Thanks to everyone who stopped by from my lovely wife Allison’s blog today. I picked up a few readers and am excited to have you with me as I go through this journey. Thanks for your support!
Today was my 2nd increase in the intervals for my running routine since I started Body For Life a little over 5 weeks ago. As I mentioned 2 weeks ago when I made my first increase, my eventual goal is to get to four reps of 5 — 6.5 — 8 — 9.5 on the treadmill. My first increase two weeks ago was by .1 to 5 — 6.1 — 7.2 — 8.3. It was a little difficult at first, but after two weeks of that I was ready for an increase today. I increased .1 again and did 5 — 6.2 — 7.4 — 8.6. I went from 2.17 miles to 2.22 miles – an increase in .1 miles total from the beginning (I started at 2.12 for the 21 minute plan).
It was a challenge, but I can tell my heart is getting stronger. I’ll probably do this for two weeks, then increase again by .1. If I keep this pace up, I’ll reach my goal by the 10th week.
And now, for a totally random picture – I saw this at Academy while getting soccer equipment for my son’s soccer team:
I was so excited to see that Academy now carries chicken poop! I went back and forth on whether I needed some more right now, but when I saw that it is from free range chickens, I was sold!
Day 37: Second Interval Increase
Day 36: An apple a day…
You know what they say – an apple a day keeps the doctor away. I’m not that concerned about keeping the doctor away right now – I just want to be healthy and eat right. I guess in a round about way that could keep the doctor away. While doing Body For Life, I’m eating 5-6 meals per day as prescribed. I’m always looking for a good meal that follows the protein/carb schedule. A great meal that I’ve found is an apple and beef jerky. I’ve tried just about all of the brands of beef jerky out there and short of fresh jerky from a trading post in the middle of nowhere, TX — Jack Link’s is my personal favorite.
The jerky serves as the protein and the apple is the carb. I buy the 3.25 oz bags and split it in half so it lasts me for 2 meals. My favorite apple right now is the honeycrisp. If you haven’t tried one, they are seriously amazing.
Nutritional Information for the whole meal, once again utilizing fatsecret’s ability to enter ingredients in and get a single nutritional info sheet for your meal:
Day 34: Week 5 Weigh-in
Time for yet another weigh-in. Man, the weeks are flying by – I’m already on week 5. This week I stayed the same weight as last week (162). I’m not concerned, though. As i previously mentioned, weight is not everything. The pictures are looking better each week, and that’s what matters. A some point I may even start gaining some weight (muscle) once I’ve burned all the fat off. Now, for the front pics:
And the back pics:
This week I moved my day off up. I started last night at dinner – we had a pre-season soccer party Friday night for my son’s soccer team and their families. I grilled up some burgers and hot dogs for everyone. Even though it was my day off, I still opted for the turkey burger and turkey dog, which is much leaner than the beef burgers. They have about 1/3 less calories and fat than the all beef ones. My day off will end before Saturday’s dinner.
My daughter has a dance competition that we’ve been at all day today. Now, for a little bit of my geeky side. I edited my week 5 photos before I left the house and uploaded them. The rest of the post I’m writing from my iPad. When we bought our iPad lasts year, we opted for the WiFi only version. We already pay enough for internet between our cable modem at home and data plans at $30 each for mine and my wife’s phone – then throw another $15/mo on top of that for mobile access on the iPad that we don’t really need…sheesh! You have to draw the line somewhere. Plus, we mainly use the internet on the iPad at the house, so WiFi was just fine for us.
Ok, back on topic to my off topic geek-a-thon. How am I posting this from the bleachers of a high school gym in-between dance performances? The answer: using the internet I already pay for on my phone. Did I pay extra for the tethering package? NO!! Why should I have to? That’s just plain dumb. I already pay for unlimited internet for my phone at $30/mo. Why should I have to pay AT&T an additional $15/mo ($45/mo) just to be able to tether from my iPhone? They sure are trying to milk Americans for as much as they can. How am I tethering from my iPhone to my iPad, you ask? I jailbroke my iPhone using redsn0w, bought the app MyWi from the underground app store, Cydia, for a one-time fee of $19.99. Now I can turn my iPhone into a mobile WiFi hotspot that the iPad can connect to for internet access. I can do the same from my laptop in a pinch – like the other day when I was working from home and the internet went out. I tethered to my computer and was still able to work while Time Warner Cable resolved the outage in our area. My question for all of the ISPs out there is “When will you stop gouging Americans and truly provide an all internet access fee regardless of where you are or what device you’re using?” Have a plan that makes sense, and I’m there.
Peace out.
Day 32: PBJ
A quick and easy snack is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I know what you’re thinking – what? That’s not healthy!?! Not so fast El Guapo! The classic PBJ with Jif, white bread, and totally sugared jelly *is* actually HORRIBLE for you. If you make a PBJ the right way, though, it can be nutritious, healthy, and has a plethora of good stuff in it. First off, use all natural peanut butter. No added sugar or anything, just all natural. We get a tub of it at Costco, but any grocery store carries it if you look closely.
For the “jelly” portion of it, I used Smuckers Sugar Free Red Raspberry Preserves. Raspberries are my favorite fruit…mmmm.
For 1 tbsp it is only 10 calories. It was yummy too. For the bread, I used two slices of 100% Whole Wheat Nature’s Own – only 50 calories per slice.
I don’t think you need a tutorial on how to make a PBJ…heh heh. As usual, I put all of the ingredients into fatsecret.com and got the nutritional information back for one sandwich:
Yes, it is a little high in fat, but it is the good kind of fat. You generally want your fats to come from plants (i.e. peanuts, avacodos, etc) as opposed to from animals (i.e. beef). It’s got a solid 17g of protein and 6g of fiber.
On another note, I ran the first soccer practice for my son’s team today. It was a bit chilly outside (in the 50s), but we made it through it just fine. I’m going to enjoy working with the 10 year old boys — teaching them soccer and teamwork.
Day 30: Healthy Turkey Chili
I made a big ‘ol pot of Turkey Chili today, and it is delicious – healthy too!
I used ground turkey instead of ground beef when making this chili. It is much healthier and lower in fat than ground beef. 1 cup of the turkey chili is less than 300 calories, less than 7g of fat, contains 24g protein & 27g of carbs (good carbs from the beans). When buying Ground Turkey, you should make sure you get the lean cut (i.e. 93/7). They also carry a 85/15 and the packaging looks the same except for the fat content – so beware! I entered all of the ingredients at my favorite calorie tracking website, fatsecret.com and it gave me all of the nutritional information. Serving size is 1 cup:
This recipe yields about 16 one cup servings. Ingredients needed:
- 3 pounds of lean ground turkey (93/7)
- 3 cans of dark red kidney beans
- 1 can of black beans
- 1 large can of tomato sauce
- 1 onion
- 4 cloves of garlic
- 2 cups of fresh salsa
Making it is super easy:
- Brown Turkey in frying pan
- Dump Tomato Sauce, beans and salsa into large pot
- Sautee onion and garlic together in frying pan
- Drain meat, add to large pot
- Add onions and garlic to large pot
- Add Chili Powder to taste to large pot
- Simmer for a few hours, adding water and stirring occasionally as some evaporates
Mmmmmmm. Enjoy!
