Nov. 21, 2025
How John Lost 50 lbs, 231-175, at 60 and Got His Life Back - 21
In this episode of Driven For Health, Coach Brian Parana talks with John Meyer about how he lost over 50 pounds at age 60 and rebuilt his health, energy, and confidence.
John had spent years gaining weight while running a business, raising a family, working long hours, and putting most of his energy into everyone and everything except his own health. At his heaviest, he was in the 230s and felt tired, overextended, and unhappy with what he saw in the mirror.
Coach Brian and John talk through what finally changed: better nutrition, calorie awareness, consistent workouts, smarter food choices, tracking macros, using dieting breaks, building muscle, and making exercise part of his morning routine.
John also shares how losing weight has changed his daily life. He has more energy than he had in his 40s, feels better in his clothes, has more stamina for his wife, kids, and grandchild, and is now pushing himself through Orange Theory, rowing, swimming, biking, strength training, and new performance goals.
This episode is a strong listen for men over 40 and 50 who feel like their health has slipped, their weight has crept up, and they need a clear example of what it looks like to get back in control.
In this episode, you’ll hear how John, a 60-year-old business owner, father, and grandfather, turned his health around after years of slow weight gain and neglecting himself.
He came into the program in the 230s, tired, stressed, and frustrated with how far things had slipped. Today he sits at 181 pounds with more energy than he had in his 40s.
We break down the real changes that moved the needle for him. How he learned to fuel his body the right way.
How tracking his calories and protein finally gave him clarity.
How his energy, strength, and confidence completely shifted.
And how building consistent routines allowed him to stay active with his grandchild, enjoy weekends again, and handle life with more presence and purpose.
If you’re a busy man who has put yourself on the back burner for years, John’s story will show you what’s possible when you commit and follow a plan that actually works.
To learn more about The Call To Rise 100 Day Fat Loss Challenge, visit www.thecalltorise.com.
Want help applying this to your own health, weight, energy, or lab numbers?
Coach Brian Parana offers Health Hot Seat coaching segments for men who want a clear next step with nutrition, fitness, weight loss, blood pressure, cholesterol, A1C, or daily consistency.
Learn more about The Call To Rise, a 100-day coaching program for driven men over 40 who want to lose weight, improve their health, and rebuild confidence:
To connect with Coach Brian:
brian@brianparana.com
Disclaimer: This podcast is for education and coaching support only. It is not medical advice. Always work with your physician before changing medication, treatment, or medical care.
- Welcome to Driven for Health, episode 21. And today is a special one. You're about to hear a story of a man who rebuilt his health, his body from the ground up. And at the age of 60, he realized that he was headed in a significantly bad direction and needed to course correct. being over 40 plus pounds overweight and starting to have the doctor get on his back about his health issues and his wife too decided that it was time for a change.
- John made the change and that's who I'm bringing to our conversation today. He joined my program after a decade of slow weight gain, long work hours, and stress that comes from running a business, raising a family, [music] and holding everything together. He was in the same place many men find themselves as they get into their 40s, 50s with being tired, overextended, lots of responsibilities weighing on you.
- And he never made time for himself. He just literally was not happy with what he saw in the mirror, his energy, and how he can sleep. Over the past year, he dropped from 230s into the 175. This is excellent because at the age of 60, he has more energy than he did when he was at 40. He feels like a handsome young man again.
- He's active with his grandchild. He is stronger, leaner, and finally feels in control. It's awesome to see what he's been doing in his Orange Theory classes. He's pushing himself, having new PRs, lifting heavier, running farther in a month than he's ran in a year, and pushing himself on those 500 meter rows. You're going to hear about the mistakes he made earlier on, the changes that actually moved the needle, meaning going down on the scale, why nutrition became the real turning point.
- Want to circle back to that again. nutrition was the key and how he adopted a lifestyle that lets him bike, swim, lift, travel, be present with people he loves and also encourage them, his wife, his daughter. He works out with his son-in-law. It's awesome. This conversation is for every man who has felt stuck for years, wants a clear explanation, an example of what to do and what progress actually looks like.
- No matter [music] how young or old you are, as long as you commit to following a plan that is built for your life, John is on the call to today and we've had quite a bit of progress here over the last many months that we've been working together. He's at an all-time low for many, many years. And we're going to talk about not only as how he is juggling a busy life with being a father of three kids, grandkid.
- He owns a business dealing with marine software and electronics and yachts and stuff down in Florida. And then he just really wants to get his health back on track so he can live the excellent years left of his life just like all of us do. want to just like live live live live and that's the best way to go about this life not just slowly decline John let's intro you who are you what do you do how old are you like all the things give us a rundown man you're looking awesome today thank you Brian a lot of kudos to you
- I'm uh my name is John Meyer I'm 60 years old been uh you know battling weight for the last 10 years you nutrition has been key. I've I've really uh signed up to, you know, have a lot of uh help with nutrition and fitness and uh got to thank Brian for that. And uh that's been u um ongoing now for better part of a year for sure.
- And uh you know, very helpful with the guidance and the supervision and keeping me on a good path. >> Yes. You've got a lot of discipline, right? Business owners do that. >> Yeah. Yeah. on business owners and really busy professionals and stuff. So, uh what are some of like the the unique challenges that you face on a day in dayout basis that were like kind of getting you off track in the beginning and paint that picture of where you were in the past? I met time management uh just putting too much energy on the business to putting all my energy on the
- family, putting all my energy on just building the business and uh you know neglecting the fitness, neglecting the the healthy eating choices. It really boiled down to lifestyles and just a little bit of course change to get get it all dialed in. But a little bit of free time helped with that as well. Making the time was a big big part of it for and the commitment.
- Well, you being a business owner, the whole point of owning a business is to have a lifestyle that goes along with what it is that you want to do in your everyday life. And but that wasn't happening. And and let's talk about some of the results. Like where were you at at your heaviest? Where are you at now? And what what have been some of the along the way? >> I think uh I think probably about 235 to 240 a couple years ago.
- I think that was uh 20 2122 I think it was. But, you know, we're at 181 now. And that's with a lot of a lot of exercise, a lot of nutrition, and you know, stumbled around for about six months before I started to figure out the importance of the professional interactions with coach Brian. And, you know, different type of techniques to to get the most out of the time that I'm putting into the whether it be the exercise routines or the nutrition.
- you know, equal professionalism on both sides of that, you know, coming from you, Brian, of course. >> Well, I totally appreciate it. We have been paying attention to calories quite a bit. For our journey, we chose to do some calorie tracking and and macronutrient tracking, which has really helped keep you on point.
- You're a numbers guy anyways, right? Being a software and like just like more of an analytical business owner. And so, it's really worked out well. We turned food into numbers, right? Right. And so you see differently and you know how to fuel your body for the activity. >> How young do you feel right now? Because you don't look 60. I'm not going to lie.
- >> I don't know. I've never felt better. I've got more energy now than I had when I was 40 if the truth be known. I feel I've gained an extra 10 years somewhere just by being able to get up and move and grab my grandchild or, you know, just go out and do chores for my wife. Really, a lot of things have just totally changed. 180 degree phase shift.
- No doubt. >> Your wife has definitely made some comments, right? Who is this young guy here? Yeah. >> Was not stopping. You know, the weekend you'd be done with the work week and what just kind of chill out. >> Oh, yeah. Go go go traveling around a little bit, you know, go out with some friends, you know, go watch the grandkids. Uh just do more.
- be a little bit more present during those time offs instead of just sitting around you know on a sofa watching TV which is very negative for me personally and uh you know a lot more activitywise whether it's bike riding or swimming or walking just simple walks >> right >> very good you know with my wife every night so it's very good healthy stuff >> that uh a lot of the honeydew list done right >> yes sir very I'm I'm happy to do that 24/7 now because I've got the energy that I didn't have before.
- So, that's not a problem anymore. >> So, before we started working together, what were some of the things you tried on your own? >> Well, you know, I tried the workout routines, which was okay because I have a a strong son-in-law. But I think the nutrition is where I was falling short. I didn't realize the importance of uh the nutrition.
- I started to do a little better on my own by making some different choices with some different prepacked meals, but then you know it offered a little bit more sodium. I did wasn't getting the right type. And I think that's where you came in where I started to learn and understand the positive of good carbs and bad carbs and protein and the importance of protein and the amount of protein.
- And I think that's where things started to click and progress was starting to be made. But prior to that, I was milling around and I don't want to say wasting time uh learning new disciplines uh but not being as productive as I could have been with each and every step I think is a fair way to describe that. Not not efficient, right? Efficiency is definitely key.
- Maximize profits, return on investments and that's what this is then understood your situation and I was able to help. Okay, this is the next supposed to do. >> We we've had a pretty good progress. So, we had done some restriction of calories, right? That's how you lose weight, the calorie diet. So, so we spent time getting some weight off and then I implemented a dieting break in the middle of our our process and we were able how many calories were we trying to get in you every single day? >> 2500.
- >> Yeah. 25 sometimes 28. 2,800 2900. Yeah. I couldn't believe it. Yeah. 2900. >> And your weight, what was it doing? >> It was staying the same. It was not It was going down and staying the same. It wasn't increasing. It was never increasing, >> you know, just building muscle and uh, you know, losing weight if anything, >> right? And this is just proper nutritional science is the metabolism is adaptive.
- And if you just stay in a low calorie state, your metabolism can round down and potentially kind of plateau and sputter out in a sense. I recognized some of the patterns that were starting to show up because we had lost a pretty good amount of weight. You down to about >> 30 to 40 pounds now. So we we paused, we got the calories up, started working them back into the mix.
- And and is every week, hey, your weight's the same. You've eaten more. Let's eat some more. And so we took that to another level. Now we're in a subtle calorie deficit, not as much as we were in the past because all of the that time off because we spent a couple months with a lot more calories in you to work on building muscle and really go along with training that you were putting in and stuff.
- So I love it and I'm really excited. One of the things that I was excited to get you on is we were at a new alltime low last week. >> Got to get you on here and talk. >> Yeah. let them know what were some of the motivations in your stage of of life and in your health and your athletic career in a sense.
- What motivated you to and is a driving factor for you to keep you moving in distraction? Well, you know, sometimes uh you know, depending on what you get fixated on, for me it was weight. But, uh, what I what I learned along the way was it really wasn't so much the weight. It was the the the how did I look? How did I feel? All of a sudden, I'm buying new shirts.
- I'm buying new shorts. I'm going from extra large to large. I'm going from 38 to 36 to 34. And that right there was just remarkable. And that was almost heating the fire. Once you get a little bit of progress, you start to step up your intensity a little bit. I think that's what happened to me.
- I started to not focus on the weight so much, focus on how do I feel, how do I look, what's my energy level, and all of a sudden it just, you know, a light switch went off and all of a sudden I was paying a little bit closer attention to the target nutrients and just, you know, going for a little bit more intensity on the workouts and next thing you know, things were just happening at a much faster pace and building a lot more muscle, burning a lot more calories, and being able to eat a little bit more than you know you know not having to worry
- about every little thing. So it was kind of motivating to see the progress after so much time, >> right? >> Nothing nothing happens fast. It's a very slow process. It doesn't happen fast. It happens slow and methodically, >> right? >> How long did it take you to get up to 30? >> 10 years.
- It took a lot of years to get there. And it took I don't want to say a couple years, but a couple years. It took a couple years to turn that train around. No doubt. >> And here we are with now. You've expedited it. Uh >> Oh, yeah. >> So, >> 100%. >> I'd still be milling around without your professional help. No doubt. >> Appreciate it. Yeah.
- What is like some goals for you here in the next like couple years? So, we've talked about some events. We've talked about accomplishing a performance driven goals as well and not just like a body fat or body weight. What can we do with this body, the training, the effort and everything that you've been putting this work into? What are some of the goals, aspirations that you're after now? >> But just uh stay healthy, live healthier, work, not work so hard to stay healthy just because lifestyle choices have become a you know a
- lifestyle now instead of a I don't have to think about it because I don't ever figure that I was on a diet. I just figured that I made different choices on what I was going to eat and what value did they offer to me. And so my new goals would be, you know, extending life, looking a little better, being a little stronger, being a little bit more present, being a little bit more positive, and know let things roll off a little bit more and just, you know, focus on this new found energy and be able to lift up my grandchild and take
- him on walks and >> swim in your pool in your backyard, right? >> Yeah. Go swimming every night, go biking every weekend if that's what I want to do. But I can do all of it now. I can bike and swim and, you know, go out and mow the lawn if my wife wants me to do that. It's just great things that I can do now.
- >> Yeah, we we've been uh pushing some other things in Orange Theory. You're signing up for a lot of plunges that they got. We've talked about the Frogman event and and such about doing some longer bike ride events and stuff. So, as those continue to formulate, I'm I'm really excited to see how we do. >> Yeah.
- You're you're >> Yeah, we're we're taking a lot of challenges on Orange Theory and we're taking a couple of uh you know, small little swim, run, row events and uh couple of Navy Seals events, which is kind of interesting. And uh a lot of push-ups learning. My next thing is pull-ups. I'm not quite there yet, but I'm getting there.
- Pull-ups is a big goal of mine. >> Yes. I love it. Yeah, we definitely need you doing some pull-ups. Set of 10 pull-ups. Body weight. >> There you go. That'll be good. >> Yes. Yes, sir. I'm there. I've got a little counterweight of I'm up to 40 pounds counterweight. So, once I can get that down a little more, we'll we'll get there. Slow process. Yeah.
- >> The pull-up is a hard one. Your gravity wants to keep you on the ground. So, >> yeah. >> Well, John, you work so hard. You've been focused, diligent. Your work ethic shines through. You know, if someone were watching this and in a similar situation to where you were at prior, you know, what would you tell them? What advice would you have for them? I would say, you know, get on a good nutrition plan.
- Understand the importance and the value of a good strong nutrition and get on some sort of an exercise program. may not have to be as intense as mine, but you know, a consistent, you know, commit to yourself. Invest in yourself. Don't come up with an excuse why you can't do it. Do it first thing in the morning so it's off the table.
- Don't let life get in the way of this thing and make, well, I can't do it because of this. Just do it first thing and it's an automatic thing. And if you are doing it automatically and you feel like you missed something, if you didn't do it, then you're you're doing it right. But make exercise important. make nutrition important.
- Everything else will fall into place. It will take a little while, maybe a few months to build the discipline, maybe a few more months to see some results that might make you happy. That's going to put you on a path of where you want to ultimately end up without question. >> We're looking for lifestyle. We're looking for education.
- We're looking >> application of this stuff. Some people pick up on it a lot faster, easier. I mean, you quite honestly were one of those. And other people, they drag their feet or they allow for, you know, the weekend to kind of throw them off the track. There's a lot of things that people don't realize their behaviors and their choices have consequences.
- Sometimes it takes longer to produce an outcome that you're looking for. And if you've gained 30 pounds over 10, 20 years or something, it's not going to be a month that you're going to drop it off. That's a that's a three, four, five, six month process of unwinding the habits, the behaviors, your thought process.
- And I I love it when business owners and busy professionals come on board with me because they're already driven in one area, right? You know how to be successful in your business. So let's use that and be successful in your personal life, your personal health so that you can thrive in both >> and your relationships and other things that go on into this.
- >> Well, and like any other business, I would say don't rely on yourself. You know, in business, we rely on outside professionals, whether it be, you know, whatever. Get a professional coach. Get get someone to be help you be accountable. Get a coach that can help you, watch you, call you out, explain things in a way that you can understand what it is you're trying to do because they understand that we don't.
- Otherwise, we wouldn't be in this situation. So, get a good coach, Brian, that can teach you, train you, nurture you. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Yes, sir. That's it. >> With that said, I appreciate your hard work, focus. We've got big things and we're going to continue to >> rearrange your your body composition, right? lower body levels, increased performance again, we're going to go back into a higher calorie intake here when we decide that it's appropriate and >> continue to thrive.
- Those are things to look forward to and I'm going to keep challenging you with >> events or activities to push some of your your limits and such. >> Thank you, Brian. >> You John, you've earned every bit of this progress. Oh, it's been so great working with you. Your consistency, your discipline, your focused effort and constant communication throughout this process and willingness to learn has pushed your health in the right direction for decades to come.
- How you feel, how you show up for your family, these are strong pieces that make you who you are and why you're so driven to keep building a stronger body, getting your performance up. We've celebrated so many big running months or faster PRs in your rowing or lifting heavier weights or shaping your body so that you can stay active, capable, functional, and confident for years and doing really well in business, too.
- If if you are listening and John's story feels a lot like where you are right now, then it might be time for you to step into your own next chapter. change your health, change your body. And that's why I built the Call to Rise. It's a structured, high accountability program that focuses heavy on nutrition, fitness, radical accountability, and direction from me to help you create the health and the life that you want.
- If you want to see whether it's the right bit for you, visit www.thecalltorise.com the call to rise.com or message me on my socials at coach Brian Piranha. I'll walk you through the step process. The website is very specific in who you are and what I'm looking for and it'll help you understand exactly how it can [music] make a significant impact in your life.
- Thanks for tuning in to episode 21 of Driven for Health. Keep moving forward with purpose, with passion, and living a healthy lifestyle.
