Hi, first post, so bear with me...
About 6 months, I embarked on weights and diet program to shift a very stubborn beer gut. For the last couple of years, I've been pretty active and gone to the gym 3 or so times a week, but the fat around the belly had largely refused to budge. I came to the conclusion I wasn't creating a proper calorie deficit, was drinking too much around the edges (albeit massively down on what I was drinking a few years ago - the reason of the beer belly!), and was doing the wrong kind of exercise - too much cardio (particularly high intensity running), and not enough weights (particularly strength sessions).
Some stats: Around mid April, before I started my new program, I was around 170llbs, with height just under 5.11 and a circumference around the fattest part of my belly of 34.50 inches - could pinch a good couple of inches of fat easily.
Now, coming up to 2 months later, I've lost around 10lbs, and just over 2 inches around my waist, which is exactly what I wanted to acheive. Overall I'm definitely leaner, but there's still more fat around my stomach I'd like to lose, although it's a lot less obvious now, but certainly not flat. By focusing on weights this time round (3 times a week) as a weight loss method, and limiting cardio to walking (60mins every day) and slow (60%HR) sessions on a bike (2-3 times a week), combined with a healthy calorie deficit diet, hopefully the weight loss has been predominatly from fat, rather than when I've crashed on cardio in a previous attempt to shift the beer gut, and also lost a lot of lean muscle tissue. Based on some calorie counting software, which includes an estimate of your BMR, it has shown the average calorie deficit over last 2 months to be around 300 calories per day.
Question now is when should I shift to *gaining weight* to build bigger muscles - should I carry on in this way (another month?), until I've shifted the last bit of fat I want to around my waist, and then go for weight gain, or start to slowly reverse the calorie deficit now, before I lose too much weight - always concerned with any weight loss, that some will inevitably be lean muscle tissue, particularly having lost so much, relatively. Losing *fat* is good, but I do want to build muscles too.
Furthermore, having spent 2 months in calorie defitcit for the most part, how can I be sure that, if I reverse that deficit (aim for extra 500 calories a day?), then the extra weight will be muscle gain, and not stored fat in areas I don't want.
Any comments gratefully received!
Cheers
About 6 months, I embarked on weights and diet program to shift a very stubborn beer gut. For the last couple of years, I've been pretty active and gone to the gym 3 or so times a week, but the fat around the belly had largely refused to budge. I came to the conclusion I wasn't creating a proper calorie deficit, was drinking too much around the edges (albeit massively down on what I was drinking a few years ago - the reason of the beer belly!), and was doing the wrong kind of exercise - too much cardio (particularly high intensity running), and not enough weights (particularly strength sessions).
Some stats: Around mid April, before I started my new program, I was around 170llbs, with height just under 5.11 and a circumference around the fattest part of my belly of 34.50 inches - could pinch a good couple of inches of fat easily.
Now, coming up to 2 months later, I've lost around 10lbs, and just over 2 inches around my waist, which is exactly what I wanted to acheive. Overall I'm definitely leaner, but there's still more fat around my stomach I'd like to lose, although it's a lot less obvious now, but certainly not flat. By focusing on weights this time round (3 times a week) as a weight loss method, and limiting cardio to walking (60mins every day) and slow (60%HR) sessions on a bike (2-3 times a week), combined with a healthy calorie deficit diet, hopefully the weight loss has been predominatly from fat, rather than when I've crashed on cardio in a previous attempt to shift the beer gut, and also lost a lot of lean muscle tissue. Based on some calorie counting software, which includes an estimate of your BMR, it has shown the average calorie deficit over last 2 months to be around 300 calories per day.
Question now is when should I shift to *gaining weight* to build bigger muscles - should I carry on in this way (another month?), until I've shifted the last bit of fat I want to around my waist, and then go for weight gain, or start to slowly reverse the calorie deficit now, before I lose too much weight - always concerned with any weight loss, that some will inevitably be lean muscle tissue, particularly having lost so much, relatively. Losing *fat* is good, but I do want to build muscles too.
Furthermore, having spent 2 months in calorie defitcit for the most part, how can I be sure that, if I reverse that deficit (aim for extra 500 calories a day?), then the extra weight will be muscle gain, and not stored fat in areas I don't want.
Any comments gratefully received!
Cheers