I wear Under Armor gear not because of brand loyalty but because they are the only company that makes good active wear in XXXL. So I will be ordering my stuff here shortly. Going with base + shirt + fleece up top and base + tights + fleece for the bottoms. I have silk weight glove liners already, so I will add a running glove and my hands will be toasty warm then too.



It has been delicious running weather up here lately. Should be ~50' tomorrow when I participate in the "Red River Run". I shaved 90sec off my 5k PR last weekend, so I am hoping after a week of rest I can shave another 30sec off it again this weekend.



Jeremiah

Herb thanks for the tip on the hat. When it gets really cold I will go with a baklava and maybe a face mask. Up here we get a least a month of temps where the high can't seem to get above 0.

Up here in the Northern Plains we are in the grips of a soggy fall and the temperatures are already falling off at a steady rate. Since I started running in April I have never had to running in winter conditions. Currently my plan is to order some tights, gloves, etc. I am also switching to some Gore-Tex trail shoes. Is there anything to keep in mind as the temperature continue their steady decline past the big donut?



JAU

I am trying to run 3x a week. Ideally it is an easy run, tempo/speed work (alternating weeks), long run. Lately it has been running for a set period of time because of time constraints.



Also I try to NOT run on concrete whenever I get a chance.

I think that highlights the key difference right there.



When my brother lived in Tokyo he ate an almost exclusively Asian diet and lost a ton of weight during his year there. The biggest difference is that he was walking a lot.



I lived in Europe and remember the French and German's really seemed to love their breads. Same thing though they are naturally much more active.



Not to over simplify the issues at hand. I think in America one of the biggest contributing factors is that walking has a stigma to it. If I walk to work the first thing I am asked is if my car is broken or if I need a ride. Everyone drives. Need a gallon of milk and it is only 5 blocks to the store. I would bet dollars to donuts (mmmm donuts) that 90% of us would drive without even thinking of it. American's have a love affair with the automobile. It is intrinsic to our lives. I think because of that, if you are outside a major metropolitan area unless you purposefully try the longest distance you walk is from your car to whatever location you just drove to.



It would make sense to me that if you are walking a lot everyday because it is your primary mode of transportation then having a carb heavy diet makes sense because you will be utilizing the provided energy much quicker.



The last point I would like to make is a cultural difference that is significant between Asia and American. Historically being over-weight in Asia was a sign of affluence and wealth. Meaning it was a good thing. I think you can derive from that it was not very common either. If you were wealthy backin the day you could pay people to bring you things or to carry you someplace in a litter, etc. Which is would seem that to be wealthy back in the day in Asia meant you didn't have to walk as much. I am sure it is more complicated than that but I think I have made my point.



In the end I think it is important to eat foods that support a healthy lifestyle given your unique circumstances.



JAU

This is all fantastic input!



When I am hurried in the evenings I have gotten in the habit of a Peanut Butter and Banana sandwich on whole grain bread. The trick is not over doing it on peanut butter.





JAU

Jennie,



Thank you so much for updating us. While I am sure it is discouraging to so those test results, no you have something quantifiable to work with. I hope for the best, please keep us posted.



JAU

In my colorful past I was a poet and a news writer.



For poetry I generally lean toward beat styles. As for the news while Hunter S. Thompson was my icon I was never that flowery.



JAU

This Christmas is different!



I am avoiding the cookies, pies, cakes, peanut brittle, egg nog and whiskey. Well maybe not the whiskey. How, you ask?



I will be snowboarding from the 21st through the 25th of December at Big Sky, Montana.



I am the lone representative of my immediate family here in the US. So instead of moping around I am going to throw myself down a mountain ... repeatedly .



Checking the calorie meter here at Traineo I will be burning roughly 4000-5000 kcal a day for 5 days straight!



Am I going to be sore? Hell yeah! Will I be tired? Without a doubt!



So what are the rest of you in Traineo-land planning to do to be active through this the most fattening season of the year?



JAU

DUDE!!!







Congratulations!!!

Ok I am going to weigh (woohoo there is a pun!) on this HR Zone debate.



Yes there is science behind both arguments. Still we as people are more than HR% and mathematical formulas. There is one inescapable fact to working out. You will get out what you put in.



If you find that you can take a 30min brisk walk everyday without fail and feel good after doing it. Then that is what you should do.



If you love a 45min high intensity aerobics class and you can attend regularly. That is what you should be doing.



For me personally (and I am not claiming to be the sterling example of sane) I just don't feel as if I have not done enough after a fat burning heart rate zone workout. I don't question the science behind knowing that I have burned the majority of my calories from fat. For me personally I have only one hour a day that I can dedicate solely to exercise. So I hit the cardio hard. I love my legs feeling all rubbery and loose when I get off the elliptical trainer. I love that my heart rate lingers in that juicy fat burning zone through my entire post cardio stretching routine. Looking at my metrics out of my hour of cardio about 20mins is spent solidly in the fat burning zone. During my interval training I dip into it numerous times, but generally only long enough to catch my breath before speeding up again.



For me I get a mental high from pushing myself. I like the feeling of stiffness that settles in midmorning and fades away around lunch. For my personality if I am not pushing it ... I am just not doing it. But that is me. I would rather hear about someone that looses 1lb. a week through solid dedication to a routine, than someone that has lost 20lbs. in the same month but has pushed themselves to hard and burned out through either injury or motivational lapse.



Those are my 2 bits. If you want change do something ... everyday. If you want that change fast be prepared to work really hard for it. If you have a reasonable goal, take a reasonable pace.



Those are my 2 bits.



JAU



P.S.

I know I need to start lifting. Getting up earlier to allow it has been very hard, but it will happen.

Cardio Coach Vol. 4

Elliptical Machine

Peak HR: 169 (86%)

Avg HR: 142 (72%)

Interval Training

Time: 64 minutes (includes warm-up and post stretching)



Overall:

Wanted to quit bad after the second challenge. So I though I will stick it out through the rest then skip ahead. Somewhere in the middle of the first interval of the third challenge my body realized it had been tricked. Tricky fish! So yeah I bulled through the workout. Not exactly feeling great. Although it always feels awesome the first few steps off the machine.



Tips & Tricks:

I wear a Polar RS200 HRM (got it on sale, would love an F6, maybe later next year). I use their OwnZone rest test in the morning before heading to the gym to set that days limits (seems to work well for me). At the gym I use a Procor Elliptical Crosstrainer (has the arm bars). I set my resistance to 10 and start up. Here is the usual break down for me:



Green Zone: 90-100 Strides/per minute

Orange Zone: 125-135 Strides/per minute

Red Zone: 150+ Strides/per minute



These of course change over time as my body adapts to the vigors of cardiovascular workouts. But right now this is where I am at.

Here is an update from todays workout:



VO2Max - 31 (HR Max 86% - 169, Avg 72% - 142)

- wake @ 0600

- @ gym by 0630

- make breakfast & iron shirt

- do one household chore (clean/vacuum/snowblow driveway)

- @ work by 0845

I was using Core Performance for a while. But as a professional in the Web industry poor navigation and poor tool design ultimately turned me off. Though for $10/mo it was really not that bad.



I am however switching to Global Fitness for my online personal training needs. They have come highly recommended to me. They seem to be focused on a lot of personal interaction with their clients which would be a nice change.



JAU

I am using a Polar RS200 HRM. Everyday before I get ready to workout I try to run the OwnZone Test to set my heart rate limits for the day. I have not been very consistent till this week and I am worried about the trending I am seeing. Please note that I did not workout from 12.03.06 to 12.11.06 which may or may not have an effect.



Here is what my metrics read (stats from similar workouts listed):

11.17.06 - 49 (Max 86% - 165, Avg 70% - 134)

11.22.06 - 47 (Max 84% - 169, Avg 69% - 138)

11.24.06 - 48

12.03.06 - 47

12.11.06 - 33 (Max 86% - 172, Avg 71% - 141)

12.12.06 - 32 (Max 83% - 165, Avg 71% - 142)

12.13.06 - 31



My workouts generally are from 40-65min in length on an elliptical machine. So my question is it normal when starting a workout program to vary this much? Is this something I should be concerned about, if so what kind of a doctor should I seek out?



Your input is greatly valued.



JAU

Here is my 10 (out of a pool of 150 or so):



Black Betty - Spider Bait

Intergalactic - Beastie Boys

Sabotage - Beastie Boys

Jump Around - House of Pain

Elvis in my Dungarees - Kung Fu Diesel

Engel - Rammstein

Black - Seven Dust

Killing in the Name Of - Rage Against the Machine

More Human than Human - White Zombie

St. Anger - Metallica

This weekend was a major yo-yo for me.



Saturday I forgot to eat most of the day then gorged on fried chicken and then salty fold over cookies with prune filling that I got from my local grocery store.



Sunday I got up in time to hit the gym before church but just couldn't get myself out the door. I had a great salad with balsamic vinegar for lunch. But at dinner time I ended up succumbing to the temptation pizza.



In regards to the holidays I am pretty lucky. I am a single guy so I don't have a wife or in-laws baking and sharing. My mother who is an awesome baker lives 6k miles away so I am safe there as well. At work we are dominated by single guys whose idea of cooking includes something frozen and a microwave. All in all it is a blessing.



As of Friday I was at 358 (+1 for the week)

Ditto for myself.



In my own experience I can train myself to go long time periods (long being a relative term) within a narrow BPM range and a medium to high intensity. For me personally I have seen my best gains through interval training. The constant push and retreat throughout a workout not only keeps it from getting boring it feels like a more intense workout.



Those are my 2 bits anyways.



JAU

LMAO



Holy Smokes. She has a point, but then again who wants to point out exactly how often and how long, and what exactly constitutes "Sexual Activity". It is delightfully ambiguous.



I am currently in a monogamous, non-sexual relationship so I unfortunately cannot spearhead the effort to exhibit clarity on this.



JAU

Thank you for the links.



I have been christened the SEO guy at work and told to get crack'in so these will definitely be added to the toolbox!





JAU

I wish I worked part time ... but knowing me that would mean only putting 40 hours in!



I love naps as well. I have a lot of trouble sleeping more than 6 hours at time so naps are often near impossible to accomplish. Normally I just lay in bed/couch and relax.





JAU

A quick follow-up:



I have been off my program for a week. So I am going to work up to Volume 6 through the course of this week aiming to hit it on Saturday morning. I am going to take this challenge a step further by charting my calories burned during that workout over multiple sessions to see if there is any trends to be mindful of.





JAU

For me eating anything from Subway causes me to have massive carb cravings shortly after the meal.







I am in the same boat. If I have a couple of beers or glasses of wine it is always reflected on the scale the next day.





JAU

I am not discounting the importance of electrolytes.



When I go on extended fasts (fluids only) electrolytes are crucial after day 4-5.



Still that being said I doubt most people workout hard enough for long enough to seriously deplete their stores of electrolytes. Couple that with the fact that most of us probably eat more salt than we should. For me it is much more important that I get a source of protein after working out than anything else.



If adding a product to your water gets you to drink more over the course of a day then I am all for it. For me personally I only see the benefits when I am working in extreme conditions (used to unload UPS trucks, in the summer they get to be 130' F. inside) or prolonged physical exertion such as snowboarding all day. We are all unique and have different needs and as such results and requirements will vary.





JAU

My mainstays currently are World of Warcraft and Dawn of War.



Held a 3 day LAN party last week. Besides copious amounts of DoW and WC3 we beat Gears of War ... in one sitting.





JAU

Hey Sean,



My entire life I loathed cardio workouts of any kind. A stout 6'4" with better than average strength meant that I enjoyed tackling and hitting things much more than running or jogging. Between rugby, football (American), free climbing, judo and karate you can see where my passions lay.



In the veritable cornucopia of workout tools and options out there I am a skeptic. CardioCoach has been one of the best investments I have made. I now look forward to the cardio portion of my workout. I workout more efficiently than before. While CC might not be fore everyone, it had made the difference for me.





JAU

Just Ask and your Wish Will be Granted

CHEERS!!!



Way to go Stephanie. Thank you for having the courage to post the pictures. You have my utmost respect.



JAU

My entire life I have been heavy set. I remember my mother having to order "Husky" jeans from the J.C. Penny's catalog. I remember being 6 years old and the tennis coach calling my fat in Spanish (lived in Madrid), making oinking noises and forcing me to run ... a lot. Not surprisingly I absolutely hate playing tennis.



In Jr. High and High School I wrestled and played football. I was never a terrific athlete. I tended to rely on my natural strength versus developing proper skills.



For a year in PA. I was an avid indoor climber. Went from 315lbs to 230lbs and was in the best shape (for flexibility and strength) of my life. This happened because I didn't know anyone there so I worked during the day and climbed at night. 4 hours of training x 5 days a week adds up quickly.



Moving back to ND I didn't have the climbing outlet anymore. So I started to gain slowly but surely. Drinking in college certainly didn't help any.



Eventually that landed me at 378 lbs. I started making some small manageable changes then around 365 lbs I found Traineo. Now I am 355 lbs. I am more active now than I have been in the past decade. The HUGE difference is my motivation. I want to be healthy first, fit second, svelte last. I will probably always be a bit heavier set. But if I can walk up a couple flights of stairs without getting winded. Participate in ultimate frisbee, snowboarding, motorcycle racing without being at a gross risk of injury then I will count this a success.



My focus is not loosing weight so much as it is to be healthy and reasonably fit. I want my "lifestyle" to be highlighted by my dedication to eating right and exercising regularly, not the nights I hit the bars or the fact that I used to be able to eat an entire large pizza without hesitation.



For the record ... I just saw myself in the mirror this morning and frankly I am dead sexy. Maybe over lunch I will post a picture.



JAU