Eating More To Weigh Less

I read an interesting quote today that really stuck in my mind. “The universe doesn’t reward or punish you for the decisions you make, it just adjusts. There is no right way or wrong way, just new ways.” I found it fitting as I have had to make a few tough decisions in my life lately that will force me to find new ways of doing things. Unfortunately my relationship with Liz has ended, but I am hopeful that we can remain friends and support each other in our journeys to Lake Placid.

I promised myself when I agreed to do this blog for Max that I wouldn’t use it as a platform to complain to everyone on how difficult my training was or how hard it was to manage a work/life balance because we all are feeling the same challenges. I feel truly blessed when I think about all I have been thru and how far I have come in the past seven years that as my life adjusts I constantly remind myself how lucky I am to even have the word Ironman in my vocabulary.

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From 443 lbs. to 140.6 Miles at Ironman Lake Placid

He was 443 lbs and just got divorced.  Sure, he was athletic in high school and even “lived it up” playing in a band until the wee hours of the night.  Then, it occurred to him that he was on a path of self destruction that would only stop if he made a life altering change.  Read here about Frank Hubbell’s loss of 240 lbs and plan to tackle Ironman Lake Placid in 2010.

Hello everybody, my name is Frank Hubbell and I was asked by Max to share my story and my thoughts with you as I make the journey to Ironman Lake Placid 2010. I will say that while I consider it an honor to be asked to do this, actually sitting down and doing this has been one of the hardest things I have ever had to do. I originally said no when asked, but Max felt that sharing my story was an important part of this journey for me and could possibly help motivate and inspire some people who may be struggling with issues of their own. I wrestled with the decision for a while before I agreed but after a few “gentle nudges” from Max I ultimately decided that this would be a worthwhile exercise and maybe taking a look back at my past would help me progress forward as an athlete. So here goes…

My journey to Lake Placid really started in 2003 when I found myself at what I consider the low point in my life. I was 33 years old, my marriage had just failed and I found myself tipping the scale at a jaw dropping 443 pounds. It was really time to make some changes in my life or die. I was always athletic growing up, I was captain of the football, baseball and golf teams in high school but once I graduated and went to college for the first time in my life all my competitive athletic activities stopped. I completely lost touch with the competitive side of myself. I still exercised but it wasn’t the same without competitive sports. I graduated college in 1992 and was still in ok shape at 270lbs. I know it sounds weird to say I was in ok shape at 270lbs, but I was. The next ten years is where I really went downhill. I spent much of my time after college working during the day and playing music in a band at night. Playing music in the clubs until 2:00am drinking free beer and eating a diet of fast food quickly began to catch up with me, add in a bad marriage and it was a recipe for disaster. One thing was certain my life had to change!

It was at this time I made a conscious decision to take back control of my life and make the necessary changes in order to survive. I went back to school after my divorce and became a Certified Financial Planner and a Chartered Financial Consultant moving my career in a positive direction. I also began to eat a very restrictive diet and exercised daily. I knew next to nothing about proper nutrition or exercise, but I told myself to just keep showing up at the gym. This was the beginning of the stubborn attitude I have about my fitness today, I just keep fighting and won’t let anyone tell me it can’t be done. So that’s what I did for hours every day. I took my stubborn personality and applied to getting healthy. As I got in better shape I would spend more time every day at the gym. What began as 30 min a day quickly became 4 hours per day. After a year or two I got enough courage to begin to take some group classes at the gym and eventually I was taking four one-hour classes in a row every day. Everything from yoga to step class it didn’t matter as long as I was moving.

There are two people in my life that I met during the next few years that really challenged me to take my fitness to the next level and become a better athlete. The first is my girlfriend Liz. I had built my new life around my exercise routine and it seemed to be working for me so I was really quite afraid to change it. Liz is a personal trainer and she was the one who originally introduced me to triathlon. She knew what an important part of my life exercise had become and is always very supportive. One day she called me up and asked if I would be willing to do a sprint triathlon with her. I thought she was crazy and dismissed the idea, after all I never swam anything other than the doggie paddle, I don’t own a road bike and hadn’t run since high school.

But after some convincing I agreed, I can’t turn down a challenge. I dug an old mountain bike out of my garage, bought a pair of running shoes and swim goggles and we trained together the entire summer. I will say it was one of the best summers I can remember having. I had a goal again and the thought of doing something competitive again thrilled me, I felt like an athlete again! I am lucky enough to live on the beach so after a few weeks of training we measured out a practice course and did little mini triathlons at my house every weekend and slowly we began to get a little better each time. By the end of that summer we did the Niantic Bay, Madison and Hammerfest triathlons. What a thrill! The following year we did a few more sprints an Olympic triathlon and a marathon, we were hooked! I never imagined in 2003 that any of this was possible, but we did it! I will always be thankful to her for waking up the competitor in me again.

It was at this point that I met the second person on my journey to Lake Placid that challenged me to be a better athlete, my trainer Ben Kelly. I was at the New Haven road race in 2008 and while warming up I noticed a group of really fit people wearing CrossFit t-shirts. I had never heard of CrossFit so the next day I decided to check it out online and it looked crazy but I wanted to learn more so I made an appointment to meet Ben.

Ben is the owner of CrossFit Performance which was coincidentally located across the street from my office in Fairfield. At this point I still was training 4 hours per day and had just run my first marathon, I was feeling pretty good and fit and had gotten myself back down to my post high school weight of 270lbs. I wasn’t breaking any records at these races but had that stubborn attitude that nothing was going to stop me from finishing. Looking back at this moment I find it funny that I actually went to meet Ben with the mindset of adding CrossFit to my routine for the winter rather than as a replacement for any of it. I was always in the mindset more was better, a mindset Ben quickly changed. So I meet Ben who is a super fit ex professional rugby player from Australia and he proceeds to tell me that everything I was doing was crap, I should stop all my distance training, that my diet sucked and I would never get better results until I fixed it. WTF? Who the hell does he think he is?

Ben was the first person to ever challenge me like that and being the stubborn guy I am I signed up, not because I believed him but because I was out to prove him wrong. It was like two immovable objects colliding. Well I quickly learned in our first session that I was not quite the athlete I thought I was as Ben humbled me with 10 minutes of Cindy. He got my attention and I was read to listen, although it did take me a few months before I began to let go of my distance training but the longer I worked with Ben the more I learned about proper nutrition and exercise. Ben took my training all the way back down to the basics and instilled in me the importance to first do it right, then do it faster, and then do it longer and that my training long distances on bad form would never yield the results I was looking for, and he was right. After a few short months of training with him I took 32 minutes off my Olympic time without any swim, bike or run training, I was sold!  He then revamped my diet by starting me on the zone diet and then he challenged me to try a 100% Paleo diet for thirty days.  I took his challenge and proceeded to drop 32 lbs in 30 days! Ben consistently challenges me daily to become a better athlete and I am forever grateful to him for that.

They say all good things come in three, so this is where Max comes into the picture. I was at a CrossFit running endurance certification last summer taught by Brian Mackenzie, Ben Kelly and a third guy named Max Wunderle. CrossFit is primarily focused on short high intensity training and Max was the first guy I met in CrossFit who actually had a endurance background so I spent the weekend trying to ask him as many questions as I could, and I really liked what he had to say. I then ran into Max again at Timberman this summer after I completed my first half Ironman. Max and I talked for a few minutes about the race and he asked me about my nutrition and hydration strategy that day, as temperatures were much higher than expected. Well to be honest I didn’t have one that day or any day. Like I said earlier my goal was to just keep showing up. I had never done a race this long where I needed to have one. I had never thought about what I was eating during a race or how much water I should drink. I just went out and did it. Heck I just learned one lap of a track was 400 meters, that I should try and ride with a 90 cadence and I still don’t remember how many meters long a pool is! I think Max gets a kick out of that when I email him with these basic questions. I don’t think he realizes what a project I am going to be!

Well anyway after completing Timberman this summer and getting my weight down to 230lbs. I decided that I would try to complete my first Ironman at 40 years old. I was a little overwhelmed with thinking about how to train for it, so I turned to Max and he recently put a plan together for me that incorporates the CrossFit training I do with Ben with his endurance workouts. I look forward to what lies ahead but I will say so far it hasn’t been a smooth road. In the past month I was kicked off my triathlon team over a disagreement with the team president over the style of training I decided to use for Lake Placid. You see we had a slight difference of opinion. He believes this training style to be a cancer on the sport of triathlon and I believe him to be a cancer on the sport of triathlon. So we parted ways. I never listen to those who say I can’t do it!

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