Slow and Steady

These last few days, I've been trying to get back to eating low-carby and just eating a LOT of food. Although eating lots of fat and protein really doesnt make you feel like eating too much. Although I'm not sure I've made a lot of eating gains in terms of expansion or ability, I have pushed my weight back in a positive (numerically negative) direction. I really think that's going to be the tricky part of this new hobby of mine, trying to stay fairly healthy. I need to start rehabbing my leggies so I can start running. That's going to be key to being able to eat like a crazy.

Weight Watch: 175.5 lbs

Tomorrow: 4 lb sushi roll.

Revenge of the Pho Challenge

Yesterday, I went back to the Pho Garden to take on the Pho Challenge again with my trusty sidekicks Eric and Anna. This time i had a gameplan: cool the pho down with a pitcher of ice, use a fork to get pho consumed as quickly as possible, and just try to be an overall champion.

I actually did a pretty good job the first 20 minutes eating like a winner, but the next 40 were a series of battles between my mind and my willpower. In the end... the pho won again. But I'd say ate somewhere in the 80-90% range of the total amount, up from my devastating 40-60% the time before. At this rate, I may need two bowls the next time I go.

Overall record: 2-3, Bulk Record: 1-3

Next Challenge: 4lb Sushi Roll on Friday. I'm predicting a narrow victory for myself.


Update: Generally feeling like butt today, haven't felt hungry and feel like im getting a cold. Does it have to do with eating a ton of noodle carbs? I don't know.

Ramen

6 packs of ramen in 11 minutes. Cya ramen. That was a lot of salt.

Sunday: Pho Challenge, partie Deux


Weight Watch: 181 lbs. :-(

Burriiittttoosss

So there's this place called La Pinata that we went to to watch the soccer game. I thought it'd be a good idea to order two pretty large burritos and see how much i could get down. We're coming up on our office trip (June 25th!) to the Bay Shabu "Killer Whale Roll" challenge - 4 lbs of sushi in under 30 minutes. I believe 4-5 of us are going to try it. If we win, its free and a picture on the wall. If we lose, we shell out $30 apiece.

I think I got about one and a third burritos consumed in the half hour, and picked at another sixth for the next 5-10 minutes. We went back to the office and weighed the remaining half burrito on the mail scale. It came in at 1.11 lbs. So, overall, I think I got about 3 lbs done in the half hour. Gotta pick up the pace a little, and the sushi is mine. Its really going to come down to how much i can shovel away in the first 10 minutes. I'm thinking i need to eat at least three-quarters of it by that point.

Links to the Killer Whale Roll:
Kartel Blog
Joey Posterous Blog

Fun right?!

Update: I'm also watching my weight climb daily into the 185 range. Then I breathe a sigh of relief as it starts to plummet back down to manageable 176-178 ranges. But it does still look like its progressively getting larger. I either need to find a new training idea or just let it happen until I start school.

176.5

Weighed in this morning at 176.5. I had taken a slight break from training for the weekend due to a few reasons. First, I was a little concerned about my 3 lb weight gain since starting, and although that can sometimes be attributed to daily weight fluctuations, I weighed in at 178 at a time when i should be at my lowest daily weight. Soo... there was that.
Also, weekends are really hard to maintain a routine, what with the eating at friends' dinner events, the boozin', and the general not controlling every minute detail of intake.
In any case, I was able to eat a head of cabbage on friday night, which wasn't actually that filling.
And today i hit the pizzeria again. I think I'm going to have to find an alternate solution. I need to find good meat for $1.50/lb or less to compete with the price/lb ratio! An unlikely story...

Exercise?

Today I re-visited the fine establishment at Mountain Mike's for their spectacular pizza buffet, and put down 11 slices in around 40 min. Of course when i say spectacular, i refer to the price of $6.31 after tax. Since this is lasting me an entire day of fullness (three meals), it seems quite fiscally responsible for me to continue training here.

However, it was also brought to my attention that Sonya "the black widow" Thomas and Takeru Kobayashi both stay so thin and fit (Kobayashi is jacked) with the addition of exercise to their training regimen. This is something I have not been including, and with the lack of: gym membership, the ability to run, the proximity of my bike, and the mental stamina to jump rope, I find it hard to build an exercise regimen that is both fun and effective.

Suggestions welcome.

Mountain Mike's Pizza Buffet

Yesterday was an off day, mostly just had some hot dogs and some lettuce.

Today I took a trip to the local pizza buffet. Pretty decent stuff, small location, nothing like a Pizza Hut buffet. I had the equivalent of 10 slices of medium pizza. I probably could have taken down 2-4 more slices if pressed. But I figured I wasn't dress rehearsing just quite yet, more trying to get a gauge of where I was at. Looks like I have some work to do still before I'm ready to take on some of these challenges with any sense of confidence.

I'm not at all certain I'm training properly... There's no online documentation.

Asia Buffet

Every time I visit a chinese buffet, I end up feeling like shit and regretting the decision afterward. This time was no different. As part of my rigorous training regimen, I determined that a trip to the buffet lines was an inevitable activity, and one that would determine where I stood.

If our bathroom scale is accurate, I believe I consumed ~5 lbs of food and water in roughly half an hour. However, shortly thereafter I spent an hour wondering if I could halt, what in this industry they like to call, a "reversal" from taking place. It was close, but, in the end, I prevailed.

Bring it, Killer Whale Roll. I'm ready. Maybe.

Challenge failure to materialize

For lunch yesterday I had the guey teaw rahd kang at Thai Satay in San Leandro. Medium spice. Big portions. Very good. They boast of winning almost all the 2006 East Bay restaurant awards. I forgot to check in on my foursquare app.

So I went out to San Francisco to this John's Snack and Deli place to check out their suicide kimchi burrito. When I got there, I saw it was an actual hole in the wall, and was informed that they didn't have it available, as it was half an hour to closing. I'm just going to scratch this one off the list and put it in the category "not worth the trouble, and probably too easy to do".

But i did have some baller dinner at Anh Hong in the Tenderloin. 7 course beef dinner? Sign me up again twice. Deelish.

Spirits soar!

In a remarkable comeback from yesterday's training disaster, I pulled through quite the routine today. After a hurried breakfast of a quart of milk, I arrived at lunch with some gusto. Using the mail-weighing scale at work, I clocked my lunch of more cabbage and pork at a middling 1.2 lbs. And put it down like clockwork.

Inspired by the mail scale, I went to the local Target after work and bought a $33 food scale for my home weighing needs [90 day return policy, bayybeeee! - I'm not yet that big of a spender]. This baby can handle weights up to 6 lbs (which I hope I don't need to test soon). After consulting with a colleague of mine, Mr. Diaz, I was given the advice not to boil meat fat, as it will give it that gross taste I complained of yesterday. Today, I grilled up some more pork, and added it to the already made cabbage/pork mix. My dinner came in weighing at a sizable 2 lbs.

Start your engines. I started leisurely shoveling the pork in my mouth, and this time, I felt much better. I was able to put down a good two thirds of it before hitting a slight wall, but powered through. I then chugged a quart of water and stopped my time. 20 minutes. Excellent.

Although certainly not eating at a pace to take in 4 lbs of sushi in 30 min like I'll have to do within two weeks, this was certainly a good step in that direction. I was feeling pretty good at the end, and I can only imagine that sushi will be more delish and palatable than this concoction of mine.

Tomorrow brings a slight break in the training, as I will be facing off against the Suicide Kimchi Burrito Challenge at John's Snack and Deli (link here - no pics but I'll make sure to take one tomorrow) at around 5:15pm PT. I'll be bringing some of that lactose-free whole milk goodness that got me through the aftereffects of the Hellfire Challenge with few adverse reactions.

I am... bad at this

So day one of training. After a light breakfast of two eggs, a light lunch of two hotdogs and some lettuce, i went to the grocery store to pick up foods to begin in earnest. Pounds of cabbage and pork buying later, I started to cook up a storm, while dranking a glass of whole milk and eating a third pound burger patty. I boiled around 6 lbs of food (estimated raw weight), and was hoping to get through a lot of it....

I shoveled about a quarter of it into a bowl, and started digging in. Within minutes, however, I began to hit a wall. The food was just so unappetizing, despite my best attempts to spice it up. Cabbage is still cabbage, and fatty pork is still fatty pork. About 20 minutes in, I realize that, although I'm starting to get full, the real problem is the way the fat feels in my mouth. Making me nauseous. I slowly get down the rest of the bowl, and throw in the towel.

This will be harder than I expected.