From 130 to 79

A good friend of mine had after the birth of her children and various life circumstances 130 kilos on the scale with a height of 1.71. She used to do a lot of sports, but for many years then nothing at all. When we met, she was down to about 100 kilos through a lot of hard work in the gym. And there it has stagnated. One of the reasons is surely that cycling in the gym is one of the most boring things you can imagine. Another reason is that you should take a closer look at your diet and exercise.

When it came to diet, I clearly saw that there was a quest for (supposedly) good food. For example, muesli for breakfast. But then also two plates full. I didn't easily manage to dissuade her that she "needed" it. We then installed an app for her to log and analyze her meals and that was a real aha moment. Of course, one has to be careful not to be enslaved by such apps. Food is and always will be a pleasure, after all! But to see where you have enough and where something is still missing - they are good for that.

When it comes to sports, we started very small. With jogging. At first it was "I can't" or "I've never done that before". But then we just started. I ran slowly, at first only 1 km with breaks. That hurt her in many ways - there were blisters on her feet and the first sore muscles! But: she did it and tasted blood. With the time we were then at 10km (!). And that at a very acceptable average of 6:30 min/km. We are now in "give me more" mode.

We have supplemented the endurance with self-weight exercises. And we had and still have to this day the issue of maintaining the desired weight (today no less than 79 kg). Because maintaining a target weight is much more difficult than losing weight itself. Topics for the next articles ...

Going off the Rails on a Crazy Train

Allright now, as Ozzy always says. Let's get going ... as the life clock goes past 40, sport becomes more and more important from my point of view. And sport has to be different than it used to be.

Why important? I've always been athletic since I was a kid, sometimes more, sometimes less (college, new job, etc.) and I've always felt good about it. Because that's what it's all about: a healthy mind needs a healthy body. Of course, there are those who have never exercised, or haven't exercised for a long time, but have recognized the need, I've written some thoughts on that here. And then there are those who have never exercised and don't plan to - I'm not writing about them.

Why different? I don't know exactly when it started, but sometime around my mid-30s I realized that it wasn't as easy to maintain your figure with your previous workload. I put on a lot of weight during that time and I didn't like it - visually or in terms of feeling good. And then I set out to find options, which I will address in further posts. It's primarily about combining strength, endurance and nutrition in the right way, but also varying it. I think the latter is very important, as I find some variety essential for both the mind and the body.  

Even Ozzy (you don't have to like him, but he's one of my musical idols) does sport from time to time and has amazingly managed to continue to stumble through the world on two legs in relation to his lifestyle! All aboard?