Diet Strategies: Weight Loss Success Story at  

Name Bill Ferriter
Home Cary, NC
Age 32
Height 6'
Job Middle-school teacher
Weight before 240 lb
Weight after 175 lb

The GainBill Ferriter--that's Mr. Ferriter to his students--would start each day with chicken biscuits and fries at Bojangles, while reading the newspaper. After a day of teaching, coaching soccer, and chugging Cokes, he'd hit Taco Bell's drive-thru for dinner. His tennis partner moved away. "The combination of no exercise and lots of fast food just added up," he says. He poked fun at himself, telling the kids he was the FBCM--the Fat Bald Cranky Man.The ChangeFerriter was embarrassed to be on the "skins" team of a pickup soccer game, and he got winded in 5 minutes. "I was worried that if I didn't do something, I would lose the respect of my students," he says. He cut the Cokes and the Grilled Stuft Burrito runs and began doing the conditioning program used by the high school's varsity soccer team. He jogged as many half miles as he could and took up stationary biking at the YMCA.The Result

Ferriter lost 65 pounds in less than a year by exercising and watching calories. He still reads the paper every morning, but eats an Egg McMuffin instead of deep-fried food. Tuna, low-cal frozen dinners, and salads are his staples these days, with beef jerky, rice cakes, and caffeine-free Diet Coke in between.

He can keep up with his athletes. "If we expect our kids to be healthy, we need to set healthy examples for them," he says. His goal is to run a 5-K race with one of the high-school track stars.

Bill's WorkoutFerriter tries to burn 800 calories at the gym three times a week, using a treadmill or elliptical machine and lifting weights. That's in addition to soccer practice.Bill's Tips

• Be precise. "You have to be a little anal-retentive. I used a computer program--calorieking.com--to record everything I ate. If I wanted to have pizza that night, I'd save up calories throughout the day."
• Waste not. "Ten Cokes a day were wasted calories. Find something that can serve the same purpose but with fewer calories."
• Change your routine. "Instead of spending my downtime at the bar with wings and a beer, I spend it at the gym with a treadmill and a bottle of water."

 

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