I am working witha 25 year old woman, no real history in weights, 5-11", need to lose 40 pounds of fat. I have been doing it my way without a second of aerobics. I try to have her eat better and lift hard as well as taking a fat burner. There are results, but I honestly feel we should be further along and I blame myself. If you were to train this woman, would you do aerobics? From sites such as this I don’t do aerobics and I have LOST fat. I think that my fat loss was due to diet (beer, wings, nachos etc.) It worked for me, I know that. I want to know what you think? Your opinions are greatly appreciated. Thanks
All else being equal, which it never is,
I would think that fat loss could be as
good for this woman with
good diet, good resistance training, and
no aerobics, as with the same good diet,
good resistance training, and aerobics.
However, in practice, for whatever reason,
you’ll have better success with women when
they spend time on the Stairmaster or treadmill
or whatever. The benefit may be psychological,
or there may be some biochemical reason why
the aerobics helps them adhere to their diet
better, but generally speaking chances of
success are way better for women if the
aerobics are in there. Who knows, it could
be nothing more than, “If I eat this candy
bar, I’ll have to spend 40 minutes on
the Stairmaster to burn that off, and I don’t
want to do that, so I won’t eat the candy bar.”
Whatever the reason, that’s how it is.
I do believe that your general theory, which
I’ll summarize as, “It’s the calories, stupid!”
is correct, but as mentioned, all else never
is equal, so just giving her a good diet and
a good resistance training program may not
do the job as well as might be done.
All due respect to Bill and T-Mag, I feel that some people need to step up the cardio, along with weight training to lose poundage. Sure, if everyone’s diet is 100% clean, 100% of the time, losing with with resistance training would be a snap. Whose diet is that way??? I have found that I need at least twenty minutes of cardio 3X / week at a kick-ass pace, along with my five days of weight training (90% compound movements). This keeps any weight gain at bay.
Some other history that I left out is that she is on the road 4 days a week. She eats restaraunt food. I think all restauant food is evil, it wil kill you. Free rolls, fatty dressings etc. wil ruin anyone. Thats another thing I have to deal with. I think I am going to have her do "nonimpact aerobics on non lifting days. No running but cycling, stairmaster, and elliptical. I don’t trust her diet when shes gone and I sure as hel dont trust what she does workout wise when she is away. Thanks
Chris, After reading your last post, she could run five miles / day and not lose weight. Seems to be diet.
Yep, Chris, sounds like she’s trying to make up for a shitty diet by throwing in cardio. I’ll never understand that. Have her read my “Diet Manifesto” article.
I’m pretty much anti-aerobics but I think some people may need it. It depends on their goals. My main goal is to add muscle, so excessive aerobics is not conducive to my goals. If I wanted to get as shredded as possible as fast as possible, I might throw in 2 short sessions a week, maybe a sprint program based on TC’s “50 Yard Dash” article.
Still, the key is diet. With a proper diet, most people simply don’t need aerobics. Besides, you can always just shorten your rest periods between sets of weight training exercises. Your cardiovascular system doesn’t know the difference between that and the treadmill. Some people think they’re not doing cardio unless they’re on a bike or treadmill. Like high rep squats with short rest periods isn’t cardio!!!
So, get her to clean up her diet. Traveling makes it less convenient, but that’s no excuse. Why don’t you tell her how long it takes to burn off those free rolls on the treadmill. Hell, I’d rather skip the roll and not have to do the treadmill, wouldn’t you? If she must do cardio, try twice a week for 20 minutes or so. Or just throw in 5 minutes of high intensity cardio right after weight training. If she’s going to eat crap, though, it still won’t do much good.
Don’t feel guilty either. It’s her ass, and if she has to be pampered and babysat, then she’s wasting your time.
First and foremost is diet, let me say it once more diet!!!, diet!!!, diet!!!, and I am not reffering to diet in the traditional since. I’m talking about a life style change, a successful diet needs for the most part to be a program that you can live with each and every day. If this young lady is trying to lose weight, then she can start her diet by cleaning it up, but in order to lose she is going to need to create a caloric deficit, either eating less of doing an activity that will create that deficit. Before everyone jumps on my case please here me out…I am also against to much cardio, but that is because I am trying to increase mass. It sounds to me that this young lady is trying to lose bodyfat, I know that increasing lean body mass will aid in burning fat, but at this point she would get more benifit by doing some aerobics at around the 60 to 70% intensity level. While working in this THR it will help to burn fat as well as provid cardio vascular improvement, and I would also continue with some resistance training. Fat burners (ie…MD6) are excellent to help someone to drop a little body fat, but you don’t want to make anyone think that they can’t do it on their own. If a person changes their lifestyle and does a little hard work to get those improvements they will usually last a lot longer.
(reply to JRR) I wasn’t saying exactly what
you thought I was saying – I wasn’t saying
that aerobics are always useless aside from
how they may change diet. When it comes to
getting down to the lower limits of leanness,
a lot of men, as well as most or maybe all
women (I’m not sure) will find it much easier
with some limited aerobics, no more than a
couple or at most a few hours total per week
and, in my opinion, preferably interval training totaling a lot less than that.
But when it comes to a man dropping from say 20%
to 10%, I think aerobics are
completely unnecessary. It’s diet, diet, diet,
and resistance training, with aerobics
strictly optional, or if overdone, actually
counterproductive.
And in reply to some other points on this
woman’s diet: Agreed, that’s where the change
really needs to be made, but going back to
the original question, it seems to me that
women always (or normally, anyway) do much
better on their diets when doing aerobics.
Again, it may be just because they start
associating extra calories with time on
the Stairmaster, and either don’t want to
do the extra time, or don’t want to waste
the time already done, so they bypass the
extra calories. Or maybe there is a physiological reason why hunger is less. Either way, for women, diet normally improves when
aerobics are included.
Can’t seem to find The Diet Manifesto article. I thought I read everything since last October or so but I guess I missed this one. Do you have link to it MR. Shugart?
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Ok, I need some advice too. I’ve been helping a friend of mine lose fat since she had her baby. Well, she’s lost a LOT of fat…I mean a lot. But she still wants to lose about 15 more pounds. The problem is her diet, no question. Her diet is probably 80 to 90% carbs, but I’ve tried to get her to eat more protein, and she absolutely refuses to consume fat…much as I argue with her. But she is also only eating 600-800 calories a day. This while doing at least an hour of cardio 7 days a week. I’ve managed to get her to start doing weights, but only about twice or three times a week.
Someone give me some help, please! I’ve tried everything, and nothing is working. I want her to increase caloric intake, but I’m afraid her body will store everything since it’s getting starved right now. Advice??
The problem is she has lost so much fat doing the seven day/week cardio thing, she assumes it will work forever. She should be doing the exact opposite, 5-7 days of weights and 2-3 days of high intensity cardio 20-30 minutes/day). 80-90% carbs/day based on 600-800 calories/day?!?!?! If you haven’t talked her out of this routine yet, you never will. Most people are experts in their own mind. She won’t keep up the 7 day/week cardio routine forever, then she will blow up because she has no muscle mass. Goo Luck!
Thanks for your input. But she actually does have muscle mass…she’s built really well, just has a lot of excess fat stored in the standard place for women…hips and ass. But I can’t convince her that fat isn’t as evil as everyone seems to think, and she’s got the idea that if she eats things like bread or bagels or shit like that, it’s much better than eating something like turkey or beef or something…
I don’t know, you are right about one thing. She lost a ton of fat by doing 1-1/2 hrs of cardio a day and starving herself, so that’s what she is sure has to be done.
Oh well, I appreciate your input. Hopefully someone can give me some good ammo to use against her bullshit logic.
In response to Brian… I know that type of women and she WILL pay the price for not listening to you. To have long term success in being lean, you need the highest possible metabolic rate, and you achieve that with calorie periodization (I hope I used the right words). I used to be fat, and my goal is to be able to lose weight with the highest calorie consumption possible. If she sticks at 600-800 calories per day, her metabolism will catch up and she’s dead. My prediction is that she’s going to be very fat in the years to come. My other prediction is that you will never convince her, no matter what, unless Oprah says so. Just drop her and concentrate on people who will listen to common sense.