Background...

Switched the blog over to blogger.com...seems to work better.

So tonight I'll post a brief background and then put in more about my baseline Wednesday.

I'm 40 now.  I was always super skinny through my early 20's.  I was 6'3" and I believe I had a 28 inch waist...all skin and bones...and I think I weighed in about 140 or something close.  At about 27 my metabolism changed.  In about 6 months or less, I gained about 35 pounds.  That would normally be a good thing, but every pound of it was all around my waist.  I looked like ET...super skinny but with a gut.  Kind of gross.

Once I got to my early 30's, I got into weights and was able to get into a better proportion.  I have never been bulky at all, but at least I looked like a muscular ET...still with the gut.  I leveled out at about 165 pounds and a 34 inch waist.

Last year, I did an experiment.  I decided to try to get back the early 20's waist and try to keep the muscle.  I still did weights, but I did a crash diet (~1700 calories a day) and a lot of cardio.  In 3 months, I went from 167 to 147 pounds (WAY too much) and went from 34 inches to 30.5.  I still didn't lose all the gut and love handles, and I looked completely emaciated.  I knew it was crazy to be that skinny and that this wasn't the way to go.

Within a few months, I was back to the pre-crash diet weight and shape.  To maintain general health, I do weights on a machine four times a week and 30 minutes on an elliptical (with resistance) around five times a week.  I'm probably in great shape for someone my age, but that gut still bums me out.

Enter P90X.  I've heard about it for quite a while.  I've known some people who have done it (some successfully and some not).  I'm not really into fads and I'm not obsessed with working out.  But I'd like to take another shot at getting my body where I'd like it.  P90X looks like a good regiment...very organized and well rounded for the entire body.  Plus there is a lot of knowledge and support out there. 

So there is a little background.  Perhaps someday, someone with the same history will see this and benefit from it.  I'll probably post some of my concerns about doing this tomorrow.  And Wednesday I'll post some baseline stuff.  Then it starts Thursday morning.

Starting out...

I'm not going to lie...it seems incredibly self indudgent and self important to blog. It is kind of like writing a personal diary and and publishing it thinking that everyone else is dying to know what you do every day.
I'm starting this blog for three reasons:

1. I'm starting the P90X workout program and I'd like to be able to look back and see what I went through and how far I've come.
2. It creates some accountability. Making a big change in your life is hard. It is easy to quit, especially if no one else knows you are trying. If I'm putting updates on a public forum, it creates at least a little bit of an embarrassing consequence if I just pack it in after 7 days.
3. It might help someone who is going through the same experience. Before I purchased the program, I was encouraged by seeing someone else's blog...someone who was at about the same fitness level as me before they started. It was nice to see how far they came and what they went through.

So there it is. I am currently planning on starting the program this Thursday. Before then, I'll blog a little bit about my current fitness level...kind of a baseline before I start.