Secrets of The Belly Off! Club

How do you lose nearly 2 million pounds? We wanted to know, because that's the combined weight that members of the Men's Health Belly Off! Club—our online fat-loss community—have dropped since 2002. So we pored through their testimonials, searching for the common strategies that have helped more than 300,000 formerly fat men shrink their big guts. And we were surprised to find that many of our Belly Off heroes cited the same simple weight-loss techniques, whether they'd lost 10, 60, 100, or even 150 pounds.

Those same real-world strategies, supported by scientific research, form the backbone of our new book, The Belly Off! Diet (Rodale, 2009). What worked so well for so many men can work for you, too. The Belly Off! Diet is about real men eating real food and doing workouts designed to fit a hectic, real-world schedule. Consider it your no-fail, guy-tested weight-loss plan.

Ninety-six percent of Belly Off! Club losers cut out refined grains and sugar. This may be the simplest way to eliminate empty-calorie junk foods from your diet. The list of products to pass up includes white bread (and other baked goods), soda, candy, and potato chips. These foods are loaded with fast-absorbing carbs that raise your blood sugar quickly. A sugar spike is typically followed by a crash, which can leave you feeling sluggish and hungry—a detrimental combination for any diet. So try to avoid products that contain sugar in any form (sucrose, high-fructose corn syrup, or cane syrup) and refined flour. (If it doesn't start with the word "whole," as in whole wheat, cut it out.)

Ninety-three percent now eat more protein, healthy fats, and fiber-rich produce and whole grains. This is the balanced diet you're looking for. Protein fills you up while you're eating and provides the raw material to help you maintain and build muscle. Fat tastes good and keeps you satisfied for hours after a meal. And fiber, which is also filling, slows down the absorption of carbohydrates into your bloodstream, so you'll have energy all day long.

The final part of the picture: produce. Vegetables and fruits are low in calories, high in fiber, and packed with healthful antioxidants.

Seventy-five percent eat breakfast every day. In the morning, you have an entire day's worth of activity to fuel. After dinner, you lie motionless for eight hours. You don't have to be a nutrition scientist to understand why you should eat big right after you rise. In fact, researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University found that dieters who regularly ate a protein-rich, 610-calorie breakfast lost significantly more weight in eight months than those who consumed only 290 calories and a quarter of the protein. Turns out, the big-breakfast eaters, who lost an average of 40 pounds each during the study, had an easier time sticking with the diet even though both groups took in similar daily calories.