When you live for the weekends, a Monday holiday is like finding an extra $20 in your pocket. Even more so when they involve visits from college buddies, new juice bars, 15-mile runs, and frozen yogurt.

But I’m not here for a weekend recap (surprisingly enough!)……

I have my first (hopefully of many more to come!) guest interview for you and I’m pretty excited about it! I would LOVE to have a whole series of interviews with inspirational guys & girls on their own fitness perspectives and stories.

*Okay, okay full disclosure: today’s guest interview is Kelly a.k.a. my mom. With good reason! Kelly has been an active and balanced health-conscious woman for my entire life, but noticed after her 40th birthday that the indulgences went up and the workouts went down. When her company office kicked off it’s own Biggest Loser competition, she competed for 14 weeks against 20 other women to WIN the title and LOSE approximately 25 pounds. Two months later, she’s kept the weight off and increased her running from a 5k to a half marathon!

After feeling like she was stuck in the same rut with her weight and running for 5 years, she shattered her personal goals for both during the 14-week competition. What’s most impressive is her commitment to running, cooking clean and leading a well-balanced healthy lifestyle after the competition. Her determination and success inspired ME and I wanted to share her story so that she can inspire you too :)

So with that introduction, here is my interview with Kelly!

Strong Like My Coffee: Hi! Thank you so much for taking the time to answer a few of my questions. Your steady weight loss and weight maintenance over the past 5 months is incredible. As your daughter, I can tell that you are more confident in a bikini, workout clothes, and tight dresses, which is so great to see. Can you please provide a brief summary of the details surrounding the Biggest Loser competition you participated in?

Kelly: The women in my office create their own “Biggest Loser” contest once a year. It’s 12-13 weeks, $20 to enter, and a $5 penalty if you gain weight at a weekly weigh in. The weekly weigh-in results are sent out in e-mails and those results definitely helped to keep me motivated. The top 3 winners (biggest percentage of body weight lost) split the ending pot. I had my own goal of getting back to a weight that I hadn’t seen in the last 12 years. For me it was about size and comfort. I wanted to look like I did when I was in my early 30’s and I wanted to dress like I was in my early 30’s!

SLMC: Congratulations on reaching your goal! What was the turning point where you thought “I need to make a healthier change to my lifestyle”?

Kelly: My clothes were getting tighter and tighter so I started wearing loose and baggy tops to hide my growing muffin top and when this became my normal routine I felt very frumpy and knew I had to do something about it. I wasn’t comfortable with my added weight and I’m too young to dress frumpy!

SLMC: In total, how much weight did you lose? Where did you notice the biggest improvements to your body?

Kelly: I lost 23 pounds. At first it was my upper body that showed the most change. My arms were getting significantly smaller and then it showed in my waist as my pants were now baggy and too loose.

SLMC: Aside from weight and numbers, you saw amazing improvements in your fitness level throughout this process. I watched you go from struggling to run 3 miles to now easily logging 8, 9, 10+ miles on Sunday mornings. You pushed past that plateau! What are some of the biggest “milestones” you hit during this period?

Kelly: The milestones came every few weeks; I used to dread the stair master and could only do about 10 minutes without taking a break, but during this contest, I pushed myself to 20 continuous minutes. The stair master still kicks my ass but it pushes me the hardest, and therefore I do it at least once a week.

Another challenge for me was the ability and stamina to continuously run 4 to 5 miles. When I first started running, I plateaued at a 5k. For years I hovered around that 3-mile mark.  I have made dramatic progress in the last several weeks pushing myself from 3 to 4 miles; then 5 miles right to 7; the next week I pushed myself to 9 and this week I’m looking to crush a 10 mile run!  It’s actually fun to see just how far I can push myself and it’s extremely exhilarating to conquer such an intense goal.

SLMC: That is incredible, and obviously I love to hear another family member describe running as “fun.” ;) I don’t know anyone who has gone from 3 to 10 miles so quickly. You inspire me!

During the contest, what are some of the things that kept you motivated to continue losing weight for 12+ weeks?

Kelly: I was originally motivated to lose enough weight to fit back into some favorite clothes that no longer fit, as well as to buy some new outfits.  About half way into the contest I was in the top 3, which then motivated me to move from 3rd place to 2nd and then of course from 2nd to 1st.  I found that I have a competitive side that I didn’t know existed and it really took over the last month of the contest.  By the end of these 3 months, I could see that my endurance level had definitely been kicked up a few notches.  It felt great to push myself to new limits, reach my original goal, set higher goals, and crush those goals as well. The last week of the competition was high intensity cardio twice a day and I pushed myself harder than I thought possible.   It literally paid off!

SLMC:  Of course when you are working to lose those “last few pounds,” you have to really tighten up the nutritional quality of your daily snacks and meals. I know that you re-evaluated some of your little habits and decreased your sodium/sugar intake. What was the most difficult habit to break?

Kelly: Munching on ‘leftovers’ as I packed them up, or if there wasn’t really enough to save, I would eat it to avoid throwing it away. Kinda like when I used pack your lunches in elementary school and you only wanted a half or 3/4 of a sandwich and I would eat the rest of it to avoid tossing it.

SLMC: You say that you never fully deprived yourself and enjoyed many splurges during the Biggest Loser contest, but still managed to consistently lose weight/body fat. What are your typical indulgences?

Kelly: I HAVE to have a daily dose of dark chocolate – no exceptions.  My go-to is either Dove Dark or Girahdelli dark chocolate squares. I always have a bag on hand. I love iced coffees and thanks to you, I now order the Americano with sugar free caramel or sugar free vanilla which is only 15 or so calories and tastes like heaven! During the 13 weeks of the contest I must have eaten out at least 15 times. Sit down restaurants, fast food joints, parties, as well as BBQ’s with friends. Just about every restaurant now offers a healthy or light menu and to me those options are as perfect as they are filling. I love trying new foods and dishes so it was fun to choose something different from each menu. Following some of these indulgences I would of course feel a little guilty about the upcoming weigh-in so I upped the interval cardio to burn more calories in a session and off-set those additional treats.

SLMC:  What is your typical breakfast/lunch/dinner?

Kelly: Breakfast is Coaches Oats – hearty oatmeal and I add in a heaping spoon of cinnamon and either banana slices or strawberries. Lunch varies since I don’t like the same thing day after day; a yogurt parfait (yogurt, almost slices, cinnamon and fruits such as banana, strawberry, peach/nectarines) and some sort of crunchy snack like pretzels, sun chips or Peppridge Farms Goldfish crackers. I always eat an apple in the morning and in the afternoon – keeps me from eating candy and/or other junk food. I love plain rice cakes smothered in PB Fit and dinner is always a veggie, a salad and some sort of protein (Chicken, chickpea burger, salmon, or black bean burger).

Our weekly go-to is spaghetti squash with my homemade turkey/veggie balls and a light marinara sauce. Veggie stir fry makes it’s way into our weekly rotation quite often too. A typical healthy dessert has been an 80 calorie Yoplait yogurt with a few berries and a sprinkle of mini chocolate chips or a 40 calorie fudgsicle. So light in calories and yet satisfies the dessert cravings.

SLMC: How did you celebrate your victory!?

Kelly: I had been craving a loaded pizza from BJ’s with a pitcher of beer for quite some time, but when it came to victory night, I had no desire for the beer and while the pizza was good, it didn’t live up to the hype in my head.

And now a lightning round:

1. Cocktail or Chocolate – Chocolate every time!
2. Sweet or Salty – Salty and preferably crunchy!
3. Morning Workout or Evening – Morning, it feels so good afterward and makes for a better day.
4. Burpees or Plank – Hmmm, both kick my butt but I can do both pretty damn good now, so I’d say Burpees.
5. Flavored water or plain – Definitely plain.
6. Coffee or tea – There was time when I would have said iced tea, but thanks to you, I’ve become quite adicted to coffee now.
7. Weights or cardio – Depends on my mood when it’s time to work out, but I probably lean more towards cardio.
8. Strong Like My Coffee of Facebook {trick question ;)} HA, Stronglikemycoffee hands down every time!

Thanks, Kelly! You’re a rock star!

***Kelly’s diet and exercise plan were successful for her but everyone is different! My interview isn’t intended to promote her meal plan, but rather her discipline and determination to reach a goal, as well as the confidence her success brought!***

One more thing that Kelly said in our interview that I absolute HAVE to share:

“When I was running, of course it was hard and I was trying not to give up. And I just thought, ‘we know or we hear about so many people who are sick, who have cancer, who are fighting diseases, who have some physical disability, and here I am with a healthy and able body. I better enjoy it and challenge it because I CAN.’ And I’m thankful for that.”

Hope you liked this little change-up, but I’ll be back with normal workout/recipes again this week :)

XOXO Kenz