Hope To The Obese

I used to work in this building. I am thinking about making a collage of all of the buildings I ever worked in.

Speaking about obese and their hope. Thanks to not eating in the evening and running four to six miles three times a week I finally resumed my weight loss. From hitting rock bottom at 255lb a year back, 230lb after being on low carb diet, I am at 217lb right now. My BMI is 32, which means that pretty soon I will officially stop being obese. Then I’ll be overweight.

WML : How to Good-Bye Obesity: Heart Rate Training. Malarkey? or Effective Way?

I am a hardened veteran of the battle of the bulge. There are a lot of factors working against me — genetic predisposition, laziness, sedentary lifestyle. Yet still, from time to time I wage a war on fat, and often enough come out victorious. I despise people who say that you should like your body the way it is. Body image hate is A-Ok in my book.

Generally I spent most of my life in various states of obesity. But three times I managed to bring my weight down to normal. The first time was when my parents signed me up for summer gym classes. Calisthenics and running 5 times a week for a whole summer really slimmed me down. Unfortunately the very charismatic coach we had ended up getting drafted into the Soviet army, and without motivation I stopped exercising and started gaining weight again. Then my dad got me into a tennis class. I got in only because he was a chief engineer in charge of building the stadium which housed the tennis courts where we played. I sucked at playing tennis, but by the time I left the Soviet Union my weight was back to normal.

American food, stress and more stress took it’s toll during my high school years. Still, one summer I took a gym class during summer school and took to running 10-12 laps around the stadium every day. My weight was back to normal again. But then I’ve got a job at Nathan’s Famous and gained a lot of weight eating free hot dogs and fries.

I never had any luck with diets up until now. Surprisingly enough Atkins diet really works. But of course it’s not enough. In fact, I lost 30 pounds and stalled. But then suggested that I try heart rate training.

There’s this company called Polar. They make very accurate pulse rate monitors. These monitors consist of two parts: a transmitter strap that goes around your chest and a watch which picks up the wireless signal from the transmitter.

The device continuously monitors your pulse so that you can adjust your effort level to stay in the fat burning zone. Luckily treadmills in the gym that our corporate overlord and beloved billionaire tyrant built for us already have Polar receivers inside. And as it turned out the gym attendants have transmitters available on request. You just punch in the desired heart rate and the treadmill adjusts to you. It also accurately calculates calories burned. And the overhead monitors are tuned into various Fox channels. Simpsons while working out — what could be better?

Running with heart rate monitor is just amazing. You don’t get too tired, but you know that you are exerting yourself just enough to burn fat. It’s very motivating. To keep myself further motivated I think I’ll buy myself an iPod when I loose another 10 lb.

If you were wondering, the subject line is a reference to the title of this book.

Dr Atkins Gets Some

Here’s a quote from an email that I’ve got this morning from the Atkins Center with the subject “Why “Diet” Is a Four-Letter Word”:

“What a relief it was when people started saying they were “doing Atkins.” It was so much better than that hideous alternative: “I’m on a diet.” ”

Well, me – I am not “doing” Atkins. I am on a fricking Atkins diet.