A lot of people asked “how did I lose the weight?” Answer: “I just got tired of being fat.” Why am I writing about it at all? Because there damned few adventures in south Texas in the summer time.

THE PLAN: Lose weight. Actually, lose fat. Because losing weight COULD be losing muscle mass instead of fat, resulting in looking like Jabba the Hut. Maintain lean muscle mass while losing fat. Phase 2: Once most of the excess fat is lost, build muscle mass. If done properly, you get to look like Chris Evans. Wait. I made that last part up.

Actual Caloric Deficit Number

KEY: Caloric Deficit – Burning more calories in a day than you take in (eat). “Burning” includes your BMR (basal metabolic rate… see in glossary) + your exercise calories burnt) minus the calories you would have burned with your BMR ANYWAY in the same amount of time you exercised. You cannot out-workout a bad diet.

For example, let’s say your BMR = 2400 calories per day and you workout 2 hours per day. Your BMR hourly rate is about 100 calories per hour.

Let’s say that your workout burns 400 calories.
Add about 200 (100/hr x 2 hrs of BMR in  exercise time) calories since you would have burnt that up in your BMR anyway. (Sorry, you don’t get to double dip.) Then, you eat as healthy as you can (more on that later) and take in about 1500 calories.

– 2400 (BMR, breathing, sitting) (minus)
– 400 (Exercise calorie burn in 2 hours) (minus)
+ 200 (BMR exercise time) (plus)
+1500 (Calories you eat) (plus)

– 2800 (calories burned) +1700 = -1100 calories
3200 to 3500 calories = 1 lb.

So it would take you about 3 days to lose a lb (fat or muscle depending) or about 2 lbs per week, which is what all the fitness gurus say you should shoot for on a sustainable plan anyway.

Ahem.         I didn’t do it that way.

To be continued…

I am NOT a fitness expert by any stretch of the imagination, nor a doctor, nor lawyer, nor an astronaut. But before ANY physical regimen or dietary change, you should consult a REAL physician for your specific situation. This is blog is not meant as medical advice, but as the story of my personal journey (and subsequent entertainment), and to be real frank, I KNOW I did not do it in a sustainable fashion, but with a barely thought-out plan to accelerate my goals (fat loss). Once I achieve that to a degree where I feel comfortable, I upped my caloric intake so that it was something I can maintain on a regular basis. Do NOT do what I did (unless of course you are a masochistic psychotic). I am not sponsored or get referral fees, so the content here is strictly my unvarnished, unsponsored opinion. Take it with a grain of salt, protein powder, and skepticism.