Day - 1 Rating - 1

Alright first day of the 30 day challenge...  Woke up at 10.30am, Slept at 4am this kind of has become the habit in the last few weeks... need to change this, will try to... Had a breakfast of muesli with milk, went to the gym, ran 2.5kms in 20mins, then cycled for 10mins and covered 6kms... but i dont trust that number, it seems too quick. No swimming as Tuesday is the day of cleaning the pool... lunch 3 flat breads with a mix vegetable curry, one black coffee. Evening had a black coffee and upma. Dinner 1 cucumber, few pieces of carrot and beet root and some of whats called as a Oat Bites ... Went a little overboard with Oat Bites... happy with the day no major slip-ups... hope to keep it going...

The next steps....

Entry for Sep 15th 2014..... Thought of starting the next phase last Tuesday... but as fortune would have it, I fell down from my bicycle, hurt my knee a little, I still cycled to work, but stopped running... Last Saturday went for swim after getting rest for 5 days... Swam 2.5 kms 102 rounds... Sunday went for an outing with friends, and we were playing a game of touch, so there was running involved on a rocky hill and I hurt my ankle a little on an uneven rock... so Monday didn't do anything... ankle is a little heavy will test it tomorrow on the treadmill... So anyway tomorrow on wards will start the regimen again... got my fridge filled with veggies and fruits but the fridge is broken so they are staying out of it... might be a good thing after all... I wont be complacent and will eat them out of the fear of them going bad... so this might just help me out... Blessing in disguise of sorts... Now the next set is for 30 days... this time serious adherence to every rule and no lapses for 30 days... So time to restate the rules again... and 1 year completed since i started this whole thing... after 1 year 10 kg of weight loss, learning to swim, buying my first vehicle --  a Cycle :) :) ... Learning to run long distances, Writing Poems, 2 blogs, 2 videos which were shortlisted to represent the organization i work for and were selected as the top videos in my country both the times... Last 1 year has been rewarding to say the least... Very thankful for it... So here are the modified rules...

1. I will not starve myself with weird diet plans...
2. Will try to eat as much of Fruits and Vegetables as possible...
3. Avoid Rice and Oils, Butter, Cheese etc..
4. DO NOT miss breakfast...
5. No TEAAAAA....
6. Avoid Baked, Fried, Deep Fried food....
7. Take smaller portions, but no limit on number of meals... Starving doesn't help....
8. Do your 3 normal activities at least 5 days in a week, Running, Cycling and Swimming...
9. Record each days activity in the Blog...
10. LAST but NOT THE LEAST....  NO MATTER WHAT .... Stick to the Rules...

Lets hope I succeed and be ready for the next 30days... going to attempt my first half marathon after missing the one last month on October 12th .... lets see how that goes... Excited for the next 30days... 

Day 161 to 180

Alright this has been long overdue... My laptop charger broke off... so didnt have access to internet for a while... i managed to download the Blogger app in my mobile, but typing into it is difficult... so didnt write it... Got the new charger now, so set to write again.... on 10th did a 10km in a hilly forest area and then got back pain again... 3 weeks of no activity and no running... getting back on track from last week onwards... During the 3 weeks of rest had plenty of food and specially chicken... for some reason, 3 or 4 days of eating chicken helps with back pain... might just be my superstition... anyway been a mixed period of rest and activity... pleasure and pain... kind of fire and ice... here is the list of my activity from daily mile.... i made sure to keep the log up to date... all in all I'm at 90 now... its not going down below... in last week i have increased the activity and started working out on the bicycle machine in the gym... increasing the load on it to go up to a maximum of 20... Will try to update the blog daily from tomorrow on wards... my big downfall in my opinion had been to target a huge number of days... 100 or 180... that made it okay to slip off every now and then from the set rules... i went to a point where i wasnt following the set rules at all... anyway in the last 6 months I've lost some weight... became surprisingly good at swimming... did 15kms twice... missed out on half marathon due to back ache... bought a bicycle moved near to office, gym and pool... hopefully became a lot more fit compared to earlier... planning for a half marathon on october 12th... at the same event where i started running last year... Intensified my regimen in last week... running, cycling in the gym and swimming all one after the other... hoping this would get me the changes in weight that i want... participated in a poetry contest conducted by a local poetry group in this city... my poem was disqualified as i didnt submit a photo which was one of the prerequisites... but they liked the poem and published it on their Facebook page as a special mention... so that was something new... and i wrote it in 3 hours... as i saw it on the last day 3 hours before the closing of the contest... been a nice 9 months or so... not exactly met the weight targets but i am not worried about that... so here is the log... Next target is 30days i want to do it right... so straying this time.. lets see what i can do in 30 days...

Day -- 160

Entry for 07/30/2014   --    Slept around 3am yesterday... didnt wake up till 12:15 pm... went to office no running and no swimming... had a lunch of 5 flat breads with sprouts boiled in water and some spices... had 2 teas one in the afternoon and one in the evening... around 8 pm had 4 or 5 small balls of fried black bean dough.... not a smart choice... dinner had 4 flat breads again got sprouts boiled in watery gravy... late night had some dry fruits... going to bed... TV will be off from tomorrow... hoping to get my act together from tomorrow... Lets see how it goes...

Day -- 159

Woke up at 11 am... stupid thing i did last night didnt sleep till 5 am this morning... may be even slept later than 5 am... anyway no breakfast as i woke up late... went to the gym and ran on tread mill... wanted to do the best i could... did 2.5 km in 18 mins... for the first time cranked up the tread mill to 12 km/hr and managed to last for about 3 mins... happy with that... lunch had 2 flat breads some rice, couple of vegetarian curries in very small quantity, some sweet dish... had a tea... evening went to eat something and the cafeteria didnt have anything... so that screwed me... as we had to go out of the office and eat a lot fried snacks... a  slip up and that screwed my day... need to keep up my running routine... got a 10 km race coming up on 10th August and my first half marathon on 24th august... if only I can just keep my damn mouth and glutton in control... it would be great... time for bed now...

Day -- 158

Entry for 07/28/2014   ---  Slept like a baby last night...Slept for 10 hours... no breakfast as i woke up late... went to the gym, did a recovery run on the treadmill... did 2.05 km in 16 mins... went to office had a lunch of 3 flat breads with some vegetarian curry don't remember what it was... had a couple of teas... evening had a 2 egg omelette with some bread... Didn't have any dinner ... came back home... got hungry later on and ate lot of dry fruits... kept watching TV till 5am in the morning next day... stupid thing to do... but somehow it went on this way.... anyway need to get some discipline into my day... will try 

Day -- 157

Entry for  07/27/2014 --- Here we are the first D day... woke up at 4.45 am... got ready and got to the race location 2 mins late... the crowd doing 10 km, 15 km and 21 km started off before i got there... i started 3 mins late... anyway started with my slow and usual rhythm... the start it self was a up climb... a gradual one thankfully... then there was a down slope and an immediate up slope... i didn't mind it much anyway... i was going pretty well... with usual speed... after 25 mins took a break as i had to empty my bladder which i couldn't do at the beginning of the race as I reached late... then went on with my usual walk run method of running.... there were no markers to indicate the distance completed.... also it wasn't an out and back race for 15 km... so it was difficult to understand how much i had covered... so i didn't know if i was running better than my previous race or not.... at one point felt like i was running more than 15 km... anyway... i did complete the 15 km distance in .... Drum rollllllssssss.... 1 hr 52 min and 44 seconds... so that's 113 mins.... 31 mins less than my previous 15 km race... that is amazing improvement at least for my standards...and the time taken per km was 7 mins and 30 seconds... that's my best speed in any race... couldn't have imagined better stats.... this has clearly gave me a boost to attempt my first half marathon.... I'm very excited about it now... very little leg pains... 15 km didn't feel a lot different than 10 km... so my legs aren't complaining... excellent day to be honest... during the run had water and a couple of bottles of energy drink... after the race was done had 2 bananas... Then got home ate an apple... took rest at home till afternoon... then had a lunch of 5 flat breads with cauliflower boiled in a thin curry sauce, some carrot dry curry and lentil stew.... evening went for a swim... did a slow 40 rounds... felt amazing that i didnt feel any fatigue at all... wanted to eat well in the night... some protein as i normally do after a race... so had 4 pieces of spiced chicken cooked on indirect heat from burning coal... 5 flat breads made of wheat flour... and a mixed veg curry... slept around 11 pm... A great day... really happy... lets see if i can continue...