
Losing 58.3 Lbs for Science - zt
http://blog.zactownsend.com/losing-58-lbs-for-science
======
lrm242
Congratulations on your weight loss! I'm down 30 of a targeted 60lbs weight
loss, half way there! It sounds like an interesting study, I can't wait to
read the results. My view of weight loss is simple: eat less. I eat anything I
want, don't eat until noon each day, do essentially no cardio, and lift
weights for less than 30 minutes 2-3 times/week. My weight loss is fairly
constant at 1 lb/week. My progress:
[https://trendweight.com/u/2c41346d238544/](https://trendweight.com/u/2c41346d238544/)
(note: chart starts at 210 which is 15 lbs into my weight loss when I started
tracking).

I say all this only to point out that losing weight can happen regardless of
approach. One's chosen approach to losing weight may or may not be suitable to
one's personal lifestyle or dietary preferences, but ANY approach can work
because the math is infallible: calories in < calories out = weight loss. So,
just eat less than what your body needs to burn on a daily/weekly basis.

If low-carb makes you happy because you can indulge in 1 lb block of cheese,
then by all means go for it. Yes, things like ketogenic diets have other
physical effects on our physiology but I prefer a simpler point of view: there
are only so many blocks of cheese one can eat before you get tired of it. If
you're restricting your carbs, you simply ultimately eat less. The restriction
of choice is the root cause, for example.

So: for everyone trying to thinking about losing weight, find a diet you buy
in to and go for it. Personally, I found the approach of analytically tracking
my food and weight and permitting myself to eat ANYTHING I want liberating. I
know precisely what I eat every day, and I like that. It fits my personality
and liberates me from the nagging choice of where/what to eat. I have my
favorite foods and I eat them, and have found ways to do so so that I hit my
daily protein target and stay at or under my daily calorie target. The down
side to this approach is I don't eat out much because it's hard to know what's
in that food (this isn't a downside for ME, though).

Don't buy into the need to do a specific diet, all diets can work if you find
one that you are in tune with, because ultimately, it's all about finding the
optimum path to eat less than what your body needs without sacrificing
whatever mental and physical joy you get from food.

~~~
SloopJon
> don't eat until noon each day

I'm trying to cut back on my late night snacks, but I don't understand the
rationale for not eating in the morning.

Great job, BTW. A pound a week sounds great.

~~~
lrm242
I don't eat breakfast because I do intermittent fasting. The reasoning is
simple: (a) once I eat I get hungry, and the 6 small meals method just doens't
work for me. I would eat breakfast at 8 and be hungry again by 10. (b) I drink
a lot of coffee, if I dont eat the coffee supresses my appetite. I'm simply
not hungry in the morning. (c) COmpressing my calories into a smaller window
keeps me sated and makes them more fulfilling as I can eat bigger meals. Its
good for the soul, if you will.

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andyhnj
Nice write-up. My experience is quite similar to the author's. I've gone from
230 to 170 over the last year or so. (Oh, and I'm also from NJ!) I wasn't
involved in any study or organized plan though; I just stumbled through it on
my own. I tracked calories with an iPhone app. I stuck to a plan that,
theoretically, would allow me to lose one pound per week. That actually worked
out pretty well. I never bothered tracking anything other than calories. I
just tried to be sensible about fat, carbs, and sugar, but I didn't explicitly
track them or set goals related to them. And I'm curious about the National
Weight Control Registry now. I'm going to have to follow up on that, after
I've maintained the weight loss for a bit longer.

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madaxe_again
To anyone else considering this, be careful what you do - there can be long
term consequences to rapid weight loss that may not be obvious, and you know
that bit where people say "consult your doctor" \- they mean it.

I shed about the same amount of weight over the same amount of time in 2010,
in the same of way. I'm having my gall bladder removed some time in the next
few months, as about eight months after finishing my diet, my life, in a
nutshell, turned to shit - literally. Turns out that eating plenty of protein
(along with the fat that comes with, if it's animal) and not much in the way
of carbs (>20g/d) can be a great way to give yourself gallstones. Which are
horrendous, and cause you to lose days at a time of your life to feverish
pain-and-vomit-filled null-time.

I've been about 180-190 lbs since then, and I'd rather be 240lbs again than
have these to live with.

Graph: the big drop in Aug '11 is the first gallstone attack.
[http://i.imgur.com/7fHJNqR.png](http://i.imgur.com/7fHJNqR.png)

~~~
exelius
That sucks; but not every diet is for everyone. Our bodies are all different,
but you're right: if you plan on undertaking a massive weight loss plan (more
than 30 lbs) you should probably have a doctor monitor you. Many insurance
companies will cover this kind of care under a wellness plan, because let's
face it: if you can lose a lot of weight in your 30s, you're probably going to
have fewer health problems when you're older.

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NicoJuicy
I actually lost 79 lbs (25 kgs) from 220 lbs to 165 lbs in 6 months with an
ebook (Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle), together with a lot of exercise (1-2
hours a day)... Remember that my genes aren't easy and i did a lot for it.
(None of my family is actually slim). I did that 3 years ago at the end of
college.

This is what helped for me (if you don't agree, no problem, but it helped me a
lot and there is so much research out there that it is difficult to get a
decent perspective):

\- Get your metabolism as high as possible, eat every 3-4 hours except when
you are a sleep. In the evening, eat less carbs. Last (very light) meal = 2
hours before you go to sleep. The higher your metabolism, the more your body
will become a energy burning machine.

\- Losing weight = eating less then your daily requirement (intake of
calories) or training more. Do this max. for 3 days in a row.. (so your body
doesn't realize you are losing weight -> remember people surviving without
eating in a month? it's a hormono called Leptine, it can severely destroy your
metabolism :) )

\- 60% is food, 40% is exercise (don't eat to little, it will hurt your
metabolism. I don't advice a protein diet for too long.. Most people get much
fatter afterwards because they destroyed their metabolism)

\- Sleep enough (this is a hard one for me)

\- No alcohol - it slows down your metabolism and contains empty calories.

\- If you want to exercise as less as possible, here are some pointers:

\- Running (= cardio), in the morning after a protein shake. Maximal effect +
positive effect during the day, untill you go to sleep.

\- Reduce sugar intake as much as possible (don't worry about fructose and
dextrose though)

\- Adding muscle (this is harder for women), in the evening after eating. If
you want to do cardio combined with this, do it after your weight exercises.
Muscle needs 48 hours to recover, so that's two days of extra fat burn.

One way of eating would be Paleo diet (popular with Crossfit). I call it :
"eating like a caveman" and starting with it in 2 months.

PS. Changing the way you eat shouldn't be a diet (=temporarily), you should be
changing your lifestyle or eating routine.

PS 2. I seriously advice Tom Venuto - Burn The Fat, Feed the Muscle... If you
want to know more about how your body works,i also liked the stuff Lyle
McDonald wrote.. (but that's more extreme)

~~~
Keats
Congrats !

A few points:

\- metabolism: [http://examine.com/faq/do-i-need-to-eat-six-times-a-day-
to-k...](http://examine.com/faq/do-i-need-to-eat-six-times-a-day-to-keep-my-
metabolism-high.html)

\- Losing weight = eating less than your TDEE. Training more is a bonus, all
you need to do is eat less to lose weight

\- what do you call a protein diet? around 2g/kg of bodyweight is enough
([http://examine.com/faq/how-much-protein-do-i-need-every-
day....](http://examine.com/faq/how-much-protein-do-i-need-every-day.html))

\- alcohol is ok if you are not abusing it (ie a 6 pack is unlikely to be
good), you can pick the alcohol depending on how many calories they have if
you want [http://getdrunknotfat.com/](http://getdrunknotfat.com/)

As for timing of exercises, do it whenever you can really, I workout fasted at
7am but that's not going to be a huge difference if you are working out at 6pm
or noon.

As mentioned, Lyle McDonald
([http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/](http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/)) has
lots of good stuff

------
exelius
I did no-carb dieting for about 6 months and lost 30 pounds. Obviously it's
not right for everyone, and I absolutely love carbs so I could never keep it
up forever, but the author mirrors many of my observations. Cutting out carbs
entirely for even a short period of time will change your relationship with
food: it's actually pretty hard to eat your daily recommended calorie intake
while avoiding carbs. Thus you end up eating because you have to.

It's just incredibly easy to over-eat on carbs: they generally have a neutral
flavor, and our bodies evolved to prefer the taste of sugar. They also tend to
dissolve into liquid in your stomach almost immediately upon contact with
stomach acid, so they don't keep you full for long. They're also incredibly
calorie dense: something like french bread is almost 100% digestible carbs.

It's not so easy to over-eat other things. I could probably sit down and
demolish 600 calories of ice cream, pasta or bread without a second thought.
Serve me 600 calories of steak and even though I like steak, I'll have a hard
time finishing it. Vegetables are even worse (or rather, better) - they have
lots of nutrients, but very few calories by weight or volume. Hence the
author's use of cheese (I'm guessing hard cheese, which has fewer carbs) as a
source of dense calories to replace most carbs.

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comatose_kid
Awesome article, especially regarding your relationship with food. Way to go
zt. If you haven't seen this TED talk
([http://www.ted.com/talks/sandra_aamodt_why_dieting_doesn_t_u...](http://www.ted.com/talks/sandra_aamodt_why_dieting_doesn_t_usually_work))
about why dieting doesn't work, do so - the speaker talks about being
intentional with what you eat.

Also: Manresa is a great reason to skip out on a diet!!

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michokest
Following the exact same approach helped to lose 20 lbs and motivated me to
start a product around it.

Check out [http://8fit.com](http://8fit.com), where we propose simple HIIT
workouts you can do at home and low-carb meal plans (40/40/20 ratios).

I'd love your feedback, if you'd like to take a look! So far we have about 50k
users and 500 customers with great feedback.

------
juandazapata
First of all, congratulations. Having lost around 40 lbs, I know all the work
that it takes to achieve something like that.

One thing that I want to share is I quit drinking sodas for about 1 year, and
when I was finally 'allowed' to drink them again I just found them too sweet
for my taste, I cannot drink them anymore. Also during the last month I've
been using Freeletics to exercise with very good results (I'm not affiliated
with them in any way).

The most important thing that I've learned through my personal process is that
the only thing that really matters is being disciplined and constant.

Good luck and keep it up!

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JoeAltmaier
Cool if the study confirmed the dichotomy of low-fat vs low-carb genotypes.
This article doesn't say - its essentially a straw-man. One success doesn't
prove anything.

In fact, I'm not sure what the study was trying to do? Imagine they're right -
you have to choose a diet that works for you. What else is new? What's
actionable about that? Already folks would try one diet, and if it didn't work
they'd try the other. Now you can take a blood test and save a couple of days?
No thanks, I don't like needles.

------
yinyinwu
Major congrats! How helpful were the group therapy classes in helping you
jumpstart the weight loss?

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brandonb
Holy shit! Congratulations.

~~~
zt
Thanks Brandon.

------
sjtrny
I'm confused about why you would differentiate between vegetables and
carbohydrates. That's like differentiating between a car and the engine within
a car. Vegetables are mostly carbs and water.

~~~
mga226
"Carbs" in this context is referring to foods that have a high carbohydrate
content, like potatoes, yams, bread, pasta, and to a lesser extent things like
carrots, beets, parsnips etc. Foods to avoid if trying to keep carbohydrate
intake below 20-50, as these diets typically require.

It doesn't refer to cruciferous/fibrous veggies, as well as things summer
squash, even though they are almost entire carbs, because the carb content per
serving in these foods is quite low - low enough that you can probably eat as
much of them as you like and still be within the prescribed range.

~~~
sjtrny
I know it's only intended to refer to a particular subset of foods. It's just
a personal pet peeve that people have this mindset and use this language and
forget that the things that aren't "carbs" contain carbohydrates. It displays
an ignorance on the topic.

~~~
zt
Ya, well, when you're trying to eat fewer than 20 grams of carbohydrates a
day, one becomes quite familiar with how many grams there are in broccoli.
Sorry that my vagueness offended.

~~~
mga226
Congratulations, by the way, on your great results!

