I won't bore you with the reasons, but I've finally decided to take weight loss seriously. I've never been truly out of shape but I do have some belly fat I'd like to get rid of before I go back to the university in September.

For the past two and a half weeks I've been out biking for forty minutes every day. I know the downside to biking is the frequent breaks you have to take in between streets and such, but luckily I live in a nice part of town near a large park with a lake and a bike trail around it as well as dozens of bike trails only blocks away. I can bike for that entire forty minutes without breaking once.

When I get back home after the ride, I do a little weight lifting, some situps, and then I call it a day.

In addition, I've eliminated pop and fast food from my diet (going on a month now) and have started to eat fruit and yogurt and granola regularly throughout the day.

Basically, I'd like to know if there's any significant thing I can do or change in order to make a substantial difference. In the two and a half weeks since I started biking I've lost about four pounds. I have no idea if that's good or not :/

Thanks for any info you can provide

Oh, and I'm a guy if that matters.

Granola isn't always the best food choice to make -there's a lot of commercial granolas thay are extremely high in sugar/fat and calories... So make sure you're reading labels if you're trying for a healthier lifestyle...

I'd spend some time with the stickied threads in the exercise forum and see if you can't improve on your "a little weight lifting and situps" doesn't sound like you're doing enough there for long term success.

Depending on what your current stats are and what your goals are is really up to you whether 4lbs is good or not... what's good is dependent upon you and you alone...

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Hmm, didn't know about the granola. Thanks.

I'm not too interested in the weight lifting aspect of my routine. I'm trying to focus on weight loss right now anyway. I only have dumbbells in my house, and gyms are out of the question.

Is the amount of cardio I'm doing now acceptable? I know everyone is different and such, but it'd be nice to know what the average person benefits from 40 minutes every day.

weight lifting/resistance training is extremely beneficial to weight loss... unless you're taking in excess calories, you're not going to bulk up... Search on body weight exercises at the very minimum... when you're 'dieting' you will lose some muscle, so you want to do all you can to help retain that...

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Will do. As long as I can do them in my house I'll be fine. Thanks again.

So there are some great body weight routines at trainwithmeonline.com that I can definitely use. If I do three of these routines a week (mon/wed/fri...A/B/A and then B/A/B) would it still be alright if I biked every day? The site says you should wait 24 hours before performing other exercises or programs, but I'm not sure if that includes cardio.

that should be fine...

you also want to make sure your nutrition is in check as well - what are your current stats (height/weight/age) and how many calories ad ay are you consuming

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5'6", 176 lbs, 21.

How many calories I consume...that's a good question. I eat about three or four fruit a day, some yogurt, and a few pieces of 100% whole wheat bread, and then I usually have supper. My suppers are not as healthy as they should be. They commonly consist of hamburgers, hot dogs, hashbrowns, chicken fingers, macaroni...that kind of thing.

you might want to get yourself an account at FitDay - Free Weight Loss and Diet Journal and start keeping track...

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Done and done. Thanks again for all the help!

cutting out simple sugars as much as possible will help a lot. oatmeal would be better than granola for that. also, weight training will definately help to keep your muscle and increase your resting metabolism.

Well, I think I have my exercise routine down pat. 40 minutes of cardio every day, and about a half-an-hour of weight training every other day. I figure I'll concentrate on fixing my diet now.

This brings me to a new problem. Looking up calorie counts it seems that I'm not eating enough calories per day. The healthy food that I nibble on all day (fruit, yogurt, whole wheat bread) ends up not culminating into a proper calorie count at the end of the day. In fact, I'm not even certain how much calories I should be taking in every day. I've tried a number of calorie calculators and they generally say that if I want to lose weight I'd want to take in about 1700 calories a day. I don't know how accurate that is though.

I checked the calorie information for some fast food places and one of the "healthier" joints (Arby's) would provide that final boost in my calorie count. I'm not trying to find an excuse to eat out, but I would like to know if it would be seriously detrimental to have Arby's or maybe Taco Time once every week or two. Pepperoni pizza would be nice too...

Just how bad is it to not take in enough calories? If my calculations are correct I haven't been eating nearly enough in the past few weeks.

I have the taste buds of a 5-year old. There are about five things I truly enjoy eating and they're all either a potato product or a hamburger. :/

there are people who will pontificate about starvation mode and allthat - I'mnot sure I totally buy into that... completely anyhow...

The downside, from my perspective of having your calories too low,when you have more than 20lbs or so to lose... is as your weight goes lower... you need to adjust your calories accordingly- and drop them lower... if you're starting at too low a calorie range... then your calories have no where to go... starting as high as you possibly can and stilllose weight is the most efficient way to go...

If you say you're nibbling thru out the day -I'dmake sure that all those nibbles are being accounted for.. I'm a huge snacker... I love to nibble -but I know first hand how those insignifcant amounts of calories can addup to something significant...

as for fast food -it's not my first choice of things to eat but oncei n a while won't kill you...

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Is it a matter of "everything moderation" tho as i have the same problem, not enough calories and too tempted to eat junk?

If you eat healthily then the odd "treat" wont make you rosie o'donnell over night...