marc42968's Journal

151 - Just checking in

Aug 14 2009 16:06

Been too busy the past month with other activities (golf, office, health, study) to check in here but the eight is holding steady, no better but no worse. Taking the neice to the county fair tomorrow otherwise nothing on the radar to speak of.

150 - New Drive(r)

Jul 27 2009 11:43

I've been slowly improving my swing the past month but for whatever reason(it seemed at the time), I would get way out of the range I would like, namely a terrible slice. I had seen the ads for the Taylormade r9 and how it could bee adjusted,so I went to a few places to try one out. The first thing I found out was that the shaft on my current driver was two flexible, as a result when I swung the toe would twist back, thereby opening the clubface even when my swing was on plane. The next thing was that I needed a club that had a shallower face so I wnt from a 10.5 to a 9.5.

With just those two changes I discovered that I didn't need an adjustible club, just one with those features that felt good to me. Good thing too since that save me $200 above what a regular driver costs..

The end result?

Before, 4/14 fairways hit, 210 yards best

After, 6/14 fairways hit (two missed by a total of 12 inches), 240-260 yards best

Now I just need to get the rest of my game consistent. when I have my irons and putter consistent, I can get pars instead of double bogeys.

The BodyBugg is still with me but I have had problems with getting the food intake registered.

149 - The Bugg

Jul 16 2009 21:09

OK so far it's been interesting with the BodyBugg. The online portion of the program isn't much to speakof in the diet category. CC users have a much greater range of items to search for nutrition information, but as expected the activity monitor is what really sells the product.

Both the online estimatoran the actual measurements from the Bugg suggest that I actually burn 400 calories more a day than the burn tool from CC. As for the calories burned reading on the bike the Bugg shows only 25% of what the bike says I burned, but the one on the treadmill was only 6% higher which I think is accurate because I hold on to the bars alot. As for the activity log here, the only thing I've tried is golfing at the driving range which showed 25-45% less than the burn tool here shows.

I suspect that there is a lag between my energy expended and what the Bugg shows. Because of that the "trip" function showed a much lower average than the downladed data recorded at the time.

So since the Bugg seems to be accurate enough for me the next step will be to more accurately measure my food for a week. That's going to be a pain as I really don't like planning more than one to two meals at a time, mainly because I usually end up changing my mind.

But I suspect that it will confirm that my metabolism is down. so I'll need to get my thyroid rechecked. Looking over the past few weeks logs, I suspect that, even allowing for discrepencies in the activity logs, that there is 500 calories a day difference

148.5 - p.s.

Jul 15 2009 09:06

I won the cardio challenge by 40 hours, so now I get 6 months free membership.

My niece informed me on the trip back from Hawaii not to eat alot of macademia nuts prior to getting on the 9 hour plane trip, they gave her the farts.

148 - Bugged out

Jul 15 2009 08:57

Came back from Hawaii 5 pounds heavier, no Big, it was worth it, but then for the next two weeks I continued to gain even though I was neutral on the intake output. I had ordered the BodyBugg to see if I was mismeasuring my expenditures, it just got here yesterday, but a full 9 days after I realized what may be my problem. When I went to Hawaii, I didn't want to take all my bottles of pills, so I put just enough into a pill box and left the main bottles at home.

When I got back I resumed taking my meds from the bottle, but didn't realize that I had knocked my thyroid medication on the floor. So each morning when I took my medication, I just mechanically took one pill from each bottle and didn't notice that I only opened 5 bottles each day, not 6.

So now I'm back on my thyroid medication so I'll see what the result will be.

Still the BodyBugg is a cute gizmo to play around with.

147 - Under 240

May 26 2009 13:38

239.4 to be exact. So with a little bit of luck I should be at 235 by the time I go on vacation. Managed to put 2 1/2 hours on the treadmill this morning for a total of 2000 calories burned. This is one of those times that I wish I had the BodyBugg so I could see if the expenditure is truely what the cardio equipment says it was.

146 - Emotional Eating

May 25 2009 21:42

Definitely ate too much today, but the annoying thing is that the day started out very well. I exercised enough to guarantee a deficit, but there's still less than I was hoping for. Now it's too late in the day for any activity and still expect to get up early tomorrow.

On the cardio challenge front I've all but locked the win away. If the next closest competitor were to continue on the pace he already has been at, I could stop now and still beat him by ten hours. He would have to put in over 4 hours a day for the next 21 days to catch up to where I am now.

Naturally I do not intend to sit still and let them catch up with me so I need to do an average of 1 1/2 hours per day to make sure that when I leave on vacation (three days before the end of the challenge) that I have mathmatically clinched the top spot.

It's been interesting watching the 2, 3, and 4 spot players shift their rankings, they are all above 60 hours now, and there is no one else in the compitition anymore (or at least they know they are out of the prize contention so they are not reporting their times)

Time to hit the hay, I need to be up at 5am tomorrow.

145 - Hard to count correctly

May 24 2009 19:56

Didn't eat anything today that was easy to count the calories, mostly because I tried new items at two local restaurants. My best guess puts the count around 2700, yes it's alot, but after four hours golfing with an electric cart then later two hours golfing with carrying my bag, that should still leave me with a deficit. Tomorrow, though will be my low salt day so I should only choose foods that I can get the info on. The reason is that my weigh in day is Tuesday and I don't want to have any retained water messing up the results.

Went to the drive in theatre last night, saw Night at the Museum 2 and Star Trek. the first one was OK, but the Star Trek was very poor. First of all the entire reason that they were able to change aspects of the story was that it was an alternate timeline, but if that were the case then the behavior of a certain pointy eared time traveller should have been different. If they try to make this part of the canon of the paperback novels, they will definitely kill the franchise entirely.

Tomorrow of course is Memorial day, which for this area means at least a 50-50 chance of rain so I don't know if I'll be hitting the golf course or the treadmill tomorrrow.

144 - Halfway Through

May 19 2009 11:01

The cardio challenge at Cardinal fitness is half over and I am still in the lead with 99 hours on the machines, the next competitor is in at 57 hours. If I keep that lead for the next 2 1/2 weeks, I could skip the last week and a half and still win the whole enchilada.

My weight is down to 241.6 and my intake has been very good even though I've eaten a a few buffets. So I am still on pace to be 232-235 pounds when I take my sister's family to Hawaii on th 14th.

143 - Mixed bag

May 12 2009 15:45

Nothing specific to write about, my dad is home and doing fine. The cardio challenge at the gym is still going on and I'm still in the lead by 40 hours one month into the two month challenge. Weather has been unseasonably cool here. Awaiting for June 14th to arrive when I go back to Hawaii. Saw that Olive garden finally put up more complete nutritional information on their website. Office is running slow today. Just a mix of different things going on.