I've got some from a vegetarian cookbook I bought a month or two ago. I'll try to remember to put a few up that I really liked when I get home from work.

This is the book I have:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...books&n=507846

One simple recipe I remember was to saute corn and red onion until "just" starting to carmelize, then drop in a few teaspoons of balsamic vinegar and sautee just another minute to disolve the vinegar. It's simple and quite yummy.

Hello everyone! I'm a longtime lurker, but decided to post today. The good news is that I'm down 13 pounds! I hit 168 in August, this was a bit too much for a 5'11" woman. I joined Weight Watchers and am down to 155. My goal is 150 - my weight when I graduated college, seems like a good goal. I can already feel the difference in my knees and my back when I'm working out, and now I can keep up with my husband when we go jogging!

BUT instead of being happy for me, people are starting to say "Don't lose too much weight!" and "Are you sure 155 isn't too light?" Ummm...no, it's not too light by any height/weight chart, and I'm wearing a size 10 pants -- I'm not a waif by any stretch of the imagination (nor do I want to be one). Has anyone else gotten this negative response from their success?

Boardline22, what kind of (vegetarian) food do you like? I have a whole bunch of recipes at home, let me know what your tastes are.

Welcome GradStudent.....gratZ on the success.

No I haven't gotten the "aren't you too light?" comments, but then again, I'm still far enough above normal that I'd be pretty shocked if I did hear that. I'm weighin in at about 315 now (down from 360-370).

GradStudent I like easy vegetarien food to make, because I don't have alot of time to cook, I would rather exercise or study. I pretty much like any food so let me have some of those good recepies.

KingTermite, thanks for the receipe book refer, I'll ask for it for christmas. That camralized recepie sounds good wonder if you can post it up?

Thanks everyone

Update: I have continued to ride more and eat less.
Since daylight savings time ended I am no longer able to ride after work so I take it to work and ride at lunch.
This A.M. I weighed in at 229. Nine pounds from my original goal. I am revising the goal to be at 200 Lbs by January 1.

Congrats to all in this thread. Reading through it occasionally really does provide some excellent inspiration.

"And the people rejoiced!" Congrats Sharpknife! Keep up the good work and keep us posted! :D Peace, Ritz.

WWW.TOURDEPANTS.COM ;)

PS. I don't really eat Vegetarians. (It was funny before it came out of my head...Maybe I should have left it there!)

Awesome work Zin - turkey day is just around the corner. the husband and I will be sharing the day together - avoiding big family dinners. We are planning a long bike ride/picnic if the weather holds and taking along the dogs for a healthy day of riding and a bit of feasting for all.

Thanks for the link to fitday.com. I had been keeping all that stuff written in a little journal - we've successfully kept 98% of our days between 1500-1800 calories. The hubby and I started riding in August on 3 speed cruisers and weighing in at 307(me) and 315(him). We are getting 21sp comfort bikes for christmas presents to ourselves, as the 3 speeds are limiting how far we can go in our beautiful little town of Moab, Utah.

So far we are down about 25#s each. Our "diet" is just eating sensibly and counting calories. I don't beat myself up over little indulgences, I just keep my self accountable for every thing I put in my body, then go for a bike ride. This is a life style change for us and we are in it together. We both were starting to see our health deteriorate as we headed into our 40's. This is really the last great chance to achieve a healthy lifestyle. We are excited to be on the right path and committed to seeing this through together. And really, if we can't get fit living in Moab, Utah, then we are truly lost causes. But- we are totally positive. All success and good stuff so far.

Happy Holidays!

fatmoabgal

Hey gal! Congrats on the lifestyle change! If you stick with the bike, it will save your life. I've managed to reverse type II diabetes and have been off of the meds for 1 year this month! A fact that I am very proud of. ;)

You and "hubby" sound as if your on the right track. Hang in there. You won't believe the quality of life that awaits you on the other side.

I could not have imagined that I would be riding centurys. Climbing mountain passes. Competing in ITTs & Road Races. A few years go. Now? Bring'em on!

Cycling has introduced me to poeple who I now held dear as my closest friends.

Please accept an invitation to join us over on http://www.bikejournal.com to record your rides. Its as important to track them as it is to track your food.

If your ever up to Montana, look me up.

I would like to join the club. I started riding when I was 264, up from my weight of 184 A few years ago. That's 80 lbs., a big chunk of my body weight. I'm now at 242, and starting to feel like there is hope of getting back in shape and maybe even get sub 200. A lot of my riding is still my 12mile long round trip to work, but I've been throwing in miles when I can. It's a lot easier to exercise on the bike because I enjoy riding. It also helps that I have almost an hour of riding built into my day every day that I work. Now my next goal is 225, wish me luck.

Welcome Scott!

Welcome Scott!
80lbs in 2 year is a bit of an explosion of weight gain. If not to forward, I'm wondering if there was a specific event that may have triggered your wieght gain? Much of my gain has been from emotional eating. Boardom, depression, and joy. All led to eating over the years.

What ever the trigger, it sounds like you have things moving in the right direction. I too ride pretty much only 12 miles per day on my commute this time of year. Last year, I lost 30lbs by pretty much just doing my commute. Its a good thing....

There is hope. You can get there. Remember, its a marathon. Not a sprint.

Good luck Scott -- you can do it!!

what were your symptoms you spoke of in your previous post? I recently discovered that I am TOTALLY overtraining.. I have been getting headaches and wooziness from time to time.

:beer:

Down to 288, from 330 in july. put on at least 5 pounds of muscle in the last 2 months, cause i gained weight between a monthly weigh in, my pants fit looser, but my quads got bigger, very noticeably so, ah gotta love those Squats.

Muscle weight rocks!!! My clothes are getting bigger, but my scale isn't going down either. Soon enough it will...I must persevere!

Ritz,

That's absolutely right. It's inches that count, not weight. This is a tough time of year for most of us that fight weight problems so we all have to hang tough. And like Nancy said, "Just say no," to that cookie, piece of pie, extra helping of green been casserole, etc.

I actually gained the weight over a period of about 5 years. Lack of exercise and work related stress were the cause. Now that I'm riding I don't have to find time to work out every day, it's built into my day. As for the Stress, I'm burning that off on the bike as well. I'm also a 12 mile round trip from some ok dirt trails to ride around on for fun. BIG hill about halfway there gets my legs burning. Last weekend I took a trip out there and back. It runs alongside the highway and traffic on the highway was so slow I was going faster than the cars. I'm not fast, they were that slow. The good thing about that hill is coming down makes up for riding up. I was doing over 30 MPH coming down the hill waving at the highway traffic and smiling. I can see the muscles firming up, so I'm not watching the scale for now. I just have to make sure I don't up my calorie intake and negate the exercise.

A new personal best today!

4 hours in the saddle (43.0 miles)! :)

KingTermite,

Congrats on the new record ... but I'm jealous! The weather here has been so-so — riding is definitely possible without freezing, at least for now — but the short days are killing me. I never seem to have enough time to actually get out on the bike. I think I doomed to spending the next few months mostly on the trainer. :(

That's great! I wish I could go that far! I picked up a Minoura Magtrainer so I could continue riding inside when I get home. I envy your accomplishment. I'll set 43 miles as a goal.

Good goin' KT!

That's the thing about Muscle Gain - once you have muscles, you need to feed 'em, so eventually your weight will go down as your muscles eat up all that fat around your gut!

Anyway, there have been a few big changes in my life over the past month and I've been able to maintain my weight (though not drop the last 5 pounds yet). I was engaged a little over a month ago, and I just recently found a new job, which I will start on December 5th. The bummer about the new job is that it's only a 3-4mile round trip, as opposed to my current 24(!) mile round trip! I'm going to need to be disciplined about long after work rides to keep the weight off.

I joined a gym for the first time in 3 years, with the hope being that I can go in for a few spin classes and aq bit of weight lifting after work until it's sunny enough to be outside after work again. It was a riot to lift weights last week and actually SEE the muscles in my arms and legs - they had previously been under quite a bit of fat!

Ok, so how did everyone do on Thanksgiving?

I weighed in at 215lbs Thanksgiving morning. I picked up 4lbs of water weight from the holiday. Today, its back to my LC ways. I expect to drop the water weight over the next day or two.

I must admit that I ingested more calories than I expended, however; I did not binge! I rode 4.9 miles in a Thanksgiving Day Parade to boot! How did everyone else do? Peace, Ritz.

WWW.TOURDEPANTS.COM ;)

First Thanksgiving in years that I didn't have to loosen my belt. I ate a large meal, but not unreasonably so. I'm going on about a 20 mile or more ride tomorrow, part of it offroad to burn off some of the excess calories, and Thanksgiving night I spent an extra 1.5 hours on the magtrainer to work some of the meal off. I now see overeating as just making extra work for myself, burning the extra calories back off. It puts me in the right frame of mind to eat but not overeat. Haven't weighed myself this week, but my pants are looser. I gained some muscle mass in my thighs, so last week I had little loss. I'm still aiming for a sub 200 final weight.