First Blog

Good morning,
   This is my first attempt at an actual blog.  I have yet to determine if it will be a daily, weekly, bi-weekly or monthly blog, but I will do my best to update it as much as possible.  For those reading thing, you probably know that I have been trying to keep the progress of my workouts on Facebook, and keep a running tally of the days I run or do Insanity or any other type of workout.  It helps me to keep track of my progress and how good of shape I actually may be getting.  A brief (very brief) history.  I was a mediocre high school athlete, I played football, wrestled and played baseball.  I was varsity on football the end of sophomore year, junior year and senior year.  I was a varsity wrestler my sophomore, junior and senior years and varsity baseball junior and senior years.  I have not been blessed with the best genetics, but really, who has.  I have always been a big guy, my freshman year in High School starting out at 180lbs. but I have always been tall.  I gradually went from 5'9 my freshman year to 6'2 my senior year (maybe first year in college).  I then went to Neosho County Community College on a wrestling scholarship to wrestle.  I was not any good, I was 190lbs and wrestled heavyweight (there were 10 All Americans at the 190lb weight class, so the next weight up was heavyweight, which went all the way up to 280 lbs.).  I spent about two years doing that then transferred to Wichita State University where I joined the rowing team and became Co-Captain of the team by my senior year (I was most improved my first year rowing, everyone doubted that I could even do the sport...I showed them!!!).  The best shape I was in was my last year of rowing.  I did dance and theatre while in college and teamed up dancing with the rowing workouts and started running about an hour a day on the treadmill.  All this led me to the best shape of my life, but unfortunately, I graduated and stopped working out so much but kept eating like I was.  Then I was introduced to beer.  This poor combination led me to gain 60 lbs in about a year...fairly unhealthy!!!
After gaining this weight, I decided I would attempt to lose it, which I was successful on MANY occasions.  I have lost and gained more weight than most people, having my weight fluctuate from 290 (at my heaviest) to 240 (at my lightest).  After losing my "career" at a place that I loved working at (a museum most of you will know but will remain anonymous), I worked a lot of crappy full time jobs trying to find something.  I did tae kwon do and actually was pretty good at it, getting to the highest level (sadly, one of the major things I miss living where I live).  I ballooned up to 290 (or more...lbs.) and was unhappy, had some health problems and not joyous.  Starting in March of 2011, I decided I would change all of this and started running.  I started out really slow (I am still slow) and not doing a lot of mileage, but was soon up to around 5 to 6 miles a day after work.  I lost about 35 lbs. and was getting in shape but summer came and with the heat and my size led me to try to keep the working outside to a minimum, but also led me to a workout called "Insanity".  I did Insanity, which was one of the hardest workouts I have ever done outside of college athletics.  The major problem was that Insanity was so hard on the joint, the knees, ankles etc that trying to do it all the time would lead to injury.  I was finally successful in finishing a months worth of Insanity, but I was not losing any weight.  I have an issue with calorie control (obviously) and when you live in a remote area where there is little to do, it is difficult to keep from eating.

Recently I ordered the Tae Bo boot camp, which comes with bands and dvds to do the workout.  It promises results in 7 days and I am sure I will try it.  I have heard both good and bad things, but I will see.  I have also started running again (yes in the cold).  I don't mind running so much as I used to and find myself in pretty good shape even though I have not lost any weight.  I am on Day 11 of running (as of 12/16/11) and started just yesterday doing both the running and Insanity(which was very difficult, I was tired and sore from running and Insanity just killed me...so I didn't get through all of it, although I finished the days program).  I am going on vacation to Tennessee where I will continue my workout program, hoping that maybe the hills of Tennessee will aid in the weight loss.  I am going to keep this blog along with my tracking on facebook, in hopes that I will lose the weight and get in shape.

My goal weight: 220
My current weight: 264