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A perfect fit, twice over! Our biggest success story—ever! - Life Change; Keith Veri loses 100 pounds - Interview

Men's Fitness, Feb, 2004 by Sean Huson

AFTER DROPPING NEARLY 100 pounds of fat, Keith Veri up. Then, six months later, he was again, running a fat-burning boot him a success story--times two.

"I went to buy a suit in a regular store, and the salesman laughed at me," Keith Veri laments of his great past. "He told me to go to a Big & Tall store. That was sad. But the saddest part was I'm only 5'6"--I might have been big, but I'm not at all tall!"

Incredibly, Veri wasn't always that big, either. He emerged from the Marine Corps in tremendous shape. "But then, all of a sudden, I just started eating," he says of his one-year transition from 180 pounds to 285. "Next thing you know, I was fat."

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Throughout his weight gain, Veri was an avid powerlifter, hoisting some 800 pounds on the squat. So naturally, he was thrilled with his new mass. "The whole mentality is 'The heavier you are, the stronger you are.' But I was a mixture of fat, muscle, and then more fat! Once you reach a certain point, you don't even realize you're getting fatter. You just get bigger and bigger."

Amazingly, Veri kept his job as a personal trainer, even as his feet faded from view. But when his limbs started going numb, he found he could no longer carry the weight. "My heart was doing a tap dance. One day, I just passed out. Doctors told me I had had a minor heart attack."

Knowing he needed to take action, he eased into what later became an intensive cardio regimen. "Fifteen minutes a day, three times a week, I walked on a treadmill or climbed on the Stairmaster. Slowly." From there, Veri added another day of cardio or another five minutes to his routine every two weeks or so, eventually building up to a heart-bursting five days of 45-minute sessions.

But the improvements Veri made to his diet were key. He severely reduced his caloric intake, cutting a 10,000-calorie-a-day intake to just 3,500. The meals were high in protein and low in sugar, often including egg whites, oatmeal, chicken, veggies, and meal-replacement shakes. "But I had bad cravings for pizza, pasta ... anything with a carbohydrate in it. I used to eat a whole pizza by myself," he remembers with pride. "I could drink a case of beer at a time."

Still, the man was determined. "I set a goal to lose two to four pounds per week, and in about a year I was down to 215." Then the moment of truth came. "My morn passed away from cancer; she was only 48. And I blew up again." Stalled by his grief, Veri stopped working out, started eating everything that wasn't nailed down, and exploded back to 250-260 pounds in just two months.

"Yeah, it was pretty discouraging, but finally a client of mine said, 'You need to snap out of it.'" His head cleared, and Veri vowed to lose the weight once more. "I did it for myself, but knowing it would have made her happy may have been the biggest motivation."

In a few months, he was back to 215 and teaching boot camp at a gym in New Jersey. Then, after adding cycling to his plan, he shrank to a tightly wrapped 170 pounds, leaner than he was when he first left the Marines.

These days, Veri works as a trainer at Crunch Fitness in New York City. But he still feels great sympathy for the obese and plans to create programs for those with extreme weight problems. As for his old fat clothes? "I still have 'em. They're at home ... somewhere."--SH

A perfect fit, twice over! Our biggest success story—ever! - Life Change; Keith Veri loses 100 pounds - Interview

Men's Fitness, Feb, 2004 by Sean Huson

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