Fat Boy Update

2024-08-07

Beginning of the year, I wrote my first post about the “Fat Boy at 40 challenge”. If this is the first time you’re hearing about this, start reading there - or head directly over to Kev’s original one.

I am six months back at work after parental leave and I think this is a good opportunity to give an update.

Status Quo

Weight Loss

During the last twelve months, I lost 10kg. It was quicker at the beginning and flattened in the past months. I still count this a big win. I was not expecting it.

Intermediate Fasting

Beginning of the year, I changed my fasting schedule to 16:8. This didn’t last long. 14:10 (still?) feels more natural to me. Removing one meal per day completely - hm - not as easy as I thought.

I changed the tracking app. Instead of Fastic, I use Fasty. Fastic is still great, but I didn’t use most of its features and thus didn’t see a benefit in renewing my subscription.

Walking

In the second half of 2023, I was on parental leave and went for long walks with the stroller. It was easy to average above 10.000 steps per day. Being back at work made this more difficult. I also spend more time in the car.

I don’t want to look for excuses, but want to mention that I ditched the smart watch in December and only rely on my phone to count my steps. As I don’t carry the phone everywhere I go (e.g. when I grab another coffee from the kitchen), I was expecting less steps in the data - even without walking less.

Food Tracking

I still don’t track what I eat. I didn’t find an app that makes this easy for me. We cook more, and try to do this in a healthier way, but it’s still “carby”. Good news is, I overeat less often.

Plans for the next six months

Although I recently read an article that was a bit sceptic about intermediate fasting, I am still convinced that this is working very good for me. Nevertheless, I plan for some changes in the next six months.

More Sports: The article mentioned that one part of the weight loss caused by fasting is the loss muscle mass. Not good. Fasting, thus, shall be accompanied with sports. Currently, I go for bike rides, but nothing regular. Beginning of the year my plan was to get up earlier to do sports. This didn’t work out. This time, I will try Thomas’ approach.

Longer Fasting Periods: I was thinking about doing a whole week of fasting. Feedback from friends who did this was, that it’s not fun. Thus, I will park this idea for next year. Nevertheless, I want to try longer fasting periods. My goal is to have at least two: 5:2 fasting schedules (five days normal eating, two days fasting) until the end of the year.