This thread really strikes my heart. I live to play sports and I’m at my yearly lull in fitness, too.
To the OP, that goal of losing 20 pounds by March 5th, 2007 is realistic because you can safely lose about 2 pounds a week without feeling starved. I really advocate becoming a hardcore cyclist if you want to lose weight. Take a look at http://www.performancelabshc.com/pages.php?id=66 to get an idea of how much energy a Tour de France rider burns during a day.
Just finished getting my weight bench put together, and tried it out for the first time. Not bad.
It doesn’t have a huge weight capacity to it, but hey, outgrowing it is a problem I want to have. 
I’ve given everybody my goal: lose at least 20 pounds by auditions for “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,” which is… uh, first week of March sometime. That’s about 74 days or so.
If you’re in, do you have a goal date and weight in mind? It’s okay if you don’t want to confess what an ugly fat bastard you are, just say “lose 20” or 'X-20" or whatever. Or if you have a certain bench weight you want to lift, keep it to yourself so we don’t all snicker at you. …I mean, go ahead and tell us.
No number goals. Wouldn’t mind getting on the other side of 200, but not overly concerned. My clothes fit fine as it is.
Just hope I’m still doing push-ups and crunches regularly 3-6 months from now.
Stay under 180lbs during the same time period.
…Run that 5k again in March
…And keep running.
I’m in. The month between Thanksgiving and Christmas makes me fat, though, so I’ll have to wait 'till January to start seriously cutting down. I am getting in what lifting I have time for even now so as much of the weight gain as possible goes to muscles… but I imagine I’ll still end up ten pounds heavier than I was in mid-November.
Once the holiday crunch is over, the goal is to get back down to 150, and with a lower body fat % than I had the last time I got that low (I am 5’8" but solidly built, so 150 with a reasonable BF% makes my body look really good). I imagine the way to get to what I want is to drop down to 145 (15 pounds below where I expect to be on Jan 2) and then add some muscle back on.
So, I’m totally in, and that’s mah story!
Every summer I end up looking like this: www.cyclingnews.com presents the 92nd Tour de France 
I’m finally starting to get serious about this, after a very slow post-college transition from thin to average to a bit pudgy to a bit TOO pudgy, which is where I am now. I’ve started exercising (20-25 minutes of jogging 3-4 times a week), which I don’t hate. I’m really hoping to avoid giving up sodas, which I just love.
I need to get myself a scale and see how I’m doing just with exercise. Hopefully, as I get into better shape, I can increase the amount of exercise. (Anyone have any idea whether I’m better off:
(1) increasing the number of days per week I exercise
vs
(2) increasing the length of the workout
vs
(3) increasing the intensity of the workout
?
thanks)
I didn’t have a goal date & weight in mind, but the thread comes with one built-in. I hope to be able to run a mile & follow it up with 40 push ups and 40 crunches. I expect I’ll have to drop 20 pounds to get there, so we’ll call it X-20. Hows that?
The booklet I got with my weight bench suggests weight loss is best with low-resistance, more repetitions exercise: less strenuous, but more of it. It also suggests strength training is higher-resistance, fewer repetitions.
I’ve also heard from a number of sources that you should be working hard every other day, but personally I intend to do at least a little bit every day because otherwise I’ll get quickly out of the habit.
Ditch the soda. Dunno how many of them you drink each day but that’s a lot of empty calories. Or at least switch to diet. I satisfy the need for “fizzy full feeling” by stocking up on plain old seltzer water (the no sodium kind). It’s incredibly cheap, too.
If your exercise routine right now is just jogging and you’re doing it every other day I’d suggest a combination of 2 & 3…go for a good brisk walk on the off days to keep activity up while giving your body some time to rest & recover. You can always run a little bit farther or find a trail with some uphill/downhill to increase length and intensity. Make sure that your existing routine feels OK before increasing it (getting hurt sucks).
I am not a trainer. You might want to talk to a professional. Three or four times a week should be good. You need to give your body some time to recover from the workouts. There are different target heart rates for different goals. If you are looking to lose weight you want a lower heart rate. Generally, my understanding is that you want steeper and slower rather than flatter and faster for losing weight. For cardio you want to get your heart rate up, which means flatter and faster. IIRC, my target heart rate for my age for fat burning is is in the 120s while for areobic it is in the 140s.
This site has some inforamation about target heart rates.
When I first started losing weight I wasn’t doing all that well. I switched to diet Dr. Pepper instead of normal and the weight just started falling off. Regular soda has tons of worthless calories. It took about a week to get used to the diet. Now if I try a regular soda it is way too sweet.
Slee
Ditto on the soda.
A large Coke at McDonald’s (which has a certain amount of ice in the cup) is 310 calories.
That’s about the same as a bagel, or two apples and a banana, and that Coke won’t fill you up — you’ll still want food.
The Diet Coke is better, of course, but water is better still.
OK, here’s my plan:
(1) A get a scale
(2) I set a target weight loss goal. Probably 1 pound per week.
(3) I spend two months trying to lose that much weight through gradually increasing the duration/intensity of my jogging (and tossing in some situps/pushups also)
(4) If that is not leading to sufficient weight loss, I go more drastic and start modifying my diet, with sodas being first on the chopping block.
So, hear me now, believe me later, and by later I mean March 1, I will be losing 1 pound a week!
Okay, fine, I am in.
I graduated high school two years ago around six foot two inches, and 175 on a good day, usually around 185. Last night I weighed in at 234. I’m not fat, my legs are actually rather nice; I’m just rather squishy around the midsection. I would love to get back to where I was, even though back then I still thought I was too squishy.
I’m planning on joining the gym in the dorm across from mine as soon as school starts up again. I would join the fancier gym that’s just a five minute walk away, but I just know that I’ll have enough trouble motivating myself to go to the one that is one minute away. Mostly riding the bikes there, and making sure I stay walking/running a little in the cold months.
Soda consumption gets cut yet again, too (I was drinking two glasses with lunch and dinner last year; now it’s one and a glass of water). And drinking more water in general. And less fried crap from the cafeteria, with more healthy stuff around the room.
…
I’m doomed.
5’6’ tall/short
280 lbs
20 lbs less by March 1st
I’ll show up then and let you know.
If you want to work out every day, rotate body parts. Arms and back, then legs and Butt, then core abbs
I have to admit, part of what motivates me is that I don’t see many of these theater people very often. I am imagining what it’ll be like, in my head, when I walk into that audition on March 5 looking thinner and more buff — they’ll be able to see the difference, you see, since the last time they saw me.
I’m in. This works out well with my wife and I’s plans for the new year…
We both cut out soda (her for medical reasons, me to support her) for all intents and purposes in October. Now, we plan to change our eating habits, and get some exercise.
I’m 5’7", and 235.
My body likes being at 235. I took circuit weights and then just weights last year at school, and while I lost fat, I stayed 235.
My current pants are 40-42’s. I hope to be into 36-38 by spring break.
Well, you might not see any weight loss immediately with weight lifting routines. I know I’m not — not yet. I’m not going to get discouraged, though. I’m doing more crunches now than I was, lifting weights for longer periods without getting tired… it’s going to work, I just have to keep at it.
Oh yeah, don’t burn so many couches over in Lansing.
Signed,
Trevor who works in Ann Arbor