Goal setting for success.

This one is strictly speaking off topic for this blog but as it is quite relevant I thought I'd share it anyway.

What ever you plan to achieve increase your chances to succeed, by setting yourself goals with targets that involve actions that you can control.

"Score more next season than this season" is not a goal that is entirely within your control. You may not get enough good passes. You may be up against a goalie that knows your shoting habbits really well. You may be injured for a really long time. There are all sorts of reasons why this may not happen. And that can negatively impact your motivation to really go for it.

"Improve shooting accuracy by September 15th" is not a S.M.A.R.T target. It is not measurable. It is also not entirely within your control.

But you can combine the targets and the goals in "I want to score more goals next season than I did this season by making my shots more accurate"

Next you have to take a little more time and look at what it would take to be more accurate. Technique, strength, muscle memory. Technique has to be monitored and possibly corrected by a coach. They have to give you feedback on your execution of your shot.

Which leaves strength and muscle memory. And there is only one way to improve both of these: Repetitions! And the number of repetitions you execute are 100 per cent within your control.

If you practice strength training for 2.5 hours a week and set yourself a goal to shoot 50 slaps, snaps backhands and wristshots every day, your accuracy will improve.

THAT! IS! HOW! YOU! SET! GOALS! TO! SUCCEED!!

It doesn't matter exactly what the goals are, but I think that if you give yourself or your players specific actions to work on they can't help it - they will improve.

You could for instance put a card board box at one end of the driveway and ask your kid (or yourself) to pass 10 tennis balls into the box every day, and then give them a little treat as a reward (reading time, 5 minutes extra before bed time, a magazine when they have done 100 passes. etc etc)

Now how to put this into practice for my weightloss? hmmm.

I'm still here

And I've not gone up or down in weight - just resting on my laurels after getting into the 19 stone area. And there's so much other stress going on that needs resolving soon so dieting has gone out the window. Trying to compensate with more exercises this week though so we'll see on Sunday what the scales say.

At the moment though I am more interested in learning where my get up and go has gone. Since I came off the Antibiotics 2 weeks or so ago now all I want to do come 9 o'clock is go to sleep. Which isn't good when hockey practice is at 10:45 at night!


Jon

Sometimes it just doesn't matter.

I went to Portchester today for my weigh in and it came back 19.13st or 126.5 kilos.

woppiedooda.

A few weeks ago it would have been a big deal, but today I just don't care. So I have removed 15 lbs from my body. 6.8k kilos of lard has gone. That incidentally was slightly less than twice my sons weight when he was born.

I was pleased to see 19 on the slip, but I was even more relieved because I wasn't actually sure I had done enough to lose the weight. What with no exercise and a massive cake sale at work on Friday.

But today I really don't care. I had a closer look at the slip and noticed that at the bottom it shows my BMI (41.3) and also what my weight should be in order to be considered within the "normal" range.

Anything over 12st 1 (76 kilos roughly) and I am overweight apparently. Just to put that into perspective, there is someone I know who is rather petite. I would say she's around 7 -8 stone. If you are 5ft 8 and weigh 12 stone, you could carry her on your back, and together you would still weigh less than what I weigh at the moment! I weigh enough for two people!

and at this rate it will take about 3 and a half years before I can get naked, put her on my back, go to a fancy dress party and introduce her as Michelle. And still only weigh 19stone 13.

Following that mental image, this is going to sound like parading around with a naked woman on my back is a desperate ambition of mine - it's not - but I would much rather I lost the 7 stone quicker than 3 and a half years.

I might even skate quicker by then!

One of the things that also made me care less about the weight loss result was that I have noticed that muscles are toning up and getting smaller. Like my legs. and waist. And I do feel fitter than I have felt in a long time.

But even still. I have only ever lost one pound a week, except ONCE when I lost more, I would love to lose 3-4 pounds this week. Because then I would have broken through the 125kg barrier.

Anyone willing to bet with me or are you all going to bet against me? Cause I think betting against me would be a fairly safe bet!

Happy St Patricks Day.

Unlike most of you I have a legitimate reason to celebrate today. By the way I'm not celebrating because I am now under 20 stone. I don't know if I am. I was ill due to Tonsilitis this weekend so never ventured out to weigh myself. But every year 2 days after my wife's birthday, I make my excuses, go to the pub and have a pint of stout and lift it to honour the patron saint of Ireland.

Because I used to live and work there and I still consider it to be home. Even though I'm Norwegian. Sounds strange I know, but it's easy to idolise a place where you spent most of your time drunk, in great company and with lots and lots of great friends.

So to the rest of you, Happy St Patricks day!

It Beggars Belief

It is staggering how easy it is to say one thing and then do another. Just think how many times you've said "Oh I must phone so and so". What about how easy it is to set a goal with good intentions, but then forgetting to do the work needed to achieve it? It's not like you deliberately set out to fail... it just happened that way. "Life got in the way". Heard that one before? Yeah. Me too.

Right now I am thinking really hard of a way to work "Pales in comparison to" into a sentence in this post. It's not exactly "Life" getting in the way of me finishing this post, but more a distraction. The mundane and frankly mind numbingly unimportant things get in my way. Like when it's time to do the tax return, sure as eggs is eggs, the housework gets done! Or like just now when I spent 10 minutes searching for an idiom to use in that last sentence!

And I am like that when it comes to exercise too. The little things get in the way. Which is kinda funny to me seeing how big I am! (Simple pleasures I know...)

It's not like life gets in the way when I don't manage to get out at lunch time to do a mad dash for 20 minutes of my 30 minute break. It's the facebook! Or I get so distracted by a TV program in the morning, that I forget to make a decent packed lunch! That's not life. That's me being an idiot.

Someone once told me in a Kleeneze training session, that some people spend more time looking for their car keys than reading bank statements. Not sure what that was suppose to mean, but to me it sounds like if I want to succeed I need to be organised. I'm not really good at making sense of idioms.

However, the one thing it appears I AM really good at is losing ONE lb a week. I think 95 % of the time that's what I do - lose one pound a week. It beggars belief how easy it is to lose just one pound a week. You should try it. Piss easy. Walk a bit more, eat a bit less and drink water when you want the kitkat.

So that means this week I am spot on 20 stone, which is a 7lbs weight loss since the 16th of January. (That's the week I went for my epic walk) Or 8 lbs or roughly 4kg since the 9th of January when I started writing here.

But I refuse to join a gym. I can see the point though. Just look at the Biggest Loser TV program. They would not be able to lose all that weight on diet alone. It's just not at all possible!

If you're supposed to eat 2000 calories a day (as an example), that's the maximum number of calories you can cut out of your daily diet. Not a sustainable solution at all and it puts a lid on how much weight you can lose from dieting alone.

But if you do some exercise then it is quite easy to burn 2000 calories. It might take a few hours on the Elliptical Trainer but it can be done. In fact you can burn a whole lot more than just 2000 in a day at the gym. Which makes it infinitely easier to lose weight by exercising than by dieting. And you would be healthier too. Sorry I would be healthier too.

So why am I not joining a Gym? They cost money. I have a gym across the road from where I work, and I can get in there to swim for free because of the company I work for. I have a bike. I have some decent walking shoes and I have my ice hockey.

And provided I can keep the little things at bay and stop them distracting me I should be alright. And Provided I can stick to the restricted eating plan, I should be alright.

But you know that slight hunger pain you get when you're on a diet? Well it pales in comparison to the starving sensation I get for up to two days after hockey practice! I burn so many calories in that one session that my body craves for me to replace the nutrients. This week I will try and see if a protein shake afterward helps me with this problem.

Because with Easter egg season being just around the corner, I need to speed up my weight loss!

Weigth loss is one thing... but then there is something far bigger

I'm not talking about my waistline this time even though it is pretty big, but something that is beginning to annoy me a little more than it should.

Yeah this week I am getting very close to breaking through the 20 stone barrier and into the "teens" as I was 20st 1lb when I weighed myself on Sunday. So what? It's 127.6kg and 6kg lighter than what I was the first time I weight myself at Superdrug in Portchester back in July. Or a stone if I go by the imperial stones and pounds. So what?

Because it is beginning to bug me that some people that frankly should know better just dismiss any sports or fitness expertise I give them. Yeah I've not been involved in hockey for very long, but I played youth sports on a very successful Handball team from I was 8 or 9 until I was 16. I did Cross country skiing competitions (although I was crap at that!), and I spent a couple of years doing gymnastics (!) and I went through some pretty hardcore training when I joined the Norwegian Army. Although the army thing isn't that important because most Norwegians my age had to go through the same training.

I did some running when I lived in Dublin (although reportedly I mainly got lost in the park) and during a particular time in my life I lived, ate, drank and trained my buff body in accordance to the gospel that is MensFitness. I lost 2 stone and a bit in a little under 2 months. But then I found a partner that I wanted to marry, settled down with kids and got lazy. And THAT, my dears is how I ended up at 21 stone.

NOT because I sat on my arse all through my childhood. I can still stand with my feet together, straighten my knees bend over and put my PALM on the floor, not because I never moved a muscle and have no muscle tone, but because I was taught how to stay flexible when I did gymnastics, and our handball club was fanatical about avoiding injuries from pulled muscles. So we bloody stretched, bent, jumped, leapt and SWUNG for flaming HOURS a week to stay flexible.

I know how important it is to warm up and STRETCH before practice starts. And I still very rarely wake up stiff the morning after a hard practice because I STRETCH and have a cool down routine that involves me loosening up the muscles and removing the stiffness before it gets sore.

But because I'm fat people don't see that. And to be honest I can't blame them. I can't blame them for not listening to me when I try to tell members of the ladies ice hockey team that when their star forward goes on a breakaway their job is not to stand on the home blueline or in the neutral zone and grumble over the fact that she doesn't pass. She's busy trying to outrun the oppositions D. Your job is to chase the bloody rebound if your star player misses!

I can't blame people if they don't believe me if I tell them that they need to move into open ice or into a position where they can receive a pass. I can't blame others if they think I'm a moron if I say that it is OK for star players to get frustrated and shout if they repeatedly have to tell other less experienced players that they are in the wrong position. It's not a smart thing to do but it's a bloody game and nothing personal! When you play in a team sport for a long time and with many different people, you get to understand that some people will always play to win, and blame everyone else for a loss. Same thing in life. Some people have great individual skill, but maybe lack a bit of confidence. A lot of times some team mates make mistakes. They cock up big time. How the team as a whole DEAL with that individuals cock-up makes the WHOLE difference when the NEXT game comes along. Disagreement and arguments are not in themselves bad provided they get resolved. Unresolved arguments fester on the whole team spirit and can ruin a good run.

Resolving issues that usually have been festering because someone couldn't let a hurtful comment go, can suddenly bring the team together again and turn a bad run around. Usually the fastest way to do this is to let the comment go - it wasn't personal. It was about the game, and it was simply a clumsy way to show you something you can improve upon.

A team is better than the total individual skill of the players when all the players want to make each other better - when you want your team mates to succeed. In fact your not a team until that happens. You're a group of individuals. And until everyone ELSE in the team is more important than YOU, there is no TEAM.

In order to play in a team sport you have to play to your mates strengths. So someone is good at breakaways - keep the D nearest her preoccupied with what you're doing. Then rush to the rebound. PLAN your Fking plays in advance and practice them in the frikking car park! 3 of the 4 goals that the ladies team let in last week came on what I would guess were pre rehearsed, planned plays (set pieces). 2 of them split the D by two forwards crossing over from left to right, one crossing in front of the goal and the other then returning with the puck behind the goal, easy slot pass - BANG in the net. And the slap shot goal? The scored had 7 - SEVEN - shots from the exact same spot. Don't tell me that wasn't rehearsed.

But I can't blame people for not believing I speak with authority. When it comes to ice hockey I don't. But when it comes to teamwork, and teamsports - I do.

But that authority is hard to spot under 20 stone of fat.

And that is MY fault and MY responsibility to fix.

Small goals help big time!

If you can't read that, it basically says 128.1 kilos or 20stone 2 pounds or a weightloss of 6 pounds since I started this blog. In the last two weeks I lost 4 pounds and I am pretty pleased with that!

And I think the biggest reason why I suddenly managed to double my weekly weightloss (and two weeks running too!) was that I broke through the 130kg barrier. I was pretty pleased to see the back of 130 and the thought of going back there scared me into sticking better to my diet.

This week I am desperate to lose 3 pounds or more because I want to get under 20 stone! And I know that went I have achieved that I will be looking towards 125, then towards the 19 stone mark etc.

Having such small targets means I should be able to hit one every month or so and I am finding that VERY motivating. I'm sorry but I find "lose 3lbs a week" about as motivating as watching bankers pissing away everyone elses money so these tiny goals help give me a sense of progress.

Another thing I started doing is using my phone to track my exercising and bore every one of my facebook friends by telling them how far I have walked, how fast, how high and where.

So keep an eye out for my exercise posts on facebook - I'm finding them very addictive!

Thank Goodness!!

I knew for a fact that I was losing weight this week compared to the weeke before because I kept on dropping my trousers. Well not literally, but they certainly felt ready to fall off a number of times. My hockey friends will say "what else is new?" but unlike my hockey kit, these trousers are not usually too big.

I think I have gone down a dress size as well this week though as I seem to have shrunk more than the weight loss shows. Last week I was 20 stone 7lbs. (130.2) but this week I'm down to 129.6. A 600 gram loss is not much but it's more than the one pound the scales claims it is!

I should start a facebook group to protest! Or at least write an indignant letter! But then I remember I'm not British so I'll try to get some Scandinavian government funding to support my fat fitness blog.

My so called diet is still ... erm... marginally being followed. The no bread (or at least not much) rule is hard to follow and the incredibly irritating idea to eat just meat/fish with veg and no/little spud is just... well.

Ok so I achieved what I achieved by being more active than I was the week before.
- I went for a total of two hours worth of walking this week.
- I played a hockey game.

and the rest of it will come in a post tomorrow.

I'm not fat enough!

One of the clients where I work conduct clinical trials. Today I discovered that they are starting an obesity trial for people with over-eating issues.

I'm not exactly an overeater but I decided to have a look to see if I would qualify as the trial pays £1600 to take part.

Turns out I'm not fat enough!

So I'm happy today :o)

This is the difficult post

This weeks post is really hard to write.

The exercise part is VERY easy to write: Hockey - 1.5 hours. Stick Handling - about an hour in all. And that's about it. NOT enough.

The eating part is also very easy to write: Didn't follow the diet, but ate "normal" food and had some sweets too. Mainly because I was really hungry all week and I ran out of eggs. But I watched how much I ate.

The hard bit is where I have to face the fact that the end result was directly caused by my own decisions. There's only one person responsible for what happened and that's me. I can explain that I did not get to go swimming because of my feet. I can also blame my feet for not doing any walking this week. In fact they still hurt from my 8 mile trek.

But I caused that too.

So how would you react if your results don't come, when you didn't put in the effort that is required? and what if all your results are there in the public domain, displayed on a giant internet posterboard if you will, for everyone to see? And you are letting everyone pass their own judgement on your lack of achievement.

This is the hard part. Everyone gets to see my results and I can't control what you people think. I failed to achieve what I wanted to achieve this week. And I failed to achieve what others expected of me. Everything I failed to do this week is out in the open and available for everyone to see. I have to face you all knowing that you know I failed to achieve what I wanted to do.

I could have simply not posted an update. Or lied. Or quit. But the whole point of making this blog was to encourage, embarass and inspire me to work harder. And if this week is anything to go by, I could do with getting humiliated a bit more!

I lost no weight this week. I didn't gain any either, which is something of a victory. But I have to step up the activity and eat better because if I don't I have to face the same humiliating task next week of writing the same miserable message that I wasn't good enough. And I don't want to do that again.

So even though this post is difficult, it is pretty important. And pretty positive.

Fat Norwegian Flat.

I learnt alot today. It's my weigh-in day and I decided that I was going to walk to the scales - 4 miles away - and then walk back again. That was an 8 mile round trip (roughly 12km) I hadn't thought through...

First of all I hadn't thought through the choice of shoes, something the blisters on my feet are proof of. It seems that cheap WallMart (ASDA) trainers can't take the 20 stone plus weight bearing down on then for a significant length of time. I am actually so fat that I POPPED one of the air bags in the sole of one of the shoes. Yup. I got a flat shoe. You know you're fat when you manage to actually POP the airbags in your trainers just walking in them. Not quite as embarassing as breaking two camping chairs in one week. Brand new camping chairs. never been used before. Never been sat in before. But then I remembered that no one could see that I poped it, and I remembered it's George. And let's face it, if George made Computer Operating systems they would have invented Windows Vista.

I should have worn my hiking boots, which are seriously high tech and very very comfortable. A lesson worth remembering; NorthWest Territory Hunters. I wore them when I went to the rink this evening and it was actually really comfortable to walk.

I can't think of any other reason NOT to do the walk. It didn't rain. It wasn't too hot. Or too cold and best of all according to my trip counter thing on my phone I burnt around 1800 calories doing that walk. I had to have a chocolate bar to even out the count to about 1500 though.

Oh, and if you're going to walk 8 miles in bad shoes to get massive blisters.... carpets are better than hardwood floors! (I am regretting "laminating" the floors!)

So let me just get on with the meat of this weeks update. There was a point to my walk you see - I weigh myself in a shop in Portchester and as Thomas and I walked home from there one time, I knew how long it was so I had no hesitation doing the round trip.

and as you can see from the video that I made while I walked back, I lost weight.

It's not alot because all I did was being careful with what I ate and cut out snacking. I also have a pretty protein rich and carb low breakfast followed by a normal lunch sandwich and fruit and if I get hungry before tea time I have a protein shake just to tide me over.

I basically try to cut down on sugary foods, bread, cheese and replace it with fruit veg and white meat or fish. There is a pretty strict plan that I should follow, but it is rather complicated to sort it all out in time, plus there's 3 of us that eats dinner. So I watch my portions sizes by trying to eat dinner on a smaller plate.

Exercise. I had my walk and ice hockey training as the two main sources of exercise this last week and if my blisters heal OK I will go swimming before work a couple of times this week as well. I also try to do 20 minutes of stick handling drills 3-4 times a week. I'm so unfit that it gives me a pretty decent workout.

And I end up looking less like a tool when I train. Because apparently I skate badly enough for one of my team mates to comment that my backwards skating was "stylish". I think he was being sarcastic! But the problem with stick handling on a wooden floor with a wooden ball? It's noisy! Must be the reason why my missus who is literally DYING to score a goal this year, flatly refuses to practice her stickhandling.

So anyone have any suggestions what other exercising I could try? It needs to be free/cheap and easy to do.

Background picture

It's me and my son playing at the local out door rink.

Why FNT?

Day 2 today and I thought I'd share with you...

Why FNT?

It is actually a nickname. A term of endearment if you will. She says I'm a nice bloke but still came up with it after I told her and my other colleagues where she works about my 13 year old neighbour. He is one of those simple types that thinks if you shout out loud from behind double glazed windows no one can hear you.

So when I came home one day he screamed OI! FAT NORWEGIAN T(At which point I looked straight at him)waaatt.... He now knows that double glazed windows are not sound proof. And the humiliated look on his face when he realized I heard him was priceless. I retold this story and this lady ( and I use the term loosely as she is from North Fareham afterall) laughed and went "FNT"! "FNT"!. I think. I'm not sure how quickly it got abbreviated to FNT, but it sorta stuck.

And when I weighed myself on Sunday I thought about making this blog and the name sort of gave itself.

So that's who I am... Fat Norwegian Twatt ... Soon to be Fine Norwegian Totty.

New Year, New blog.

Those of you that have known me less than 5 years may not know that I have a blogger past. I was in fact a shit hot success in the blogging world 5 years ago. Well. I knew what to do at least. And until 2008 I blogged about my self employed life every week. 3 years solid in fact. If not longer. I stopped because I was no longer self employed and well. I got bored and had nothing more to say really.

Now, about 30 months later I have a reason to write to you again.

I have decided I need to be accountable so that I can remove the fat from my life. Because the title of this blog is the truth.

From Fat, Norwegian Twatt (FNT)

I am very fat.

I am also Norwegian. And one of my neighbours frequently call me a twatt. So there you go.

The picture proves how fat I was on Sunday. The date is on there as well. So every week I will detail what I have done in terms of exercise and any other tips or what ever I have discovered and then let you know how much if any weight I have lost. Wish me luck!