I’ve completed my seventh week of 4 Hour Body. If you want to read previous posts about my journey, use the links in the table at the bottom of this post or browse the 4 Hour Body tag archives of my blog.

Day 43 – Sunday, February 27, 2011

For breakfast I ate hard-boiled eggs, turkey bacon, and spinach. Rode for 13.74 miles on the stationary bike. Picked Mom up at the airport. She’ll be visiting until Thursday, on there will definitely be some extra cheat meals this week. For lunch I had chips and guacamole and a bowl with veggies, pinto beans, chicken, tomatoes, lettuce, and guacamole from Chipotle. Ate 3 pieces of pizza and a cannoli for dinner.

Day 44 – Monday, February 28, 2011

For breakfast I ate scrambled eggs, turkey bacon, and spinach. Went for a 2.29 mile hike. Had a steak bowl with veggies, pinto beans, tomatoes, salsa, guacamole, and lettuce for lunch.  For dinner Mom and I went to P.F. Chang’s. I had a bowl of egg drop soup, some chicken lettuce wraps, sweet and sour chicken, and a mini Tiramisu.

Day 45 – Tuesday, March 1, 2011

My weight was up about another 1.5 pounds this morning, but not surprising considering the big dinner last night. Ate the usual scrambled eggs, turkey bacon, and spinach to start the day. Did swings with the 50 pound kettlebell for sets of 75 and 45 repetitions. Then I completed the Ab Ripper X workout. For lunch I had leftover sweet and sour chicken from last night’s dinner and some black beans. Went to a half hour golf lesson with a half hour of practice after that. Then I played 18 holes of golf with a cart. I ate a small thing of trail mix in the middle of my round.

For dinner, I had a Groupon to a “New American” restaurant so took Mom there. It was interesting to say the least. We each order a starter salad and a main course, but they brought you a spoonful of something in between courses. They also gave you cotton candy at the end of the meal. We didn’t want desert, but they were trying to bribe us into coming back, so we each got a dessert for free. I’m not exactly sure what I was eating most of the meal, although my main course was a bass, so I’ll just post the pictures (I don’t have pictures of the “bites” they brought to us). The food was very expensive and the meal took 2 hours so I will not be going back.

Day 46 – Wednesday, March 2, 2011

I actually dropped 1.6 pounds yesterday so maybe it’s true that eating slow is good for you. I thought for sure I was in for a weight gain after eating the cotton candy and tasty dessert.

I didn’t have an early breakfast this morning. I’ve either got a cold or allergies are kicking in because I’ve had a runny nose and watery eyes for a couple of days. Did not feel like cooking at all. For breakfast I had a scramble made from hash browns, eggs, sausage, bacon, ham, green peppers, and onions with a couple of tomato slices on the side.

At a spring training baseball game I had a Super Rope licorice. At dinner I had a cup of Manhattan clam chowder, steamed veggies, and wild prawn linguini. I ate about half of the veggies and didn’t each too much of the linguini, but of course I finished the prawns. After dinner, we went to Cold Stone Creamery where I had a waffle bowl with Thin Mints mixed in Cheesecake ice cream. Fourth night in a row having dessert.

Day 47 – Thursday, March 3, 2011

Weight is up less than a pound from yesterday after not eating so great. Mom is leaving today so I’ll be back to the slow carb diet. For breakfast I ate scrambled eggs, turkey bacon, and spinach. For lunch I had a chicken salad. Had an hour golf practice session at GolfTEC. Made ground turkey, with taco seasoning and black beans for dinner and ate it in lettuce wraps. Warmed up my leftover steamed veggies from dinner last night to go with it. Ran 4 miles on the treadmill.

Day 48 – Friday, March 4, 2011

My weight was at a new low this morning. Lost all of the pounds from extra cheat meals. For breakfast I mixed up the scrambled eggs, turkey bacon, and spinach. I ate baked salmon, peas, and pinto beans for lunch. Went for a 5 mile hike. For dinner I had turkey and bean lettuce wraps with some broccoli.

Day 49 – Saturday, March 5, 2011

This is the second Saturday in a row I’m skipping cheat day, but it’s the second week in a row where I cheated on a bunch of other meals.

For breakfast I made a scramble with turkey bacon and spinach. I did sets of 75 and 50 reps with the 50 pound kettlebell and then completed Ab Ripper X. For lunch I had turkey and black bean taco salad. Walked 5.5 miles playing 18 holes of golf. Ate baked salmon, pinto beans, and broccoli for dinner. Went for 7.4 miles on the stationary bike and then ate a small pack of trail mix.

Tracking Progress

In the last two weeks I’ve learned that I can maintain weight (actually lose weight) by getting away from the slow carb diet a bit. This is great news! Considering I ate dessert 4 nights in a row and how much I cheated early in the week, I’m thrilled to have lost 2.7 pounds and dropped 0.4% body fat this week.

When	Weight (lbs.)	Body Fat (%)
Change	-16.9	-3.6
Day 1: 1/16/2011	193.9	19.4
Week 1: 1/22/2011	189.7	18.7
Week 2: 1/29/2011	187.9	17.9
Week 3: 2/5/2011	185.8	17.7
Week 4: 2/12/2011	183.1	17.0
Week 5: 2/19/2011	180.7	16.4
Week 6: 2/27/2011	179.7	16.2
Week 7: 3/6/2011	177.0	15.8

Here are some charts the Withings scale gives for weight and body fat %.

I was planning to stick to the same routine for another week, but since I only have 4 weeks left in Phoenix I’m going to switch to a muscle-building phase using some of the stuff from the Geek to Freak and Occam’s Protocol chapters of 4 Hour Body. Maybe that will help me drop body fat at a faster rate. I’m going to be using creatine (I’ve had good success with it before), chocolate whey protein powder, and protein bars. Other than that, I hope to keep my diet the same.

Look ahead to week 8.