http://www.fitday.com/While it isn't martial arts technique, fitday.com is a handy tool if you're looking to monitor your food intake (portion control) or drop some weight. Best of all, it's free.
What you do is sign up, and then track what you eat on a daily basis. While the online database has alot of food already covered, you can also add the info from the nutritional label of the food packages. The items you have to input from the label are calories, fat, carbohydrates, and protein.
I ignore the "healthy weight" ranges. It says my ideal weight is somewhere around 150lb and that's unrealistic. Most men, especially martial artists, have higher muscle mass and bone density than the chart estimates. Your resting metabolism may also vary but with some careful monitoring you can figure out what it is after a few weeks. (3500 calories equals roughly 1 lb)
I know there are tons of crock out there with fad diets and Weight Watchers type groups. Sure some work, but you really don't need to pay someone hundreds of dollars a month for books and frozen dinners to tell you that the key to losing weight is eating less calories than you burn. Doctors say that safe weight loss is 2-3 lb per week, so you're looking at cutting about 1000-1500 calories from your daily intake. It's a tough adjustment at first and it requires a little discipline when it comes to getting into the habit of using measuring cups to portion your foods, but it becomes much easier once you hit the 2 week mark. (The body readjusts from just burning your calorie intake to burning your fat stores too). After awhile you'll be able to portion food without needing a cup and everything's all golden.
I published my blog at
http://www.fitday.com/WebFit/PublicJournals.html?Owner=BayaniSo far in two weeks, I've lost about 7lb. I'm looking to get down to 215 by the end of the year before I re-evaluate. If other people start some journals of their own and publish them here, we could lend each other some moral support and all that.
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