Reached my weight goal but not body composition

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  • kcbythec
    kcbythec Posts: 22
    Hi all....and Dawna I couldn't agree more with your method of achieving your goals. I do think lifting is becoming a way to burn, and rev up the metabolism, but I still do at least 40 minutes of cardio a day, sometimes interspersed for just getting my HR up. The more moves I learn to do the more I can feel the particular muscle group getting stronger. It's a good thing!

    KCbythec
  • mworld
    mworld Posts: 270
    think i saw it mentioned quite a few times, but sounds to me like you just need to buff up....eat maintenance and do serious weight training -- im a p90x fanboy for the weight training portion (but don't think their cardio like bits are that impressive and run instead fo those). Just going to the gym and moving some weights around wont cut it unless you get really body builder serious with your research....which is why a PT or something like P90x is great since they do the 'thinking' for you (i know that sounds ironic)
  • aippolito1
    aippolito1 Posts: 4,894 Member
    Just like you said, increase your calories to maintenance and lift heavy stuff to bulk up. It's pretty simple, actually.
  • HOSED49
    HOSED49 Posts: 642 Member
    You said you enjoy running so I would second an above suggestion of looking into either a crossfit gym or just using their website to do your own crossfit workouts. It is cardio based with olympic lifts along with bodyweight exercises. I was also unhappy with my weight, I joined a biggest loser contest at work in January at 214 lbs and 19% bodyfat. In April I placed third in the contest by dropping 21 lbs and got to 14% bodyfat. So like you I reached my weight goal and then I changed my goals on here to maintain my current weight. It raised my calories, which were very hard to acheive the first month! Like you I still wanted closer to the 10-12% bf range, so I began running more and utilizing the crossfit workouts. They say you can see your abs below 12% bf, so I must be there because I am glad they are back. And the workouts....they kick my *kitten* and I love the challenge. I posted the deck of cards workout earlier today which is just one of many of the different challenges they have. Oh and from personal experience with the protein, the higher I kept my protein intake, the leaner I got, scientifically debunked or not, eating more protein made me and alot of the guys I workout with alot leaner! Anyways, thats my two cents....you can use em or throw em in your change jar for later!
  • michiganderrdh
    michiganderrdh Posts: 151 Member
    I also recommend ChaLEAN Extreme which is also a Beachbody program. It concentrates on exactly what you're looking for - tightening things! She recommends heavier weights, slower and few reps. You are still sore and get a great workout. I got my hamstrings defined again for the first time in years.

    http://beachbodycoach.com/esuite/home/michiganderrdh?bctid=25219364001

    My husband also used this program and liked it. I'm working out a plan for the first of the year (I'm pregnant ;) and am going to mix Insanity (mostly cardio), P90X and ChaLEAN together. I prefer CHL's strength training over P90X's but I really like KenpoX and YogaX (even though it's so long, I break it up some days).

    What about yoga??? I LOVE yoga! It always helps to define your tri's and is a GREAT core workout! Pilates as well! Are you at a gym at all???
  • Azdak
    Azdak Posts: 8,281 Member
    At this point, I don't think doing more cardio is going to get you where you want to go. Keeping your cardio more or less where it is and moving in the direction of more strength training is probably the best advice. My gut feeling is that something more akin to a crossfit style routine would be a good place to start--or something like TRX-, perhaps cycling through periods of heavier weight lifting.

    Also keep in mind that if you have made your current changes in 5 months, you are just getting started. You are aspiring to an athlete's body, which is going to take more work (and probably time) than it took you to get to this point.
  • whyflysouth
    whyflysouth Posts: 308 Member
    At this point, I don't think doing more cardio is going to get you where you want to go. Keeping your cardio more or less where it is and moving in the direction of more strength training is probably the best advice. My gut feeling is that something more akin to a crossfit style routine would be a good place to start--or something like TRX-, perhaps cycling through periods of heavier weight lifting.

    Also keep in mind that if you have made your current changes in 5 months, you are just getting started. You are aspiring to an athlete's body, which is going to take more work (and probably time) than it took you to get to this point.

    Yeah, you're right, I think this is the part of the game where the real journey begins. My brother has been an athlete his whole life and he got pretty surprised when he saw how quickly I lost the weight that I seemed to put on gradually over the last decade, but he was surprised by how "flabby" I was at the same time... so I think losing the weight has probably been the easiest part of it, now the key is putting on the right weight and this is where the endurance stretch is going to be for me, maybe it might take a year of dedication but I'm thankful I have all of you providing support & advice here.

    On the lifting, yeah I'm starting a program called MAX-OT where you lift as heavy as you can to get to failure in 4-6 reps, it's something I've never really focussed before as all my previous lifting has been in the 10-15 reps range, and I'm hoping it will jump-start my muscles into growth. The times when I'd be dedicating lifting I'd always hit a plateau in strength after about what seems like a month, and I wouldn't really see much change physically, so I don't know if that I'm just being impatient and need to work through such times, or if I'm not eating enough to get real muscle growth... when I was 20 yrs old never had such a problem, was able to keep growing (albiet at a slower rate than most others, i guess this is the ecto part of my ecto-mesomorph somatype).

    Hosed - nice work on getting to your abs! Yeah you've always had an impressive physique under the fat so once you lost the fat you could get back to it quite nicely. I'd like to get my body up to a level where if my work schedule got so hectic that I found myself with an extra 10-15 lbs of fat one day, I'd only need a diet modification and introducing some daily cardio to get back to my ideal... rather than being a fat-skinny-guy.
  • disneyfetishboy
    disneyfetishboy Posts: 65 Member
    This has been a good thread, thanks for starting it.

    I'm in a similar situation where I have hit my target weight, and am moving into a phase where I want to look better. I sought out a professional's advice (registered dietician, physical therapist, trainer) and received some recommendations already made by others here. Here's a quick summary of her recommendations:

    1) Back out of *some* cardio (I was going 7 days a week) and substitute-in some serious weight training

    2) When lifting, use compound lifts and lift heavy (until fatigue)

    3) Up your protein intake and try to eat immediately after lifting

    4) Feel free to eat all your calories (incl. exercise calories) but as a rule of thumb just eat when you're hungry

    5) For the cardio that remains, try interval training to make better use of your time (and leave more time for lifting)

    Another observation was that she thought that a body fat percentage lower than 12% (for men) is something that is very hard to attain for someone who isn't a pretty damn serious athlete or a bodybuilder. Be sure your goals are appropriate for your lifestyle and the amount of time that you want to dedicate to fitness/health.

    I'm just 3 weeks out of making some of these changes to my routine. I can already tell that it will be slower transformation than straight weight loss, but am hopeful it will work . . .
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