The Background Story

Me (on the right) mid 2009

So it all began mid 2009. A routine visit to the doctors included a weigh in. I discovered to my horror that I was 135kg (297lb) I knew I was big, but that was a shock. So I decided, on my own and with the encouragement of my family to do something about it, stetting myself the goal of being under 100kg (220lb) by Christmas.

It started with the south beach diet, essentially the principles are low GI (glycemic index) foods. The most important thing I got from this was not so much the 'fad' diet, but re-learning how to eat well.

Several months into the diet I started to add exercise to the program, specifically the C25K (couch to 5 km) program. The idea behind this program is to slowly build up your strength and stamina from nothing (where I was) to being able to run 5k in 30 minutes. Towards the end of this I made the comment to my flatmate that I'd like to be able to get myself fit enough to run a half marathon next year. Somehow this turned into running the Kerikeri half marathon 2 months latter.

1st half marathon
Nov 2009

So there I was, I had gone from a 135kg couch potato to a 99kg half marathon finisher. All done right?

Wrong!

I let myself go a bit over Christmas, who doesn't, but never snapped back into healthy mode. I kept running, even added cycling to the mix and ran in another half marathon and a 100km duathalon, but my diet slowly crept back into bad habits and my weight climbed up, to a peak of 118kg in July 2010.

So it began again,  watching my diet, working out harder, trying to get myself back to where I want to be. So the purpose of this blog is to share my story, and to help myself stay motivated and keep working hard.