RONNY TERRY'S Top-Ten New-Year Weight Loss Tips

I think we’re all now past the diet industry marketing nonsense that turns up on social media each day. We already have all the information we need and now it is all about action!

So here are our top-ten tips, with easy action points, to get your new-year health and fitness regime off to a flying start.

They come from years of helping men and women lose weight, and form part of the latest fad-free weight loss programme from www.swindonweightloss.com.

1. Win Little & Often If you try and do everything at once, you may soon feel overwhelmed and move a step closer to breaking point. Your enthusiasm is admirable, but you need a little restraint to ensure your changes last for more than a few weeks.

• Aim for one pound a week instead of three.

• Plan two gym visits instead of four.

• Have one glass of wine instead of giving it up.

It’s far more satisfying ticking off small achievements and giving yourself a pat on the back than it is breaking your back struggling to reach unrealistic targets.

You’ll soon get the knack of winning every day, and these small changes will soon become permanent life-changing habits.

2. Track Your Food Why don’t you put diesel in your petrol-powered car? Because you look at the label on the pump.

If you can do this for a machine, you can do it for your body.

By becoming aware of how many calories you are eating, and measuring your progress (see below), you’ll soon know if you are on track to lose weight or if you need to make adjustments to your diet.

You’ll also get a snapshot of the overall quality of your diet including levels of vitamins, minerals, and fat content, and all of these details are important if you want to live a long and healthy life.

There are loads of mobile apps out there to track the foods you eat, and most of them are free. Try www.myfitnesspal.com for a week and see how you get on.

3. Measure Your Progress If you’re not tracking your results then how do you know if what you are doing is working?

You may have become disillusioned with the bathroom scales, but there are a few things you can do to get them back on your side:

• Take a 3-day average. Your weight naturally shifts a little from day-to-day, so weigh yourself three days in a row and calculate your average weight to ‘iron out’ daily fluctuations.

• Accept menstrual mayhem. Big changes in fluid levels can affect your weight during the menstrual cycle so compare your weigh-ins to the same phases of the previous month.

• Be consistent. Weigh first thing in the morning after a trip to the bathroom and before eating or drinking anything. Do it naked or with the same clothes on each time.

Also, measure your waist, hips, and thighs every month to see if you’ve lost inches. Sometimes you may lose fat, but your weight won’t budge (yes it’s weird), so use the tape measure for a ‘second opinion.’

4. Get Organised With Food Buying a load of food and hoping for the best won’t work - you must prepare. That doesn’t mean you need to spend every Sunday prepping 36 different meals, but you do need to get your act together.

There are three little things you can do each week that will make life much easier for you.

• Plan your meals. Create a breakfast, lunch, and dinner for each day of the week and make a note of the foods you need. Usually, shopping lists contain a bunch of the foods you like with no thought of how you’ll combine them or when you’ll eat them. Go one better, and you’ll waste less and feel in control

 • Do a big shop. Get everything you need from your list plus a few healthy snacks. With your cupboards full of the good stuff you won’t have to worry about annoying mid-week trips to the shop that usually result in fattening impulse buys. Fill up and forget.

• Clear out the junk. Scan your cupboards and fridge for anything likely to derail your efforts and either take them to the food bank or show them the bin. Don’t worry about how they got there – there’ll be no internal investigation – just get them the hell out and move on quietly.

5. Push Up Your Protein Keeping your protein levels topped up can help you deal with the worst thing about dieting: feeling hungry.

Many studies have shown greater weight loss, fat loss, and preservation of lean muscle with higher-protein diets.

Eating between 0.54-0.74g of protein per lb of your bodyweight, compared to the general recommendation of 0.34g, may provide improvements in both appetite and weight management.

A serving of around 25g per meal should be enough to keep you full.

And don’t forget, around 30% of the calories coming from protein ‘disappear’ during digestion. Compare that to approx 5-10% for both fats and carbs, and it’s easy to see why increasing protein can help you shed some serious fat.

6. Fill Up On Fibre Fibre is the forgotten hero of weight loss, despite some studies showing that increasing it could help you lose weight.

Many high-fibre foods, such as vegetables, fruits, and beans, have a low energy density, meaning they fill up lots of space in your stomach for very few calories. Fibre also expands in in your stomach, taking up even more room.

There are loads of other health benefits associated with fibre, including the reduction of ‘bad’ cholesterol and lowering the risk of heart disease.

Fibre also acts as a ‘broom’ for your digestive system, helping everything pass through you without any aggro.

7. Up Your Daily Activity News flash: moving more can have a huge impact on weight loss.

Non-exercise activities, such as walking to work, doing household chores or chasing the kids around, can clock up serious calorie burns. In fact, these are your biggest and best opportunities to shake off extra fat without getting a sweat on.

If you have an active job, you already have a big advantage over those sat on their bums all day. It’s easily possible for someone with a very active job to burn more calories at work than an office-based worker who goes to the gym four times per week.

Either way, you should look for a minimum 10,000 steps a day to maintain good health and burn a decent amount of energy.

Three easy ways to add to your burn:

• 20 minute ‘no excuses’ daily power walks.

• Lunch break strolls instead of coffee and Facebook.

• Chasing the kids around the soft play instead of drinking a latte.

8. Exercise A Little Bit You don’t need to have aspirations of Olympic glory to benefit from exercise. Anything that gets you out of breath will do the job. If you feel a bit intimated at the gym, go with a friend or train when it’s quiet.

Here are three more ideas:

• A brisk hour walk 3 x per week.

• Self-defense or dance classes.

• The latest celebrity fitness DVD Decide on which days you’ll do your exercise and stick to them with no excuses.

9. Chill The Hell Out Stress is not good for weight loss, so if you feel you’re doing everything right and still not losing weight, you may have just found the answer.

There seems to be a link between psychological stress from daily living and life events, and weight gain. Worrying about work or bills, relationship troubles, even spending time on social media, can cause enough grief to mess up your diet.

Even dieting causes stress.

Here are three ways to reduce your stress levels:

• Talk to people and get anything bothering you off your chest.

• Learn simple, quick meditation techniques - you don’t need to be a hippy.

• Get more sleep. Who doesn’t want more time in bed?

Talking of sleep, studies have also shown that women sleeping less than five hours per night are more likely to be overweight than those sleeping between 7-8 hours. It’s thought that hormones regulating your appetite can get messed up when you are sleep deprived, so you overeat – especially carbs.

Start by getting just one extra hour of sleep per night – that’s a whole 15 days worth of extra sleep per year. Think of the dreams!

10. Start Now There will never be a perfect time. What are you waiting for?

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