I want to do something exceptional...

I want to do something exceptional with my life! I know that is a bold statement, but seriously I'm tired of just living day to day, and getting through those days. I want everyday to be an adventure! Is it to much to ask to live life? I heard a statement once that went something like we're not Human'beings' but Human'doings'. I want to get out and live life to the fullest everyday. Running has been my outlet for that lately and I'm glad to have it. I want to keep pushing myself to go harder and farther every time out. Besides my goals of running a half and a full marathon one thing I'm really looking forward to this summer is going on a runabout. Basically I'll pack a light pack with some food and water and head out running early in the morning and run all day through the country side. Spend an entire day outside in nature, I'm really jonesing for warmer weather already.

A Runners Blog #2

So I finally experienced the so called runners high, or as my training partner calls it 'a glory run'. Yesterday on our run we set out with the intention of running about 6 miles. We devised that if we took our normal 4 mile course (2 out and 2 back) and added what we assumed was another mile roughly, we would have no choice in the matter and thus not be able to cut the run short and just power on through, if we only knew then...

It started out fairly well with a good pace but not too fast with both of us sensing and realizing the fact that we were going to try and push ourselves a little today. After we made the turn around we both acknowledge the fact that we felt strong and that's when I first got the feeling that something awesome might be brewing. I began to figure out course altercations to prolong the run and hopefully push past previous barriers. After reaching our previously designated finish line we both agreed to one more mile. Our pace remained steady and even picked up a bit. After quickly reaching the end of the next mile an unspoken acknowledgment to 'one more' was made. I was feeling great at this point, I was now running in uncharted waters for me, prior to yesterday the farthest I had ever run was 7 miles at the Bix in July, we were now fast approaching mile 8 and I was quickly running out of deviations to my previous course outlines, I have never had a training run in excess of 5 miles, hell, previously I would get tired if I had to drive more than 5 miles let alone run it. So I improvised and just ran, I figured in my head and later confirmed with the odometer in my car that we had traveled roughly 9.5 miles in 1hr 18min, which was equal to my training partners, and one minute faster than mine, Bix 7 this year. I have never experienced such a feeling from running, it was exhilarating to do something I previously thought wasn't possible. I have had my doubts about running a half marathon but after yesterday I realize that I have the capacity and with the proper training will be able to achieve that goal as well as running a full marathon.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device from U.S. Cellular

A Runners Blog #1

So I have really gotten into running lately, which is weird, seeing as how for the first 32 years of my life I absolutely despised running. Oh I ran when I had to, say if I was cashing down a pop fly, or running on the football field to make a play, or if wild animals were chasing me and my favorite as some form of punishment or conditioning (who are we kidding, conditioning is just a coaches word for punishment). Running has always been something I had to do, either for sports or weight loss recently, but now I find myself actually enjoying it. I have begun to understand what people mean by a "runners high", and I like it. What I like most about running is I can do it whenever I feel like. I don't have to wait for a specific class time, I can go for as long as I want or as little. I have a treadmill in my basement that I can use on rainy/cold days if I want or if I want to feel the elements I can go outside. I ran the Bix last July and that is where I think I first found the enjoyment of running. I set a goal that I never thought would be achievable (running the Bix) and I did it. Not only that but I did better than I had hoped and it felt great. Now my goal is to run a half marathon 13.1 miles, that would be officially 6.1 miles farther than I have ever run in my life. Prior to the Bix I had never run more than 5 miles and less than a year ago its safe to say I had never done more than 2 miles at any one given time. Eventually I would like to do a full marathon and then maybe a tri-athalon and someday maybe an Iron Man.

The thing I like most about running is there is always something more you can get out of it, distance, time, whatever. Running has become almost a spiritual event for me, I think a lot about my life and what is going on and sometimes I just let my mind go completely quiet and just let my headphones drown me in whatever music is the flavor of the day. I have been inspired by Dean Karnazes and his book "The UltraMarathon Man, confessions of an all night runner" he runs these 100+ mile races in extreme conditions, he has run 250+ miles on more than one occasion and I'm now starting his book 50/50 about his quest to run 50 marathons in 50 consecutive days in 50 states. The guy is absolutely amazing and yet he thinks of himself as just a regular guy. I want to follow his lead and just keep pushing myself to new extremes, and be an example to my 2 boys that anything is possible if you put your mind to it. I know if I set the example for my kids of a healthy active lifestyle than maybe they won't have some of the same struggles that I have had with my weight and health. They need a role model, everyone needs a role model to help keep them pushing new limits and I want to be my kids role model.

Fighting again

So I might be fighting again on December 12th, just got to get the ok from Spencer. It is kinda short notice but I have been keeping up on my cardio just got to make sure I get in and train as much as possible over the next 4 weeks. Good thing is my buddy Kenny Nyquist is also fighting on that card so we will be pushing each other.

Halloween

Halloween was here and gone and for the most part it was pretty awesome. Both boys have been sick over the last couple weeks so they missed out on the Halloween Party at my buddy Matt's on the 24Th but were feeling much better by 31st and were able to make it out for Trick or Treating. Casey is getting so grown up, he was so cute with his trick or treats and subsequent thank yous, I can believe he is 4 and half and Caden is coming up quickly on 3. Man how time flies. I will get pictures of the boys in their costumes up shortly as well as some good ones from playing in the leaves yesterday. I'm so jealous of them, they look at leaves and think to play, I look at leaves and think "Yard Work", ah the innocence of youth, were everything is still meant for your enjoyment alone.

A Fighters Blog #5

I sent in a quick post that I had one my fight but I wanted to go into a little more detail. First off it was absolutely amazing, the feeling after winning was one of the greatest feelings of my life. The day I was married and the day my children were born were amazing but this was different, those were more emotional and spiritual, this was something primal, a pure animalistic rush that in no way was to be confused with emotional, ha ha!

My biggest fear before the fight was how was I going to react once I got in the cage? Was I going to get what I call the nervous knees, like when I have to give a presentation, or speak in front of a large group. To my surprise I was incredibly calm, I felt confident and secure in my ability. I knew I had trained hard and had put the time in at the gym, so the fight should be easy by comparison.

The fight started out with both of us testing the distance, maybe a couple of punches exchanged (I haven't yet seen the fight) he was able to get in on a take down which I was able to sprawl and stuff for a moment but he eventually did get me down but I was able to pull guard and slip in a guillotine. He was able to slip out of the choke and posture up, I could hear Spencer yelling at me to wall walk so I started to position myself to stand up. He was trying to throw puches and I was able to take advatage adn trap an arm and get the sweep and reverse positions. Now I was in the mount and started working elbows and punches, once he rolled over and covered up it was over adn the referee stepped in to stop the action. Winner TKO in the first round!

A Fighters Blog #4

MMA and my first fight:

So I have been training in MMA for about 5 months now and am coming up on my first amateur fight on Oct. 3, and the major question I have been getting from people outside of the sport is "Why?”
Well its really very basic and also very complicated as well, for most guys they fight because it’s what they know, they have been fighting for all their lives in one fashion or another. For others it’s an attempt to assert their Alpha-Male status and prove some macho ideal that they have.
For me it really falls into the more complicated category, I don't have to fight; this isn't an avenue to a better life like some guys. I don't feel like I need to prove myself as a man to others either, for me it’s something entirely different, for me it’s mostly about fear and not giving up. I have spent the majority of my life being afraid of failure and quitting something if it became too difficult. Training and thus fighting is about overcoming that fear, to set a challenge in front of yourself and working your ass off to achieve it. It's really no different than someone setting a goal of running a marathon, (which I also want to do) it’s just viewed so much differently because of the violence factor; which leads to the other reasons of why MMA. When you are a former wrestler and football player who hates basketball and just doesn't get into softball there aren't really a lot of competitive ventures for you to explore, oh yeah there is running but that's just not physical enough. For someone like me there is no more pure athletic competition than 2 men facing off in competition whether it’s wrestling, lineman in the trenches or a cage fight. When you step into that ring, octagon, or mat you are all alone, you can't rely on anyone else like in team sports. Success and failure lies squarely on your shoulders, no one to blame but yourself if you aren't prepared and that is really the attraction of the sport. There is a mental aspect that doesn't translate if you have never trained for MMA (or been a wrestler) for casual fans and those outside the sport. You can't be mentally or physically weak and compete in this arena, and that goes back to the fear. If you can train for a cage fight, diet and sacrifice then other things in your life become much less daunting tasks.
But in the end the basic answer to "Why would you want to do this?" is simple "Because I can!"

Taken July 22, 2009 @ 260 lbs. Nearly 4 months and a total of 38 lbs lost.

A Fighters Blog #3

My first, and hopefully last, major health scare:

I was 30 years old and I kept having this persistent nagging pain in my chest. At first I just thought it was a lasting result of a car accident I had recently been in, but it just never went away. After consistent nagging by my wife I finally went to see my Doctor about my chest pains. After running some tests and checking my blood pressure he decided as a precautionary measure to do some blood work and have me take a stress test. Well let’s just say that I failed my blood work, badly. I was borderline diabetic, my triglycerides where 500 and my bad cholesterol was 250 plus. The good news from my stress test was my heart wasn't bad but it wasn't doing great and if I had kept on the same path I could have been in really bad shape at a very young age. I realized I was lucky that I had recognized the problem before it got out of control but like a lot of things we don't address problems until we can see them. I kept putting off working out and changing my diet, if it wasn't the work excuse it was the holiday season or whatever I could come up with to prolong the fact that I needed to change my life. The real eye opener was when we went on vacation to Florida. Now the idea of spending a week in Florida lounging by the pool, swimming and soaking up the sun in March for an Iowa boy sounds great but when you are embarrassed to take your shirt off in your own home exposing your love handles out in public is a completely different thing. It was then and there that I vowed to make the changes, to never have to feel that embarrassment about my body again, and the next year when we went on vacation I was going to be the "hard" body that I wished I had been. That's when I decided I was going to get back in the gym I had been paying for the last 3 years and make the changes I had been talking about for so many months. And that’s where I discovered something I had lost so many years earlier.

May 27th, 2009 272 lbs. 26 pounds lost after 2 months.

A Fighters Blog #2

The day I realized I was severely out of shape.

Getting out of shape isn't something that happens over night, granted it doesn't take nearly as long as getting into shape but none the less it is a process. It’s usually not until you try to do something that once never seemed like a difficult process, say like walking up a flight of stairs, or running to your car when it’s raining. Something you have done before and doesn't seem like that big a deal till you realize your heart is pounding out of your chest and you can't breathe. For me it was playing out in the snow with my oldest son pulling him around in his sled he got for Christmas. I don't think I lasted more than 10 minutes before I realized that I couldn't keep it up for much longer or I was going to keel over. The worst part was the disappointment on his face when I told him Daddy couldn't play anymore. It’s bad enough to be fat and out of shape but when that causes you to sacrifice things like playing with your kids you come to the realization that you have hit an all time low. But just like many people who have allowed themselves to get to that point, even though you recognize that you are out of shape, fat, obese or whatever you want to call it, doing something about it is the hard part. Also just because you hit an all time low it doesn't mean you can't dig just a little deeper until you wake up and start doing something about it. And thus we find ourselves at 30 years old and experiencing something no one that age should be dealing with.

Taken April 29th, 2009 281 lbs. One month in and 20 lbs lost. The advantage to taking periodic photos is being able to to compare photos, sometimes you don't notice the little changes taking place.

A Fighters Blog #1

I had created a separate blog to chronicle my recent adventures in MMA as well as the journey that I had begun to lose weight, get in shape and start living the life that someone might want to read about, when I realized it was silly to manage two separate blogs. So I am just going to enter those entries under the Title of "A Fighters Blog". The following entries will be those I copied over, so here we go with the first entry.

In the begining:

I decided to start this blog as a diary of sorts to capture the journey I have been on for the last few months as I set out to get back in shape and start doing some of the things I always talked about doing but never did, but the story really started a lot longer ago. I had always been an athlete growing up I was always involved in a sport from 5 years old through the first 2 years of college. I was always a bigger guy, I played offensive line in football, but I was always in good if not great shape for someone my size, I was one of the few people I knew that could dunk a basketball and that was at 5'11 and 240 lbs. After I quit football in college I got into power lifting and body building and that is where my hunger and passion for working out was really ignited for the first time, I had always had to lift weights for sports but now I wanted to. After awhile I started getting interested in MMA and started taking classes with Pat Miletich, my goal was to compete in MMA fights and hopefully make a career at it. Well much like a lot of stories, one thing led to another and I quit working out, for me it was a combination of injuries, heartache from a love lost and the subsequent alcohol abuse. Over time I found my way back to the gym, but once again life got in the way and the obligations of work and a new family put my athletic adventures on the back burner. My weight and health over a period of 5 years spiraled out of control, the low points were the day I realized I was severely out of shape and when I had my first (and hopefully last) major health scare.

This is a photo I took on April 4th, 2009 1 week into my new workout weighing in at 289 lbs. At my highest I weighed 301 lbs back in Febuary. I look back at this photo and can't even believe I let myself get this out of shape.

I won my fight on Saturday, TKO in the first round. Felt great to get the first fight and win under my belt!

Caden just covered all his monster trucks with a blanket and informed me that they are sleeping. Where do they come up with this stuff?

New scooters

Story time!

Casey the Conductor

"All aboard"!!!

Casey the Magician

Caden the Boxer

Caden was pretty excited about Daddy's new head gear, you would of thought it was his birthday present.

Let the sword fights begin

Casey's 4th Birthday

Bix 7

So I ran the Quad City Times Bix 7 for the very first time today, and I have to say it was great. I finished in 79 minutes and 45 seconds which is awesome, my goal was under 90 minutes. I am really excited when you take in to account that 4 months ago I couldn't even run 1 mile let alone 7!

Somewhere in that group of people is me, I think I'm the third guy in from the left in the 87th row, can you find me?

Gone Fishin'

Down on the Farm