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hs#h-effiilh WilGHT L0SSShape puts the latest electronic tools to the test to see ifthey can help you drop pounds. By Bethany Gumper

Savvy dieters know that tracking what they eat is the key to their weight-loss success. "Keeping a food journal increases your awareness of whatyou're putting in your mouth," says Cleveland-based American Dietetic Asso-

ciation spokeswoman Cindy Moore, M.S., R.D. But these days, few of us stilluse spiral-bound notebooks.

Now, a slew of high-tech handheld devices use bytes to help you track yourbites. In an effort to lose a few extra pounds, boost my diet's nutrition and

curb my junk-food addictions, I road-tested three different programs on threeseparate devices for two weeks each: a cell phone to create a video clip of mymeals, which I sent to a nutritionist; a Palm Pilot to aid me in following WeightWatchers'Points system; and a BlackBerry that calculated how many dailycalories I needed for weight loss.

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you to easily track

These gadgets definitely work - I shed

an average of a pound a week using each

one and was able to retool my diet toinclude more whole grains, fruits and veg-gies and less processed foods and sweets.

To learn how I did it and see if taking your

diet high-tech is right for you, read on.

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How it works Before meals, you grabyour phone and snap a brief video clip orpicture of your food, then press "send"

to transmit it to a registered dietitianassigned to you by MyFoodPhone. Atleast once a week, you log on to myfoodphone.com to get video feedback fromyour R.D. and view your progress.

ln the real world There's no deterrent tounhealthy eating like being forced toshow a weight-loss expert everythingyou consume. Tempe, Ariz.-based nutri-tionist Amanda Carlson, M.S., R.D.,

observed my typical habits for a fewdays. During the week, I usually have oat-

meal and coffee loaded with cream and

sugar for breakfast, a sandwich or salad

with soda for lunch, an afternoon choco-late fix of a cookie or a few Hershey'sKisses, followed by pasta or chicken and

veggies for dinner, with an ice-cream bar

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for dessert. On the weekend, I'm muchworse: Happy hours and dinners out withfriends or my boyfriend mean wine and

high-fat, high-calorie fare. Carlson's daily

dietary Rx: Get in five or six mini-meals(300 calories each) to keep my energyup and stop afternoon snack attacks,consume three servings of dairy or take

calcium supplements (1 ,000 milligrams)to help prevent osteoporosis, drink eightglasses of water and include fruits and

veggies with each meal.

Initially, I was daunted by her to-do list,

but it was surprisingly easy to follow. I

stuck to oatmeal for breakfast butpacked healthy snacks to eat throughoutthe day - apples with peanut butter, cot-

tage cheese, carrot sticks, turkey sand-

wiches and string cheese. P

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what you eat.

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ffi Although snapping my food at

ffi restaurants was embarrassing, it

ffi worked! At happy hour, a co-workerwk offered me greasy chicken strips. I

ffi was tempted but didn't want to photo-

ffi graph it, so I ordered a Plain baked

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W*$qfut b$mt**t#ns #m-thm*ffi#How it works This sidekick to WeightWatchers Online lets you follow the Flex

Plan (you track foods' "Points") or theno-counting Core Plan (you eat onlyfrom a list of approved foods) withoutattending a single meeting. You down-load the Weiqht Watchers On-the-Goapplication from weightwatchers.com(using a PC with Windows 98 or newer)to a handheld device via the USB Hot-

Sync cable that comes with your hand-

held. Your PDA must run the Palmoperating system version 3.5 or higher(this includes Palm, Handspring, Sonyand Dell models, but not the popularBlackBerry). Then, scroll through a

database of 27,000-plus foods andtrack how many points you've con-sumed or select the foods you've eaten

from a Core-friendly list. Synchronizingthe data between your PDA and youraccount on weiqhtwafchers. com is

easy - you just make sure the HotSync

cable is connected to your handheldand your PC and push the "HotSync"button on your PDA.

ln the real world I chose the Flex Plan.

Based on my height and weight, Weight

Watchers granted me 20 daily points(along with a 35-point allowance tospread out during the week). lsoonlearned that 20 points don't go very far.

One instant-oatmeal packet for break-

fast and poof! Three points gone. A cup

of fat-free cottage cheese and a banana

for lunch cost me five, and a WeightWatchers frozen dinner and a salad withranch dressing knocked down eightmore. My remaining four points left littleroom for lattes, treats or even healthysnacks like an apple.

Logging my points on the Palmwasn't as embarrassing,but it washarder to stay on track without a dieti-

tian checking up on me. But that's not tosay I was on my own. Weiqhtwafchers

t8a $ eat right I sHnpe September 2Oo5 i Shape.com

.com offers motivation and inspiration:meal ideas, 38 message boards and adatabase of 'l ,000 recipes.

An added benefit of Weight Watchers

On-the-Go: My workout incentive sky-rocketed. Once I learned that I could earn

Activity Points for my workouts and swap

them for Food Points, I'd find myself on

the treadmill thinking, "Just run for fivemore minutes! Forty-five minutes equals

five points, which equals one Starbucks

Grande nonfat Gffd Mocha!"

ffTfummfux #m&*nE* #*axmt*rHow it works Register your Java-enabled cell phone (most new phones

support Java applications) for a Calorie

Counter account at unc.2thumbz.com,and wait for the prompt to downloadthe application to your phone. Enteryour height and weight, and it will deter-mine how many calories you need dailyto meet a weight-loss goal by a setdate. Track your food intake by select-

ing foods and beverages from a 500-item database; then upload your datafrom your phone to the website using

the Calorie Counter software (no cables

or special accessories necessary, andyour computer can be a Mac or a PC - itjust needs to have a web browser). On

the website, see how your diet stacks

up to the U.S. Department of Agricul-ture (USDA) Dietary Guidelines.

ln the real world Need to drop 20 pounds

by Thanksgiving? This tool is for you! When

I set a goal of 2 pounds in two weeks, the

Glorie Counter told me that, with moder-

ate exercise three to five days a week, I

needed to consume no more than 1,7 18

calories per day. Since I was already used

to eating smaller portions from my experi-

ence with MyFoodPhone and WeightWatchers, this was no problem.

I ran the Calorie Counter on a Black-

Berry, but you don't need a PDA; it will

run on any handheld device that supportsJava text. lt was easy to enter the foodsand watch my calories. This program put

me in control; with no nutritionist check-

ing up on me, and no message boardsoffering encouragement, I had to make

sure I kept myself on track.

When I logged on to the website onday three, my calorie charts were per-

fecl between 1,700 and 1,75O calories

a day. But my daily nutrient intake was

a far cry from the USDA Dietary Guide-

lines: There were only 1O grams of fiberin my diet (the recommended is 25),and my sodium was through the roof at3,500 milligrams (the recommended is

2,300). So I added berries to my oat-meal, packed whole-grain sandwichesfor lunch, ate low-sodium legumes withdinner and cut back on processedfoods. When I checked the website a

week later, my diet was back on track.

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MyFoodPhoneFrt** Sgg per month (includes

weekly feedback from a nutritionistand access to subscription-onlyareas at myfoodphone.com;doesn't include phone or cell-phone service)Works em Any camera- or video-

enabled cell phone and all majorU.S. cell-service carriers**st fsr The lazy dieterwho has trouble committingto a healthy lifestylefinf* myfoodphone.com

Weight Watchers On-the-GoFr$se SgO sign-up fee,plus St7 per month forWeight Watchers Online and

55 per month for Weight

Watchers On-the-Go (doesn't

include the PDA)

Wmrks er: Any PDA thatruns the Palm operatingsystem, version 3.5 or higher;devices from Palm, Handspring, Sonyand Dell will work, but not theBlackBerry or Treoffi*st f*n The structure-loving dieterwho wants a virtual support group*mf* (800) 651-600 O, weightwatchers.com/pda

2Thumbz Calorie CounterFri*e 55 flat fee - plus 52 permonth (or SZO per year) tostore data on the website (not

including cell phone/PDA)

W*rks cn Any device thatsupports Java applications;will work on newer cell phones

and PDAs like BlackBerryffi*st fsr The self-sufficient dieter on a

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