umd

It's not that they are myths per se, it is just that they are misrepresented. Eating frequent small meals and not eating late at night are just methods for preventing overeating.

CharlieWoo

Don't feel bad; between May 1 2006 and Dec 1 2006 I rode nearly 5k miles hard and gained a pound.

Wheel_Motion

I am 40 @ 186 Lbs. 6' tall. My wake up call was when I found out that my father @ 60 weights less then I do. So now I am biking again and working on losing the weight.... It seems that a lot of people here have some good ideas as to what one could do or need to do to loses weight. One thing for sure is that each and every one one of us metabolizes foods in differing ways we all need to find what works best for each and everyone of us. The one thing I have heard in life is that water will keep your metabolism up and running and this in it's self can help in the ability to lose weight. True or faults I can not say for sure....

ukmtk

I have to admit that after I met up a friend from university and discovered how healthy he was I decided to get fitter/slimmer. I'm 46, 5'11" and weighed 176 pounds mid July. The lowest I registered recently was 158 pounds. I just did a lot more mileage on the bike. I can't say that I push myself cycling but get a few decent hills. I do a few exercises (pushups, situps) a couple of times a week (15-20 minutes).

My typical diet is as follows:

breakfast: bowl of muesli with skimmed milk
lunch: an apple or two
dinner: whatever my wife cooks - normally a healthy meal with a glass of orange juice

I allow myself a chocolate biscuit + a couple of sweets (candies) in the evening. I probably drink a little too much coffee but do try to drink low calorie juice (i.e. a squash that you mix down with water = 5 cals).

I normally cycle just after lunch. Workdays (I work from home) I do 12-15 miles. Weekends I try to do 20 + 40 mile rides. For the long rides I add glucose to the low calorie fruit juice and have a banana half way round.

dirtyphotons

fwiw, everyone's different but i would not consider 6' and 185 lbs to be overweight (body mass index puts that just a hair in the "overweight" range but that's a terrible metric). i certainly wouldn't consider 5'11" and 176 to be overweight, especially if any of that is muscle.

ukmtk

The reason that 5'11" @176 lbs was overweight to me was that I did have a beer belly. I wanted my BMI to be down to 22 (or just below). I'm not hugely muscular (good legs but thin arms). BMI is just an indicator - I actually prefer the narrower range of 20-24 being healthy. BMI does not apply for the very athletic (e.g. American football players).

kipibenkipod

You need to take care if a person is muscular or not. If not he will have a lot of fat, even if BMI is good.
The point I make is, when on diet, the aim is to lose fat and weight is just a by product.
This of course will change if you are muscular but want to loose weight just to be better on hills, but this is the rich and famous problem ;-)

dirtyphotons

that's totally fair, like i said everyone's different. didn't mean to be calling you out, just didn't want others to see that and think that such a height/weight ratio is necessarily overweight for them.

EatMyA**

THANK YOU! someone had to say it...geez.

Elric

I had the same trouble losing weight last year, so I can totally empathize. One thing I recommend doing is going on a detox diet every 3 or 4 months. Try to make your diet mostly raw fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds for a week or two, and don't eat anything fried during that time. I did that last year and it really jump-started my metabolism. I was hungry all the time so I kept stuffing myself with more veggies and fruits, which in turn kept the whole process going. The nice thing was that with all the fiber getting my system going, I was able to throw in some fun stuff each day like a brownie or two to keep from going crazy, and I still lost weight.

One side benefit is that since the foods are mostly raw, there's not much cooking involved. And if you don't have the time to prepare the foods, a lot of health food stores have detox supplements that do the same thing. I haven't tried any of those, though.

imshockeygoalie

Fwiw, I have lost 100 pounds in this past year doing a couple of things. Its worth noting I am much more muscular than I was when I started so actual fat loss is probably closer to 115-120 pounds. I am Currently 6' 205.

1. I exersize differently all the time. Some weeks I spend more time weight training at my gym, others I will lift less but run 5k a night as fast as I can, others I spend more time riding easy on the bike. My main focus during this time has been my activity level and type. My diet is not nearly as clean as yours, but when I work out, I WORK HARD. There is no sense wasting your time spent exersizing if you're not going to get the most out of it, IMO.

2. I don't worry about what I eat except from a very general, macronutritional perspective. I try to make sure I am not eating a lot of simple carbs, regardless of activity level I maintain. If you feel like you're bonking, then you're probably burning body fat. So IMO bonking during a non competitive ride for an overweight rider is not a bad thing. I make sure I get enough protein for my muscles to recover from the activity I am doing. I eat a decent amount of veggies, and I never ever worry about getting enough fat into my diet (I usually don't have to worry about having too much). I eat when I am hungry and I don't ever eat when I'm not. Your body will tell you whats up. Sometimes, If I have been eating a lot lately I will spend a day drinking just water. Usually after that day my stomach has shrunk again and I get full very easily. Its usually a good idea to sneak a little protein into whatever you eat. It supresses grehlin (the hormone that makes you feel hungry), so you'll feel more satisfied for longer, than if you ate pure carbs.


3. Interval training. Whether I am on the bike or running, I try to have set sprint/rest periods. When I run I do 30sprint/60rest. On the bike the intervals are longer. This does two things for me. My recovery from anaerobic activity is worlds better, so I can sprint at point during a ride/run and not be dead for a long time. Also it gets you in shape quicker than just cruising at a set pace. You will burn more fat during a given amount of riding time like this, and the improvements in the strength and efficiency of your heart and lungs will enable you to cruise/jog at much faster speeds at a given % of your max heart rate. So if you ran 20 minutes at 80% MHR and did 2.5 miles, and now you are able to cover much more distance in that time at the same heart rate, then you will burn more calories in that time, its simple physics.

4. I always try to exersize in the morning when my stomach is definitely empty and I haven't eaten very much. Your body will be forced to burn fat stores at a much earlier point in the run and whatever
energy it takes to get you moving comes off your ass and not your breakfast.
It is a lot less enjoyable to run like this though, you feel tired easier and its a generally ****ty experience, but like I said, I trat working out like work.

5. I make it a point to only weigh myself once a week. I always do it in the morning on Friday after my morning pee, lol. This way its consistent and my numbers are actually comparable. No sense weighing myself one saturday night after dinner and drinks to see I actually gained a pound despite kicking ass in the gym all this week.


This is just what works for me. I did these things based on the advice of a certified personal trainer with lots of experience.

Anthony8858

Just thought I'd share an update since my last post.
On August 21st, I complained that I had lost only 1 pound after being on a diet and moderate exercise for a few weeks.
After making some adjustments, I'm happy to say that I'm down to 211 , from 226lbs 4 weeks ago!

I'm able to ride only 3 nights a week for about 45minutes to an hour, but the real key is the new boxing heavybag I bought a few weeks ago.
I've been doing a few 3 minute rounds every other day, and the weight started coming off.
Thanks all, and I'll chime back in when I hit my next goal of 195 lbs.

MrCrassic 

It's very simple when your previous lifestyle was lots of TV (or lots of computer), and fearing exercise because "it hurts" or "you don't have the time for it." Combined with eating practically whatever you want to eat (which, in most cases, is a ton of junk food), whenever you want to eat (i.e. the typical college student), and being an endomorph (i.e., very easy to gain body fat, but easy to gain muscle as well), being overweight going on obese was pretty easy to maintain.

Had I kept doing that, I would have probably hit the lower 200s before I hit 30. I was already 15 pounds away from that, and I was only 18! (I weighed the same at 19).

Now that I'm 155, I don't ever want to be there again.

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MrCrassic 

Congrats, man!

3 minutes with the bag? That must be some intense 3 minutes!

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Richard Cranium

No, the "key" is that if you remain active - you can be completely ignorant of diet and exercise principles and still succeed.

Anthony8858

Yes, very true.

I'm very active in one shape or form EVERY DAY.

Thanks

Anthony8858

Not sure if you ever used a heavy bag.
If you did, you might understand just how intense a round could be.

Throw on a pair of gloves, bounce around the bag left and right, jab, bob, weave, constantly, hook, upercut the bag. Right now, I can only manage 3 rounds or so.
eventually, I'd like to get up to about 6-10 rounds every other day.

This morning I did 1 hr on the bike, came home warmed up and still sweating from the lower body workout. I threw on the gloves, and finished the workout with a few heavy rounds.

I repeat....I WANT MY BODY BACK!!!

DataJunkie

Depends on what mean by success. I rode 300 miles a week, ate what I wanted, and still stayed fat.
Now I ride less, eat healthy, and the weight has been coming off. I feel much better and actually understand how to fuel myself properly.
In an optimal situation one should watch what they eat and work out as well. Both go hand in hand toward making you as healthy as possible.
That is unless you posses a nutty metabolism and can eat whatever you want. I on the other hand has issues with my stomach so eating healthy helps that out as well.

hrt4me

+2

Racaryu

The human body is a remarkable machine. It adapts to different situations and, for the most part, is very good at keeping you from hurting it.

In regards to changes metabolism, which is what you're trying to achieve, the body is amazing at regulation. I remember learning years and years ago that it can take even three months for your metabolism to shift.

Up until you had started your routine, your body had your metabolism set to store away food for later, for emergencies. Your body is used to putting energy towards this activity, not so much towards exercise. Well, now you've put yourself into that emergency situation by changing your diet and moving more. But your body is responding as if you've become lost in a barren landscape with only salads and low-fat foods.

Because your body is in survival mode, it is having to shift to balancing the conversion of fat to calories with what you take in. It's going to take your body a long while to get all of the necessary proteins and other resources in the right place.

After that, your body will shift to becoming a more efficient machine for converting consumed energy directly into dynamic motion, using only a bit of stored energy. Your stored energy will also be glycogen instead of fat- which takes up less room, requires more management, and is converted to energy faster.

This whole process can take months. Just keep with what you're doing, knowing that the changes are going to take a while. Don't get discouraged, because it IS going to happen. Your body just has to take all the right steps to get there while keeping you healthy and alive. Cheers.