The new me

*Success picture at end of post*

So its been years since I wrote anything on Blogger, but someone recently reminded me that I have a blog and well since I am on this long ass fitness journey, it will be a good way to write more about it and share my struggles/successes.  Welcome back everyone!

On New Years of 2012 I, along with 3 other distant family members decided to start a Facebook group in an effort to lose weight. My current weight was 265, my highest ever was around 285.  This worked for about 3 months, then it fizzled out, but I lost about 25 pounds by watching my food intake and exercising at Fitness 19.  Then crazy as I am I signed up to run the Pittsburgh Half-Marathon on May 5th, 2012.  I ran 8 miles, walked the last 5, but I finished.  I definitely didn't train enough.

Then June came around and I moved to Oakland with a friend and started a new me.  I joined LA Fitness of Southside and went religiously almost everyday.  In the beginning I really had no idea what I was doing and would strngth train on random machines in conjunction with cardio.  I really wasn't going anywhere.  There I signed up for a personal trainer.  With his help over a few sessions he showed me a new routine to follow to target my 5 muscle groups to combine with my cardio everyday.  My trainer left after about 2 months to go back to grad school at PITT and I didn't know which PT to switch to, so I continued on my own.  I started to lose again, 1 lb here and there.  I would follow my workouts always with a whey protein fruit smoothie to help my muscles recover.  My routine was 1 day for each group: legs, arms, shoulder, back, and chest.  Cardio everyday for 30 min, and abs every other day for about 10 minutes.

Then around the end of August, things really changed, for the better.  I found MyFitnessPal.com or MFP. This site allows me to track food intake (calories, protein, carbs, etc) so easily as well as input exercises.  This really helped me to start losing 2lbs/week.  MFP is as I call, a HUGE "weight loss social network".  I love it to much, and love all the friends I have on there and share my thoughts, dairies, worries, etc with everyday and there are there to help me.  Tomorrow marks 100 days with MFP.  I continue to work out on my own and the before mentioned routine, with consuming about 2200 food calories since I usually burn about 500+ calories doing exercise.  If you need help with weight loss, join MFP! It's free, add me: derekj222.

I also ran Mud on the Mountain, a 7 miles, 22 obstacle course at Seven Springs Ski resort a few weeks ago.  It was 35 degrees, I claimed over 1000ft of elevation, waded through freezing cold water, and had the best time of my life!

SO FAR: -52.8 pounds!

My goal is to lose about 100lbs, and be down to 165, but I plan to hopefully put on some awesome muscle mass in the time until then as well.
Current: 211.6
12/31 Goal: 199
5/5 Goal: 165