The INGO Hardcore Weight Loss/Fitness Thread

[Frosty]

Taco Bell

I don’t need it that bad!

 

[melensdad]

Just a lot of arthritis pain today so no workout. Closed all my rings yesterday. Not going to happen today. I hate this. Insurance denied my medicine change yesterday. Doctor submitted a request for a different brand today. Hopefully something gets done. I'm popping opioids and ibuprofen like a school kid eats M&Ms.

Sticking with the diet.

Ordered 2 more pairs of pants, size 32 waist.

 

[melensdad]

Well I have to say that my weight is creeping up. Instead of bouncing around from 173 to 176 for the past several days I'm bouncing between 175-177. So the lack of exercise is clearly not balanced with my diet. While I am sticking pretty close to 1850 calories per day, that is clearly too much if my activity level is going to be low. Thinking I may have to cut it down to 1700-1750 calories at the high side of the spectrum if I am having an arthritis flare up??? 1850 is fine on the active days.

On the bright side, my doctor submitted for approval of a different biologic medicine. It is a once a week shot, but hopefully it gets approved by insurance and I can get back to a daily active lifestyle instead of good & bad days.

 

[Frosty]

Well I have to say that my weight is creeping up. Instead of bouncing around from 173 to 176 for the past several days I'm bouncing between 175-177. So the lack of exercise is clearly not balanced with my diet. While I am sticking pretty close to 1850 calories per day, that is clearly too much if my activity level is going to be low. Thinking I may have to cut it down to 1700-1750 calories at the high side of the spectrum if I am having an arthritis flare up??? 1850 is fine on the active days.

On the bright side, my doctor submitted for approval of a different biologic medicine. It is a once a week shot, but hopefully it gets approved by insurance and I can get back to a daily active lifestyle instead of good & bad days.

Out of curiosity, take a look at your fitness app. Click on the fitness circle at the top, under the active calorie chart it will tell you your total calories for the day. This should be a good baseline for you. This is mine on a typical day that I don’t work out.

 

[Ark]

Six weeks on and I'm not happy with the pace of my knee injury recovery. Walking just ain't the same as daily running. It's improved somewhat but just not enough to train back up and resume. So I went and got it examined. X ray is clean, so it's probably just tendonitis. I'm gonna work with a PT provider to try to speed recovery and be back to running by the end of winter.

They did put me on a scale. 6'1", 213lbs. I'm not sure what I was at when I started counting calories in September but I estimated 240-250. This is the lightest I've been since high school, and six weeks ago I was probably lighter. Pretty darn happy with that.

 

[melensdad]

Got a big surprise on the scale today. 171.9# at my morning weigh in. The UPS truck dropped off 2 more pairs of size 32x32 Wrangler pants. My gun belt is comfortably pulled to the last belt hole. I'm going to need a new gun belt.

Still doing a lot of food substitutions. Made a meatloaf today for my lunch but eliminated bread/breadcrumbs and substituted in some cauliflower that I chopped up fine. Used pork sausage. Probably should have used 3 eggs to bind it together but I used 2. Tasted good. Low carb, moderately low calorie.

 

[Frosty]

Lost .2 pounds last night

 

[Ark]

Got a big surprise on the scale today. 171.9# at my morning weigh in. The UPS truck dropped off 2 more pairs of size 32x32 Wrangler pants. My gun belt is comfortably pulled to the last belt hole. I'm going to need a new gun belt.

Still doing a lot of food substitutions. Made a meatloaf today for my lunch but eliminated bread/breadcrumbs and substituted in some cauliflower that I chopped up fine. Used pork sausage. Probably should have used 3 eggs to bind it together but I used 2. Tasted good. Low carb, moderately low calorie.

Calorie budgeting makes me do a lot of stuff like this. The mentality of "you're allowed to have it, but you have to budget for it" has really helped me. When it's actually a choice between an entire pan of Asian noodles or one piece of pizza, I turn down the junk food much easier because it just doesn't have bang for the buck.

You can eat a lot of freaking popcorn and salad to get to the same calories as, like, ten pizza rolls out of the microwave that are gone in 90 seconds.

 

[melensdad]

Calorie budgeting makes me do a lot of stuff like this. The mentality of "you're allowed to have it, but you have to budget for it" has really helped me. When it's actually a choice between an entire pan of Asian noodles or one piece of pizza, I turn down the junk food much easier because it just doesn't have bang for the buck.

You can eat a lot of freaking popcorn and salad to get to the same calories as, like, ten pizza rolls out of the microwave that are gone in 90 seconds.

EXACTLY

I eat a lot of those Konjac noodles. They are essentially tasteless and rubbery, but like 5 or 10 calories. Add them as 'filler' to bulk up food so I am full. High fiber so you need to drink lots of water or you might have an upset stomach after eating.

Lots of 'riced' Cauliflower as a substitute for regular noodles. I love "hamburger helper" type meals, but the traditional noodles make them high carb/high calorie. Substitute out the noodles and put in cauliflower and the carbs disappear and the calories drop substantially. I've figured out how to make a bunch of different homemade skillet meals without noodles.

And riced cauliflower works well in other dishes for bulk. Mashed cauliflower is a decent substitute for mashed potatoes. Much lower calories and carbs.

Heart of palm 'noodles' are another great substitute. So are 'noodles' made of zucchini, both are low calorie. Both have high moisture content so the moisture throws off some recipes and need to be adjusted, but both can be sautéd with some garlic, onions, tomatoes and peppers to make a very good spaghetti & sauce.

Breakfast is often some diced tomatoes, peppers, garlic, onions (or maybe just a 1/2 cup of RAGU or PREGO at 80 calories) that I put into a skillet and sauté down with just enough water to cook them down, then I poach 2 eggs in the sauce. 200 calories and filling.

 

[Ark]

EXACTLY

I eat a lot of those Konjac noodles. They are essentially tasteless and rubbery, but like 5 or 10 calories. Add them as 'filler' to bulk up food so I am full. High fiber so you need to drink lots of water or you might have an upset stomach after eating.

Lots of 'riced' Cauliflower as a substitute for regular noodles. I love "hamburger helper" type meals, but the traditional noodles make them high carb/high calorie. Substitute out the noodles and put in cauliflower and the carbs disappear and the calories drop substantially. I've figured out how to make a bunch of different homemade skillet meals without noodles.

And riced cauliflower works well in other dishes for bulk. Mashed cauliflower is a decent substitute for mashed potatoes. Much lower calories and carbs.

Heart of palm 'noodles' are another great substitute. So are 'noodles' made of zucchini, both are low calorie. Both have high moisture content so the moisture throws off some recipes and need to be adjusted, but both can be sautéd with some garlic, onions, tomatoes and peppers to make a very good spaghetti & sauce.

Breakfast is often some diced tomatoes, peppers, garlic, onions (or maybe just a 1/2 cup of RAGU or PREGO at 80 calories) that I put into a skillet and sauté down with just enough water to cook them down, then I poach 2 eggs in the sauce. 200 calories and filling.

My go-to is shirataki type noodles. They're basically zero calories, I think they're made of tofu or yam or something. I make the one below with peanut butter, but his channel also has a teryaki version and a simple spicy version. Chicken, onion, celery (cause it's basically free eating), noodles, and sauce. Two full bowls for dinner, 350 calories, ready in 15 minutes if the chicken is defrosted. The oriental groceries have packages of these noodles for $1.75, and stuff like soy sauce and rice cooking wine and sesame oil is cheaper than Kroger. On my 2000 calorie budget I'm sometimes hitting 9 or 10pm with 600+ calories still available on noodle days.



I've become a big fan of stir frys and curries. You ballpark the calorie number by adding up everything in the entire batch and then dividing it up. You can bulk it up a LOT in volume with celery, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, etc that have very few calories and go more modest on the meat and the rice you serve it on. Plus I'm just one guy living here, so that 1600 calorie pan plus rice is yielding a 800 cal full dinner plus four 400 cal lunch boxes.

Rice is a carb, admittedly, but Asian food is awesome and all the permutations of meat-vegetable-sauce-rice score impressively low on calories and carbs. Got a lot cheaper, too, when I ditched bottles of premade sauce and figured out that most sauces are derived from the same 5-6 things.

 

[melensdad]

The shiitake noodles are made of the konjac root. Basically we are talking about the same thing, just different term.

Shirataki noodles - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Konjac - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Ark]

Bought a pair of new Wrangers today, two sizes down from what I was wearing in the summer before I started tracking calories. Not only do they fit, there's enough slack in the waist to AIWB a pair of Beretta 92s. Clearly, Wrangler has gone wild with the vanity sizing lately.

Last time I wore pants this size I was 6" shorter and nearly 20 years younger.

 

[Frosty]

Slacked off a little today and only did 5.22 miles. Just not feeling it this morning. I did manage to get my best mile time of 13.97 on my second mile. I’m pretty happy with that and honestly, other than the frequently occasional hip knee ankle back elbow and shoulder pain I’m feeling pretty damn good…

 

[Dr.Midnight]

Slacked off a little today and only did 5.22 miles. Just not feeling it this morning. I did manage to get my best mile time of 13.97 on my second mile. I’m pretty happy with that and honestly, other than the frequently occasional hip knee ankle back elbow and shoulder pain I’m feeling pretty damn good…

 

[melensdad]

Partly due to arthritis pain, partly due to the holidays, partly due to lower motivation, I have definitely been slacking off since early November. So roughly 60 days.

Mostly maintaining my diet, but I used to go to bed with a clear calorie deficit, now I eat my way up to the daily calorie limit. Exercise has been lacking, I have managed to close my rings about 75% of the days, but I had previously lowered my goals since I had lost weight.

I tend to grab bites of crap food too. Especially while our part time foster son is at home. And every Saturday during the day because I coach at fencing tournaments and the food in the coach & referee room is usually pretty unhealthy (Mayo loaded sub sandwiches, chips, cookies, bagels, donuts, etc)

I'm still below the target weight of 177, but bounce around and notice a slight trend upward toward that 177 mark, which is where I was in mid-November. Honestly not unhappy with the weight, but still not happy with the body shape, which is generally too thin across the upper arms, chest and shoulders and still a little love handle and belly fat.

Motivation is my biggest problem. And since I'm not feeling great due to the arthritis it is hard to motivate myself to workout. I should be getting new injectable drugs next week??? Start giving myself those shots ASAP and hopefully within a couple weeks of the initial dose I will start to feel better.

 

[Dr.Midnight]

I love watching the playoffs and snacking, and the scale reflected that this morning. I'm up about 1.5 pounds over what I was Saturday morning. I didn't miss any exercise sessions though, so it could have been much worse. I'm getting serious again today.

 

[Frosty]

My wife gave me a stomach bug. I feel like I’m about to get a real good abdominal workout really soon

 

[BehindBlueI's]

My wife gave me a stomach bug. I feel like I’m about to get a real good abdominal workout really soon

That's a terrible present. Next time ask for socks.

 

[Ark]

My wife gave me a stomach bug. I feel like I’m about to get a real good abdominal workout really soon

Get ripped king. Reps plus dehydration equal tenpack

 

[melensdad]

Nothing yesterday. Literally.

Lots of windshield time. Spending family time with our oldest daughter. Did go out for a nice meal but didn't destroy myself at the restaurant, ate sensibly.

Today I managed a 40 min treadmill workout, alternating walk/run. I'll be coaching fencing at Purdue University this evening from 9pm to Midnight so I'll get in some good sweating if I play it right. I suspect I'll be closing all my rings pretty easily again.