Right now I’m 5’8.5" 198 pounds. AKA fat. I’ve made a bet with two work colleagues as follows: I need to get down to 170 lbs by December 20th. I haven’t weighed 170 pounds in about 15 years. Between the two bets, if I’m over 170 pounds I pay them 700 dollars, if I’m under 170 they pay me 700 dollars. And then 70 dollars a pound for every pound I am above 170. So if I maintain this level of fatness I will owe these guys $2660. If I get to 165 I win 1050 bucks.
I am aware that this is a lopsided bet and I will likely lose. But I think I have a chance at winning, and I like that the way this is structured I will have to try to lose as much weight as I can. So don’t tell me it was a bad bet, unrealistic, etc etc etc. I know! But I’m going to do my best.
So remember those articles about Penn losing a bunch of weight? He started out just eating potatoes. That’s what I’m trying. I started yesterday and am going to do it as long as I can stand. We will see how well this works and how long I can stand it. I bought 30 pounds of potatoes and 4 12 packs of LaCroix. And coffee. Doing some research, folks seem to lose about a half a pound a day on this all potato diet. That’s more or less what I have to do. Looking at the nutritional information on potatoes, it looks like their nutritional profile is surprisingly complete. Probably just going to do some B12 and vitamin A supplements if I stick with this diet for a long period of time. But in any case I’m going to weigh myself daily and post my results ITT, along with what I eat and how I feel.
Get a calorie tracking app and start counting calories. 28 pounds in 60 days is a big deficit to run, play around with how you eat till you find a pattern that is sustainable. I started working 11a-8p and found a bunch of small meals with a bigger meal at 2:30 worked. YMMV, good luck!
Potatoes seem like they’d be a pretty bad staple food if you’re trying to lose weight. With that said I think you’ve got a shot at the bet and I hope you’re able to do it in a healthy manner.
Just doing some back of the napkin calculations and you’re going to need to cut like 1440 calories a day from your usual day to make it. But not knowing your current calories it could be possible.
So first, get MyFitnessPal (free version) and track calories. Cut sugar to almost zero.
Second, pick a type of exercise to do for .5-1 hours a day. Walking is 334 calories per hour and jogging is 600. If you ran an hour a day you’d only need to cut calories by 800 to get to the goal. I did HIIT for a little while and it seemed good, currently doing yoga.
The above chart is from an experiment where they fed folks an equal calorie meal of these various foods and did something like time them to see how long it took to get hungry again. Plain boiled potatoes were by far the most filling food. And then this dude called Chris Voigt back in 2010 ate nothing but potatoes for two months and lost 22 pounds. And he wasn’t even very fat to begin with and wasn’t trying to lose weight! So I think it might be a good staple food for this challenge. We will see.
I’ll definitely track calories if I abandon my potato experiment. For now I’ll just stuff as many plain potatoes as I want into my fat face and see what happens. According to my phone I usually walk 4 miles a day and climb 12 flights of stairs at work, which is an OK activity level imo. Maybe I’ll try to get up to five miles every day, walk a few if I don’t get enough steps in at work. Also I have a standing desk.
I’m sure I will down the road. A vendor at work usually takes me out for sushi once a week and I’m for sure not strong-willed enough to pass up free sushi, so that’ll be maybe 4 oz of salmon and tuna a week. But a week or two of just potatoes isn’t going to hurt anything and will maybe help to reset my food mindset. Just after a day of only potatoes walking around the grocery store with a couple sacks of potatoes and my fizzy water was bizarre seeing all the food there. Penn said he did it to reset his food mindset and relationship with food. I think that’s a good idea.
Although 1500 calories of potatoes is actually 30 g of protein. Which yes is low but not horrible. Maybe after a little bit I’ll throw in a couple of four oz salmon portions a week and an egg a day or something. That would make up for the deficient parts of the diet as well, omega-3, b-12 and vitamin A.
I probably spend 20 bucks a day on food/going out to eat. Just potatoes would be maybe 2 bucks a day plus another 2 bucks for coffee and fizzy water. So I’d save maybe a thousand dollars.
I don’t understand why people torture themselves like this when reasonable weight loss is already so hard. That said, good luck.
I lost ~60 lbs several years ago over about a year and a half and have been up and down some lately. Back to within 10 lbs of what I think is ideal now. Not entirely out of choice but I think it has helped that I’ve been limited to one meal a day at times. It seems to moderate my appetite overall.
Tracking calories and exercise helps and I was diligent for a long time but it gets old.
I ate 1493 g of potatoes yesterday. Had high energy all day, wasn’t hungry at all. According to myfitnesspal, that’s 30 g protein, 254 g carbs, 33 g fiber, 12 sugar, 1 g fat, and 1150 calories. Walked 5.1 miles and climbed 17 flights of stairs. Weight: 198.0.
I slept very well and had crazy dreams. Not sure what that’s about.
