The Netflix Diet

I wonder how motivational it'll be to give some personal details about myself publicly where they can be read by...well, no one at this point...and know that I have pressure from complete strangers to actually keep working and progressing.

I'm a little heavier than I, or my doctor, would like me to be. At about 5'9", my 202 pounds puts me just shy of a 30 BMI. Ideally, I'd be down in the 170 range. I've been down as low as 185 a few summers ago (from my previous high of 215). I'm not morbidly obese - I can still run a 5K in under 30 minutes - but I could use some work.

My plan of attack, like last time I set out to lose weight, is a combination of diet and exercise. Amazing how well such a simple combination works. I tried the South Beach diet once. That was a disaster. I didn't enjoy eating any more, but much worse I found myself blacking out after exercising, presumably due to the conspicuous lack of carbs. I changed instead to some portion control, smarter snacking, only water to drink, and minimal/no desert. Combine that with 45 minutes of rowing and running 5 days a week and I shed almost 30 pounds in 6 weeks.

I'm now hoping to do that again, although the timeframe isn't as pressing (last time my girlfriend was out of the country for 6 weeks and I decided to surprise her). I started at 206 pounds in May of 2009.

Step one was to acquire an elliptical since I no longer had access to the university gym. We landed a pretty sweet NordicTrack AudioStrider 990 on Craigslist for a very reasonable price. I started using it occasionally - a few times a week, but nothing regular enough to really have a large impact, having dropped only 4 pounds in 2 months.

Where does Netflix come in? Well, I used to watch movies. A lot. I was in a movie club. I was a member of BlockbusterOnline. I rented movies constantly when I was home alone in the evenings in my apartment. In the past year, I've lacked the time and the opportunity to watch many movies, and I've missed that.

This morning, I decided to get up and hop on the elliptical, but instead of watching some TV, I booted up Netflix on my Xbox 360 (which is freakin' awesome by the way) and started watching JCVD (review to come in a few days). I got 30 minutes into it when my running program ended, and then I stopped it. I don't get to watch more until I run again, which is some great motivation.

Now, I'm going to be able to get my exercise (might even bump it up to 45 minute programs) and watch tons of movies without feeling like I'm wasting my time. I'll be able to get through almost two movies a week if I run each workday (which is my goal), and then I can write up my reviews here. It's a win-win situation and is dirt cheap: $9 per month and you get 1 out at a time plus unlimited on-demand video. Awesome. :)