I won my diet bet!

I wasn't sure how i'd feel about an online social diet experiment but I ended up loosing 7.2 lbs and lots of inches!!!

I lost 1/2 an inch from my chest... 1/2 an inch from each of my arms, 1.75 inches from my waist, 1 inch from my hips, 1.5 inches from each of my thighs, my calf's now match up and I lost 2% body fat!!!

I find out in a few days how much money I won (they give everyone 48 hours to do their final weigh in and get it verified), but what's really cool is that I'm only half way through with the fitness challenge that's running at work so I might be able to win one of the 3 prizes there... (They are doing 3 challenges, each one has $100 on the line) Most steps, % of body fat lost and % of weight lost. I won't win the steps because some of my co-workers are just huge movers, but i'm hoping I might have a shot at the weight loss one or the body fat one.

To keep me motivated, I decided to do another diet bet, but this one is designed for you to loose 10% over 6 months and keep it off instead of 4% in a month. If I do this and win I will need to get down to 140 lbs and since my ultimate goal is 135 lbs, I'm really hoping putting $25 on the line each month will give me some motivation to keep trucking along and not give up BECAUSE I HATE the idea of LOOSING money, so it seems like a good motivator for me.

If you want to join me on the 6-month Diet Bet transformer, you can click here.

I also decided since this months budget was way shot, to get a small folding treadmill off Amazon for $200 so I can walk in my house while watching a TV show to help get in my daily steps. It will hopefully be here in a week, but this way I won't have to pace back in forth around the condo while I try to get up to 10,000 steps before I get to crawl into bed for the night. Who knows, maybe i'll up my step total to 12k or something once it gets here.

I'm up to 10 miles distance for my half marathon in August, so i'm way ahead of schedule... SCB will be starting his training "any day now."

I'm also still loving my FitBit Zip, and it was really helping me keep on track and stay on pace with the first 4% Diet Bet I did. On a side note, South County Boy has finally admitted that he doesn't use or really need his Fit Bit One... So if anyone wants to buy his, feel free to live me a comment and we can touch base via email if you want to buy a slightly used one at a discount. He likes the $20 one that goes with the Wii fit better cause his Mii can get new outfits when it reaches certain distance goals.

Anywho, the 6 month challenge is based on loosing 3% the first month, hitting a cumulative 6% the second month, 8% cumulative the 3rd month, 9% cumulative the 4th month, 10% cumulative the 5th month, and then maintain the 10% during the 6th month. Its a $25 a month buy in and half the money from each of the rounds goes to the final to give people incentive to stay in it for the long haul.

New Running Shoes

We finally bit the bullet and took SCB down to our local Road Runner for some running shoes so he can start to train for his 1/2 marathon.

In hindsight, I was a little disappointed. I normally go to snails pace for my running needs but I had attended a few group runs at Road Runner so we thought it would be best to check it out and try some place new.

The first thing they did was start fitting SCB for custom in-soles... to "try" with the shoes. If he didn't want them, he didn't need to pay for them but they do that to try and sell you on the product.

He has rather high arches, and since i'm big on not getting hurt, he wanted to try them out.

I also decided to try out a pair and hunt for some shoes as well since i'll need to replace mine soon.

I hate to say it, but SCB got "sold" and while I told him that he needed to try on multiple pairs with and without the insoles, run on the treadmill in them, walk around the store in them and then do one shoe on one foot, another shoe on the other... he didn't really listen too much since he was caught up in the experience of everything.

Eventually he said he couldn't tell the difference with 3 pairs of shoes (only trying them with the expensive insoles) so I said if he was sure then the only question to consider was color and price. I told him to pick the cheapest pair of the three unless he couldn't stand the color (since we all know you don't really get to pick the color of your running shoe).

Then I drove their staff crazy trying to have them help me.

Originally they told me my shoes were shot because she could "bend" them in half... a sign that they were used up... but I watched her bend brand new shoes just to show another girl how flexible they were to sell her on that idea... so I walked in a bit skeptical because my old running store was more honest with me. They would just compress the shoe at the heel and see if the rubber cracked. If the rubber cracked when compressing, then shoe's support was done and it needed to be replaced. When I compress my shoe, the rubber didn't crack yet... but I wanted to see what was out there since a replacement would be coming up soon in a month or so now that i'm going to start seriously training for the Disney 1/2 marathon in August.

First, they started pulling stability shoes for me that were a full size too small. Mind you this is after I told the employee making my shoe insert (since I wanted to see what the hype was all about) that I ran in a full size up from my street shoe cause my toes like all the happy space and i'm a "sweller" when I do distance. I don't think the guy believed i'd done 3 marathon and a half because i'm out of shape at the moment and I don't think he was really listening.

So he fitted my custom insole for me to fit my street shoe... so it naturally  wasn't going to fit well in the shoes that were a full size up... and it wasn't until I "wasn't sold" on purchasing the smaller insert that the "light" went on in the clerks head that the insole had to be remade (I was complaining on pain when I went around with the insoles then without)... It was funny for me because their was another lady being fitted for shoes and she seemed to like my advice better then the sales rep when I told SCB that he needed to try the shoes with and without the insole, and with a different shoe on each foot if he couldn't decided between the pairs...

Even after I had the new insole, I continued to make the employee a bit upset because I'd walk in the shoes with the new insole... and then with the standard insole again to compare the difference between the larger size and didn't assume it would automatically make the shoe better... then I re-laced the shoes I was trying on because my heel tends to pop out a bit since its a full size up from my street shoe so I use some lace tricks to keep it in... and if i'm blowing $100 on a pair of shoes I'm testing them out in a practical manner to make sure they are a good fit...

Then we also found out that I couldn't wear their store socks  because they kept slipping off my feet so she had to relent and let me use my own.

In the end i'm seriously considering a new shoe and model... and if i go back to get mine i'll get $10 off with a coupon and if I bring in an old trash'd pair, another $10 off. But I think what bothered me the most was the rep never had us get back on the treadmill or watch us run in the shoe to see if the shoe fixed our "running issues" we both need a slight corrective shoe since we pron-ate a little... and that's what I loved about the other smaller store I went to... so I think i'm going back there to compare results a bit since I think I still have more time in my shoes. But since SCB swore he loved his shoes and they have a 90 day wear em and take them back if you don't love them policy, he got his and the insoles... Costing us a total of $216.26

A week later he told me he couldn't stand the insoles so we took them back since he had 30 days to try them out and just wearing them around the house in his shoes was causing him pain. He did a 7 mile walk with me and my two friends and was fine without the insoles.

So $138.51 for new shoes for SCB.