Healthy Weight Loss Tips
BigCris__
Posts: 10 Member
Hello! I’m a 23 year old 6’0 male and at my heaviest when I first started working out again was 356 lbs about 2 and a half weeks ago and I’m currently down to 340. I know while working out and looking to lose weight and body fat is to be in a calorie deficit. I’ve heard from around my weight and height I should be consuming 2000-2500 calories but I’ve been eating 800-1400 calories and burning about 700-1000 calories in a work out. I only do HIIT exercises so I focus on intense short workouts from 45 minutes to an hour and I know they’re best for losing weight and body fat. Just curious if there’s any tips that can help me out more. I eat a lot more clean as well like chicken and potatoes usually 4-8 oz of chicken and 1 full potato. Sometimes a ham sandwich with some veggie straws, salads, ground turkey and rice, that kind of vibe. I use to not care what I eat but I really want to lose weight so I’m more aware of what I eat and watch my macros. Would love any tips that can help me on this journey, thank you!
3
Answers
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Hey, good that you decided to lose weight.
But: yeah, if your tracking is correct then you're severely undereating. Every man should not eat below 1500 calories, and that's including exercise. If you're really only eating 800 calories (going dramatic now) and you're really exercising for 700 calories then that's the same as not exercising and only eating 100 calories. Yeah, exercise calories are often grossly exaggerated, but still: with your current weight you can probably eat 2000-2500 calories, not eat back exercise and lose at a rapid rate. Eat enough! Your body needs the nutrition, plus the chance of this undereating catching up with you and you binge and give up is totally realistic.3 -
Thank you for your response and feedback, much appreciated and very insightful. That’s good to know moving forward!2
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Yeah...faster is not better with weight loss.
Faster is - fatigue, irritability, hair loss, muscle loss, and every other body system suffering, possibly leading to disease or worse.
I agree with yirara. Eat 2000-2500 at minimum.
None of us come into this knowing what to do. You have a few beliefs that just aren't true...but you're headed for a fall.
Ask me how I know.
2 -
Thank you for your response and knowledge, may I ask how you know? I’m just doing my best bc I know in order to lose weight I must be in calorie deficit but seems like I’m pushing it and need to consume more calories than what I am currently. Doing more research and hearing from these comments with tips will definitely be of great help, thanks again!2
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How do I know...
I started out all gung-ho. I'm female, I was 220 pounds. Instead of choosing the recommended "Lose 1 pound per week" I saw a choice to "Lose 2 pounds per week." Well, that's better, isn't it? DONE!
I got 1200 calories.
I did that for a while, probably about two months. Then I just crashed. Hard. My nails were flaking, the skin on my feet and hands was dry and cracking, my hair was falling out. I had bone-deep fatigue. I couldn't keep my eyes open. I was irritable, depressed, and couldn't concentrate on my work. Heck, I was having trouble concentrating on a TV show. That's just what I could see - there were internal things happening that I could not see.
Malnutrition has consequences.
You can Google those consequences. It's a real thing.
I've been on these forums since 2007. I've read similar stories hundreds of times. Sometimes they're worse, and sometimes they end in really bad ways.
It's not a race.2 -
I put your data into this website:
With a few workouts per week and eating 2500 calories you'd probably still be losing 2lbs per week. That's super fast!3 -
^^Yeah, that's from sailrabbit.com
Good guidelines.2 -
Hey, great job so far! To echo everyone else here, definitely more food is needed to support your body. I would eat a minimum of 2500 - 3000 calories. This will give you room the calories needed to grow muscle while still supporting your fat loss goals. If you have high output from workouts you may need more depending on the frequency of workouts. Keep up the good work!1
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>>intense short workouts from 45 minutes to an hour and I know they’re best for losing weight and body fat<<
No they aren't.
As to the rest. Data point: at age 48+ not 23+ and at 172.25cm and not 182.88cm I went from 280+ to 160+ over about 1.75 years (and another 10lb over the next year). That all started a bit over 10 years ago
a) it was more than fast enough
b) it was more than fast enough especially if you consider the amount of work you have to do to figure out how and why you overshot normal weight by that much and how you are going to manage your life in order not to repeat this once you stop losing weight
c) during the 1.75 years I didn't find MFP till half way through
d) during my first year on MFP while losing ~72.5lbs in that time frame I logged 2540 Cal in on average
e) yes I was more than very active and that did not involve short bursts of intense activity followed by inactivity
d) yes the calories in and out at the time tracked to less than negligible variance from Fitbit calories out vs MFP calories in. This variance has increased over time to about 5%. But at the time was less than 0.25%
Forget the tv shows. Start thinking stuff you see yourself doing long term
Being morbidly obese but also never ending cycles of losing and regaining impacts both your physical and mental health.
Your goal is not to lose weight fast. Fast is meaningless because your health gains are measured by total time at a reduced weight, not speed of loss.
Your goal should be to figure out how to revamp your food and beverage intake and everyday life so that your weight level wants to trend (and keep trending) towards "normal" as opposed to always trending towards obese.
Try to figure out what's going on with you now instead of waiting for 25 more years. Because it is nice to be normal 😉 at least when it comes to weight🤣😎
Log your food. Avoid heroics. Look for health promoting normalcy! Take your wins and fight delaying actions and try to slow things down when things are go wrong. It's never too late in the day to put a stop to something that's gone wrong and you don't wait for tomorrow to start again.
You and your health matter!
Best of 🤞 luck!3 -
>>intense short workouts from 45 minutes to an hour and I know they’re best for losing weight and body fat<<
No they aren't.
As to the rest. Data point: at age 48+ not 23+ and at 172.25cm and not 182.88cm I went from 280+ to 160+ over about 1.75 years (and another 10lb over the next year). That all started a bit over 10 years ago
a) it was more than fast enough
b) it was more than fast enough especially if you consider the amount of work you have to do to figure out how and why you overshot normal weight by that much and how you are going to manage your life in order not to repeat this once you stop losing weight
c) during the 1.75 years I didn't find MFP till half way through
d) during my first year on MFP while losing ~72.5lbs in that time frame I logged 2540 Cal in on average
e) yes I was more than very active and that did not involve short bursts of intense activity followed by inactivity
d) yes the calories in and out at the time tracked to less than negligible variance from Fitbit calories out vs MFP calories in. This variance has increased over time to about 5%. But at the time was less than 0.25%
Forget the tv shows. Start thinking stuff you see yourself doing long term
Being morbidly obese but also never ending cycles of losing and regaining impacts both your physical and mental health.
Your goal is not to lose weight fast. Fast is meaningless because your health gains are measured by total time at a reduced weight, not speed of loss.
Your goal should be to figure out how to revamp your food and beverage intake and everyday life so that your weight level wants to trend (and keep trending) towards "normal" as opposed to always trending towards obese.
Try to figure out what's going on with you now instead of waiting for 25 more years. Because it is nice to be normal 😉 at least when it comes to weight🤣😎
Log your food. Avoid heroics. Look for health promoting normalcy! Take your wins and fight delaying actions and try to slow things down when things are go wrong. It's never too late in the day to put a stop to something that's gone wrong and you don't wait for tomorrow to start again.
You and your health matter!
Best of 🤞 luck!
This is an amazing post!!!!!! 1,000% agree!
Take it slow. Learn new habits you can keep the weight off with and not fall back into bad habits causing regain. Quick weight loss typically regains quickly.
invest in a fitness tracker. It will completely up-end how you look at food and exercise.
I lost too much weight (something that was never on my radar!) , and lost muscle. Rebuilding muscle was hard for me, and took much longer the second time around.
Food is fuel. I only eat what I enjoy, but I’m also more concious of fueling my activity- which increased exponentially with weight loss.
Undereating severely- as you are doing- creates so many issues, as stated above, including muscle loss. Always bear in mind, your heart is the most important - yet unseen- muscle in your body. If you’re losing muscle elsewhere, remember you may be losing it in your heart as well.
I’d strongly suggest seeing if you can get a visit with a dietician. Your insurance, gym, employer may provide free or discount in-person visits. My insurance provides free phone visits with a dietician.0 -
Cris, these boards are here to serve you and answer questions.
Take advantage. You’ve got a minor miracle in the palm of your hand.
There’s NO question too “dumb”. I asked some doozies along the way to my significant weight loss, and at no time did anyone treat me as “less than”.
Weight loss changed my life, my attitude, my confidence. I’m still shy, and socially awkward, nothing will probably every change that, but I’m more better, more me, if that resonates with you.1 -
Hello! I’m a 23 year old 6’0 male and at my heaviest when I first started working out again was 356 lbs about 2 and a half weeks ago and I’m currently down to 340. I know while working out and looking to lose weight and body fat is to be in a calorie deficit. I’ve heard from around my weight and height I should be consuming 2000-2500 calories but I’ve been eating 800-1400 calories and burning about 700-1000 calories in a work out. I only do HIIT exercises so I focus on intense short workouts from 45 minutes to an hour and I know they’re best for losing weight and body fat. Just curious if there’s any tips that can help me out more. I eat a lot more clean as well like chicken and potatoes usually 4-8 oz of chicken and 1 full potato. Sometimes a ham sandwich with some veggie straws, salads, ground turkey and rice, that kind of vibe. I use to not care what I eat but I really want to lose weight so I’m more aware of what I eat and watch my macros. Would love any tips that can help me on this journey, thank you!
Others have given you excellent advice to get more calories so that you don't tank your health.
I'm going to comment on the exercise, but I'm torn about which direction to go.
Probably most important: If you're relatively new to regular exercise, start moderately and build gradually. You don't mention how often you're exercising, but I'm guessing from context that it might be daily, or nearly. Even if you've been moderately active previously, daily HIIT is NOT best for losing weight and body fat, no matter what nonsense in the blogosphere may claim.
Highly intense exercise is more fatiguing. Over-exercise can bleed calorie burn out of daily life activity (via fatigue, doing less - maybe in subtle ways - and resting more). Also, the exercises usually described as HIIT these days, often fast-paced exercise with weights, bodyweight, or similar equipment . . . they have higher injury risk. Injury can sink an entire exercise program until healing can happen.
What's best for weight loss is a sustainable, manageable challenge to current fitness level. If a person hasn't worked out much previously, I'd recommend they start with some moderate thing, even walking, striving for a pace that's just a bit of a challenge for the time they have to devote to it. The sweet spot, IMO, is maybe just a few minutes of a "whew" feeling right after the exercise, then feeling energized - not exhausted - for the rest of the day.
If new to the exercise, I'd go with every other day (or less) for the first week or two, and see how that settles in to the body. The exercise isn't where the magic happens, isn't the part where our bodies rebuild better. That happens in the recovery time between exercise sessions. Recovery is very important. This applies to our hearts, as well as our other muscles.
As a person gets fitter, the starting exercise load will get easier. That's when to increase pace, duration, intensity or type of exercise to keep that manageable challenge always in the picture.
The challenge is what triggers fitness improvement. The "manageable" part allows for an energetic daily life routine, solid recovery to rebuild the body better, reduced risk of injury, and probably more enjoyment of exercise as well. (There are research studies suggesting that test groups assigned intense exercise don't continue as well as those assigned a more moderate routine.)
It is good to include some strength exercise while losing weight, but I'd recommend a slower-paced traditional routine rather than high rep, fast-paced work. That can be weight lifting, bodyweight exercises, or really anything that challenges current muscular strength. Although it burns fewer calories than cardio, strength training helps us preserve as much muscle as possible alongside losing fat.
Did you know that obese people usually have more muscle mass than similar always-slim people who have the same exercise history? It comes from moving our larger mass through daily life. Muscle is slow to build, and building it takes a lot of work as well as time. Strength training during loss helps preserve what we already have.
A pound of muscle burns very slightly more calories at rest than a pound of fat, which results in "higher metabolism". That effect is small, just a few calories a day. But people with relatively more muscle are likely to find it easier and more fun to move in daily life, so are simply likely to move more. That more-frequent movement can burn meaningful numbers of calories daily. (Example: I used to budget trips up and down stairs in my house when I was obese, staging items at the top/bottom to carry on infrequent trips. Now it seems like I scamper up/down stairs many times a day without a thought.)
We don't need to start strength training and cardio all at once. It's total exercise load that IMO is best increased gradually. A person could start with a bit of each, or start with one type and add the other later. What matters is total load being appropriate for current fitness level. The goal is to establish a productive, enjoyable routine that we want to keep doing long term. (Any exercise we do is 100% more beneficial than some theoretically better punitively intense thing that we eventually procrastinate or skip with the slightest excuse.)
Back at HIIT specifically: Elite cardiovascular (CV) sport athletes don't do all high-intensity work every single day in every workout, and they have the best fitness and health advice money can buy. Yes, the daily work they do would be intense for me, but in terms of their personal capability, CV elites do a large volume of moderate intensity work (their "main meal" in exercise terms) and add a small amount of high-intensity work a couple of times a week (like a "side dish"). Why would us regular duffers do otherwise?
Starting out, it's a good idea to keep CV exercise moderate for the first few weeks, to build a base of endurance. Higher intensity exercise can be added later on that foundation, in smaller doses. That's a normal way to look at training plans.
This last I feel like I have to say, and it may seem critical but I think it's more of a blessing in context: There are physiological limits on true high intensity exercise, at any fitness level. If a person can do something for an hour, it isn't truly high intensity. That's OK: Like I said, doing all high intensity work isn't ideal for fitness OR weight loss. The fast-paced nature of most modern activities called "HIIT" is still an injury and fatigue risk, too.
Since you (quite legitimately) asked Riverside the follow up on "how would she know", I'll answer that straight off. The point isn't to be braggy, it's to offer bona fides for the advice, which you can evaluate as you will.
I was a late-bloomer athlete who started being routinely active after cancer treatment. I was obese (and stayed obese for a dozen years while training hard and even competing, BTW). Along the way, I got coaching certifications from the official body for my short-endurance CV sport, to the highest level I could without being a professional coach. I've personally used training plans developed by a high-level coach (Division I NCAA) for people like me, and have seen the similar plans used with that coach's collegiate athletes. I've known multiple elite (national team, Olympic) athletes in my sport, and been coached by those folks.
I won't pretend to detailed knowledge about strength training; I just know basics. I know more about cardiovascular fitness development. Personally, I'm not competing anymore (probably), but I'm still athletically active, still working with good coaches when I can, and (for reasons on the eating side of things, not exercise), I haven't been overweight (let alone obese) since around late 2015.
Best wishes!
1 -
cmriverside wrote: »How do I know...
I started out all gung-ho. I'm female, I was 220 pounds. Instead of choosing the recommended "Lose 1 pound per week" I saw a choice to "Lose 2 pounds per week." Well, that's better, isn't it? DONE!
I got 1200 calories.
I did that for a while, probably about two months. Then I just crashed. Hard. My nails were flaking, the skin on my feet and hands was dry and cracking, my hair was falling out. I had bone-deep fatigue. I couldn't keep my eyes open. I was irritable, depressed, and couldn't concentrate on my work. Heck, I was having trouble concentrating on a TV show. That's just what I could see - there were internal things happening that I could not see.
Malnutrition has consequences.
You can Google those consequences. It's a real thing.
I've been on these forums since 2007. I've read similar stories hundreds of times. Sometimes they're worse, and sometimes they end in really bad ways.
It's not a race.
Oh wow, yeah I think maybe that’s where my head was at like why shoot for 1 pound when I can maybe do more than 1 pound a week. I’m so sorry that you crashed bad and hope you are doing better now! I’m happy that you have found this and gave such insightful advice to me that I will for sure take and use. Once again thank you for your response.
2 -
I put your data into this website:
With a few workouts per week and eating 2500 calories you'd probably still be losing 2lbs per week. That's super fast!
Wow, I didn’t know such a website existed! Thank you so much for going that extra mile and inputing data for me. Your advice as well as everyone else’s is much, much appreciated!
1 -
davidgutschon wrote: »Hey, great job so far! To echo everyone else here, definitely more food is needed to support your body. I would eat a minimum of 2500 - 3000 calories. This will give you room the calories needed to grow muscle while still supporting your fat loss goals. If you have high output from workouts you may need more depending on the frequency of workouts. Keep up the good work!
Hello,
Thank you for your response. I will definitely amp up the calories I intake compared to what I’m doing now and I appreciate the advice, truly!
0 -
>>intense short workouts from 45 minutes to an hour and I know they’re best for losing weight and body fat<<
No they aren't.
As to the rest. Data point: at age 48+ not 23+ and at 172.25cm and not 182.88cm I went from 280+ to 160+ over about 1.75 years (and another 10lb over the next year). That all started a bit over 10 years ago
a) it was more than fast enough
b) it was more than fast enough especially if you consider the amount of work you have to do to figure out how and why you overshot normal weight by that much and how you are going to manage your life in order not to repeat this once you stop losing weight
c) during the 1.75 years I didn't find MFP till half way through
d) during my first year on MFP while losing ~72.5lbs in that time frame I logged 2540 Cal in on average
e) yes I was more than very active and that did not involve short bursts of intense activity followed by inactivity
d) yes the calories in and out at the time tracked to less than negligible variance from Fitbit calories out vs MFP calories in. This variance has increased over time to about 5%. But at the time was less than 0.25%
Forget the tv shows. Start thinking stuff you see yourself doing long term
Being morbidly obese but also never ending cycles of losing and regaining impacts both your physical and mental health.
Your goal is not to lose weight fast. Fast is meaningless because your health gains are measured by total time at a reduced weight, not speed of loss.
Your goal should be to figure out how to revamp your food and beverage intake and everyday life so that your weight level wants to trend (and keep trending) towards "normal" as opposed to always trending towards obese.
Try to figure out what's going on with you now instead of waiting for 25 more years. Because it is nice to be normal 😉 at least when it comes to weight🤣😎
Log your food. Avoid heroics. Look for health promoting normalcy! Take your wins and fight delaying actions and try to slow things down when things are go wrong. It's never too late in the day to put a stop to something that's gone wrong and you don't wait for tomorrow to start again.
You and your health matter!
Best of 🤞 luck!
Thank you for such a great response to my question and giving me so many gold nuggets I can learn from. You’re right the goal isn’t to lose weight fast but, finding a healthy way to lose weight at a normal okay pace.
Do you mind me asking what exactly MFP is? I have no clue what that is and would like to hear more about your thoughts and definitions on it. I will definitely be googling it to see what I can find myself.
Once again, thank you for your response and message. Wish you nothing but the best like everyone else, this is great advice I’m getting from everyone!
2 -
springlering62 wrote: »>>intense short workouts from 45 minutes to an hour and I know they’re best for losing weight and body fat<<
No they aren't.
As to the rest. Data point: at age 48+ not 23+ and at 172.25cm and not 182.88cm I went from 280+ to 160+ over about 1.75 years (and another 10lb over the next year). That all started a bit over 10 years ago
a) it was more than fast enough
b) it was more than fast enough especially if you consider the amount of work you have to do to figure out how and why you overshot normal weight by that much and how you are going to manage your life in order not to repeat this once you stop losing weight
c) during the 1.75 years I didn't find MFP till half way through
d) during my first year on MFP while losing ~72.5lbs in that time frame I logged 2540 Cal in on average
e) yes I was more than very active and that did not involve short bursts of intense activity followed by inactivity
d) yes the calories in and out at the time tracked to less than negligible variance from Fitbit calories out vs MFP calories in. This variance has increased over time to about 5%. But at the time was less than 0.25%
Forget the tv shows. Start thinking stuff you see yourself doing long term
Being morbidly obese but also never ending cycles of losing and regaining impacts both your physical and mental health.
Your goal is not to lose weight fast. Fast is meaningless because your health gains are measured by total time at a reduced weight, not speed of loss.
Your goal should be to figure out how to revamp your food and beverage intake and everyday life so that your weight level wants to trend (and keep trending) towards "normal" as opposed to always trending towards obese.
Try to figure out what's going on with you now instead of waiting for 25 more years. Because it is nice to be normal 😉 at least when it comes to weight🤣😎
Log your food. Avoid heroics. Look for health promoting normalcy! Take your wins and fight delaying actions and try to slow things down when things are go wrong. It's never too late in the day to put a stop to something that's gone wrong and you don't wait for tomorrow to start again.
You and your health matter!
Best of 🤞 luck!
This is an amazing post!!!!!! 1,000% agree!
Take it slow. Learn new habits you can keep the weight off with and not fall back into bad habits causing regain. Quick weight loss typically regains quickly.
invest in a fitness tracker. It will completely up-end how you look at food and exercise.
I lost too much weight (something that was never on my radar!) , and lost muscle. Rebuilding muscle was hard for me, and took much longer the second time around.
Food is fuel. I only eat what I enjoy, but I’m also more concious of fueling my activity- which increased exponentially with weight loss.
Undereating severely- as you are doing- creates so many issues, as stated above, including muscle loss. Always bear in mind, your heart is the most important - yet unseen- muscle in your body. If you’re losing muscle elsewhere, remember you may be losing it in your heart as well.
I’d strongly suggest seeing if you can get a visit with a dietician. Your insurance, gym, employer may provide free or discount in-person visits. My insurance provides free phone visits with a dietician.
I agree with you as well, it is definitely a great post with a lot to learn from in it!
I’m doing my best to try and not fall back into old habits and staying disciplined, something I struggled with for a while. I got to a point of where I’m tired of being the way I am and really need and want a change in my life. When I was 15-16 I was around 200-230 pounds and didn’t like it and I started going to the gym with my brother everyday religiously, from 2-3 times a day and started seeing great results losing weight in that year from doing so and staying on a good diet and stayed at a good healthy weight with good muscle for a while. However, I let myself go shortly after that and really shot up in weight. Leading to where I am now. I use to be more than what I tracked when I first started at on July 29th I was at my heaviest 370ish a while ago but, got covid and lost around 20 pounds and when I started this journey again I tracked myself at 356.
So, im definitely going to take your advice and everyone else’s because I’m honestly learning so much and am very grateful for it and will strive to be better and lose weight in a healthy manner.
I do have an Apple Watch I monitor steps, workouts and runs on, and recently started using this app when I began my journey.
Good point on the heart being our most important muscle and how underrating can affect it. I think that really got to me and I will do my best to try and do this journey in a healthy way.
Once again, thank you for your response!
1 -
springlering62 wrote: »Cris, these boards are here to serve you and answer questions.
Take advantage. You’ve got a minor miracle in the palm of your hand.
There’s NO question too “dumb”. I asked some doozies along the way to my significant weight loss, and at no time did anyone treat me as “less than”.
Weight loss changed my life, my attitude, my confidence. I’m still shy, and socially awkward, nothing will probably every change that, but I’m more better, more me, if that resonates with you.
I 100% am going to take advantage of it and do my best to learn from everyone.
I’m happy to hear it changed your life in a positive way and hey I get that I am somewhat the same way I stay in the house and don’t really go out because sometimes I feel awkward. Just do your best when you do go out to be social and be yourself! You’re in charge of you. Trust me I know how you feel.
What’s going to happen? Not talk to whoever I was talking to anymore? Oh well, they weren’t meant to be in my life then. That’s kind of how I think of things and just be myself like I said unapologetically.
Once again, thank you for your response it is much appreciated!
3 -
Hello! I’m a 23 year old 6’0 male and at my heaviest when I first started working out again was 356 lbs about 2 and a half weeks ago and I’m currently down to 340. I know while working out and looking to lose weight and body fat is to be in a calorie deficit. I’ve heard from around my weight and height I should be consuming 2000-2500 calories but I’ve been eating 800-1400 calories and burning about 700-1000 calories in a work out. I only do HIIT exercises so I focus on intense short workouts from 45 minutes to an hour and I know they’re best for losing weight and body fat. Just curious if there’s any tips that can help me out more. I eat a lot more clean as well like chicken and potatoes usually 4-8 oz of chicken and 1 full potato. Sometimes a ham sandwich with some veggie straws, salads, ground turkey and rice, that kind of vibe. I use to not care what I eat but I really want to lose weight so I’m more aware of what I eat and watch my macros. Would love any tips that can help me on this journey, thank you!
Others have given you excellent advice to get more calories so that you don't tank your health.
I'm going to comment on the exercise, but I'm torn about which direction to go.
Probably most important: If you're relatively new to regular exercise, start moderately and build gradually. You don't mention how often you're exercising, but I'm guessing from context that it might be daily, or nearly. Even if you've been moderately active previously, daily HIIT is NOT best for losing weight and body fat, no matter what nonsense in the blogosphere may claim.
Highly intense exercise is more fatiguing. Over-exercise can bleed calorie burn out of daily life activity (via fatigue, doing less - maybe in subtle ways - and resting more). Also, the exercises usually described as HIIT these days, often fast-paced exercise with weights, bodyweight, or similar equipment . . . they have higher injury risk. Injury can sink an entire exercise program until healing can happen.
What's best for weight loss is a sustainable, manageable challenge to current fitness level. If a person hasn't worked out much previously, I'd recommend they start with some moderate thing, even walking, striving for a pace that's just a bit of a challenge for the time they have to devote to it. The sweet spot, IMO, is maybe just a few minutes of a "whew" feeling right after the exercise, then feeling energized - not exhausted - for the rest of the day.
If new to the exercise, I'd go with every other day (or less) for the first week or two, and see how that settles in to the body. The exercise isn't where the magic happens, isn't the part where our bodies rebuild better. That happens in the recovery time between exercise sessions. Recovery is very important. This applies to our hearts, as well as our other muscles.
As a person gets fitter, the starting exercise load will get easier. That's when to increase pace, duration, intensity or type of exercise to keep that manageable challenge always in the picture.
The challenge is what triggers fitness improvement. The "manageable" part allows for an energetic daily life routine, solid recovery to rebuild the body better, reduced risk of injury, and probably more enjoyment of exercise as well. (There are research studies suggesting that test groups assigned intense exercise don't continue as well as those assigned a more moderate routine.)
It is good to include some strength exercise while losing weight, but I'd recommend a slower-paced traditional routine rather than high rep, fast-paced work. That can be weight lifting, bodyweight exercises, or really anything that challenges current muscular strength. Although it burns fewer calories than cardio, strength training helps us preserve as much muscle as possible alongside losing fat.
Did you know that obese people usually have more muscle mass than similar always-slim people who have the same exercise history? It comes from moving our larger mass through daily life. Muscle is slow to build, and building it takes a lot of work as well as time. Strength training during loss helps preserve what we already have.
A pound of muscle burns very slightly more calories at rest than a pound of fat, which results in "higher metabolism". That effect is small, just a few calories a day. But people with relatively more muscle are likely to find it easier and more fun to move in daily life, so are simply likely to move more. That more-frequent movement can burn meaningful numbers of calories daily. (Example: I used to budget trips up and down stairs in my house when I was obese, staging items at the top/bottom to carry on infrequent trips. Now it seems like I scamper up/down stairs many times a day without a thought.)
We don't need to start strength training and cardio all at once. It's total exercise load that IMO is best increased gradually. A person could start with a bit of each, or start with one type and add the other later. What matters is total load being appropriate for current fitness level. The goal is to establish a productive, enjoyable routine that we want to keep doing long term. (Any exercise we do is 100% more beneficial than some theoretically better punitively intense thing that we eventually procrastinate or skip with the slightest excuse.)
Back at HIIT specifically: Elite cardiovascular (CV) sport athletes don't do all high-intensity work every single day in every workout, and they have the best fitness and health advice money can buy. Yes, the daily work they do would be intense for me, but in terms of their personal capability, CV elites do a large volume of moderate intensity work (their "main meal" in exercise terms) and add a small amount of high-intensity work a couple of times a week (like a "side dish"). Why would us regular duffers do otherwise?
Starting out, it's a good idea to keep CV exercise moderate for the first few weeks, to build a base of endurance. Higher intensity exercise can be added later on that foundation, in smaller doses. That's a normal way to look at training plans.
This last I feel like I have to say, and it may seem critical but I think it's more of a blessing in context: There are physiological limits on true high intensity exercise, at any fitness level. If a person can do something for an hour, it isn't truly high intensity. That's OK: Like I said, doing all high intensity work isn't ideal for fitness OR weight loss. The fast-paced nature of most modern activities called "HIIT" is still an injury and fatigue risk, too.
Since you (quite legitimately) asked Riverside the follow up on "how would she know", I'll answer that straight off. The point isn't to be braggy, it's to offer bona fides for the advice, which you can evaluate as you will.
I was a late-bloomer athlete who started being routinely active after cancer treatment. I was obese (and stayed obese for a dozen years while training hard and even competing, BTW). Along the way, I got coaching certifications from the official body for my short-endurance CV sport, to the highest level I could without being a professional coach. I've personally used training plans developed by a high-level coach (Division I NCAA) for people like me, and have seen the similar plans used with that coach's collegiate athletes. I've known multiple elite (national team, Olympic) athletes in my sport, and been coached by those folks.
I won't pretend to detailed knowledge about strength training; I just know basics. I know more about cardiovascular fitness development. Personally, I'm not competing anymore (probably), but I'm still athletically active, still working with good coaches when I can, and (for reasons on the eating side of things, not exercise), I haven't been overweight (let alone obese) since around late 2015.
Best wishes!
Yes, I do workout everyday only doing HIIT exercises from 45-65 minutes. To go off of your point on how HIIT exercises every day aren’t the best that is news to me and I have noticed myself trying to rest more.
If not HIIT exercises every day are there any other type of workouts you may suggest good for losing weight and fat that I can look into more?
I don’t really use weights in my HIIT workouts only in 2 or my exercises out of the 8 that I do in 1 workout consist of me using 10 pound weights.
After working out everyday I can say after I feel energized rather than more tired to do anything the rest of the day so I guess that good from going off of your point there lol.
I agree that recovery is important so I will implement taking Sundays off for my workouts.
I do 2 strength type of exercises in my workout bc as you said I know it is important to incorporate it somehow. Good point on how athletes don’t do those high intensity workouts everyday. Good way of putting it with the main meal and side dish 😂.
For the past 3 weeks I’ve been working out I can say they’ve been somewhat moderate and definitely built my endurance up.
I did ask riverside how she would know politely because she did say to ask her and I thought I could learn from it, and that I did! Everyone has been giving such great advice and I thank each and every one of you guys.
Once again, thank you for your response and I will do my best moving forward and congratulations to you on being healthier after your cancer treatment and getting to a point where you’re healthy and can even compete it seems like! Hats off to you!
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MFP=MyFitness Pal
Another good one to know is NSV aka Non Scale Victory.
There’s a whole thread about NSVs over on Success Stories. I’ve read every single one. Whenever I stalled (and you will stall along the way, just trust yourself!) remember to look for NSVs.
That’s probably the best thread here, and kept me going through the whole process.
As far as “sticking to it”, find foods you enjoy and incorporate them. For whatever reason, I love me a bowl of cottage cheese topped with frozen Wyman’s wild blueberries (has to be Wyman’s!), fresh or frozen cherries, 8 gr of Grapenuts for crunch, and a tablespoon or two of sweet blueberry balsamic vinegar.
Obese me couldn’t last half an hour without a hit of chocolate or Geneva cookies. Now I love my bowl so much, I get crabby if I have to take it out of my meal plan for some reason.
Today I’m on the fence because I’m making chilaquiles, which I’ve never done before. I’ve got a tentative estimate of those calories (I pre-log several days out- also helpful). If need be I can pull either my blueberry bowl or my bowl of popcorn.
OTOH, if the chilaquiles look to come in less once I assemble them, or I burn more than I expect today (unlikely for a Saturday), I’ll be doubling up on the popcorn to make my calories. 😃
Find those foods you like, if you’re looking to build muscle make sure you have higher protein levels than the average recommended daily, and be flexible enough to know how to Tetris it all in advance.
I know your burning desire to change. That was what finally got me off my rump. Just don’t wait til you’re an exhausted 50-something headed down the path to diabetes and a cane. Don’t mean to be rude and hope your life isn’t like this, but if you e got older siblings or parents, mine were a terrible example, but example nonetheless.
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Hello! I’m a 23 year old 6’0 male and at my heaviest when I first started working out again was 356 lbs about 2 and a half weeks ago and I’m currently down to 340. I know while working out and looking to lose weight and body fat is to be in a calorie deficit. I’ve heard from around my weight and height I should be consuming 2000-2500 calories but I’ve been eating 800-1400 calories and burning about 700-1000 calories in a work out. I only do HIIT exercises so I focus on intense short workouts from 45 minutes to an hour and I know they’re best for losing weight and body fat. Just curious if there’s any tips that can help me out more. I eat a lot more clean as well like chicken and potatoes usually 4-8 oz of chicken and 1 full potato. Sometimes a ham sandwich with some veggie straws, salads, ground turkey and rice, that kind of vibe. I use to not care what I eat but I really want to lose weight so I’m more aware of what I eat and watch my macros. Would love any tips that can help me on this journey, thank you!
Others have given you excellent advice to get more calories so that you don't tank your health.
I'm going to comment on the exercise, but I'm torn about which direction to go.
Probably most important: If you're relatively new to regular exercise, start moderately and build gradually. You don't mention how often you're exercising, but I'm guessing from context that it might be daily, or nearly. Even if you've been moderately active previously, daily HIIT is NOT best for losing weight and body fat, no matter what nonsense in the blogosphere may claim.
Highly intense exercise is more fatiguing. Over-exercise can bleed calorie burn out of daily life activity (via fatigue, doing less - maybe in subtle ways - and resting more). Also, the exercises usually described as HIIT these days, often fast-paced exercise with weights, bodyweight, or similar equipment . . . they have higher injury risk. Injury can sink an entire exercise program until healing can happen.
What's best for weight loss is a sustainable, manageable challenge to current fitness level. If a person hasn't worked out much previously, I'd recommend they start with some moderate thing, even walking, striving for a pace that's just a bit of a challenge for the time they have to devote to it. The sweet spot, IMO, is maybe just a few minutes of a "whew" feeling right after the exercise, then feeling energized - not exhausted - for the rest of the day.
If new to the exercise, I'd go with every other day (or less) for the first week or two, and see how that settles in to the body. The exercise isn't where the magic happens, isn't the part where our bodies rebuild better. That happens in the recovery time between exercise sessions. Recovery is very important. This applies to our hearts, as well as our other muscles.
As a person gets fitter, the starting exercise load will get easier. That's when to increase pace, duration, intensity or type of exercise to keep that manageable challenge always in the picture.
The challenge is what triggers fitness improvement. The "manageable" part allows for an energetic daily life routine, solid recovery to rebuild the body better, reduced risk of injury, and probably more enjoyment of exercise as well. (There are research studies suggesting that test groups assigned intense exercise don't continue as well as those assigned a more moderate routine.)
It is good to include some strength exercise while losing weight, but I'd recommend a slower-paced traditional routine rather than high rep, fast-paced work. That can be weight lifting, bodyweight exercises, or really anything that challenges current muscular strength. Although it burns fewer calories than cardio, strength training helps us preserve as much muscle as possible alongside losing fat.
Did you know that obese people usually have more muscle mass than similar always-slim people who have the same exercise history? It comes from moving our larger mass through daily life. Muscle is slow to build, and building it takes a lot of work as well as time. Strength training during loss helps preserve what we already have.
A pound of muscle burns very slightly more calories at rest than a pound of fat, which results in "higher metabolism". That effect is small, just a few calories a day. But people with relatively more muscle are likely to find it easier and more fun to move in daily life, so are simply likely to move more. That more-frequent movement can burn meaningful numbers of calories daily. (Example: I used to budget trips up and down stairs in my house when I was obese, staging items at the top/bottom to carry on infrequent trips. Now it seems like I scamper up/down stairs many times a day without a thought.)
We don't need to start strength training and cardio all at once. It's total exercise load that IMO is best increased gradually. A person could start with a bit of each, or start with one type and add the other later. What matters is total load being appropriate for current fitness level. The goal is to establish a productive, enjoyable routine that we want to keep doing long term. (Any exercise we do is 100% more beneficial than some theoretically better punitively intense thing that we eventually procrastinate or skip with the slightest excuse.)
Back at HIIT specifically: Elite cardiovascular (CV) sport athletes don't do all high-intensity work every single day in every workout, and they have the best fitness and health advice money can buy. Yes, the daily work they do would be intense for me, but in terms of their personal capability, CV elites do a large volume of moderate intensity work (their "main meal" in exercise terms) and add a small amount of high-intensity work a couple of times a week (like a "side dish"). Why would us regular duffers do otherwise?
Starting out, it's a good idea to keep CV exercise moderate for the first few weeks, to build a base of endurance. Higher intensity exercise can be added later on that foundation, in smaller doses. That's a normal way to look at training plans.
This last I feel like I have to say, and it may seem critical but I think it's more of a blessing in context: There are physiological limits on true high intensity exercise, at any fitness level. If a person can do something for an hour, it isn't truly high intensity. That's OK: Like I said, doing all high intensity work isn't ideal for fitness OR weight loss. The fast-paced nature of most modern activities called "HIIT" is still an injury and fatigue risk, too.
Since you (quite legitimately) asked Riverside the follow up on "how would she know", I'll answer that straight off. The point isn't to be braggy, it's to offer bona fides for the advice, which you can evaluate as you will.
I was a late-bloomer athlete who started being routinely active after cancer treatment. I was obese (and stayed obese for a dozen years while training hard and even competing, BTW). Along the way, I got coaching certifications from the official body for my short-endurance CV sport, to the highest level I could without being a professional coach. I've personally used training plans developed by a high-level coach (Division I NCAA) for people like me, and have seen the similar plans used with that coach's collegiate athletes. I've known multiple elite (national team, Olympic) athletes in my sport, and been coached by those folks.
I won't pretend to detailed knowledge about strength training; I just know basics. I know more about cardiovascular fitness development. Personally, I'm not competing anymore (probably), but I'm still athletically active, still working with good coaches when I can, and (for reasons on the eating side of things, not exercise), I haven't been overweight (let alone obese) since around late 2015.
Best wishes!
Yes, I do workout everyday only doing HIIT exercises from 45-65 minutes. To go off of your point on how HIIT exercises every day aren’t the best that is news to me and I have noticed myself trying to rest more.
If not HIIT exercises every day are there any other type of workouts you may suggest good for losing weight and fat that I can look into more?
On the cardio side of things, any activity you enjoy that raises your heart rate a bit is great. It can be walking, swimming, biking, cardio machines, canoeing/kayaking/rowing, active VR or video games, playing frisbee, skating, any of dozens of kinds of dancing, YouTube cardio videos (lots of types), martial arts, . . . you name it.
I'm a big fan of finding things that are fun, and what's fun is individual. If fun is out of reach, tolerable and practical is the fallback. The golden prize here is good overall life balance, a happy life, IMO. Personally, I mostly row (boats) and bike. I do both of those at a mix of intensities. But those specific activities wouldn't suit everyone.
Any added activity burns extra calories, and burning more calories lets us eat more (getting better nutrition!) while losing at the same sensible rate. Some people do use exercise to create a calorie deficit, but I'm not personally a fan of that thought process: I was training hard 6 days most weeks for a dozen years, while staying overweight/obese. Getting eating (in calorie terms) where I needed to be was what triggered weight loss. It typically takes me, at my size, over an hour to burn 500 calories. I can eat 500 calories in 5 minutes without even blinking.
Strictly speaking, exercise is optional for weight loss. But it's great for health, fitness, and the joy of movement, so I'd encourage everyone to do some.
For strength exercise, there's some of that "find the fun" aspect, too. The most effective ways to keep and even increase muscle will be well-designed progressive strength training programs.
There's a thread here about strength training programs other MFP-ers have found beneficial:
https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10332083/which-lifting-program-is-the-best-for-you/p1
Despite the title, it does include programs a person can do at home with minimal equipment, not just programs that require access to a well-stocked weight room.I don’t really use weights in my HIIT workouts only in 2 or my exercises out of the 8 that I do in 1 workout consist of me using 10 pound weights.
After working out everyday I can say after I feel energized rather than more tired to do anything the rest of the day so I guess that good from going off of your point there lol.
I have to say, I'm a little confused here: Earlier in this post, you said "I have noticed myself trying to rest more", but here you say "I feel energized rather than more tired". The key thing is to avoid over-exercise for current fitness level.I agree that recovery is important so I will implement taking Sundays off for my workouts.
I do 2 strength type of exercises in my workout bc as you said I know it is important to incorporate it somehow. Good point on how athletes don’t do those high intensity workouts everyday. Good way of putting it with the main meal and side dish 😂.
For the past 3 weeks I’ve been working out I can say they’ve been somewhat moderate and definitely built my endurance up.
I did ask riverside how she would know politely because she did say to ask her and I thought I could learn from it, and that I did! Everyone has been giving such great advice and I thank each and every one of you guys.
Once again, thank you for your response and I will do my best moving forward and congratulations to you on being healthier after your cancer treatment and getting to a point where you’re healthy and can even compete it seems like! Hats off to you!
I'm cheering for you to succeed: You're clearly committed, and thinking hard about what will be best for you. That's great! I'm wishing you success, and would bet you'll achieve it, with your positive attitude and actions.
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