60 POUNDS LIGHTER: GRANT VANDEHEY

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Before I started training, my weight at the health clinic here on campus [at Gonzaga University] was 265 pounds in February 2011. I’m not sure about body fat, but at 6-foot-1, this was mostly fat. I couldn’t even finish a 2k row and I ran roughly an 11-minute mile.

I started working with XX at Crossfit in March 2011. We started with simply doing Crossfit workouts such as box jumps, lunges, pushups, etc, etc. Everything was difficult at first. I couldn’t even get two pushups without having to drop to my knees.

Since then, XX has been sending me about three workouts a week that include strength work as well as conditioning. I do a lot of power cleans, squats, dumbbell bench-presses, thrusters, etc, etc.

We try to work in strength with conditioning, so I do a lot of multiple-round, fast-paced strength workouts with breaks in between, similar to the WODs that everyone does during classes at the gym.

This is not easy while attending college. Not only is working out difficult to fit into my schedule, but eating right has been key to my weight loss as well, and this also takes some work while away at school.

The way that I approach training now is just like going to class — it’s something I have to do to accomplish the goals I’ve set out for myself. It just gets easier as time goes on because I keep seeing results and improvements on all the workouts.

The training has really helped my personal life as well. I’m much more confident with my appearance, my clothes fit better, and I simply have more energy throughout the day. I never huff when I go up flights of stairs anymore, and even just waking up in the morning, now I feel like I have more energy.

XX has been a great motivator throughout this process. He’s been very understanding about how hard it is to work training into a busy school schedule, and always gives me positive feedback about the progress I’ve made. We track my workouts and progress on a Google document. He sends me weekly workouts and I log my results.

Now it’s December 2011 and I weigh 205 pounds! [This is a loss of 60 pounds!] For the first time in my life, I can finally do a pull-up, which was a huge personal accomplishment for me. My mile time is down to 7 minutes and 42 seconds, and I can now row a 2k in 7 minutes and 38 seconds. Needless to say, my physical fitness has improved leaps and bounds since weighing 265 pounds just 10 months ago!

None of this would have been possible without Crossfit, the Paleo diet, and needless to say, the encouragement and effort that XX has put into my training and accomplishments.

Losing 60 pounds wasn’t easy, but man, was it worth it, and I’m not done yet!