My Weight Loss Plan – 3 Key Components

Tag lines and marketing slogans would like you to believe that “You can lose 10lbs doing this ONE thing,” or a weight loss book may claim that cutting calories is all you need to worry about, but the truth of the matter is that any good weight loss program needs to include 3 key components: 1) a nutrition plan, 2) cardiovascular exercise, and 3) strength training.

Why do I know this? As a former elite endurance athlete and a person who has been actively participating in athletics all of my life, I have plenty of experience exercising, experimenting with different nutritional programs, and trying out different strength training routines. I know what works and what doesn’t. My only problem is that I’ve never consistently incorporated all three of these components into a weight loss program. I’ll go on a “clean eating” kick for a week then follow it up with a weekend of burgers and pizza, or hit the gym religiously for 2 weeks and then avoid it like the plague for a month. This is my chance to finally change that.

To lose 20lbs., these are the three things I am going to CONSISTENTLY integrate into my life:

1) A Nutrition Plan. I’ll be using Weight Watcher’s Online program to track what and how much I eat. They have a convenient system that assigns food certain points values, and provides me a recommended target for how many “points” I should be consuming per day in order to reach my weight loss goals.
2) Cardiovascular Exercise. I’m going to aim for 6 cardio workouts (~30 min each) or 180 minutes total per week. Because it’s important to vary the exercise intensity level to burn the most calories, I’ll also be including intervals in some of my workouts. I used to row competitively and really like this 3-week online program from Concept 2.
3) Strength Training. This is my least favorite component, but I really want to not only lose fat, I want to look toned. So, I’ll be following a “Total Body Tone-Up” schedule which has a gym workout (12 exercises) 2x per week and one cardio/strength circuit routine that I can do at home on the weekend with 5lb. hand weights.

I’ll devote an individual blog to go into greater depth about each of these three components later this week, so stay tuned!

What’s So Different about this Weight Loss Blog?

Everybody loves checking out before & after shots of people who have successful lost weight – who isn’t impressed by somebody that can fit 2 people into their old jeans – but don’t you ever wonder what happens between the “before” and the “after” photos? What kind of weight loss plan did they follow? What kind of challenges did they encounter? How long did it take? Chances are they faced-off against a very persuasive pint of Ben & Jerry’s somewhere along the way and were able to scare it back into the deepest, darkest corner of the freezer. Wouldn’t it be great to know how they did it?

As a 29-year old gal with a larger frame, love of good food (not to mention beer), a full-time job and a busy social schedule, I’m no stranger to struggles with my weight. I’ve got a shelf full of diet and exercise books – some of which I’ll review later on – subscriptions to magazines like Shape and Women’s Fitness, plenty of dusty exercise DVDs, and a web history littered with weight loss searches. All of them have excellent information – sometimes too much – but what’s missing is that none have ever given me a start-to-finish look at what it’s like to go through a successful weight loss effort. Sure, Jillian Michaels can tell me everything I need to do to make my weight loss effort successful, but what is it like to go through that? How do I know it really works?

I created this blog and my Twitter page to provide an opportunity for others to read about my experience LIVE, in real-time to know what it’s like to go through a significant weight loss effort. In my first blog, I’ll outline my plan, and as I stated above, each week I’ll upload photos of my progress and blog a run-down of my previous week’s effort. I’ll also write about other topics I find relevant to my weight loss effort along the way. My Twitter page (http://twitter.com/Lose20lbsLIVE) will show you exactly what I eat each day, how long I exercise for, and if I get taunted by any left-over chocolate cake at the office (and more importantly – how I avoid it)!

With that, I’m off to the races. I hope you enjoy following along on my journey.

- Weight Loss Girl