CHALLENGE: LOSING TWO STONE BEFORE XMAS

Background

I've been half-heartedly trying to make some positive changes to my physical wellbeing for some time. In September last year I started taking karate lessons, I also started running and took on a challenge to complete a marathon in a month, however during the coronavirus lockdown my weight was piling up.

With the seed already sown, one day when lazily scrolling on Facebook I saw a post from a friend who had decided to take on the challenge of losing two stone in fourteen weeks before Xmas and immediately it piqued my interest. A quick chat with my wife cemented the decision, I was going to take on the challenge.

The Challenge

I have thirteen weeks to lose two stone. My challenge started on 14th September and ends on 14th December at which point the all important weigh in will take place.

The task itself is simple. Executing the task however requires will-power and I tend to get more easily distracted than... oh look a bee...

My starting weight is 13 stone 12 pounds (as you can see from the photo with the Fred Flinstone feet), so I need to get down to 11 stone 12 pounds by 14th December (just in time to pile it all back on over the Xmas holidays).

The Cause

All monies raised will go directly to a great cause, Mental Health UK. If you would like to donate please feel free to visit my JustGiving page at the link below:

https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/rob-gore2

If you can then please open that wallet, look down the back of that sofa, or come to my house and sell some of my food to stop me from eating it. However you manage to find some spare cash I would be humbled by your generosity and it would go towards helping someone in genuine need of support.

How I'm Planning to Achieve the Weight-Loss

A weight-loss of two stone over thirteen weeks equates to just over two pounds per week. In order to achieve this I'm not going to go on any fad-diets or take any mis-advertised and misleading supplements, instead I will use simple mathematics by ensuring that for each week I burn more calories than I consume.

Generally the recommended calorific intake for men is 2500 calories per day (and 2000 calories per day for women). In order to ensure that I lose a steady amount of weight I will be targeting 1500 calories per day.

In reality the 1500 calories per day will be an average over the course of the week. For each week I will allow myself a treat day where (within reason) I eat and drink whatever I want. The 1500 calories also doesn't include exercise, so if for example I do a 6k walk which burns ~250 calories it means that on that day I can consume 1750 calories. This means that it's within my interest to do as much exercise as possible to enable me to earn calories that I can spend on my meals. To track my calories I will be using the MyFitnessPal app on my iPhone to capture the calories consumed and burnt each day.

I'm only a week and a half in so far but lost 4.5 pounds in the first week which I'm proud of. I'll give an update each week after I do my weekly weigh-in on a Sunday morning. Wish me luck!

Rob