Okay people I have been lifting for sometime but through the years have not kept it going. Just turned 40 and have gained a little wieght. After reading this sight now for about a week I have decided I have not been taking in enough food.
Here are my stats
6’ 1-2" 250 pounds 30% BF (175 LBM)
The last two months I been taking in 2200 to 2300 calories. 1 to 1 2/ gallons of water a day. Since some of you would ask here is the break down of nutrients.
P 38gr
C 38gr
F 8gr (all the above each meal 6 times a day)
I am anal about amounts and timing, although my amounts were not enough after reading this sight.
GOALS: Gain 15 pounds of muscle
Lose BF (get to aorund 10-15%)
I have read some of JB’s articles and I am floored as to the lack of knowledge I have. All of the articles are rather humbling. It appears I have always been afraid to eat more for fear of gaining BF.
I have calculated my calories from JB’S article and came up with around 2,251 calories to just live.
3,259 to maintain what I currently have
4,009 to gain muscle
I do not really care about getting so big I can hadly move, I just really want to be healthy.
Here are my ?'s
1.) I know in order to lose fat I must gain muscle, okay. But should I start at around 3,600 calories and see what happens?
2.) Should I incorporate cardio? I feel alot better when I do.
3.) Should I maintain a consistant 6 meal a day routine with p + c only & p + f only?
(I am thinking of a split as pro 40%, carbs 30%, fat 30%) I would like to eat clean to reduce the amount of fat gained with muscle.
This should do it for starters. If anyone would be kind enough to assist I would appreciate it. Previously I had been doing the BFL routine and it really never worked for me. I did help many people I just did not beneift from the prescribed method.
[quote]miniross wrote:
PS, cardio is ineffective for fat loss. try to add in some HIIT (high intensity interval training i.e.sprints…search site)[/quote]
I dunno if I’d go so far as to say cardio is ineffective for fat loss… you will burn fat from cardio. You can burn more calories from things like HIIT and thus take off more fat. Thats probably what you meant but… whatever. Various forms of Cardiovascular exercise have their place in fat loss regimens.
At 30% bf, I would think its not that you need to eat more, I would think you need to eat differently.
Have you tried lifting weights?
I hate to see all of those good lifting programs go to waste.
Eating right is important, but so is lifting weights. Kind of like someone finding the atkins program and thinking that it gives them licence to chow down on a bunch of pork chops and steak without counting calories. Finding good nutritional info here is great, but it is only a partial solution.
Does bfl mean Body For Life? Cause there were a few others I came up with but better judgement will prevent me from using them.
So how about them weights?
I will qualify my “cardio is rubbish for fat metabolism”.
It is true that as with all activity, energy in different form will be used.
Why i state that cardio is poor (still do it if it works for you) is that, say we take cycling. A human is one of the most efficient engines on the planet when on a bike (why people should really cycle rather than drive, but i am lazy). Its around 1000 miles/gallon equivilence.
I would buy that car!
With running/walking, millions of years of evolution have ensured that these are efficient movements and processes (for endurance hunting etc), and as such, the “effort vs return” time wise is less than say, circuits/interval training or the like.
Cardio can be extremely effective in both fat loss and weight maint. Maybe your outdated belief of what cardio is, is leading you to believe it is inefficient. HIIT or interval or sprint work or hill running or weighted vest while performing these is extreme cardio and it sheds bodyfat. I would agree that incorporating weights is positive, and the 2 facets together are better than either alone. But please don’t imply that their are no gains to be had with cardio. 20-25 minutes of intense cardio does not seem inefficient to me.
I take your point, however, when i stated “cardio” i should have defined it. what i should have clarified was that i meant cardio in the oft used sense, i.e. 70/80% max HR, which i am sure falls outside of the range to be found in the exercises outlined by your good self.
Hey thanks for the info.
Yes, I have been lifting and was doing HITT for cardio along with swimming (good for shoulders).
Although my calorie intake from what I can understand from this sight was too low.
I do also lift 3 times per week along with cardio.
So your input is to drop BF first then bulk up. Thats fine but but is it possible to add muscle while losing BF even if in small amounts?