I was just wondering if any of you guys has expirence with doing aerobis and bodybuilding the same time.
Because I wanted to lose some body fat and running or riding a bike is good for such things but does it really stop muscle growth?
THx
[quote]el_minjo wrote:
I was just wondering if any of you guys has expirence with doing aerobis and bodybuilding the same time.
Because I wanted to lose some body fat and running or riding a bike is good for such things but does it really stop muscle growth?
THx[/quote]
It’ll take a lot longer to reach your goal if you do both at the same time.
Basically you’re trying to lose weight (fat) and gain weight (muscle) at the same time.
I prefer losing weight first. Cut calories below maintenance, workout to preserve as much muscle as possible until you reach your bodyfat % goal.
Then, increase calories and switch to a bodybuilding training regiment. More weights; more food. Very little aerobics, maybe 2-3 times a week max, just to keep your cardio conditioning.
If I had to do both at the same time (let’s say for a weird reality show), I’d try eating very close to or a little above maintenance, but very high protein. 3-4 days of challenging workouts and cardio in the morning 5-6 days a week. I’d split the heavy workouts so I could do them in 2 or 3 sessions in the day, keeping each session to 20-30 minutes.
I’ve never tried that though. When I train, I eat.
Check out Jana’s HOT-ROX pics in the photo forum. She lost 16 pounds of fat and gained 7 pounds of muscle concurrently.
While your at it, check out my 40th birthday pics. I lost 16, or so pounds of fat while adding 11 pounds of muscle from May till the end of November.
I would never recommend cardio only. Diet will do more for fat loss than cardio.
But I could be wrong.
[quote]rainjack wrote:
Check out Jana’s HOT-ROX pics in the photo forum. She lost 16 pounds of fat and gained 7 pounds of muscle concurrently.
While your at it, check out my 40th birthday pics. I lost 16, or so pounds of fat while adding 11 pounds of muscle from May till the end of November.
I would never recommend cardio only. Diet will do more for fat loss than cardio.
But I could be wrong. [/quote]
What confuses some newbies and even some people who have been doing this for a period of time is when comments like this are made without understanding of how the body works. The chances of you setting out to gain large amounts of muscle while also losing a ton of body fat are slim. Yes, losing fat and gaining lean tissue can happen, but this is usually the result of the person choosing one goal, eating well, training well, and allowing their genetics to take their body where it can. I have lost body fat and gained muscle…HOWEVER, that was not the original goal. The original goal was to simply lose body fat and hold onto as much muscle as possible. Due to my genetics, dietary intake, and training, my body responded by gaining some muscle in the process over the course of months. Had I actually tried to pull my body in two directions at once, I would have been running in circles…like I have seen happen with many people in the gym who appear to have stagnated for years.
As far as weight loss in concerned, I would recommend that the individual get their diet to the point where they are seeing a loss in weight and THEN add cardio. It ensures that your diet is on point which is the primary factor in you losing any body fat in the first place…not tons of cardio. Tons of cardio is a great way to lose muscle and burn yourself out quickly…especially as a beginner.
I agree with you for the most part, ProfX. Mine and Jana’s goals were to lose fat primarily. There were definitly some newbie-type gains since we had been out of the gym for about a year.
But - we took our nutrition very, very seriously, and chose workout programs that had been proven by their authors to minimize LBM loss. We did very little cardio between our ‘before’ and ‘after’ pics.
Judging from the original post, it appaers as he is a newbie as well. I think you can lose fat more effectively with resistance training and diet than you can with cardio and diet. Especially if you’re a newbie, or have been out of the game for an extended period.
[quote]rainjack wrote:
I agree with you for the most part, ProfX. Mine and Jana’s goals were to lose fat primarily. There were definitly some newbie-type gains since we had been out of the gym for about a year.
But - we took our nutrition very, very seriously, and chose workout programs that had been proven by their authors to minimize LBM loss. We did very little cardio between our ‘before’ and ‘after’ pics.
Judging from the original post, it appaers as he is a newbie as well. I think you can lose fat more effectively with resistance training and diet than you can with cardio and diet. Especially if you’re a newbie, or have been out of the game for an extended period.
[/quote]
We’re on the same page, it just bothers me when I read someone give a newbie advice making claims as if they should EXPECT a gain in muscle and a loss in body fat. Most people are not very serious about this. Their knowledge of training will most likely end at hearing what they want to hear initially. That means, as soon as they hit “newbie gains” and then stop making much progress, the fall into the same rut as MANY other trainers. I see these skinny kids jumping on the treadmill for 30min at a time at the gym. Why? Because along with their desire for big biceps, they somehow think they are about to build definition.
You don’t BUILD definition. Definition, by definition, is the result of taking something away. That means a loss. It also means that it shouldn’t be the goal unless you are truly out of shape and overweight or if you have already built the basic mass to begin with.
Choose one goal and spend quality time at it. Either shoot for gaining mass or losing body fat…not both at the same time. Most people on the planet do not have the genetics to pull that off over a long period of time after training for years. Hell, even though I think I fall somewhere around mesomorphic abilities to gain size in relation to body fat (only being smooth because of the amounts of food I eat when gaining and the fact that I don’t care if I gain a little body fat), I still wouldn’t attempt to gain muscle while also attempting to lose body fat at the same time.
I certainly hope I didn’t give the impression that one should expect the type of results that Jana and I had. She’s a genetic freak, and I think I was just lucky.
The point I was trying to make was - given cardio only, or resistance training only - resistance training should be the first choice when trying to lose fat. Of course, doing both would be best.
I lost a bunch of weight several years ago doing a cardio intensive prgogram. I lost damn near 30 pounds on the scale, but my BF% changed very little. That was back in the fat-free craze, so I’m sure a poor diet played a role in it, but I blame the cardio as well.
Prof:
I’m with you…
Can’t the pendulum ALSO swing in the opposite direction? In other words, many are swayed into believing, by their favorite Bodybuilder or gym “expert”, that “bulking” are these 70-100 pound fat swings that you often see…when in my experience, for many it’s an excuse to eat like a pig and get fat, under the guise of “bulking”…
As you stated, there seems like there is some medium needs to be reached…
Mufasa
[quote]Mufasa wrote:
Prof:
I’m with you…
Can’t the pendulum ALSO swing in the opposite direction? In other words, many are swayed into believing, by their favorite Bodybuilder or gym “expert”, that “bulking” are these 70-100 pound fat swings that you often see…when in my experience, for many it’s an excuse to eat like a pig and get fat, under the guise of “bulking”…
As you stated, there seems like there is some medium needs to be reached…
Mufasa[/quote]
I think those extremes are ridiculous. Lee Priest gaining 80+lbs in the off season is damn near insane. However, I also think, that through this current obesity epidemic and the associated “boy band wannabe”/skinny wtih abs craze, we have fallen into a situation where many of these guys are so afraid of any body fat gains that over time, they rarely make all that much progress. This then leads to many turning to anabolics use when they could have simply done what it takes to gain that weight in the first place.
You already know that I don’t mind gaining a little extra body fat. The reason I don’t mind it is because of the results I have seen from doing so. I began weight training weighing about 150lbs. When I first logged on here and posted pictures, I had just reached about 200lbs. I see these guys claiming to only “eat clean” but I don’t see the results that come from it…unless their goal is to remain about the same size and simply be lean. I think many have gone overboard with that.
The 80’s had everybody bulking up probably much more than they should have. The main supplements sold at the time were weight gainers anyway. I remember adding about 14lbs over the course of about a month one time thinking I had really done something…until none of my pants fit. I won’t take it to that extreme again, but I am damn sure not afraid of weight gain or the loss of definition. You can’t honestly expect to jump into bodybuilding and build a significant amount of size while maintaining a body fat percentage well below 10% at all times. I just haven’t seen many who can accomplish this aside from the claims by Ronnie Coleman and Dexter Jackson. Most pro’s I have trained near or around at the same gym got pretty damn smooth in the off season. Pictures in magazines lie.
If your dietary rules are so strict that you are barely making gains, common sense should let you know that some changes need to be made and you have to make a decision whether definition is more important than gaining a large amount of strength and size. Fat can be lost later…and much more easily if there is more lean tissue around.
Thx for the answers. It is true that I’m a noob at bodybuilding.
The thing is that a few years ago I had about 120kg then I decided to lose weight to about 90kg, which I did. But I lost too much muscle mass so I went to do some bodybuilding and I used the mass eating plan. I am about 196m tall and now have 100kg. But the problem that I always have is the big belly. I just hate it. Now I have muscles but still a big stomach. So I want to try to lose the fat stomach and still keep my muscles or gain more. And that is why I was wondering about the aerobics during my training.
I think I will just cut down some carbs and do more abs trainig and wait a month to see the results. If there are no results then I must do more aerobics and go under my maintainace.
[quote]el_minjo wrote:
I think I will just cut down some carbs and do more abs trainig and wait a month to see the results. If there are no results then I must do more aerobics and go under my maintainace.[/quote]
You are excpecting results too quickly. When dieting, I don’t even start to get comments from others like, “are you losing weight?” or “you are getting more definition around your shoulders” until after about 2 months. Physical changes are usually barely visible under about 10lbs of body composition change.