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March 23, 2005

It's a Numbers Game

A pound of fat contains 3,500 calories. So you need to burn or reduce your intake (or a combo of the two) by 500 calories a day to lose a pound of fat per week.

So far this week (Monday & Tuesday) I did no less than 40 minutes each day on the elliptical trainer. The digital monitor showed that I burned nearly 600 calories during each session. Now that’s an approximation because my E.T. doesn’t have an input device. But I bet that’s pretty close because they probably do it for an averaged size person and I’m well above that, even for a man (ugg!). I sweat bullets on that thing and I love it. It doesn’t put any impact on my feet or knees. I’m digressing.

So if I keep my eating habits exactly the same I should lose 1 pound in a little less than 7 days. If I reduce my diet too (and I can certainly reduce my diet by 500 calories a day) I should lose another pound. Losing 2 pounds a week shouldn’t be difficult. That’s 8 pounds a month. In two months that’s 16 pounds. That’s a lot.

Now that math is fun, it really makes it sound do-able. That’s a lot of pounds, especially for someone who’s been doing nothing but gaining weight for goodness knows how long (of course I know how long - 5yrs). And that’s worst case scenario because I feel like I can do that. I plan to increase my workouts with weight, etc. and continue to whittle away at my mass consumption.

Huh, at this point I’d be happy with 8 pounds a month. I hope I didn’t just jinx it.

Posted by hopeful @ March 23, 2005 2:28 AM