Hello All

tim_fitbuilt4life

As a youth on up to adolescence I have always been active in sports. I played mostly football and ran track up to high school. When I graduated from high school, I only weighed 135 lbs which was 25 years ago and I was never really into weight lifting just running. When I turned the age of 21 years, I joined Ballys Total Fitness Club (formerly Holiday Spas) with the aspirations of becoming a body builder. I added about 70 lbs of muscle on my small body frame in under a year. At that point I plateaued at 205 lbs and people who remembed me from high school thought that I was huge. Next, I joined a Olympus Gym and started working out with powerlifters with the hope of gaining even more wieght. Within the first year at 205 lbs, I was able to bench press 415 lbs and squat 505 lbs and I started to pack on more muscle.

I got my body wieght up to 235 lbs, one hundred pounds heavier then my senior year in high school. However, then injury started to set in. From all of the heavy lifting over time I sprained my lower back, tour a pectorial and bicep muscle and developed bursitis in both shoulders so I had to call it quits to heavy lifting. The problem with calling it quits was that I still had a very high metabolisim and so I ate just as much food as required for heavy lifting but did not really work out much to burn those extra calories. I got as heavy as 250 lbs. On a 5 foot 7 frame that is way too much weight to carry so I had blood work done and my doctor discovered that my cholesterol was 270 and it should be below 199 and my triglycerides were 170 and should be below 100. I coached little league football and I noticed that my energy levels were bad. I could not run without feeling dizzy and tired. I knew I had to do something to get my body back to the shape that it was in when I ran track and played football.

My doctor gave me an ultimatum. She said either I lose the weight or get on medication. So the "no brainer" was to lose the weight and follow a strict diet and exercise program. For starters I got with a personal trainer who cross trained me for the first six months then I started lifting weight again, but not heavy. From that I was able to lose 45 lbs but I could not drop below 200 lbs. I figured that I needed to change my routine to get my past that milestone so I purchased the P90X DVD's to give it a try and as of today I am 197 lbs and in the beginning of my third week. Can you say, "I'm Back"! Glad to join you all and good luck with your goals.