So it dawned on me the other day as I was glancing at my blog that I never left you all with any closure on the Chipotle Diet.  I'm sure the first thing that ran through your mind was....."he probably gained it all back and is afraid to post anything else" or "he probably developed some poor health condition for eating the same thing for an entire year."  Well nothing could be further from the truth.  As you may recall....the last time I blogged, I was tired of "maintaining" so I wanted to shake things up.  The option I chose to go with was working out.  My motivation was this.  If I could literally drive 45 mins round-trip out of my way to eat a burrito for an entire year, then why couldn't I start to work out on a regular basis!  So that is how I approached it. 

And the results?  Let's just say that a couple of weeks ago marked the 6-month anniversary of me working out 5 days a week.  That's right.  6 MONTHS of going to the gym.  So now you probably think I'm this skinny, yet sexy stud.  Well......you are partially correct.  It seems that even after working out...I've still maintained.  However, don't get me wrong, my body has changed.  As it turns out, muscle weighs more than fat.  So although my body has completely changed, I just haven't seen it on the scale.  I also have to admit that I'm addicted to the gym.  It has become my regular "Cheers" where everybody knows my name.  Not to mention where everyone seems to memorize your work out routine. 

So what about my last days on the Chipotle Diet?  I have to say it was sad.  Even the employees were shocked.  They at least gave me one final FREE burrito and I have to say that it tasted as good as the first one.  OH...and did I mention it was fully automated?  I believe the final metrics went something like this....

• 5,460 miles driven to and from Chipotle
• $1,638 spent in burritos
• 13 fully automated burritos
• 1 Chipotle Employee Stalker
• 65 TOTAL POUNDS LOST!!

Finally, the fine people from corporate were nice enough to give me one last piece of swag.  A gift that I know you fellow geeks would drool over.  A Chipotle laptop bag.  Complete with enough compartments to fit one PC (or MAC) and 4 burritos.  Not to mention a could of lids (upside down of course)!  The Chipotle MBA keeps paying off as well.  Last month I received the official 2008 coin and a NICE Chipotle soccer jersey.  Burritoful!!  But perhaps the biggest reward of all came yesterday.

After 6 months of working out, I was ready to show how far I've come.  So I've enrolled myself in three 5K's (3.1 miles) over the next 6 weeks and my goal for the first one was to finish under 30 minutes.  The pics below tell the story.

BEFORE

29 MINUTES AND 38 SECONDS AFTER

So, despite the stalker, I would have to say the Chipotle Diet was very successful.  But in the words of LeVar Burton from "Reading Rainbow", "you don't have to take my word for it."

A lot of people have wondered if I have fallen off the face of the earth.  Well I have.  Damn that Columbus and all that 'world is round' talk.  Actually, I just have been really busy between work, school, and two little girls.  As it turns out, finding out the world is flat isn't the only discovery I have made.  Somebody forgot to tell me that children are logarithmic.  By that I mean, messes, crying, and toys to name a few, do not double, they increase exponentially.  However, despite all the recent changes, a couple of things have remained constant in my life.  The first is burritos.  I haven't sacrificed anything on the Chipotle Diet.  I still continue to enjoy my chicken fajita daily.  Just ask my local store manager, Jeremy.  The second thing unfortunately has been my weight.  It has been two months since I have lost 60 pounds, and I still have lost 60 pounds.  That's right, I have officially hit my plateau.  The good news is that I haven't gained weight.  I literally have fluctuated +/- 2 lbs the last 8 weeks.  This has left me to contemplate my next move.  Thus, I developed three options:

1)  Put an end to burritos and the Chipotle Diet altogether.  Go to lighter eating and start a new chapter.

2)  Change my burrito to something smaller, perhaps a burrito bowl or tacos.

3)  Start exercising.

Since day one, my diet has revolved around the giant burrito, thus I had to eliminate option 2.  Plus Eric Foster is already doing that.  Not original.  I was now left me with options 1 or 3.  That's right, start exercising or give up the Chipotle Diet altogether.  I know eventually the diet will have to come to end, but I didn't know if I was quite ready for it to come so soon (8 months).  So before I made my decision, I first had to answer the question of how long I wanted this diet to go on.  A couple of weeks ago, my wife answered the question for me.  We have officially planned our first family vacation; Destin,  FL.  The same Destin, FL that has no Chipotle for miles.  This vacation would mark my first week ever where I couldn't commit to a minimum of 5 burritos.  Not Cool.  However, the vacation will be the first week in July.  This gives me four more months of the Chipotle Diet.  Therefore, I have chosen option 3 and will remain on the Chipotle Diet for 1 year, until July 1st.  1 uninterrupted year of giant burritos.  I don't have a set weight goal in mind, but I have set an aggressive workout goal ahead of me to obtain the best results possible in the last 4 months.  I joined a gym last week and I am working out 1 hour a day for 6 days a week.  3 days I am running, and the other 3 days I am lifting weights.  My goal is to not scare my children when I take my shirt off at the beach.  Let's see where this journey now takes me!!

Justin Hall - Master Burrito Ambassador

Over 7 continuous months I have consumed my beloved chicken fajita with medium corn salsa, two scoops of the hot stuff, and cheese (aka ?the Justin?) at a minimum rate of 5 times a week. Do the math people. 155 burritos. I just so happen to know that my burrito costs $6.30 after tax. That is $976.50. Almost $1000 spent on burritos. This is not including the gas expenses incurred on my 40-minute round trip drive from Chipotle and back. In summary: I?m a fan.

However, the giving hasn?t all been on my end. One of the many things I love about Chipotle is there ability to recognize us super fans in a fashion that keeps us spending more money. I dedicate this blog describing the very perks of the diet I have received thus far (minus losing 60 pounds).

First of all there are the fish bowl drawings. Basically, this is a bowl in which you drop your business card. Once a week the store manager draws a card out of the bowl; and if it is yours, you and your coworkers gets free burritos (max limit of 10 coworkers). I made it a point to drop my business card in the bowl everyday. Unfortunately, the store manager wasn?t very good at keeping up with weekly drawings. In fact, for 3 months he never drew any card and my business cards were starting to flow out of the top of the bowl. So, I reminded him of the drawing and I won 3 out of the next 4 drawings. After that, he quit doing the fish bowl drawings altogether. However, he didn?t take the fish bowl down, so I still keep tossing my card in everyday in hopes that one day he will continue the drawings again.

After that I went on a cold streak. It seemed like everyday I would read Eric Foster?s (the other Chipotle Diet guy) blog about how he got another free t-shirt or another free burrito coupon. However, I got nothing. I knew I could probably email the guys at corporate and out of pity they would send me some freebies, but I wanted to get freebies without having to beg. I wanted to get freebies, because they wanted to give me freebies (if that makes sense). So I ate burritos and kept corporate informed about my accomplishments along the way.

Then one day in October my hard work paid off. Corporate responded to my fully-automated burrito post in disbelief. They could not believe that I no longer have to order my burrito. They thought it was so amazing they forwarded my accomplishment throughout the entire business. One of those contacts happened to be Ben Neis, marketing coordinator for the Midwest region; my new best friend.

Ben and I continued to exchange emails for over a month on my progress. Then in November, I sent Ben and Corporate my cost savings analysis on the lids. Two days later Ben responded with an email saying that he would like to present me with a small gift on behalf of Chipotle as a token of their appreciation. I peed my pants.

OK I didn?t, but needless to say, I was excited. My excitement was delayed however as Ben told me that I would have to wait over a month for my gift to be made. Yeah that?s right. MADE!! What exactly did that mean? Am I getting a restaurant or something? I think anyone in my situation would have been curious if someone said they had to personally make your gift. I have to admit?my imagination got the best of me?I had hopes of a commercial contract, a year supply of free burritos card, and a giant billboard with my face on it dancing in my head. Needless to say, the gift wasn?t any of these things?but they give me something to shoot for in the future.

Xmas and New Years rolled around and still no word from Ben. However, around Xmas I had received a gift from Chipotle. Lip Guac; basically, Chap Stick in the color of guacamole green. The Chap Stick gift came with a free coupon for chips and guac and with a postcard with a little message at the bottom saying ?a small token of our gratitude?. I couldn?t believe my gift was Chap Stick. Not quite what I needed to complement my diet. However, it was my first real freebie.

Kind of bummed out, I continued on the diet, because after all, the diet was about weight loss, not freebies (although freebies are cool). Then finally things started to look up for me. Two weeks ago Ben finally emailed me saying that my real gift had arrived and that there were two parts to the gift. He also told me that the Chap Stick wasn?t the real gift, but that he hoped I had enjoyed it.

I couldn?t believe the freebies weren?t done. This is awesome!! Ben?s email described the first of two gifts. Up to 50 free burritos for my coworkers. Can you believe it? 50 free burritos. Wow. I get to be like Santa Claus as I hand out burritos to all the coworkers who have been nice to me throughout the years. Too bad I couldn?t have planned it around evaluation time. On top of the free burritos, Ben was going to personally deliver them to my work and present me with my other gift. Unbelievable. Chipotle doesn?t even deliver in the K.C. area. Now I feel special.

Without further delay, today was the day of my free gift; or free gifts as it turned out to be. Ben and Chipotle showed up right on time with 50 free burritos in hand and I noticed Ben had a few items to present to me. The first few items he presented to me were a Chipotle beanie, a Chipotle CD containing world music from putamayo.com, a Chipotle backpack, 10 free burrito coupons in the form of a deck of cards, and two free burrito coupons in the form of silver coins. Very cool might I add. Then Ben unwrapped a framed certificate. I have been named as a Chipotle MBA. Master Burrito Ambassador. Kid you not. The certificate was signed by CEO Steve Ells and came with an elite Chipotle MBA T-Shirt. On top of that, Ben told me that this was the gift that keeps on giving. It turns out that if you are a Chipotle MBA, you get a free gift every quarter. Hence, the Chap Stick was the gift from last quarter. How cool is that?

After the presentation was done, Ben had one last item to present to me; a stack of my business cards (Over 100 of them to be exact). It turns out that my store manager had kept all my business cards I threw into the fish bowl. He had Ben hand them back to me today so I could reuse them. I still didn?t win the drawing :). Thank you Chipotle!!

Below is a pic of me in my new Chipotle gear along with some pics of the freebies I received today. Enjoy.

Justin

MBA ? Master Burrito Ambassador