Ok, I'm ready

[Warmby]

To figure out what I'm doing, or not not doing, that's keeping this 30 pounds on me.
Ok, here goes. Age 31; white male; 6'4; 230 pounds.

I would post a picture if I had one here at work, but here's the skinny

Not fat, but much too much weight on the love handles, a little extra under the chin, big legs, and a thin layer all over. I think I should weigh 200 pounds. My brother in law is the same height and weighs 185. That's too light. I'm thinking right in the middle.

What I do:

8 count bodybuilders, 20 per night. I do these because I read that if you can 20 of these a day, you'd be in good shape. In case the name means nothing to you, it's when I start from a standing position, drop into a squat, and then sprawl to a pushup position, do a push-up, and pop back up, rapidly, 20 times. When I'm done I'm winded, and it feels like it works a bunch of spots, but it might just be a trendy thing that's doing little or nothing, I'm not sure.

In addition, I workout with a friend in the gym for about 1 hour two times per week, (tue and thur). We lift either chest/tris, back/biceps, or shoulders. We usually do 4 sets of 10 reps, and do fairly heavy weight. Also, on those two days, I do light to medium squats (3 sets of 10).

Finally, I play basketball at least twice a week, for about two hours, fairly vigorously. Now, bear in mind, this isn't 2 hours straight, since if my team loses, I'm off the court for as much as 20 minutes. But I leave soaking wet and usually am stiff and a little sore the next morning.

Diet:

I eat a bananna, a no-fat yogurt, or a bowl of raisun-nut bran every morning. Usually it's the bananna.
For lunch, I usually eat a weight watcher's dinner or lunch serving, typically with a handful of baby carrots, a diet pepsi, glass of milk or juice or water, and usually a couple of chocalates, a cup of ice cream or something like that.
Dinner is usually much bigger. My wife cooks, almost alway, unless we go out. She makes things like lasagna with salad and bread, enchiladas, blts, macaroni salad, chicken breast with mashed potatoes, pork chops, or steak. The reason I list them all is because that pretty much covers everything she makes. I have one large serving, occasionaly two, and usually eat something for desert.

I snack here and there in addition to this stuff, but nothing dramatic.

And on Sundays, all bets are off. I do no exercise, and I usually eat with inlaws on that day, which means I typically eat many more calories.

Questions:

1. I've been doing this for about 2 months, and have lost 0 pounds (before the diet was worse, and I didn't do the bodybuilder things). Will I get anywhere on this plan?
2. If not, tell me how. Bear a couple of things in mind: No 1: I won't jog. I hate it, I'd rather weigh 800 pounds. No 2: I won't eat chicken breasts for every meal. If I have to be hungry all day, it won't work, I don't have the tolerance.
3. I've never taken a suplement. I'm scared of them. Do any work, and are they safe?

Thanks so much for any advice you can offer.

[Ch0r]

Oh man, I had a really nice response, but then I hit the back button and lost it! Lemme try again for ya.

You need more calories. For your size and weight there's no way on earth your getting enough calories. Remember, 5-6 smaller meals a day will keep that 'ole metabolism burning fat around the clock. Your gonna have to drop the dessert, or at least reduce it. That doesn't mean you can NEVER have it, but again, moderation is key. A valiant effort with the diet, but it needs some serious revising.

On to the questions:

1. Lost zero pounds? Have you checked your body fat percentage? Maybe you reduced that. I say you won't get anywhere on that diet. The excercise program isn't as bad tho. (Constructive Criticism!)

2. No jogging...ok! You play basketball so that means you have to sprint at least some of the time right? Try some Guerilla Cardio. It's pretty much alternating 20 seconds of a full-out spring with a 10 second jog for maybe 4 minutes. Does this seem reasonable? Wanna know the best part? It will burn a lot more fat then jogging for two hours, and requires far less time.

I know some people don't do cardio at all. I know Fudyo doesn't (or didn't for a period of time at least) and still saw good improvements. If you do basketball your set on heart/lung health most likely. On second thought, you could probably just have a nice and heavy lifting program and not have to do cardio at all. (That basketball certainly helps.)

3. I'd definately tweak your diet before you go looking at supplements.

Take a look at these threads for some diet ideas:

Gaffer's Food Experiment

Example of Good Plan

Read all the threads included in that post.

Also, have a glance at the Online journals.

Hopefully this helps!

[Klinger]

Don't take this personally, Warmby, but if you are carting around an extra 30 pounds, you are fat. When I was at a plump 194 (5-11 male), I thought all I needed to do was trim up a little, too. Now I'm at 168 and I realize I was kidding myself when I thought a couple days of running each week would do the trick.

Diet, as Ch0r explains, is the key. You'd be surprised how a chocolate here and a bowl of ice cream there can add up and sabotage your weight-loss goals. For about a week, keep an extremely detailed log of everything you eat - even the cookie or cake that someone invariably brings into the office every day.

My guess is that even though your calorie count is not terrible, the sources of your food are less than ideal. I know you don't want to eat chicken all the time, so ymix in some lean beef and pork. Sounds like there is a lot of pasta and chees in your diet, too. Try to plan your carb intake around your workout and use whole-wheat or spinach pasta whenever you can.

As for your workout, it doesn't look thatbad, but it looks like it lacks structure. Draw up your split and keep track of the weight you lift to see where you are stagnating and where you are making progress.

Cruise some of the journals here to get an idea what others are doing. There are plenty of plans to glean information from. :

[Firehawk]

Warmby what kind of build do you have? I am 6'3 and I have a wide build, you can view my pictures in the progress pictures forum.

The reason I ask is if you have a narrow frame, and are 6'4, you may need to try adding some lean mass to your body which will start helping you reduce the fat as well. 1 lb of pure muscle burns around 50 calories a day, so the more muscle you ahve on your body the more calories you burn off. You said you are having a hard time losing any fat, so perhaps this is why. How strong are you? Ever lifted weights consistently? Did you lift heavy or lift high reps?

[Firehawk]

I would like to answer each of your questions you have at the end of your post:

1. I've been doing this for about 2 months, and have lost 0 pounds (before the diet was worse, and I didn't do the bodybuilder things). Will I get anywhere on this plan?

Looking over your diet, it looks like you aren't eating enough protein, and you are eating WAY too many carbs. For fat loss, you should eat a high protein diet, and low to moderate carbs. Also the right carbs are just as important as how many. Right now I don't think you will get very far to be honest.

2. If not, tell me how. Bear a couple of things in mind: No 1: I won't jog. I hate it, I'd rather weigh 800 pounds. No 2: I won't eat chicken breasts for every meal. If I have to be hungry all day, it won't work, I don't have the tolerance.

LOL i sounded JUST like you a year ago man. I think we are alot alike in some aspects, judging from what you are saying here. I HATE running too, so I bought myself a stationary bike with resistance programs on it. It cost me I think 150-200 bucks, somewhere in there. MUCH more tolerable. I hear ya, if I HAD to run to get in shape I would probably just let myself go also lol.

Eating high protein kills your appetite. Chicken breasts are one of the best sources of protein, but not the only one. Egg whites are another good one. I eat 7 egg whites, with 1 egg yolk, and a little bit of salsa or ketchup to kill the egg white flavor. Egg whites, Tuna (you can put a little miracle whip light in a can of tuna, I do), FISH, Hamburger (watch the amount, and get extra lean meat), turkey, just about any dead animal . Eat a portion of protein, and a portion of carbs (the right carbs, not sugary ones) every 2-3 hours. Try to target 1900-2000 calories and see what happens. This is my advice. Stick with a diet like that for 6 days, and on the 7th day eat anything you want. If you wanna eat 10 bananas, eat 10 bananas. Wanna eat 2 pizzas? be my guest. J ust keep it to THAT ONE DAY. This has worked for me, ive dropped 58 lbs thus far.

3. I've never taken a suplement. I'm scared of them. Do any work, and are they safe?

I had something bad happen to me with a Meal replacement supplement. I was already very hesitant to use ANYTHING, but I tried this out and i had a bad experience with it, so I know how you feel about them. I personally don't take ANYTHING, including a multivitamin (but only cause ive been too lazy to take them on a regular basis). I will never take any kind of supplement other than a multi-vitamin and that's it. I just would rather steer clear of it all and do it purely on myown.

I also think you should lift heavy weights, lower reps while dieting. I think you should lift in the 6 rep range max. This will give you strength, not so much muscle mass because your diet isn't there to support it, but it will definitely make you stronger and allow you to maintain that muscle you have. My body hates lifting anything over 8 reps. For me, 3-6 rep range is PERFECT. You said you lift light to medium squats, what does that mean? 10 reps is just sorta tough on squats?

Do you do deadlifts? Squats and Deadlifts take retarded amounts of energy to do. If you do both of those (on different days), you will burn alot more calories during each of them than you would say doing leg extensions, or seated rows.

It all boils down to how big of a priority it is to lose that fat. It is surely, in my opinion, worth giving up your treats and eating healthy for 6 days, and then on the 7th day eating anything you want. This works man, it has worked for me thus far.

Hope some of this helps.

[Warmby]

Wow,

I got on to 2 different fitness forums. I gotta say, this one leaves the other in the dust. You guys have been helpful and kind. I appreciate it very much.

I'm going to give it a shot. Wish me luck

[Warmby]

Hey all,

One week after I posted this, and I tried a couple of things which were suggested. First, I did some gorilla cardio. It really wore me out. I did it twice, on top of one weight session, a really intense one actually, about four hours of basketball spread out over two days, and the 8 count bodybuilders everyday like I mentioned.

What's more, I basically ate the diet that Ch0r suggested for the whole week. I broke the diet only 3 times, with one crispy cream donut, and two small dove chocalates. That's it, over 6 days. Now it's sunday, and I'm not staying on the diet today, but holy crap, is this scale wrong, or did I really go from 227 to 216 in 6 days? I mean, I know I fluctuate a little over the course of the week, but nothing like this. If this continues, I'll be at an even 200 in a month.

Anyway, here's my new question, Firehawk suggested I keep on the diet all day except Sunday, and then eat what I want on Sunday. I've been looking forward to Sunday, and here it is, but since I've seen such good results all week, I'm a little worried that pigging out this one day is really gonna ruin everything. Is it really ok to splurge one day a week? And when I say splurge, I'm talking about going from my 2-2.5k calories a day to about 4-5k on Sunday. Lemme know, cause I'm about to start eating

[Firehawk]

I doubt that you lost 9 lbs of fat. More than likely you lost some water, but could easily have lost 3 lbs of that as fat for sure. Depending what kinda food you eat, you could see a 6 lb gain on the scale. If you eat heavy carbs on the cheat day, that would cause you to retain water. If you eat things like steak or other meats as your cheat day, you might only see a couple lbs gain.

[Lift2Live]

Keep it up Warmby! The first 10-15lbs. always comes off fairly easily du to the fact that much of it is water retention AND fat loss while your metabolism really kicks in. Your body will start shedding pounds and then it will start to slow down to a more moderate pace, which is healthier than extremely rapid weight loss. Stick to the diet as much as possible at all times EXCEPT for your "day off". Most people have a day off due to such a strict regimen during the week. It will keep you from going nuts. Just don't go bonkers on things. Allow yourself to eat but I wouldn't go to krispy kreme and eat a half dozen donuts. lol You get the idear. If something is important enough to you, you will do what it takes to get what you want. :