strength training and cardio question

lorisiii

I'm getting close to my weight goal, I still have about 10-15 pounds I'd like to lose. I got to the gym Mon - Fri during my lunch hour - On Mon. Wed. & Fri. I do 25 minutes of cardio (usually eliptical) and 20 minutes of weight lifting. On Tuesday & Thursday I do a full 45 minutes of cardio (usually a spinning class). I'm starting to see some muscle definition including some in my upper abs but my lower abs still have a good layer of blubber covering them (I've had 2 c-sections and 2 wonderful children though!). My thought is to cut down the strength training to 2 days per week and to do 3 solid days of cardio - thoughts? suggestions? Thanks!

stroutman81

Firstly, congrats on your success. That's fantastic.

With regards to cutting down strength training, that's probably the last thing I'd do in your situation. Humans aren't biologically hardwired to be lean - it goes against our evolutionary programming. What this means is that once we become relatively lean and try to get leaner, funny things happen such as a reduction in metabolic rate above and beyond that which is expected with ordinary weight loss as well as muscle loss.

Especially in a females case (as you women aren't hormonally dispositioned to carry a lot of muscle), it's very important to take the proper steps to ensure muscle maintenance when going from relatively lean to leaner. These steps include eating sufficient amounts of protein as well as lifting weights sufficiently.

Doing a lot of cardio can actually be counterproductive for someone in your situation.

I'd highly suggest sticking with 3 sessions of strength training per week. If you do cut it down to twice per week, at least increase their duration to something like 45-60 minutes. If it would help, I'd be happy to take a look at your current weight lifting program.

If you're finding you need to do more cardio than you're already doing... there's probably one of two things going on:

1. Something is off nutritionally, which in your case I doubt since you've already been so successful.

2. You're expectations are a little "off." For someone at your stage of the game... results come painstakingly slow. I can't emphasize that enough. Especially for women, as they tend to hold onto fat and their metabolism tend to vary more than males. Remember, our "problem areas" are typically the first place to store fat and the last place to lose it.

Simply keep up with your balanced approach to exercise, ensure calories and nutrients are where they need to be given your goal and stats, and be patient.

lorisiii

Thanks I really appreciate your advice. You're right I'm probably just being impatient but I could stand to up my protein. I lift pretty heavy (I have freakishly strong legs and could leg press 300 pounds but don't because my husband is afraid I'll blow out a knee). I alternate two different work-out routines, one using the gym machines (ab & back machine, leg press, leg/hamstring curl, incline press, lateral raise, lateral pulldown) and the other using free weights (crunches, squats, dead lifts, chest press, lateral raise, bicep curl, tricep extension) I do two sets of each and once I get to where I can do 15 reps I increase the resistance, I keep a journal with me so I can log what I do each time so that the next work-out I can "one-up" the last time. I just want to de-jiggle so it's easy to see the muscle beneath! I didn't mention before I'm turning 38 in a couple of weeks if that makes any difference. Thank you again!

DeeDeeLHF

I am responding so that I can re-read this again and again. I am also in my later phases of weight loss and it is really slow. I plan to increase a bit more my weight lifting. You seem to have a really good plan. I think I will make an appointment with one of the trainers at the Y tomorrow to get some better direction! I have been meaning to buy a notebook to keep track and you just motivated me to actually move on that.

Thanks for the post!

DD

stroutman81

Thanks I really appreciate your advice. You're right I'm probably just being impatient but I could stand to up my protein. I lift pretty heavy (I have freakishly strong legs and could leg press 300 pounds but don't because my husband is afraid I'll blow out a knee). I alternate two different work-out routines, one using the gym machines (ab & back machine, leg press, leg/hamstring curl, incline press, lateral raise, lateral pulldown) and the other using free weights (crunches, squats, dead lifts, chest press, lateral raise, bicep curl, tricep extension) I do two sets of each and once I get to where I can do 15 reps I increase the resistance, I keep a journal with me so I can log what I do each time so that the next work-out I can "one-up" the last time. I just want to de-jiggle so it's easy to see the muscle beneath! I didn't mention before I'm turning 38 in a couple of weeks if that makes any difference. Thank you again!

That's actually not a bad routine. I expected much worse if I'm being honest.

Let me try to prove a point. One of my current clients is a female who's 5'8 and 135 lbs. She's roughly 19-20% body fat. She's strong and lean relative to most women. However, she wants leaner.

Her strength training routine is so simple that most would probably laugh. But I don't follow trends. I do what I know works and makes sense to me scientifically.

Her routine is 3 days per week.

Monday:

Barbell Squats 3 sets of 4-6 reps
Barbell Bench Press 3x4-6
Barbell Row 3x4-6
DB Overhead Press 2x10-12
Planks 3x60 seconds

Wednesday:

Step-ups 2x12-15
Single Leg Romanian DB Deadlifts 2x12-15
Pushups 2x12-15
Inverted Rows - 2x12-15
Pallof Presses - 3x12-15

Friday:

Leg Press - 3x6-8
Leg Curls - 3x6-8
Incline DB Press - 3x6-8
Cable Pulldowns - 3x6-8
Cable Crunches - 3x10-12

Now don't get hung up on the exercises, though I'll find videos of them if you'd like. I want you to see the overall flow of things. Exercise selection matters little, relatively speaking. What matters is the intensity and volume of this program matches the goals of maintaining (possibly building a little) muscle while leaning out (which is losing fat).

Monday can be thought of as a heavy day, Wednesday as a light day, and Friday as a moderate day. Why? Well rep range dictates weight lifted. The heavier the weight, the lower the rep range and the lighter the weight, the higher the rep range.

I don't ever allow her to lift to failure on any set, as that's counterproductive.

JennCh

Hi Steve,

My question to you is this: I'm currently training for a sprint tri to be done in late April. The training currently is all cardio--swim one day, bike the next, run the next, then basically follow that pattern with one day off per week. While I see significant improvement in performance in all three categories, I still think I should be doing a couple of days of strength training. The trainer disagrees. What would you suggest?

While I am enjoying the improvements I see with my swimming and running, I'm one of those who would like to see results in getting a bit leaner. I've reached a point where I'm not seeing much change in weight. I am 5'6" and weigh around 145, and with all the cardio, it seems like I should be leaner. I do pretty good with the diet, too, so I'm getting a bit frustrated.

Any suggestions would be very appreciated.

Jennifer

lorisiii

Wow, thanks Steve. You've given me a lot of information and I appreciate your advice, I definately see some things that I could switch up in my routine by looking at your client's. I'll try to be patient in the meantime!

stroutman81

Hi Steve,

My question to you is this: I'm currently training for a sprint tri to be done in late April. The training currently is all cardio--swim one day, bike the next, run the next, then basically follow that pattern with one day off per week. While I see significant improvement in performance in all three categories, I still think I should be doing a couple of days of strength training. The trainer disagrees. What would you suggest?

While I am enjoying the improvements I see with my swimming and running, I'm one of those who would like to see results in getting a bit leaner. I've reached a point where I'm not seeing much change in weight. I am 5'6" and weigh around 145, and with all the cardio, it seems like I should be leaner. I do pretty good with the diet, too, so I'm getting a bit frustrated.

Any suggestions would be very appreciated.

Jennifer

Jennifer -

This is quite a common issue I run into - women who are training for endurance competitions who are also interested in enhancing body composition.

Here are some of my general ideas pertaining to endurance training and becoming lean (and remember, leanness is a function of shedding fat while maintaining or ever growing muscle). These are in no particular order:

1. Making a muscle grow requires specific changes in the cellular structure of the muscle fibers - this is related to anaerobic (oxygen-free sugar-burning) metabolism. Protein accumulates under these conditions, making it bigger.

Cardio, on the other hand, triggers muscle fibers to adapt for aerobic (oxygen-burning) metabolism and endurance.

This is an obvious clash as these two variables are mutually exclusive - they tend to cancel each other out. You can't have a muscle that's optimized for being large/anaerobic and to be energy-efficient and endurance-oriented.

The analogy I use is comparing a big SUV to a compact economy car. The SUV is big, powerful, and has horrible gas mileage. The economy car is small and not very powerful, but it'll run for days on a tank of gas.

I'm not saying everyone who does endurance training and competition is going to be soft/un-lean. Common sense and simply looking at the runners at a starting line will tell you there are lean runners. However, if you're genetic proclivity is to be un-lean, chances and not carry a significant base of muscle... chances are slim you're going to obtain appreciable leanness while training for an endurance competition.

Training to optimize muscle retention/growth you need to aim towards the big inefficient muscle. Anaerobic optimization is what allows protein to accumulate, making the muscle bigger and stronger - at the cost of aerobic endurance. Aerobic-trained muscles are going to be much smaller (smaller = efficient) and full of the enzymes and cellular junk necessary for that - which will be at the sacrifice of the contractile proteins that make up the bulk of a muscle fiber.

I should add that this effect is mainly observed in athletes that are trying to do too much at once. I'm not talking about a handful of 30 minute cardio sessions here; you can out-eat that. This does become a concern if you're one of those doing 2-3 hours worth of cardio several times a week.

2. Performance enhancement and high volumes of training require calories. Dieting, and thus improving leanness, requires a calorie deficit. They don't tend to mix.

3. Our bodies are only able to handle so much stress. Think of it like a sink with a drain. The water coming out of the facet is stress, which can be in the form of training, family life, busy work schedule, illness, anxiety, a lack of calories coming in, etc. All these things accumulate. The drain is our recovery from said stress. If the water is coming out of the facet at a faster rate than the drain can get rid of the water, we're going to have a overspill.

This is when injuries are likely, overtraining, lack of motivation, physical sickness, etc, etc. etc, pop up.

So that's a lot of words to say my suggestion would be to focus on improving your performance right now and worry about getting lean later. Make sense?

At long duration type events, weight training isn't likely to improve performance much at all. If you ARE going to institute some resistance training though, I'd make it two brief, full body sessions per week.

stroutman81

Wow, thanks Steve. You've given me a lot of information and I appreciate your advice, I definately see some things that I could switch up in my routine by looking at your client's. I'll try to be patient in the meantime!

Soon, maybe today, I'll be writing something up on my blog here at MFP about some basic, foundational ideas pertaining to weight lifting... so stay tuned.

JennCh

Thanks so much for the reply. I get what you're saying, and this brings up another question. I've had to work really, really hard at improving my endurance. When I run, the first half mile to a mile is agony for me. My legs feel heavy and tired. When I bike, my thighs burn for the first ten minutes or so. I don't understand this as my legs have always been really, really strong. I can press huge amounts of weight. My calves, well, let's just say my hubby marvels at how big my calves are. They seem out of proportion to my thighs and always have been. Are some people just not genetically made-up for endurance, and no matter what they do they will never be really good at it?

Jennifer

stroutman81

Jennifer -

Yup, strength doesn't have a lot of carryover to endurance. Just b/c you can leg press a lot of weight doesn't mean you'll be good at exercising over long distances/durations.

It doesn't mean it won't improve over time, but if you're not genetically built for endurance type stuff.... you're going to have more of a challenge than someone who is built for it. I'm actually in similar shoes as you. I'm a power/speed athlete. I grew up always being the fastest kid on teams. I was a sprinter. I've always been explosive and very strong in the gym.

But now... now I'm into climbing mountains. And that requires some serious endurance. And I have to *really* work at improving my ability to last over long, strenuous climbs.

Different forms of training can have different impacts on how your cardiorespiratory system adapts. Essentially, all cardio isn't built the same.

Quick question:

What's your resting heart rate?

JennCh

I was the same way as you with sports: sprinter, explosive. I can play basketball all day long and love doing every second of it. Tell me I have to run a 5k and I crumple on the floor in tears. My resting heart rate, the last time I checked which has been awhile, was 58.

Thank you very much for the feedback. I greatly appreciate it.

questionablemethods

Is your weight lifting routine fairly stable? Maybe mixing it up a bit might help--use the whole idea of "muscle confusion" to shock your body into letting go of a bit of that fat? Just a thought.

Edit: Oh, I see you did note that you have two different routines and you up things a bit each time. I am just very much in favor of mixing things up a LOT for each of my workouts. I get bored easily with routines. Best of luck!

JennCh

Right now I'm not lifting. I went strictly cardio to train for the sprint tri. The trainer who is helping the group advised us not to do strength training, so I'm swimming, running, and biking. I think I should add strength training. Before I started training for the sprint tri, I was doing P90X. I loved it and saw good results with it. Since switching, I've not seen the gains I saw with P90X. Maybe I should start back with the X.