hey everyone, im 18 and ashamed to admit it, i weigh around 200lbs. im 5'11" and quite overweight. i just finished exams, and am out of school for the summer, and was wondering if anyone could give me some advice. my goal is to be 170-180lbs by september, without using roids or expensive dieting plans. i dont have alot of resources available, got a couple 20lb dumbells, an ab lounge, and a new bike, but i have absolutely NO clue where to start. im tired of always being tired and need to adopt a healthy and proactive lifestyle. any advice would be GREATLY appreciated (meal plan, what to eat - when to eat, exercise regime, anything, etc,etc.). thanks.

You're definitely in the right place to get help. I would hop on your bike and start doing 30-40 minutes of that a day. Make sure you are going at a speed that gets your heart rate up. When it comes to the free weights... I'm not sure about how many repitions and how often to do those, but do about 3 sets of 15-20 repitions using your ab machine. I might recommend more, but since I don't know your fitness level, I don't want you to get sore the first time. Just try that out and if the next day you have no soreness... do a couple more in each set.

When it comes to eating... obviously stick the healthier choices like fruits, veggies, whole grains, water instead of pop, lean meats, etc. Whether you choose to eat 6 meals a day or 3 meals a day doesn't really matter, just as long as you do eat and eat within your recommended calories. Someone else would probably be better at telling you how many calories you should be eating to stay healthy and lose weight... but I would guess if you ate 1800-2000 calories a day with riding your bike and working out then you would start to see some results.

Hope this helps ya! And good luck!

Hi Areopostale, If you want to find out the amount of calories you need to be taking to lose weight, you will need to work out your Basal Metabolic Rate. then you need to factor in the amount of exercise you are doing, (Harris Benedict equation) and eat about 15-20% less calories than you require to maintain your weight. [link removed] will give you both formulae

read the sticky threads for a start before posting. everything you need is in there

Hi there Aeropostale

The only resource you really need to lose weight is your brain. You have to get your brain into the right mindset and the rest falls into place. You have to want to lose weight more than you want to over eat and lazy about - but it sounds like you've got the brain under control.

Walking is a great way to start out, you can add in other more varied things as you get into the fitness habit. 45minute to an hour 6 days a week at a brisk pace will do it - as you get fitter you'll walk faster and lean down and tone up more. After 6 weeks everything wobbles a lot less. After 3 months you will look and feel incredibly different and you'll never want to quit.

Diet - a good breakfast within an hour of waking up, a decent lunch of complex carbs and lean protein with some mainly unsaturated fats and a smaller dinner with minimal carbs is a basic start. Make sure you eat healthy snacks between meals, so you are eating 5-6 times a day. Plenty of water and you are set.

It's going to take longer than you want, but if you do it right it will last longer too (a lifetime of being fit, looking great and feeling happy in your own skin; how good is that!)

Hey Aeropostale, there's alot of good advice here. Tons of info in the stickies too but alot to take in all at once. Best bet is like mentioned figure out approximately how much in calories you burn each day and then go 500-1000 below that to lose weight. You can google for Harris Benedict equation or just google for a BMR calculator figure in activity with that if you want to be more detailed.

Also you may want to use either fitday.com or sparkpeople to log your food...they do the hard part of figuring out calories and everything else for you so makes life simple. Sparkpeople even has meal plans if you want.

It's ok to start slow and build up too. This doesn't have to be painful, I had to learn that the hard way, lol. Just make changes you can live with. Good luck and welcome to the forum ~Lisa

There is a program called "STF" that has many advantages over other diets, the main one being that ANYONE can do it. After going through many new diets every year, this is one that really exceeds expectations.
"You can personally create your very own diets using the STF Diet Creation tool". There are over 40,000 different two week diet combinations that you can create. Within the first two weeks using the diet system provided to you, it is possible to lose up to 10lbs…a lot of that being PURE FAT!

This product is worth every penny and more. There are products that cost $100’s/mth that are weak into comparison to Strip That Fat! If you read and apply what learn within Strip That Fat guide, YOU WILL LOSE weight.

It includes some of the most practical and easy-to-implement weight loss techniques that will not only lose you weight in the short term, they are sustainable for long term weight loss. You can eat as much as you want on this diet and the extra bonuses you get when you sign-up are worth the price along. Remember, don't forget to try the STF Diet Creator which will generate a 14 day diet plan for you on the fly in an easy to print document (they even provide a shopping list for you!!).

for more info goto weightarticle.com

You can't lose 10 lbs of fat in the first 2 weeks of any diet. That's .

IF you do manage to lose 10 lbs in 2 weeks, 90% of that will be water.

There is no need to pay any money for help with losing weight. There is tons of information on this board, start by checking the stickies, it gives you the general idea of where to start. There are links to all the calculators in the 'Tools and Calculators' section, as well as loads of other helpful links, all to sites that will provide helpful information FREE OF CHARGE, including pages that will provide you with fully customisable meal plans and things like that.

San, can you tell me where I can find a *FREE* diet generator? BTW this STF system is about $40-50 only once!


The STF system gives you a diet system and eating program that will make you lose weight WITHOUT restricting your diet to “low fat” or “low carb” foods, rather eating the right calories, it calculates for you the calories as well as you can choose what ever type of food you want and STILL LOSE WEIGHT.

for more info goto weightarticle.com

Try sparkpeople.com, just for starters. Customisable mean plan, broken up into calories/nutritions, including recipes and food tips, plus a LOT more, all for *FREE*. And that is just one of many pages.

Btw, what's wrong with learning how to do things yourself and come up with your own plan instead of having some website spoon-feed it to you?

Save the money, buy yourself something nice for it instead. There are plenty of good, free pages out there, and even more help around here on the forum.