Greetings GeekFitters, Steve and I wanted to let you know that we’re now be on facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/geekfit (I know, we’re original huh?) We use to have a Facebook Group but we are closing that group and moving to a Facebook Page. Click the link and hit the like button!

Oh yeah, one more thing… we added Facebook Comments to our website to make it easier for you to leave comments on our episodes and blog postings.

http://www.facebook.com/geekfit

Friday

• Zumba Flash Mob in Marysville WA
• Zumba Party with the Hickory Girls at Hope Fitness in Mukileto 7pm to 9pm
  (Proceeds are going to the NW Sarcoma Foundation)
  11811 Mukilteo Speedway # 200
  Mukilteo, WA

Saturday

• NW Sarcoma Foundation Fundraiser- The Rage Cage in Everett 11am to 1pm
  1520 112th St SW
  Everett, WA
• Zumba Party – Studio Phoenix in Marysville
  9114 State Ave
  Marysville, WA 98270

Sunday

• Zumba Master Class with the Hickory Girls in Olympia!  11am to 1pm
  Fusion the Integrated Body
  302 Columbia St.
  Olympia, WA 98501
• Zumbathon Fundraiser 5pm to 7pm
  StudioZ Stanwood
  7009 265th Street Suite 105, Building B
  Stanwood, WA

Alan (@sweating_it_off) over at Sweatinguntilhappy has proposed a challenge for his blog visitors: 30 days of no eating out. Swing by his site if you want to participate, it looks like Steve is interested.

http://sweatinguntilhappy.blogspot.com/2010/09/challenge-30-days-of-no-eating-out.html

If you’re not familiar with the BB, it’s a unit that you wear strapped to your upper left arm all day long. At the end of the day you plug it into your computer, upload your data, and the website will present a graph with your calories burned throughout the day. A HRM is more straightforward – you wear a strap around your chest just under your pecs and it transmits your heart rate to a wrist watch (or other device).

My Polar FT7 came in the mail today. I read the manual, configured it for my weight, height, age, and gender and it dutifully reported that my max heart rate was 188 beats per minute (BPM). You can find yours by subtracting your age from 220. I ran the center portion under water, attached the WearLink® unit, and headed to Zumba. The results are in a letter to my trainer; Jason Tucker; and of course; my Zumba instructor, Kelly Emerson of Vancouver Zumba.

========================================================
Hi [there],

Today I wore a Polar FT7 during an hour of Zumba and came up with the following: 619 cals burned, 59:53 duration, 146 average bpm, 161 max bpm, 10:36 spent in fat burn range, 49:17 spent in fitness range. I uploaded my Body Bugg data and selected the same ~1 hour period and it reports 784 calories burned.

The Body Bugg site says the skew is due to having multiple data points instead of a single data point “which is what other calorie estimation devices such as pedometers and heart rate monitors rely on.” So, is an HRM inferior technology for measuring calorie burn? Maybe, but it’s possible it’s marketing hype. For me, it’s all relative. Whether it’s the scale, Body Bugg, HRM, or Omron body fat tester – their efficacy isn’t in question because as long as you’re using the same device to measure each data point you can tell when it’s going up and down.

I’ll continue to wear the Body Bugg to collect the waking-hours data and the HRM for workouts where intensity is something I’m interested in maintaining. That would be anything other than kickboxing and Zumba since I don’t have much control over the routines. I always squat a little bit lower and squeeze the abs a little bit tighter because I know that’s what is going to get me the most bang for the buck, but I don’t need an HRM to tell me that.

I’m looking forward to hitting the elliptical and seeing how consistently I can keep my heart rate in the fat burn zone. From what I’m seeing from the Zumba data my cardio fitness time is already covered.

/sk

The Hot Womens (aka The Instructor Whose Butt Defies Physics)

You’d think being the one of the only guys in a Zumba class is awesome. You’d be right. I spent a lot of money playing an arcade game called Dance Dance Revolution – you know the one, colored arrows? and the four arrows on the floor you step on? Zumba is like playing DDR on random mode only instead of colored arrows you get to follow pretty ladies. =) It doesn’t get much better than that and they really make me feel welcome at every class.

The Weight Loss

When I started I weighed 450 and now I’m down to 350. That’s a lot of hours doing mind-numbingly boring cardio. In an hour of Zumba the average person burns 500-600 calories. At my current weight I’m burning 850-900 calories and I have the body bugg graphs to prove it. Since I started with at Fit on 1st doing Zumba I’ve lost another 15 lbs, inches all over, and I had a blast doing it!

Great Classes (aka The Gym We Do Not Speak Of)

I had been going to a local gym’s Zumba class and – whew, crowded. The instructors were great, but when you have to be careful not to move your arms away from your side so you don’t thwap your neighbor. Yes, it’s that bad. When I found Fit on 1st I was so excited! The class sizes are manageable and the energy is amazing. Each instructor adds their own flare to the class so you’re never bored. Two thumbs up – come give it a try! The first one’s free. =)

Give it a read:

http://www.stevenklassen.com/2010/03/10/going-up/

It turns out that what I thought were bent-over barbell rows were more like almost-passable upright rows. He demonstrated the exercise and then nudged and pushed me into the right position while I did a couple reps. The minute he let go I almost fell over. It’s hard to hold yourself in that position! Needless to say I had to come down in the weight (again) but I could feel it in all the right places.

Alwyn Cosgrove‘s workouts (from New Rules of Lifting for Men) include periodic cycles: 3 weeks on the weights, 1 week off. I think it would be worthwhile to get some training at the outset of each 3-week run of weight training. I don’t feel bad about 3 weeks worth of upright rows, but it would have been nice if I hadn’t done double-duty on my shoulders.

Now, should I go through my Fitbook and cross out bent-over row and scribble upright row over the top?

Let’s back up a little. What the heck are front squats? Well, they’re not what I was doing. Instead of having the bar on the top of my chest I was kind of cradling it in the crux of my arms. That worked, sort of. When I did it today Cory Gilday, co-owner and exercise physiologist, swooped in and offered some tips. He corrected my form, but I had to come down a bit in the weight. The exercise felt much better with the right form (more quads and a lot less back), but whew I’m going to have a pair of bruises on my upper arms I’m naming Cory and Gilday.

So far we’re enjoying the new venue. The staff is supportive and the they keep the place nice and clean. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a misplaced weight or anything else out of sorts.

If you mention GeekFit when you sign up, you’ll get all the water you can drink. Y’know, from the water fountain. It was funnier in my head.

This was my response (written first thing in the morning, so bear with me):

I wish I could say it’s all muscle, but that only accounts for maybe an extra quarter calorie per minute (225 calories over 15 hours)**. I burn ~2750 calories a day at an idle, so that extra 500-1000 comes from deliberate daily exercise. 30m on the treadmill, a couple 15 minute brisk walks, etc. The 4500 calorie days are a Zumba class or a combination of weights and some intervals.

I’ve had a couple surplus days though – no exercise and usual intake. That’s good food, too. After tracking with a Body Bugg like this it’s really easy to see how tossing a Double Bacon Western Cheeseburger in the mix (or something similar) would EASILY pack on the pounds.

So, why 3000 calories at an idle instead of 2000 (USDA break-even calorie number)**? I’m carrying 100 lbs of extra ballast. I’m used to carrying it, so it’s like a workout you do for too long and plateau.

If I had to guess I’d say 2000 is a average, 2500 (extra 500 for the muscle composition), and then an extra 250 for carrying the extra weight brings us to 2750.

So the secret is to either be 100 lbs overweight (I really don’t recommend this one!) and/or lift weights to get the added benefit of the extra burn.

** This is a complete WAG (wild @$$ guess) based on what I’ve been heard from other bodybugg users who average 1-1.5 calories/min at an idle.

GeekFit Listener Survey

Here’s my latest post to their forum:

I’d been hitting the cardio pretty hard and I decided to get some weight lifting in.

Now, I used to lift weights all through that run from 420 to 300. I did squats, and bench pressed, and did all those macho things the big tough guys did. So when I return to the weight room it only makes sense for me to jump right back in. Eh, not so much.

My legs are pretty strong, but I forget that not all muscles are created equal. Just because a few muscles that are employed to get me from A to B are strong doesn’t mean they’re the same muscles used in, let’s say, a squat in a smith with 20 lbs thrown on for good measure. All day yesterday everything from my hips to my toes were screaming. Today it’s worse. Tomorrow – well let’s just not think about tomorrow.

Oh, on top of that I did a shoulder workout. Dumbbell shoulder presses, lateral raises, front raises, and shrugs. They’re sore too and I’m still getting a little leftover DOMS from the chest/back workout a couple days ago.

On the upside, my feet feel better. The balls of my feet were pretty ouchy all day yesterday, hence the push to do resistance instead of getting back on the treadmill. All in all, I’ve been going at this every day and hereby declare today my day of rest. Tomorrow morning I’m back at it, DOMS or not – even if I have to “ouch” *step* “ouch” *step* “ouch” to get there.

Last Saturday I flew home, 6 hours in total, and was eager to weigh myself Sunday morning. I came in at 366 lbs, netting me a loss of 18 lbs. On a hunch I weighed in again this morning and was at 362 lbs for a total loss of 22 lbs. That’s some Biggest Loser weigh-in progress, y’all.

So, what changed? I had been working out half-heartedly, eating “alright” and avoiding the major pitfalls, but not really pressing in any particular direction. I had maintained the 370-375 range until late August when, unchecked for a bit, jumped up to 384. That set off all the bells & alarms. I wasn’t quite back where I had started, but my “eh, it’s maintaining” attitude went out the window. Something had to change, and like now.

Around the same time I had been reading up on carbohydrates, protein, and procrastination in general. That gave me some interesting insights to what starches and carbs would do to my overall intake for the day. I started preferring protein over carbs, veg over starch, and worked out every day. The stairs were the other big thing. I was on the 6th floor of the hotel for a while and then the last couple weeks they had me up on the 7th floor. I took the stairs every time I had to go to/from my room. The only exception being heading down for breakfast in the morning. I was already plenty worked up from the rush of getting out of the shower, getting ready, getting dressed, and then packing out the door with my backpack on.

All in all it was a good trip. I got a lot of work done and kicked my fitness into high-gear. I think I made the most progress on the cardio and now I’ve got to bring the resistance training up a few notches.

Southwest Flight to Austin

Tried seat buddy on the southwest flight. The straps let you roll the display into whatever angle you want. The clown in front of me decided to lean back and that didn’t work so well, so I tried it on the adjoining seat. Having the independent lengths helped – I was able to use the tray on the seat back next to me, kind of at an angle so that the strap closest to me was tucked all the way in while the furthest was pulled out a bit.

Halloween DJing

We headed into Austin to check out the crazy costumes. Of course I fancy myself an iPod DJ so I had my iPhone mounted using the seat buddy in the glove box in front of me while I found music on my friend’s iPhone. I’d swap the audio cable back and forth between the two phones – only having to hold on to the one seat buddy-less.

Teenager-Proof Anchoring

More iPhone DJ’ing at a Halloween party. It made me nervous to put my iPhone next to the stereo where some hapless kid could knock it down. Again, the seat buddy came in useful. Two heavy books atop the straps held it in place while I plugged into the sound system providing the music for the festivities.

Check it out at TheSeatBuddy.com.

You can locate the wave by going here if you have an account already:  https://wave.google.com/wave/#restored:wave:googlewave.com!w%252Bn9h-dQIyB.1

and if you need an invite direct message @jasontucker or @mrxinu on twitter.

[wave id="googlewave.com!w+n9h-dQIyB" color="#050505" width="100%" height="800"]

Again I checked my bag, went through security, and arrived at my gate with ~45 minutes to spare. I walked up to the attendant at the booth and smiled.

Me: “Hey there – I’m a customer of size. Do I need a pre-boarding slip?”
Agent: “Do you have [indecipherable]… ?”
Me: “I have nothing but my ticket here – I just know I get singled out and wanted to get ahead of the curve.”
Agent: “Do you think you need a second seat?”
Me: “I don’t think I need one, but there was food in Ohio, so can’t be sure. I didn’t need one coming out here.”
Agent: “Oh okay, then you don’t need a second ticket then.”

She was nice about it, but it looks like there’s nothing I can do to control when and how I get picked out for being overweight short of presenting myself for inspection at the gate every time I fly. Leave it to the airlines to invent a new flavor of profiling.

I had heard about the upset airlines were causing by charging their larger passengers for an extra seat, but it hadn’t happened to anyone I knew. That is, until last Sunday morning.

My first Southwest flight was a 3.5 hour stretch from Oregon to Chicago. I arrived early as always, checked my bags, went through security, and got to my gate. I was sitting a stone’s throw from gate with about 45m to spare when one of the airline staff walked up and sat right next to me.

“Do you have a ticket for this flight?” he asked. I had no idea what was going on. My first thought was they might have oversold the flight and were going to offer me something above what they normally did for giving up my seat and didn’t want to make an announcement. I was excited because I didn’t need to be there as early as I’d planned and that meant Ivy would have a freebie trip somewhere.

“Yes sir, I do.” I said, ready to hear about my proposed reward.

“Well there’s a policy that if you don’t fit comfortably in a seat with the arms down that you’ll have to buy a second ticket. Do you think you can?” he asked.

I felt sick. There were 100 things I would have said had I not kicked into self-preservation mode. I just wanted the exchange to be over.

“Yes, I can sit in a seat with the arm down.” I said, hoping he would accept it on my word and go away. Of course it wouldn’t be comfortable, but I’d taken full flights before and sat squished into a seat with the arms down. I even made a game of it in my head—I’d pretend I was in a space craft designed for a smaller being. If I got too uncomfortable I could always stand for a bit at the back of the plane; no problem.

“It’s a 4 hour flight. You can sit comfortably with the arms down for the entire flight?” he asked, doubt in his voice. Still gripped with embarrassment I couldn’t even think straight.

“Yes, I can.” I reiterated.

“Okay, we’re going to take you down to the plane shortly to let you get settled and make sure.” he said, finally.

I felt mad, embarrassed, and scared all at once. I made my living traveling. There was no way I could ask my company (or the customer) to eat a second ticket because I was overweight. I worked out what a second last-minute ticket for this flight was going to run me and felt sick.

He came back and took me down to the plane. I stuffed my carry-ons into the overhead and slid into the middle seat, pulling down the arms and showing that I could indeed squish myself between them. At that point I got a bunch of “we’re sorry, but you understand I’m sure” from the attendant who brought me up and the ones working the flight.

So, now you know someone who has come close to getting charged for a second ticket.

Guidelines for Customers of Size

Customer of Size Q&A

MetaFilter: Forced to buy second seat on Southwest Airlines?

Southwest Trial Begins

Token Fat Girl – United Airlines: Too Fat To Fly?

So what does this do for you? Well, Steve and I are tweeting about all the achievements we’re doing in health and fitness. Sometimes its a picture of what were eating, or a status update on our weight change. It really could be anything you want to share with the world. For instance I could say:

Went for a walk in the park at lunch, 2.5miles #geekfit

or something like

Wow, this sandwich is great, I gotta talk about it on the next #geekfit podcast.

The goal for this is that people can see what others are doing in the GeekFit community and can comment on other peoples actions. We call these pats on the back. We’re hoping if someone in the community tweets about something related to health and fitness and puts #geekfit in the tweet on twitter then someone will comment on that persons accomplishment.

Below are what some of the people have said including #geekfit in their twitter posts:

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http://www.gyminee.com/groups/1133-GeekFit-Podcast

This is a picture of me at 300 even standing in front of a newly-remodeled bathroom. It’s a picture I return to for that jolt when I really need it, so I emailed the URL to my lovely wife and asked her to print a copy for me. I’d planned on tacking it to the wall with a pin, but she went the extra mile and framed it.

The best part, for me, are the words: You did it before… you can do it again! (click for a larger version)

So what does this do for you? Well, Steve and I are tweeting about all the achievements we’re doing in health and fitness. Sometimes its a picture of what were eating, or a status update on our weight change. It really could be anything you want to share with the world. For instance I could say:

“Went for a walk in the park at lunch, 2.5miles #geekfit”

or something like

“Wow, this sandwich is great, I gotta talk about it on the next #geekfit podcast.”

The goal for this is that people can see what others are doing in the GeekFit community and can comment on other peoples actions. We call these pats on the back. We’re hoping if someone in the community tweets about something related to health and fitness and puts #geekfit in the tweet on twitter then someone will comment on that persons accomplishment.

So what do you do now? First get a twitter account by going to http://twitter.com if you already have one Go follow geekfit on twitter then make your first posting using the #geekfit tag.

Below are what some of the people have said including #geekfit in their twitter posts:

[HTML1]

So I ate the 300–400 calorie meal. Yes, there was food. Yes, there were calories taken in, but they were really bad tasting calories. I just blew a perfectly good meal trying to expand my options. Do you ever get this overwhelming urge to declare a “do over”?

Two things seem to keep me from pulling the trigger on that “do over” meal that puts my total calories at double, if not more:

1. Eating small meals 5–6x a day, the next one is only 3 hrs away.
2. I can punt with fruit, nuts, or if I’m really feeling ripped off, a spoon of peanut butter.

The most effective trick I’ve learned is just getting the taste out of your mouth by brushing your teeth. It works twofold in that you have alien food taste away from your taste buds and you have minty breath to boot.