Golf & Weightloss go together like ...

George Dubya Bush and books with big words. Yes, it's official, I can't play golf for toffee no more. Since losing this weight I've gone from competent 15 handicapper to someone who can't even break 100 today. I hit the ball further but seem to be unable to hit it where I want for 50% of the time it's doing my head in! Today went round in 100 off the back tees which isn't even 28 handicap stuff. Great Zeus' beard, if I can't get my act together quick what on earth am I going to do on May 10th when I'm supposed to be playing at the Audi thing at Loughborough golf club, sheesh.

Another milestone - 36" jeans!

This week I got some 36" waist jeans and they fit with room to spare. I've not worn 36" jeans in twenty years so that's a significant milestone for me. I'm aiming to be in 34" jeans by the mid-June. Another milestone is that I've not been 15st anything since my teens so that's another leap forward. Blood Pressure average is now 124/79 - again it's never been lower. All coming up roses for me at the minute. Well chuffed.

Week 9: 25-04-2007 First Target Achieved!!

Another good week in most regards. Bike riding up massively, as I write this on Saturday morning I've done over a hundred miles this week and this very morn had a go at doing the Ashbourne/Derby bypass which is a mile and a half straight uphill and it was no problem. Went onto ride 13.5 miles this morning. Saturday is my "guilty pleasure" day, I skip breakfast by doing the bike ride, washing the cars, checking the oil, cleaning my golf clubs, doing email and updating the blog, doing the hoovering most saturdays. Then about forty five minutes before I go golfing Janette will fetch me a double sausage and bacon cob from a shop called the Picnic Basket - it's total bliss and is just about my only Syn! Well worth missing breakfast for!

Am 3lbs short of losing 3 stone so that's what I'm aiming for for next Wednesday. I hit my initial target of 16st in just 9 weeks which just goes to show how good Slimming World's food optimising is. But I've combined food optimising with a range of good choices - big on exercise with loads of biking and a bit of golf whenever I can sneak off and play. Maybe, most significant is I've not had any alcohol for nearly 10 weeks.



Current figures:
Start Weight : 18st 11lbs
Current Weight : 15st 13.5lbs (103.06 KG)
Loss this week: 3.0bs
Total loss thus far: 2st 11lbs in 9 weeks.
New BMI: 29.51
Height: 6ft 1in (1.85m)
Blood pressure ten reading average: 124.8 over 79.1

Biking Stats Week 2 - preparation for Great Notts Bike Ride

Sean, a colleague from work has asked me if I want to join the team to do the fifty mile Great Notts Bike Ride which goes from Nottingham to Newark and back again. Although it's predominantly flat the distance is quite a bit more (by about three times) than am used to so at weekend I'm going to have to put in some serious practice to get there. I think it's at the end of June (24th?) so I've some time to get fit enough for it but it's still a serious run for the likes of me.

Did 9 miles this morning on my paper run but am going to see if I can up that to twelve - will need to get map out because I've already added Church Mayfield into the loop. Did fourteen plus miles on Sunday but that would have been more if the poxy bike computer hadn't kept switching off. Have replaced it with a £12 Lidl one which has a heart monitor now!!

Sunday 22-04-2007 - Sat 28-04-2007 102.66miles 9hrs 17mins Avg speed 11.05mph

Biking Stats Week 1

Have decided that I'm going to record my bike stats on here too as I get fitter. Have a cheapo bike computer from sunny Hong Kong that records distance travelled and time spent on bike.

This week Sunday 15th to Saturday 21st April I've done 65.27 miles in 6hrs 22mins which works out at about 10.25 mph on average.

Next week my target is to exceed 70 miles. Will see what average speed is next week!!!

21-04-2007 Golf - All gone wrong again!

Played in RNLI stableford this afternoon and scored a pitiful 27. Found bunkers off tee on first two holes, overshot lord knows how many greens, hit a brilliant drive down five then put a nine-iron into the bunker. Putted like a fool on most every hole. I really hate golf. Hit some good drives and some good irons, parred a few but 27 is playing to a 24 handicap not a fifteen handicap. On the positive, positive side I got on the par-5 eighth hole in two, which was nice!

20-04-2007 - Golf - Cotgrave Park, Nottingham - 88 nett 73.

Back in January I discovered (probably word of mouth from the whizzkids at work) the website hotdealsuk.com On this website I found that using Buyagift.com and a voucher code you could get 18 holes of golf for £3.50!! Only downside to all this was that Cotgrave Place near Nottingham was the nearest one I could use. Anyway, after crawling along the A453 and arriving late (people at Cotgrave Place happily changed the tee-time and were very nice about it all), we finally got onto the first tee at 11:52. A round of two halves then ensued - I whipped through the first nine in 39 which for me is very good but the back nine I made all sorts of duff decisions and ended up taking 49 (found water twice and three-putted quite a few times). I think if I played it again I'd score a lot better but here are the positives:
1). Have sorted out the irons, think I was guilty of chicken-winging it before and have started making sure I get my right elbow into my body more on the downswing - I hit most of the green in regulation on the front nine. I hit the flag on one hole.
2). I boomed I don't know how many big drives (for me) out there and found a lot of fairways off the tee.

I think if I'd known the depth of the greens I'd have made different choices for approach shots on the back nine which would have meant I'd have played to my handicap instead of being four over. However, 88 round a course I don't know off a handicap of 15.4 is not too shabby in my view.

19-04-2007 An aside - 38" jeans no good now!

A few weeks ago I got some 38" jeans having worn 40" or 42" for years. I texted Janette while she was shopping and asked her to get me some 36" jeans while she was out (£3 from Tesco - quality!!!). In her usual wisdom she bought me back 38" jeans - they're massive on me!!!! So well chuffed about that am going to trawl Ebay and see if I can pick some good ones up cheap.

18-04-2007 Week 8 Weigh-in 2.5stone award

Group is now moved to Wednesdays, weighed in at 16st 2.5lb which is a total loss of 2st 8lbs over 8weeks which I'm very please about. Had a bit sort of weekend as went to me mums and had homemade bread and lemon meringue and vienetta ice cream (not altogether) so had put on on Monday so Food Optimised 100% for three days to turn things round - Slimming World really does work and although there will be days when I have lose focus and mess things up I'm aware most of the time that I'm making blooming good choices!

Current figures:
Start Weight : 18st 11lbs
Current Weight : 16st 2.5lbs (103.06 KG)
Loss this week: 4.5bs
Total loss thus far: 2st 8lbs in 8 weeks.
New BMI: 29.97
Height: 6ft 1in (1.85m)
Blood pressure ten reading average: 132 over 83.8

14-04-2007 - Golfin, April Medal gross:90 nett:75

April medal at the golf club.

Am wearing a lotto XL polo shirt that has not fit me for about seven years which is nice - surprised at how much stuff in my wardrobe now fits really well.

Since losing all this weight my golf has been plain lousy most of the time. Today I managed to pretty much hold it together and shot a 90 off the white tees. Played pretty solid - got a new driver (MacGregor NVG DR 9.5 degrees, stiff shaft jobbo) that has all sorts of weighting technology that is supposed to straighten your drives out if you're someone prone to the power-fade like myself. I hit some beauts today and some rubbish as normal. Quite often I was left with eight or nine irons into the greens and it was these beggars that let me down more than anything. Putted really well making no end of the six to twelve footers which was nice.

90 less my 15 handicap was about four shots over handicap which wasn't bad when you consider I shot 103 a couple of weeks ago.

So it's coming back!!

11-04-2007 In the 16s - 8lbs lost since last weighin

Wednesday 11th April
Total loss 2st 4lbs in 7 weeks - Weighed in the afternoon on Wednesday as the group has now moved to a Wednesday. Everyone in this Slimming World group is doing great almost without exception and two of us got club 10 awards tonight which means that we've lost 10% of our starting body weight. This is something Slimming World recognises as 10% has some real health benefits - for myself my BMI has dropped from nearly 35 down to nearly 30 which is good and my blood pressure rolling average has dropped from 146 over 91 down to 132 over 85 which is great and I intend to see it keep dropping so I can get off some of the medication I have to take.
Lost 8lbs since last weigh-in. Great to see 16 at start of my weigh haven't seen that in twelve or more years I reckon.

Current figures:
Start Weight : 18st 11lbs
Current Weight : 16st 8lbs (104.87 KG)
Loss this week: 8lbs (note was on holiday last week with lovely flu, so really two weeks since last weigh)
Total loss thus far: 2st 4lbs in 7 weeks.
New BMI: 30.5
Height: 6ft 1in (1.85m)
Blood pressure ten reading average: 134 over 85.3