Where do I go from here?

khall86790

So for 4 months so I have been eating at a deficit and doing cardio 4-5 days per week and have lost around 20lbs. Before that I wasn't calorie counting and I lost probably another 10lbs. Now, I am under my original goal weigh and at the clothes size I want to be.
However, I still have an untoned stomach and my arms could do with some serious muscle building as I still struggle with push ups, side planks, etc. and can feel I don't hold a lot of strength there.
Generally, I like the shape of my body I just want it to be a toned version of what it is, below is my progress so far and how I currently look;


Now what I want to know is, what is going to get me "toned" from here? Realistically, I don't think I need to lose anymore weight and if anything I am mentally preparing myself that I may need to gain in the process of turning excess fat into muscle.
I want to know if I should still be eating at a calorie deficit or eating at a maintenance level at this point and also what exercises are best to do from this point onwards to achieve what I want?
Currently, I have been doing a aerobics style of yoga for 30 minutes, 6 days a week to build my core and arm strength up and I intend to start swimming once a week and probably running (again) 2 times a week in about 2 weeks time.
Will this get me where I want to be? Or do I need to be incorporating weight training in?
Is the cardio necessary at all if I just want to tone?
I have been searching online for answers but I just want to make sure I get this right!

Thanks in advance

JenMc14

You can't turn fat into muscle. You burn fat, gain muscle. You can switch to maintenance, cut down on cardio and had in a solid lifting program. As a beginner, you may experience some fat loss along with a bit of muscle gin. This will even out after a few months. After that, you can start to up your calories until you're gaining .5-1 pound a week. You will gain fat, but if you go slowly, hopefully it will mostly be muscle. After a bit of time, you can go back down to maintenance, then back down to a deficit to burn off more fat. I'm working on this problem, too. Congrats on your progress, you look great

khall86790

You can't turn fat into muscle. You burn fat, gain muscle. You can switch to maintenance, cut down on cardio and had in a solid lifting program. As a beginner, you may experience some fat loss along with a bit of muscle gin. This will even out after a few months. After that, you can start to up your calories until you're gaining .5-1 pound a week. You will gain fat, but if you go slowly, hopefully it will mostly be muscle. After a bit of time, you can go back down to maintenance, then back down to a deficit to burn off more fat. I'm working on this problem, too. Congrats on your progress, you look great

Is it necessary to up my calories after a few months of that?
My ideal is to be toned with slight muscle definition and then to maintain that throughout. So is it necessary at that point to still be keeping a close eye on calories and making adjustments to that?
I think after toning I will probably not want to burn off more fat as I've always been quite hourglass shaped and I'd like to keep that, if I keep losing I am going to lose my chest all together. Haha.

Thanks so much

JenMc14

It's not really "toning" Toned is when the fat is burned off to see the muscle. In order for that to look better, you need to have a good muscle base. So, you build the muscle, some fat comes with it. If you're happy, stop there and go to maintenance. If you feel jiggly, go back to a cut to lose the last bit of fat. Having more muscle will help increase your burn a bit, plus, once you lose the fat, you'll have more muscle to show through. Once you've been on the second cut for awhile, if you like where you're at, go to maintenance. You can switch to maintenance any time once you're happy with your look.

TeaBea

RESISTANCE training ..... it can be weights (very efficient) or body weight exercises (think squats, lunges, dips, push ups, planks) or pilates or power yoga. Find something you want to do regularly, because you will want to keep it up.


Cardio is great for burning calories & building endurance .... swimming is mostly cardio. Cardio will not help you "tone" very effectively. By effective .... I mean swimming good for the arms, spinning is good for the legs, something else for the abs & on and on ...... just do some kind of focused strength training.

Uppper http://exercise.about.com/cs/exerciseworkouts/l/blupperbody.htm
Lower http://exercise.about.com/cs/exerciseworkouts/l/bllowerbody2.htm
Abs http://exercise.about.com/od/abs/ss/abexercises.htm

khall86790

It's not really "toning" Toned is when the fat is burned off to see the muscle. In order for that to look better, you need to have a good muscle base. So, you build the muscle, some fat comes with it. If you're happy, stop there and go to maintenance. If you feel jiggly, go back to a cut to lose the last bit of fat. Having more muscle will help increase your burn a bit, plus, once you lose the fat, you'll have more muscle to show through. Once you've been on the second cut for awhile, if you like where you're at, go to maintenance. You can switch to maintenance any time once you're happy with your look.

Ok, well then at this point I am confident my problem is that I have smashed so much cardio I have neglected to build any muscle. So now that is why I am struggling to achieve a toned look? Does that sound right?
So from here I should work on a maintenance diet and building muscle, then see where I am at after a month or 2 and if I'm not happy go back into a deficit to drop any remaining fat?
Sorry, just want to check I'm following your advice correctly! Haha.

khall86790

RESISTANCE training ..... it can be weights (very efficient) or body weight exercises (think squats, lunges, dips, push ups, planks) or pilates or power yoga. Find something you want to do regularly, because you will want to keep it up.


Cardio is great for burning calories & building endurance .... swimming is mostly cardio. Cardio will not help you "tone" very effectively. By effective .... I mean swimming good for the arms, spinning is good for the legs, something else for the abs & on and on ...... just do some kind of focused strength training.

Uppper http://exercise.about.com/cs/exerciseworkouts/l/blupperbody.htm
Lower http://exercise.about.com/cs/exerciseworkouts/l/bllowerbody2.htm
Abs http://exercise.about.com/od/abs/ss/abexercises.htm

Body weight exercises is what I've been doing the past 2 weeks now in place of cardio. Specifically, I've been doing Jillian Michaels' Yoga Meltdown to get me into the swing of yoga and then I intended to move onto some power yoga DVDs and classes once I've perfected the "basics" and ideally built up some strength from it to be able to move onto something more intensive.
So does that mean yoga is an effective way to incorporate strength into my regime?

Thanks for the links!

Huffdogg

New Rules of Lifting For Women and Starting Strength are both excellent books full of wonderful information and some ideas for routines that you can try.

khall86790

New Rules of Lifting For Women and Starting Strength are both excellent books full of wonderful information and some ideas for routines that you can try.

Thanks!

Really interested for any answers on if I can class yoga and/or other types of body weight training as strength building enough to make that the "weight training" part of my regime and if I would see the results I want this way?

Huffdogg

yoga= no. Yoga is stretching. It can be difficult, but I have done it extensively and can say with a fair certainty that you cannot class it as "resistance training." It will never take the place of weight lifting.

Bodyweight exercises are...useful to a point. Many people have gotten to be extremely fit doing *mostly* calisthenic, body weight routines. I cannot say with a ton of authority what extent you have to use them to produce serious results, but I cannot believe that, for instance, doing 5 push-ups can possibly be as effective as doing 5 repetitions of bench press after you have build enough strength so that 5 push-ups are easy

So, I guess, they are an ok place to start, but will likely reduce their usefulness rapidly as you build a baseline of strength.

koing

New Rules of Lifting For Women and Starting Strength are both excellent books full of wonderful information and some ideas for routines that you can try.

Thanks!

Really interested for any answers on if I can class yoga and/or other types of body weight training as strength building enough to make that the "weight training" part of my regime and if I would see the results I want this way?

You need to do some weight training and build some muscle. You simply haven't built any muscles to show yet.

Get on the weights, do not be scared, use the suggestions here and you will the shape you want. Starting Strength is a good start.

Bodyweight exercises are okay for a beginner, but once you can do 15-20squats without killing yourself the exercise is pretty useless. Push ups and Pull ups will be a staple for most people until they can knock out 20 or 10 properly.

Congrats on your results so far.

Koing

Huffdogg

Push ups and Pull ups will be a staple for most people until they can knock out 20 or 10 properly.

IMO Pull ups will never stop being an incredibly effective staple exercise.