Historical data can be incredibly useful when you begin a restoration journey, particularly when tracking weight loss progress. It gives you more than a starting point: it gives you context. Instead of relying on memory or a vague sense of where you used to be, you can look back at the numbers and see the route that brought you here.
For today, I am keeping that view deliberately simple. There are plenty of measurements I could explore, and plenty more I intend to return to in future posts, but this one is about weight—and an unexpected way that old weight data is helping me see my progress.
A private number, a visible journey
I have not publicly shared my weight or my target weight. That is a personal choice, and it is one I am comfortable with. Sharing the journey does not mean that every number has to become public.
What I can share is the shape of the journey. Percentages allow me to show how far I have moved without revealing the raw figures, while dates give the data a human reference point. Together, they make it possible to be open about my progress while preserving the part I want to keep private.
Over time, I will explore some of those dates in more detail. For now, though, the weight line tells an interesting story on its own.
Tracking weight loss progress through dates
I have weight data going back to summer 2017. It has been collected using internet-connected Withings Body scales, which quietly record each measurement and build a history over time. The scales provide more information than weight alone, but that is the only measurement I am interested in today.
When I plot the data, the recent direction is clear: the line is descending. I can then take this morning’s weight, trace it backwards across the graph and ask a simple question: when did I previously pass through this same weight while travelling in the opposite direction?
The answer is 7 January 2022.
That means I am now passing back through a point I last crossed more than four and a half years ago. The number itself remains private, but the date gives the achievement real meaning. It is as though the weight clock has turned backwards to January 2022—not because I am trying to return to that period of my life, but because I am undoing some of what has accumulated since.
It also changes how I look at the graph. The older data is no longer simply a record of weight gained. It has become a set of milestones waiting to be reached again on the way down.
What the graph cannot show
I cannot pretend that the benefits exist only in the numbers. I am already feeling the physical and mental effects of this transformation. Everyday movement feels different, training is becoming more consistent and the sense of momentum is much stronger than it was when I started.
Even so, I have always been interested in numbers and statistics. They give me another way to recognise progress—particularly on days when change may not be obvious in the mirror or in how I feel. A line on a graph cannot describe the whole journey, but it can confirm that the work is taking me somewhere.
That confirmation matters because weight loss is rarely experienced as a perfectly smooth daily decline. Individual measurements move around. What matters is the longer trend, and the longer trend is now carrying me back through dates that once seemed firmly behind me.
Running the second half better
The encouraging signs are appearing elsewhere too. Yesterday I completed my third 5km run of the week. It was harder than the previous two and the route was more undulating, so it would have been easy to lose control of the effort or fade towards the end.
I had the help of my wife, who is a far more disciplined and capable runner than I am. With her pacing and encouragement, we completed the run with negative splits, finishing stronger than we started. That is something I want to focus on as I build more regularity and, eventually, more performance into my running.
Three 5km runs in one week, alongside a relatively long cycle, is a meaningful training week for where I am now—and I feel great. The challenge remains the same one I wrote about recently: to enjoy that momentum without treating every encouraging result as a reason to overreach.
The weight graph and the running splits are telling related stories. One shows the longer transformation, while the other shows what is becoming possible along the way. Neither needs to be rushed. Both become more useful when they are viewed as trends rather than isolated victories.
A bigger archive still waiting
Weight is only one part of the historical record available to me. I also have exercise data logged on Strava going back to 2014. At some point, I want to explore that archive properly and begin matching comparable points in time.
What was I able to do the last time I weighed roughly what I do now? How did my running pace, cycling performance and training volume compare? As the weight continues to come down, which older versions of my fitness am I beginning to catch?
There will be limitations. Conditions change, routes differ and life does not fit neatly into a spreadsheet. Weight alone does not determine performance either. Training consistency, strength, injury history, recovery, age and confidence all matter. The comparisons will need context rather than being treated as exact tests.
Used sensibly, however, the combination of weight and performance data could create a fascinating map of the restoration. It may show moments when the weight clock and the performance clock point to different dates—and that difference could reveal as much as the raw figures.
Beyond the old data
The overall aim is not merely to recreate a previous version of myself. I want to move beyond the history I have saved. I want to reach a lower weight than anything recorded in this data, and eventually I want to become faster than the performances preserved in my old activities.
Those are long-term ambitions, not demands I need to satisfy next week. The historical numbers are useful because they provide reference points, not because they set limits. Each old date I pass is evidence that the direction is right, while each new run and ride is part of building something that did not exist in the old data.
For now, 7 January 2022 is the latest date on the clock. If the trend continues, the hands will keep moving backwards through the weight history even as the journey itself moves firmly forwards.
