How to Fat Smash and Become an Ultramarathon Man, Pt. 1

When you surpass the weight of Homer Simpson, you began to develop an elephantine disgust with oneself. I had done this several months prior, yet kept engorging myself with foodstuffs through the holidays. It is a lucky bit then, I suppose, that ultimate collision of several motivating entities that drove the forging of both form and mind. With continuing fortitude, I shall hammer myself into an ultra-marathoner. What a load of pretentious drek that was… In all seriousness, I had previously heard that the only way the vast majority of people who achieve a drastic change in body type manage to do so is the mindset that comes along with absolute abject misery towards the state of their body. To paraphrase: I was a disgusting fat body. I felt my fat had gained enough experience to go up a level. Somewhere between 230 (Homer’s weight) and my peak of 252 I had slipped into obesity. You can feel this. Your bulges no longer seem to be a part of you, but almost as though you are wearing a coat of lipids. The underside of your arm touches your chest before it’s supposed to. When you sit on the toilet, your gut takes a nap on top of your leg. You sense your wife’s growing abhorrence towards your naked form. I would like to think that that was the kicker, that my need to please the love of my life was enough to push me to better health. For the sake of not delving into the darker, more honest portions of my psyche, we’ll leave it at that. Luckily, several other things simultaneously occurred, the first being that several of my teammates at work expressed a similar desire to shed a few pounds. Competitive nutcases that we are, a bet was formed. Money was put on the line, big money. The second motivating factor was Wired magazine publishing an article on Dean Karnazes. Dean is known as the “Ultramarathon Man� This guy ran 50 marathons in 50 days. He’s ran a marathon at the south pole. He’s won the Badwater Ultramarathon, a 135 milerace from Death Valley up a mountain… in the middle of summer. I was awed at what he had done, and inspired. If this guy could push the limits of human endurance as far as he had, I certainly could push myself 1 50th of the way there. And I could give myself 2 years to do it, which would give a nice milestone of running a marathon when I’m thirty. I plan on covering the grueling steps to get where I’ve gone, and where I’m going. But right now I’ll just settle for telling you we had our second of 3 weigh ins for the bet. I’ve lost 30 pounds, more than twice the competition. I can run 5 miles on a hill climb program when I’ve never been able to run much more than 1 flat, even when I was in my weight lifting football years. I bought a belt yesterday because I was on my old belts last notch and my pants were slipping off. Best of all, I’ve had a lot of women tell me they can tell I’ve lost weight and I’m looking good. And one of those women happens to be my wife.

  1. I am glad you are feeling better about your whole program. Keep telling people and write down exactly what you are doing so others can follow your example.

    S. H. Skuld
    March 7th, 2007 at 9:39 am
  2. Congratulations, R G! I am eager to read about your process!

    I keep watching the infomercial for P90X (where you can get RIPPED in just 90 days!) wishing that I were slim enough to at least start such a program. Perhaps when you reach your weight goal you can then set a “ripped” goal and never have to wear a shirt again.

    JessB
    March 7th, 2007 at 12:39 pm
  3. Actually I’m hoping to become to get so ripped I don’t Have to wear pants.My Abs and quads would be so huge that you couldn’t see my naughty bits.

    R Glow
    March 7th, 2007 at 6:55 pm
  4. OMG you’d totally be a Ken doll!

    JessB
    March 7th, 2007 at 9:10 pm
  5. Sometimes you need a wake-up call to get out of your old habits and in to shape. Mine was finding out that despite living with a vegetarian and eating generally well, my cholesterol was over 230. Damned chromosomes!

    And I also wanted to mention that back in 2001/2002 when we were working out, you were in pretty good shape, but bulkier from the weight lifting. So I knew you had it in you, underneath all that flab.

    Jason
    March 10th, 2007 at 3:36 pm

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