I've lost 22 pounds so far this year. !

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Here's how I did it:

Last December I went to my doctor for my annual physical. !

He gave me the talk every adult dreads: "Lose the weight, or else." !

Then he showed me this chart:   — April 2008 (before Hannah arrived): 227 pounds  — September 2011: 232 pounds  — December 2012: 237 pounds, and  — December 2013: 243 pounds

Indeed - over the years, it'd piled on.

Perhaps providing some consolation, most Americans struggle with this. After all, our way of life is designed to keep us sitting and eating food that isn’t good

for us. Staying lean is a huge challenge these days.

Alarming, and no doubt my doctor was right. Yet I wondered, how had it crept up on me? And what would I need to change?

!After all, I ate most of the right things and few of the wrong things.

I went to the gym 3 or 4 times a week, just as I had most of my adult life - lifting weights regularly and

doing at least 4 hours of cardio a week. !

Heck, I even had a stint as social marketing manager at Weight Watchers back in 2010, where I learned all sorts of things about losing weight - and keeping it off. (It’s worth noting that, thanks to all those hours

chained to the office desk and sitting in meetings, I managed to gain weight during my tenure there!)

After the New Year, I vowed, I’d get serious and drop the weight. Not before topping out at 247 - just 3 shy of 250 pounds!

!My body - while always big and tall - simply wasn’t built to carry that kind of weight around. I had to change, or face the consequences. 

My doctor advised me to: 1. Get and use a calorie-tracking app for my phone, & 2. Snack on popcorn when I get hungry at night.

!That advice alone would have gotten me halfway there..

!I took his advice on the popcorn but thought tracking

my calorie consumption on the app was silly.

After a few months of putting it off, I started tracking everything I ate. !

While a bit time-consuming, it kept me accountable. I quickly noticed patterns in my eating, and the relative satisfaction I got from different foods I tended to eat.

!Looking at the calories certain foods had, very quickly, bread all but

disappeared from my diet. Then large meat servings. And then I realized I could eat as many vegetables as I want to fill hunger gaps,

as veggies are “high volume” foods, with few calories. Onions became my friend, as did mushrooms,

frozen veggies and baby carrots.

— After two months of tracking, the ratios didn't change much. Only that all 3 trended down, and I ate notably less protein, which surprised me. Less meat and more beans, perhaps?

Fat vs. Carbs vs. Protein intake, from June to August

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— Tracking everything I ate in "Lose It!” made it easy to identify what I could cut without sacrificing nutrition and flavor. In the example below, tortillas add lots of calories but not much else. 

“Lose It!” app screens

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— Over time, consumption dropped from an average of 3,200 to 2,500 calories per day.

Calories consumed

“Moves” app screens

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— I track my daily activity in the “Moves app”, and then add it manually in greater detail against my food intake in "Lose It!”

Lose It! app screens

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— Adding the activity captured through the “Moves” app into “Lose It!” enables me to track the approximate number of calories I burn, and then compares against food intake to also track “net calories”.

Not all exercise burns calories equally. For my body size, here’s about how many calories I burn in an hour with each:

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!Running: 1,265 calories.  — When the opportunity presents itself, I run and enjoy it - for about 10 minutes. And then I get bored. And I feel like it puts wear and tear on my knees. So I rarely do it.  Cycling: 964 calories. — I’ve always enjoyed riding a bike. On a weekend morning, it’s hard to top. Elliptical training: 750 calories. — While I believe elliptical trainers have few real benefits compared to other full-body exercises, they do burn calories. And I can take my iPad with me and work while I’m at it. Or read. Or watch TV. Indoors, when it’s warm and it’s cold outside. Walking & Hiking: 268 & 536 calories, respectively.  — I enjoy walking - especially hiking - and I find it essential to get my brain humming about work and sorting through issues. Yet it doesn’t burn enough to lose weight. Weight training: 536 calories. — Essential, yet I rarely lift for more than a half hour at a time. Yard work & house cleaning: 300 & 246 calories, respectively. — With the house and 3 girls to look after, there’s no shortage to do here.

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— Calories burned through activity and exercise remained consistent, at about 1,400 per day.

Calories burned

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— And here's the reason my weight dropped - the hardest balance, overall net calories consumed decreased from about 1,500 to 1,400 per day.

Net calories = consumed - burned

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— Sticking to the goal and making subtle improvements, weight dropped - from 237 in June to 225 by Halloween.

Here’s my weight drop, from June to October

The difference between staying where you are and hitting tough goals is the little changes, the “extra inches”,

the disciplined decisions made every day. !

You can't do it with exercise alone; it's what you eat, and how much you eat. 

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If I could boil down what I learned to a few points, it would look something like this:

1. Move as much as possible. Some movements burn more calories than others, but activity is key.

!I’m at my best when I have 4+ hours of activity a day. While low for our

grandparents (they did physical work), it’s difficult to find time to be active - now that we’re chained to our desks, driving our cars, or plugged in to screens.

It’s been said that sitting is this generation’s smoking, and I believe it.

2. Cook your own food. Eat the things you value, eliminate the rest, and fill up

on seasoned veggies - not nutrition-free junk. !

This is a tough one for many of us. I’m fortunate to work from home most days, so I have control over what I eat. Cooking burns up a lot of my time, but

I’ve saved thousands of dollars, eat better than ever, have become a much better cook, and I’ve come to enjoy it. And I’m much healthier for it.

3. Don’t eat bread, and don’t eat processed food. !

As a rule, it’s best to avoid white food (refined sugar, bread, flour, rice, etc. - though I still eat dairy). Processed food is bad. If you haven’t yet,

watch “Fed Up”, “Food, Inc.”, Super Size Me”, etc… Whenever possible, avoid the stuff, as it’ll slowly kill you.

4. Track your calories and activity with mobile apps. I use “Moves” and “Lose It!”, but there are many others. 

! I’ve tracked my physical activity for nearly a year now. I enjoy it.

I find it keeps me accountable. Yet I only tracked my food intake for about 3 months. Once the habits were set, I found that it seemed redundant to keep

tracking it…unless my weight swings back upward, or my efforts plateau.

5. Figure out what works for you, and stay at it. It’s a lifestyle change, and in time you’ll realize that

you feel better about yourself, you have more energy, and that you crave nutrition over junk.

!I went to a fast food restaurant with my girls a few weeks ago,

ingested ~800 calories of “brown food”, and walked out hungry.. The experience made me never want to go back again.

6. Keep looking ahead. Have goals that matter to you, and keep figuring out how you'll achieve them. 

1. Move as much as possible. 2. Cook your own food.

3. Avoid bread and processed foods. 4. Track your calories and activity with mobile apps.

5. Figure out what works for you, and stay at it. 6. Keep looking ahead.

To sum up - in order to lose weight, keep it off & stay healthy:

My next goal? 

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!!Quantitatively: 210 pounds. Might as well get as much of it off as I can. I'm down 22 in 2014. What's 15 more in 2015? !Qualitatively: to keep finding new places to hike, ride my bike, and try new things to keep physically and mentally fit. 

brent@100mph.us !

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Thanks for listening. !

These are only highlights, and I tried to summarize. If you have any questions on specific techniques I’ve used,

please comment here or message me.