After a client told me her husband was gaining weight on a low calorie diet because he “ate like a Sumo”, it dawned on me that I ate like this to! What is this diet and why does that happen. Upon further research I realized that it was not just me, but so many of my friends do as well. So I asked myself, does the NY lifestyle with its ’snack on the run’ mentality keep our metabolism low only to bite us on the ass by converting the food when we do eat to fat on the ass? We tend to eat a minimal breakfast - only coffee sometimes (does the latte count as a full meal?), skip lunch, and then meet up with friends at night at a great restaurant and indulge in a high calorie meal. Sometimes I eat the whole bread basket myself and drink the ramekin of butter with a straw I’m so hungry. I thought I was gaining weight because I was exercising less due to a higher client load, now I realize its the timing of my meal more then anything that counts.

How to eat like a Sumo Wrestler from Dietblog:
1. Skip breakfast. By depriving their bodies of food after eight hours of sleep, their metabolic rates stay low.
2. Exercise on an empty stomach. If their bodies have
no food, their metabolic thermostats are turned down even lower to conserve fuel.
3. Take a nap after eating. The Sumo secret for gaining weight is that, after eating, they sleep for at least four hours.
4. Eat late in the day. Going to bed with full stomachs means that their bodies must respond to the huge flood of nutrients with a rush of insulin, forcing their bodies to store some of it in the cells as fat instead of in the muscles and organs as nutrients.
5. Always eat with others in a social atmosphere. According to leading researchers, a meal eaten with others can be at least 44 percent larger and with 30 percent more calories and fat.

And the facts are in:
New Yorkers have finally ecclipsed the nationwide obesity rate! From the Daily News,

New Yorkers collectively gained more than 10 million pounds in two years, according to Health Department data released Wednesday.