Adventures In Weight Loss, etc.: Hello Everyone!

Hi,

My name is Dan and I am a first time blogger. I have always been interested in writing a blog in order to develop my own writing skills and for the purpose of motivating myself to achieve better results in regard to my diet and exercise programs. I didn't want to limit my topics to just writing about diet and exercise, so as you can tell from the title, I left a little wiggle room.

A little about myself:

I was born and raised in the great state of Michigan in 1988. I was always one of the kids that didn't really fit in to a clique but I had friends in all of them. I guess the one that I associated myself with the most was the nerds and the geeks: I graduated with a respectable GPA (3.707). I ~~was~~ am a Star Wars fan. I was in band for all of my middle school and high school years (got my band letter! haha), playing saxophone. Not only was I in the upper level concert band (our school had two concert bands, "Concert Band" and "Symphonic Wind Ensemble" (SWE)), I was in marching band and I did some small chamber group stuff (Sax Quartet, Woodwind Ensemble, Jazz Band). My senior year, the Quartet I was a part of was selected as the best Saxophone Quartet in the state of Michigan. We went so far as to record a CD. --> i.e. Band Nerd

I was also athletically inclined. I played 4 years of football, playing Guard, Full Back, Defensive End, and both Outside and Inside Line Backer. My true love was then and always will be hockey. I play two years on Varsity with my high school program and the other two years for teams not affiliated with schools. My love for sports got me in to weight training. I didn't really lift hard until the summer before my senior year. From my freshmen to my junior year, I went from 155lbs to maybe 170lbs. This was not all muscle gain. I definitely was not out of shape, but I had little to no definition in my muscles either. By the start of football season, I was tipping the scales at 185. By the end of the year, I had bench pressed more than 200 lbs for the first time in my life. I was squatting 340, dead lifting (hex bar) 475, power cleaning 190, and benching 205. I graduated high school weighing 190lbs at 5'10.5"

Then college happened. Since graduating high school, my weight has ballooned as high as 235 lbs. Even though I started participating in AFROTC during my second year, I have been struggling with my weight constantly. The skinniest I have been in that time was in August 2009, right after I came back from AFROTC field training. I came back at about 190 lbs after a month of training. This past summer is when I ballooned up to 235. I saw a picture of myself after a day at the beach and absolutely hated the way I looked. That day I went back to the gym. I have been lifting on and off all through college. The only progress I have made is raising my bench up to 255 lbs. Once the semester started up in the Fall of 2010, the stress started to mount, and I fell off the wagon again.

So now, here we are. Mid-way through the second week of the spring semester. I am starting a couple of new techniques and strategies to lose weight, and sharing my journey with the entire interwebs. I'll try to keep accurate picture uploads and have a table of my progress numbers. Feel free to message me and ask questions, or leave comments. Any encouragement you have to offer will be much appreciated as well.

Initial Shots: 21 Jan 2011 215.4 lbs