50 days and 184.6 miles to go

With 50 days remaining in Project David 2.0 I have 184.6 remaining to reach my goal of 1,000 miles. This was a goal that I added 45 days into the project, so the 1,000 miles is over 9 1/2 months time.  It is a combination of walking and running on the treadmill and running outside.  It is going to be close.  No more days off.  Or else extra daily doubles. :-)

The 1,000 miles was not in my original plans, but after a couple of months, and tracking every session I decided that maybe it should be another goal.  Last year my good friend Bob Stanke made his goal of running 1,000 miles.  A little more aggressive then I am, but great inspiration.  Maybe next year I'll try running the 1,000 miles.

With 2 months to go......

Thursday marked two months to go in Project David 2.0.  It also marks one month since I hit my original goal weight.

So what's happened in the last month? Well, we continue to drive to our final (David 2.1) goal of 7 bags of flour.  That would take us to a total of 71.6 pounds.  Over the last month we've lost another 4 pounds.  (There was an amazing Mother's Day brunch in the mix that might have had an impact on the weight loss. Might have had something to do with dessert. A chocolate layer mousse cake.) So we have two months to lose the last 6 pounds.  Pretty sure we'll get there.  And once we do we'll continue to focus on toning and strength.

What about the other goals? Well, the running continues, sort of.  I am planning on 2-3 5k runs this summer.  Schedule has been such that it's been limited, but we are continuing to walk.  I am up to 758 miles since I started walking/running on September 30th. That's like walking from Minneapolis, MN to Knoxville, TN.  In January I decided to see if I could get to 1,000 miles by July 17th.  I'll need 242 miles over the next two months.  Going to be tight since I am averaging about 100 miles a month.  Need to pick up the running to increase my daily totals.

People frequently ask me how I did it.  Did I use one of those commercial weight loss programs? Nope. I did it by diet and exercise.  I tracked everything I ate using MyFitnessPal, working against a reduced calorie diet.  I tracked all of my activities with a FitBit tracker.  The really nice thing is the MyFitnessPal app and the FitBit tracker sync together.  My activities log on MyFitnessPal and calculate my net calories letting me know how I need to adjust my diet.  And as you can see on my blog page, MyFitnessPal updates my blog with my total weight loss.  Great tools.  Check them out!  I highly recommend them.

GOOAAAAALLLLLLL!

On August 15th, 2011 I kicked off Project David 2.0. A transformation project with two major goals - personal transformation and professional transformation. My goal was to complete Project David 2.0 by July 17th, my 48th birthday. As I've previously shared, I hit my professional transformation goal when I started a new position with Best Buy on November 28th.

Today I am excited to share that I have reached my personal transformation goal. I set the goal to lose 61.6 pounds, and today, 8 months and 2 days, and 6 bags of flour later, I have achieved that goal!! 3 months early! Unbelievable.

It has been an incredible journey, but I am not done yet. Along the way I added several goals to reach before July 17th. Stay tuned as I continue to prepare for my first 10k run, try to lower my A1C to the point that I can get off of the oral meds, and get one more bag of flour!!

Thank you to my family and friends for all of their support along the way. I couldn't have done it without you all!

You've lost how much?

How much weight have you lost? I hear that question pretty frequently. So how much have I lost? Well, let's just say it's....

more than a 4 yr old, more than a 6 yr old, and more than 6 bags of flour.

As of today I have lost 60.6 pounds. 1 pound away from my original Project David 2.0 weight goal, and three months ahead of my goal date. But I'm not stopping there. I've decided to go for another bag of flour. Why? I still have some work to do to get to where I want to be. And I am still working on bringing down the body fat number as well. That has some room in it.

I am feeling great. I can't remember when I've felt this good. I am enjoying the running. Really enjoying how it feels when I finish up a 4-5 mile run. For me, an amazing accomplishment. Two reasons. I never had the desire to run, and with all of the walking and running that I've been doing since the end of September, I've not had any problems with my knees. Something that has been an issue for 30 years. Maybe it has something to do with dropping 25% of my body weight. Now that I've got my first 5k under my belt I am "training" to do a 10k. I'll keep you posted on how that progresses.

Each day I continue to be amazed at what I've accomplished in the last 7 months. When I started Project David 2.0 I just hoped that I could come close to my goals by July 17th. Today I am celebrating another milestone in a growing list of milestones and accomplished goals. I wouldn't have gotten this far without the support of my family, friends, and the vision I have for myself.

It was about more than just the shirt.

With my wife and kids cheering me on at the finish line, I accomplished something today that I never really thought I'd do. Something that 60 days ago I couldn't believe I would do. Today I became a runner. Today I ran my first 5K race, the St. Patrick's Day Human Race in St Paul. Not bad for a guy that 60 days ago struggled to run for 5 minutes, let alone 3.13 miles. My time, 28:25. I'll take it!! It was an unbelievable feeling as I came down the last few yards to the finish line. Seeing my kids jumping up and down cheering me on, giving me another burst of energy to "sprint" home. What a feeling. It was about more than just the shirt (although I proudly wore my first race shirt).

It was also about another accomplishment in my Project David 2.0 journey. It was an amazing day. I can't wait for the next race, and looking down the road to improving my distance and time and working towards a 10k.

I am 7 months and 3 days into Project David 2.0. An 11 month project. On Saturday I hit the scale, down 57.6 pounds. 4 pounds away from my original goal. So close to a goal that I hoped I could reach by the middle of July. And today I accomplished another goal - I earned the shirt.