Hey guys...

Originally Posted by Jordo!

I give specific dietary recommendations besides counting calories... I also recommended he use that as a STARTING point.

Yes, in principal, you can lose weight on twinkies and vodka, but you feel like **** and be creeping your way towards late onset diabetes...

Lean meats, fish, veg, fruit, limit processed foods (i.e., wheat and rice products), obviously cut out all foods devoted to high sugar, fat, or sodium content (i.e., snack foods), cut out whole fat dairy, and if really serious NO booze. For at least two months, pretend you are training for a fight and be disciplined. It will suck. It will be hard. But its only 8 weeks. You'll feel like a new man in 4, and that will galvanize you for the next 4. Then, re-evaluate your next move.

That hilarious 2000 Kc/day recommended for the "average" adult is, if you work out the values using the old BMR maths, for a 175 lb reasonably lean and physically active adult man. That's not a lot of people, as it turns out. In any case, the "average" American probably eats about double that or more.

Based on my recommendation, if he eats 7,500 Kc a day (quite possible if he eats lots of junk foods), cutting 20% is a drop to a "mere" 6000 Kc. Hardly starvation. Then those updated caloric needs have to be filled with densely nutritious foods.

40 lbs of body fat will drop off fast provided he reduces caloric intake, increases physical activity (especially resistance training combined with cardiovascular activity), while sparing (and building) lean muscle mass.

Stat light to moderate; work hard, but slow down if you get wiped out. Consult a physician if you are in poor health, injuries, or have heart/breathing issues to work around before beginning. When the exercise regimen seems fairly easy, time to work harder and do more.

Always stretch at least a bit before and after (there is evidence you burn more calories by skipping the pre-stretch -- more latent energy in the muscles -- but also greater likelihood of pulling something... so stretch). Flexible is good.

Set your goals to be challenging but manageable. If you feel like its too little, put more effort in. If you are ready to collapse (especially just beginning) slow the **** down and pace yourself. You'll be maintaining these habits the rest of your life, not for a month or two.

The only supplement I would recommend other than Designer Whey (the "designer" part is based on a production method that makes it more easily absorbed rather than destroyed in the gut), is calcium citrate (better absorbed than carbonate) and, if desired, as a very safe appetite suppressant/fat burner, good old caffeine. Mind your tolerance to it -- don't overdo it, obviously. If you are twitchy and can't sleep, that's not good... if you already down coffee on a daily basis, use that as your guideline.

Drink lots of water. Fills you up, keeps your cells hydrated, and helps with elimination. Good for the kidneys too.

Oh yeah, and if you smoke: QUIT.

Log everything, count calories, time, reps, weights, take notes.

Compare and contrast in 4 weeks. If you follow my advice, I predict a loss of around 10 lbs of fat and overall feeling surprisingly more fit, agile, and light on your feet.

Originally Posted by Meulen

NICE!!! We actually recommend a similar 2 month diet during winter training months for our endurance athletes. Not only do they lose weight on the diet but seem to continue losing weight in post diet months and seem to attest they perform better in races/workouts.

The only thing I'll add is about the stretching. A lot of recent studies are showing stretching before workouts actually contributes to injuries. Theory goes that stretching loosens up soft tissues and and promotes hyperextensions. Over the past few years we've been promoting regular use of foam rollers to lengthen muscles and take out adhesions instead.

Originally Posted by Jordo!

hmm. That sounds good. In the absence of that, I'd argue for fairly light stretching before and more after, and/or in between sets. Hyper stretching will definitely loosen things up too much, so I'm not surprised of hear of evidence that it leads to injuries if people overdo it.

The "no pre-stretching" idea was based on fairly recent data that the tighter ligaments had more potential energy and therefore actually burned more calories when stretched during exercise rather than before.

I feel that is probably adequate advice for fit and reasonably flexible individuals (and irrelevant for ballet dancers and trained fighters or gymnasts). But newbies should definitely at least do some modest warm up stretches, if nothing else because figuring out the interval between "not enough" and "too much exertion" will be ill defined.

The foam roller probably works really well. Nothing like that at my gym that I am aware of, sadly...