FarHorizon

I know the internet is strewn with various weight loss programs that involve combinations of diet & exercise. I'm for one, but which one?

I'm currently 270 pounds, and willing to ride & diet as needed to lose 60# over the next five months. (I'd like to be 210 by New Year's). Is this a realistic goal?

I have no known health problems other than being fat. I don't smoke, don't drink, don't do drugs, and don't have diabetes or any other chronic disease except gout, which is treated with daily Allopurinol.

Recommended websites with valid information (and minimum snake-oil) are requested. Ideas?

Thanks!

derath

Gosh that is a tough one. I am certainly no expert, but a program that worked well for me was the "Body for life" book. It is not cycling specific but is basically smart eating and exercise.

The biggest thing I took away from the program is the idea of many small meals vs the traditional 3. That helps me eat less overall while feeling less hungry in between meals (and subsequently snacking as a result).

-D

EJ123

Yikes. I was 254 back in early june and now im 243-+. My goal is <225 by New years. I think you're asking to lose more weight then you can. Maybe not.

crypticlineage

Any more than 2lbs per week is unhealthy. You need to set a realistic goal.

I was 35 lbs overweight on June 10 this year and since then I have lost 23 lbs. My only major exercise is cycling and walking. Cycling is around 200 miles per month. Then I make sure I eat wholesome foods and completely cut out sweets, fatty foods and snacks like chips. Eat many smaller meals throughout the day and cut down your portions. Sign up for Fitday.com and sincerely record all the foods you have eaten so you can keep track of calorie intake. Plan on eating 500 kcal less than what you burn and by the end of the week, you would have eaten 3500 kcal less, which amounts to 1lbs of fat weight. If you bump daily deficit to 1000kcal you will lose 2 lbs per week. Goodluck!

kuan

Take it one step at a time.

Cut out sugars.

Once begun is half done.

JPradun

You never mentioned your age.

More than 2lbs/wk is unhealthy for most people; however, if you are pushing 275lbs and a lot of it isn't muscle, you can afford to lose up to 3lbs/wk until you get down to ~225.

If I were you, I would eat at a defecit of 500cal/day. That should cut 2lbs/wk. If you exercise and burn, say, 600 calories, intake 500 of those and continue with the rest of your caloric needs (so an extra defecit of 100 calories that day); this should help burn up to an extra pound per week. Exercise is a great way to make you feel guilty about eating unhealthy later in the day, so try to exercise early. Eat eggs or some high protein breakfast so you feel less hungry throughout the rest of the day.

Exercise is extremely important in this equation. It will help raise your metabolism.

nedgoudy

3 Whey Protein smoothies per day.

Ingredients:

3 cups skim milk.
44 grams of whey protein powder (two scoops).
2 tablespoons psyllium husk for fiber.

I did that for 10 months and lost 90
lbs. I still do at least 2 of those smoothies
a day and have maintained the weight loss
for 7 years. My BP is 106/68. LDL 68 HDL 40.
All other health indicators are good and I
am trim and fit and ride my bike to my
hearts content.

See https://www.wheyoflife.org for details
on the many, many health benefits of whey
protein. Look in the BENEFTIS and IN THE NEWS
sections of the purple menu of the left side of
webpage.

I highly recommend this diet, and my doctor
will back me up on it. He is blown away and
amazed at how healthy this stuff has made me.

Primordial

I have lost 24 lbs over the past 2 months. I went from 198lbs to 173 lbs. Of course this is an average, as weight fluctuates a few pounds here and there.

I also have been eating a lot of junkfood too.

My recommendation is to eat 5 small meals, averaging around 2500 calories for the day. Go on a morning and night-time ride, 1 hour each, for a total of two hours a day. This will burn 1000 calories (Very rough estimate). This will put you at 1500 calories for the day.

The above program, estimating that your body needs 2500 calories, will cause you to have a negative calorie intake of 1000 calories a day. This is 7,000 calories a week, or the equivalent of two pounds a week.

This will yield a loss of 8 lbs a month, over 6 months that is 48 lbs.

Before my life turned into a mess and I let myself go, I used to be very active in sports and had great control over my bodyweight. The key is counting calories and eating many small meals a day.



Sources:

https://www.annecollins.com/weight-lo...-per-pound.htm

https://www.nutristrategy.com/fitness/cycling.htm

https://www.annecollins.com/weight-lo...eight-loss.htm

ericgu

Get yourself a copy of the south beach diet. It's the one that's the closest to normal eating, and the third phase is a healthy diet for the rest of your life. There's a website that has some of the information on it.

60 pounds over 5 months is a lot of weight. Generally, the people who lose weight more slowly are more likely to keep it off.

ScrubJ

I weighed 247 pounds in March, I now weigh ~200 pounds. I dropped most all sugars and fats, snacks are fruits and veggies. I ride my bike about 8 miles a day during my lunch hour, about 10 miles in the evening after work. I usually try to do another 40-100 miles during the weekend. There are MANY weeks I don't get in the rides I like but I do what I can.

I think the biggest thing to start with is to look at what you eat. If you drink a lot of sodas and/or eat a lot of sugar containing foods, stop. I eat a high fiber cereal with nonfat milk with a scoop of whey protein powder for breakfast, a can of salmon for lunch (work) and a reasonable dinner. We eat a lot of salads, very little carbs or fat. Olive oil is my friend as are nuts and as close to fat as I regularly eat. I still do eat meat, but try to find the leanest cuts as I can. Roasted chicken, grilled meats and baked or grilled fish (some sesame oil and ginger good on fish). I do use a lot of spices when I cook which helps keep food interesting.

Go to a smaller plate size for portion control. I am trying to keep my "diet" as simple as possible as it will have to work for me the rest of my life. All the fad diets seem to help for a period but are often hard to stick to. I understand the need for my diet to be a lifestyle change as much as anything else.

Best of luck,

Keith

Edited to add a couple of links

https://www.whfoods.com/
https://caloriesperhour.com/
https://www.biprousa.com/recipes.asp

tunczyk997

man... eat less, escersise more and you're done... i ride my bike because i want to make my muscles work hard. but if u want to get thinner eat less sweats and junkfood and ride pretty long distances. i ride 40-80km a day, but i dont ride every day. except riding a bike i also play basketball so it builds up my muscles to.
oh i would have forgotten... 1 km is about 1,5 mile. in us you have different units...

ScrubJ

Wanted to add that I am 51 and you should visit us on the Over 50 part of the board. There are many of us that are a bit weighty and working to get ourselves back into shape. A lot of good information and support can be found there even if you are a young whipper snapper.

john bono

The goal you have is tough, but doable. The one thing I would add is to include a good amount of weight training to your exercise program. Bicycling is extremely effective at burning calories, however, weight training can do a better job of changing your appearance, especially in the upper body. Also, keep an eye on the long term. It's fine and dandy to lose 60 lbs by New Year's day. Before I had lap band surgery, I had lost 100 lbs--twice.

SSP

Sorry guy, but your goal is very unrealistic. To lose that much weight would require a daily deficit of 1653 calories per day, or -3.3 lbs per week (see attachment). In other words, you would need to consume 1653 less calories than you burn each day between now and January 1st.

That rate of weight loss would require either a starvation diet, or 3-4 hours of intense exercise per day, or both. It could also be dangerous, because you would risk not getting necessary vitamins and minerals if you cut your food intake too much. You'd also need to deal with incessant hunger.

Losing weight at the rate of 0.5 - 1 lb per week is much more realistic. That rate requires a daily deficit of 250-500 calories. The deficit can be achieved by eating less, or by moving more, or by doing both.

I'd recommend the following:

1) Start an exercise program. The bike is pretty efficient at burning calories, and it's easy on your joints so you can go longer than with running. Slowly work your way up to 7-10 hours of cycling per week. Go easy at first, but after a month or so start adding some intensity (you might want to get a physical first).

2) Start studying your food. Learn how many calories are in the things you eat. Try to find a few hundred calories each day you can live without.

3) If you drink sugared sodas, fruit juices, lattes, or other calorie-rich drinks...stop right now. This alone can cut hundreds of calories from your diet.

4) Identify your "problem" foods. For some it's chips and beer. For others (me!) it's cookies and crackers. If you find yourself binging on certain foods, arrange to not have them around. You might need to give them up altogether, or you may be able to have them every once in a while...only you can tell which strategy will work for you.

5) Weigh yourself each morning just after you wake up. It's a good way to stay focused on your long term goal, but don't worry if your weight bounces up and down from day to day (that's common, even if you're successfully losing weight).

6) Don't beat yourself up if you have a bad day, but just keep plugging away.

7) Try to eat more fruits and vegetables every day.

Bottom line...move a little more and eat a little less and the weight will come off.

Oh, one more:

8) Start budgeting for some new clothes!

will dehne

Hello FarHorizon:
I guess we both are looking at other groups than the 50+ group.
Your goal of loosing 60# is possible but not with performance biking. I did it with sticking to Oatmeal and Fish and Veggies. As simple as that.
Now lets talk performance biking. I went on this 3000 mile tour for 25 days. Well, I had to add Gatorade, steaks and potatoes and recovery drinks to my diet. The result?
No weight loss after 3000 miles.
I now exercise every day at least one hour. The last three days I did 50 miles/day at top speed. I had Gatorade and for recovery, ice-cream. The result? I gained weight but feel fantastic. I do not like the weight gain and reluctantly have to cut out all the sugars.
Darn it. Such is life. I am training for another cross country trip. I need to be fit for that. So you see, it is all a balancing act.

FarHorizon

I'm thinking that may be the route for me too. Thanks!

will dehne

FarHorizon:
You got me here keeping my fingers crossed that you succeed. It is worth it but nothing good comes easy. I can only tell you that at age 64 I am very happy to have done it.
Will

Redrom

The trick to keeping it off is to embrace it as a new way of eating nutritionally, rather than think of it as a "diet". You need to relearn the principles of nutrition. I found a logic I could embrace in the book, "Eat to Live" which enabled me to commit and helped me wrap my brain around seemingly contradictory scientific studies that come out on a weekly basis. This year I've gone from 230 to 180, and have 10 lbs to go to get to my target weight; though admittedly, if I never get there I'll still be happy with the results. The biggest thing to keep in mind is that you want to make sure that your body is getting the nutriton it needs. Just because one diet is easier than another, doesn't make it healthy. Retraining your taste buds to find fruits, vegitables, grains and nuts to be delicious takes a little time, and may not seem easy at first. Once you get there and find complete satisfaction in the new flavors you'll wonder why it took so long to begin. I took a lot of small steps along the way, and the weight loss followed in hand. My favorite part about reeducating myself nutritionally, is that previously I had always equated weight loss with starving myself, but my experience this time was the opposite. I've never filled myself as well as I have this year. What will this new knowledge do for you... does it inspire you to find new recipies, rework your old favorites or create new ones? That's up to you, there's an exciting world out there waiting for you to discover it.

FarHorizon

Amen, brother!

kleqkleq

This page has some great cycling programmes ranging from beginner to advanced.
https://www.health24.com/fitness/Prog...-1347-2102.asp

DannoXYZ 

Losing 60# by the end of the year's not realistic for long-term or permanent weight-loss. You can do it on crash diets & other stuff, but you'll end up with a yo-yo effect and end up gaining that weight back next year.

You can lose about 25# by biking 2-hours/day, it's really the 2nd hour that burns up 2-3x more fat than the 1st after you're warmed up. Even better is 3-4 hrs on the weekend, the 3rd & 4th hours burn up more than the 1st two. Keep the rides as brisk LSD pace about 10-15% below LT, steady speed the whole time. The goal then is to maintain a 500-700 cal deficit per day for a 1.0-1.5 lb/week weight loss, so you'll have to track your diet too. Fitday.com is a good place for this.

If you stick to this, losing 25# is certainly possible by the end of the year and keep it up next year until you hit your final goal. This is strictly an endurance/weight-loss regimen, you're not gonna be fast biker by any chance and you'll get dropped on group-rides. But cut back on the miles & hours later and add some speedwork/intervals and you'll get speed quickly as well (the weight-loss will slow down).

Mr. Gear Jammer

I know a great training regimen for ya, have you ever heard of a man called (Chris Carmichael)?. Well this guy was Lance Armstrongs trainer and he has several books out about training, just search it on www.amazon.com you will have no problem finding one of his fitness books.