Tennis season is just around the corner and I’m on a mission to get in the best shape possible to help defend our 2012 league championship. There’s only one problem. I’ve let myself go a little this winter as I seem to always do every winter since freshman year of college.
I firmly believe effective weight loss is all about the diet and that staying in shape has less to do with how much you exercise. The more you exercise, the hungrier you get. The hungrier you get, the more easily it is to overeat way beyond what you just burned off. Take it from me, someone who plays tennis three times a week for 1.5 hours each session. No matter how hard I try to get below 160 pounds and stay there at 5′ 10″ tall, I can’t.
My favorite drink is Gatorade after every single workout. Sure Gatorade provides electrolytes and replenishes nutrients lost through sweat, but each quart I down contains 200 calories. It takes on average one mile of jogging to burn 100 calories for your reference. My quart of gatorade wipes out about 30 minutes of workout in the three minutes it takes to drink the darn thing!
If only I could just drink three Gatorades all day, I’d lose weight in a hurry. Alas, I also eat tons of fruit, which although good for you, contains a tremendous amount of fructose. I love mangoes and can eat three for breakfast with ease. Unfortunately, three mangoes equals about 400 calories, more than a quarter pounder cheeseburger which contains roughly 350 calories according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Of these, 123 calories are fat, 118 are carbohydrates, and 62 calories are protein.
For the longest time, I thought I was eating a normal amount of food. The fact of the matter is, I was eating way more calories than I should due to the biases I had in my head of what is considered good food, and what is considered bad food!
To get you pumped up for losing some weight, I’ve provided two charts that are amalgamations of research I’ve done for what the ideal body weight is for men and women. These weight loss charts keep me motivated as they piss me off for how light they are across every category.
Ideal Body Weight For Men
| Height in Feet&Inches | Small Frame | Medium Frame | Large Frame |
| 5’2″ | 128-134 | 131-141 | 138-150 |
| 5’3″ | 130-136 | 133-143 | 140-153 |
| 5’4″ | 132-138 | 135-145 | 142-156 |
| 5’5″ | 134-140 | 137-148 | 144-160 |
| 5’6″ | 136-142 | 139-151 | 146-164 |
| 5’7″ | 138-145 | 142-154 | 149-168 |
| 5’8″ | 140-148 | 145-157 | 152-172 |
| 5’9″ | 142-151 | 151-163 | 155-176 |
| 5’10” | 144-154 | 151-163 | 158-180 |
| 5’11” | 146-157 | 154-166 | 161-184 |
| 6’0″ | 149-160 | 157-170 | 164-188 |
| 6’1″ | 152-164 | 160-174 | 168-192 |
| 6’2″ | 155-168 | 165-178 | 172-197 |
| 6’3″ | 158-172 | 167-182 | 176-202 |
| 6’4″ | 162-176 | 171-187 | 181-207 |
Ideal Body Weight For Women
| Height in Feet&Inches | Small Frame | Medium Frame | Large Frame |
| 4’10” | 102-111 | 109-121 | 118-131 |
| 4’11” | 103-113 | 111-123 | 120-134 |
| 5’0″ | 104-115 | 113-126 | 122-137 |
| 5’1″ | 106-118 | 115-129 | 125-140 |
| 5’2″ | 108-121 | 118-132 | 128-143 |
| 5’3″ | 111-124 | 121-135 | 131-147 |
| 5’4″ | 114-127 | 124-138 | 134-151 |
| 5’5″ | 117-130 | 127-141 | 137-155 |
| 5’6″ | 120-133 | 130-144 | 140-159 |
| 5’7″ | 123-136 | 133-147 | 143-163 |
| 5’8″ | 126-139 | 136-150 | 146-167 |
| 5’9″ | 129-142 | 139-153 | 149-170 |
| 5’10” | 132-145 | 142-156 | 152-173 |
| 5’11” | 135-148 | 145-159 | 155-176 |
| 6’0″ | 138-151 | 148-162 | 158-179 |
Definition of medium-frame: Your middle finger and thumb just touch when you hold your wrist. You are large-framed if your fingers do not touch. You are small-framed if your fingers overlap.
I’m going to guess that if you live in America, the land of processed foods and sugar overload, you are likely not ideal body weight! I’m medium framed and weigh roughly 165 pounds. Not bad, but not ideal. It’s frustrating because I work out three times a week and try and eat healthy. That said, I know I’m about 10 pounds heavier than ideal weight on the tennis court because 150-155 pounds is where I was in high school and college.
Strategies To Lose Weight
1) Cut out as much sugar and processed food as possible. Sugar kills. There’s no other way to say it. The problem is that we are inundated with products that contain sugar. An easy way to cut down half your sugar intake is to replace all fluids with water. This includes sports drinks, soda, and alcohol. Food that comes in a box is processed food. The nutrients are largely gone by the time you eat or recook the food again. Instead, try and eat as much raw vegetables as possible.
2) Remove your food biases. Gatorade and other sports drinks are not good for you if consumed in large quantities because of the sugar. Marketing makes people think they’ll all turn into Michael Jordan because of Gatorade. Forget about it. Fruit is wonderful, but unfortunately contains massive amounts of fructose. It can also blow up your stomach if you eat too much, so be moderate in the amount that you eat.
3) Understand how many calories are in your favorite foods. If you don’t know how many calories you are eating, how will you know whether you are eating too many or too few? Your 10 favorite foods should account for the majority of your diet, so start there and work your way down. There are an endless amount of online calorie calculators to choose from. Also learn how to portion some of your food. There are cool gadgets to help you with this but if you still need to eat high caloric foods, the best thing to do is portion it out.
4) Don’t work out too much. There is a point of diminishing returns where your body starts getting overly fatigued to the point of injury. For most people, 45-60 minutes of intense workout is where diminishing returns kick in, however the point is different for everybody. Instead of going for massively long workouts, increase the frequency of 30-60 minute workouts. This way, you get the most bang for your buck and reduce your chances of overeating.
5) Think about the millions of starving children. There are literally over one hundred million starving children in the world who will die prematurely. As soon as we become mindful of the suffering of others, we become more mindful of how much we eat. If you really want to lose weight, take a flight to Calcutta, India and stay for a couple weeks to experience poverty. You will come back a changed person.
Weight Loss Is Straightforward
We all know that in order to lose weight you must consume less calories than you expend. The concept is exactly the same when it comes to building wealth and personal finance. You don’t want to be poor and unhealthy, yet unfortunately there is a correlation between the two.
After struggling with my weight in 20 pound yo-yo’s for the past twenty years, I strongly believe that weight loss is attainable by practically everyone. If the winners of The Biggest Loser can lose hundreds of pounds of body fat in three month of filming the season, and if a man can lose 27 pounds in 10 weeks by eating a Twinkie Diet, then so can you.
I’m sick of making excuses for myself for why I can’t get back to fighting weight again. A slowing metabolism and older age are not real reasons! The reason why I’ve been stuck is because I simply love food more than I hate not being in ideal weight. But now, I hate having to run around with an extra 10 pounds of fat on the court as I try and vanquish my opponents in the upcoming tennis season.
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Untemplaters, do you think people who want to lose weight but don’t after months of trying really don’t want to lose weight? Is the idea of losing weight more attractive than the actual weight loss itself?
Do you think that we live in a bubble in North America given the abundance of food and water? Why can’t we recognize how much poverty and starvation there are in other parts of the world? Do you think that once we realize the suffering of others, we’ll do a better job of eating in moderation?
What is your excuse for why you can’t lose weight?
Picture: Everyday, this man walks up 588 steps at least five times a day from Santorini harbor to Fira. Diet over exercise. SD.
Regards,
Sam
I don’t think the charts mean a thing. I am a 5’2 woman,small framed, according to the wrist test. Which I find funny, cuz when I was obese, I thought I was just big boned LOL I started at 241 and currently I am 154 and have been stuck. The closer u are to goal, the harder it is to lose..fact. I try not to get stuck on a number. Focusing on health and happiness. My goal is 140 which will still put me overweight according to the charts. Whats a number anyway?
I swear it feels like I follow Sam around waiting for him to post about weight and to argue with him a bit about it.
Yes, being overweight is a lot like being in debt, and certainly the skills you learn to in fighting one can be used in fighting the other. (I’ve even written about it.) There is no way I would be succeeding in my current weight loss journey (5lbs down, 25lbs to go) if it weren’t for the skills I developed in budgeting and getting out of debt. At the same time, there are other factors to consider.
The first is a biological fact- your body wants to be the heaviest it has ever been. That’s it’s survival mechanism for handling famine. We haven’t had abundant year round food for long enough for that bit of biology to have evolved away. (And, as Sam points out, there are plenty of people in this world who do NOT have access to abundant year round food.) Because of this, once you have been overweight, it is harder to maintain a normal weight than it is for someone who has always been normal weight. You have to eat fewer calories or burn more.
The second thing to understand is that there is a misconception in this country about what morbidly obese looks like and the health risks of being overweight vs obese. When I met Sam at FinCon last year, no one would say I wasn’t fat, but people were surprised when I mentioned I was morbidly obese (I was only 6 weeks into my diet) because I am tall and carry my weight evenly distributed. I didn’t look like Roseanne, and I fit in an airplane seat without a seat belt extender.
And yet, when I reach my goal weight (which will have me in the overweight category vs the obese category), there will be people who think I am fatter than I was before.
Being obese has a lot of health risks associated with it. Being overweight does NOT. (I just had this conversation with my doctor.) And in some cases, including mine, being overweight may actually decrease health risks (for me, specifically osteoporosis).
All of that said, I agree with the statements that it’s more about diet than anything else, or for me, at least, it’s about being AWARE of what I eat. I knew when I started this that it wasn’t temporary. Unlike paying off debt where, once you’re done, you have more money to spend, with weight loss, if you want to maintain it, you never get those calories back. Simply removing the mints from my desk and weighing my serving of chips, etc, has been the key. It doesn’t mean I can’t have a slice of pizza every once in a while (in fact I had one today for lunch), but it does mean that when I made that plan, I thought about what dinner tonight was going to be and also packed fewer snacks than I do when my lunch is 180 calories of soup.
I wouldn’t think you were morbidly obese either when we met up. The term “morbid” just sounds so wrong I wish the lexicon would change.
Interesting to note about osteoporosis. I’ll look on the bright side of being overweight next time. Because I’m so focused on winning for my team, I really want to be in the best shape possible.
Congrats on your weight loss so far!
While all great tips I have to disagree with the ideal size chart for men. According to its standards the wrist wrap I’m a small frame individual but I can tell you from years of athletic and military experience I am indeed not a small framed man. At my peak performance I was 6’1 200lbs and had 4% bodyfat.
I would like to gain a few inches. 🙂
My weight is good, but I need to turn the one keg into a 6 packs. The weather is nicer now so we’ll go out and run around more.
How come the women’s chart has wider range than the men? Seems a little unfair…
I have never seen a weight chart that takes into account different frames – this is incredible! Though tall I have a very small frame and as such I’m normally way underweight for my height, but it’s great to see my healthy weight is in fact perfectly fine for my shape. Thanks!
Good to hear you are fine and the charts help!
I have sympathy for the abundance hypothesis – we’re expanding because the variety of food we have access to, year round. Perhaps fruit was a few-times-a-year diversion… but it certainly wasn’t something you put on your grain-based cereal with milk every morning.
Anyway, I’m 5’10”, small frame (upper body), 170 lb, and don’t eat grain. Also, trying to gain weight, haha. Body fat % > BMI, if you work out (as I know you do).
How much weight do you want to gain? I’m the same height, but would ideally want to lose 5-10 pounds to get down to 155lbs to be quicker on the courts.
Courts for me are the basketball court – but, as you know, 5’10” limits us to small forward/shooting guard, even in a pick up game.
I think 180 for a “this year” goal. If I go too far my wife or the mirror will let me know, haha.
I hear ya.
I always think back to Allen Iverson, at 5′ 11″-6″ maybe and 155-160 pounds and then drive inside.
I am making progress on my goal to get fit before my next trip. I’ve stopped eating pizza for lunch and have up’ed my salad intake which is working well and I feel less sluggish. I’m still not doing that great with my exercise goals, but at least I’m doing better than 2 months ago.
I feel the best when I eat at least one salad a day, have one or two fresh pieces of fruit, and as little dairy as possible. It’s sad to say I went through periods earlier this winter when I barely ate any vegetables. I’ve found staying hydrated also helps me feel better physically without headaches and such.
I lost 35-40 lbs. 35 years ago and never gained it back! I stopped weighing myself years ago and yet stay within one or two pounds of my weight (150 lbs.). If my pants begin to get a little snug, I cut out one item or just eat a little better and it goes away. I learned to substitute the calorie heavy food items with better choices such fruits or vegetables. I stay pretty active walking, bicycling and exercising routinely too.
That’s nice you have a steady weight after losing those pounds! Most people in my family seem to maintain about the same weight too so I’ve been lucky.
One of my friends though has struggled with ~30 pound swings for many, many years. I think for her a lot of the causes are stress, eating out all the time, and lack of exercise. When she really watches what she eats, she tends to drop the weight pretty quickly, it’s just hard for her to maintain a steady diet.
150 lbs is light! How tall are you?
This is very true. I dropped well over 20 pounds by changing my diet. I had been exercising pretty hard for years, but it wasn’t until I cleaned up my diet that I was able to drop the weight. I started drinking a lot of water, cut out simple sugars (fruit juice, alcohol, etc.), and tried to adjust the kind of calories that I was eating. More proteins and healthy fats and a bit less carbs.
Nice! I try to drink mostly water myself too. Fruit juice can get almost as addicting as sodas and sports drinks because of the sugar content.
I’ve had to cut back on my sugar intake many times as I’ve found I get hooked pretty quick. If I start having something sweet after dinner a few times a week, pretty soon I find myself craving desert every day. Sometimes chewing gum or just drinking a lot of water helps me forget about the craving.
It is easy to over-eat. Many foods have a lot more calories than you first realize.
I blame slow metabolism. I’ve been on diets where I counted my calories and the math said I should be loosing a pound per week but didn’t loose any. When I lost my weight, I lost an average of .4lbs for week on a diet that, mathematically speaking, should have lost 2lbs per week. But instead of complaining, I just know I have to work 5 times harder!
That said, I hate those “ideal” weight charts. Even at my lowest weight, I was considered “overweight” even though I had a 30″ waist!
That’s quite bizarre you were considered “overweight” with a thirty inch waist. I wonder if you have higher than average bone density.
Musculature probably has something to do with it as well. That’s why some pro-athletes are considered “obese” by the charts even though they are under 10% bodyfat. For myself, I’ve always seemed to have somewhat more muscle mass than I have any right to.
Eh? 30″ waist is SKINNY! I was a 30-31″ waist up until Junior year in HS. Now I’m 32.5 or something.
Crazy as it sounds, I can touch my index finger and thumb together around my wrist, wore 30″ jeans (I’ve drifted up a bit, but my goal is to be back down by my buddy’s wedding in September), but I’ve never seen a chart that says that my 5’8″ body wasn’t overweight at 175 lbs. Not overweight by much, but certainly over the “ideal” weight. I’m not that bothered by it, but it is somewhat frustrating because I was the fat kid. The last time I had a 30″ waist was probably 6th grade.
Have you ever seen that PSA about people who are overweight or obese without even knowing it? Not a single person who is listed as overweight looks heavy to me.
I grew up around grandparents traumatized by the food shortage of WWII so there was not leaving your plate half full. I still hate waste but don’t think it will stop us from overeating if we see people starving.
Overweight people who complain are like people in debt who are unhappy about their debt, only they can change the course of that.
I think your body is used to eating ingredients that do you well, and no super food will be as easy to process because it is new to your body. For example I moved to Guatemala 8 years ago and took on 20 pounds eating corn tortillas instead of bread. Came back to Paris, ate baguette, cheese and wine for a month, shook off the 20 pounds. Your diet is important in that sense, if you introduce new foods, check what they do to you before you keep them as part of your diet.
That’s a good analogy on being overweight and being in debt. We can only blame ourselves for our unhappiness and bad habits.
It is interesting how our bodies and environment react differently to foods. I have a hard time eating spicy foods because I didn’t grow up eating any at all. Others can’t get enough spiciness in their food because they’re acclimated to a lot of hot spices.
I know a lot of people in the US would be thrilled to have your ability to eat baguettes, cheese, and wine without gaining weight! I can imagine the foods in Guatemala vs Paris are quite different.
That’s very interesting about the Parisian diet and losing 20 pounds in one month! I love Paris.