Brian Calhoon, Kevin Kinsey, and Jessica Baugh lost the most weight in the Wellness Committee's 2022 Weight Loss Challenge
The City of Carthage's Employee Wellness Committee is pleased to announce the successful conclusion of 2022's Annual Weight-Loss-Challenge, and announce their "biggest losers".
"This was a great and successful challenge season", said committee chair Michael Miller, HR Coordinator for the City of Carthage. "We've not had many meet their goals in previous years."
3 employees exceeded a 5% weight loss in 9 months. Jessica Baugh, Court Administrator, lost over 6% of her initial body weight; Kevin Kinsey, IT Administrator, lost over 7%, and CFD Training Officer Brian Calhoon lost a fraction over 20% of the weight recorded in his initial weigh-in. Mr. Calhoon and Mr. Kinsey* were awarded cash prizes of $150.
"I saw a photo of me at one of my son's college events early this year", said Calhoon, "and I was NOT impressed. I had already decided to do something about my weight, and when the contest was announced, I said 'I'm gonna do this thing.'" Calhoon said that cutting out nighttime snacking and drinking lots of water were key to his unusually high weight loss.
"My wife and I decided to work on this together," he said. "Since what we do at the Fire Department is generally pretty intense physical work, all I had to do was control my snacking and work out normally." Calhoon and his wife also spent time walking in area parks and outdoor facilities; she has also lost several pounds this year. "We both are feeling great and loving it!", he said.
There were some humorous anecdotes as well: "I asked someone how many ounces were in a gallon, and they told me 180", Calhoon chuckled. "I tried to drink 180 ounces of water a day, but couldn't pass the restroom without having to go." When his wife corrected that number to 128 ounces, it became easy for him to drink a gallon of water a day.
Mrs. Baugh also credits water intake, along with keeping focused on her WalkerTracker goals and portion control as key to her success. "My weight tends to fluctuate," she said, "but I was able to keep focused on exercise and eating smaller portions for most of the year, until a recent vacation". She and Kinsey have both participated in some walk/run activities this year, including CWEP’s Tower to Tower 5K in the Spring.
Kinsey used intermittent fasting (2 meals/day, no breakfast), along with a general decrease in carbohydrate intake and regular exercise. "I had a salad for lunch, usually four days of the work-week, and then an Iggy's cheeseburger on Friday and pretty much what I wanted on the weekends," he says. He works out each weekday except Wednesday, with calisthenics all 4 days, interval training for over a mile twice a week, and light, high-repetition weight-training the other two days. "My wife says she notices the difference when she hugs me. She had lost quite a few pounds three years ago 'eating keto', and using a low-carb strategy seems to have done pretty well for me this year."
All 3 "losers" said they wanted to continue managing their weight better in the future. Baugh and Kinsey will be participating in the Maple Leaf 5K next month, although neither expect to be front-runners. Calhoon says he and his wife are having a great time staying fit, but "it will be more challenging to lose further weight, since I lost so much this year. But I took a recent photo at another of my son's events and it looked MUCH better."
"We'll start 2023's Challenge in January", said Miller. "We hope to have even more employees involved and losing those extra pounds."
*Kinsey's award was selected via a random drawing between the 2nd and 3rd place "losers".
