Losing 5-7 more pounds-advice please

Since I started on MFP, I have lost almost 10 pounds, but still feel like I could stand to lose another 5 to 7 in the long run. I am currently 128 +/-, 5' 6.5", 23 years old (F). I have a desk job and go to the gym for 45 minutes to an hour an average of 3 times per week. My work outs are typically: jog 1 mile, stretch about 10 minutes and then weights for 30-40 minutes. I have my daily calorie goal set at 1400, which according to MFP would be .5 lb weight loss per week. I don't expect to lose that much each week but I try to keep my calories lower throughout the week because I do take in more calories on the weekend. I guess I am just wondering if this seems reasonable. I figure my TDEE is around 1900, is it okay for me to have a 500 calorie defecit for 4-5 days out of the week and then no defecit and even surplus for 2-3 days? 121 pounds seems really small for someone over 5 foot 6 inches tall, but like I said, I still have quite a bit of extra cushion. Just wanna know what you guys think!

Thanks! :drinker:

also for your height, you are at a perfect weight


In my recent issue of Womens Health it said when you go up and down on calories that will make your metabolism slow down. Your metabolism will be confused. One day its getting 1400 the next 2000. You want to stay at a consistant range.

The alcohol really is a waste of calories. How many drinks are you having a weekend? Add up the calories and look at how much real food you could be getting for that. A drink or maybe two is ok, more than that and you really are sabatoging the work you do in the gym.

Plus jogging 1 mile three times a week isn't much for cardio. I've read that just to maintain you need 30 min of cardio, 5 days a week. That's about what I get and it works for me. When I've wanted to drop some I up that to about 45 min, 5 days a week. I try to run 3 days and walk the rest. Usually trying to take walks with the dog on the weekend too. With that keep up your strength training.

But remember your body needs nutrition and while you might make your calorie count or even go over on the weekend those alcohol calories don't count towards fuel for you body. Especially when you're cheating it out of fuel during the week.

:grumble: I'm having computer issues.

Sorry for being confusing on the 30 min thing. My main point with that is that if you are jogging 1 mi. that is not much cardio time. If you want to lose you will have to up the cardio. Strength training is good and will help but cardio is key to losing.

It sounds like you eat good during the week. It's the weekend and alcohol that are undoing everything you work for. Did you read the article that someone above me posted? It was eye opening for me. It talks about how alcohol stops our metabolism and that's after a couple of drinks. I think (and yes it's only my opinion) that the alcohol is what is keeping you from reaching your goal. Really it's my problem too. I like to have a glass of wine or a beer with dinner, depending on what we are having. That article really made me think about this. Now I need to make the choice. Which do I want more?

I'm selfishly glad you posted because it got me thinking.
Hope you have a good Monday:flowerforyou:

I checked your BMI- Body Mass Index and your wieght range is -Healthy- you can still be healthy at a weight as low as 116.4 or up to 157.3, But this really depends on your bone size... now you can check your bone size simply by taking your thumb and your middle finger on one hand and reaching around the wrist of your other hand. (like making a bracelet with your fingers)
Small bone structure you should be able to overlap your thumb over middle finger.
Medium bone stucture your fingers will just touch each other.
Large bone stucture your fingers will not touch.

Then when your done with that you can divide the body mass index into the three groups. The lower end will be for small bone structure, middle for medium bone structure, and the high end will be for large bone structure. Hope this info helps...

I don't think that really works for everyone. I, for one, have a "small" bone structure. I can very easily overlap my fingers around my wrist.. I can even overlap some using my thumb and pointer finger BUT I don't consider myself petite. If I were to get into the lower category (5'7": 123-136) I would look unhealthy . I've been 148 at a low in the past and honestly don't think I'd want to get below 140.

I would attempt to eat your allotted amount of calories per day. If your body doesn't have fuel to burn it will start to use your muscle protein to fuel the body. Make sure you're getting plenty of protein after you exercise. Also if you're body goes into starvation mode from not getting enough calories per day.. when you do "make up" those extra calories on the weekends then your body will automatically try to store them as fat. Check on this article someone posted about a person eating 700 calories a day and still weighs 185 : http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/3047-700-calories-a-day-and-not-losing

I Love Beer, but to get where I need to be I can't be drinking it every weekend. I've busted my *kitten* too much to give it all back.

X 2. The weeks where I had 1 or 2 beers on a saturday thinking it was ok. I didn't lose any weight that week.
It's been mentioned on here several times.
Doesn't matter if their 67 calorie beers or 200 calories beers. Alcohol slows down the metabolism.

The original point of my post was to find out if it is a bad idea or not to eat 1400 (500 cal defecit from my TDEE) calories net throughout the week and then have a 500 or 600 calorie surpluss for 2 days. So basically I would be cancelling out any defecit for the week.

Is that including your exercise calories? I would say it's a bad idea to just eat 1400 each day and 2400 on weekends(2 days). if your burning ~300 calories exercise per day
Net caloric intake is 1100 during week , (2100 for 2 days)? that's if you work burn 300 calories each day.
Not sure why you would want to cancel out all your hard work.
You might think your canceling your defecit, but you could be steping backwards as well.

FWIW, That's not much of zigzag. from what I read people who zigzag they go up and down each day 200-300 calories.

OK. Expensive DVDs and personal trainers are out of the question for me (for now at least). I have a yearly membership to a hole in the wall gym in my town that I need to get my money's worth out of!

Why is it not okay to do both cardio and weights in the same day? How do you work out for an hour and a half doing just cardio? How on earth would I be able to eat my maintenance calories plus whatever crazy amount I would burn doing 1.5 hour of cardio?!

On a weight training day, is that when I should incorporate the circuit training? Would that be like, lifing (using free weights or machines) for 2 minutes then moving on to jump rope for 2 minutes, then doing the next weight station for 2 minutes then jumping jacks for 2 minutes, etc...? If I did this kind of routine for 1 or 1.5 hour 3 days a week and then cardio for 45 min to 1 hour 3 days a week, is that what you're talking about?

It's not that it's not ok to do both cardio and weight training in the same day, it's just that that is more for people trying to compromise, and once you get to a certain level, you really need to focus on specific parts of training. I.E. you can't gain muscle while in caloric deficit, so weight training is more about just keeping your muscles in use and working and keeping bones strong. Put it this way, cardio is better for burning fat than weight training (both will do it, but cardio does it better).

Also if you do cardio (10 minutes is fine, I'm talking if you did 1/2 an hour) first before weight training, your sabotaging your weight training to a degree. Glycogen depletion will limit the amount of "bang for your buck" you'll get from weight training. While this isn't a big deal for cardio (as you almost never train to glycogen depletion during cardio, even extremely intense cardio, for more than a few seconds at a time), not having the energy to push to failure in weight training really reduces the amount of "good" you receive from the weight training.

As to how to do an hour to an hour and a half of cardio in a day, I don't know what to tell you, it's just something you have to learn to enjoy if you want to have that low Body fat % and not just be skinny but be trim and have muscle definition, there's no way around this. That doesn't mean you have to do it all at once, if more than a 1/2 hour of cardio is mind numbing for you, then split it into 2 1/2 hour sessions, for instance, I did 35 minutes of hard running today, and tonight I'll do 30 minutes on the heavy bag (which is INSANE cardio by the way), then 10 minutes of core.

The point is, get creative, you aren't limited to the gym machines. Find stuff you enjoy, swimming, jumping rope, riding a bike, plyometrics (I LOVE plyos, google plyometrics for more), specific training routines (there are lots of great training routines online, google boot camp routines and you'll find plenty). Funny, I do a 4 machine circuit in the gym sometimes, 15 minutes on the mountain climber, 15 minutes on the elliptical, 15 on the tredmill, and 15 on the spinning bike. All of them I push myself, but since each one has a different primary muscle movement, It isn't so repetetive and boring, and I can look forward to that end period in 15minutes instead of a full hour. Plus a good ipod really helps

ok time to drive home. Have a good one.

Thanks for answering Awmylolo's post. I'm always inspired when I read your posts. I'm off to search for a new work out and feeling good about upping my cardio. I'm also going to look for someone to check my BF%. I've looked before for the bodpod and there is nothing anywhere around me. But calipers will be a start.
Thanks again, hope you had a good ride home:flowerforyou: