Fat Bob Slim's Story

I flew to South Korea in September of 2006 to teach English and to learn martial arts during my free time. I was 103 kilograms and like most westerners, lifted weights for upperbody size and strength, but was still carrying too much fat. One day while I was jogging in Korea, having dropped to 94 kilograms for the first time in a long time, I fell--and my world fell down with me. Nothing broken, just torn tendons in my left ankle, which was even worse.With 18 more months left in my teaching contract, I coundn't jog or run or even stand for long periods of time. Fat, tired and depressed, I just unhappily went to work, came home and watched TV and ate crap, lots of it. Disabled and depressed, I shot up to an unhealthy 110 kilograms, surpassing more than 30% body fat, which only made my ankle worse. A mentor, Antonio Graceffo, recommended Thailand for weight loss. Thailand? We all know who goes to Thailand. But his was a different Thailand. Not girls and beers Thailand but boxing gloves and tears Thailand. In September of 2008 I enrolled at a Muay Thai camp in Phuket to lose weight. I arrived at 107 kilograms. Beginning with a five day all water detox, I lost a kilogram a day. Then I trained Muay Thai twice a day--longer and longer every week. I also power walked at night, sometimes went swimming in the afternoon, cycled and ate healthy and delicious Thai food. In 10 weeks, I lost a total of 14 kilograms, finishing at 93 kilograms! Then, I returned to my teaching job and continued to practice Muay Thai at a local gym and ran almost daily, and lost an additional 12 kilograms, a total of 26 kilograms in 8 months! And now I'm back, down more than 30 kilograms, for some more FITNESS, maybe some FIGHTING and perhaps a little FUN.

We have all been there: nursing a hangover with fried food and a can of cola while falling in and out of sleep to annoying infocommericals about rapid weight loss. "Lose 10 pounds in 10 days.....Shed 30 pounds in 30 days....Transform your body with our 3 month program". And we have all thought the same thing. Impossible, or at the very least, highly improbable. Well, the purpose of this blog is to inform you that under the right conditions---say training in tropical Thailand, impossibility is possible and improbability is not as problematic as one may think.This is my story; a story of detoxing and training Muay Thai Boxing on the island of Phuket; a story of losing 30 pounds in a little under 3 months and a total of 30 kilograms. And along the way, we'll meet many more people with similar stories, who have had similar success.

Saturday, January 30, 2010

6 Easy Ways to Lose Weight Without Starving (from Yahoo News)



1. Fidget: People who tap their feet, prefer standing to sitting, and generally move around a lot burn up to 350 more calories a day than those who sit still. That adds up to nearly 37 pounds a year!

In short, during your off-hours, don't just lay around. In the future I would like to see a swimming pool, ping pong table and foozeball table to keep people active when they aren't training. In the meanwhile, walk around, talk to people, take short bikes rides to the market.

2. Keep most meals under 400 calories
Study after study recommends spacing out your meals at regular intervals and keeping them all about the same size. Eating meals at regular intervals has been linked to greater calorie burning after eating, better response to insulin, and lower fasting blood cholesterol levels. When you eat regular meals throughout the day, you're less likely to become ravenous and overeat.


This is a biggy. Since I eat at the buffet twice a day, I eat way too much at each meal. In addition, my sugar levels drop too low from training so I'm inclined to grab a soda. Keep the meals small and frequent and you won't have this problem.

3. Take yourself off cruise control
Increase the intensity of your everyday tasks, from vacuuming to walking the dog, recommends Douglas Brooks, an exercise physiologist and personal trainer in Northern California. "Turn on some music, add in some vigorous bursts, and enjoy the movement," he says.


Focus less on the number on the scale and more on the numbers of minutes you are running or doing other forms of cardio. Can you run the same distance faster than you did last week? Can you go more rounds? Can you do more sprints while running? Those are the numbers you should be looking at. Again, easier said than done.

4. Drink 8 glasses of water per day
Water is not just a thirst quencher--it may speed the body's metabolism. Researchers in Germany found that drinking two 8-ounce glasses of cold water increased their subjects' metabolic rate by 30%, and the effect persisted for 90 minutes. One-third of the boost came from the body's efforts to warm the water, but the rest was due to the work the body did to absorb it. "When drinking water, no calories are ingested but calories are used, unlike when drinking sodas, where additional calories are ingested and possibly stored," Increasing water consumption to eight glasses per day may help you lose about 8 pounds in a year, he says, so try drinking a glass before meals and snacks and before consuming sweetened drinks or juices.


If its yellow, let it mellow. If its brown, flush it down. GROSS! Let me return to the first one. If its yellow, DRINK MORE WATER!

5. Step it up--and down
Climbing stairs is a great leg strengthener, because you're lifting your body weight against gravity.


For people who have weight issues, I recommend the following for cardio. 20 minutes of power walking on the tread mill, 20 minutes of cyclying or on the ellipitical, 20 more minutes on the tread mill...but with every passing minute or two, increase the spead and incline. By the time you get to the last five minutes, you should be SPEED walking up hill pretty quickly.

7. Eat 4 g of fiber at every meal
A high-fiber diet can lower your caloric intake without making you feel deprived. In a Tufts University study, women who ate 13 g of fiber or less per day were five times as likely to be overweight as those who ate more fiber. Experts see a number of mechanisms through which fiber promotes weight loss: It may slow down eating because it requires more chewing, speed the passage of food through the digestive tract, and boost satiety hormones. To get 25 g of fiber a day, make sure you eat six meals or snacks, each of which contains about 4 g of fiber. For to-go snacks, buy fruit; it's handier than vegetables, so it's an easy way to up your fiber intake. One large apple has just as much fiber (5 g) as a cup of raw broccoli.

2 comments:

  1. The best weight loss programs are the ones that do not make you go on crazy diets. You will not lose weight if you are uncomfortable with the food you are eating. You will feel stressed about trying to remember what you can and cannot eat. Being stressed will not help you to lose weight. It might even make you gain weight. Thanks a lot...

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