I was pleasantly surprised on Wednesday – truly surprised. I was heading into East Lansing to see a friend play at a local brew pub. It’s a nicer place, so I could dress up a little bit.

I decided to try on some denim shorts that haven’t fit me since last year, after the massive weight gain of Fall/Winter 2009-2010 (we’re talking 30 pounds). Wednesday, the shorts fit, and they were even a little too loose. This would not normally be a problem because I could just throw on a belt, but the particular style of these shorts didn’t go too well with the tunic that I was wearing.

Hmmm…

Enter other, smaller, denim shorts. I was shocked. A couple of weeks ago, I couldn’t even zip these things up. Wednesday, I was wearing them out on the town. You have no idea how happy this made me.

I started my special diet on Sunday, May 9. It was the weekend after the Fort Custer Stampede, when I DNFed because I just wasn’t feeling it. I felt like crap. I looked like crap. I needed to do something about it.

On May 9, in the middle of the day, I started my new diet and headed out for an aggressive hill workout on the bike. It was a new beginning.

Now, almost two weeks later, I am feeling much better, my clothes are starting to fit, and I’m getting faster and stronger on the bike. My legs are starting to look good, again. Here are some simple stats:

• 8 pounds lost;
• 1.5 inches lost around the hips;
• 1.75 inches lost around the waist;
• Body fat is down 4.3%;
• 12 pounds of fat lost;
• 4 pounds of muscle gained.

This is with several cheat days scattered throughout. For example, I had a few evenings out with beer. That definitely throws things off balance, but I’ll explain that later.

For those of you who are curious, Weight Watchers was no longer working for me. I decided to try The Zone, which has produced excellent results, thus far.

The reality is that, while it is more difficult for me to achieve and maintain a healthy weight than some other women, I do respond to diet and exercise. I have proven to myself that consistent exercise, especially mountain biking, will peel the pounds off no matter what I eat or drink. I am working to achieve that, once again.

I have been following the Weight Watchers POINTS plan to the letter since last Sunday. That makes today day nine. I have been doing very well. I’ve been using my Flex POINTS when I go over my allotted POINTS for the day, and I’ve been training, so I get to eat my Activity POINTS.

How It Works

At Di’s current weight, Di gets 26 POINTS to spend on food each day. On top of those points, Di gets 35 Flex POINTS for the week to distribute as she feels necessary. If Di wants to eat 29 POINTS, she can allot three of those Flex POINTS to that worthy cause. If Di wants to horde all of her Flex POINTS for a Dominos pizza and sweet, sweet microbrew on Saturday, Di can do that, too. Di also earns activity points when she exercises. Moderate-intensity bicycling for two-and-a-half hours converts to nine additional points that Di can spend on food.

The Evil, Evil Scale

This morning, I stepped on the scale to find that I weigh just as much as I did nine days ago. This doesn’t really surprise me, because I know better, but it really doesn’t do much for my self esteem or my motivation to progress further on this plan. Fortunately, for me, I decided to take waist and hip measurements, yesterday.

Why?

Because I know the scale is the weight-loss enemy when training. Yup. You heard me right. I am training. I am working on becoming a faster, stronger rider because I want to regain my podium status in races. Call it an ego thang.

Yesterday’s 30-mile ride greatly affects today’s weight…as in gain. A hard effort followed by proper refueling leads to water retention and the good kind of weight gain. This weight gain is temporary, however. (See Weight Gain after a Workout.)

While I will continue to check the scale for progress, because that is what I have been conditioned to do, I will compare my physical measurements to gauge my true progress. I know the first week was successful because I had gotten too fat for the “fat pants” I bought a couple of months ago, and now they are much more comfortable, again.

The great weight escape continues…

I have had the pleasure of meeting many riders who have taken up the sport as a supplement to a heart-healthy lifestyle adopted after experiencing a heart attack. Some riders mountain bike to take control of diabetes. Most of these riders are a part of a much larger group that simply wants to lose weight. The sense of community they find with their fellow mountain bikers motivates them to show up to the trailhead on a regular basis.

It isn’t rare to find an overweight, fast mountain biker on a Michigan trail. I am one of those riders. We often go for two-hour rides and aggressively attack various trail features like steep ascents and rocky descents. Sometimes, we push the envelope in an effort to increase our training in preparation for a race and to encourage further weight loss. For example, I recently did a five-hour, 27.4 mile ride. It hurt. It was hard. I completely tore my body down. I also properly refueled. I wasn’t surprised to find that I weighed four pounds heavier the next morning. This occurrence is common after a hard workout, and often throws many weight-loss hopefuls into a state of panic.

A hard mountain bike ride puts the muscles into a desperate state of repair. This is when the body is most receptive to carbohydrates and other substances that are necessary for muscle repair. Eating the appropriate protein/carbohydrate/fat ratio within a certain period of time can maximize the amount of glycogen stored in the muscles and liver.

Glycogen is a stored form of energy that is easily accessible by the body. It is easily broken down into glucose, a sugar that is used by the body’s cells for energy. After a workout, the body converts ingested carbohydrates into glycogen, which is stored in the muscles and the liver. When no more glycogen can be stored, the excess energy is stored as fat.

More glycogen can be stored after a hard workout. Each molecule of glycogen bonds to four molecules of water, so more water is also being stored. This accounts for a weight gain of as much as five pounds the following morning. This weight gain is temporary.

What do you do if you experience this post-workout weight gain? Don’t panic. The day after a workout, you may feel a little sore and tired. Rest, eat healthy meals and even do a recovery ride. If the trail is full of anaerobic features such as steep climbs, you may wish to take the road bike out for a gentle spin. If you decide not to ride, take a 20-30 minute walk just to keep the muscles loose. The next day, hit the trail with your mountain bike. You’ll find that you are more energetic and stronger. It will be well worth the temporary weight gain.

I love to go out. I need social interaction and Coriander, my little, red dachshund, really isn’t gifted in the art of conversation, although she tries. When I go to The Library, I almost always get involved with a fun conversation. There are some other regulars who I really enjoy keeping company with. The problem is that massive beer consumption is almost always a part of the fun, and that is quite the problem where my waistline is concerned.

It was last week when I decided to start consuming non-alcoholic beverages while out and about. Water and coffee are quite common, and iced tea was the beverage of choice, last night. I don’t have to drink alcohol to have a good time. If I do drink alcohol, it doesn’t have to be in every beverage. Last night, I wanted to keep the calorie count down. It also made for a more affordable evening. I walked into The Library, saw two of my favorite drinking buddies, and ordered coffee. With [then] present company, I knew I was going to be in it for the long haul, so I held off ordering food. This is one of my tricks: take my time ordering, and don’t order everything at once. Don’t be afraid to eat some of the food and leave some of it for a bit later. Spread it out. Enjoy it. Heck, I multi-task at the computer, so why not at the restaurant? It’s like pulling up Facebook, then walking away to do some dishes or watch television for 15 minutes. In the restaurant, I can take a few nibbles of my food, then work on my iced tea and chat for a few minutes, then bring the food back into play.

It comes down to this: I just don’t feel healthy, right now, and it’s really messing with my mind, mostly on the emotional scale. I haven’t been making the best decisions, and I’ve decided that it’s time to put a positive spin on my habits, rather than cut out my social time.

In ~2002 (I think that’s the right year), I joined the Weight Watchers At Work program. Let me begin by saying that I lost a lot of weight, and while there was a bit of a yo-yo partly due to geographic location (Wisconsin), I’ve managed to consistently keep 25 of those pounds off. The last ten that I lost (total of 35 pounds) have been a regular battle, usually only becoming an issue in the winter. This is where I now stand. As a result, I chose to go back on the program, although not officially.

The Weight Watchers POINTS program works like this (this is an elementary explanation):
• 1 POINT for ~50 calories
• -10 calories for every gram of fiber, up to 4 grams per food item.
• 1 POINT for every 8 grams of fat

If I have an example food item with 200 calories, 16 grams of fat, and 4 grams of protein, that would work out to 5 points:
• 200 calories minus 4 grams of fiber 4 x -10 for every gram of fiber = -40 calories equaling a total of 160 calories
• ~160 / 50 calories for each point = ~3 POINTS
• 16 grams of fat / 8 = 2, x 1 POINT for every 8 grams of fat = 2 POINTS
• Total POINTS: 3 + 2 = 5 POINTS

Looking at this, you can probably figure out that a fair amount of food can be consumed if one opts for high-fiber, low-fat food items. This isn’t always the case, and it isn’t always desirable.

My struggle is fitting in my dairy. I generally like to consume two cups of skim milk (with Ovaltine) and 1 cup of yogurt with ¼ c granola per day. This comes to a grand total of 11 POINTS for dairy. Allowing for only 22-27 POINTS per day, I am trying to stay on the low end. This means that dairy accounts for almost half of my intake.

I could cut out the dairy, but I find that to be an unacceptable alternative. As a 31-year-old woman who has never, ever broken a bone and participates in sports that are known to have produced broken body parts over the years for others, I am not about to give up my dairy. What I do works for me, so there is no need to change.

You may have figured out that it is impossible to get one’s vitamin and mineral requirements on this low of a calorie-intake. This is another reason why the Ovaltine is important. The stuff is basically a multi-vitamin in a jar, and makes for excellent chocolate milk that is also low in calorie.

Another caveat to consider is that I have not been active over the last week, so I haven’t earned more points by exercising. I am hopeful that I will feel good enough to ski on Monday. This keeps getting pushed off, but this illness needs to go.

While compiling my menu for tomorrow, I had to make an adjustment. Taking everything into consideration, I decided to keep the Ovaltine and halve the yogurt and granola. This brings my dairy to 8 POINTS. That’s more acceptable. Since I plan to spend about two hours on the ski trails on Monday, I will burn 17 POINTS (sustained, high activity level for two hours). This is 17 POINTS I could use on food, but I think I will eat an additional 10 POINTS. See? There is a lot of motivation for hard core exercise.

Another trick I am using to keep me sane while going through this lull in consumption is drinking herbal tea. It is flavorful, caffeine- and calorie-free, and full of water. I go through a lot of tea bags, each day.

As you can see, I have devised a plan and am off to a good start. My clothes should start fitting me much better by the end of the week. I am excited.

It is my hope that Sunday will be the first day of crazy exercise. I need a good, hard fat-burning, endorphin-rushing workout. I look forward to my next ski or bike, and that is really the trick. It is currently below zero. If this remains through the next week, I won’t be able to ski, but I will sure as hell break out the mountain bike for some good, old-fashioned, Keweenaw, snowy, road riding. So, there.

The good news is that ideal skate skiing weather is predicted for next week and on through to spring break. Thank you, old man winter, for throwing me a bone.

There you have it. Over the next two weeks, I am going to work on being more mindful of my food intake, getting well, and pushing my body to its limits. Wish me luck.

Last winter, I read a little bit in Bicycling about a little cheater trick for burning fat. I can’t find the issue with the information in it, but I will pass it on.

The advice the article gave (several ideas) was bad advice, and the article was up front about that. One of my favorite and safest pieces of advice was concerning a morning workout. During sleep, the body shifts to fat burning for energy. Upon waking, the body continues fat burning until a certain threshold is reached. The advice is rather simple.

Upon on waking, head out the door with nothing but water in the stomach. Take some backup carbohydrate source for later. Don’t do a hard workout, but go at an easier effort for about 40 minutes to an hour. It is pretty obvious when the body switches to muscle burning mode because the head starts to feel a bit off. If that point is reached, eat some sugar. I like Hammer Gel, although a Cliff bar or something else of solid substance may be more desirable since a fast is, well, being broken (thus, breakfast). The reason for finally consuming something is obvious: we don’t want to lose muscle.

The next part of the weight loss equation is my favorite. Head home and eat a healthy breakfast. My favorite breakfast is actually quite good for an active day – it holds a little more than 1/3 of my daily calorie intake for weight loss on a sedentary day:
• Stonyfield strawberry yogurt with Udi Vanilla Almond granola
• Hot cereal or a hard-boiled egg
• Two slices Healthy Choice 7-Grain toast with Jelly
• Hot tea

This leads me to another point. I believe one of the reasons why these 10 Fall pounds were packed on so easily over the last couple of months is because of my fluid intake. I always drink a lot, but the types of beverages I drink change from season to season. This fall, I have been indulging in lot of beer, iced tea with sugar, and coffee with milk and sugar. In single-serving sizes, these beverages are all wonderful and have their benefits. In massive quantities, they pack on the pounds. I have switched back to herbal tea that does not require added sugar to keep my palate happy.

I have been too lazy to drive anywhere, so my preferred exercise of choice has been snowshoeing. It is amazing how snowshoeing can wipe me out after only an hour. With skiing, I can go for twice as long, but that may be because my senses are flooded with many thoughts like, “I’m gonna die!” and “Woohoo, this is fun!” I have to admit, while I like snowshoeing, it definitely lacks the excitement of skiing. It does have its merits, however.

Where’s Di?

My HughesNet (doesn’t deserve a link) decided to take a poo, Thursday afternoon. I have been without internet ever since. I have decided to travel to Cyberia Café (deserves a link) in Houghton, MI (thanks for the internet access!) to post this garble to my blog. Unfortunately, there may be a few more days of interruption to this somewhat regularly scheduled blog. I will continue to write, however, and post when I have a chance.

In the meantime, I have been celebrating the wonderful season of Advent (more about that later) in preparation for Christmas. A holiday season photo essay will follow.

Saturday night, I wisely went for breakfast before I drove home. I ate a lot – Perkin’s pancakes and eggs benedict. I love eggs benedict. Eggs benedict really aren’t waistline friendly, at least not when ingested among days of high-calorie consumption.

I saw the frightening number of 180 when I stepped on the scale, yesterday morning. I really don’t think that 180 is the number, but it was there because I had eaten a large breakfast at 3:00 in the morning and drank three large glasses of water throughout the course of the morning – throughout my eight hours of sleep.

Yikes!!

I love how Andrea, the Accidental Athlete, has joined Weight Watchers. She served as great inspiration – she and her first-week five-pound loss – for me to be more mindful of my food intake. I have resumed counting points.

Some of you may recall that Ali, Andrea, and I began including our food intake in our blogs. I quit doing it after a short while, mostly because I was eating a lot. I’ve generally found that my food intake is way too much if it takes too much energy to think about and write down. Not taking the time to face my 2000-3000 calorie intake in print is an obvious denial. I haven’t counted, but I’m pretty sure I’ve had days that were that high in calories.

While I am putting in the time with exercise, between snowblowing, skiing, snowshoeing, and weight training, the truth is that I am not putting in as much high-intensity training as I have with cycling. It is simply amazing the number of calories I can take in over the summer without gaining an ounce, and maybe even having a little weight loss. The transition into fall is another thing.

Many people blame the holidays, but the truth is that I ate and drank fewer calories at Saturday’s Christmas party than I would have had I gone out for dinner and ordered a 40 oz brew. The truth is that I am a spoiled cyclist. Spoiled rotten with living the dream of being able to eat whatever I want. That came to an end with fall’s weather and that is the source of my weight gain.

My winter vacation is beginning Wednesday evening. I have three weeks to get back on track and make adjustments to my diet and my exercise schedule. I’d like to spend the next three weeks being an iron woman. I am beginning my Christmas break by reorganizing my environment and my habits.

As far as Christmas goes, I’ll just have to go out for an awesome, long ski before dinner.

Now, that shake would not have been so full of calories if I limited myself to the half-scoop of ice cream that is what they call a “serving.” Truth be told, a good milkshake is never limited by such boundaries. I can handle the 130 calorie single serving scoop for eating ice cream, but a milkshake!? No, that required four scoops of ice cream (13 POINTS), two tablespoons of baker’s cocoa (1 POINT), and one cup of milk (2 POINTS).

What I did not realize, and what I learned from writing down my food intake, is that a personal pizza can be upwards of 13 POINTS. Now, that is a guestimation based on the nutritional information for a Pizza Hut personal pan pizza. That’s the best I can do. The pizzas at Michigan Tech cafes are handmade, so that explains why pizzas from some cafes are really good, and why some suck. Nutritional information really is not available. There is a possibility that I consumed fewer calories than my estimation because the pizza I eat at Michigan Tech is not pan pizza like the Pizza Hut personals. Pan pizzas are usually higher in calorie.

Another observation I made is the high calorie content of one little International Delight French Vanilla Creamer: 45 calories. Yikes. That’s a lot for a tablespoon of fluid used to flavor my coffee.

Obviously, I need to make some changes. I need to replace the pizza with a lower calorie alternative. Pizza may be on the menu for the rest of the week, however. I need to gather my resources and figure out how I can take a healthy alternative to school. The problem is that I don’t have access to a microwave, or a refrigerator. I may have to relearn the lunchbox days of old, when I had my metal lunchbox in the elementary school cafeteria. As far as beverages go, I do carry my water bottle to school every day. I don’t always drink the whole thing, especially when my throat is sore. Water and sore throats just don’t mix. It makes my throat feel even rawer.

What I find really interesting is the fact that I am not gaining weight on this pizza diet. By replacing the pizza with a less calorie-dense food, I can easily drop a load of calories from my daily intake. Replacing the coffee will remove four sugars (60 calories) and one creamer (45 calories) giving me two more POINTS to work with.

As I write this, I have consumed 41 POINTS, 16 more than my recommended 25. With at least three waking hours left to my day, I will eat. I plan to have a salad, like yesterday. It is very low in POINTS and quite nutritious.

I could look at today as a failure, but it’s not. I learned that my choices are having a greater impact than I thought, and this has given me the opportunity to make the appropriate changes.

Today’s Menu

Breakfast
Taco Salad
• Lettuce, tomato – 0 points
• 2/3 c corn – 1 point
• ½ c refried black beans – 2 points
• 3 tbsp sour cream/guacamole combined – 3 points
• Taco sauce – 1 point
• ½ oz cheese – 3 points

Lunch
Personal cheese pizza – ~13 points (unsure)
Coffee – creamer, four sugars ~ 2 points

Dinner
Milkshake – 16 points
Salad
• Lettuce, tomato, cucumber – 0 points
• 4 Morningstar Chik nuggets – 4 points
• 14 g croutons – 1 point
• ½ oz cheese – 3 points
• 3 tbsp homemade ranch – 2 points

Total POINTS: 51
Weight: 171, down from 175

I didn’t keep track of calories, yesterday, but I have started recording the numbers, today. I don’t record calories, fat, and fiber, but I keep track of my food intake using the Weight Watchers POINTS! system I learned when I was a member back in 2002 or so.

I found the Weight Watchers meetings to be the greatest asset when I first started. I needed to be held accountable, and a weekly weigh-in with supportive talks and rewards, even though they were trivial, were quite helpful in helping me to drop over twenty pounds.

I regained quite a bit of the weight back when I moved to Wisconsin and got back down to my current weight when I moved back to the Upper Peninsula, where an active lifestyle is the norm. Residents of the Keweenaw are quite enabled both geographically and socially to lead an active and exciting lifestyle. This is a very important factor in controlling one’s weight.

When I joined Weight Watchers, I was 206 pounds. I was beginning to have physical pain associated with hauling around the excess weight, and I wasn’t particularly proud of the fact that I was wearing size 18 clothing. Plain and simple, I was fat, and it wasn’t healthy.

Currently, I weigh about 170 pounds. I’ve maintained a range of 165-175 since I lost my Wisconsin weight several years ago. I even found myself between sizes this summer. I found myself purchasing some size 12 clothing – a size I haven’t been since high school, thirteen years ago.

The exception to my weight range was when I found out I was edging into the 180s last winter. I had finished my second round of antibiotic treatment. I spent much of the winter quite sick, and the tetracycline I was on caused stomach irritation, which I believe is what caused me to feel hungry all the time. I ate and ate and ate in an effort to get rid of that “feed me” feeling. After I got well, I panicked when I saw my weight. The next month, I came down with my first ever case of tonsillitis. Needless to say, that week of drinking hot tea and only dreaming of eating solid food took the weight off. I was back to 175 and ready to prep for cycling season.

I’ve mastered the art of getting myself back on track when it comes to weight gain. Every time I start creeping above 175, I devise a plan to get myself back down to 165. While I don’t always reach 165, I usually get into the 160s. It’s quite a relief.

This year, I’ve decided it was time to get down to 155. This is quite difficult. I do like consuming calories, and the lighter you are, the fewer calories it takes to maintain your weight. This is why a 250 pound person can lose weight easier than a 170 pound person. I had no problem getting from 206 to 190 pounds, but trying to get from 170 to 155 pounds is pure hell. I just don’t want to give up my food and beer, but it’s time for moderation.

I’ve made some wonderful changes in my diet. It is helpful that the American food companies have tainted our food with unnatural or unhealthy ingredients, such as high-fructose corn syrup. This has made giving up pop/soda/soda pop/liquid speed quite easy for me. I bought a large bottle of sweetened tea at a gas station during a long trip. I really wanted that tea, but I knew there was high-fructose corn syrup in there, and I also knew that my asthma symptoms went away after I quit consuming that stuff. I took a couple of sips, thought it tasted funny, really wanted a beverage, but couldn’t get myself to drink anymore. I threw the bottle away – full.

Over the last few years, moderation has been a valuable lesson I have learned. The only thing I haven’t used in moderation is beer. It is always at mountain biking parties, and I love it. I drink it. It is very much a part of my life. However, it is time for a change. Hell no, I’m not giving it up! I won’t drink very much at home, though. If I have a race the next day, in most cases, I will not drink. It is time to eat and drink for performance.

This is where the Weight Watchers system I learned several years ago comes in. Each food is assigned a POINTS value. The POINTS value can be easily figured out based on some simple mathematical equations involving calories, fat, and fiber. I can look at a label and know the POINTS value of a food.

You will see POINTS values assigned to each meal I have eaten. I am shooting for 25 POINTS per day, and some extra POINTS are allowed with exercise. You’ll see my exercise values as well.

If I post earlier in the day, you will see an uncompleted meal list. It will get filled by the end of the night, HughesNet willing.

I look forward to this. Even though Ali is about six hours away, and Andrea is about eight, it is nice having friends doing this as well. I think this will be a great support network. Maybe I really will get down to 155 pounds by New Years!

Ali brought up the possibility of learning new recipes, as well. I think this is a great idea. Since I’ve already written about food, before, I most likely will write about food that I enjoy, and their benefits. Maybe we will all get some great ideas from this melding of the minds.

***

Today’s Menu

Breakfast
Yogurt with granola – 6 points

Lunch
5 Morningstar Chik Nuggets, 2 redskin potatoes, 2/3 c corn – 8 points
Chocolate and FruitaBu – 1 point

Dinner

Spaghetti with olive oil and spices – 7 points
Salad – lettuce, tomato, cucumber, homemade ranch – 4 points
Ovaltine (2 cups milk) – 5 points

Total POINTS: 31