Problems Loosing My Guy...Help!?

Millionaire

Hi Lads:

I am having problems loosing my gut. it is not massive or anything, but I have an annoying gut starting, and am have serious trouble shifting it.

people are starting to joke about it, as i was always very lean, and I want it gone now!

I am still fairly fit....

Here is my situation, I live in Thailand which is great....
Wake 7am(take me about 45 minsot wake up, I be mad cranky until I have a coffee and ease into the day!)....

get to Thai Boxing camp before 8am. warm up 5 - 10 mins bouncing on tires...sort of thai style home made rebounder unit. This how they warm up.
its hard work, and works the legs, and burns the calf muscles.

1 Round Shadow Thai boxing to warm up more

4 - 5 rounds full on Muay Thai with Pad Man (see vid link, also allows you to see my gut)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MStzmt41Qcs 3min 30 sec which is how long round lasts. I will be working up to 4 mins next week.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2-m8tmps8w shorter version

1 Round boxing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=duxqP-95zcE

Now most days I put my heart and soul into these 5 - 6 rounds, gave 110% effort and try to push speed and power. of course we all have the odd bad day, but 80% of the time I give it my all.

After this, I do a few rounds of the punch bags, and take it a little easier, working more on technique.

I finish with 100 - 200 sit ups on sit up slanted thingy, I do in sets of 50 or 25 depending on mood. do 20 to 50 Hindu Squats some days too. and a few push ups.

I do this thai boxing a min of 4 days and a max of 6 days a week. usually try for 5 sessions on average. lasting over and hour, and I go in for sparring somedays when that is on, usually sat afternoon.

I do yoga 2 sessions a week. usually I skip thai wed morning and do yoga session, more for stress and a relax, though you get a great stretch, and again on a saturday or one evening. I love the yoga. its a mix of all styles, and with the heat in Thailand I sweat buckets. I do Thai session same as above 2pm on wednesday.

i am supposed to be getting in one class of grappling MMA style a week, so I might drop a thai session to do the MMA grappling class.

I also want to work in 1 or 2 days quick and light dumbell session. I got some at home here....just the basic stuff....3 sets of 10....not too heavy, more for tone. and I use Swiss Ball for a weight bench.

I was off sick for a month there with a terrible viral infection, so I a,m just back into training, and easing in over next month.

If I feel real tired I will take a day off, and just do the yoga on a wednesday and skip the 2pm thai session wed afternoon. sometimes I take the whole sat and sunday off, and just have a light swim.

I will add in 30 min runs maybe every 2nd day...in the evening, on thread mill. I am to do 5km in 30 mins with a small inversion....which I have not done yet...but am not far off. last time I was 87% on this goal...I usually run on thread mill in barefeet too. I prefer this.

I drink tons of water. After thai boxing I eat breakfast....brown toast baked beans, slice of bacon and ham, apple and cucumber. I guess I should take a protein shake with this too? and then I take multi vits and 2 1000 mg fish oil bills. I also drink this stuff called "Green DrinK' which is a mix of wheat grass etc, in a water a few times a day.

Lunch btwn 12 - 2pm I eat big can of tuna sandwiches with veg, or chicken sandwich.

7pm ish dinner....usually loads of green veg and a grilled meat.

I stay away from junk food 90% of the time. sure I have the odd curry, or roast beef and spuds dinner.

Maybe I should blend a protein shake with some fruit to make an instant meal btwn my food meals?

Bodywise...I am 6 foot and I weight between 88 - 92kg depending on the day. I moved to Thailand in Jan this 2006 and have gone from 77kgs up to 90.

Now this is important to note. in 2004 - 2005 I had alot of personal problems and i became an alcoholic and a coke abuser. for approx 18 months. booze and coke sessions mean, you may not eat right for 1 or 2 days after....your body cannot take in food, and coke cuts desire to eat. Now I am clean of coke since 14 dec 2005, and I am clean off booze....60 days today with help of AA. So I know drank alot of beer this year and that put on zilions of calories. however I always training in martial arts 3 -4 nights a week all through the booze and coke times, and could crank out 100 push ups in sets and 100s of ab exercises in sets.

So I think how that I have an appitite, I am eating normally, and not missing food for days. maybe that is whay I put on 15 kgs...

I am also 35 years old in a month. so the metab is slowing down.

I feel fit for 35. and I am work on it more, and I love it the boxing and all.

So you can see I am training hard....how do I bust this bloody gut!

and no...I am not going to do Body for Life!!!! :mad: I am training harer than that!

the only junk I take is 2 cans of 7UP and Fruit and Nut bars before bed, as this is to help me replace the booze with a treat...AA advice. I can cut this in time, but right now I need it since I am not long off the booze. and if I go out on weekend I have a few Cokes and Red Bulls....but surely with all the training I would be buring them off.....mineral cannot be as bad as the booze?

Help me please!!!!!!

All advice, ideas tips will be considered.

Also I do not eat much rice like Thai people do. i rarely eat it.

Re my job I work over the internet so when not training most of the day 8 -12 hours I am sitting at a desk on a computer. Mon - Fri. I got a little rebounder unit so maybe I should have a 5 min bounce on it, every hour or so, so keep metab going?????

I cannot undertand how thais who eat max 3 meals a day which is 70% white rice, and train on empty stomachs, can be so fit, muscled looking in a figthers way, and have a six pack abs?? lift no weights, and just do the boxing training a few hours a day. The professional fighters would only be doing 30% ish more than me.

Dan133269

should this not be in personal issues judging from the title? couldn't resist

Jumpy

You probably know more than me about fitness mate, but the only thing I can recommend is to drop the sugar before bed.
Try a protein shake with low fat milk before bed instead of the 7ups and the fruit and nut bars.
You arent going to do much with all that sugar while you sleep.

Kinetic^

The title ftw!!!

Dragan

Alright Gerry,

first off man, fair play on the honesty, and well done for swinging your life back on track dude. Not then, to get straight into the advice....

try and cut out the bacon and fried stuff in the morning. Basically go for some leaner sources of protein, and maybe a protein shake would not go amiss at all.

The can of coke and the bars i will give you, seeing as what they are helping you to contend with, but is there any chance you could maybe have these straight after a Thai session??? Your metabolism will be nicely amped up after all the LHK's!!!!

I would suggest you kick this when you can though...keep the training up, rest properly and the gut will fall away!!! I know it's crap but patience as a male when it comes to losing abdominal fat is definitely a virtue.

\m/_(>_<)_\m/

Kenny 5 wrote:

The title ftw!!!

i wonder is it meant to be witty?

yomchi

Hey Gerry,

Agree with the Dragmeister, keep the fatty meats down to a min. Try some low intensity cardio for optimal fat burning (heart rate around 125 BPM / 30yrs) Do the Thai's like to eat late at night? That could be a problem. Try keep the man made carbs to a minimum after 6.

As you say the coke can act as a hunger supressant, therefore the body will automatically think it is starving and go into survival mode. When you go back to normal a normal diet and eating right the body will store more fat than usual as it prepares for another possible stint in survival mode - hence why crash diets dont work.

Try work out how many cals your consuming in any given day and take it from there

Millionaire

Thanks for the advice lads!

Yes, I was figure the slice of bacon had to go in morning! I was trying to tell the GF that, I will just stick on the fruit, veg and beans and a protein shake.

I think Drgan said before, try and eat something before the moring sessions, even if small. I will try to force a banna or 2 in before boxing session. I am one of those people who find it hard to look at food that early in morning or before training.

I think I can replace the Mineral and Fruit and Nut bars with a small lean chicken sandwich. might take a few weeks to wean myself of them, but as we agree a bar of choc and a few cans of 7up, are better than 10 pints a night ! LOL!!!!

Low intensity cardio Jon...do mean some lighter jogging/fast walking, rather than trying to lash it out of it running at 12 Km for 30 mins? which is what I was working up to.

Yeah, I did a good ( a bad) job of myself when I started sticking white lines up my nose for the best of 2 years, and not eating. They say if you were a heavy drinker it takes 2 years for your body to completly clear of signs of drinking (when they do a post mortem), so maybe that means if I was on drugs for 2 years, it might take the same for my body to "normalise"...

Off topic of OP, but Dublin is awash with coke, and there is going to be a serious amount of people with serious habits (there is already), but the long term effects will be extremely serious. Thank God I got off it, and later got rid of the booze which was on and off for 2005. did not want to do a Georgie Best!

The thais, this is how they eat, as in fighter up 5 at 6am, no breakfast running 10km, 2 hours boxing training. 9 or 10am is lunch....a ton of white rice, chicken curry with tons of chillies (usually boney chicken), maybe a fish if lucky. midday sleep until about 2pm...repeat training on empty stomach.... finsih 6ish.... then eat simialar meal with tons of rice about 7pm. bed 10pm.
coud also eat alot of pork, or noodle soup with pork/chicken. they never seems to drink much water, despite training 5 hours a day. so its 2 or 3 meals a day with a ton of starchy white rice! maybe their bodies are so used to this, it works for them.

Yeah I guess, I got to give this time, only been 2 months since I finally manage to kick to beer. which blows you up like a baloon. so that will take a while for body to change.

I think too, if I start to get tired to take a day off, to avoid over training. and not go 6 hours without food or between meals. another bad habit of mine.


Question... The Yoga...which is the basic usual yoga moves, and some can be quite challenging, given it makes me sweat like a pig, that would help burn some cals too, and firm some muscles also? yoga seems to work mucles way in under, the "beach" muscles.

So right, lets see can I count the cals... (i hate that part of fitness, never can figure it out).

Keep training away as I am, and add in the cardio as jon says, next week. maybe early afternoons for that.

and then 1 or 2 simple dumbell work outs, 3 x 12 reps, just to tone a bit.

Yes and patience, I was trucking along with the training, until I got that viral infection. which had me on my back for a month.


I met this american man in boxing camp and was chatting. he looked in great shape I thought same age as me maybe 35. told me he was 45, his abs were cuts into a 6 pack, body cut like a fighter, and all he did was 45 - 60 mins days a week thai boxing. he said he only ate protein and no carbs (no veg cannot be good?). apparently he works training professional western boxers in USA.

aoa321

Hi,

I'm no expert but your body will get used to doing certain exercises, so if you are training in the same way year in year out perhaps you are not "shocking" your body as much as you think you are with all your training, maybe if you tried something different for a couple of months as an experiment you might notice a difference. I'd say it will take a while so you will have to stick with whatever the experiment is - you could try something as simple as long-distance walking to see how you get on - it should burn the calories.

You seem very focused right now so I'm sure if you can discover the right formula you'll get to where you want to get to - my advice is to cut back sensibly on the calories and find a way to freshen up your fitness routine. Sometimes Weight Wathchers gets a bit of bashing on the boards. I've never been to a meeting but I have used thier point measuring system to measure my intake in the past, it's very simple and I lost over 2 stone using it - I'm 3 years older than you. Good luck, and keep us posted.

Off-topic, do you mind me asking if the Thai boxing school you are attending is just like a public gym here in Ireland? Can you just walk in off the street, pay your money and get tuition or do you have to be up to a certain standard? Will you be fighting in any tournaments or are you just doing it for your own personal satisfaction? How did you make the decision to move to Thailand, was it just for the Thai boxing training?

Degsy

I had a similar problem a few years ago,ate every two days due to er,substances and drank 12-20 cans of beer a night for three years.My gut came up like a balloon,man boobs and yet my arms were so skinny i could practically span the top of my arm with one hand.I still have a bit of a gut although i'm getting rid of it slowly,16.5 inch arms and counting.I still partake in the occasional pint or three at the weekend so i'm never going to be ripped and if i'm honest its the only thing keeping the gut there i think.Congrats on getting your life back on track Gerry.The gut will fall away in time,just think of how much you've turned yourself around and dont worry bout a bit of flab in the meantime.

yomchi

Millionaire wrote:

Low intensity cardio Jon...do mean some lighter jogging/fast walking, rather than trying to lash it out of it running at 12 Km for 30 mins? which is what I was working up to

Yep, low intensity cardio will use fat storage for energy. Especially good in the morning before eat time. Hign intensity will use your glycogen and ATP stores.
Try giving yourself a good old fashion detox, fat cells are harder shift when they have toxins attached to them.

Odysseus

Hi Gerry,

Congrats on the sixty days keep going to AA. As you know I am more knowledgable about the psychological side of the recovery process rather than the pyhical. On the psych side you are talking about two years as the process of early recovery, so 60 days is very early, I would imagine this will apply to a lesser degree with your body, so I would imagine that your training along with the advice above should do the trick for you. Best of luck with it and if I can be of any use pm me.

PS love the title, you know us psychoanalysts love stuff like that;)

Millionaire

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF^&^^&^&^&^&^&^&^&((((KKKKKKKKKKKKK

I am only after copping on to the title of my post! LOL!!!!!! ha ha!
No I got a lovely wee thai GF. and I am straight...just for the record! LOL!

I could not figure out what all the slagging was about on the other posts!

Yes thanks for all the help everyone, I really appreciate the support!

. will work in low cardio, keep a better eye on the diet, keep up the Thai Boxing Hard. And Seamus its daily meetings for me....AA is just a brilliant organisations. I kicked the other ****e myself.... know you know how I was able to lead the class warm up at 100 miles an hour. 100 jumping jacks in about 20 secs! LOL!!! ssshhh!

Degsy who sound like you had the same pattern as me! I did the exact same as you! 2 days of not able to face food, but no problems dowing a heap of beer later than evening, and another wee bag delievered into me, an addict need his stash! still I trained in the MA 3 or 4 nights a week all through it.


re AOA321 Thailand questions....

In most of the better know gym you can walk in on the day, no experience, and train. and they will show you. there is loads too catering to Muay Thai holidays.... and stay in a thai camp in phuket or koi samui and train the same as the fighters for a few days, weeks, months. You are spolied for choice. just hit google.

Of course there are the more serious ones too, that are mainly thai pro fighters and while they might let you train, do not expect too much attention or instruction. the fighters come first. they make money for the camp.

I spend 6 months in NE Thailand in Isan and trained in a small camp that back in early 90s thad famous world champs that fought all over the world. there is not many foreigners up there, so I was an bitof a oddity but in time they accepted me. great experience, but most of the training time was for the fighters, I sort of would get 20 mins and then have to train myself.

I train in Sityodthong in Pattaya, which is a famous camp, and has a good stable of fighters, and also people come from all over the world to train tioo.
It 200 bhat a session which is about 4 euro and thats sort of a private lesson. one on one with your trainer, as per my signature link.

why i do it. I was into kickboxing for 20 years and I love martial arts, with an interest in Self Defence, I love the Thai style training, its hard, tough and informal.

The reason I came here is because I was letting my life slip away in ireland with booze and drugs, and it was everywhere I turned. I got sick of the prices, the materialism, (and once I was very materialistic), the lifestyle I lived in dublin. so I discover I would telework my business from thailand into ireland and have buddy inthailand doing same into USA....so I thought, I got nothing to loose, and off I went, and I am here a year later.

My mental attitude has changed, I am thank God Booze and drug free (day by day) , I love the Thai peopel and the life style, and I feel great. and over here it is not like cafe en seine "is that a dunnes stores shirt you have!!!!", here some people are lucky to have a shirt...and that puts a different perspective on life!

Now I gotta to loose that gut!!!!!

Dragan

Millionaire wrote:

Now I gotta to loose that gut!!!!!

In fairness Gerry, with the better choices your making, and the new path your life is set on....the gut will not be a problem! Best of luck buddy.

Millionaire

Dragan wrote:

In fairness Gerry, with the better choices your making, and the new path your life is set on....the gut will not be a problem! Best of luck buddy.

Thanks Dragan, I appreciate the support! thats good karma!