Bob Fisher, a member of Beyond Strength for over two years now, is a confident and strong guy. He likes long walks on the baseball field, picking heavy weight up off the floor, and wearing his patriotic Speedo (don’t ask).
He’s a fit dude. But he wasn’t always this way.
If you saw Bob two years ago, you might not recognize him. He was a different man. Because within his first six months at BSP NOVA, due to his hard work and commitment to his training and nutrition, Bob was able to lose 47 pounds.
Nope, your glasses don’t need to be cleaned, you read that right—he lost 47 pounds. Talk about kicking some major butt!
Here’s the best part: he made this amazing transformation by making one small change. A change that, at first glance, seems too simple to be true.
Before I share the “how” behind Bob’s success though, to fully understand things, it will be helpful to start at the beginning: before Bob joined BSP NOVA.
Bob Wanted A Fat Loss Solution
Two years ago, Bob weighed around 212 pounds. In large part, this was due to his nutrition habits and behaviors. He ate Taco Bell and other fast food three to four times a week. Some nights, he would also grab a few brews with his buddies after baseball or softball games. Needless to say, his nutrition choices weren’t helping his fat loss goal.
He was active though.
Bob played baseball and softball consistently, as well as doing P90x or Insanity six or seven days a week. And he got results from it. Things were good; they weren’t perfect though.
Bob realized that, though he saw some results, there was something those programs didn’t help with: keeping the results over time. He would attack the workouts day after day, week after week, month after month…and then stop. He wasn’t consistent in the long-term.
Bob saw this as a problem.
He would lose weight, then gain it back. It was frustrating.
To be clear: Bob did like those programs, but they weren’t the best long-term fit for him. So he needed a solution.
Bob wanted to train somewhere that would teach him proper exercise technique, and educate him on why he was doing them. He wanted to feel confident enough to do the exercises on his own if needed—if he was traveling, for example.
He also knew he needed to address his nutrition.
Bob understood that eating fast food three to four times a week was an obstacle to achieving his goals. So, with the understanding that he needed to work on his exercise and nutrition, Bob joined Beyond Strength.
Bob’s First Day at BSP NOVA
Bob pulled his car into the parking spot in front of BSP NOVA, next to the yellow flag indicating where the gym was located. He walked up to the door where he found Chris—the founder of BSP NOVA—waiting to greet him and shake his hand. As Bob stepped through the doorway towards the consultation room, he passed the “What’s your goal today?” sign.
Shortly after sitting down with Chris, Bob said, “I want somebody to ask me what I ate the day before.” Bob wanted a way to be held accountable for his nutrition. Luckily for Bob, as Chris explained to him, that was already something that we did at BSP. On member’s training programs there is a readiness questionnaire on the back that asks about nutrition each and every time they come in.
Bob was pumped to learn this. It was exactly what he was looking for.
When he came in to train, he would walk in and mark down R (for poor nutrition), Y (for SO-SO nutrition), or G (for great nutrition) on his program. Since he didn’t want to see an R on his program, it helped him stay accountable to himself and created awareness of his eating choices. Because, if he wasn’t happy with the R he put down, then he could choose differently the next time.
Bob loved this idea, but he still hadn’t found the solution that led to his 47 pound weight loss. So he begun thinking through possible solutions.
He knew he needed to find a nutrition approach—one that he could consistently follow over time—that helped him not only to lose fat, but to keep it off. While he didn’t know the solution from day one, he did know what he didn’t want to do: follow a “name diet.”
To Diet Or Not to Diet?
“Name diets,” as Bob referred to them, are the popular diets like Keto or Paleo. His problem with these diets is the same problem he discovered with P90x and Insanity: they worked…until they didn’t. They often had strict rules—no carbs or no fat, for example—which made him less likely to stick with it.
He wasn’t a fan of that.
The diets might get him to lose fat quickly, and sure, that was nice, but it would eventually come back. No. Bob knew better. Bob wanted to find a way to lose fat and keep it off—for good.
So, if Bob didn’t follow a name diet to achieve fat loss, then what was his secret? What nutrition change worked?
It was this: he cooked his own food.
Seriously. His secret was he started cooking all his food.
Hang with me for a second, because I can understand if that seems too good to be true. “He cooked his own food?” you think, “That’s it? There has to be something else.” Nope. Sorry. No quick fix was used. No complex diet was followed. Bob just started cooking his own meals.
There were three reasons why this worked so well for Bob:
- By cooking his meals at home, he stopped eating out three to four times a week. That greatly reduced the total calories he consumed.
- Since he made all his meals, he knew exactly what was going into them. For example, instead of using a ton of butter in a dish, he could substitute it for something else, or get rid of it all together.
- Bob enjoyed Making the switch to home cooked meals allowed Bob to do something he enjoyed—cooking—which made it easier to stick with.
It really was that simple. Bob didn’t need to follow some diet that was successful in the short-term, but failed in the long-term; he didn’t need to follow something with strict rules; and, it didn’t have to be complicated.
Instead, he found a positive nutrition change that allowed him to do something he already enjoyed doing. Once he made the switch to cooking all his meals at home, the pounds started dropping off.
Beyond Body Fat
“When you commit to something, and really commit, and start to see results, there is no part of your life that isn’t improved.” -Bob Fisher
Bob’s story shows us that being successful with fat loss is possible; that big changes start with a small change—like switching from takeout to home cooked meals; and, that change doesn’t have to be complex.
Losing 47 pounds was a huge milestone for Bob. It showed him that he was capable of setting long-term goals and achieving them.
As all TV infomercials say though: but wait, there’s more!
Bob’s fat loss journey didn’t just affect him physically—by having 47 pounds less body fat—but in other ways: he’s more confident—at the gym, out with friends, everywhere—he fields ground balls in Baseball with more ease, and he feels happier in his own skin.
That transformation changed more than just his body, it changed his life.