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Posted by Editor | Filed under Andy Bloch, Weight Loss

Because of Andy Bloch’s offer last October, I found myself in the worst position a fat gambler could imagine: losing weight but NOT having a weight-loss bet. After posting Part II of this blog, I sent Andy Bloch a consolation note. I wanted to thank him for getting me motivated to lose weight and let him know I was on a path to doing so even though he hadn’t proposed an actual weight-loss bet.

Andy Bloch came through! After very minor negotiations, we came up with the following wager:

• I have to weigh 200 lbs or less by the start of the World Series of Poker.
• We defined the time and place as the Amazon Room at the Rio in Las Vegas, at 5pm on May 28, the start of the Player’s Championship event.
• If I don’t meet the goal, I pay Andy Bloch $10,000.
• If I meet the goal, Andy Bloch pays me $20,000.
• In exchange for 2-to-1 odds, I have to invest the $20,000 in WSOP buy-ins with Andy owning 50% of my action.

Arguably, I could have pressed for better terms. Although I haven’t priced myself as a poker investment on the open market, I assume I would have insisted on some premium based on my skill and prior record. On the other hand, Andy Bloch is doing me a huge favor, so it’s not only unseemly to haggle but not necessarily in my favor to figure out the actual odds of my losing that amount of weight.

To get to 200 lbs (from my last October weight in the 250s) shouldn’t be an extraordinarily difficult feat. It’s fifty pounds in five months. The biggest barrier is getting started – and I already cleared that. In fact, at the time Bloch agreed to the bet it was more like forty pounds in four-and-a-half months. So even thought his bet doesn’t give me a premium for the action I’m “selling,” it’s not likely that my chances for success merit getting 2-to-1 odds.

Structuring the bet in this fashion will also help me at the World Series. As always seems to be the case, I’m looking at the upcoming World Series Schedule and trying to figure out where I’ll get the money. I’ve had my eye on a few of the $10,000 buy-in Championship events – like HORSE and Stud Eight-or-Better – and winning this bet will give me a chance to play a pair of events I most likely would not have otherwise played. (My friend Marissa offered me a similar bet at much smaller stakes, which I also accepted. It involves the first $1,000 buy-in event, though, because I already planned to play it, gives Marissa, in the event I win the bet, 33% of my action.)

I’ve already made substantial progress toward the goal and I will keep you posted along the way. I’m on a medically-supervised diet in which I weigh-in with a nutritionist once a week. Yesterday, I weighed in at 232.4 lbs, a loss of 4.8 lbs since the previous week and approximately 21 lbs less than I weighed at the start in late December.

The diet is called HCG. Although Jo Anne and the girls are doing it as well, the whole process scares me so much that I don’t even want to look up what HCG stands for. It involves pregnancy hormones, needle drugs, 500 calories per day, and is restrictions like no lip balm or deoderant. They let you stay on it for no more than six weeks at a time.

Jo Anne has been nice enough to take care of the food purchasing and preparation. It’s not that either involves much time on this diet, but it has freed me from looking at or thinking about food. After a few weeks, Kim, the nutritionist, gave us a “recipe book” based on the diet. When I looked at it, I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. It consisted primarily of recipes with titles that sounded familiar and appetizing, made from ingredients that were neither. If Kim hadn’t given us the recipes for free, I’d have considered suing someone for false advertising.

Let’s face it, when you can eat only 500 calories per day, there’s not a lot of room to innovate.  For instance, the “lemon meringue pie” consisted of a piece of melba toast, cooked egg whites, and some kind of new food flavoring additive that probably turns your urine green – if you’re lucky. But I’ve lost over twenty pounds in five weeks, and Jo Anne has lost almost thirty-five in her almost-two terms on HCG.

Next week, we start six weeks of maintenance. To assure that I keep losing weight, Shauna and I are going to exercise at the local gym each morning during the week. (At least that’s what I promised.)

I will keep you posted on the following: (1) My current weight and weight loss; (2) What happens with this new exercise “business”; (3) How I deal with potential psychological barriers like slowed weight loss and getting beneath some of my historic lowest weights; and (4) What I want to do with the many helpful comments and emails I have received offering advice or bets. If I can get Uncle Tilty to loosen the purse strings on the fortune he has made the last two weeks from Rush Poker and Double Guarantees Week, perhaps Full Tilt can offer some kind of promotion.

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3 Responses to “#954 – How to Lose Pounds Money and Dreams Part III – The Wai[s]ting is the Hardest Part”

1. Montana Mike Says:
   January 28th, 2010 at 4:27 am

   Congrat’s, the degen’s have turned you out and into one!

   Ever decide to do a “whatever happened to” truthful article and find out the truth about the luck boxes that were “hero’s” that won poker events and where they are today?

   I only “go back” to the Nugget era with Bill Boyd, Johnny Moss, Eric Drache – Scoff, Bob Ciaffone, O’Neal, Garland, Seymour, Sarge, Ray Zee, Stu, Jack Keller, Pat Calihan, Bill Smith, Jack Strauss, to name a few – I have met, played with and seen the money and the “hero’s” come and go.

2. Dale Says:
   January 30th, 2010 at 3:57 pm

   Hey Michael,
   Love your blog but that is a seriously crazy way to be reducing your bodyfat/weight. I just read about HCG and I wouldn’t go anywhere near it.

   Anyway when you go back to a normal weight loss diet which can’t be defined as maintenance if you still have weight to lose might I add. You need to go on a reduced carb, high protein, good fats eating plan. Eat 5-6 small meals a day and include daily exercise (4hrs min a week) with at least 2 resistance sessions and a hard cardio a week. I do this for a living with my clients as a personal trainer in Australia. Your daily macronutrient goals should be worked at as a function of Lean body mass x (goal = fat loss / base daily activity level (x) / body type (x)) I can work this out for you with some correspondence. Good luck Michael.

3. Ted Says:
   February 21st, 2010 at 12:26 pm

   According to Wikipedia (yeah, yeah, I know) “The controversy proceeds from warnings by the Journal of the American Medical Association and the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition that hCG is neither safe, nor effective as a weight-loss aid.”

   I did Atkins about 10 years ago … lost weight but ended up w/ kidney stones. Now I do moderation and tennis. Be careful. Good luck.

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