DRCAINSJOURNEY

The first step after realizing you have a problem is to formulate a plan. After doing some research on the topic of weight loss I discovered that my journey would consist of three components; (1) the psychological, the will to want to lose weight, (2) a serious exercise program and (3) a healthy diet of reduced calorie intake. Weight loss is like a three legged stool. Each of these three legs, the mental, the exercise and the diet are necessary to keep the stool from falling over. If you leave any one of the three out you will not be successful. I was lucky that willpower and setting and achieving goals are something that comes naturally to me. Nevertheless, it helped to have a family who is supportive and who made changes in the environment conducive to new and better eating habits. Something as simple as not buying junk food, scheduling the meals together as a family more often, eating out less and when we did eat out eating sensibly and taking home excess food to be eaten later. Tracking my progress was very important. I would weigh myself daily at about the same time every day relative to my meals and make notes on how I was doing. Certainly there are fluctuations from day to day but in time these fluctuations even out and the picture of weight loss begins to emerge. Lastly, I needed the support of family when things didn't go smoothly. I needed a sounding board, usually my wife, to talk to when I was making slow progress and to push me to keep going when it wasn't pleasant to do so. The second component, exercise, was the fun part. I joined a local gym and got a personal trainer to set me on a safe exercise and weight training program. Exercise helps burn calories and weight training adds muscle which in turn burns more calories. This cycle builds on itself so that the stronger you get, the more you burn and the more you burn the easier it is to lose. It's important to work on all areas of one's body. I divided my weight training into a three day a week process spending a half hour a week on each of the three body areas; upper body, core (back and abdominal muscles) and lower body. This way each area would be fully recovered by the following week. In the beginning weight training yields quick results of strength but little in the way of weight loss. This is because much of the gain is muscle recruitment efficiency and technique practice effect. You want to believe that the pound will just fall off once you start exercising but they don't. It takes time for the exercise to have an effect but slowly and steadily it does. Besides the gym I needed to have some physical activities that were fun. For me that was bicycling and water skiing. I dusted off my stationary bike that up to this point had very little use and I got out on my real bicycle on weather permitting days. I would ride one or the other for about six to ten miles five days a week. About one weekend a month I would go on a fifteen to twenty-five mile ride with my son who lives in Seattle and who is an avid bicycle rider. (My son doesn't own a car and he goes everywhere either by bike or bus) As summer came around I tried to get down to the ski lake for a couple slalom sets. (a slalom set is six passes through the course) Now anyone who has water skied through a slalom course knows it consumes a great deal of energy. Two sets in the course is about equal to a half hour in the gym so on ski days I substituted slalom for the weight room. My first summer of water skiing showed very slow improvement. I was still quite overweight most of the summer weighing in around 205 to 210. But it was certainly better than trying to ski at 225. By the end of my summer season and skiing into the fall I had dropped to just under 200. At that point I rewarded myself with a new ski that had an optimal ski weight of 175. I was still too heavy for that particular ski at that time but I knew that if by the next summer I got my weight down to my ideal weight I would be rewarded with better skiing performance on this shorter lighter ski. Lastly the third leg of my weight loss was the diet. I was lucky that one of my daughter's soccer coaches invited me to an evening meeting given a dietician. She was promoting a weight loss meal plan product through my daughter's soccer coaches' home marketing business. The meeting came at just the right time because I needed to simplify my caloric intake and not cheat myself if I was to get the results I wanted. Using the system of meal replacement bars, drinks and snacks I was able to tightly regulate my calories for the majority of my day. I would have a 200 calorie meal replacement drink at breakfast, a 200 cal snack pack and or energy bar at mid morning, a 150 to 200 calorie lunch, a 200 calorie afternoon snack packet around 3pm. For dinner I would eat what the family ate, usually a meat or fish portion, a carbohydrate such as a bread and an equal amount of fruits and vegetables for about a 1000 calories. Before retiring for bed I would have either another 200 cal meal replacement as a snack or make a small sandwich of the same number of calories. This regimin put me at about 500 calories below my BMR (basal metabolic rate). This enabled me to have a weekly caloric deficit of 3500 calories which brought about a weight loss of one pound a week.
I found that weight loss is not rocket science. It is simple math; energy burned must be greater than energy consumed. The difficult part is getting the plan together and then sticking with it.

Over the course of that first year there would be two obstacles that would stand in my way and these were physical problems. The first problem that was limiting my exercise was a condition known as plantar fasciitis. This condition, which causes pain and inflammation in the feet was partially caused by me being overweight. Once I developed this chronic, and at times disabling, foot disorder I was unable to run and at times I found it painful to walk or stand. Fortunately my son came to my rescue when he suggested I get back into bicycling. I found that road biking and stationary biking actually felt good on my feet. My other alternative would have been to swim but since I had no ready access to a swimming pool bicycling made the most sense. Over the course of a few months as my weight came down my feet began to feel better and I could even jog for short distances without pain. This pointed out to me the importance of getting my weight under control when I did. Had I waited a few more years I might have developed knee or hip pain which would have made the exercise component of weight loss all the more difficult. Fortunately for most children activity is not a problem. As we age it is harder and harder to find the time; but find the time we must. The second condition I developed affected me towards the end of my first year of weight loss. Having reduced my weight at this point almost 40 pounds I began to be much more involved in my water skiing. However, many years of water skiing with bad falls had left me with multiple herniated discs in my neck. As the summer wore on the pain in my neck and down my left arm became too intense to bear and surgery was the only option. I had to discontinue my skiing until the operation but I was able to continue stationary cycling and supervised physical therapy to continue my weight loss right up until the time of surgery. Recovery from surgery definitely had a mixed effect. I was not able to exercise at all for several weeks and then had to begin to build back to my former endurance very gradually over several months. I had surgery in October of 2007 and I had to skip then entire 2008 winter snow ski season. The good effect my neck surgery had was that it made eating very difficult for several weeks as swallowing took some effort. Even today I have to eat slower as I cannot swallow as large of amounts as I could before surgery. Slowing down and chewing one's food is always a good thing, especially for weight loss; in my case it is now a necessity. My surgeon said that I could ride my bicycle throughout the spring but that I could not water ski again until June of 2008. Hence, bicycling got kicked into high gear while water skiing had to wait a little while longer.

As the competitive water skiing had to be put on hold for a few months I needed a goal. Since my son was the one to suggest I get back into bicycle riding in the first place, he added a second suggestion. He proposed we set our goal on riding the Seattle to Portland Bicycle Classic. This is a 202 mile organized bicycle ride from Husky Stadium through the back roads and scenic country to Holladay Park at the Lloyd Center Mall in Portland Oregon. This was a goal that would push me to get in top riding shape. I had never gone on a ride more than about forty miles before so this was going to be bigger challenge than I had encountered before. My son, who goes to school in Seattle, was my inspiration to keep pushing myself. His schedule did not permit us to ride every weekend during the spring of '08 but about every other week we would do a 20+ mile ride in the greater Seattle area through the bike trail system. When summer arrived I lost my son as my training partner as he had summer employment on the east coast. We would have to train separately from June until the start of the ride on July 12. Training together is important because you have to get comfortable with drafting 2" off of each other's rear tire and reading the hand signals. We had done as much drafting off one another until he had to go and from then on it would be up to us individually to maintain and build our fitness up until the time of the ride. My son could not take his bike back to the east coast so he would have to rely on spin bikes at the local gym to keep his riding legs in shape. Starting in June I was cleared to start water skiing so I would cart my bike down to Olympia and train on the back roads between Lacey and Littlerock. The lake where I train for slalom water skiing is known as Lake Havvaski and is located just east of the town of Littlerock. Some days I would ride my bike 38 miles from my house in Steilacoom to the Lake and follow this with a couple sets in the slalom course. Most days, however, I would drive to the lake and ski with my daughter and go for a twenty mile ride between Littlerock to Olympia and back. As the weeks drew near for the big ride I was putting in about 90 miles a week of riding and two or three days a week of water skiing. I think this was the best shape I had ever been in during my entire adult life. My weight was down to 170, I was fit, trim and strong; I had the body back I had worked so hard for. ............While I was getting prepared on my side of the country ..........MAJOR GLITCH........were happening on the east coast with my son. Just before the Fourth of July I got an urgent phone call from my son who said he had come down sick with what appeared to be an infection in his hand. He wasn't sure how it started but within a few short hours redness and swelling was developing on his thumb. It was late in the afternoon and I directed him to the nearest medical facility and to seek treatment. First he went to a local urgent care and got a prescription for an antibiotic. He went home and while on the way home the tissues of his thumb ruptured and drained large amounts of pus. He watched the infection very closely but over the next five to six hours the infection was beginning to take over his hand and he was starting to feel ill. When he called me I told him to take a cab to the nearest hospital as I knew at this point he had a very serious infection. At the hospital he spent the night and part of the next morning recieving high doses of antibiotics to get the infection under control. The redness and swelling began to recede and recovery was beginning to take place. However, he and I were just a little less than two weeks away from our big ride and he could no longer train. It wasn't even certain if his hand would be healed up in time to ride the event. We both went on hoping and planning as if he would come through. If he couldn't ride he would still come home and cheer me on. The only problem with that scenario would be that I would not a drafting partner and the ride would seem much longer without somebody to take turns with cutting through the wind..............SECOND GLITCH.......Well as luck would have it his hand healed up just in time and he flew back to Seattle to get ready for the big ride. I picked him up at Seatac and he headed up to his apartment on Capitol Hill to get his bike ready. One thing he had done right before he had left was to purchase new lighter weight rims for the long ride. The only problem was that tires used a different inner tube than the old tires and of our only two inner tubes the right side one was defective. We spent over two hours trying to devise a fix and it just would not work. As it was getting to be nearly 3 am and the ride started at 7am we punted and used one old rim and one new one and grabbed some quick shuteye before the dawn came around all too soon. Up bright and early we downed a high calorie breakfast and coasted to Husky Stadium from Capital Hill and started the ride on time, albeit a little sleepy. The rest of the ride came off without any more serious problems. There were no flat tires. My son got a little pain in his right knee about a hundred miles into the ride, just twenty miles from our sleep layover. We pulled into a pharmacy and bought a compression knee sleeve and loaded him up on some ibuprofen and he was good to go for another twenty miles where we planned our stop. Most likely he got the ache from being unable to train the two weeks before the ride because of his sickness. At our slightly past midway stopping point we were 126 mile into the ride and we went an extra 5 miles out of our way so we could spend the night with friends in Toledo. My friend, who owns a chicken farm fed us about a 5000 calorie spaghetti dinner and gave us hot showers and warm beds. I don't think a bed ever felt so good. In the morning Rod and his wife gave us 2000 calorie breakfasts of eggs, bacon, rolls and juice and sent us on our way at 6 am.........................
......THE HOT FINAL PUSH INTO PORTLAND..........Both my son and I felt strong for the final leg of the trip. We had only about 86 miles until the finish but the weatherman decided to throw a few rays of sunshine our way. We knew the day was going to be a scorcher so we covered as much ground as we could in the early morning hours. By late morning we were crossing into Oregon and the day was getting warm. By noon as we rode on the side of Hwy 30 in Oregon our bike thermometers were topping 100 degrees and each time we would stop for water we would douse ourselves as well as drink at every opportunity. Now you would think that with 190 miles ridden in two days, 100 degree heat and only 20 miles to go we would have taken it easy the final leg. Amazingly our bodies felt fantastic. We kept pouring down the liquids and eating energy bars as we rode and we nearly sprinted the final twenty. We hooked up with four other riders who had a similar plan and we were cutting through the air in as a team of six riders all drafting in line averaging in the mid 25mph range. Now I will admit the final hill before we got into the city limits was no fun in the blast furnace heat we were enduring but with the finish so close we just put it out of our minds and rode on............BEER NEVER TASTED SO GOOD............It was a terrific feeling riding into Holladay Park grabbing onto the "Finisher Patch" they handed us as we rode across the line. We quickly stowed our bikes and went to the beer garden for brew and burritos. My wife and daughter arrived by car soon afterwards to join us in refreshing; not to mention provide us transportation back home while listening to our stories. This goal accomplished it was time to focus on my next goal; competitive water skiing.

As I noted above, my water skiing resumed in June of last year after I was cleared by my spine surgeon. The one caveat I did not mention is that I had to ski with a hard collar neck brace to protect my spine. This was a bit of a setback as it meant I could not look down and could not tilt my head and neck when I was going into the turns. This had two consequences. First, I could no longer see the slalom buoys until after I changed edges and was rotating into the turn. Secondly, I could no longer tilt my head to keep my eyes partially level with the horizon when I was at the apex of my turns. This essentially made me have to partially learn to ski the course over again. While accepting the fact that from here on out I would need to use a neck brace to water ski was not difficult; certainly I do not want to risk paraplegia. It did make the water skiing more of a challenge than I anticipated. After about a month of skiing I was approaching the level that I had left off at, though never quite equaling my past performance in the course. Nevertheless, I had full intentions to resume competition again in the novice brackets just to see what I could do. Unfortunately, life had some different plans. As I was preparing and practicing three times a week after the big bike ride, I had an unfortunate water skiing accident. In water ski talk "I went out the front on my off side pull." What that means is that I got my weight too far forward over the front of the ski as I was crossing the wake coming out of my weak side turn (crossing right to left for a right foot forward skier like myself). This catapulted me at close to 45mph head over heals into a summersault in which my ski ejected from my feet being flung over my head past me. The ski landed in front of me and my trajectory placed me right in line with the ski. I tried to protect myself as best I could but my head ended up striking the ski carving a nice little gash in the top of my forehead at the hairline and sent me "seeing stars." My ski partners pulled me into the boat, dripping with blood, dazed and slightly confused. My friends got the bleeding stopped with pressure bandages and got me to the local hospital emergency room where the good doctor stitched me up. He did an excellent job as you can hardly see the scar. Unfortunately, return to competition was put on hold. Because of the concussion I had to take a two week break from skiing and forgo the two tournaments I had been lined up to participate in. By the end of summer and early fall I was back skiing and had shaken off the effects of my injuries. It was too late to register for another tournament so my second goal of returning to an active physically fit life would have to wait for the spring of '09. The first novice events I plan to enter are the INT events in Washington State. Having the busy practice I do, I probably won't be able to do all of them. However, I'll try to enter as many as I can. This year, barring any unforseen mishaps, I hope to surpass my past performances. If I can compete and compete well at these events then I will have reached the second of the two fittness goals. This is living an active healthy lifestyle is really all about; setting goals and achieving them. I want all my patients to enjoy the benefits of a healthy body. A healthy lifestyle is rewarding. It make take some work and sacrifice to achieve it, but it is worth it.

THE NEXT YEAR HAS FINALLY ARRIVED! and as much disappointment and pain as last season dealt me, this season in its first day has brought a measure of compensation and satisfaction. My daughter, who has been one of my two training partners this spring, accompanied me down to Winlock Waters for the 2009 inaugural event. Just last week the weather was teasing us with an unseasonably hot blast that made it seam more like August than June. However, just as the weatherman had forecast, we were back to overcast, wind and drizzle the morning of the event. After getting through all the formalities of checking in at the registration table and signing the waiver for my daughter and myself, absolving the lake owners of liability incase we are killed or maimed, I decided to survey the wind and water conditions. For those that have skied at Winlock, you know that the lakes are oriented north-south. For the slalom skiing event, which would begin at 8am, I would face a 10 to 15mph wind out of the south making my opening pass a stiff headwind. Herein comes the strategy of slalom skiing; which speed (or line length for the high end skiers) to begin with. My personal best in any prior tournament before my neck injury was a full pass at 30mph and 5 buoys at 32mph. My best ever in practice is 1 ball at 22off at 34mph and at practice the night before I ran 3 at 15off 34mph. So the dilemma is this. Do I start my opening pass at 28mph which is about as easy as my deep water start, or do I begin at 30mph being as I have the headwind which will make this pass easier but the 32mph pass that much harder. I chose the later as I was thinking ahead to a possible 34mph headwind pass. As luck would have it my conditions would be tricky. My lone competitor in my novice division skied before me and he started off at 28mph and ran it successfully. However, on his return pass at 30mph, with the wind at his back, he went out the front crossing the wake from 3 ball to 4 ball cartwheeling a nice double summersault. As skiers often do he waived off the rescue boat putting his hand in the air. However, after about a minute he was making no progress moving towards the shore. The crew boat made a quick dash down to him and pulled him on board. I was getting ready to ski next as the rescuers pulled up and they assisted him onto the dock. He was a little shaken up but he was gathering his wits about him. He was able to smile and say he didn't intend to give us an Evel Knievel show! Of course this is all running through my mind as I am stepping onto the swim step of my towboat getting ready to head into wind and chop with with gusts up to 15mph. Just a little less than a year ago I was put out of commission with an "out the front" fall and "head on collision" with my ski. I slipped into the water which was surprisingly warm from the prior weeks weather. In just a matter of seconds I was heading south on the water shooting through the entrance gates. I was skiing behind a brand new 2009 Ski Nautique which had just about the softest wake I ever experienced. I stretched out my arm rounding 1 ball with my knees bent and headed for 2ball barely even feeling the wake behind this beautiful towboat. I repeated this movement four more times and was soon going around 6 ball and out the gates at the other end of the lake just a little less than twenty seconds form the beginning of my run. I didn't have much time to congratulate myself for having just won my two man division because the 2009 Ski Nautique was heading around the turn island and accelerating up to 32mph back into the course with the wind at my back. The south end of the lake was a bit smoother because of the shorter fetch for the waves to grow but I made a slight mistake and pulled out for my gates a bit late. This put me a bit down course and after 3 ball I was not able to make up the shortage. However, I would ski back to the dock having run my opening pass in tough conditions and scored within 2 buoys of my pre-injury tournament best. I thought to myself that considering last summer, if my season ended right now I could consider it a success!

About about two hours and twenty skiers later, it was my daughter's turn to ski. Shannon is my youngest child and has a July birthday. This year I decided to get her a brand new ski for her "birthday" and give it to her a couple months early. She has only had a couple weeks to practice on her new stick but already she is making excellent progress. In practice the other night she ran her full pass at 28mph and got around three buoys at 30mph. In the two hours between the time we skied the wind had died down to about 7mph so the conditions would be a little better for her. Shannon decided to run her opening pass at 26mph which she handily negotiated. Coming back at 28mph she got around 4 ball but came into 5 ball a little too narrow giving her a score of 4 buoys at 28mph. This was her tournament best and every day she gets more and more used to her new ski. It won't be long until she is passing me up, like her brother did about fifteen years ago. If there is one thing I have learned as a water skiing parent it is this. You have to check your ego at the starting dock. The kids are getting stronger, faster and better every day; we adults are just trying to hold on to what we have. It is sure fun watching them grow and progress. Sharing these moments with my children is more precious than gold. For pictures of the first day of action click here to go to my waterski page.

Last year when I rode the 2008 STP with my son Nick it was the goal that I used to push myself to a higher level of physical condition than I had been at for some time. This year I did it for fun. Joining my son and me on our second trek from Seattle to Portland was his girlfriend Eina. Eina is a native of Japan and is a very strong rider as well as an amateur bike mechanic (which came in handy when my son's wheel became slightly untrued). Eina spent her younger days as a bike messenger in Japan riding as much as sixty miles a day for her work. Needless to say she had no problem with the distance of the STP.

We began our journey on the 2009 STP from Husky Stadium on a bright and sunny Saturday morning with clear skies and smooth riding. We decided to ride the STP a little differently this year. We decided we would keep a good steady pace, and often a quick pace between stops, but rest and enjoy the day at each of the breaks. Our total time for the event would end up taking longer than the year before but it was very enjoyable to take in the moment and festivities at each of the rest and meal stops. The weather didn't take long to get us heated up as the sun began to bear down on us as we climbed out of the Puyallup Valley. Once we hit the bike trail out of Puyallup we were in for a great surprise. Not only were we giving shade from the afternoon sun but we had a tailwind pushing us all the way to Centralia!

Overall our riding pace was quick and our rests were leisurely and pleasant. We did have a few minutes down time due to fixing two flat tires but nothing that was out of the ordinary. We pulled into Centralia College around 5pm and we were met by my wife and daughter who brought the provisions for the evening meal. We cooked Linguini noodles on the camp stove and added pesto sauce for a tasty dinner with which to replenish our carbs. We ate plenty of bread and fresh fruit before retiring for the evening.

Sunday morning we awoke to a totally different weather pattern. As we pulled out of Centralia we were being chased by thunder and lightning. Not far behind came brief pelting of corn sized hail and after that we were hit by rain drops the size of small marbles. What a difference a day makes! After we were good and wet, we did take solace in a fifty mile respite from further rain. As the day wore on we did have some periods where the riding was made very easy with a persistent push from a wind out of the north. This made the hills in Oregon after the Longview Bridge seem much less steep. However, we were not to get off totally easy. As we neared Portland the skies once again decided to open up. There were long stretches of road where the three of us could no longer draft due to the "rooster tails" being thrown up by our rear tires on the rain soaked streets. Finally we cruised into the "City of Roses" in the late afternoon under dark skies. This year, like last, I replenished my energy stores with a giant burrito. However, somehow beer on a cold wet and dark afternoon just didn't sound so good and a warm cup of coffee was much more appealing. Already I am making plans for next year's STP. We are in the process of looking for a tandem bike. All the tandem riders I saw looked like they were having just "too much fun!" Next year I would like to do the STP in one day, possibly as part of a tandem team. Now I am thinking to myself, who will want to be my "stoker?"