A bit of help with slow weight loss...

Same old song and dance…I’m sure you’ve heard it about 1,000 times on these boards!! Well it’s now my turn to gripe.

I’m a 40yo male celebrated that “other side of the hill” about 6 months before I began working out about 10 weeks ago. My initial goal was modest “to lose about 10 lbs and my modest gut, eventually build more upper body contour”

I’m 5’7” and I’ve weighed 172-175 for the past 10 years. I have a “small frame” I graduated from High School at 135 and college at about 145lbs, when the weight gain came in my late 20s I was actually glad to look like less of a “weakling.” Initially it came on fairly uniformly but in my 30s the bulge in my gut became more noticeable, I drank alcohol fairly heavily in my 30s and I just figured it was the beginning of a “beer belly.” Nothing ridiculous but I've gone from a 30" pant waist to a 34" waist.


I quit drinking alcohol about 17 months ago and quickly lost 7-8 lbs dropping to 166lbs. Slowly the weight came back over the past year. With some modest urging from my wife I decided to “hit the gym” and “watch my diet” which has been strictly “seefood eatfood”, I have always believed I’d been blessed with a very high metabolism as I’ve never really “dieted” and eaten as much as I could possibly consume at many or most meals.

As you can imagine at first I was pathetically “out of shape” (cardio). I could barely jog a mile and I hated the forced rhythm of the elliptical machines. I gravitated to a PreCor stair climber (C764), from pretty modest exertion levels (50-60 “flights”) I’ve built up to a level 6 interval workout for 20-25 minutes, about 110 flights, burning just over 300 calories according to the machine. I do this stair climber workout 4-5 times per week.

About 6 weeks ago I started mixing in the Gravitron dip/pull-up machine, I do the machines recommended 3 sets of 6-8 dips and 3 sets of 6-8 pull-ups, exercising until “failure” with each set, I had been doing this 3x/wk but after reading here may go to 1-2x/wk to build muscle mass.

Recently I began some dumbbell curls 3 sets each arm exercising to failure at 8-10 reps.

I’m also trying to eat less fat, less sugar, and more protein.

I am going to start doing crunches and leg lifts as I’d really like to get my abs in better shape before I start cutting into that belly?

I’m definitely in better cardio condition and I think I’m already seeing chest and arm results.

I do think I’ve dropped almost 1% body fat, we have an electrical computerized scale (with some kind of foot sensor I think) that reports I have about 22.1% fat, which is down from almost 23% before I started working out.

My frustration and confusion is that I haven’t dropped a single pound? Do I need to be on that climber longer? I’ve increased the level rather than the time as I’ve become better fit. Do I really need to spend 30-45 minutes on that damn climber? Or is 20 hard minutes good enough since I’m damn near dead when I step off it?

Or should I just increase my focus on diet and perhaps start more of a lower body workout?

Concentrate on a good, clean, healthy diet, and weight training consistently :) Good luck :tucool:

I agree with Foley. It is probably your diet. It either isnt as clean as you think or you are eating too much. You might want to track your intake via a food diary to get an idea what you are eating then adjust your diet as needed.