Tag Archives: weight loss

Sep4

My Best Friend 

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I’m flying to Los Angeles for the second time this year. And for the third time in a rolling calendar year. I used to go to LA to visit Ali while she was out on summer program at USC, and then while she was there doing her masters and after. That would be maybe once a year…sometimes summer, sometimes college breaks. I’d go and visit, and we would attempt to go to Price Is Right (which we got into while Bob Barker was still host, but not never called to “Come on Down!”!), drive to Tijuana, Mexico (before it was basically a ‘do not enter zone’ as it is now), or go to Conan O’Brian tapings. But now, I apparently go for racing. And not just for myself.   
  
It’s only been the last year that Ali has started doing road running races. She did her first ever 5km in Independence, Iowa, in August 2014. Don’t know Indee? Yeah, unless you’re an Isham, you don’t know Indee. There’s an Insane Asylum museum there you can go on a tour at…We have pictures in straight jackets. There’s also a lot of corn and Dollar General stores we used to ride a two-person bike to when visiting her grandparents in the summer. Anyway, Ali did her first ever Spartan Race later that same month of August when she came to visit me in Lethbridge, Alberta….the other LA. We drove the two hours to Calgary one Saturday morning to compete in the Spartan Sprint. She has admitted it being one of the hardest fucking things ever. She could have stopped trying after taking 1 hour and 44 minutes to finish a 5 km obstacle race.  

  
But she hasn’t.  
This girl has always hated running. I’m serious. While she was a competitive swimmer growing up, she would loathe dry land practices. I do remember once having her go on a run with me when we were both in Franklin and she did a 2 mile loop on the bike trail and hated her life. The fact she went back at it after having such a hatred for it so many years later is admirable.
Ali has found a love and healthy addiction to Crossfit. Crossfit works for her. It motivates her. She is focused. She has caught on to healthy habits and lost a shit ton of weight the healthy way. She has achieved so much since being part of it. And she keeps pushing herself. She has now, since that 5km, run numerous other 5 km and also 10 km races. She is hooked on Spartan Races (she even bought a damn spear to practice throwing) and the Rock N Roll series of races. She has become a “bling addict.” Last year at this time I was flying down to run her first ever 10km race with her in Disneyland. We ran it together in a 1:27. This past May she ran the TinkerBell 10km in 1:04.  

  
So this weekend I head to LA not for Tijuana or late night shows. I’m going to run the Disneyland Half with my best friend. I’m going to push her towards her goal time, and we are going to have a great time doing it. She may hate me partway through (I can already picture the look of death at mile 10) but I’m there for her. I’m always there for my best friend.

  
Lanikai 

Jun22

Clean Eating Challenge—COMPLETED!

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Well. It’s done. It’s over. It’s completed. And we survived. Barely.

The “Clean Eating Challenge” was taken on by my husband and I two weeks ago. I found it online here: Crazy-Ass Challenge
This seemed manageable and actually realistic, since it contained actually meals, not just liquid. We also made a deal that if one of us bailed, we owed the other $100 for each week we didn’t complete. That, and the fact we spent a ton on groceries, kept me in line. But, let me be honest—this was fucking HARD!

We went into this not because we wanted to lose weight, but because we wanted to clean out our systems of some unhealthy habits. Both Dan and I are pretty addicted to beer. Ok, addicted sounds bad, but it is a known fact that we love our craft beer. We usually have at least one beer a day. For two weeks, we had no beer. I crave my salty snacks, especially my Mrs. Renfros green salsa and tortilla chips. Dan craves ice cream and candy. We gave that up for two weeks of clean eating.

How much did this cost? Well, we estimate we spent $600 for the two weeks of food. Yes….that’s a lot of cash. Especially up front. But yesterday, we sort of ran the numbers, and it seemed alright….so, $300 a person for two weeks of meals. $300 divided by 14 days is $21.43 a day. We also have some leftover food. Some of the perishables will have to be composted, but the frozen fish is fine. Also, since we did not eat out at all, that makes this $600 ok for us. Dan and I go out usually once a week, and after all is said and done with meals and drinks, we usually drop $100 each time. Easy.

The one killer about this diet is on the site it claims you will FEEL GREAT! Have SO MUCH ENERGY! Yeah. About that. LIES. Dan and I were exhausted every damn night. I went to bed around 9 pm almost every night the second week. This diet did not take into account our activity level, so we were definitely malnourished. Some would say we were starving ourselves. Dan does intense labour as a landscaper and arborist during the day. I had just started my marathon training and did 30 miles and 35 miles each week, respectively. In that first week I did the Millarville Half Marathon and was so lethargic. Yesterday I did a 14 mile training run and I wanted to curl into fetal position. My body cannot wait to start consuming gluten again. It needs it.

My mind is starting to thaw after this brainwashing two weeks, so my thoughts are a bit scattered today. Here’s a list, in no particular order, of things Dan and I liked, hated, enjoyed, dreaded, etc about the last two weeks. (we made this last last night while we enjoyed our “last supper.” I admit, we drank a beer with it. We deserved it.)

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-Tamari, Hummus and veggies and Baked fish were great additions to our cooking and diet that we will include. We also will try to make more of our own dressings.
-Dan says “Olive oil is the bomb. Your omelets are so much better”
-We buy free range meat (chicken, beef, turkey) and it’s expensive, but I caved for the first time in about three years and bought some shitty chicken breasts by the package at Safeway. I immediately felt guilty.
-Hardest time for Dan was rain days when he was laying on the couch staring at the kitchen. Mine was 4:00 pm. I wanted Cheetos.
-Thought we would be gassier. We weren’t! Yay!
-Vegetarian chili was “fucking terrible”
-I Still don’t care for kale-can handle it in smoothies
-Got better with cooking and multitasking. We had to cook every damn meal in the kitchen and by us tag-teaming the meals, we pumped them out fast.
-With that in mind, this challenge did bring us together more as a couple during mealtimes and immediately after.
-Andrea became a royal bitch by 9 pm. Dan was “touchy with his feelings” but he said I got more out of line

Final number results? Well, it’s no surprise we lost weight. Dan weighed 155.6 pounds when we started. I weighed in at 131. Neither of us had an issue with our weight. But we knew with the limited calories in the diet we would lose some. Just didn’t know how much. Yesterday, Dan weighed in a final time at 147.3 pounds. I was laughing my ass off on the couch because he couldn’t believe he was under 150. A total weight loss of 8.3 pounds. I weighed in at 125.9 pounds-a weight loss of 5.1 pounds. I even put on my wedding dress last night, solely because I could zip it up again!

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I can definitely say this is crazy and unsafe, as losing that much weight that fast is never a good idea. Cutting pasta and beer and cheese out of my diet will do that I guess. Cutting the pasta and beer and cheese out ruined me for my races and training runs, as my system was out of whack and I felt like proverbial crap. Literally. Yeah, take that as you think.

I am now enroute to Albuquerque for a conference, and I think I am gaining that weight back as I type this at the crappy airport bar in Great falls, Montana, while I enjoy my Bloody Mary.

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We both laugh though because as we bitched for two weeks about being hungry, Dan always finished with a sarcastic “…but we look so good!” He also said yesterday he should start taking mirror selfies stat because it’s the best he will ever look. And now I look back at a post I did last year, and me writing this post today is almost ironic and counter productive. I want everyone to still know that I stand by what I said here last year. A lot of you haven’t read this, because you didn’t read my blog until recently, so here’s what I am talking about: My thighs will always touch

And with that. I leave you this picture from my bachelorette party in the Bahamas. Yes. I am wearing a mumu. And yes, that drink is an impossibly blue color. But that cheese sauce…I could have a whole boat of that right about now. Cheers!

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Dec30

How Do I Sum Up 2013?

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There is that. That picture is worth a thousand words.

While this is a mix of finisher medals, placing medals, and challenge medals….they all share in common that they are some pieces of special bling I earned during 2013. I registered and competed in 21 unique races so far in 2013.…I say “so far” as I will be doing race 22 tomorrow when I run the Brita Resolution Run 5km with my good friend Kelly! The mix of races I ran this year weighted heavily on half marathons, along with some 10kms and unique distance 10-miler and 35 km trail races. I also got snatched into the whirlwind that are Spartan Races, where I completed 3 Sprints (5km), 1 Super (14km) and 1 Beast (21km) which earned me a coveted Trifecta Tribe medal!

Those aren’t the only important numbers of 2013.…I went into the year with a two year old half marathon PR of 1:54:19, from Woody’s RV Half in Red Deer 2011. I wanted to break that sometime during this year! While back in Wisconsin for Easter……First race out, I hit 1:52:53….holy crap.….I was hoping that wasn’t the peak! I went on to break this NEW PR three more times during 2013! My best ended up occurring up in high elevation-ville of Lethbridge, where I ran a 1:41:07 at the Bare Bones Half! I never thought I would now be setting my sights at sub 1:40!

More numbers…..1155 & 1621. These are the dollar amounts I have fundraised so far for the Heart & Stroke Foundation (Canada) and the American Heart Association, respectively. I began this fundraising journey at the start of 2013, with the roll-out of this very website. My year would be devoted to running more races than my previous years, and all races would be ran in memory of my father, Andrew Lammers. This April 25th marked the 9th year since his passing. He was only 51.

While the medals are the tangible item I can now hold in my hand to reflect and remember the races of this year, there is much more that I have gained by competing in this ridiculous number of events. The personal bests…the fundraising goals being met and surpassed…the new race experiences….doing it all for Dad…….and now it’s one week until I leave for the culminating event of the year….the Dopey Challenge….2013 has been an amazing year. I can’t wait for the start of 2014!