Biggest Loser

Warning: I'm posting before and after pictures so feel free to NOT look! Even the "after" pictures have left some room for improvement. What can I say? I've had three kids and I wear my stripes proudly! :)

A few friends and I did this competition at the local gym and it was lots of fun surprisingly! It was just like the t.v. show with Team Challenges, Last Chance Workouts, weekly weigh-ins, and prizes. I didn't end up winning, which honestly, I knew I wouldn't. I just didn't have the mass to lose. I did it to see what would happen and because my friends were doing it. I can safely say that I'm in the best shape of my life and I've never been so confident in myself. I feel awesome! It's such a nice change to look in the mirror and think "Dang! I look good!" It's nice to feel comfortable in my clothes now. It's awesome to have things fit better, like they should. I love shopping for clothes and having to go back to get a size SMALLER. It's been fun seeing my body change. I feel different in my own skin. My belly doesn't hang to the side when I lie down like it used to. My thighs don't rub together when I walk. I like when Ryan puts his hands on my waist and I can feel that they're not as far apart as they used to be. It's just awesome. :)

The first Last Chance Workout was killer for me! It was basically just drills across the basketball court but it was something I had never done before. We did the same workout at our last LCWO and it was cool to see how much I had improved. It was still challenge but I wasn't dying. There was a LCWO when we went up and down 8 flights of stairs for 45 minutes. That was for sure the hardest workout. I've never gotten to the point where I've wanted to puke before. 

There were two Team Challenges. The first one was treasure hunt around downtown. You ran to certain  places where you had to answer a nutrition question and then do a certain physical challenge like a certain number of burpies or push-ups or lunge squats. This challenge wasn't really hard for me because each team was divided into three levels so the most in-shape were a's and then the least in-shape and overweight were c's. For some reason, our trainer made me a c. I felt bad because I didn't feel like I was doing my part. 

But then the next challenge she made me a 1. First of all, it had been raining all night so it was muddy and cold.  We had to 22 different relays on the baseball field and then they had scattered like a thousand golf balls around the outfield and you had to run out, could only grab one ball at a time, run back all the way to the top of the stadium and drop the ball into your team's bucket. Since I was a 1 my golf ball only counted for one point. Man, it sucked. Plus, our team was literally half the size of everyone else's. We had 12 people show up, the other teams had at least 20. Each team had to have five 1's and the rest of the team were 2's and 3's. We were at a total disadvantage but we didn't come in last and we destroyed everyone else when it came to the relays. 

We just had crappy people on our team. We had 14 finishers and the winning team had 22. Lame. Oh, well. I'm just happy with how well I did. Plus, an added bonus was that I won 16 free hours of daycare with the raffle. I'll definitely use that!!

So here's the results...
14.5 pound total weight lost
9.7% total weight lost
4.5% body fat lost
 1.5 inches off chest, 3 inches off abs, 2.5 inches off hips, .75 inches off legs and arms
7.25 total lost inches

I forgot to add that I did the Atkins diet and I think that was what really helped me to lose weight. The first week I lost 7 pounds! Then because I thought since I did so well that I didn't need to be so strict with the Atkins plan and I didn't lose anything for 3 weeks. I got back to really following the diet and then I lost the rest. It's completely transformed my metabolism too! The first two weeks are super hard because it is really really strict but then you start to introduce foods back into your diet slowly to help you identify what will make your body start craving and losing control of your appetite. But seriously, I can eat whatever I want now! I feel guilty about it but I'm not gaining weight! It's crazy that I can have to much freedom! So I really commend the Atkins diet to everyone!! You just have to stick with it through all three phases! If not, you're just torturing yourself for two weeks. Every time I talk about the Atkins, people always ask me if I've tried Weight Watchers. And I have and I had a lot of success with it the first time because I didn't know how to eat healthy. The second time I did it, I was already eating healthy so the weight didn't really come off like before. The Atkins is different because it has the science behind what is happening to your body with food that you eat. It's made me look at food differently that's for sure.