Phase Two - Giving Up

Giving Up...

The hardest part about being healthy and moving towards being fit is giving up those hard to quit vices. My vice, my one thing that I cannot seem to live without has always been Coca-Cola, and all other forms of sugary, soft fizzy drinks. They have always been my refreshment 'go -to' for as long as I can remember and honestly, I've known for a very long time that its part of the reason why I never shift those stubborn inches of unfriendly, unhealthy fatty tissue. Well, not anymore!

It's going to be hard, but I intend to diarise my next goal - Quitting Coke (and other soft fizzy drinks). I'm going to get fit, that goes without saying since my Naval career demands me to be, but I'm going to give up the fizzy drink that I've been consuming at an alarming rate. I'm going to follow a Yoda philosophy and I'm not going to say try...

 Yoda, Jedi Master - Star Wars V, The Empire Strikes Back

On the back of my trifecta of goals this year, I decided not to wait for the anti-climax, and push on with another goal for 2014. So, I'm a gonna kick the habit and give up Coke (and other soft fizzy drinks) and keep pushing myself to get as far away from FAT and as close to FIT as I can!

I left this post until I had completed 3 whole days before writing it and today is the 4th.... Since I'm not always going to have a good signal (I'm currently deployed) to post I'll be writing everyday (ish) and posting all of the written blogs in bundles! It's the best I can do.

So, Why Coke? Well, as long as I can remember I've been a little addicted to coke, well any cola derivative and well, as much as I enjoy a refreshing cola beverage, I'd like to think that I can live without the urge to drink it. Luckily, I've never needed cola for it's caffeinated properties, instead I just love the taste and the sweetness. Well, thats where I've realised I need to focus my attention. As I've known for a while a single 12oz / 355ml can of coke contains 34g of sugar (or equivalent to sugar in the High fructose corn syrup), which is like swallowing 10 teaspoon of sugar, every time I knock back a can of cola... that's just wrong. My dentist would agree, my wife definitely agrees and almost anyone interested in health and fitness would be like "Derrr! We know that Gaffa!" - however its taken me almost a year of training, eating right and developing my own nutrition to realise I'm potentially reversing all the good I've been doing. If I drink 4 cans of coke (I have been known to smash more in a day), which is like 48oz / 1420ml of coke I'm consuming 136g of sugar... thats 40 freaking teaspoons of sugar...no wonder there's such a concern for obesity when people consume large quantities of cola (and other soda pops).

I've decided to ignore all of the advice out there, in lieu of knowing my own body. I'm aware that I should reduce my coke intake until I stop 'needing' it, but I know that one taste and I'm hook again, so I'm going cold turkey... at least I'll be a grouchy bugger at sea and not at home! I've had a headache and I've lost my appetite this week already, so I'm hoping for some stability there.

Apparently I'm supposed to get a caffeine withdrawal, but I doubt that'll happen since I drink coffee - which incidentally I've reduced in consumption too!

Wish me luck. This may be a bigger challenge than a marathon!  

Days 60-62: A Well Earned Rest...

Home. Where My Heart Is....

This weekend, seemed to take forever to arrive but I guess that's the way it goes when you're waiting for something awesome to happen. For me, this weekend was about going home to see my wife, and spending quality time with her. Being a serving ADF member means that home time really needs to be all about the quality, since the duration is never all that long....Devoted to my wife, and making every moment count, I planned to spend every second having fun, and that's why I've been quiet all weekend!

We did the usual, visited various yummy restaurants and ate (carefully in my case) delicious meals. A regular haunt of our is Ayam 99, which is the best Indonesian food in Sydney...in my humble opinion! We also, got to try some new places too. Winnie is bound to blog about them on our other blog Eat.Travel.Dive, so I'll not steal her thunder!

The best part, not including the amazing time spent with my wifey, and also with family too. We hung out with IronRay, Queen Filsie, and Winnie's parents. More amazing than that, however was the various amazing, yummy raw/vegan/suger free/dairy free treats that the Winster prepared for me.... now that is awesome! For recipes check out our other blog... 

There were Chocolate Fudge Bites, Healthy Snickers and Blueberry and Orange Zest Cheesecake.... Did I say these are all healthy! OMG I know, right? AMAZING!

Who could resist this?

Time to Train Together

Winnie and I actually like to train together. We bounce off of each other, we keep it fun and we always share the "pain". Saturday afternoon was no different, since quality time also means that we train, or go to yoga...We chose the gym before dinner.

Shoulders and Abdominal Smash - so I run my darling wifey through an endurance workout, and after 90 minutes of hard work, she rated it an 8/10 overall. I'm happy with that. The workout however, did get a bonus mark too. You see, Winnie has decided she wants to build her upper body strength and core strength to enable her to do hand stands. We ended our workout with 3 sets of against the wall type. Winnie was very anxious about doing this, so I assisted her in getting up then guided her through it. We're a pretty awesome team, I know this because she reciprocated in ensuring I didn't knock the wall down on my turn. I can get into the position, just have to throw myself in!!! My third set was what Winnie called "hollow back" which is apparently an achievement...

Shoulder press up (mid push up)

Hollowback?

Anyways, time for bed. I have a big week ahead - hopefully culminating in graduation from this course I've been on since January..Plus, another week of endurance training.

Oh, and I'm thinking of signing up for the following fitness events, if you wanna join in let me know...I'm sure training and doing will be fun.

1. Sydney City 2 Surf (14km Run) - 10Aug14
2. Sydney Marathon (42km Run - but there are other distances) - 21Sep14
3. Husky Olympic Tri (Swim 1.5km, Bike 40km, Run 10km, Sea Posting Permitting) - 02Nov14
4. The Cole Classic (2km Ocean Swim, Sea Posting Permitting) - 01Feb15
5. Husky Half Iron Man (Swim 2km, Bike 83km, Run 20km, Sea Posting Permitting) - 22Feb15
6. Port Mac Iron Man.... or Melbourne.... ??

Well, thats the plan....am I crazy?