One Fat Man's Fight

ONE FAT MAN'S FIGHT

Last year I went to the doctor's office for an annual physical. Part of the reason I was going to the doctor was because I was not feeling great.

As a coach I am always on my feet and sometimes in the course of a tournament weekend I may coach as many as 15 games. Afterwards, my feet and joints would be killing me.  I was constantly taking Advil to kill the pain and to reduce the swelling.   

The first thing the nurse had me do was get on the scale.  Over the last few years I had definitely let myself go and had put on a lot of weight.  The bad thing about it was that I was always justifying it to myself - "It's OK, you worked really hard today, you can eat whatever you want" I would tell myself.  

Not only was I eating a lot, I was eating a lot of crap - ice cream, candy, pizza and fast food.  Well when I got on the scale I was shocked.  I was embarrassed.  

In college I wrestled at 190 lbs and played lacrosse around 210 lbs.  When I saw 274 lbs on the scale I was devastated.  I knew I had to make some serious changes in my life.  

My brother-in-law Brian told me about a video he watched on Amazon Prime Video  called "Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead" by Joe Cross.  Click below to watch the trailer:

In the film, Joe Cross is a man who is 100 lbs over weight who decides to change his life and lose weight through juicing.  Joe is also on many different types of medications and his overall health is terrible.  After watching Joe transform his own life and the lives of others, I decided to take the leap of faith.

I immediately went to Bed Bath and Beyond (with my 20% coupon of course) and bought myself a juicer.  When I got there I was amused to see Joe Cross's face all over some of the juicers.   I bought my juicer and then downloaded Joe's simple to use app - Reboot with Joe which allows you to customize your own plan for how long you want to do your juice cleanse.  

5 days is nothing I told myself so let's go with 5 days to start.  The app gives you a grocery list of everything you need to buy.  One quick visit to my local Stop N Shop and I was ready to start my juicing journey.  


I could feel the "here we go again" eye-rolls from my daughter's as I set up my juicer and loaded the fridge full of fresh vegetables.  They had seen me try and fail before with other fad diets and weight-loss gadgets.  They assumed this would be another hit and miss.

However, I had a game plan and I was ready to follow it.  

Like Mike Tyson famously said - "Everyone has a plan, until they get punched in the mouth."  Well my punch was no coffee during the 5 days.  Anyone who knows me, knows I love coffee.  It's how I start my day - the smell, the taste, the caffeine -  the whole coffee routine.  I love it.  

5 days is nothing right.  Well the first 2-3 days were brutal for me.  I was in coffee/caffeine withdrawal.  I experienced headaches and I was definitely grouchy.  Joe Cross had said this might happen, but I was still unprepared.  

The moral here is quite simple - anything that is important to you in life requires hard work.  You also need to overcome adversity and have a plan for when you get knocked off your plan.  

My plan to help me stay on track was to go for a walk the first thing every morning while listening to powerful podcasts that would help me stay motivated.  Prior to this I had never even listened to one  single podcast even though my daughter Victoria had been telling me about them for a year or so.  I didn't even now how to listen to a podcast, but I did know the type of podcast I wanted to listen to.  

Years earlier I had gotten hooked on Tony Robbins and his audio book called "Awaken the Giant Within."  Tony had talked about the importance of exercise and having a morning routine.    I had listened to it before, but it did not have the impact on me that it had now.  I "re-listened" to the entire book and then I went searching for more motivation.  

I discovered Tony's podcasts  and I then I found a whole treasure  trove of other motivating podcasts.  One specific series I fell in love with was by Lewis Howes  called The School of Greatness.  It is done in an interview format and he has amazing guests on his show like Kobe Bryant, Rachel Hollis, Tim Ferriss and Tony Robbins. Click on each name to watch their interview.  

I started out walking a couple of miles each day.  However, the podcasts drowned out the boredom of walking and now I was actually excited to get up every day and go for my walk.  Very soon I was walking 6-7 miles each morning while listening to an awesome podcast.  I found myself taking voice notes during my walks about important points that I found interesting.  

Each morning I kept asking myself, how could I use some of the things I was learning to help all the girls I was coaching at Team Elevate and Holy Trinity High School.  

I wanted to be better.

After my first few days, the headaches went away and I started to feel better than i had in a very long time.  I had a whole new mindset!  I looked at  the juices I was drinking as really high octane fuel that was nourishing me.  At 5 days I decided to extend it to 7 days.  After 7 days I extended it to 10 days.  

After 10 days, I had lost 15 lbs and already felt so much better physically and mentally.  So much of weight loss and getting healthy revolves around your mental health and being mentally prepared to face the challenges.  Well at this point I had the perfect trifecta going for me or for you Rodney Dangerfield fans -it was the Triple Lindy - Healthy food, daily exercise and awesome mental health. 

Click below for one of the greatest athletic achievements of our time - the Real Triple Lindy!! 

The key difference for me was that I established a routine.  I had a plan.  And as with any plan, sometimes you need to tweak it and make changes.  My brother-in-law Brian also introduced me to another documentary on Netflix called "Forks over Knives" where two scientists discuss and detail how certain foods are actually killing us.  The trailer is below and it's definitely worth watching.  

In its simplest form, the documentary tells us that you are better off eating something that you can cut with a fork (vegetables) over something that has to be cut with a knife (meat).  Now I was not going to become a vegan but I was willing to make changes.  

A good friend of mine, Don Saladino is literally one of the most fit people I know.  Don is in insane shape and he lives what he preaches.  He is the founder of Drive Health Clubs and he is the trainer to superstars like Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds.  I always remember something Don told me when it came to eating protein - he said, "the less legs, the better it is for you."  So a cow has 4 legs, a chicken has two and fish have none.  Fish is therefore better for you.  

Just so you know that Don is the real deal, here's a shot of him on the front cover of Muscle & Fitness Magazine. 

So I developed a plan that worked for me.

In it's simplest form, here is what I am doing: Gluten free, Dairy free and no red meat.  

Gluten free:  Even though I am not allergic to gluten, it is amazing how good I feel when I don't have gluten.  It's also amazing how bad I feel when I do have gluten.  Today so many supermarkets have extensive gluten free aisles.  There are so many choices and you can still eat the things you love.  

No Red Meat:   If I am going to eat protein it is usually chicken or fish.  I also eat beans and edamame which are great protein sources.  Every once in a while - like twice in the last year - I have had some grass fed beef.   

Dairy free: After watching Forks over Knives it really changed what I wanted to eat.  The only dairy I eat now is when I have sour cream on my Chipotle bowls.

Speaking of Chipotle...I eat so much Chipotle I should be their spokesperson.  I love it because it's healthy.  My typical bowl is brown rice, both beans, fajitas, chicken, mild and hot salsa, corn, sour cream and guacamole.  I eat this 4-5 times a week.

Once I tell people what I am doing and what has worked for me, the next question I usually get is - have you stopped drinking alcohol.  And the answer is no.  Yes I drink beer and yes I know it has gluten in it.  

The bottom line is I found something that has worked for me.  And has it really worked - yes 100%.  I went from a size 42 pants down to a 34 waist size and I'm heading to a 32.  I used to wear XL in everything and now I'm either a large or a medium.

This morning I weighed in at 205 lbs.  I am one pound shy of losing 70 lbs.  I feel amazing, I have so much energy and I finally found a plan that truly works for me.

Now, do I ever go off track - of course I do.  In the past when I went off track, I would immediately throw in the towel.  That kept me in a vicious cycle of yo-yo dieting.  Now,  it's the mental training that brings me right back. One of the keys to my mental training has been meditation. 

I never even thought of meditating until I was at a conference run by one of my college football teammates and founder of Nantucket Nectar's - Tom Scott.  Tom is also the founder of The Nantucket Project and he invited me as his guest a couple of years ago.  The Nantucket Project is like a think tank and reminds me of a Ted Talk conference.  They had some amazing speakers, but the one who really blew me away was Deepak Chopra.  Deepak is one of the smartest people I have ever heard speak.  But that is not what blew me away.  What blew me away was that Tom had asked Deepak to lead the entire audience in a group mediation session.

At the beginning of the session I was super skeptical but as we went on, I saw how awesome and how valuable this could be for me.  Today, I use an app on my phone called Calm to meditate every day.  The great thing about this app is that it guides you through your mediation.  One of the things it always talks about is if your mind starts to wander away in other thoughts, let that thought go (without judgement) and come back to your breathing.  It gives you a plan to follow and a way to get back on your plan.

Now when I go off track with my eating, like I did this past weekend, I come back to my plan without any judgement and I restart.

I have done plenty of fad diets.  Right now all I hear about is Keto and Paleo.  Years ago it was low fat, then we had Atkins which was high fat.  What I am doing is not a diet at all, it is a lifestyle change.

Lastly, on one of the Lewis Howes podcasts,  I listened to an interview with Robin Sharma about his book The 5am Club.  The subtitle of the book is Own Your Morning, Elevate Your Life.  Well as the founder of Team Elevate, I immediately thought that this was karma and I had to learn more.  I loved his tag line because our motto is Elevate Your Mind, Elevate Your Body, Elevate Your Game and Elevate Your Life.

Now every morning, my alarm clock goes off at 5:00am, I go into my bathroom and put on my workout clothes that I laid out the night before, I go make a cup of coffee, put in my airpods, turn on a podcast and I am out the door by 5:10am on my way to a 6-7mile walk.

That's my routine.  Is it hard - sometimes.  What is even harder is being Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead.

Can anyone do it - ABSOLUTELY yes.  It's pretty simple - get up early, exercise right away, self-reflect through a personal journal and meditation, eat healthy and love life.

If I was going to ask my players to Elevate Your Mind, Elevate Your Body, Elevate Your Game and Elevate Your Life - how could I not be leading by example?  "Do as I say, not as I do". I was not being credible.  Now I'm walking the walk, literally, everyday.

I love what I do and there is nothing better than being able to help young student athletes be the best they can be.  Every morning I get up and I ask myself one question - how can I help my girls and who can I help today?

Thanks!

A much slimmer and healthier Coach K