Every 3 weeks I go to work in London for 3 days. Hard to get exercise and staying in a hotel means eating out.

Did pretty well with it this week other than one day where I was just hungry and definitely going over my 1800 cals. So took a long walk around the town then thought I’d get some noodles or similar. Went to wagamama and had a dry curry (chicken firestarter I think). Was only when I went to log it in my fitness Pal that I found out it’s 1200 kcals! Should have just had the bag of chips I was fancying!

Hard to get exercise and staying in a hotel means eating out.

Walk, London is the perfect place for it. Wagamama is lovley but all the dishes are rice/noodle based and starch heavy. Re food that’s low-carb/low GI:

Nandos – a great place to get low carb, low gi food that is good. This is a solid go-to for me

If you eat in your hotel they’ll accomodate you – for example have the steak, but no chips and ‘seasonal veg’ or something instead.

Many burger restaurants will do naked burgers and sweet potato fries – very satisfying meal that.

Lunches can be tricky but if you have a staff canteen they’ll usually have a hot meal option where you can have say chicken and you can skip the starch and just have extra cooked veg. This is my go-to option.

Eating out at lunch – Starbucks have boxes of low GI food like the one that’s scrambled egg, spinach and some beans – also a pulled pork one. Also burrito places will let you swap the rice for extra beans, and often replace the tortilla with a bowl of leaves. If you are in London visit a Tortilla, it’s the best one and the salad/extra beans/meat is bloody delicious. Subway also have salad boxes now and you can assemble something pretty decent from their menu.

Fast food – chicken selects and a latte/diet coke at McDs, BK now do chicken wings and if you really need it the chilli cheese bites – low carb and filling. But perhaps a bit too tasty! KFC do salads that aren’t half bad cos of the spicy chicken breast.

Some of these options may not fit if you are going for low calorie rather than low carb – but most low carb options are also low calorie. Even then McDs chicken selects are only 634 cals for the box of 5 and I find them very filling and satisfying.

And before smart arses chip in with ‘just eat less and do more’ – simple it may be, some of us still struggle immensely doing it.

Amen to that. People who say that are generally people who have never been properly overweight like I have been (and am now).
It saps at your will to live. You’re overweight (maybe by 4 or 5 stone in my case) so everything is hard. Walking up stairs, getting off the sofa, any sort of exercise is not just difficult it’s excruciatingly painful. Things rub, clothes are tight.
I was getting to a point last time I was overweight where I could see signs on depression setting it from my situation. It’s like a horrible vicious circle, it’s so difficult changing the way you live so you just feel worse about yourself. So you eat more as that’s your comfort. Which makes it even worse.

I remember the first time I went running when I was last really overweight and I couldn’t jog for more than 20 seconds. I ran when it was dark at night so people wouldn’t see the tears running down my face as I cried doing it as it was so hard.

It took me a couple of months to get used to exercise and eating healthy and every day up to that point (and beyond) was a misery of feeling hungry, being in pain etc. It was only the slow reduction in weight that kept me going.

Unfortunately I’ve put the weight back on through injury and doing up a house for 3 years. In a way I know what is in front of me so that makes it hard to start again but on the other hand I know I can do it.

Every time I see a really overweight person at the gym or running or cycling it makes me happy as I know they are willing to go through hell to get their bodies in shape.

Losing a handful of KGs after a lazy winter is nothing, it’s easy. Losing a quarter of your body weight so you can live a happy life is in another planet in terms of effort required.

What scales do people have?

I went fancy and bought some Withings Wi-fi enabled ones. I weight myself everyday at the same time just after I get up and after morning piss. The best thing is the data goes into the app and from there to garmin, MyFitnessPal and zwift. My zwift avatar changed shape without me doing anything – spooky! The most useful thing (IMO) of this daily weighing approach and says storage was that it evens out the daily fluctuations which for me at least are pretty large. The Withings app gives you a best fit graph. Over time you stop focusing on the number of today’s weigh in and start to look more at the trend.

1kg here, but I think my initial weigh in was a bit heavier than expected. Id found the 10-6 eating manageable in the past and has been so far this time.

Lost 2.9kg this past week, I know its mostly water retention but I’m impressed. Haven’t actually done anything either yet, just cut back on the snacking. Hoping to start doing stuff this week though.

-1.6kg this week, good solid start. Have completely cut out all booze, snacks and generally eating a more balanced diet. Definitely find a weekly meal planner helps and I have a bowl of green veg with each meal (beans/spinach/broccoli) to accompany that to ensure I am sated. Walk ~50k a week so that’s helping for sure and quickly notice improvements on ascents etc. Weigh myself every morning straight after slash and record it, personally I find it satisfying/interesting to see trends. Do struggle with fatigue and sore feet (post chemo) but generally going solid. Keep it up guys.

What scales do people have? I was talking to friends and they didn’t beleive I weighed 17st so I am wondering if there are some cheapish scales that are accurate.

I’ve got the Anker Eufy ones which seem excellent, and for thirty odd quid a real bargain. Same here, I’m 19 stone but don’t really feel it or feel think I look it, definitely need to lose a few stone though.

Right, it’s either time for new scales or last week i weighed myself with my boots and coat on – according to scales lost 3.2kg in a week…which i very definitely haven’t!!

2lbs heavier- get in!

Don’t know yet, as I’m in London and not at home, but hoping to have lost at least half a kilo.

Just been reading this thread, and I’m super impressed by all your efforts. It takes some doing to start a diet, and doubly so in public. Props to you all.

Crap week for me, but I’ll weigh in the morning.

The short story is an unplanned week in an apartment in Aberdeen on my own. Ate a fair bit of takeaway crap, but I did do about 60km of walking.

Weigh in tomorrow then take two…

Simon Alex

During mY ham fisted, chubbythumbed effort at updating my target weight on the iPad, I managed to enter it into your target weight column. I think I fixed it back to what it was but please check.

Sorry.

Good going to all. Bare in mind you will lose a decent amount in the first week or two as this is mainly water and glycigen being burnt and not much fat. I find week three can hit you hard as the drop off flat lines or goes much slower, this is the harder part, the real fat burning stage.

My tips:

– Hugh Fernley Whittingstall’s recipe for “Riballito”, a fantastic vegatble stew full of goodness and very filling (in a healthy way)

– Gym twice a week for steady cardio, target 700 calories a session

– 8/16 diet, breakfast at works at 9am and last meal 5pm.

– No sugar, crisps or dairy (love Oatley currently)

– Rice, pasta and bread…. fill your boots, no issues with Carbs

Not managed a second weigh in yet as I’m travelling home at the moment, but I’m not expecting good news…yet

Well instead of 2lb down I’m 0.2lb down 😂

Home now anyway so I can crack on with no excuses. Exercise will be largely turbo and real riding whenever there’s a break in the gales, plus some walking. The plan diet wise is lower carb, no sugar no grain.

48 out of 70 have updated – come on guys, get it done!

Thanks for adding me as a late entry, I’ve not lost anything this week but actually started a couple of months ago and have already lost some weight so not demoralised. I’ve had a cold/cough this week so back on it properly in the next week.

5lb down in a week, 8lb down since I made a conscious decision on 28th December that I needed to shift the weight off. Have ridden my bike a couple of time, been swimming, been to spin class etc too! Haven’t even really been to careful with what I’ve eaten, yet… Does help I decided to drop the booze for Jan I guess, in fact had one pint on NYE but other than that haven’t had a drop since 28th Dec.

Just been updating myfitnesspal and got an ad for signing up to be a Harvester secret diners!!

Blimey after a relaxing low carb day at home I had a dump and reweighed myself just now… 2lb loss over night!

Trying to stick to ~1800 calories a day so far seems fine. Just back from a 10k circuit in my local forest which almost turned into sprint to find a toilet thankfully back home now.. Sunday breakfast of muesli and a piece of wholemeal toast awaits. Keep the faith!

slow start from me – week one didn’t go to plan with regards to meals (can’t complain though, 3 free nights out and on one I actually chose a healthy option) but given that I still managed to lose a lb I can’t complain.

To be honest I can’t recall at what time I weighed myself last time, so this might just be down to having had a dump today 🙂

Have just joined you all 🥳

A bargaintastic price on the Anker Bluetooth scales I’ve been using, great for keeping track of things.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Bluetooth-Measurements-Composition-Analysis-Tempered/dp/B07GZBXCH6

been pretty good this weekend, 3.5 hours on the bike with a bowl of porridge for breakfast and a tin of veg soup afterwards (OK, and a cake at the coffee stop)

But then we had the family post-christmas get together this evening at an all you can eat pan-Asian….. which with the best intentions always turns into a blowout.

Ah well – 600 cals tomorrow!

Hi Rob, the years in rows 1 and 2 should be 2020 not 2019?
Days look good for every Friday.

Hi Rob, the years in rows 1 and 2 should be 2020 not 2019?

Ooops!

Fixed – cheers for the heads-up.

I keep getting errors trying to open the sheet from the email.

Can’t change name on the tracker sheet either.

Started the weekend with the best of intentions, fairly healthy Saturday followed by an 11 mile ride with the boy on Sunday morning. All went wrong when we went to the pub and I had a massive meal and 3 pints. Back on it today though.

13st 7lb
6ft
Muscular build
Two weeks of 16:8 fasting plus restricting to 1700 cals.
Loads of trail running, riding and even some boring zwift sessions

Zero!!! Weight loss in two weeks… why?

Never bothered following structured weight loss plans or calorie counting before… I’d like to get to somewhere around 12-12.5st, which would be fairly skinny for me but at this rate, It may never happen!

Any knowledgable types out there have any theories as to why I’m static?

13st 7lb
6ft

At the start of this year I was just over that weight and am 5’8” and not muscular, so don’t think you’ve got much to worry about!

I still have plenty of belly chub to loose and need to be lighter for cycling, running and climbing. Also the dawning realisation that im now 40, I will only find it harder to stay in shape. Don’t want to be back here next year at 14st 7 instead…

Maybe im expecting too much to soon? does this dieting malarkey take some time to kick in (doesn’t look like it from the awesome weight loss happening in this thread, well done all)

It’s early days hooja – stick with it. If you’re doing 1700 on the reg the weight must come down, or the first law of thermodynamics is wrong.
That weight built big you’re not that overweight, so it’s going to be harder for you. A lot of us here either are very overweight, or are fundamentally skinny folk wearing giant fat suits, so the weight can come off easier.

Any bright ideas for reliably testing scales – two sets in the house, both left behind by past tenants, consistently different by well over a kg.
Obvious answer is to weigh something of a known weight, but have nothing significantly heavy in the house that I know the exact weight of.
Come on, science must have an answer for me?? (other than heading out and buying 84 more bags of sugar…)

A litre of water weighs a kilo…

“A litre of water weighs a kilo…” + the weight of the container.

which you can tare out while empty.

seriously – go to a chemist and weigh yourself on their scales, most have a set in case they need to work out accurate dosages. Compare to yours. Scales work by springs (even electronic ones use youngs modulus of engineered profiled metals) so they will be to all intents and purposes linear. so even if the absolute is out the linear comparison should be the same.

(eg: say you weight yourself at the chemist and it says 90kg, and at home yours say 80kg, you can then multiply yours up by 9/8 in future to get a truenumber – so when yours say 72kg, you’ll really be 81kg)