Female

28

Washington, United States

Housewares

Jan, 2007

I played a lot of sports in school, but always struggled with my body fat due to poor eating habits. After high school, I no longer exercised regularly and ate like crap. In 2002, I weighed 185 lbs and had 40% body fat. I decided I had to do something. I started strength training and doing cardio regularly. I stopped eating read meat, pork and poultry. I enrolled in a martial arts class and loved it. After 1 year of martial arts I weighed 155 lbs and had 24% body fat, but my diet was still less than ideal,and full of too much sugar and fat. My situation changed and I couldn't afford the martial arts classes anymore so I had to quit and I found it difficult to be motivated to exercise on my own. My body composition, unfortunately, changed for the worse. Then, my employer had a "Biggest Loser" style event in which teams could compete. Some of my work friends and I thought it would be a great way to get in shape and support and motivate each other. We been worked out in the company fitness center everyday after work, and we got together on the weekends also. It gave me an excuse to get active again. My team worked really hard and came out in first place with 7.6% total weight loss! I really enjoyed seeing my teammates excited about the changes they saw in their bodies. Winning the challange was a huge condfidence booster for all of us, and everyone agreed that we would continue to work out and see what we can achieve by the end of the year. I'll be going back to martial arts classes very soon and the contest my work is ran gave me an excuse to get up and get into fighting shape so I won't feel years behind in class. This time I am doing things differently because this is the first time I have committed to a clean diet. I eat lots of fruits and veggies, and tons of fish, soymilk, and whole grains. I allow one cheat meal each week, but I seldom cheat because the empty calories and junk doesn't even sound good anymore!

I don't love exercise! Exercise is boring and a chore if you do it because you think you should! So instead I train to be better at the things I actually like to do, like jujitsu.

Sports and martial arts are fun and training for those things is fun, so I train with a goal in mind. I don't do squats because I should work on my legs, I do squats because they will make my kicks stronger. I think about why I'm doing this and what I'll get out of it with each rep. Of course thinking about looking good never hurts either! I also want to fight a full contact mixed martial arts match one day, so I have to get into fighting shape to reach that goal. My workout buddies are a big motivation to me as well. Some of them have a lot further to go than I do and they work their asses off, so I can't be lazy.