I’m curious, what do people do when they need to lose a lot of weight to weigh in for certain sports activities? Say you need to lose 10 lbs in a week for such a weighing, what is the best way to do it? I haven’t been able to find much on the internet, except about the dangers of dehydration. Is there some kind of diuretic pill that athletes take to temporarily lose weight? ( I understand it’s not the healthiest thing to do, but I’m interested in the technique)
Well, every year around March 1st through the 8th…I have a lot of b-day parties to go to. I know this sounds really bad but I went out every night and drank a lot. I woke up at around 4pm the next day, drank a whole lot of water then left for the next night out at 8…I did this for a week. My hunger was practically gone and all I wanted was either juice or water. I lost 6 pounds in one week. But I gained it all back in 2 weeks. I don’t suggest you do this but if your desperate…be my guest.
-M
P.s. The pill your talking about is either Phentermine or the one in the blue bottle from GNC. I hear they both are generally for people heavily overweight who need a “push” to lose that first 20-30 pounds. Be careful with that stuff.
Phentermine is an appetite suppressant, not a diuretic, and was part of the phen/fen craze a few years back. It’s supposedly available only by prescription, but I guess there are places to get it online. I don’t know about at a GNC. Never been there. Maybe you’re thinking of something else?
Rusalka: I don’t know how athletes do it, but I’ve heard Atkins Fat Fast works pretty fast for some people if you can handle it. Probably just water weight though. I guess athletes could be doing diuretics though.
Wow. That was no help at all!
Boxers (I suppose wrestlers/weightlifters as well) will exercise in “rubber suits” to sweat off pounds.
Most of the medium weight (welter thru Lightheavy) guys will do this,tho a few are just naturally the right weight.
A welterweight weighing in at or under 147,eg,routinely weighs as much as 152/55 the next day (day of the fight,after putting back that weight thru food and drink.)
Jockeys sweat off the last few pounds in the sweat box-same principle.
All of this to make a deadline for a temporary weight,not for maintaining the weight.
The only diuretic I’m aware of that’s prescribed widely is Lasix.A lot of hypertensive people use it in combo with other drugs.
Quadgop would know that one.So would racehorse trainers 
Boxers and weightlifters are not allowed to use diuretics but use natural dehydration means to lose fluid. They make extensive use of saunas and physical activity to sweat off weight. In extreme cases they may spit repeatedly to aid in fluid loss. After the weigh in they will regain all the weight by drinking fluids. Some boxers who happen to be able to shed weight quickly can climb in the ring weighing up to 10 pounds more than they weighed in at. That is why particularly in lighter weight divisions some boxers seem much bigger than all their opponents.
G’day
Wandering slightly from the topic:
The way the Atkins diet and other low-carbohydrate diets produce those first few spectacular pounds of weight loss is this:
The diets are very low in carbohydrate, so blood sugar drops. In response, the pancreas stops releasing insulin (which stimulated the kidneys to retain fluid) and instead releases glucagon (which is a diuretic). Voila! weight loss.
When I started on a low-carbohydrate diet I lost 7 kg (more than fifteen pounds) in two weeks. Probably at most 2 kg of that was loss of actual fat.
Last night politeness forced me to eat a large bowl of chicken soup thick with roots and grains. That put up my blood sugar, lowered my glucagon, and raised my insulin. I put on 2 kg overnight, almost all of it retained fluid. Most of it will be gone in the morning.
But this is not, so far as I know, a method much used by athletes.
Regards,
Agback
I’ve heard some models wrap themselves in Saran Wrap™ to sweat out weight.
My dad used to do wrestling in university. He would cover himself in plastic bags and run for 15k or so… I believe he would drink a ton of water to gain all the weight back between the weigh-in and the match.
I certainly wouldn’t want to try it… ugh…