Final Hot 100 Post and Year-End Review

I would be sad writing this post if there weren't a new challenge taking its place. I am talking about the Perfect 10 challenge which you can read about HERE.

Anyway, in terms of the Hot 100, with the food challenges, I would say that I had about an 80% success rate. I rarely "cheated" on my food plan and when I did, I got right back in the saddle.

My amount of exercise varied WILDLY from week to week, I was often below my target of five hours a week. Time-wise, I constantly felt overwhelmed. IN SPITE OF THAT, I lost over a foot of inches during the challenge. So this goes to show that doing what you can, when you can, is better than doing nothing. Having SOME progress is better than NO PROGRESS.

The Hot 100 challenge helped a lot and I am looking forward to starting the Perfect 10 challenge. I did totally suck ass at posting my updates when I should have. That, along with trying to fit in the exercise and other things in my life points to time-management issues and also just trying to do too much.

So I want to improve on that during the new challenge and the new year. I also look forward to reading the goals and challenges of my fellow bloggers.

Steve has a career and a family and his own health to deal with, yet he takes the time to organize and track these challenges. This is an incredible example of generosity-- which is another reason that I like this so much. Steve is generous in creating the challenges and then so many people here are so good about leaving comments for their fellow "team mates." I love how it all comes together and the spirit of the whole thing.

The fact that my gut will get smaller in the process is great too. The challenge insures that there is always something in your life that is bigger than your problem area. LOL

Now for a quick review of the year. Last year at this time,I wore a MEN'S size 5X and my hips were nearly 70 inches! I weighed 430 pounds and no doubt I was plannning what kind of fattening goodies Jeff and I would stuff in our jibs whilst watching new year's eve specials on TV.

My blood pressure was so high that I would get pounding headaches and you could actually see the blood vessels in my forehead pulsing like crazy. My cholesterol was through the roof and I was borderline diabetic-- my doctor at the time threatened to put me on medicine for diabetes. It was the diabetes scare that finally moved me to action. (That, and trying to fit my fat ass into TWO airline seats during my trip to the rez)

I started a low-carb diet in March, but I did not exercise until I returned from my trip to the rez in July. At that time, I did a 21-day fast and thereafter, modified my eating plan and began to exercise.

I have lost about about 4 feet of inches since July. I DID NOT measure myself back in the beginning-- so that is not the total inches lost for the year, that number, if I knew it, would be much higher!

I can now run a complete mile when I could barely walk earlier in the year. I brought my cholesterol down by 70 points, and my fasting blood sugar is down nearly 40 points. I am also on track for normal blood pressure. It is much lower than it was but not yet "normal."

My first visit to the gym was July 26th. On that day, on the machines, I set the chest press for 30 pounds and that was literally the best I could do. I now set that at 100 pounds. Leg press went from 120 pounds to 300 pounds, seated cable rows went from 60 pounds to 150 pounds, Lat pull downs went from 40 pounds to 130 pounds, and cable flies went from 40 pounds to 90 pounds. I really wanted to be able to pull 100 pounds on the cable flies by the new year-- I didn't make it-- I just can't do it. It is just out of the reach of my strength. No matter how hard I tried to dig, I just couldn't pull it-- maybe by the end of the Perfect 10 challenge?

I am finishing up the ChaLEAN Extreme program, which is one of my accomplishments for the year. Whether or not it is worth the money for someone to buy this depends on where they are at fitness wise and other factors. I will do a full review of the product this coming week in which I will be honest about who I think would benefit from it and who wouldn't. I will also outline my results.

I am preparing for a new weight lifting program which I will outline over the week end, and one thing that I will do differenly is that every time I work out, I will list the exercises that I did, the reps and sets, and the weights used. So this blog will start doubling as a training journal. When I am able to increase a weight, I will note it. So you will all be able to follow my progress in a more "real" way.

I am officially starting the new weight lifting program on Monday.

I will continue with my monthly progress reports with pics -- these I do around the middle of each month so I will post one in the middle of January.

I want to thank everyone who reads my blog and for those who take the time to comment. Thank you for your encouragement, insights and helpful information. If I had to make this journey alone, I would do it, as we gotta do what we gotta do.

But having you guys here makes this a little easier. Thank you for that! And happy New Year!

XOXO