Fat no longer an option for Corporal
Stephanie Burr
Staff writer
March 17, 2008
Stephanie Burr
Lookout
Cpl Mark Keen puts the new equipment at the dockyard gym to good use as he tops off his daily work out with leg presses.
Most people dread putting on a bathing suit at summer’s start. Lily-white skin and those extra pounds piled on during Easter are the usual complaints muttered in bedrooms across the city.
But for Cpl Mark Keen, it is what he’s looking forward to most this summer.
After losing 82 lbs, the aviation technician from 443 Maritime Helicopter Squadron is proud to show off his new body.
“I’ve worked really hard to lose the weight, and this summer is going to be a pay off for me,” he says. “I am going to Thetis Lake proud of the way I look instead of ashamed.”
Last September, Cpl Keen tipped the scales at 361 lbs. He failed his third EXPRES test in a row and was facing a forced release.
He decided to make a lifestyle change.
“I was completely disgusted that I was going to be released because I couldn’t pass what is considered a simple, non-taxing test,” says the 46-year-old.
Weight loss wasn’t a new idea, but his bulk caused painful shin splints, and an easy excuse to stay on the couch. The real pinch was the heave hoe threat out of the military.
“I had one blow-out weekend of binge eating, and then on Oct. 1 I turned my life around and cleaned up my diet and started exercising,” says Cpl Keen. “I made a conscious decision that I was not going to let myself fail.”
He consulted his doctor, who put him in touch with SLt Anja Franz, acting team leader for the physiotherapy section at the base hospital.
“I had read an article in the Lookout about how the CFB Esquimalt physiotherapy and fitness centre helped Chief Dunlop lose a bunch of weight, and I was hoping maybe they could do the same for me,” he says.
SLt Franz quickly put together a low-impact training schedule.
“When I met Cpl Keen I knew he was ready to change, but just didn’t have the proper tools to accomplish his goal,” she says. “So we made a deal; I would help him and provide the tools if he took the necessary steps and got serious about losing the weight.”
Cpl Keen began physiotherapy and work outs with SLt Franz five days a week.
“Hardly ever did he miss a work out, and if he did he was at the gym doing his physical training,” she says. “When he was training, he worked very hard and I could tell there was going to be no stopping him.”
SLt Franz says a large deterrent for Cpl Keen was distinguishing good pain from bad pain.
“Some activities are going to feel painful if you are so badly out of shape and this is natural, but there may be other exercises that are detrimental to your body rather than helpful and you need to be able to tell the two apart,” she explains.
In addition to working with SLt Franz, Cpl Keen connected with Megan Ramsay, a fitness instructor with Personnel Support Programs. Ramsay put him on an exercise program to help him pass his EXPRES test.
“She not only developed an exercise program for me, she was a key motivator, and continues to be - amending a constantly changing physical program to help me achieve my fat loss,” he says.
The effort paid off and by early January he had lost 42 lbs, and at the end of the month he passed his fitness test.
“Once I changed my lifestyle and started focusing on my cardio and exercising regularly the weight started to melt off,” he says. “My life has become fun again, I can do things now that I could never even think of doing before at 361 lbs.”
His life now includes a daily visit to the dockyard and Naden gyms and nightly laps at the Esquimalt Recreation Centre pool. While losing 82 lbs is a true accomplishment, Cpl Keen would like to trim off another 70 lbs.
“Unless you’ve stood in my 54-inch ex-fat pants, you’ve no idea how good it feels to stand in my new 38 inch pants,” he says. “I can’t imagine what was going to happen if I didn’t lose it, but I definitely can imagine what I’m going to do now that I have; go to the beach in a proper bathing suit.”
“For those thinking about losing weight, they should know if Mark Keen can do this anybody can do it, because I was at the apex of lazy.”
