G’day,

Since I started RTP Blog on November 8, 2006 four media profiles have been published on my weight loss journey. Below you can watch the NHK TV profile, FUJI TV profile, and read the two Men’s Fitness Magazine profiles (US Edition, April 2008 and Australian Edition, August 2008).

===================================================

Adam Waters On NHK TV Japan

===================================================

Day 620: Mens Fitness Australia Profile

G’day Shredders

As I discussed in Shredder Sunday #23 Video, the first ever edition of Mens Fitness Australia contains an article on my shredding journey!

Below is a full reprint of the article with some extra pictures, videos and links inserted to provide context and documentation.

I’d like to say a massive thank you to Hannah and the team at Mens Fitness Australia for writing and publishing this article.

It is truly a spin-out to see this in a magazine from my home country and something I could never have predicted when I started this blog 623 days ago.

So, without further adieu here is the article below!

Enjoy!

P.S. Full details of the soon-to-be-released RTP Transformation System and South Beach Event coming very soon. Stay tuned…

P.S.S. For my Fellow Shredders you’ll also see a reference to the original RTP Group Shred towards the end of the article!

Mens Fitness Australia: August/September 2008, Edition #1

Adam Waters: Blogging To Beat The Bulge

Browsing the Internet can waste away the hours but unfortunately doesn’t help with wasting away the weight. Adam Waters, 33, decided to put the Net’ to good use and used it as his primary tool to beat the bulge and get fit.

Originally from Brisbane, Waters moved to Osaka in Japan in 2000 to teach English. Before he moved, he stood six feet tall and weighed in at a lean 71 kilograms with a bodyfat percentage of just eight percent. Waters was a healthy human specimen.

However, upon relocating to Japan he left his healthy lifestyle behind. Waters was faced with dietary dilemmas that he didn’t have the willpower to conquer, “A lot of traditional dishes over here are very high in carbs,” he says. “And the term vegetarian doesn’t even compute.”

To add to to the unhealthy diet, Waters wasn’t exercising. He was commuting long distances to work, which minimised the time when he would normally work out or play sport. His lifestyle had changed and his body was suffering.

In 2006, Waters booked a trip to Phuket with a plan to enjoy the sun and surf and take a break from his busy life as a schoolteacher. On a gorgeous sunny day at the beach he pulled off his shirt and was struck with horror and shame.

Adam had let himself go, his body was an overweight mess and he could not avoid it any longer. The holiday was ruined, as he couldn’t supress his self-conscious embarrassed feelings. It was time to face the fat.

Waters returned home determined to reshape his now flabby 84kg physique and lower his bodyfat, which was now at 20% of his total bodyweight, but he didn’t quite know where to begin.

He took a photo of himself, posted it online and announced his mission to lose weight to the world (RTP Blog Zero Day: My Secret Pictures Revealed After 3 Years) .

Making his commitment to losing weight public would give him the motivation to stick to his word. “I wanted external accountability in real time,” says Waters.

In promising to get fit he also promised to post a daily photo of himself so that everyone could witness his gradual progress or give him a hard time if he was slacking off, “This gave me additional pressure to finish the job.” (Day 1: The Truth Hurts)

Waters tackled his bad eating habits first and began making his own meals rather than eating out or ordering all the time. He ditched fatty tempura and teriyaki and began eating fresh raw vegetables, fruit and lots of chicken and fish.

He combined this new health eating program with high intensity sessions and circuit training at the gym. Eighty four days and 84 photos later Waters was seeing a transformation. He had “shred” a massive 9.5 kilos of fat and the gut, which ruined his holiday in Phuket, had shrunk five inches and had taken on the shape of a six-pack.

He then collated the 84 pictures and turned them into a mini-movie and posted it on YouTube for all to see. The public support he received was overwhelming.

Since that day, Waters has not stopped. He has continued with his online blogging and has had many followers contact him to congratulate him and to ask for help to begin their own transformation.

In 2007, he led a 14-day challenge online in which 14 people began their own daily blog and posted a new photo each day to make them accountable for their weight loss just as Waters was.

Just like Waters, their progress was astounding.

Day 365 Video:

Closing The Book On One Year With The Shredder Council

Waters has travelled to America where he has won prizes and been invited to share his innovative weight loss blogging program.

My Winning Contest Video

In front of the EPCOT entrance.

He has done photo shoots in New York and continues to inspire people all over the world to “shred” the fat and change their lives forever.

When looking at Waters now it is hard to believe that he was once sporting a double chin, a potbelly and living a sedentary lifestyle. He continues to blog on a daily basis, is no longer ashamed to go to the beach and lives to “eat clean, shred hard and think big.”

===================================================

Day 493: Men’s Fitness Success Story Goes Live!

G’day Shredders,

As I mentioned in yesterday’s Day 492 Video: Last Day On The Job what I do for a living over here in Japan is no longer a “secret”. This is because an interview I recently conducted with Brandon Guarneri from Mens Fitness magazine is now in print in the April 2008 US edition (which mentions my job!)

This truly blows my mind because I bought a copy of Mens Fitness when I was in Australia last year as a souvenir for my brother because it had Tiger Woods on the cover (my brother is a Australian PGA Golf pro living abroad). Never in my wildest dreams did I think I’d be in an issue of Mens Fitness 8 months later!

Also, the web version of this article has now gone live. Below is how the article currently appears on www.MensFitness.com/success where they also link to my video, 84 Days In 48 Seconds.

P.S. I’d like to say a big thank you to Brandon Guarneri for interviewing me and writing an article that explains 7 years of my life so succinctly. Thanks mate!

by Brandon Guarneri,
Mens Fitness, April 2008

An English teacher living in Japan, he indulged in local foods and skipped workouts. When he finally decided to shed the weight, he needed some extra motivation. So he started photographing himself daily and posting the pics on his blog for the world to see.

After 84 days, Waters had completely transformed his physique. He edited together the pics, made sort of a virtual flipbook, and posted the video online. Since then, his success has spawned a series of online “missions,” where he continues to document his efforts to get as jacked and lean as possible.

Check out his first 84-day transformation here.

84 Days In 48 Seconds: YouTube Version

1,265,233 Views As of May 7, 2008

World Wide Waist
How logging online helped Adam reboot his body

There’s a lot of dreck on the Internet. That’s why it’s so easy to waste hours surfing sites littered with celebrity scandals and pop-up porn. But for Adam Waters, 33, the ‘net is more than just a place to read gossip or check e-mail: It’s the tool that helped him get fit.

Originally from Brisbane, Australia, Waters has been teaching English in Osaka, Japan, since 2000. He loves his job, but it came with unique obstacles that challenged his fitness. Lean and athletic growing up, Waters was a trim 6’0″, 156 pounds, with just 8% body fat, when he headed overseas. But with his new life in a new land, Waters could not maintain a healthy diet. “A lot of traditional dishes over here are very high in carbs,” he says. “And the term ‘vegetarian’ doesn’t compute.” To compound matters, Waters often traveled for work, forcing him to regularly miss workouts.

He got a rude awakening when he went on a beach vacation to Phuket, Thailand, in August 2006. When Waters peeled his shirt off, he felt self-conscious and ashamed, suddenly coming to grips with the fact that he’d let himself go to pot. “You just can’t relax when you’re out of shape,” he says. “That really kicked me into high gear.”

Though committed to becoming fit again, Waters, then a flabby 185 pounds, was unsure of how to proceed. After a few months, he took a shirtless photo of himself and measured his body fat—it was 20%. Knowing he had to do something and sensing that if he posted his mission online he’d be more motivated to stick to it, he created a blog featuring his picture and announcing his intention to get in shape.

Once he posted a link to it in a fitness forum, the challenge was on for the whole world to see. “I wanted external accountability in real time,” says Waters. Additionally, he promised to upload a new picture each day. “This gave me additional pressure to finish the job.”

Then, the transformation began: Waters started preparing his own meals, eliminating processed junk from his diet and opting for lots of chicken, fish, raw fruits, and veggies. In the gym, he did high-intensity cardio and circuit training.

By the end of January ’07, 84 days after he began, Waters had shed 21 pounds of fat and five inches off his waist. Pleased with his results, he edited together all 84 pictures in his archive, turning his three-month transformation into a 48-second movie clip, which he posted on YouTube. Though he’d made commendable progress, Waters wasn’t quite convinced that he should take his shirt off on a beach.

Eager for approval, he asked readers of his blog to vote on whether his abs constituted a six-pack. If the majority said no, he would skip his already-paid-for vacation back to Phuket. To his surprise, voters overwhelmingly applauded his achievement, and Waters went. Though he continues to inspire people, the ever humble Waters is reluctant to see himself as a role model. “I’m just an English teacher!” he says.

===================================================