So one of my goals is weight loss. Looking to lose maybe 10-15lbs. As far as gaining strength and stamina, I'm doing great, it's just losing the weight which seems difficult.
My diet is good. I eat mainly fruits, veggies and nuts, pretty much vegan. I do eat a bit of meat though now and again. I eat maybe 3 meals worth of fruits/veggies a day, although I usually just snack whenever I get hungry so it's hard to quantify exactly, and drink mostly water and herbal tea with a bit of honey in it. Mainly water though. I know I'm eating ok. I don't feel hungry, and I don't stuff myself ever. I don't eat candy or junk food or anything. That's pretty good.
The problem is I'm not that fit to start with I guess. I can't consistently run for long amounts of time/distance. Maybe 10 minutes straight if I'm feeling good. I've been working on this so that I can get more exercise done before I need to stop, and that's been going well. But I still don't think I'm at a point of stamina where I can run long enough to make an impact on my weight.
I run for at least 20 minutes a day. 3 minutes walking warm-up, 3 minutes walking cool-down, 2x6 minute blocks of running with a 2 minute walking rest period in between. I try to do this on average 2-3 times a day, if I've been doing resistance training on my legs I'll only do this once. However since I'm trying to push my endurance higher, I'm frequently changing this up to get more time in my running blocks. The next step is to take 1 minute out of the resting walk and put it into the first block of running. After that I'm taking out the rest entirely, and I should be able to run 14 minutes straight comfortably. Then I guess I'll just keep pushing to add more and more time onto that running until I hit 20 minutes, etc, etc. I think if I could run for close to an hour straight, I'd be extremely happy with my progress.
I run 5-7 days a week. The only days I don't run are after a day of exceptionally hard exercise when my legs need the rest. I take advantage of these days to strength train my upper body a bit harder.
For strength training I aim for 2-4 days a week. I know my strength training isn't what it could be. I lack space to lie on the floor or really move or turn. I only have a set of 20lb weights and a set of 30lbs, so I do a lot of exercise with my own body-weight.
I can work my arms and shoulders no problem. It's my core muscles and legs which I can never really exhaust.
I'd estimate that my resistance training takes me about 20-30 minutes.
So can I get some input? I think I definitely need a way to get more/better resistance training done, but as I said, I can't lie or sit anywhere, so I'm limited to stationary standing exercises. There IS a gym around here, but I've really got no idea how to use the weights, and they don't offer anything for a beginner so I'm a little apprehensive of joining.
So how does it sound, am I on the right track? Just build my stamina until I can run long enough to start burning off the weight? Should I check out this gym despite having no idea what I'm doing in there? Is there anything else I could be doing for resistance at home with only 2 dumbbells? I was thinking about getting a weight vest, does this sound like something I could get good use out of in my situation? I think I just need ways of exercising which don't put so much demand on my legs and arms all the time so I can fully work EVERY muscle in my body, not just work the muscles until the arms and legs get tired from doing the exercise.
Doing some additional reading it seems that a lot of you are placing a lot of importance on strength training for losing weight. This seems to correlate with my situation and problems. The reason I've been focusing on endurance so is that I can sprint, I can high-jump, and I can lift, I just can't sprint for long, or play sports which require longer periods of activity. I've always been strong and fast but for only short periods of time. I can lift weights with the some of the regular lifters in my age group, I just couldn't come close to matching their stamina. So my logic was that endurance would be a good place to establish a basic level of fitness before I start really taking things on. So, if I could get some help working out more high-intensity exercises, it would be a big help. I've only been running at a comfortable pace (6mph), but I have been going for as long as I physically could, enough that the sweat can be rung out of my clothing and that I've gotta keep wiping sweat out of my eyes and having it drip off my face. I'm definitely pushing my limits. I'm just not pushing the limits for intensity, I've been going more for pushing the limits of how long I can carry myself. Which has its own respective intensity, but I assume you're referring more to pure strength intensity, not how intensely you can exhaust yourself with repetitive easy movement.
My diet is good. I eat mainly fruits, veggies and nuts, pretty much vegan. I do eat a bit of meat though now and again. I eat maybe 3 meals worth of fruits/veggies a day, although I usually just snack whenever I get hungry so it's hard to quantify exactly, and drink mostly water and herbal tea with a bit of honey in it. Mainly water though. I know I'm eating ok. I don't feel hungry, and I don't stuff myself ever. I don't eat candy or junk food or anything. That's pretty good.
The problem is I'm not that fit to start with I guess. I can't consistently run for long amounts of time/distance. Maybe 10 minutes straight if I'm feeling good. I've been working on this so that I can get more exercise done before I need to stop, and that's been going well. But I still don't think I'm at a point of stamina where I can run long enough to make an impact on my weight.
I run for at least 20 minutes a day. 3 minutes walking warm-up, 3 minutes walking cool-down, 2x6 minute blocks of running with a 2 minute walking rest period in between. I try to do this on average 2-3 times a day, if I've been doing resistance training on my legs I'll only do this once. However since I'm trying to push my endurance higher, I'm frequently changing this up to get more time in my running blocks. The next step is to take 1 minute out of the resting walk and put it into the first block of running. After that I'm taking out the rest entirely, and I should be able to run 14 minutes straight comfortably. Then I guess I'll just keep pushing to add more and more time onto that running until I hit 20 minutes, etc, etc. I think if I could run for close to an hour straight, I'd be extremely happy with my progress.
I run 5-7 days a week. The only days I don't run are after a day of exceptionally hard exercise when my legs need the rest. I take advantage of these days to strength train my upper body a bit harder.
For strength training I aim for 2-4 days a week. I know my strength training isn't what it could be. I lack space to lie on the floor or really move or turn. I only have a set of 20lb weights and a set of 30lbs, so I do a lot of exercise with my own body-weight.
I can work my arms and shoulders no problem. It's my core muscles and legs which I can never really exhaust.
I'd estimate that my resistance training takes me about 20-30 minutes.
So can I get some input? I think I definitely need a way to get more/better resistance training done, but as I said, I can't lie or sit anywhere, so I'm limited to stationary standing exercises. There IS a gym around here, but I've really got no idea how to use the weights, and they don't offer anything for a beginner so I'm a little apprehensive of joining.
So how does it sound, am I on the right track? Just build my stamina until I can run long enough to start burning off the weight? Should I check out this gym despite having no idea what I'm doing in there? Is there anything else I could be doing for resistance at home with only 2 dumbbells? I was thinking about getting a weight vest, does this sound like something I could get good use out of in my situation? I think I just need ways of exercising which don't put so much demand on my legs and arms all the time so I can fully work EVERY muscle in my body, not just work the muscles until the arms and legs get tired from doing the exercise.
Doing some additional reading it seems that a lot of you are placing a lot of importance on strength training for losing weight. This seems to correlate with my situation and problems. The reason I've been focusing on endurance so is that I can sprint, I can high-jump, and I can lift, I just can't sprint for long, or play sports which require longer periods of activity. I've always been strong and fast but for only short periods of time. I can lift weights with the some of the regular lifters in my age group, I just couldn't come close to matching their stamina. So my logic was that endurance would be a good place to establish a basic level of fitness before I start really taking things on. So, if I could get some help working out more high-intensity exercises, it would be a big help. I've only been running at a comfortable pace (6mph), but I have been going for as long as I physically could, enough that the sweat can be rung out of my clothing and that I've gotta keep wiping sweat out of my eyes and having it drip off my face. I'm definitely pushing my limits. I'm just not pushing the limits for intensity, I've been going more for pushing the limits of how long I can carry myself. Which has its own respective intensity, but I assume you're referring more to pure strength intensity, not how intensely you can exhaust yourself with repetitive easy movement.
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