Need help with effective weight loss routines (please!) - Exercise & Fitness Message Board

Domani · 03-11-2006, 02:10 PM

First off, I'm new here. I came here in search of some help to develop a successful weight loss routine. I'm the only one in my house that's really into working out, so I have no one to turn to for advice. I'm extremely open minded to suggestions and just want to do this in the healthiest way possible.

I've always had trouble sticking to a routine, but since February, I've been working out on a consistent basis, but I'm discouraged by the notion that I'm doing something wrong. I've been doing a minimal workout, so I wasn't expecting too much out of it. But since I'm ready to really get things going, I just want to make sure I'm going to be doing them right.

Let just give you a run down of exercises and diet so maybe someone can help me out here a little bit.

I would say my diet is pretty minimal.
Breakfast - Special K cereal w/ Soy Milk
Lunch - Plain yogurt w/ almonds, raisens & a little cereal
Snacks - I generally have 3 peices of fruit and 2 Special K bars as snacks throughout the day between my meals.
Dinner - Soup, or vegetables & chicken
Beverages - I only drink water, and try to drink as much as I can without having to constantly go to the bathroom at school

My diet is basically..eat my 3 meals, and eat if I get hungry in between..and eat healthy.

As far as my workouts go - I get up before school to jog. I walk for about 3 minutes, jog between 15-20, then walk again for a cool down. I come home & jog again..walking for 7-10 mins, jogging for 25-30, cooling down for 3-7...(I jog between 5-6mph) and after that, I'll switch off every other day with working out my abs using a variety of crunches and working out my upperbody on my Bowflex.

I've also been trying to add in a kickboxing routine (I have a kickboxing bag) when I get home from work.

Right now, I see the front of my stomach flattening out, but I have those stubborn love handles that are keeping my waist size from getting any smaller. My arms & shoulders are beginning to become more defined, as well as my legs..but generally there's just a lot of fat that still needs to go away.

I've always been bigger, so I have no idea what it's like to be skinny..and how skinny I could actually be. I'd like to lose 30 pounds..I could probably lose about 40 as my maximum.

I just need to know if what I'm doing is going to work, and I just need to give it more time? I've really only been doing the morning workouts & bowflex up until this week..I just started adding the second jog in.

Any help would be appreciated.

Naxis · 03-11-2006, 03:08 PM

First, congratulations on sticking with your plan so far. the first steps are the hardest.
What are your current stats? Height/ weight/ age/ sex?
As far as your diet, it's isnt terrible, but it seems painfully low on protein and quite high in high GI carbs. And almost no healthy fats. Cereal and Special K bars aren't exactly healthy. They tend to be heavily processed and often loaded with sugar. Oatmeal maybe sweetened with berries and a hard boiled egg would be a much better breakfast choice. For lunch, if you can have a salad with meat or some kind of protein with veggies, it would be better than cereal, yogurt and raisins. But keep ther almonds - protein, fiber, healthy fat. Dinner looks fine (depending on what the soup is, I suppose). One or two fruits are okay, but limit the sugar intake if you can. Jerkey, a few nuts, carrots, cottage cheese, fat free string cheese are all good snack options for lower cal and higher protein intake. One meal every week or two should be a cheat meal. Higher calorie, somehting you really like to eat. This will actually help you to keep losing weight because it keeps the thyroid running hot and also keeps you from feeling too deprived.
It's excellent that you drink only water. That makes a huge difference.

As for your workout, you could make some small tweaks. Your cardio looks fine, but if you start to feel tired or fatigued by doing 2 sessions per day, then drop it to one or take the whole day off to recover. You only need to work each muscle group only once a week if you're working them properly. You need to be lifting fairly heavy to keep your lean muscle and keep metabolism high. This includes legs. If you aren't doing squats, deadlifts or lunges, you're missing out on half of your body. A good plan would be to lift heavy upper body one day, take a day off, heavy lower body + abs, day off and then kick boxing on either days off or on the next alternate day. It will help toward your weight loss goals while keeping your lean muscle.
Hope that's helpful.

Domani · 03-11-2006, 10:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Naxis

First, congratulations on sticking with your plan so far. the first steps are the hardest.
What are your current stats? Height/ weight/ age/ sex?
As far as your diet, it's isnt terrible, but it seems painfully low on protein and quite high in high GI carbs. And almost no healthy fats. Cereal and Special K bars aren't exactly healthy. They tend to be heavily processed and often loaded with sugar. Oatmeal maybe sweetened with berries and a hard boiled egg would be a much better breakfast choice. For lunch, if you can have a salad with meat or some kind of protein with veggies, it would be better than cereal, yogurt and raisins. But keep ther almonds - protein, fiber, healthy fat. Dinner looks fine (depending on what the soup is, I suppose). One or two fruits are okay, but limit the sugar intake if you can. Jerkey, a few nuts, carrots, cottage cheese, fat free string cheese are all good snack options for lower cal and higher protein intake. One meal every week or two should be a cheat meal. Higher calorie, somehting you really like to eat. This will actually help you to keep losing weight because it keeps the thyroid running hot and also keeps you from feeling too deprived.
It's excellent that you drink only water. That makes a huge difference.

As for your workout, you could make some small tweaks. Your cardio looks fine, but if you start to feel tired or fatigued by doing 2 sessions per day, then drop it to one or take the whole day off to recover. You only need to work each muscle group only once a week if you're working them properly. You need to be lifting fairly heavy to keep your lean muscle and keep metabolism high. This includes legs. If you aren't doing squats, deadlifts or lunges, you're missing out on half of your body. A good plan would be to lift heavy upper body one day, take a day off, heavy lower body + abs, day off and then kick boxing on either days off or on the next alternate day. It will help toward your weight loss goals while keeping your lean muscle.
Hope that's helpful.

Thank you *so* much.

I'm 18/F/5'3"/165 - I wish I knew my body fat percentage, just so I could track my progress more accurately.

As far as the eating go, I'm very limited, since I'm still in highschool..I don't have much time in the morning to prepare anything (I get up at 5:30 as is)..and there's only so much I could bring to school with me. But I'll look into the salad. For the time being, I have an access to a fridge at school, so I'll take advantage of that while I can.

I'm going to the supermarket tomorrow, so I'll look to switch the Special K bars with something else.

As far as the workouts go -- the reason why I wasn't working out my lower half on the bowflex was because I thought the jogging was enough of a workout for my legs, and I felt like my legs were just gonna bulk up too much. I have A LOT of muscle in my legs, but it's all under fat. I figured I just needed to stick to the cardio for that.

I just have one question about the workout -- when I'm lifting heavy and then 'taking a day off' -- am I still doing cardio on that day off? I just hate missing days...makes me feel out of the loop.

Thanks again, though. You were a huge help.

By the way..would you say 2.5 weeks is enough time to lose a pants size? lol. Or is that asking for too much?

Naxis · 03-11-2006, 11:17 PM

Realistically, expect to lose 1-2 pounds of fat a week on a "doing everything right" program. If you're losing more weight than that, it isn't fat. It could be water or muscle, but you want to avoid that. Too much water loss could indicate dehydration and muscle loss will drop metabolism. If you continuously lose at that rate, you're in really good shape. A 2.5 week timeline may be a bit unlikely, but it's not inconceivable.

If you're really muscular in the legs then don't go TOO heavy with leg work. A little less weight and higher rep (weight that you can get 15 to 20 reps with), or even just using bodyweight for squats and lunges will work, but don't neglect them when it comes to resistance training. It is not the same thing as cardio.
You can absolutely do cardio on off days. The breaks are for the benefit of recovery from resistance training. Muscle is built at home during recovery, not in the gym. Once in a while take a whole day off though. Even cardio can be a strain.
And just one more suggestion for diet: it saves a lot of time and effort if you pre-make a few days' worth of food like salads or snacks into gladware to take to school. Or hardboil a bunch of eggs at once for the next week or so, so you have them on hand whenever you want them - if you like eggs.

And a very quick and easy protein is a can of tuna; 37g of protein, 1g fat, no carbohydrates, only 150 calories and maybe 50 cents a can. Can't beat that. Time savers make eating healthy much easier. Good luck and keep us updated on your progress.

Domani · 03-11-2006, 11:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Naxis

Realistically, expect to lose 1-2 pounds of fat a week on a "doing everything right" program. If you're losing more weight than that, it isn't fat. It could be water or muscle, but you want to avoid that. Too much water loss could indicate dehydration and muscle loss will drop metabolism. If you continuously lose at that rate, you're in really good shape. A 2.5 week timeline may be a bit unlikely, but it's not inconceivable.

If you're really muscular in the legs then don't go TOO heavy with leg work. A little less weight and higher rep (weight that you can get 15 to 20 reps with), or even just using bodyweight for squats and lunges will work, but don't neglect them when it comes to resistance training. It is not the same thing as cardio.
You can absolutely do cardio on off days. The breaks are for the benefit of recovery from resistance training. Muscle is built at home during recovery, not in the gym. Once in a while take a whole day off though. Even cardio can be a strain.
And just one more suggestion for diet: it saves a lot of time and effort if you pre-make a few days' worth of food like salads or snacks into gladware to take to school. Or hardboil a bunch of eggs at once for the next week or so, so you have them on hand whenever you want them - if you like eggs.

And a very quick and easy protein is a can of tuna; 37g of protein, 1g fat, no carbohydrates, only 150 calories and maybe 50 cents a can. Can't beat that. Time savers make eating healthy much easier. Good luck and keep us updated on your progress.

Ah, thanks again.

Good advice with the pre-making food...that would definitely save me a lot of time.

Now, with the tuna..my mom's always been telling me that it's not good to eat tuna more than a couple of times a week or something..'cause there's something in it that isn't good if you eat too much of it? Is that true? I have no idea what she's referring to, but she's always discouraged me from eating tuna more than once a week, really. Otherwise, I love tuna, lol.