Maintain Weight, Lose Inches

kharmacat

I broke my arm pretty badly in March, and during the surgery/recovery process, I lost enough weight to get me to my goal - but not in the right places! My bum is flatter (not a good thing on my body), and you can see I've lost weight in my face ... however my waist measurement is still the same as when I started out with MFP, and it's really my waist where I wanted to lose the weight to begin with.

I've set MFP to give me calorie recommendations on losing 0.5 lbs/week, and I'm trying to cut down on the carbs and alcohol (sugar isn't a problem, gives me a headache) ...

Doing 30-45 min of cardio and/or ab exercises daily while eating lots of protein. I can't do any weights with my arm still healing, but my cardio includes lots of squats, lunges and other leg work.

Any advice? Thanks!

nxd10

I sit on a pilates ball chair all day at work. It's been great for my posture. During maintenance I haven't lost weight but have lost 4" on my waist and 2" on my hips that I attribute mostly to just that, because nothing else about my exercise pattern has changed.

And yes, lifting will do it better.

heybales

With that workout, you'll just get more of the same as you already got - which means smaller version of current you.
It is cardio with doing a lot, you need smaller reps for the resistance training to ask your body to make improvements.

Same fat places, same weak places, ect.

Skip the weight loss since you said already at healthy weight. Just undesired fat level.

And guess what you can do with even a hurt arm?

You can use the biggest muscles in the body that will have the most effect for improving while fat is lost. Lower body.

You can use machines for now with bad arm for all kinds of glute, hamstring, quad, and calf work.
Throw in some core and lower back stuff that doesn't require the arms, and you almost got full body.

Depending on arm issue, may be even able to do more.

Why no weight loss attempt, only maintenance?

Because you'll get the biggest improvement from lifting eating at that level. Well, actually eating in surplus, but that's for later.
Make this a good heavy program, 3 x weekly, 3 sets of 8 to 12 reps, rests of 2-4 min, last few reps of last set should be shaky leg tired muscle almost bad form.
Do NOT do cardio during the lifting rests. Really rest so you can go hard.

Now - do not log those lifting workouts, those are going to create your slight deficit. That means the day after when actually getting repaired, you are eating at maintenance.

Do log cardio, which should only be walking or similar easy on between rest days. If you want something harder, do it right after the lifting for up to 30 min, however hard you can with tired muscles.
Log all that cardio and eat those back, no deficit from that.

Oh, extra protein is worthless unless the body has a need to use - otherwise you are just converting it into glucose because it's not needed for current workouts. Wasted money you might say.

kharmacat

Thanks for the reply! I was under the impression that I needed heavy cardio to lose the body fat, no? If I understand your advice correctly:

3 x weekly weight lifting with lower body while eating at maintenance level (net calories below maintenance)
On opposite days, do light cardio for net maintenance

I don't have a gym membership anymore, I've just been working out at home with squats and lunges, etc ... in your opinion do I really machines, or can I get the change I want with just body weight exercises?

At this point I can't lift more than 1lb with my bad arm, so even holding weight while doing the squats/lunges is out, unless I could do it effectively with one arm. Maybe some rubber bands with the legs?

nxd10

From everything I've read, you need more than just your body weight to get real resistance and training. The other stuff is good, mind you, but it does different things.

heybales

Thanks for the reply! I was under the impression that I needed heavy cardio to lose the body fat, no? If I understand your advice correctly:

3 x weekly weight lifting with lower body while eating at maintenance level (net calories below maintenance)
On opposite days, do light cardio for net maintenance

I don't have a gym membership anymore, I've just been working out at home with squats and lunges, etc ... in your opinion do I really machines, or can I get the change I want with just body weight exercises?

At this point I can't lift more than 1lb with my bad arm, so even holding weight while doing the squats/lunges is out, unless I could do it effectively with one arm. Maybe some rubber bands with the legs?

Diet is for weight loss - done right just fat loss, done wrong includes muscle mass loss.

Exercise is for heart health and body improvements - done right can support just fat loss, done wrong encourages muscle loss.

You do NOT need heavy cardio to lose fat - in fact that's a great way to lose muscle mass along with it.
You need a diet to lose fat.
Or eating at maintenance while body makes improvements which require more than you eat, so it burns fat to get the extra.
Cardio merely increases what you burn daily, so that when you remove some calories, your eating level still may be as high as you want to eat - but you'll burn off some muscle mass.
Lifting would be better, but it burns less, so your eating level would be less to obtain the same loss - but you'd retain muscle mass.
But eating at maintenance should take care of eating level then.

If you are out of shape enough that you can only do the set and rep ranges I mentioned using body weight and it's difficult, than that will work. Obviously not for long as it should become easier.

But if you require much more reps to feel any difficulty, then that is cardio with strength component. Can help retain muscle mass in a diet, but it ain't gonna add anything eating at maintenance. That's turns in to endurance, which doesn't need more muscle for a long long time.

But if that's all you got, you can at least strengthen what you've got with 1 legged squats and straight-leg deadlifts with weight in good hand.