Who is this Guy?

In October 2010, my wife and I signed up to do a 5k at the Lake Norconian Club in Norco, CA. I was interested in seeing the place because Huell Howser did one of his shows from there and it looked interesting. My wife grew up in the area and had heard a bit about it but had never seen it because it is on active military base. Her brother and friends were running the 5k so we figured we would walk and check it out.

You can't blame me for wanting to see the place!

Flash forward to the end of the race. We both walked and our time was about 56 minutes. I finished last in my age group, but it didn't really bother me all that much. I was just there to do some sight seeing. I think the time disappointed my wife and the idea of being able to improve it intrigued her.

She eventually found the Couch to 5k program and casually started it around January 2011. A month later, I bought her a fancy new iPod touch with the Nike+ app so that she could better track her distance. We happened to buy her Nike+ sensor at an Apple store (important, because I ended up buying an iPhone) and she started the C25k deal with vigor.

It should be noted that my wife started running and exercising more because she wanted to lose weight. We weren't small people on our wedding day, but we both of us had certainly packed on a few extra pounds. She carried two gigantor babies (both of our boys weighed over 9lbs), so at least she had an excuse. I just had gained sympathy weight or something like that.

Needless to say, after a couple of months she was certainly in better shape but the scale wasn't reflecting anything. After trying to be positive and saying things like "Hey, at least the scale isn't moving other direction", I finally decided to be more honest with her. Even though we were eating fairly healthy, we were eating too much. Before we were married, both of us had moderate success with Weight Watchers but kind of gave up on it too soon. I mentioned to her that maybe before giving up entirely on exercise that perhaps changing our diet might be a good idea and that she should give WW another try.

She did and in conjunction with her running, she has lost about 50 lbs. to date. She looks freaking amazing (she always has, obviously). This all somehow leads back to me in some sort of narcissistic way of course.

Remember that iPhone I bought? A couple of months after my wife put on her running shoes, I decided that I would like to try the C25K thing. There was even an app for it. I got a sensor and some new running shoes. After graduating the C25k program, I started on the Bridge to 10K program during the summer. I soon found myself in the same place my wife was in just a few months before.

I was certainly in better shape. At that point in time, I could run almost 5 miles at a comfortable pace without stopping. I weighed myself from time to time and even though there were a few dips, nothing was really permanent. After a month off from running (hot weather, wife went back to work), I decided I needed to worry about my weight.

On September 12, 2011 I officially joined WW. My weight at the time was 290. I had hovered around that number all summer. I ran quite a bit, but I also popped open quite a few bottles of beer during the summer.

As of today (January 20, 2012) my weight is 264. The weight hasn't been coming off as fast I would like lately, but I am still mostly losing.