> <i>Myth 3: If You Are Fat, Go On a Diet! – Wrong. If you are an overweight wrestler facing a weigh in, diet (here is a great one). Other wise you need to change forever. Diets are temporary. If you are overweight, you need to change some of your habits around food and exercise forever.</i><p>Speaking as a high school wrestler...my last year I had to cut from 130 to 112...most of it was water weight though I tried to keep under 1,000 calories a day. After the season, I gained that weight back in about 3 days, and then an extra 10 pounds that I have never been able to lose (not that I'd want to be less than 130 pounds). Not contradicting the OP...just pointing out, even if you are a wrestler, season-long dieting sucks :)<p>Also, one mistake that I hear of from casual dieters/exercisers...getting excited about losing 1-2 pounds after their first day of a decent workout and light meal...and then getting depressed a couple of days later when that weight ticks back up. Over that short period of time, that weight is almost definitely just water weight...for wrestling, we obsessively weighed ourselves...and the number of pounds (of water) you could lose in a 2 hour workout was always impressive. Taking a short piss was almost a sure way of losing at least half a pound. And even if you stopped eating the day before weigh-ins, did a normal workout, and restricted your water usage...you could expect to be at least a pound lighter by weigh-ins early morning due to water loss through respiration during sleeping.