Count me in for 17 pounds. Just weighed in at 172 -arrgh - and I need to be at 155.

I wanted to add that in addition to Joe Friel's book that Lauren has suggested, I have also bought one book that he coauthored with Loren Cordain, called "The paleo diet for athletes". I would highly recommend it because it can give you more details in specific types of food that are good for you, along with their nutritional values.
I have learned a lot of stuff as well from reading www.gordoworld.com, especially with regards to endurance training and nutrition.
That wiki is an excellent idea and ideal for what we are trying to accomplish.Lauren I can help you with this if you want.
My target is to lose 10kgs.Currently I am 6'1", 92 kgs, so ideally I would like to be something around 82-84 for race season.However, I don't think that for me it is a good idea to lose it by December because it will definitely affect my training.I would prefer to lose it by February-March and be strong enough to get through winter training (weights etc.)

Thanks,
Alex

Ok...

It's up to you guys to decide. I consulted with my boyfriend and he thinks that a ST Health Challenge thread would work fine (on the ST forum) without an extra outside web-location; the extra location muddies things up. That's a good point.

Here's my own opinion, as a coach:

1) People need to hold THEMSELVES accountable for their daily and weekly goals/guidelines; it's not necessary for the ST community to look over Joe Triathlete's water or sugar intake to poke fun. One of the issues that crept 20lbs onto your body was that you weren't holding yourselves accountable for your choices.

2) Therefore, any site like Joe's Goals (www.joesgoals.com) or Fitday (www.fitday.com) can help you keep your OWN goals, and you can have the OPTION of making your goal-site public if you want. This would be good if you selected a 'Health Challenge Buddy' like Jodi suggested. However, I can tell you from experience that it's VERY labor-intensive to watch over others' journals and food; I do it because I am paid to, but YOU need to focus on getting your own habits back in line, (See #5 and #6), not read 20 other peoples' individual Fitday journals every day.

3) A "ST Health Challenge" wiki is a good idea in theory but it truly isn't much different than a forum, except people can change posted information - it simply takes the discussion off the ST board into a 'clean' environment. A wiki is infinitely changeable and expandable. If someone can refine its intent, feel free to create the format, add pages or design, and discuss how it can be used. I set one up already at:

http://healthchallenge.pbwiki.com/
password: "slowtwitch"

You have to become a PBWiki member to be a part of it. (PBWiki stands for "peanut butter": as in, 'making this wiki is as easy as making a peanut butter sandwich')

4) OR you can post it here on the 20-lbs weight loss thread, here on ST.

5) Ultimately, whatever you are allowing you keep you eating junk food or not-training will also keep you tied to the freakin' computer, also eating junk food and not training! The DEEPER point of a challenge is to help you GAIN AWARENESS into the common [fat-producing] mistakes you've been making... NOT to create an environment where others can poke fun if you ate a ho-ho. FIND WHAT'S GOOD FOR YOU: set goals and reminders the way YOU need, ask for help when you need it, but the real point is to get out of your RUT (and the 20 extra pounds) and set back into quality health habits.

6) You are triathletes. You are used to challenging training and racing, strenuous transitions, and uncomfortable situations. My suggestion is not letting a little pizza or candy bar be your master ;) ... you CAN do this challenge, beat the pizza, find your own motivation which gets you off your a$$.

7) I truly want you guys (and gals) to succeed in dropping the fat --- but ultimately, it's about noticing (and changing) the habits and behaviors which crept the weight onto you in the first place.

My morning thoughts,
Lauren

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Lauren Muney
certified physical fitness trainer
certified health coach
wellcoach
http://www.physicalmind.com

There is no escape from your life... solve the problems and get on with it.

"Just tell her you love her and you think she kicks ass" ~AndrewinNH

"I'm moving [Lauren] to guru status" ~Last Tri in 83

Lauren - thanks for all your time dedicated to us! Awesome stuff. What are your thoughts on salt? I've read conflicting articles. Recently (as in the last couple weeks) I have gone from eating tons of processed foods to eating almost all natural - all as a result of reducing sodium from easily 5K mg/day to somewhere in the 800-1200 mg/day. I can't say I feel much better, although I do have to drink a lot less water to stay hydrated.

I like keeping this on slowtwitch on this thread - we can decide amongst ourselves what to post on a weekly(?) basis. If everyone wants to move it off ST I can create a page but it would be very simple. I also like the donation to charity - I'm changing my "motivation" to donating $20 to a group selected charity for each person that makes it if I don't.

I also like the buddy system and am in search of one :)

"What are your thoughts on salt?...I'm changing my "motivation" to donating $20 to a group selected charity for each person that makes it if I don't. "

Tony,

1) Your 'motivation' should be deeper than money lost - your 'punishment' is the money lost. Instead, please consider that you'll ultimately have a better life if you can create your own VALUES ('motivation') as to why you truly need to get (and stay) fit.

Don't motivate your life on fear... motivate your life with QUALITY/VALUES.

2) Salt:
Go read about electrolytes. You'll find how/why they are important for the body during heavy training... but our normal processed food is full of sodium (often ill-quality) for flavor and preservatives and not for electrolyte balance. But you need the full electrolytes in good balance. If you get off the processed food you have a better control of your body: less bloat, for example: and then you can CHOOSE the supplements you need depending on your training/sweat levels.

Lauren

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Lauren Muney
certified physical fitness trainer
certified health coach
wellcoach
http://www.physicalmind.com

There is no escape from your life... solve the problems and get on with it.

"Just tell her you love her and you think she kicks ass" ~AndrewinNH

"I'm moving [Lauren] to guru status" ~Last Tri in 83

atl_tony, stop stuffing twenty dollar bills down other people's pants and start savin'em, cuz you'll need'em when we're done witchu. :-)

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Atl_tony, I'd love to be your buddy if you still need one. :)

I love to cook, so I'll put as many recipes on the wiki page as I can when I come up with them. If anyone is looking for a natural way to spice up their food, I highly suggest growing some herbs. I always keep fresh rosemary, basil, and oregano around. They are basically weeds, so you don't have to have a greeen thumb to raise them. Just give them water often. You can buy plants either at your local garden center or the grocery store. It's much cheaper than buying herbs packaged and they are always available. I also have Sage, but for the life of me can't come up with a way to use it, so it just sits on my microwave and grows.

I am giving myself one week to purge the cabinets of processed foods. I was shocked to see that my Health Nut bread has high fructose corn syrup- gasp! Even my mustard has sugar. This is going to take some serious label reading and smart shopping :)


Jodi

Excellent! keep me accountable :)

Lauren - you are right about the motivation coming from within - I almost used 'punishment' but then thought I'd keep it more positive. My real motivation is better health and a longer time to be around for my wife and son. Oh and to run faster :)

I think a website where we all posted our current weight and our goal and posted weekly status updates, as well as a place for a thread, would be really helpful. In addition, each person could have a place to state their consequences if they do NOT meet their goal.

I think the public statement of goals and consequences and progress would make a BIG difference in focusing people on working towards their goals.

A long thread like this becomes anonymous very quickly.

Not that I know how to set up a website like that, of course. :-)

"I think a website where we all posted our current weight and our goal and posted weekly status updates, as well as a place for a thread, would be really helpful. In addition, each person could have a place to state their consequences if they do NOT meet their goal.

I think the public statement of goals and consequences and progress would make a BIG difference in focusing people on working towards their goals."

Good point.... and this is where the wiki can work well. My brain is full and I already have a pile of client (paid!) projects... maybe I can set a few minutes to think about which layout/text/copy can work best.

Thanks,
Lauren

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Lauren Muney
certified physical fitness trainer
certified health coach
wellcoach
http://www.physicalmind.com

There is no escape from your life... solve the problems and get on with it.

"Just tell her you love her and you think she kicks ass" ~AndrewinNH

"I'm moving [Lauren] to guru status" ~Last Tri in 83

Agreed. Would a Wiki be best? I have no experience in this.

I could set up a simple page this weekend with an editable chart for logging weights/personal goals/consequences and include a forum if everyone wants.

We could use the Wiki site that Lauren set up, and addition it is very easy to set up a blog for yourself. It's free and you can form little "communities". I am going to set up another one just for the Health challenge. Just go to http://blogspot.com

I can set up a list of everyone in the challenge who has websites and a "blogger" page full of our links if you are interested. It is easy to post pictures as well if you want before and afters to keep motivated. I can give more detailed instructions on how to change your templates, make your profile, etc. The pro's to the blogspot page is that it is not "open access" and everyone has their own password, so the only one that can modify your page is you. (unless you give out your username and password). I certainly hope that wouldn't be a problem with the wiki page, but you never know :) If you want I could certainly be a moderator of a Health Challenge blog. I could update everone's stats and pictures. Just let me know if you're interested.

Jodi

I made a small change to the wiki that Lauren set up.If you like it I can start adding names in that table to track down our progress.

Thanks,
Alex

In my opinion, we need an outside source (wiki, spreadsheet, whatever) to list the people involved in the challenge, their starting weight, weekly weight loss, goal weight and other goals. Just a one-pager with the crucial information listed line by line for each person. That list can either be updated by each person (using a wiki) or by one "administrator" person who will update it each week (if we use a spreadsheet). All other forum stuff should be done on ST. ST is what brought us together, so that's where this discussion should stay. I know I won't go to another forum or blog to keep up with this challenge.

I also think we should start a new thread each week to list our weight loss and what goals we were able to meet. Maybe Atl_Tony can start a thread every Monday morning with the date included so everyone knows where to post. That way, the threads won't get too big week to week.

I like your suggestions Dawn...I'll commit to starting the weekly thread each Monday morning.

Just updated the Wiki set up by Lauren with my stats.

Thanks for the advice. I'm definitely trying to work on it. My good cholesterol is high, so they say that is good. Hopefully all this will help!

Looks good. I would just add:

total weight loss to date
remaining lbs to goal

This way we can keep track of total lbs lost during challenge and how many lbs we have left to lose.

Sounds great!

Alex, can you start adding our names?

Atl_Tony can you start a new thread on Monday?

Is everyone okay with this challenge starting on Monday? First weigh in, and first day to start officially tracking Lauren's goals is 9/11 (ooh, bad Karma, maybe we should start our weeks on Sunday)

Let's do this thing :)

Jodi

Cool. This is starting to come together. I've added myself into the list too. I hope you don't mind that I put myself above you in the list so it can be alphabetical.

Should we add columns for Starting Weight, Total Weight Loss, Total Lbs to Goal?

Added.

Alex

Start posting your data guys, whoever wants me to add them.It is not diffucult for someone to do it on his own but it is faster if one makes the changes.

Alex

Excellent! Thanks!! I think everyone should just add themselves (this is the beauty of wiki). Just go to:

http://healthchallenge.pbwiki.com/

and press Edit Page. The format is pretty easy to figure out. Just add yourself in alphabetically. I'll go through the thread in a few days and add in anyone else who didn't do it themselves. So, we'll be all set for Monday's first big weigh-in.

Let's all have a good first week.

I added weekly and cumulative "health points" for all people who want to follow Lauren's goals. I will post how the points add up and what everything is worth later today. We'll come to some sort of easy system.

Jodi

That's great. Don't forget to include pts for weight loss each week along with the other goals from Lauren.

Come on, everyone - we want to see you on the list!

What is the password??

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