over, I don't want to have to start trying to add muscle. I'm making the goal losing fat and gaining muscle, not simply losing "weight."

Well, I'm excited about the Horns winning their first game in the CWS, even though it wasn't pretty (a walk-off walk!?!?). This does mean, however, that I will be watching game 2 Tuesday night with family and pizza. Uh oh. Have you noticed yet? Pizza is my favorite food! This is hard work, but I'm feeling better, and that's what matters. Don't care where I place, just want to get some lbs off.

I've had a successful week so far, and the weekend has been great. I've eaten well, and workouts have been awesome. I've had slow weight loss the last couple days, but that's okay. As long as the number is getting smaller, I'm happy. Well, off to do my Saturday morning workout...

So far it has been going well. Go figure, this is only my third day. But, I'm encouraged. I've worked out both Tuesday and Wednesday, and I rode my bike part way to work today, and I will be doing a work out this evening also. Of course, that's after the dinner engagement. This will be my first real challenge for eating well. They're making my favorite food, homemade pizza. It's tough when I'm eating with friends, especially if they are cooking for me. I don't want to insult them by not eating much, but I also don't want to indulge and fall off the bandwagon. So, I'll let you know how it goes. My plan is to approach the meal very moderately.

Well, here is day one of the challenge. I am excited and optimistic about results. Even if I don't place, I think the motivation of losing weight and feeling better is more than worth it. My wife deserves a better me. Today, I am focusing my energy on having an excellent day of eating well, and then I will work out when I get home from work. I am also going to start biking to work for progressively longer distances. We'll see how it goes.