Holiday Hold’Em 2.0
The Goal: To maintain or decrease your body fat percentage and maintain a healthy diet and workout routine throughout the holidays.
Entry Rules:
1. Entry is $20. The Hold ‘Em will begin Monday, November 26th, 2018 and end Wednesday, January 2nd, 2019. You must pay your entry any time between now and Monday, November 26th. Once you sign up you’ll be given a chart to track your points. You point charts will need to be brought to the gym by Thursday, January 3rd, 2019 in order to be counted.
Q: Why is the entry fee more than last year?
We want to give back! A strong, supportive community is the foundation for this gym, and we want to support the larger Moab community through this challenge. Read more about where this money will go below.
2. The grand prize will be half the total sum of the money paid as entry for the challenge. More participants = more prize money! The other half will be donated to a local Moab non-profit organization of the winner’s choice. The grand prize winner will be the individual that has earned the most points by the end of the challenge. If there is a tie, half of the grand prize money will be evenly divided among the winners. (For example, if the entry money totals $500, $250 would still go to a non-profit, and the other $250 would be divided among the winners).
3. Other ways to win! We want to make sure that everyone who participates has a chance to win some rad swag (gear, gift certificates, memberships, and more). Everyone that participates will have their name thrown into a pot based on the points they earn. The grand prize winner’s name will not be entered into this drawing. The caveat? This will be weighted, so for every 10 points you earn, your name will be added to the pot again. i.e. If by the end of the challenge you have earned 134 points, your name will be entered into the pot 13 times. We will round down for numbers ending in 4, 3, 2, and 1, and will round up for numbers ending in 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9. The better you do, the more chances you’ll have of winning!
How to Earn Points:
1. Get pinched Monday, November 26th; Monday, December 17th; and Wednesday, January 2nd. Must get pinched BEFORE you workout. Ya can’t be swole yet. And don’t worry, none of these numbers will be made public, we’ll keep your info private, it’s just for you to track your progress. You’ll earn 10 points for each time you get pinched, and 30 points if you maintained or lost body fat by the end of the challenge.
2. Track your daily points on your calendar.
a. 7+ hours of sleep (1 point)
i. At least 7 consecutive hours in the evening. You do not get a point if you sleep for 5 hours at night and then take a 2 hour nap during the day.
b. Drink half your bodyweight in ounces of water (1 point)
i. i.e. A 160 lb. person would need to drink 80 ounces of water to earn 1 point. Yes, we know there’s water in coffee; no, it doesn’t count towards your water consumption for the day.
c. Sugar (+1 point if you don’t eat it, -1 point if you do)
i. This is a really tough one. Sugar and other sweeteners are a sneaky ingredient in a lot of common foods, especially condiments and sauces (ketchup, dressings, etc.). They’re especially pervasive around the holidays! Helloooo cookie trays and pies! Read all labels. We know there are some “healthy” alternative sugars out there, most of which are on this list, and we’re by no means saying that these are bad to consume in your regular life, but for this challenge we really want to focus on the fact that we have a sugar problem as a society, and we’re so accustomed to eating sweet or sweetened foods that we don’t even realize we’re doing it anymore. By omitting the following ingredients from your diet as much as possible throughout the challenge, we hope to form some new habits while also learning something about what’s actually in the food we eat on a regular basis.
ii. Here is an exhaustive list of sugary ingredients that you may find on labels:
1. Just plain sugar
a. ______ sugar (brown sugar, cane sugar, raw sugar, beet sugar, confectioner’s sugar, etc.)
b. ______ syrup (high fructose corn syrup, malt syrup, refiner’s syrup, rice syrup, brown rice syrup, date syrup, etc.)
2. Science-y names for sugar
a. Dextrose
b. Disaccharide
c. Glucose
d. Galactose
e. Maltose
f. Monosaccharide
g. Polysaccharide
h. Ribose
i. Saccharose
j. Sucrose
3. “Natural” sugars
a. Agave nectar
b. Coconut nectar
c. Coconut sugar
d. Date sugar
e. (Evaporated) cane juice
f. Maple syrup
g. Honey
h. Molasses
i. Monk fruit extract
j. Rice malt (extract)
k. (Sweet) sorghum
l. Treacle
4. Artificial sweeteners
a. Aspartame
b. Acesulfame-K
c. Equal
d. Nutra-sweet
e. Saccharin
f. Splenda
g. Stevia
h. Sucralose
i. Sweetleaf
j. Sweet-n-Low
k. Truvia
5. Sugar alcohols
a. Arabitol
b. Dulcitol
c. Erythritol
d. Glycol
e. Glycerin (Glycerol)
f. HSH
g. Iditol
h. Isomalt
i. Lacitol
j. Maltitol
k. Mannitol
l. Polyglycitol
m. Ribitol
n. Sorbitol
o. Threitol
p. Xylitol
d. No alcohol (+1 point if you abstain, -1 point if you partake)
i. Pretty self-explanatory. No beer, wine, liquors. No alcohol for 1 day earns you 1 point. If you imbibe you lose 1 point. We all like to celebrate, especially during the holidays, but the idea here is to encourage you to make intentional choices. Do you need to drink 5-7 nights a week, or are you just in the habit of it? Can you hold off for a few days because you know you have a holiday party coming up? Exercising self-control will not only leave you feeling better and prepare you to make better choices after the challenge, you’ll also be more likely to WIN!
e. Eat 4 cups of veggies (1 point)
i. Much like the “no sugar” aspect of this challenge, consuming 4 cups of veggies each day is meant to bring awareness to your diet and what you’re putting into your body. Rather than talk about what you can’t have, this rule is about what you can! Potatoes and sweet potatoes are wonderful foods but they do NOT count as a vegetable for this challenge! You can of course still eat them, they just will not count towards your 4 cups of veggies. Pro tip: Pre-slice bell peppers, carrots, and cucumbers to have on hand when you need a snack. Dip in salsa or hummus instead of chips!
ii. Some ideas to get you started
1. All greens (lettuce, kale, chard, spinach, etc.)
2. Tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, onions, garlic
3. Celery, broccoli, cauliflower, artichokes, asparagus, cabbage
4. Squash, zucchini, cucumbers, green beans
5. Turnips, radishes, rutabagas, beets, carrots, kohlrabi
How to Earn Points Throughout the Challenge
1. Work out at least 3x a week (3 points)
Attend 3 classes at the Gym on 5th Monday - Saturday and you get the points. As opposed to our last challenge, you do have to workout at the Gym on 5th in order to get your points.
2. Improve any of your numbers on the Big Ol’ White Board. New PR? 1 point. New and improved number of double unders you can do in 1 minute? 1 point.
Tips to Help You Maintain:
1. Maintain consistency with your workout schedule. Shoot for 3-4 days of intense work, 2-3 days of active recovery (Bike! Hike! Climb! Swim!), and 1 day of total rest
2. Eat well. Low carb, high protein, lots o’ veggies, little to no sugar. Absolutely enjoy the holidays, but don’t overdo it. Plan your cheat meals, and only indulge if it’s really worth it. The treats will be around all winter long, practice saying no, you’ll thank yourself later. Refer to the bulletin board for healthy recipe suggestions, and share your own tricks to eating well on the board or on the gym’s Members-Only Facebook Page.
3. Assess how you’re doing with your pinches. Do you need to rein it in? Can you relax and enjoy yourself a little more? Be honest with yourself.
4. Go to bed! We cannot stress enough how important sleep is for your overall health and wellbeing. If you have secret things you want to accomplish, get up early to tackle them. “Beauty sleep” is the time you get in before midnight.
Extra Tidbits:
1. If you won’t be here for the pinches, but still would like to participate, just let us know and we can work something out.
2. Coaches will be participating but not eligible to win. They also inherently possess veto power if you try and cheat the system.
Good luck!