Eat, Play, Run

Hong Kong Running Diary

If you're curious, I'm writing my Hong Kong trip on my other blog: runsenorun.

Diet: Week 4 Update

OK, tomorrow marks week 4 of the "diet." I keep putting "diet" in quotation marks because I don't really feel like I'm on what we normally call a diet. More, I feel like I'm changing my eating habits, and weight loss is happening at the same time. Here's a rundown...

What hasn't changed: I still eat the same amounts protein... beef, pork, chicken, seafood. I'm also eating plenty of sushi, Chinese food and ramen.

What I eat more of: Vegetables, fruit, nuts

What I less of: chocolate, rice, pasta

What I rarely eat: candy, baked desserts, potato chips

What I never drink: alcohol, canned/bottled anything... juice, soda, whatever. Exception being water.

On top of this, I'm trying to control portion sizes. For example, the other night I made a half-pound steak instead of a full pound. I also had it with asparagus and a fresh fruit salad (peaches, apples, blueberries and grapes) instead of my normal 1.5 cups of rice. I finished the meal full, but not gross.

If I really miss something, I'll eat it. Life is too full of important things to get caught up on missing chocolate, so if I'm craving it, I'll eat a piece.

I do miss hamburgers. Unfortunately, there's nowhere in my general home or work vicinity to get a decent enough burger to splurge. But, when I'm in LA next week, you better believe I'll be making a stop or two at In-N-Out. And when in NY next month? Oh yeah, it's on!

I was afraid this diet would affect my running. But it's not at all. I'm having no problem with 5-to-6 mile daily runs and did a 10-mile run yesterday. I don't think I'll go much past 12-miles for now. But, that's not based on the diet. It's more because any longer than that, and it would affect how many days per week I could run without hurting myself.

The core exercises and push-up routine are both going really well. I'm definitely getting stronger.

So, I know you've read this far just to see if I've actually lost any weight when I've really done is cut out snacking on candy, baked desserts and potato chips. Through four weeks I've lost 14 pounds. I weigh a little less now that I did when I toed the line for the New York Marathon 10 months ago. Really, all I've done is lost the weight I gained since moving back to Seattle last October. Though, again, I moved back at the tail end of marathon training, so that number was deceivingly low.

There you have it. As a side note, about a couple of weeks into this, I picked up Michael Pollan's "In Defense of Food." It's a fascinating look at the food industry. It's not one of those "you'll never eat another hot dog again" meant to gross you out. Instead it looks at how the food industry has really screwed up our diets. What he advocates (I'm only 30% done,) so I'm sort of guessing, is that we need to eat as nature intended, not as the food industry dictates. I'm really no longer eating pre-packaged foods. It's all fresh veggies, fruits and vegetables. This means I'm going to the grocery store nearly every day, but thankfully there's a great one between my bus stop and home.

I'm on a Diet

On Monday, I decided to fix my diet. No caffeine, alcohol or fried foods. Add more complex carbohydrates (fruits, vegetables, nuts) while eating less starchy carbs (rice, pasta, bread) and seriously cutting down on the simple carbs (sugar, glucose, fructose). Overall, I just want to eat healthier. In other words, my plan is to cut out everything I love in life. 

Caffeine and alcohol are fairly easy for me. I would drink an occasional beer, but I don't drink coffee at all. My caffeine comes in the form of Diet Dr. Pepper, Coke and chocolate. Lots of chocolate. In fact, therein lies the biggest problem... my insatiable sweet tooth. I can eat chocolate, candy, cookies, brownies, donuts all day long. In fact, I pretty much do... or did, anyway. My sweet tooth is somewhat legendary.

The other big problem is the starchy carbohydrates. Being a runner, I need carbs to sustain my energy on runs. Rice and pasta were a big part of my diet. It's safe to say that I would eat one or the other six nights a week.

So, can I pull this off? I've replaced my daytime sugar fix with fruit and nuts. I can't cut sugar cold turkey, so I figure fruits are a decent compromise. I've stocked my office with apples, bananas, plums and assorted nuts. I think I can actually do this part of it. In the evenings, I replaced potato chips and assorted crap with sunflower seeds.

The part where I'm breaking from this "diet", however, is being really picky with what I eat. While staring down at my salad on Friday at lunch I actually got sad. Like, it was so depressing I wanted to cry. At that time I realized it just wasn't worth it. I'm going to eat what I want, within reason, while cutting out the snacking.

What's the reduction in carbs done to my running? Well, running hungry is brutal. I go out with just a glass of water in the morning. This comparison won't resonate with most of you. But, a four mile run now feels like the last four miles of an 18 mile run... in other words, not good. Running without carbs, I can feel my body eating itself. I sweat more and every step is more difficult. While running without carbs is hard, it's certainly not impossible. In fact, I kind of like the challenge.

I've changed my training schedule from one that featured long, medium and short runs, five days a week, to six days on - one day off at a consistent distance. I started this week with four miles. Next week, I'll do four or five miles a day. Eventually topping out at six miles a day.

When I decide to do another marathon, I'll change my diet and running schedule again. But for now, I'm going forward with this. How long will it last? We'll see.

In case you're curious, I've lost four pounds in the first six days days...

How Personal to Get Here

I attended my grandmother's funeral today. It was very nice. But, I'm not sure if I'm going to go into personal stuff in this space. Or, maybe I should.

Again, I'm just sort of playing right now.

I'm leaning towards making this a Seattle food-centric blog, with a little bit of running coverage. Maybe I leave the personal stuff to Twitter?

All that I really know right now is that I'm tired and need a nap.

What Will I Be Blogging About?

So, what's happening here?

First, I love food. I'll eat anything and everything. When I left Seattle for New York, I never knew the pleasures of a well-cooked meal.

Well, now I'm back and I plan on trying every great (and not-so-great) restaurant in the Northwest.

Additionally, I love running. I tend to run between 4 - 8 miles per shot, about 25 miles a week. But, when I'm training for something, I'll go as long 24 miles with cap of around 60 miles a week. That said, I don't intend on doing another marathon until the Fall, so I have some time to eat like a hog.

As soon as my domain www.eatplayrun.com gets resolved, I'll start making some real posts. In the meantime, I'm going to continue playing around with the software. Don't get dizzy as I swap out designs. I promise I'll settle on one and keep it!