Geek Fitness

Over the course of 5 and a half years of playing WoW, I managed to pack on a few pounds…and by few I mean somewhere in the range of 80-90 pounds. It was a gradual gain over the years, compacted by my lifestyle decisions, namely:
1. Job as a sys admin where I sat majority of day
2. Second job as a WoW raider where I spent my nights sitting in a chair killing dragons
3. Sponsorship* by Papa Johns wherein I would plow through a pizza most raid nights

*Unfortunately, Papa Johns wasn’t aware they were sponsoring me, and I’m pretty sure I kept that local Papa Johns afloat during the economic downtimes.

Shortly after my 30th birthday I decided it was time to create Trigah 3.0 and actually work at fixing the glaring issues that had popped up throughout my 20’s. I had two ways to go about this transition:
Complete 180
1. Get a job as a construction worker
2. Spend nights in dance class
3. Learn to cook and portion my meals

Augment Current Lifestyle
1. Find a way to get some exercise at work
2. Find a way to raid and get exercise
3. Find a way to eat healthy without learning to cook

I decided to look into ways to augment my current lifestyle, as I enjoyed every aspect of it minus the weight issues and aversion to sun. The first step I got really lucky with, as a group of friends from work were going to the company gym during lunch and I began tagging along. I strongly suggest getting at least one gym buddy, as I know personally that I will use any excuse to skip out on going to the gym unless someone is relying on me to go with them.

The second step was to buy a treadmill for my house and a TrekDesk. I had read in the past about research showing that if people walked 1mph during the work day they could lose up to 57 pounds in a year. I didn’t see myself actually using a treadmill at work, as I could just imagine the strange looks people would give me as they walked by my office, but I felt I could definitely use it for raiding and general WoW playing.

I looked into a lot of DIY options for creating your own treadmill desk, and though many had had huge success in building their own, none of theirs seemed like something I would want in my living room (let alone the fact that I am horrible at DIY construction). I opted to get the TrekDesk, and began to use it for raiding, general WoW playing, working from home, and watching TV. I found that for WoW playing, I could comfortably set the speed to 2mph and have no issues performing in game (3mph made my hand move too much). I decided that for any raid content that was on farm status, I would hop on the treadmill and raid. This led to many 4 hour sessions where I would end up having walked 8 miles, but didn’t even notice due to being engrossed in the game.

As for eating, I decided to go with Diet to Go for my meals. I initially was uncertain about the cost of the meals, but after tallying up the cost of Papa Johns during the week, plus all of the breakfasts and lunches that I bought at the deli in my office building ($7-$9 per meal), I realized that I might actually be saving money by getting these meals. The big thing is to not get discouraged if you hit a weight plateau. As I was doing the low carb plan, I hit a weight plateau and after 2 weeks gave up and went back to Papa Johns and my old habits. The Trigah 3.0 revelation was when I decided to get back on Diet to Go and try again, and though I hit the same weight plateau as before, I was able to burst through it a month later. I personally am doing the 6 day a week plan for meals, as I figure there will be times where I am going out with friends for a meal, or may miss a meal and end up with an extra one during the weekend.

A great online tool I found to use for managing your day-to-day eating and exercise is TheDailyPlate . Through this I was able to track my daily caloric intake and gauge the amount of calories burned during exercise. This was extremely helpful for me as I did a lot of travel for work where I didn’t have my meals and had to forage on my own. I began to realize that 1200 calories is a heck of a lot less than I used to eat, and that many times when I’d stop by a McDonalds I’d approach or go over the 1200 calorie limit in only one meal. Through this site I was able to get a real understanding of what a portion actually is, and better understand how my old eating habits led to my current state of affairs.

I am now approaching the 8th month of Trigah 3.0, and I am down 68 pounds from my WoW maximum. I would never suggest that we change our hobbies and passions just to get in shape, but I strongly suggest we augment them so that we can enjoy them longer.