Jiu Jitsu and clean eating are a good combination for getting lean!

From 2003 to 2011, I was a competitive powerlifter.  When I started that journey, I weighed 195lbs and at the end, I was able to get up to 282lbs:

At this point, I was pretty strong with my best lifts in the squat, bench, and deadlift: 860lbs, 500lbs, and 672lbs.

Then I tore my pec clean off the bone.  After that, I stopped competing in powerlifting (although I still lifted) and re-arranged my priorities.  I didn't have to force-feed myself anymore and as a result, started to lose some weight.  Then I got married in 2012.  Then had a baby soon after.  All the while, I kept losing weight simply because I didn't have to eat big anymore.

I joined a jiu jitsu place in June of 2012 (Elite Team East Bay in El Cerrito) and was really having a great time.  When I started, my body weight was around 250.  As the months went by, I kept losing weight.  If you've ever done jiu jitsu, you know it's really tough and involves a lot of hard work.  Eventually, I got down to around 220lbs at the beginning of 2015.  At this point, my wife and I got the amazing news that we were expecting another child.  So, I decided that this would be a good chance for me to compete in a jiu jitsu tournament. I picked a lower weight class (208lbs with a gi on) so I had to cut weight to about 203lbs.  With the tournament happening on June 20th, I had several months to clean up my diet a bit and drop the 17lbs.

Well, it is about time.  I have a little over a week to go and this is the result:

My body weight is around 200lbs and I'm the leanest I've ever been in my life.  I weighed 165lbs at one point in college, but I didn't have any muscle so while I was light in weight, I wasn't really lean.

Here are a few pictures detailing the results of about 5 months of hard training and a pretty good diet:

I'm going to certainly try to lose a little more body fat after the competition and see how lean I can get BUT, who knows what will happen. Without a competition to keep me motivated, it will be tough.  I am pretty sure that this will be my best chance to do this because when kid #2 comes, I sure as hell won't be worried about diet or exercise.

MMMMMM that shoe tastes pretty damn good....

It seems that the concept of "opportune timing" does not exist in my world. I mean, I'm as lucky the next guy and will have my fair share of serendipidous encounters/experiences but for the most part, a lot of what I do (or in this case) what I say tends to be at the worst possible time.

I attended a wedding this weekend (Nov 13th). Amazing, beautiful, elegant, fanciful, etc etc are all great descriptive words that understatedly delinate the afternoon and evening.

You're probably thinking, "ok, this sounds like a normal wedding...."

And it was. The nuptials were executed outdoors, right next to the calm ocean with a setting sun as a backdrop and the Ritz Carlton Hotel as a breeze blocker to our left. The happily married couple finished with the ceremony and were on their celebratory walk back down the isle. During their leisurely jaunt, Dave and I were reciting a line from the movie "Princess Bride"

"Wuv, twuuuu wuvvv!"

I then immediately thought about that one part in the movie when they go to see Miracle Max to help revive the mostly dead Wesley. When they were leaving Max's house, the old couple say,

"You think it will work?........"

"It'll take a miracle."


So yea, I said that out loud. And the shitty/funny part about that was, I said this just as the married couple walked by.

I spent the next several minutes trying to convince the people around me that what I said was totally taken out of context and that I was just reciting one of my favorite lines from a movie. I don't think they believed me.

C'est la vie.

Despite the embarrassing nature of this moment, I am comforted by the one fact that Asian Murphy has the un-surpassable title of "Saying the completely wrong thing at the completely wrong time"

If you don't know who the Asian Murphy is, look at one of my previous posts titled "Asian Murphy's Law" and read the inauspicious moment #3....

WTF?

This is what you find when you're bored out of your mind and have grown weary of searching the entire youtube archives for entertaining shit.

I will say this... If I happened to come home and find something like this waiting for me, I just might simultaneously shit and piss myself and then do this:

I laugh every time I watch that video. She was a pretty good sport about it. If that were any of the girls that I know, someone's nutsack would be stapled to the wall.

How I got over my fear of the dark

This is a short, coming of age tale of a young boy, his fear of the dark, and how this fear was violently purged.

I think I was about 7 years old or so and I was having trouble falling asleep. Mom and dad were in the kitchen talking about stuff. Around 11pm or so, I walked into the kitchen and told my parents that I couldn't sleep.

My dad asked, "why can't you sleep?"

To which I replied, "I'm scared of the dark."

Dad then said, "oh, I can fix that."

He then took me into the bathroom that was directly connected to his. This bathroom was freaky. It was old, smelled funny, and the shower that was in it had so much grime that you couldn't see through the door. Once in the bathroom, he turned on the cold water in the shower, pushed me in clothes and all, closed the door, and said don't come out until I come back.

I was in that shower for what felt like an hour or so (I think it was about 15 minutes). I had time to reflect upon why I was really afraid of the dark. When my dad came back, he opened the door, turned off the water and said, "go to bed." I quickly dried off and wanted nothing more than to be in my bed. I slept rather easily and have not had a problem with being afraid of the dark since.

Now, if only there were a similar way for me to get over my fear of little people. I mean, I find them absolutely fascinating but whenever I get near one, I freeze up.

Anybody know of a "midnight cold shower" equivalent for midget fear?

Sometimes... you don't need words.

Remember how I said that sometimes you need to kick a girl in the cooter? Well, if I had to face this particular cooter, I might just turn tail and run the fuck away.

I miss Berkeley....

Just this past Sunday (8/16/09) I was in Berkeley, walking along Telegraph Ave. I was very close to the Amoeba's. As I was on my leisurely stroll, enjoying the sun and cool weather, I happened upon the most random verbal exchange ever.

To my right, there was a homeless man. He was blind and had one of those "seeing" canes. He was standing in front of Amoeba's. To my left, there was another homeless man. He was not blind and he was sitting on a bench about 10 feet away from the blind guy. The following conversation happened, verbatim (the names are different to protect the innocent)

normal vision homeless guy: "hey, Joe!"

blind homeless guy: "huh? who is that?"

normal vision homeless guy: "It's Steve!!!"

blind homeless guy: "Steve?"

normal vision homeless guy: "Yeah, you know, the guy who helped you take a shit last night!"

Berkeley. Telegraph Ave. I miss college.

Drinking Contest

I went on a short trip to Los Angeles, I think it was for a few days, with my ex. We were gonna hang out with some good friends and have some fun.

These good friends of ours are korean women, 3 of them to be exact. We were gonna go to a Korean club and party. I had never been to a Korean club before but had heard about the shenanigans that go on there. Lots of Crown Royal and little asians does not go well together. Anyways, on the way there, these girls talked about how much they drank the last time they went and how they drank a bunch of people, including dudes, under the table. I muttered out loud that they would not be out-drinking me. Lots of laughter and giggling ensued. That only pissed me off even more. There was no way I was getting beaten at drinking by 3 little Korean women.

We get to the club. Order a bottle of Crown Royal and start drinking.

14 shots later, I was done. Not only was I done, I couldn't move. The 3 Korean girls with me and my ex? All fine, they went dancing. Actually, the 3 girls went dancing and my ex stayed with me. I remember hearing this guy sitting close to us talking to my ex and saying how they should go dance. She said no and he replied, "but he's fucked up, he won't even know." I thought to myself, "If I could move, I would totally fuck your ass up." But I couldn't even open my mouth, so I just laid there.

Next thing I remember was waking up at a noodle house or something like that. I had a cup of tea that I was nursing. In and out of consciousness I went. I have no idea what time it was or how long we had been there, let alone how the hell we even got there. But, I knew one thing, I was really fucking drunk. I needed to get some air. So, I got up and walked outside. I walked to the sidewalk and noticed a bench. I sat down and put my head in my hands. I then noticed a bright light shining down on me. I looked up and wondered what the hell it was. "Sir, are you OK?" Was the question I heard. I replied, "yeah, I'm just getting some air." Turns out it was LAPD and as they were walking towards me, probably to take me to the ol drunk tank to sober up, the 3 girls and my ex come running out of the building screaming their heads off about how I was with them. The cops told them to keep a better eye on me and left. The girls got me in a cab and we went back to the hotel.

So yeah. Don't battle little Korean girls at drinking Crown Royal. They will win.