Liam's story so far...

FIVE weeks into this trek and I'm still huffing and puffing away three mornings a week at the gym, trying to avoid those evil foods that threaten to derail my ambitions and leave me depressed. I'm still working on the cross trainer with my eyes closed while floods of sweat cascade down from my brow and trying not to fall off when my legs suddenly go all wobbly.

But so far I'm winning. I've lost exactly a stone which I'm very happy about and I feel much fitter in general. I am now able to walk up the two flights of stairs at work without getting out of breath.

When the gym is good, it is very good but when it's bad it is torture. Some days it is harder than others and it is quite easy to beat yourself up when you don't do quite as much as you might hope. One day I might not be able to wait to get off the bike after just ten minutes but the next time I go I could be doing half an hour and not be ready to stop. Hopefully it all balances out over time.

It might be hard work in a morning, or at any time really, but I feel so much better on the days when I've been to the gym. If I did not get up in the morning and stayed in bed I would probably get around 45 minutes more sleep but I feel far worse than when I'm out early and get the blood pumping. By the time I've done in the gym I'm usually sweating like mad but once I've had a shower it sets me up nicely for the day ahead.

The good thing about trying to lose weight in the public eye is that people comment to you that you've lost weight and that they can notice the difference. This gives you a nice boost and there is no better question someone can ask than 'Have you lost weight?' But the bad part is that the pressure is immense. Because you know that people are aware of your plans you feel like everyone is watching and waiting for you to fail. If you tell people that you're on a diet or trying to lose weight, it seems to become something to prove to them so failure would be humiliating.

To speed things along with the weight loss I decided to try the Weetabix Week - one of several diet suggestions by the cereal companies that involve having a bowl for breakfast and a bowl for lunch.

Now I like Weetabix, I can easily eat them without sugar and would gladly choose them when I go to the supermarket. But ten bowls in five days is a lot of low fat, low sugar, high fibre goodness for one person to handle.

I am typically a hungry person at both breakfast and dinner time so two 'Bix are not enough to satisfy my large appetite. Therefore I have been eating three in each serving meaning last week I ate 30 Weetabix in five days. Now I am royally fed up of them.

As the week went on, whenever dinner time approached I kept thinking about the nice sandwich I could buy but then I would remember the commitment I had stupidly made and shudder before opening my desk drawer and taking out that damned yellow box.

What is worse is that it has been of little success, so it seems that it could have all been a bit of a waste of time. However, along with avoiding pizzas I did manage to prove to myself that I have a small amount of willpower when it comes to food and I can take this forward over the next few months.

Myself and pizza have gone through a big change in our relationship. I love it a lot and I was recently going through a stage of eating at least once a week. But when starting this push to lose weight I realised that I would have to cut them out of my diet until they were just a rare treat. Everyone has their own personal food weakness and mine happens to be pizza, with the more greasy meat and cheese the better.

Luckily I have avoided the temptations - and there have been many - and stayed away from them. It has now become a bit of a test of my resolve and I intend to see it through as long as possible. Well, maybe just until my birthday when a day off from the gym and a visit to Pizza Hut may be in order.