New to the board.

I am not sure if this is the right forum, but I figured I would give it a shot.

I have started going to the gym about 3-4 days a week and was curious on a couple things. 1) I love doing cardio ( eliptical ) and can go on in for 30-45 mins. I was told today that it was too much cardio. I really got a good sweat going and thought I was doing good. Is there such thing as too much cardio? 2) I really dont like weight lifting, to boring, but would it help burn more fat if I did like 30 mins of cardio, did weights, and another session of cardio? 3) My main goal is to loose the pounds and body fat, and later possibly building more lean muscle.
Thanks for your comments in advance, sorry for such a long post, but I am new to alot of this.

Peace
 
thats a small post compared to most peoples posts, and yes you can do to much cardio, it will cause your body to burn up its own muscles for energy (catabolism), you should if you want try HIIT, see link at bottom.

lifting wegihts burn allot of fat. doing cardio raises your metabolism for only about an 1 or 2 after your work out, where as doing weights keeps your metabolism up for days after, and every pound of fat burns something like 300 extra calories a day just to excist, so its a defenent plus. you should do like 5 min of warm up cardio, then do some weights, then go do your cardio or HIIT, or you can just do cardio and weights on seperate days.
 
Thanks,
I'll figure out a routine that gets me on the cardio and weights. The gym I use have free weights and Nautilus equiptment, does it matter which I use. I am 6 feet tall and weigh around 250, my goal is to get down it least 220. Also as a reward for going to the gym I will shoot basketball for an hour or 2 afterwards, and we get some really good games going. Thanks for the help bro, I need all I can get. Also with HIIT can I use the eliptical instead of jogging, its easier on the knees?
 
any kind of cardio can be used with HIIT, but its a little, well its a lot harder to do it properly on eliptical and bike, with treadmill you can much more easily control the speed.

also if you want any results you need a clean diet, if you dont mind post what you eat on a normal day.
 
I have been watching my diet. Today I had cream of wheat for breakfast, healthy choice entree for lunch with some grapes, and for dinner I had a footlong chicken breast sandwich from subway with no cheese or mayo, instead had bbq sauce. I will snack with fat-free chips, and fat-free suger free ice cream.
 
I know I know the dreaded template, it get's old fast im sure your all sick of seeing it but it's really good on giving the all around info every beginner needs
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template for loosing fat (cutting)
by average I mean you just want to effectively loose fat, without becoming extreme about it. I will try and outline the basics for you, and later on you should make adjustments / additions that will best fit your needs.
all that will be discussed is for optimal fat loss

DIET : -40% protein 40% carbs 20%fat this is a basic layout. "what kind of protein?" well you should eat: chicken,tuna,eggs,fish,beef are all acceptable basically avoid things like fast food meats and other stuff that's just common since. "what about carbs?" mainly oats, whole grains, starchy vegetables, but no fruit. "and fat?" most of your fat intake should be from vegetable oils, seeds and nuts. if you don't like those foods there are some alternatives. -"how many calories?" around 200-300 or 20-30% less than your maintenance level, "how do I know what my maintenance level is?" one way to figure it out is to keep a calorie intake journal for 5-7 days. If your weight stays constant, then you simply divide the total calories consumed by the number of days and you’ll get your daily intake. -liquids: 1-2 gallons/4-8 Liters of water a day is the basic amount you want. you should eat 6 meals a day spaced out 2-3 houres. foods you will want to say away from are: soda, mayo, chips, french fries, ice cream, most salad dressings & oils(except olive oil), cheese. if you can't live without them then go for non-fat and low sugar type things. and lastly don't eat most juices and fruits, it's great for a healthy lifestyle but horrable for fat loss, some fruits are ok like blueberries, strawberries, blackberries, cranberrys. use some common sence and don't try to make drastic changes all in a day, it should be a gradual process. once you get to the weight you like then you can raise your calorie intake up to maintenance.

SUPPLEMENTS: (first tier supps) for fat loss is a multivitamin and some EFA's (essential fatty acids). (second tier supps) protein powders like casein (used before bed) would be the one of choice for fat loss, whey (after workout) is also benifital. thermogenic fat burners or stimulant-free fat burners are usefull in loosing weight, follow the direction on thoes products, they will add an extra boost to your goals (san tight is a good stimulant-free product). I would not bother with anything else like carb blockers, fat blockers, appetite suppressants, and other fat loss products you will see everywhere, with maby the exception of thyroid hormone increasers but usally there is no need for them.

WORKOUT PROGRAMS: almost any program will work. the only thing you will want to add is less rest between exercises and sets, but don't hurt yourself.
alot of these exercises have dumbbell-counterparts.
Chest: Parallel bar dips, Bench Press, Incline Press
Legs:Squats (including front squats), tiff-Legged deadlifts, Calf-raises
Back:Bent-over rows, Chins Bent-legged, Deadlifts (also a leg exercise)
Delts:Military press, Lateral raises
Arms:Close-grip bench, press Close-grip chins
you can find fully detailed workouts.

CARDIO: there are two main types of cardio you should use, first is called slow cardio and the second is called HIIT (high intensity interval training). you should use them in a ratio of 3-1 (IE 3 days of slow and 1 day of HIIT). For best results do cardio 4 times a week for an houre, too much is somtimes counterproductive and too little is well too little. "what is slow cardio?" slow cardio is doing any activity (running, biking, swimming, boxing, etc) with about 75-85% of your max heart rate for an houre. "how do I know what my max heart rate is?" well when you do an activity where you are still able to talk without being extremely out of breath, or another easy way is take 220 and minus your age then take that number and multiply it by .75-.85 which will give you rough percentages of 75-85% of your max heart rate or (HR), of course this is not entirly accurate, cause everyone is different. "ok what is HIIT then?" HIIT works like this first you warm up doing whatever for 5 min then take some time and stretch. after your all ready, start a moderate pace for 1 minute then you move your pace up to 90-95% of you max HR for the next 15-30 seconds, then go back down to your moderate pace for 1 min, then back up to 90-95% and back down agen. you get the idea (moderate for 1 min, then 90-95% for 15-30 sec) do this around 15-20 times and your done.

WILLPOWER: alot of people try to make changes too fast and end up quiting, so don't over do it, this means to slowly change your diet and work your way up to the suggested cardio regimen. if you don't workout already and don't want to that is ok, working out is not required for loosing weight but it will help the main parts are your diet and cardio. by phaledax
 
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If your goal right now is to lose weight and fat, I think 3-4 days of 30-45 minutes of cardio is fine. When you decide to start focusing more on building muscle, that will be too much. HIIT is an excellent option for cardio and fat loss. I think it's fine to do on the elliptical and I don't think it's harder - no, you can't control the speed like on a treadmill, but just be sure during the sprints you are really going all out.

In terms of your diet, it's best to eat 5-7 meals per day - this keeps the metabolism going at a faster rate. I would nix the chips and ice cream (it doesn't matter that their FF or SF) and replace them with fresh fruit and veggies. A clean diet is essential for fat loss - no processed foods, no white flour or sugar, etc. Instead, fill up on oatmeal (NOT from the packets - they're full of sugar), fruits & veggies, grilled chicken, lean beef, natural PB, egg whites, cottage cheese, sweet potatoes, etc. Do a search on these forums for a clean diet and you'll find some good meal ideas. Frozen entrees are no good, either - try to avoid those as much as possible.
 
woops I put up the wrong template sorry about that, look back at my previous post it's been edited to the right one.
 
jeffinkentucky said:
Even the Healthy Choice/Lean Cuisine/Weight Watcher dinners ?
Look at the ingredients list - how many of them can you pronounce??? How many do you actually know what they are??? Frozen meals are full of preservatives and unnecessary additives that are not meant to be in our diets. If you need a quick meal, make a chicken stir-fry, or a bowl of oatmeal w/ fruit.
 
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