losing weight

bookiebasher

hello all...36 year old here that wants to do something with the six pack before it gets out of hand..i was superfit about 15 years ago and played inter county football and even played in an all ireland final...
my question is what sort of programme should i start with...im 6 foot tall and weight is 19 stone...im told i can carry the weight but i was 15 stone playing football

rubadub

Your BMI is 36, obese being above 30. Unless you have a hell of a lot of muscle you are pretty overweight and have very polite friends who say you can "carry it".

You should read the stickies about what suits you best. What worked for me was.
Reducing calories by at least 500kcal per day.
eating 6 meals a day, equally spaced, equally sized calorie wise.
Eating lower calorific foods, this comes naturally if you count calories.
Cycling and walkling everywhere I could, average 70miles cycle per week.
Lifting heavy weights to put on muscle and boost metabolism and prevent muscle loss from being on a diet.
Drinking less. Once you loose weight you need less booze to get to the same level of tipsiness. I still go out as much and get in the same "state" but on about 2/3 the drink I used to or less.

bookiebasher

thanks...just dont want to start back doing what i was doing years ago...i would get a heart attack ha ha..cycling sounds good..

Red05

rubadub wrote:

Your BMI is 36, obese being above 30. Unless you have a hell of a lot of muscle you are pretty overweight and have very polite friends who say you can "carry it".

You should read the stickies about what suits you best. What worked for me was.
Reducing calories by at least 500kcal per day.
eating 6 meals a day, equally spaced, equally sized calorie wise.
Eating lower calorific foods, this comes naturally if you count calories.
Cycling and walkling everywhere I could, average 70miles cycle per week.
Lifting heavy weights to put on muscle and boost metabolism and prevent muscle loss from being on a diet.
Drinking less. Once you loose weight you need less booze to get to the same level of tipsiness. I still go out as much and get in the same "state" but on about 2/3 the drink I used to or less.

Hey any chance you could give a quick description of what you ate during a typical day - to lose weight? Thanks!

rubadub

Red05 wrote:

Hey any chance you could give a quick description of what you ate during a typical day - to lose weight? Thanks!

Wasn't a perfect diet by any means. I aimed for 6x 300kcal a day which is 1800kcal, but usually ended up with an extra bit from drinks or the odd buscuit so usually 2000kcal. The key is to weigh your food and calculate the calories properly. Taking note of calories will open your eyes to some foods that are higher than you thought like bread.

Breakfast 8.00- porridge, or museli, now oat pancakes.
10.30- fruit, orange, apple & banana, or a tin of beans
1.00- spag bol I would make my a big batch of a meals like but calculate 300kcal portions and store them in jars in the fridge or freeze
3.30- 2 chicken fillets with some sauce
6.00- steak & onions & other veg
8.30- protein shake with milk or more chicken.

Red05

rubadub wrote:

Wasn't a perfect diet by any means. I aimed for 6x 300kcal a day which is 1800kcal, but usually ended up with an extra bit from drinks or the odd buscuit so usually 2000kcal. The key is to weigh your food and calculate the calories properly. Taking note of calories will open your eyes to some foods that are higher than you thought like bread.

Breakfast 8.00- porridge, or museli, now oat pancakes.
10.30- fruit, orange, apple & banana, or a tin of beans
1.00- spag bol I would make my a big batch of a meals like but calculate 300kcal portions and store them in jars in the fridge or freeze
3.30- 2 chicken fillets with some sauce
6.00- steak & onions & other veg
8.30- protein shake with milk or more chicken.

Cool thanks. Am I right in thinking you cut out bread, potatoes, pasta (minus the spag) totally?

rubadub

Red05 wrote:

Cool thanks. Am I right in thinking you cut out bread, potatoes, pasta (minus the spag) totally?

Not totally, I still ate some, always brown wholemeal bread or pasta. The thing is when you are calorie counting I would prefer to eat something over something else. Take a burger, you can get steak yourself and trim the fat off and mince it. Then a 1/4 burger has the same calories as the bun, so instead of a 1/4lb burger and bun I would have 2 1/4lb burgers without a roll, just on lettuce with sauce. You naturally go for the lower calorie option, 300kcal is 2-3 spicy chicken fillets, or 3 chocolate buscuits, or a few slices of bread, I felt more full and prefered the chicken so went for that. A full tin of beans is about 250kcal, less than a chocolate bar.

Protein rich food also acts as a appetite suppresant and I was trying to build/maintain muscle so went for protein.

There was a program on bbc2 last week mentioning this about protein and other ways to keep yourself feeling full, they recommended eating soup saying it worked better than eating food and then lots of water. It slowed digestion. I sometimes took protein shakes in the morning and would not be hungry till 1pm, pretty much a protein "soup". That was before I started the 6 meals a day which works better for me.

The program also talked of portion size and showed 2 groups of people having a be feast, lots of chicken drumsticks. One group had the plates cleared constantly, and they ate far more than the group who had to bones build up in front of them, as they were aware they had eaten a lot.

Red05

Ya I agree with taking two fillets and leaving out the buns. You'd feel more fuller.

Can I ask another question? Nuts - are they ok? I've heard so many different things about nuts. Am I right to think you should NOT have any kind of nuts if on a diet?

rubadub

Red05 wrote:

Am I right to think you should NOT have any kind of nuts if on a diet?

No, I ate some nuts while watching calories. They are highly nutritious, full of protein, but they are all about 50% fat, BUT it is generally good fats that you should be eating anyway.

So they are fairly high in calories and do not fill you as much as other foods thats what would put me off them while watching calories (and makes them ideal for thin people who have problems getting all the calories in). They pack about 550kcal per 100g, whereas chicken breast would be about 110kcal per 100g, so you could eat 5 times the weight.

I used to eat them more as a treat when watching calories, I love cashews, used to fry them with chicken.

If you eat 6 even meals a day your stomach never gets stretched, it shrinks and you feel fuller with less food.