New Year, New Resolution, Same Results

[Eagle43]

Part of my retirement regimen is to go to the gym. I'm there 1 to 2 hours every day. It's an opportunity to get the endorphins moving and also socialize a little.

Anyway, I have noticed a lot of new people. They start coming in just before New Years day. The regulars wager that most will be gone by tax day; and some a lot sooner.

The gym makes money, of course. And the newcomers really intend to lose weight or get in shape. Somehow, they never do. We can then look for them back next year.

BTW I used to make New Year's resolutions; work harder, be more decisive, learn something new, get up 15 minutes earlier, blah, blah, blah. It didn't work for me, either.

[azanon]

OK i'll reveal my fitness/weight loss secrets; a topic i love about as much as ER/Investing.

1. *Its all about the Calorie; A unit of energy-producing potential equal to this amount of heat that is contained in food and released upon oxidation by the body
2. *Its also all about understanding the first law of Thermodynamics; *Energy can neither be created or destroyed.
3. *Put 1 and 2 together, and you realize a truth. *If you burn more energy (calories) than you take in, you lose weight. *You have to, unless your body retains additional water that temporarily compensates for it.
4. *Water and undigestable material will reach an equilibrium, thus become constants. *Attack the variable that isnt a constant; *Stored Energy (calories).
5. *Turn your body into a gas guzzling racecar; *three great ways to do this are 1. eat many smaller meals. (analogous to throwing small twigs on a fire intermittently instead of heavin a large, round log on it) *2. exercise, both anaerobic and aerobic *3. *get plenty of rest.

My plan:
1. *Calorie count -- i use fitday.com. *Works great, esp if you have a pc at your disposal. *Guess how much calories you need/day using the tool there, then create a mild calorie debt. *I prefer this method over fads like low carbs, cause it allows you to eat what you want.
2. *Exercise daily for 30 minutes - my poison is Tae Bo II cd + Total Gym which i alternate.
3. *Weight every day, and use excel to make 3 columns; *the day, today's weight, and your weight averaged over the past 10 days. *The reason to do that is so you dont get discouraged simply because you weighted more one morning cause maybe you just ate. *The 10 day average will show daily progress.
4. *Take suppiments if you're on a diet just to make sure you're getting the vitamins and minerals you need.

When i'm on a diet doing the above, i can still eat 2200-2400 calories a day and lose about a pound a week.

That's my secret and i currently weight 158 at 5'11 (at 33 yrs old). *Although my somatotype is ectomorphic, i have a nice, muscular body too per the exercise. *You could cut out the exercising and still cause a calorie debt, but why not just maximize the pleasure of it all and have a killer bod to go with it.