Starting Bodyweight Exercises- need advice

linka411

Hey Everyone,

I fractured a bone in the ball of my foot about two months ago from trying a little too hard in the gym to lose weight. I had to walk around in a giant boot, but last week I was given the ok to walk around without it. I was told to take it easy on the foot and try to avoid high-impact activity for a while. This basically means that for some time:

1. I can't run
2. I can't do very very intense workouts
3. I can't lift weights-though honestly I tried to before the fracture and I don't think I'm strong enough for it yet. Nothing against it, it'd be fun to do one day and I know the great results it gets, but I don't think I'm ready for them.


Because of this, I was thinking about what kind of workouts to do while I'm still recovering. I decided that bodyweight exercises might be the say to go. I looked for programs and I found this one: http://www.startbodyweight.com/p/about-start-bodyweight-program.html

It appears to be a progressive program, starting from the super beginner (me-I can't squat correctly or do a push-up at all) to more advanced exercises. It includes warmups, stretches, and the workouts for 3x a week, which is the amount of time I plan to be in the gym. The warmups include jump-roping or running which is out, so I'm thinking of just doing some stationary cycling instead which would be less intense on my foot.

I'd like to be able to do this workout, however I'm not sure about a few things which I thought I'd ask all of you here:

Before I begin, I'd like to point out that my overall goal is to go down to 20% BF. I believe I'm around 28-29% right now. 5'3'', 126 when I weighed myself earlier this week. BMI around 22. Set to lose 0.5 lbs/week.

1. How would I track calories burned? I know strength training doesn't burn a lot of calories, so is it worth it to even track them?

2. How would my calorie intake/nutrition work? I've done some research and I understand that the IIFYM site is good place to understand what you should be eating, but I'm not sure if I'd be doing a fat loss or a bulk, how aggressive it should be, or if it's even worth it to be considering this since I'd be starting at such a low level of strength training and I can just keep eating at a deficit like normal.

3. How would working out even though you're sore be determined? I've heard you can do it but I don't want to tear anything. I plan to work out M-W-F so I have Tuesday and Thursday to rest. However, I might still be a little sore on the next workout day. I just wanted to know whether or not it was safe to work out if I'm still feeling the hurt.

4. Should I eat a certain type of food after I work out? I plan to hit the gym in the morning before breakfast. I've heard of people say to eat certain things after you work out so I thought I'd ask.

5. I would assume that I'd be eating a lot more than I am now in order to build my body up. Should I expect an increase in weight/inches in the beginning?


If you guys can provide any kind of help or pointers I'd really appreciate it. Thanks so much in advance!

EpsilonGamma

1. How would I track calories burned? I know strength training doesn't burn a lot of calories, so is it worth it to even track them?

Yes you should. Walking is about 200 calories burnt in an hour. Strength training is about 300 calories.

2. How would my calorie intake/nutrition work? I've done some research and I understand that the IIFYM site is good place to understand what you should be eating, but I'm not sure if I'd be doing a fat loss or a bulk, how aggressive it should be, or if it's even worth it to be considering this since I'd be starting at such a low level of strength training and I can just keep eating at a deficit like normal.

Bulk? How can you bulk if you can't lift heavy weights? All you would gain is fat. Fat loss. Make sure to eat lots of protein so you don't wither away during this period.

3. How would working out even though you're sore be determined? I've heard you can do it but I don't want to tear anything. I plan to work out M-W-F so I have Tuesday and Thursday to rest. However, I might still be a little sore on the next workout day. I just wanted to know whether or not it was safe to work out if I'm still feeling the hurt.

You are only sore if you don't workout that muscle group enough or, you are going the hypertrophy route where you have moderately big weights and do about 8-10 reps. If you are sore, you definitely need to keep working out the next session. Being sore won't affect if you were tear a muscle, it will probably do the opposite. Once you warm up during the workout you won't feel as sore.

4. Should I eat a certain type of food after I work out? I plan to hit the gym in the morning before breakfast. I've heard of people say to eat certain things after you work out so I thought I'd ask.

Depends what you are doing. On a cut (fat loss) I would stick to protein and fats with little carbs. So say, eggs, bacon, sausage, veges, fruit....if you wanted you could add like one piece of toast or something equivalent. If you were bulking, then you would cut out the fat and eat protein and carbs.

5. I would assume that I'd be eating a lot more than I am now in order to build my body up. Should I expect an increase in weight/inches in the beginning?

To increase in weight you would need to eat a surplus of calories. If maintenance is 2000, then I would be aiming to eat 2200-2300. Again this would need to be high protein (make sure to get lots of fibre as well!). If you are on a cut, you will notice that you are getting toned and the inches will fall off. Depending on your rate of muscle growth you may not lose weight, but you won't gain weight.


I can't really help you with your program if you can't do things like push ups, I just haven't had the experience.

You can try pistol squat (one legged squat) and have something to help balance you at the beginning.
Do push ups on your knees (aim for 15-20) rest for 1 minute and then go again, if you only make 12, then so be it, rest a minute, go again.
You can try planks, but I don't like them, I rather do like a reverse plank. Lie down, then lift your legs, arms and torso, leaving your butt on the ground. Lift them only slightly so they aren't on the ground and then hold for as long as you can.

linka411

Hey there, thanks for the reply! I went ahead and started my program prior to your response and I guess out of planning I am doing some of the things you mentioned:

1. I work out if I'm still sore. I just try to push myself as much as I can on a rep until my muscles are really screaming to stop. Fortunately that hasn't happened since last week so I'm just doing my reps and sets until I feel like I can do them smoothly-to which I'll then progress to a harder level if it seems too easy.

2. I'm really pushing to have more protein. After every exercise day (Mon, Wed, Fri) I have two scrambled eggs, a slice of bacon and now a little protein pancake bite. I've made a lot of recipes consisting of meat (chicken thighs, turkey balls and salmon patties) and beans (black bean quesadilla) and greek yogurt to up my protein. I try to hit the limit MFP provides for me and go over to hit my LBM as much as possible. I should probably up my fiber though. I'll have to figure out how.

I understand I'm kind of starting out at a sissy point T___T but I appreciate your efforts to help me-here's essentially the very beginner program and the reps I'm doing for it.

Warm-up: 15 minutes of elliptical (I'm hoping this will soon move to 5 minutes of jogging since my foot isn't giving me pain on the elliptical), dynamic stretching
3 sets, 12 reps of assisted deep squats (I hold on to a railing and do a deep squat, hip bone parallel to knee), working to maintain posture as I do it.
3 sets, 12 reps of horizontal pulls (right now I'm using a towel to wrap around a pole in my gym and pull myself towards it. I'm getting pretty good at this so I think I might be ready to move on to the next level soon)
3 sets, 12 reps of wall push-ups (also getting better at this, I can touch my nose against the wall when I go down- I might be ready for incline push-ups soon)
3 sets, 20 reps of crunches in center, left and right (I added this for some ab work)
1 plank for 30 secs-1 min or laid-down leg lifts, 3 sets of 8 reps(might bump it up to 10 or 12)- it alternates between the days.

30 sec-1 min break between each set mentioned above. Then I stretch.

I'm still eating at a deficit since I decided that I'd like to try and lose a little more weight- however, as mentioned I'm working to eat a lot of protein to maintain my LBM as I do this.

I know my routine is kind of weak, but I'm hoping with time I'll get stronger and move on to more advanced versions of the exercises as mentioned on the site. They said to give this complete beginner routine 8 weeks before moving on to the basic one. I've only been at it for two, and I thiiink I might move on to their more basic routine in 4-6 weeks based on how I'm feeling.

One more question I do have, If strength training is about 300 calories/hr, and let's say I go for about 45 minutes with all these exercises mentioned above, I don't think I'm doing enough work to burn 300 calories- maybe like 100-150? Thoughts? My fitbit tells me I burn about 120 or so calories on the elliptical and about 50 during my bodyweight work. The fitbit naturally isn't good at tracking calories for strength training, so maybe I should just add x more calories manually to my burn and put it in as strength training-I just don't know how many.

Anyway, thanks so much for your response, I really appreciate it! I'll be keeping some of this in mind if and when I do begin lifting. Thank you! :flowerforyou:

EpsilonGamma

One more question I do have, If strength training is about 300 calories/hr, and let's say I go for about 45 minutes with all these exercises mentioned above, I don't think I'm doing enough work to burn 300 calories- maybe like 100-150? Thoughts? My fitbit tells me I burn about 120 or so calories on the elliptical and about 50 during my bodyweight work. The fitbit naturally isn't good at tracking calories for strength training, so maybe I should just add x more calories manually to my burn and put it in as strength training-I just don't know how many.

Yes, 300 might be too high depending on how much you weigh, same goes with walking. It's still safe to eat half the calories back though if you want. You don't want to be in too much of a deficit for too long as this can affect your later workouts, moods etc.

When you are ready for a different routine, let me know, but the best form of exercise is the one you are willing to do and consistently do it. So keep at what works for you at the moment.

In my opinion, strength training is the best, this gives you strength (duh), helps to build lean muscle and tone. Strength training requires you to lift heavy and do 4-5 reps.

This is opposed to hypertrophy which requires slightly lower weights and doing 8-15 reps.

What you are doing is high reps but very low weighs I am assuming, so you will only be toning.

linka411

In my opinion, strength training is the best, this gives you strength (duh), helps to build lean muscle and tone. Strength training requires you to lift heavy and do 4-5 reps.

This is opposed to hypertrophy which requires slightly lower weights and doing 8-15 reps.

What you are doing is high reps but very low weighs I am assuming, so you will only be toning.

I guess what you're describing is what I'm doing, if my body is considered a light weight (sure has heck doesn't feel like it XD). I want to be able to do push-ups and squats before I can lift though, so I'll stick to this for a while at least until I can accomplish that. When I first tried lifting I couldn't bench-press an empty bar because I have no upper body strength. Doing squats with an empty bar caused me to break a bone in my foot, so you can see my reluctance to begin again until I can strengthen up to at least a competent level. I'll be sure to update you when I decide to go back into lifting or want to do something harder.