all that mainly do CARDIO, need your advice please

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HealthyThinFit2012
HealthyThinFit2012 Posts: 32
in Health and Weight Loss
IF you mainly do cardio, do you eat high in carbs, low protein?

recently have gained weight from eating high protein and low carbs.. and i do mainly cardio such as walking from treadmills, and elliptical workouts..

but i've heard going low carb was great success.. would love to know from those that mainly do cardio.. i am scared to eat too high carbs as bread & pasta even if its whole grain causes me to gain weight.

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  • dougii
    dougii Posts: 679 Member
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    I have been doing mostly cardio and a lot of it every day (800 -1000 cal. burn each day). I eat less than my cal goal for the day - goal is around 1600 and I have been eating beween 1200 - 1400 cal/day (once a week I splurge and go slightly over). I gave up potatoes, pasta and bread 2.5 months ago and have eaten each of them only once since then. I eat a lot of fruit, vegetables and lean meat and this seems to be working for me. I also take a multi vitamin and fish oil every day.
  • slemington
    slemington Posts: 15
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    You need to measure yourself. Doing cardio and eating protien will help gain muscle mass, if you measure you trouble areas or areas in which you are trying to tone, or just basically you mid section, thighs, waist, glutes, and shoulders.

    by doing this, if you see that your mid section is getting bigger, then you are gaining unwanted weight, or fat, same with glutes or thighs and waist. If they are all getting smaller, then you are gaining muscle, remember, muscle weighs more than fat, also your legs and glutes may gain size due to muscle growth, I would say that eating something small before you work out will help to lose weight since you have food in you body your body will burn the food for energy and not muscles. Stay away from bread and pasta, mostly bread, it will make you gain unwanted weight like fat, not muscle. also water water water hope this helps, I am not a pro, I read my fair share of mens health and I am a workout junkee
  • vsmurrow
    vsmurrow Posts: 145
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    ... No.
  • samhelen
    samhelen Posts: 98
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    You need to measure yourself. Doing cardio and eating protien will help gain muscle mass, if you measure you trouble areas or areas in which you are trying to tone, or just basically you mid section, thighs, waist, glutes, and shoulders.

    by doing this, if you see that your mid section is getting bigger, then you are gaining unwanted weight, or fat, same with glutes or thighs and waist. If they are all getting smaller, then you are gaining muscle, remember, muscle weighs more than fat, also your legs and glutes may gain size due to muscle growth, I would say that eating something small before you work out will help to lose weight since you have food in you body your body will burn the food for energy and not muscles. Stay away from bread and pasta, mostly bread, it will make you gain unwanted weight like fat, not muscle. also water water water hope this helps, I am not a pro, I read my fair share of mens health and I am a workout junkee

    ^^ This! But, Muscle doesn't weigh more than fat, it just takes up less space :)
  • Chloe_Chaos_
    Chloe_Chaos_ Posts: 150 Member
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    Sorry to keep following you around on the message boards but you've posted a lot and I have a comment for them all lol

    Why don't you just try something different? Try doing a different cardio machine or going longer or anything else.
  • dougii
    dougii Posts: 679 Member
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    Actually a pound of muscle weighs the same as a pound of fat. A pound is a pound. Muscle is denser than fat; with more muscle and less fat you will look leaner.
  • liftingheavy
    liftingheavy Posts: 551 Member
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    I do a lot of cardio and try to keep my carbs under 90g/day. I personally find it difficult to keep my energy levels up at the gym when I go too low on carbs.

    I think weight loss may be a little slower with more carbs, but for me the food choices are sustainable long term.
  • Hood25
    Hood25 Posts: 208 Member
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    You might be gaining muscle. I agree that you need to look at measurements. I do Jillian's Ripped in 30 and interval training on the treadmill. I didn't gain weight but I didn't lose any according to the scale. My measurements changed. I am now losing weight.
  • 967_1111
    967_1111 Posts: 221 Member
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    I do mostly cardio, and I eat whatever I feel like. Bread for breakfast, cereal for my evening snack, potatoes, rice, etc. A balanced diet of grains, fruit, veggies and lean protein.

    I've lost 24 pounds, or 10% of my body weight, in about 4 months.
  • Rae6503
    Rae6503 Posts: 6,294 Member
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    In order to gain weight you have to eat more calories than you burn. Protein vs. carbs doesn't have an effect.

    Cardio does NOT cause muscle gain. Muscle gain is accomplished through weight lifting and eating again eating more calories than you burn including an adequate amount of protien (1 gram for every pound of lean body mass).
  • marbly
    marbly Posts: 103
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    Perhaps you are experiencing water retention?

    My stats are similar to yours. From my personal experience, I do mainly cardio, eat low carb and high protein, have been doing this for about 9 weeks now, have binged on high carb/sugar foods on and off as well, and have lost weight. I also took two weeks off the diet in between.

    If you are doing a lot of cardio, you could try upping your cals?
  • wisebadger53
    wisebadger53 Posts: 382 Member
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    I do lots of cardio, and two days a week I do some pretty heavy weight training. I have mine set to 55% carbs, 20% protein, 25% fat, and that seems to work for me. When I have a large calorie burn I try to pack in more protein before I opt for carbs.
  • atjays
    atjays Posts: 798 Member
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    You need to fix your first post. You said you were eating high protein and low carb doing cardio and gaining weight then said you were on high carb.... Which is it?

    Fact of the matter is you should eat a balance of both. I also would not advise high carb for really anything.
  • purpleipod
    purpleipod Posts: 1,147 Member
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    Why would any human need to eat low protein?
  • athensguy
    athensguy Posts: 550
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    I do a lot of cardio.

    Macros don't really matter that much, as far as I can tell. I make sure to get at least 10% of my calories from protein and try to get less than 30% from fat.
  • qtiekiki
    qtiekiki Posts: 1,490 Member
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    You don't gain muscles doing cardio.
  • athensguy
    athensguy Posts: 550
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    You don't gain muscles doing cardio.

    On the other hand, if your body fat percentage goes down, you're more muscular than you were before.
  • qtiekiki
    qtiekiki Posts: 1,490 Member
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    You don't gain muscles doing cardio.

    On the other hand, if your body fat percentage goes down, you're more muscular than you were before.

    Yes. Fat and muscle ratios change, but you don't gain muscle. So that mean you are not gaining muscle weight.
  • UpEarly
    UpEarly Posts: 2,555 Member
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    I do cardio 6-7 days a week and lift 2 days a week. 55% of my calories come from carbs. I haven't had any trouble losing (and now managing) my weight.

    Personally, I feel and perform much better fueled by extra carbs.

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