Last night I didn’t sleep. I got hooked on The Expanse, season 4. By the time common sense came to me it was 3:00 am. I thought I wouldn’t be able to wake up on time If I slept then, so I just kept going. Was too tired for weights because of this. On the afternoon I cycled 3 laps but was too tired for the 4th. A 4th might not be good for me at this point anyway, so that’s okay. Not at all happy with my performance, I have to sleep on time.
Diet was breakfast pancakes, lunch chicken, and throughout the afternoon some fried patties made from ground tenderloin. I would use the steak fat estimate but since it’s fried I figure tenderloin might be more accurate. Worst case scenario I ate less fat than I was aiming at; not a tragedy. Had a shake late at night.
The good thing about not sleeping is the opportunity to go to sleep at whatever healthy hour I choose and re-calibrate the sleep cycle, so I’m going now. 4 cigs.
I’ve taken the unit amounts from the chart. Before, a text said “Egg x2” or so. I realized I hadn’t updated it for D-10 & D-11. Better to get rid of unnecessary complexity to keep in mind. I’ve added the corrections to the relevant posts.
This post is a day late. As soon as I’ve finished this I’ll be writing D-13. I went to bed late on D-11 and overslept. I did wake up on time, but my legs felt too weak for cardio, so I slept four more hours. I woke up much renewed (goes to show the importance of proper sleep), but not enough to get more than an 8 on the workout. 4 cycling laps may have been a mistake.
Breakfast pancakes were at noon. Somewhat after I ate some roast meat (93g). I’ve added tenderloin and steak to the global food chart. I had another 105g of roast around 4:00 pm. Diet is 9 because I had an apple. Had chicken and an egg for dinner and a shake at some point. I shouldn’t wait a day to write these, I messed up. 4 cigs.
EDIT – Not on chart, but estimating chicken oil at 5g in future references.
Today is D-11! This is an extremely important record for me. Truth is, I started and abandoned the “Weight Loss Timelapse Project” a number of times over 7 years. The most I ever got before giving up was D-10. I scoured my hard drive and cloud server for traces of them and found a few. Let me show them to you.
You can actually see me getting fatter
Oct. 1st, 2012 — D-6, last photo of its set. This was the first attempt ever. There’s also a bunch of photos previous to D-0 with tests of angles and lighting.
Sep. 13th, 2014 — Angle and lighting testing set. No photos in subsequent days.
Jan. 1st, 2017 — D-0. No subsequent others.
Jul. 16th, 2017 — D-0. No subsequent others.
Oct. 26th, 2017 — D-7. Last of its set.
I also found an old spreadsheet starting on Feb. the 22nd, 2016. D-1 is at 98.4 kg. Last registry is D-4 at 99.0 kg. Intensity and Diet average 6.75 and 7, respectively. All other attempts were wiped. I’d do this every now and then when looking at my past photos: they shamed and disgusted me. I don’t know how many times I tried in total but it feels to be around 10, at least.
It’s different now. Before, the exercise was a torture I was whipping myself with and the diet was agony. Now I’m enjoying the process. I’ve grown a lot in the last year or two. This blog helps a bunch too, even without readers.
One last thing I didn’t include in the Decad Report (because I was too sleepy) were the changes I’ve noticed in my body:
I can see a slight difference in face roundness.
You can barely see it, but I’ve definitely reduced in volume: I can feel it with my hands. I’ve started to get comments.
My knees are doing lot better; before, I’ve hurt myself a few times when putting too much weight on one.
After a few days, I can now touch my toes during calf stretches.
I don’t get a tendon stretch feeling when walking anymore. This used to happen occasionally.
I’m discovering a few muscles in my legs that I didn’t know of, particularly the ones responsible for pedaling.
This has all been very encouraging. But anyway, on to the day.
Diet is 9 because I was aiming for less fat. I overdid it with the oil, but I didn’t want to make a mess trying to put it back in the bottle; plus I had already weighted it. Morning was the usual 2 pancakes +2g butter. Lunch was 188g of chicken (from now on chicken means chicken breast unless otherwise specified) +15g of oil (olive oil assumed from now on too). There was also the post-cycling shake in the afternoon and dinner was 85g of chicken, 102g of avocado (less than half!) and a scrambled egg; all in 18g of oil.
Today was also my first caffeine-fueled cycling ride. It helped quite a bit: I did 4 laps around the Pentagonito and even improved my average speed (marginally). I know which apps don’t track stops now and will be removing them from the averages calculations from now on and retroactively in future posts.
I’m very happy with my general improvement. Looking back, my problem was always an attitudinal one. I’m way mentally healthier now and have no interest in stopping this project. I had 5 cigs.
ERRATAS: Food charts from D-9 and D-10 aren’t adding the protein and fat of the eggs to the totals. I’ve added disclaimers to both posts. Yes, this means I ate even more fat than I meant to. Also, the number of isolate protein servings (“…protein x2”) in D-11 and D-10 should be 3.
A decad is a set of ten. Decade used to also refer to ten days, but it’s fallen from use. I’ll be making a report like this every ten days. I also took some special photos for the occasion. They’re useless right now but will serve to track future progress.
I’ve lost 4.3 kg in these first ten days (official goal is 3 kg per decad). Although the start was rocky, you can see in the previous chart that the last few days have had a steady-high effort in exercise and diet. Speaking of diet, here’s the chart (global table now has butter):
Breakfast was the usual 2 protein pancakes with one egg (+2g butter). I tried a cup of tea, but it just tastes like bitter water without the sugar. I had a big avocado at noon, 172g of chicken breast (+10g olive oil) for lunch, 89g more for dinner (+10g olive oil) and a shake before bed. Fat got higher than 70f, that’s why I only got a 9 in Diet. I must eat less avocado.
My cardio performance was the best so far. The caffeine really helped. I did have some slight nausea for some moments throughout the morning, maybe due to taking the tablet on an empty stomach, or maybe it was the intensity of the workout.
I’ve learned that Bioelectrical Impedance Analysis is useless in its inaccuracy. BIA is the technology behind the feature of digital scales in which they estimate your body fat percentage, muscle mass, bone density, etc. I had planned on reporting that too. From now on I’ll be using a measuring tape on my waist for a more objective tracking.
I’m really sleepy so that’s the end of it. Tomorrow’s a VERY special day, you’ll read why. I had 6 cigs.
ERRATAS – Food charts in D-9 and D-10 aren’t adding the protein and fat of the eggs to the totals. Also, the number of isolate protein servings (“…protein x2”) in D-11 and D-10 should be 3.
I’ve modified the chart. Now it depends on a global table with the protein/fat per gram values for everything I’ll be eating. I got to my “ideal” 70f today, but I don’t like those calories. I’d like to stay at around 1000 cal, if possible, although not ingesting the fat minimum lowers testosterone and generally disrupts hormonal functions. Maybe I’ll aim at 60f (that’s 102 less calories!).
I also doubled the weight of my dumbbells. They’re now at 4kg each. Exercise was intense but not as hard as I expected. Prudence demands I don’t add more weight for a few days.
Speaking of exercise, cycling was good today. I tried to go faster in the same distance, but my average only increased by 0.54 k/h. Not all apps stop measuring when I stop to drink, so that average might be contaminated. May re-check the whole thing at some point in the future.
Some cardio mornings are lethargic
Also, my caffeine arrived today! This will help with the 4th lap of the Pentagonito I’ve been pining for and may prove useful during cardio. I don’t drink coffee so I’ll probably only take half a tablet. Curiously, local brands also sold 100-unit bottles at around the same price, but each tablet only had 100mg. This means that the imported thing with tariffs and middlemen profits still doubles the amount of caffeine for the same price. I guess caffeine is just that much cheaper in the USA. Weird.
About the food: for breakfast I had two protein scoops and an egg in two pancakes. Lunch was 181g of chicken breast and 208g of avocado. After cycling, in the afternoon, I had a protein shake and I ended the night with a scrambled egg and 88g of chicken breast. This was nutritionally perfect and delicious. I weighted the chicken, avocado, and even dinner’s olive oil for frying (10g). I estimate another 10g for the lunch’s chicken. I guess I’ll be weighing my food after all.
Just a bunch of chicken
I’ve realized chicken is cheaper than the protein isolate. The powder is 8.34p per sol (currency unit) while the chicken is 12.9p/sol. Chicken breast also only has 36f per kg, now a plus. Eating more chicken and maybe red meat will allow me to reduce the isolate to 3 servings per day, making a 1200g jar last for 20 days.
I had 6 cigs today. This isn’t a smoke quitting blog, so there’s no commitment there, shut up.
ERRATUM – Food charts in D-9 and D-10 aren’t adding the protein and fat of the eggs to the totals.
I went to bed late yesterday and overslept. As a result, I didn’t have much energy for cardio in the morning. I did put up a good fight so I get an 8.
Courtesy of the good people at the bodybuilding.com forums, I’ve erased my doubts about the proper amount of protein I need to eat. I should indeed be aiming at 160p, never less than 140p, and up to 200p without a fuss. More protein is advantageous for fat loss and minimizing muscle cannibalism (and in fact growing them). I was just worried because I had trouble ingesting that much of the powder.
A new world of possibilities
I also learned there’s a minimum fat intake that I should have. It’s 0.4 times my ideal weight in lbs. That means that I should eat around 65f-70f (grams of fat, new nomenclature). When I learned this I went and fried a hamburger. The nutritional table in the back of the bag was convenient. I never thought I’d end up reading those things seriously. I also looked up the fat amount in a 60g egg (6f). I ended up charting the whole thing and realized it made a fine screenshot for this blog, so I think I’ll be doing this from now on. I also looked up the amount of calories per gram of protein and fat (4 and 9 cal, respectively), so now my excel sheet counts my calories too. Apparently I ate a bit less than 1000 cal (nice!). The chart doesn’t include the butter and oil I used as a bed for the pancakes, scrambled eggs and hamburger though. Weighing that feels excessive. Surely it’s not much.
I’m getting better at making these
As for how those figures manifested: breakfast was two servings of powder with one egg resulting in two pancakes, lunch was two servings in two water pancakes, and at night I had the hamburger with a scrambled egg and some broccoli (veggies also aren’t counted in the chart). There’s one last protein shake that I’ll be drinking before bed.
Realizing the need for some fat intake has opened the doors for more enjoyment in my diet. I’ve now researched the fat and protein contents of avocado. I’ll be able to have some bacon and more hamburgers too. Good news all around. I had 3 cigs.
For breakfast, I had the usual two fried eggs, but I also added my first protein shake (24g of protein per serving). I found it acceptable in taste, although somewhat difficult to finish: it feels like a lot when you drink it. It was also a bit too sweet for my liking. I assumed my body just wasn’t used to digesting it because I got the runs. I decided on brute-forcing the issue.
Lunch was some pan garlic broccoli recipe I found on the internet that was easy to make, plus another shake with twice the serving in the same amount of water. I was trying to increase the concentration so there’d be less volume to chug, but it felt like a sandy sludge at that point, so I had to top it off with water.
Water pancake, half-eaten
Later in the afternoon, I went online and found out about creative ways to prepare protein powders. I tried making a pancake (just a scoop mixed with one egg) and It came out great. The egg must have done something to the sucralose because it wasn’t sweet in the least, a good thing since I think I’ll get sick of sweet cookie milkshake flavor, plus I get something to chew on. I was thinking of doing this from now on but I’d end up consuming way too many eggs, so I tried making a pancake from a paste of powder and water. This one retained the sweetness, and had the consistency of a soft cookie. I found it to be way easier to eat than the liquid shake, so I’ll probably do this from now on. At night I had another water pancake and a piece of leftover chicken from D-5.
The average local egg weighs 60 grams. According to the internet, that translates into 8p (8 grams of protein, new nomenclature). If that holds true, I ate around 168p today, not counting the chicken. I was trying to aim at 200p, but that got really difficult. According to what I’ve read, I need to eat enough protein to replenish broken muscle from intense weight lifting, so as to have the body rely on fat burning as the main source of energy while minimizing muscle consumption. Thing is, I do not know just how much protein I should be consuming per day. Reports vary and my particular circumstances are different from available information. It’s possible that the 200p number was for hulking men who needed a lot of muscle mass regenerated. Regardless, it should be between 100p and 200p. This also means I’ll run out of powder sooner than I thought. It’s going to get expensive, so this strategy of living on protein powder might not be tenable for the full regiment.
Not a pentagon
On the afternoon I went for my second cycling day. I made three laps around the Pentagonito (“little Pentagon”, the army’s HQ). The four apps worked this time, averaging 12.77 km in 52:28. The burned calories vary wildly according to each app that estimated it: one says 120, the other 542 and the last one 252. I don’t know what to make of that: I put my age/weight in all of them.
