Kristen completed our five week nutrition challenge and lost 5 lbs and decreased her body fat by 2.1%! Kristen stated her favorite part of the challenge was learning that eating healthy does not have to be boring.
Introduce Yourself
“Hi I’m Kristen Simms and I have been a member of CrossFit since the end of August.”
Why did you sign up for the nutrition challenge?
“Nutrition side of a healthy life is always harder for me. Working out, while I’m not on top of my game and lifting the heaviest weights, that’s easy. I just listen to directions and do what I have to do. The nutrition part is always the hard part for me, so I really – I think I know a lot, but I just want to keep learning about nutrition so I can continue some of these tips and tricks throughout the rest of my life.”
Tell us a little bit about the success you have had over the last five weeks.
“I’ve definitely been a little up and down. It’s my first nutrition challenge, some people have been doing it a couple times. I still lost(weight) and gained muscle and all of those other things. Walking away from it, at the commitment level that I gave it, I’m still super happy. What it tells me is, if I buy in and continue to do this – those numbers are going to get even better. I’m still super happy to see that I got results even though I wasn’t 100% compliant. I can sustain this for quite a while.”
What was your first sign progress during the challenge?
“I just have to say, I fought the scale. I had to hide it in a closet, I did not get on it. I would be flexing in the mirror and I would notice things are juicer, or things are tighter. I will say, I just went back into work in person yesterday and I had a semi form fitting outfit on and and three people gave me a compliment, so I knew that something was happening.”
Obviously there are the results that we got on paper, are there any results that we as your coaches wouldn’t have noticed?
“Just the comradery in our meetings on Monday nights. The Facebook group that we had, learning different recipes and learning about peoples lives. I feel like I made a lot of connections that’s something very purposeful and just adds to the experience.”
What was the biggest obstacle that you faced that we helped you overcome with the challenge?
“I definitely think the biggest obstacle – I don’t know if I’m totally over the hump but I’m getting there. I think the biggest obstacle for me was weekends, unstructured time for me. During the week I was more or less compliant more of the times that I was on the weekends. I’m going to blame my mom, sorry mom. I would spend time with my Mom, going out to eat as a social thing and things like that. I will say, I talked about the challenge enough that I sent her home with a couple trays that I had to try and get her to buy in. I think as I keep talking about it with her it will be something that we can do together. So I’m kind of excited about that. “
What were the top contributing factors that helped you have success during the challenge?
“I think that the top contributing factors was not counting calories, not counting macros. I’ve done that before, I can do it for like three days and then when I’m not hitting those numbers it’s even more frustrating. I feel like with our tray method, you just put it in the tray. I will say, even if I didn’t meal prep for the week, if I was at work and had stuff in the refrigerator I could put together a meal pretty easy, so that was awesome. Again with the group that we had, learning that it doesn’t have to be boring. The cheeseburger casserole or the turkey meatloaf, I’m always thinking chicken or cut up vegetables, the carb one was easy, I can fill that one out. Aside from the first week I didn’t eat that much chicken – it was kinda neat to learn that you can be creative and still get results. That was really cool.”
If someone was sitting at home right now in the same shoes you were five weeks ago, what would you tell them?
“I would say definitely do it. I thought I knew a lot coming into it, and I stand by my claim that I knew stuff about nutrition, but what I know and what I apply are two different things. Even if you think you know what you’re doing or you think you know a lot – it’s just eye opening and you learn so much. Everything you learn you can continue to carry, it’s not like you’re buying prepackaged meals, you can keep doing it. If you feel like you plateau you can do it again and get another prescription to reevaluate where you are. I feel like I learned a ton.”
