Losing Weight as a Team: 

They will probably never meet.

 

They live in different states, and differ in age by decades. One sells plywood, another real estate, another cranes. One of them audits how others do business. They’re 10 single guys, married men, fathers, sons, and strangers—but they suddenly have an enormous impact on one another’s daily lives.

 

And they may wind up helping each other live years longer.

 

They’re the “128 Club,” a group of 10 strangers who started the Men’s Health Belly Off! program on January 28. They’re proof that you don’t need to start on New Year’s Day to change your life.

 

“With the way my job was around the holidays, it was too hectic to start,” says Ross Muhleman, the group’s 28-year old founder. “I also wanted to wait for the New Year’s resolution-ers to quit. It’s just ridiculous at that time when they’re starting their programs.”

 

The Salem, Ohio, crane sales engineer wanted some support in his quest to drop 17 pounds and improve his cholesterol, so he posted a query to the Belly Off! “Ask an Expert” message board looking for other late-January starters. He’s lost 3 pounds and a notch in his belt in just 10 days, and found 9 guys to share his success with.

 

“At first, I thought it was kind of weird—I thought I wouldn’t really use [the message board] all that much,” says Ryan Carmichael, who has lost 5 pounds already. But the plywood salesman from Memphis has found inspiration knowing that other guys struggle with the same things he does.

 

“I can’t finish these five pullups, but neither can 95 percent of these people. Unlike when you’re in the gym, there’s these guys who can bench 400 pounds, and you’re embarrassed just trying to get by.”

 

128er Craig Laskey needed some support—or at least a place to vent—when he gained 2 pounds in his first week.

 

“I had felt better until I looked at the scale—I had actually been pretty good on Super Bowl Sunday, and didn’t gorge,” the 42-year old says. After using the 128 forum to get his frustration off his chest, the Naperville, Ill., man was able to focus on his positive progress—increased energy and a little strength. “I feel a little bit better with the pushups—I can do one or two more here and there than I could.”

 

Marty Wheeler has seen even quicker strength gains—the 31-year old has gone from struggling to show his daughter how to do pushups to “popping off 20, no sweat.”

 

Like the rest of the 128ers, he’s into the group support, but more into making the right change for himself at the right time.

 

“January 1 doesn’t mean that you’re ready to do something about it,” says the Cornish, N.Y., man. He’d cleaned up his eating starting last fall, and has used Belly Off! as the next step in his shift towards healthy living. “The weekend before the 28th—not at New Year’s—I decided I don’t want to be this person anymore. I wanted to be a different guy.”

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