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Exclusive interview by InsideHoops.com

The Vin Baker of today is thin and extremely fit. He's barely recognizable from the last few years. Baker hopes to be a key contributor to this season's Boston Celtics this season. InsideHoops.com editor Jeff Lenchiner met with Vin and talked about his successful physical transformation.

InsideHoops.com: How'd you get into this kind of great shape? You're ripped.

Vin Baker: Yeah, a lot of work over the summer. My trainer, we really got in the gym and spent about four hours a day, four or five hours a day. It was a matter of training, lifting weights and changing up my diet. A lot of it was nutrition, getting rid of a lot of junk, and my body reacted well.

InsideHoops.com: So the changing of the diet, is it towards things like vegetables, chicken and fish?

Vin Baker: Yeah, a lot of it was healthy food, a lot of fish, a lot of chicken and things like that, and really concentrating on not doing it not just for two weeks but really concentrating for the last eight months.

InsideHoops.com: Is that the core of the change, changing the actual foods and general habits?

Vin Baker: Yeah, I definitely think that's the core of it. The times you eat, the amount of times you eat during the day, not eating late, things that are probably habitual to most people, that do it every day - I was doing it every day, eating late at night. So you just got to be religious with it, and really stick to it, and I think that's been a big part of my change.

InsideHoops.com: How late do you not have to eat at night, not after six or something?

Vin Baker: Probably like not after about eight-thirty or nine-o'clock at night.

InsideHoops.com: And what was the workout schedule, roughly?

Vin Baker: It was two hours in the morning of conditioning and lifting, and at night some conditioning and lifting, so two and two - twice a day. The whole summer.

InsideHoops.com: What was the weight change for you?

Vin Baker: I'm at probably about 240, down from about 255, so about 15 pounds.

InsideHoops.com: That's almost about what you were at in the Milwaukee Bucks days.

Vin Baker: Yeah, a little bit back in the Bucks days.

InsideHoops.com: As for the Celtics, what's up? A solid squad as always, trying to advance.

Vin Baker: It's going really good. We have a very talented team. We have a team we're excited about this year. We have some young players, some new players, and we're going to be able to compete every night in this league.

InsideHoops.com: What have you seen from Marcus Banks so far? Have you been around him enough to have a real opinion on his talent?

Vin Baker: I think he's going to be a terrific young player. He's one of the better young point guards that I've seen enter this league. He's got a lot of experience to gain, still, but he's going to be a very good point guard in the years to come.

InsideHoops.com: This team's offense, you guys mostly focus on working it inside to kick it out - do you see any changes coming this year in how you do things?

Vin Baker: I don't think there will be a lot of changes. We've had success in the last couple of years. I think we've tweaked a few things here and there, but coach O'Brien has a very good philosophy on the reason in how we play and how this team's won the last couple of years, and I think this franchise is in position to doing really good things, so we just got to stick to what we're doing right now.