Last Tuesday I decided to head down to Los Angeles for some advanced body fat testing. Unfortunately mother nature decided to intervene and bless us with the worst rains in years. Luckily I survived and after spending a total of six hours in traffic (I was only heading down to irvine!) I made it home mostly intact.
But let me go into my visit to the body fat test center some more. I had made reservations for three different type of tests. The first one was to test my resting metabolic rate. During this test they sit you in a comfortable massage chair and then stick a tube in your mouth that can only be described as a cross between scuba gear equipment and the gear used in the Rocky 4 Russian training montage! After fifteen minutes of ackward breathing I was done with the "easy" test.
The second test is best described as chinese water torture! It is a method of weighing someone while completely submerged in water, or more commonly known as the "water dunk test". This test is a lot harder then it sounds, you literally have to go under water and expell ALL of your air. Then you have to hold it for a few seconds, its a feeling of near drowning that took me a few attempts to get right. Then again how do you get "nearly drowning" right? Luckily after a few minutes it was all over. The good news is this test is the most accurate way of body fat testing. With margin of error being +/- 1 percent. Most other methods including caliber can be off by between 3 to 6 percent, which as you can guess is grossly inaccurate. So if you want accurate body fat testing, all you have to do is nearly drown! What a deal.
Finally came what I like to call the "iron man" test. This is where they put a mask gizmo around your head so that you can keep a breathing tube in your mouth. It makes you look really cool and sound like Darth Vader. Other then that it allows the computer to monitor your oxygen consumption as you traverse the treadmill. They also give you a heart rate monitor to check your heart rate during the test. The test consisted of increasing treadmill speed and incline as they pushed my heart to its limited. By the end of the test we peaked at around 191 beats per minute, or as I like to call it the, "gee I think im going to puke" zone.
Now that all the testing was done, I had the to sit down and look at the printouts of my performances. As predicted they were pretty scary. Before my downhill slide I was in excellent health when it came to body fat as well as my cardiac endurance. I was really shocked at the degree i had degenerated to in a mere two years! As promised I am 100 percent candid about my experience and below I will list all my results as they were given to me by the testing center. As a side note I need to note that the test center scale had me weigh in at 329 while my local gym had been reading 326. For the testing purposes every statistic is based on 329, further updates to my blog will be based on my local gym's scale so results may be slightly scewed by +/- 2 lbs.
Test Date: January 22, 2008 12:42 PM
Sex: Male Age: 25 Height: 75.25 inches Weight: 329.5 lbs
Ankle Circumference: 11 inches
Resting Pulse: 70 BPM
Water temp: 33 C
Water WEight: 6100 grams
Hydrostatic Evaluation:
Body Fat %: 32.1
Fat Body Mass: 105.8 lbs
Lean Body Mass%: 67.9
Lean Body Mass: 223.7 lbs
NOTE: The system recommended an ideal body fat percentage of 15%. If lean body mass is maintained during dieting, this would entail losing 66.3 lbs to settle at a weight of 263.2 lbs. Currently I am what I would consider "really REALLY fat" so there is a lot of room for improvement. Always look at the bright side of a situation!
VO2 Testing Results
Cardio strength:
start AeT AT Peak
VO2 (ml O2 / kg/m) 8.9 13.9 15.0 25.2
Heart Rate (BPM) 105 124 128 191
Calories Per Hour 384 601 647 1090
Fitness Level Very Low
AeT = Aerobic Threshold AT = Anaerobic Threshold
NOTE: For all those who prefer the easy explanation over the numbers above, the analysis basically says im in horrible shape. I am currently the polar opposite of Lance Armstrong. While i have never been a runner, in the past my cardio was in great shape and I am set on reaching my goal!
Fitness Level Scale for Age 20-29
Very Low Low Fair Good Excellent Superior
<33.0 (thats me!) 33.0 - 35.6 36.5 - 42.4 42.5 - 46.4 46.5 - 52.4 52.4
Target Workout Zones:
Moderate Zone (optimal for fat loss): HR 124-128
HIgh Zone (optimal for cardiac training, not optimal for fat loss) HR 128 - 175
NOTE: From analyzing the above data you can deduct that the optimal cardio for body fat loss is a slow cardio. When I started doing cardio sessions recently it was easy for my heart rate to settle into the 140 to 150 BPM range. keeping my heart rate at around 128 was a great challange because for me it was a walking pace. And "walking" never felt like much of a workout. To assist me I bought a Polar Heart Rate Monitor which has helped me greatly in the last week. The only downside to this method is that you have to do cardio for longer periods to burn more calories then before. The reality is that running or going faster may be good for your heart but you will burn more muscle and less fat during the activity. So slow and steady wins the body fat race!
Target Caloric Zones
Recommended Daily Caloric intake for Weight Loss Zone: 2731 - 3413 calories
Maintenance Zone: 3413 to 4436 calories
NOTE: Please note that my caloric intake requirements are much higher then the average person. Even though I am over weight I still have almost 225 lbs of lean body mass which is more then most peoples complete mass. This is an important fact to realize for anyone who starts out "larger". Most diet fads out there have you go down to 1500 or even 1000 calories per day. For anyone that is above average in natural size this could be a medical disaster. Starvation is not the key to diet. In fact, it will bring your metabolic rate to a halt and hamper your fat loss instead of assisting it.
Resting Metabolic Rate: 3413 calories
Lifestyle & Activities: 1023 calories
Excercise: 426 calories
Total = RMR + Lifestyle + Exercise
My Total = 4862
NOTE: THe lifestyle & Activities as well as Excercise numbers were calculated by questions I had answered before my test. the 426 calories burned would be the equivolant of my body performing 30 to 45 minutes of cardiovascular activity at 128 BPM.
Calories IN vs Calories Out Comparison:
Calories IN 2732 VS Calories OUT 4862
Caloric Deficit: 2130
Calories in 1 lb: 3600
NOTE: From the previous calculation you can see that simply by keeping my diet to roughly 2732 calories and doing moderate cardio each day I can lose upwards of 2/3 of a lb of weight a day. An important thing to notice here is that there are a lot of hidden variables to this sytem. If my caloric intake drops below recommended levels it can slow my resting metabolic rate. Additional cardio can increase my daily excercise caloric output as well as weight training.
During the remaining weeks of my Getting Back To Awesome Project I will keep all these numbers in mind as I continue to battle toward my end goal. This trip was like a rude awakening that forced me to look at myself and evaluate my health. The journey will only get tougher from here but I confident that in the end i will be victorious. I hope you will follow me on my journey and as always I greatly appreciate the feedback and support.
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Monday, January 21, 2008
Week One Reactions
Well, it has been a week since the beginning of my project and it has already been full of triumphs and failures.
Going into this project I knew it would be a big test for me both mentally and physically and it definitely has not disappointed. This week has been a build up to my week two and three where my cardio training will be in top gear. This week I trained with weight four times; Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday. I also have ramped up my cardio dramatically from my previous light cardio training. I managed morning one hour cardio workouts on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. I also managed to get night cardio sessions Monday and Wednesday which really pushed me to a new level. During this time I found my new favorite cardio machine, the Nautilus Treadclimber. If you haven't tried this machine then you have to give it a try! it will kick your butt! Its like a hybrid stair climber/treadmill. What I like best of all is that I can get a high intensity cardio workout without hurting my knees like running or the stair climber have done for me in the past.
When it came to diet I definitely had a lot of mental demons to overcome. During the months before this project my diet was never horrible but I had a bad habit of eating too much good food. And no matter whether a meal is healthy or not if you take in more calories then you burn then you will gain weight over time. Clearly my previous diet was tipped the wrong way when it came to a caloric balance. In order to keep my diet manageable I decided to keep my meals simple. My week one arsenal included mass prepared brown rice, mass prepared chicken breasts, protein shakes, and protein bars that I used as treats. My goal was to get in a minimum of 4-5 meals per day to keep my metabolism peaked as well as keep myself from feeling like im starving. Even with the numerous meals, the combination of cardio plus limited diet on my huge frame created a large calorie deficit so if I ever went too long without a meal I would feel extremely weak and winded. Fortunately, after a few days my body learned to adjust to my new diet and training regiment and recovery times have improved. Time will only tell how i am able to adjust as i increase the intensity of my training and add a few surprises to my training regime over the next few weeks.
The good news of all this hard work has been dramatic results since my start. Since the day that I took pictures for my ad I have dropped 10 lbs already. I started at 336 lbs and on monday I weighed in at 326 lbs. This Tuesday I will be heading down to Los Angeles and getting body fat testing in a water tank (the most accurate body fat testing method available). I will also be testing my VO2 max as well as my resting metabolic weight. Once I return from the trip I will post my results and at the end of the twelve weeks I will return in order to get comparison results. I am very excited to see where I stand and then what kind of improvements I can make over the next 11 weeks!
At the beginning of my blog today I mentioned that this week has been full of triumps ans defeats. And there was a great defeat indeed, but it was not a failure with diet or training. It happened sunday in Green Bay when my Green Bay Packers lost by a field goal to the NY Giants in OT. It was a sad day in Packer Town to be sure. Rest in Peace GB.
Going into this project I knew it would be a big test for me both mentally and physically and it definitely has not disappointed. This week has been a build up to my week two and three where my cardio training will be in top gear. This week I trained with weight four times; Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday. I also have ramped up my cardio dramatically from my previous light cardio training. I managed morning one hour cardio workouts on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. I also managed to get night cardio sessions Monday and Wednesday which really pushed me to a new level. During this time I found my new favorite cardio machine, the Nautilus Treadclimber. If you haven't tried this machine then you have to give it a try! it will kick your butt! Its like a hybrid stair climber/treadmill. What I like best of all is that I can get a high intensity cardio workout without hurting my knees like running or the stair climber have done for me in the past.
When it came to diet I definitely had a lot of mental demons to overcome. During the months before this project my diet was never horrible but I had a bad habit of eating too much good food. And no matter whether a meal is healthy or not if you take in more calories then you burn then you will gain weight over time. Clearly my previous diet was tipped the wrong way when it came to a caloric balance. In order to keep my diet manageable I decided to keep my meals simple. My week one arsenal included mass prepared brown rice, mass prepared chicken breasts, protein shakes, and protein bars that I used as treats. My goal was to get in a minimum of 4-5 meals per day to keep my metabolism peaked as well as keep myself from feeling like im starving. Even with the numerous meals, the combination of cardio plus limited diet on my huge frame created a large calorie deficit so if I ever went too long without a meal I would feel extremely weak and winded. Fortunately, after a few days my body learned to adjust to my new diet and training regiment and recovery times have improved. Time will only tell how i am able to adjust as i increase the intensity of my training and add a few surprises to my training regime over the next few weeks.
The good news of all this hard work has been dramatic results since my start. Since the day that I took pictures for my ad I have dropped 10 lbs already. I started at 336 lbs and on monday I weighed in at 326 lbs. This Tuesday I will be heading down to Los Angeles and getting body fat testing in a water tank (the most accurate body fat testing method available). I will also be testing my VO2 max as well as my resting metabolic weight. Once I return from the trip I will post my results and at the end of the twelve weeks I will return in order to get comparison results. I am very excited to see where I stand and then what kind of improvements I can make over the next 11 weeks!
At the beginning of my blog today I mentioned that this week has been full of triumps ans defeats. And there was a great defeat indeed, but it was not a failure with diet or training. It happened sunday in Green Bay when my Green Bay Packers lost by a field goal to the NY Giants in OT. It was a sad day in Packer Town to be sure. Rest in Peace GB.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Preparing for day 1, and the mind games we play.
So it is now Tuesday January 15th and officially day 2 of my "Getting Back to Awesome" project. I was going to blog last night, but in all honesty i passed out about 15 minutes after getting back from my final workout. Ill go over my first day reactions in my next blog, but there is a topic I wanted to touch upon first.
Mind games. It is often said that we are our own worst enemies and I truly believe this 100 percent. Leading up to the official start date of Monday January 14th felt like a mental wrestling match with a 600 lb sumo wrestler. At some points I questioned whether I could go on with this project. I had to keep telling myself that I made a personal commitment and I was hell bent on following through with it. Sunday night i had finally committed myself to starting Monday, but it wasn't an easy road.
It all started Tuesday the "picture" day. Around 8 pm I had shown up to my close friend's house to take the "current state" pictures. Let me tell you, it was freezing. It didn't help that his studio was in his garage which was also freezing (nice one rob!). Normally I would have no problems taking pictures, but this was different. I was a mental wreck. I must have paced around for 20 minutes before finally committing to the shoot. It was a mix of embarrassment, ego, and a morphed self image that made things so hard to do. It is easy to take picture when you look good, but here you are taking a picture with your shirt off to be shown to everyone when I was barely comfortable taking my shirt off currently in front of myself! In a big way, I felt this was a critical step for me. It was acceptance of where my inactivity and poor diet had lead. It also symbolized my commitment to change. One of the things I learend over the years is that often times it is easy to ignore the problem. The saying, "Out of sight, out of mind" perfectly illustrates this point. It seems silly that you could literally ignore a problem like this. You could think how can you ignore being 336 pounds (my actual weigh in weight the day of the shoot), but you would be amazed at how easy it is to do. People do it all the time and they live in denial. It is not healthy and at some point you have to look at your self straight in the mirror and accept where you truly are before you can move on to make changes. Taking those pictures helped me accept my current position as well as helped me set my goals for the next twelve weeks.
With the photoshoot over I felt like my first hurdle had been cleared. The next step was preparing myself for the shock of the forthcoming project. I knew it was going to be a total change to my lifestyle and diet. Many times it is possible to make small change as to not shock your system too much, but considering how out of whack my life had become I had no choice but to make drastic changes. The training changes were going to be hard, but my biggest problem was going to be cleaning up my diet.
My diet has , on a regular basis, been what makes me or breaks me. I believe most americans are like this. I have met a few metabolic freaks in my life that can eat french fries all day long and stay absolutely ripped, but I was not one of those blessed souls. If I eat good then it shows, but if I pig out then I quickly turn into resembling a pregnant beached whale. I always looked at it as both a blessing and a curse. Regardless of what you look like, having a poor diet is bad for you. Just because your metabolism is abnormally fast and keeps you lean doesn't mean that living off of burgers and french fries is good for you. In fact I believe it is a crutch that lets people justify eating poorly. In the end, the poor eating habits damage everyone not just the people who actively show the added pounds. In this light I take my added weight as a blessing. Its more of a warning sign then anything. My body is literally sending out an S.O.S. screaming to be fixed. It was about time i got that message in a bottle.
Leading up to my start on monday i experienced a phenomenon i call the "pre diet binge". The truth is that im one of those people that really loves food. I especially like good food, but unfortunately I often tend to eat too much of a good thing until it becomes bad for me. Serving sizes have always been an issue for me as it is for millions of Americans. I always eat too much of everything. When I travel overseas I notice how much smaller food portions are and it often doesn't hit me just how big of a difference it is until I return to the states. I knew that going into this project I would have to re-assess my food portions if I were going to be successful.
Going back to the "pre diet binge", it isn't as bad as it sounds. I like to compare it more to a "last wish" for my taste buds. Im not saying that eating healthy food isn't delicious. ok maybe I am, fatty food is so much tastier then healthy food. I can't deny it! And the truth is that it is very hard for most people to let go of their favorite foods, or even to cut back. Under most cirucmstances I would say cutting back on your "comfort foods" would be enough but for the project at hand I wanted to show what is possible when you push things with training as well as diet. The bad food had to go. But it wasn't going away without a farewell party. Over the weekend I had a going away part for my taste buds as I sampled some of my sinful foods. I had a serving of lasagna with my workout partner over lunch, I ate at Panda Express(curse you delicous orange chicken!), and I even had cheeseburgers from Mcdonalds. I would like to point out that I resisted the temptation of paying 1 cent more to make them double cheeseburgers. Go willpower! Finally I had an ice cream sandwich from 7-11 to saturate my sweet tooth. All of this was spread out over a few days, so it may not have felt like what most people would consider a "binge" but in reality it was mental compromise that justified my diet. I am not saying its the way to go when starting a diet, it simply is my method to mentally prepare myself for the battle at hand.
As I watched the clock on Sunday night turn to midnight and Sunday rolled into Monday I knew the battle had begun. There was no looking back, twelve weeks lay ahead of me. In twelve weeks I would find out if I could beat my ultimate opponent, myself.
Mind games. It is often said that we are our own worst enemies and I truly believe this 100 percent. Leading up to the official start date of Monday January 14th felt like a mental wrestling match with a 600 lb sumo wrestler. At some points I questioned whether I could go on with this project. I had to keep telling myself that I made a personal commitment and I was hell bent on following through with it. Sunday night i had finally committed myself to starting Monday, but it wasn't an easy road.
It all started Tuesday the "picture" day. Around 8 pm I had shown up to my close friend's house to take the "current state" pictures. Let me tell you, it was freezing. It didn't help that his studio was in his garage which was also freezing (nice one rob!). Normally I would have no problems taking pictures, but this was different. I was a mental wreck. I must have paced around for 20 minutes before finally committing to the shoot. It was a mix of embarrassment, ego, and a morphed self image that made things so hard to do. It is easy to take picture when you look good, but here you are taking a picture with your shirt off to be shown to everyone when I was barely comfortable taking my shirt off currently in front of myself! In a big way, I felt this was a critical step for me. It was acceptance of where my inactivity and poor diet had lead. It also symbolized my commitment to change. One of the things I learend over the years is that often times it is easy to ignore the problem. The saying, "Out of sight, out of mind" perfectly illustrates this point. It seems silly that you could literally ignore a problem like this. You could think how can you ignore being 336 pounds (my actual weigh in weight the day of the shoot), but you would be amazed at how easy it is to do. People do it all the time and they live in denial. It is not healthy and at some point you have to look at your self straight in the mirror and accept where you truly are before you can move on to make changes. Taking those pictures helped me accept my current position as well as helped me set my goals for the next twelve weeks.
With the photoshoot over I felt like my first hurdle had been cleared. The next step was preparing myself for the shock of the forthcoming project. I knew it was going to be a total change to my lifestyle and diet. Many times it is possible to make small change as to not shock your system too much, but considering how out of whack my life had become I had no choice but to make drastic changes. The training changes were going to be hard, but my biggest problem was going to be cleaning up my diet.
My diet has , on a regular basis, been what makes me or breaks me. I believe most americans are like this. I have met a few metabolic freaks in my life that can eat french fries all day long and stay absolutely ripped, but I was not one of those blessed souls. If I eat good then it shows, but if I pig out then I quickly turn into resembling a pregnant beached whale. I always looked at it as both a blessing and a curse. Regardless of what you look like, having a poor diet is bad for you. Just because your metabolism is abnormally fast and keeps you lean doesn't mean that living off of burgers and french fries is good for you. In fact I believe it is a crutch that lets people justify eating poorly. In the end, the poor eating habits damage everyone not just the people who actively show the added pounds. In this light I take my added weight as a blessing. Its more of a warning sign then anything. My body is literally sending out an S.O.S. screaming to be fixed. It was about time i got that message in a bottle.
Leading up to my start on monday i experienced a phenomenon i call the "pre diet binge". The truth is that im one of those people that really loves food. I especially like good food, but unfortunately I often tend to eat too much of a good thing until it becomes bad for me. Serving sizes have always been an issue for me as it is for millions of Americans. I always eat too much of everything. When I travel overseas I notice how much smaller food portions are and it often doesn't hit me just how big of a difference it is until I return to the states. I knew that going into this project I would have to re-assess my food portions if I were going to be successful.
Going back to the "pre diet binge", it isn't as bad as it sounds. I like to compare it more to a "last wish" for my taste buds. Im not saying that eating healthy food isn't delicious. ok maybe I am, fatty food is so much tastier then healthy food. I can't deny it! And the truth is that it is very hard for most people to let go of their favorite foods, or even to cut back. Under most cirucmstances I would say cutting back on your "comfort foods" would be enough but for the project at hand I wanted to show what is possible when you push things with training as well as diet. The bad food had to go. But it wasn't going away without a farewell party. Over the weekend I had a going away part for my taste buds as I sampled some of my sinful foods. I had a serving of lasagna with my workout partner over lunch, I ate at Panda Express(curse you delicous orange chicken!), and I even had cheeseburgers from Mcdonalds. I would like to point out that I resisted the temptation of paying 1 cent more to make them double cheeseburgers. Go willpower! Finally I had an ice cream sandwich from 7-11 to saturate my sweet tooth. All of this was spread out over a few days, so it may not have felt like what most people would consider a "binge" but in reality it was mental compromise that justified my diet. I am not saying its the way to go when starting a diet, it simply is my method to mentally prepare myself for the battle at hand.
As I watched the clock on Sunday night turn to midnight and Sunday rolled into Monday I knew the battle had begun. There was no looking back, twelve weeks lay ahead of me. In twelve weeks I would find out if I could beat my ultimate opponent, myself.
Wednesday, January 9, 2008
Santa Barbara Body Sculpting's "Getting Back to Awesome" Project
Hello and welcome to my "Getting Back to Awesome " project (thanks for the name idea Rob! ) I figured this would be the perfect time to share with you a little bit about myself as well as give you an overview of the "Getting Back to Awesome" project.
To begin I will give you some background information on myself. My name is Leon Jesmanowicz, I am 25 years old and I have been a SantaBarbarian for the last fourteen years (outside of my 16 month hiatus, more on that later). I have been a personal trainer and nutritional consultant since 2000 and in 2004 I started my personal training company Santa Barbara Body Sculpting (http://www.sbbody.com/). I have done modeling and competed in bodybuilding as well as had side jobs ranging from managing store fronts, to bouncing at nightclubs, to taking care of kittens at a pet store (they are pretty darn adorable after all!).
Now, if there is one thing more varied then my professional life, then it must be my personal life especially when it comes to my body. I was born and raised until the age of six in my birthplace of Wroclaw, Poland. During my early years I was always extremely skinny and tall, even though my mother fed me like I was a prized pig, I couldn't put on any weight. After leaving Poland in 1988 we moved to Germany and then Holland before making our way to the USA in December of 1990. It wasn't until then that i was able to fill in my frame and stop looking like somebody locked me up under the stairs with no dinner every day (thanks McDonalds!). Throughout my teens and early twenties I had gone through ups and downs when it came to my physique and personal health. In November of 2005 I had become what I like to jokingly call "full of awesome". I was in the best shape of my life, I was helping people reach their goals and life was great.
Unfortunately, as the saying goes "The bigger they are, the harder they fall." With that being said, since that time I have learned that above all else I am human. I am a man like any other man that can reach great heights as well as be unbelievably humbled by the trials and tribulations sent towards us by life. In times of prosperity it is easy to feel over confident and "invincible". But when you least expect it, life comes around and smacks some humility into you. In between the time I was "full of awesome" and now many things happen. Things that happen to everyone, things that have befallen the best of the best. Within a 24 month span my life had been ripped apart by tragedy within my family and friends circle. Personally I had been plagued by injuries both mental and physical. I learned the hard way that people i thought i could trust, suddenly were the knifes in my back. It was a dark portrait of what my life had become. I attempted to go a new direction in my life by moving to Los Angeles for 16 months and attempting to try and ignore all the bad that had happened, unfortunately like any wound left unattended it soon got worse rather then better.
Luckily for me, I believe that every bad situation has a silver lining to it and it is from this silver lining that the "Getting Back to Awesome" project had its origins. After 16 months in Los Angeles i had decided to move back to my strongest roots here in Santa Barbara in order to make things awesome again! I was left with a daunting task, i had been working a desk job for 16 months and that coupled with my injuries had lead to chronic inactivity (read: couch potato), I had been left staring at a body that was 80 lbs over weight and a shadow of my former awesomeness. Something had to be done, and I felt I would approach it like all my other projects, and that was through pushing it to the limit. Because if you are going to do something, you might as well do it right!
The "Getting Back to Awesome" project is simple at its core. I have 12 weeks during which I am going to attempt to get as close being "full of awesome" as possible! But there is a catch, oh why does there always have to be a catch! I'm a firm believer that two extremely strong motivators for people are "rewards" and "fear of humiliation". People generally love rewards, and hate humiliation so i thought "geez Leon! what would happen if we put both on the line".
So the deal was as followed. I would start out by putting an ad in a local newspaper where it showed three pictures; a picture of me when I was full of awesome, a picture now, and a question mark(?). I personally always had a hard time relating to all those "before and after" pictures in magazines and ads as you never knew how the person really transformed. Plus there was no risk. They only showed the "bad" pictures after they were in shape. There was no pressure, because if you didn't make your goal nobody would see it. With my project, at the end of the 12 weeks I will have to fill in that question mark in the ad with my new status. Basically we flip around the "before & after" idea and give it an added twist. Talk about pressure!
With the "Back to Awesome" project everyone who wants to follow the journey from Aweful to Awesome can thanks to the miracle of blogs (bless you blog inventor guy!) During the project I will be sharing my diet, training strategies, as well as mental strategies and personal reactions as the project wears on.
In the end my intentions are for this project are two-fold. My primary objective is to get back to my healthy lifestyle and earn a physique that I can be proud of again. My other goal is to show the world that nobody is infallible and it can be hard when life knocks you off your horse, but if you work hard you can get up and be stronger then ever. I have had clients over the years always say to me "when I was younger, I was a football star and I was in great shape" or "before I had my kids, you wouldn't believe the body I had" and to that i say, "well lets get that body back!". Hopefully for those trying to get back to their former Awesomeness my journey can be an inspiration. For those that have never been in shape and are just starting out I am hoping that they can see that they are not alone when it comes to dealing with the hurdles thrown in their way on their path to living a healthy lifestyle. At the end of the day with the right kind of training and guidance anyone can sculpt that body they always wanted. The road to awesomeness is not an easy one, but hopefully my experience can motivate you to reach new levels of physical health and well being.
Look for my upcoming blogs as my start date of Monday January 14th approaches and beyond!
To begin I will give you some background information on myself. My name is Leon Jesmanowicz, I am 25 years old and I have been a SantaBarbarian for the last fourteen years (outside of my 16 month hiatus, more on that later). I have been a personal trainer and nutritional consultant since 2000 and in 2004 I started my personal training company Santa Barbara Body Sculpting (http://www.sbbody.com/). I have done modeling and competed in bodybuilding as well as had side jobs ranging from managing store fronts, to bouncing at nightclubs, to taking care of kittens at a pet store (they are pretty darn adorable after all!).
Now, if there is one thing more varied then my professional life, then it must be my personal life especially when it comes to my body. I was born and raised until the age of six in my birthplace of Wroclaw, Poland. During my early years I was always extremely skinny and tall, even though my mother fed me like I was a prized pig, I couldn't put on any weight. After leaving Poland in 1988 we moved to Germany and then Holland before making our way to the USA in December of 1990. It wasn't until then that i was able to fill in my frame and stop looking like somebody locked me up under the stairs with no dinner every day (thanks McDonalds!). Throughout my teens and early twenties I had gone through ups and downs when it came to my physique and personal health. In November of 2005 I had become what I like to jokingly call "full of awesome". I was in the best shape of my life, I was helping people reach their goals and life was great.
Unfortunately, as the saying goes "The bigger they are, the harder they fall." With that being said, since that time I have learned that above all else I am human. I am a man like any other man that can reach great heights as well as be unbelievably humbled by the trials and tribulations sent towards us by life. In times of prosperity it is easy to feel over confident and "invincible". But when you least expect it, life comes around and smacks some humility into you. In between the time I was "full of awesome" and now many things happen. Things that happen to everyone, things that have befallen the best of the best. Within a 24 month span my life had been ripped apart by tragedy within my family and friends circle. Personally I had been plagued by injuries both mental and physical. I learned the hard way that people i thought i could trust, suddenly were the knifes in my back. It was a dark portrait of what my life had become. I attempted to go a new direction in my life by moving to Los Angeles for 16 months and attempting to try and ignore all the bad that had happened, unfortunately like any wound left unattended it soon got worse rather then better.
Luckily for me, I believe that every bad situation has a silver lining to it and it is from this silver lining that the "Getting Back to Awesome" project had its origins. After 16 months in Los Angeles i had decided to move back to my strongest roots here in Santa Barbara in order to make things awesome again! I was left with a daunting task, i had been working a desk job for 16 months and that coupled with my injuries had lead to chronic inactivity (read: couch potato), I had been left staring at a body that was 80 lbs over weight and a shadow of my former awesomeness. Something had to be done, and I felt I would approach it like all my other projects, and that was through pushing it to the limit. Because if you are going to do something, you might as well do it right!
The "Getting Back to Awesome" project is simple at its core. I have 12 weeks during which I am going to attempt to get as close being "full of awesome" as possible! But there is a catch, oh why does there always have to be a catch! I'm a firm believer that two extremely strong motivators for people are "rewards" and "fear of humiliation". People generally love rewards, and hate humiliation so i thought "geez Leon! what would happen if we put both on the line".
So the deal was as followed. I would start out by putting an ad in a local newspaper where it showed three pictures; a picture of me when I was full of awesome, a picture now, and a question mark(?). I personally always had a hard time relating to all those "before and after" pictures in magazines and ads as you never knew how the person really transformed. Plus there was no risk. They only showed the "bad" pictures after they were in shape. There was no pressure, because if you didn't make your goal nobody would see it. With my project, at the end of the 12 weeks I will have to fill in that question mark in the ad with my new status. Basically we flip around the "before & after" idea and give it an added twist. Talk about pressure!
With the "Back to Awesome" project everyone who wants to follow the journey from Aweful to Awesome can thanks to the miracle of blogs (bless you blog inventor guy!) During the project I will be sharing my diet, training strategies, as well as mental strategies and personal reactions as the project wears on.
In the end my intentions are for this project are two-fold. My primary objective is to get back to my healthy lifestyle and earn a physique that I can be proud of again. My other goal is to show the world that nobody is infallible and it can be hard when life knocks you off your horse, but if you work hard you can get up and be stronger then ever. I have had clients over the years always say to me "when I was younger, I was a football star and I was in great shape" or "before I had my kids, you wouldn't believe the body I had" and to that i say, "well lets get that body back!". Hopefully for those trying to get back to their former Awesomeness my journey can be an inspiration. For those that have never been in shape and are just starting out I am hoping that they can see that they are not alone when it comes to dealing with the hurdles thrown in their way on their path to living a healthy lifestyle. At the end of the day with the right kind of training and guidance anyone can sculpt that body they always wanted. The road to awesomeness is not an easy one, but hopefully my experience can motivate you to reach new levels of physical health and well being.
Look for my upcoming blogs as my start date of Monday January 14th approaches and beyond!
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