Weight lifting, cardio, and treat days
BlackPantherChick123
Posts: 425 Member
I finally joined my local gym, I had a personal trainer set me up a plan and even added on to it. On MWF I do a full body workout with a 5 min treadmill warm up and TTh I do abs. Also I do 45-1 hour of cardio everyday and Saturday and Sunday I don't lift. Is this a good plan for burning fat and building muscle? Also, I'm consuming 1500 calories a day (even decided to save 200 calories until after my cardio as a bedtime snack to prevent me from being hungry and binging and it's working), I also want to know has anyone reach their goals by burning fat and building muscle with treat/cheat days/meals? Basically dieting/eating clean for 6 days and day 7 have whatever you want. I normally have donuts/apple fritters, some chocolate, and my usual main meal of choice. Would this work? What are your opinions, options, tips, or plans? I'm just curious and I'm very new to weight lifting.
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Replies
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What are your stats? Height, weight, age, activity aside from exercise.0
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I ask because... burning fat will depend on a caloric deficit which will depend on your stats. If you're at a healthy BMI already, you should check out the threads on "recomp."0
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Building muscle with a ton of cardio in a deficit? No. Losing fat that way, sure.4
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if you told your personal trainer your goals and that's what he set you up with, then give it a try as its gotta be better than the 90 percent of people here who only think they know what they are talking about. As for cheat meals and cheat days, I was never comfortable with an entire cheat day, but enjoyed a cheat meal every 7 to 10 days or so but never really forced myself to eat one and lost about 80 pounds. Everyone is different tho. Find what works for you. Good luck!5
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Are you trying to eat and maintenance and recomp or at a small deficit? I don't remember your stats but I remember you either don't have much to lose or are at a healthy weight if I'm not mistaken.
If you are eating in a deficit, while you can build a bit of muscle as a beginner, your main focus will be losing fat and maintaining as much muscle as possible.
If you are maintaining, you can build some muscle and lose some fat over time, but it can be fairly slow and hard to notice week to week.
Either way, as long as you are staying within your calorie goals over time (I usually go by week), getting adequate protein, nutrition, and making progress in your lifting, you can reach your goals, even if you eat what you want some days (as long as it isn't blowing you out of a deficit or maintenance... which it can if you go all out and eat anything and everything). In a deficit I tend to calorie cycle, so I eat lower two days, medium three days and high two days (usually on weekends) and I lost fat and maintained muscle no problem, in fact it helped me adhere to my deficit and increased my workout performance.
Also just make sure your cardio isn't impacting your lifting recovery or causing too high a calorie burn so that you can't keep up with fueling. That will not be good for your goals.2 -
Yep. I do that, and have had great success. Saturday is my play day.1
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Last I weighed I was 134-135 (no longer care about the number, just want to lose fat and build muscle and stay sane) I'm 21, 5'2 and I workout daily (MWF weight lifting, TTh abs, with daily 45-1 hour intense cardio (38.0 incline and 3.8 mph).0
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Log your "cheat day", even if you have to estimate . . that way you'll know if you're theoretically in a deficit, and know what adjustment to make if you don't lose as desired. If you don't log the "cheat" (I hate that term
), you have no compass to guide adjustments. 3 -
Lifting weights is a great way to build muscle. You can build muscle with cardio but not the same muscles a weight lifting regimen will give you.4
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Could I expect to see results even with cheat/treat days/meals only in a deficit? Or will these prevent me from seeing results?0
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My brother has logged over 3 years straight on mfp, lost and kept weight off and he lifts regularly.
He swears by his weekly Saturday cheat days and his body is on point with super defined flat abs.
He is ultra strict during the rest of the week though and eats low carb. Hope this helps.
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BlackPantherChick123 wrote: »Could I expect to see results even with cheat/treat days/meals only in a deficit? Or will these prevent me from seeing results?
Depends on which results.
You won't lose weight unless you're in a calorie deficit via eating, exercise, or a combination. Being in a deficit will limit muscle mass gain (not necessarily rule it out entirely, in theory, if deficit is small, you are new to lifting, follow a good program, get enough protein, etc.). You can get quite a bit stronger, when new to lifting, even without gaining muscle mass. You can possibly get stronger and look better via exercise, even without gaining muscle mass or losing weight.
You can't, in a practical sense, lose maximum weight and gain maximum muscle simultaneously. The goals oppose each other. You can maybe do a bit of each, at least for a while; or you can do a fair bit of either one while holding the other near to steady. You can build the most muscle mass if you gain weight (calorie surplus).
The so-called cheat day is kind of irrelevant, as long as you get good overall nutrition and don't eat so much on a cheat day that you completely wipe out whatever deficit you're wanting to have, if any.
Just my opinion/experience, though.3 -
I lost fat while doing a lot of cardio and a lot of weights.
I now do even more cardio and a lot of weights (and a higher activity level) but maintain my weight because I eat more.
Always keep in mind that with exactly the same exercise routine you can add, lose or keep the same amount of fat - it depends on your calorie balance. Your cheat/treat days are part of that calorie balance, it may get counter balanced by your six days of (presumably) deficit but doesn't get discounted.
Whether you regard your six days as "clean eating" and your treat day as "unclean" (???) doesn't negate both have calories.
As a beginner you do have the possibility of adding a small amount of muscle in a deficit (a very small deficit in all likelihood) but really try to shift your focus from the next few weeks and months to where you want to end up.
Be realistic - as a petite woman your potential rate of actual muscle growth is slow even with optimal training and diet.
Concentrate on doing the right things and the long term results will follow - maybe not as quickly as you would like!
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I do want to make this as a lifestyle, I want to make weightlifting part of my life and surprisingly I'm enjoying it. So much better than spending hours doing intense cardio daily bc I tend to dread of the idea that I have to do so much cardio daily and fast rather than give myself some protein before bed to prevent binging and to recover. Even though it's been a week, I can feel changes in my body and it's improving my mood. I'm still quit sore but working through it without pushing myself like I use to do back in high school when I used dumbbells. I would do like 5 sets of 50 or to the point where my muscles ache where I feel like I can't do anymore for like a week and then I just give up. With a plan, I don't hurt as much and don't feel pressured. I want to keep an active lifestyle and be able to enjoy myself at least once a week without getting fat like I done over 2017 (kept binging, over exercising, or cheating too often but I'm still lean just put on a little bit of unnecessary fat).0
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If you ate whatever you wanted on that cheat day you could wipe out your whole weeks calorie deficit.
'Cheat day' is a horrible word imo, yes on one day you could eat at maintenance calories, e.g 2000 instead of 1500 just to throw a figure out there (say you have your weight loss settings to 1lb a week then your deficit is 500 a day so 2000 would be maintenance as an example.)
But I get what you mean, while I was losing I banked some extra calories for weekend eating. I eat around 2200 cals on a Saturday, so even now at maintenance I eat at slight deficit during the week to account for that. My TDEE is approx 1950. If I ate 1950 every day then on Saturday ate my usual/preferred 2200 I would slowly gain weight. I don't want to gain so I choose to eat 1750-1800 Mon-Thu)0 -
BlackPantherChick123 wrote: »Last I weighed I was 134-135 (no longer care about the number, just want to lose fat and build muscle and stay sane) I'm 21, 5'2 and I workout daily (MWF weight lifting, TTh abs, with daily 45-1 hour intense cardio (38.0 incline and 3.8 mph).
I see a conflict with the goals of eating in a calorie deficit. The bolded references a goal where you maintain weight to build muscle and lose fat. This is known as a process called recomp. And 1500 (even if this has a small deficit included) calories seems low to maintain on for someone doing cardio everyday and a form of lifting 4 days of those same cardio days not mention activity level for a 21 year old.
So the cheat day/meal etc you plan might or might not be an added calorie 'increase' that may cause weight gain over time instead of weight/fat loss. Of course only time will tell as you have been doing this for a week, so if you were to keep up with your scale weight, measurements, etc. over the next 4-6 weeks the calorie goal you are currently eating at with the cheat day will tell you if you need to alter calories according to you end goal.
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If it's not the best to have one every week, would on every 10-15 days be better?0
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I'm 37, 5'3, 138; I am training for 4th PL competition in Feb. I maintain around 2150-2350 (I have a semi-active part-time job). Right now, I've cut out intentional cardio completely.
Lifting doesn't burn a huge amount of calories. I'd try the 1500 calorie approach if that has heen suggested (at the calorie intake, you probably don't need 45-1hr of cardio; I'd probably drop that down to 30 minutes)...and reevaluate in a couple of weeks. You can adjust calories or cardio as needed.
I eat chocolate (less than an ounce) every morning; so the answer to that is yes. You can have a (reasonable) treat everyday without interferring with your goals.1 -
BlackPantherChick123 wrote: »I finally joined my local gym, I had a personal trainer set me up a plan and even added on to it. On MWF I do a full body workout with a 5 min treadmill warm up and TTh I do abs. Also I do 45-1 hour of cardio everyday and Saturday and Sunday I don't lift. Is this a good plan for burning fat and building muscle? Also, I'm consuming 1500 calories a day (even decided to save 200 calories until after my cardio as a bedtime snack to prevent me from being hungry and binging and it's working), I also want to know has anyone reach their goals by burning fat and building muscle with treat/cheat days/meals? Basically dieting/eating clean for 6 days and day 7 have whatever you want. I normally have donuts/apple fritters, some chocolate, and my usual main meal of choice. Would this work? What are your opinions, options, tips, or plans? I'm just curious and I'm very new to weight lifting.
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If I want to avoid cheat days/meals for awhile, would it be better to increase my calories a bit? I do get hungry on 1500 and I eat every 2-3 hours. Sorry for all the questions, just need advice and opinions that would be beneficial for me since I do seem to struggle a bit.0
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BlackPantherChick123 wrote: »If it's not the best to have one every week, would on every 10-15 days be better?
It's fine to have them every week as long as you keep control and don't let them blow your calorie goals.1 -
stanmann571 wrote: »BlackPantherChick123 wrote: »I finally joined my local gym, I had a personal trainer set me up a plan and even added on to it. On MWF I do a full body workout with a 5 min treadmill warm up and TTh I do abs. Also I do 45-1 hour of cardio everyday and Saturday and Sunday I don't lift. Is this a good plan for burning fat and building muscle? Also, I'm consuming 1500 calories a day (even decided to save 200 calories until after my cardio as a bedtime snack to prevent me from being hungry and binging and it's working), I also want to know has anyone reach their goals by burning fat and building muscle with treat/cheat days/meals? Basically dieting/eating clean for 6 days and day 7 have whatever you want. I normally have donuts/apple fritters, some chocolate, and my usual main meal of choice. Would this work? What are your opinions, options, tips, or plans? I'm just curious and I'm very new to weight lifting.
No
OP lifts three days a week full body just not on weekends3 -
BlackPantherChick123 wrote: »If I want to avoid cheat days/meals for awhile, would it be better to increase my calories a bit? I do get hungry on 1500 and I eat every 2-3 hours. Sorry for all the questions, just need advice and opinions that would be beneficial for me since I do seem to struggle a bit.
You don't want to avoid anything, you just need to carefully monitor your calories over 4-6 weeks and see where your weight is going.
Real world results will tell you over time what you need to do. Use your body weight data, calories burned and calories consumed and you can determine if you these are inline with your goals to maintain or lose weight.2 -
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Your plan doesn't sound unreasonable. The only way to really know if it will work is to try it for a few weeks and assess your actual results. You can always make adjustments as you go along.2
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stanmann571 wrote: »BlackPantherChick123 wrote: »I finally joined my local gym, I had a personal trainer set me up a plan and even added on to it. On MWF I do a full body workout with a 5 min treadmill warm up and TTh I do abs. Also I do 45-1 hour of cardio everyday and Saturday and Sunday I don't lift. Is this a good plan for burning fat and building muscle? Also, I'm consuming 1500 calories a day (even decided to save 200 calories until after my cardio as a bedtime snack to prevent me from being hungry and binging and it's working), I also want to know has anyone reach their goals by burning fat and building muscle with treat/cheat days/meals? Basically dieting/eating clean for 6 days and day 7 have whatever you want. I normally have donuts/apple fritters, some chocolate, and my usual main meal of choice. Would this work? What are your opinions, options, tips, or plans? I'm just curious and I'm very new to weight lifting.
No
OP lifts three days a week full body just not on weekends
DOH!1
This discussion has been closed.
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