Rusty740 Member

You're going to be fooling yourself. You'll see a different, and it will be good, but it will be the exercise and proper calories in/out that does it, not ACV.

No, you can't build much muscle while maintaining at your current weight, I think you've lost the recomp opportunity, if it ever existed. You need to lift weights (or other resistance training) and you need extra calories (surplus) to tell your body to store energy. Stored energy is either fat or muscle. If you just…

There's a difference, you just aren't able to notice it. Start taking measurements if you don't believe it :) You're doing an awesome job. Keep it up.

Yeah, this is it pretty much. Of course you might want to check your measurements again. The more measurements the better IMO. You using a measuring tape or a BF scale or what?

Muscle ;) You can use them in baking.

I bet 65 lbs is a nice weight to work on form and it sounds like it will still be at least 60% 1RM so I wouldn't increase it too much until you get this form down. I don't really think your chest needs to be way over your knees so long as your back is bent over enough. I think bent knees or not is ok. The feeling of being…

That sucks, but it's going to get better. It really is.

You're not wrong, but it seems like a pretty good gig for the time being.

I'm with Kimny on this one.

She felt the pressure, but I don't think there's any point in worrying about it. She's got value, and the parents know it.

No, did I say that. I said it's unlikely the parents will let her go so she doesn't need to feel that type of pressure.

Dishonesty isn't the way to go. Everybody loses.

I don't agree with this assessment, and in any case it doesn't change your relationship with her. The parents are just trying to do their best for their child. They know full well how hard it is to get a good babysitter, nevermind how hard it would be to get one their kid actually likes and the fallout there would be from…

Here's the thing. There's a difference between "bringing up food and telling her you're going to teach her about calories and stuff" and responding to her questions and giving her the best advice you know how. This is what friends do, and make no mistake, she sees you as a friend. If she asks you something, you've got to…

Don't worry about your expectation of trying to get a workout in 10-15 minutes a few times a week and get tones. The fact is, you can do this, but... You'll need to focus on what's important, and what will have the most impact. The single most important way you can 'get toned' is to lose body fat. The fastest, easiest way…

Being the dad of two younger girls, I'm sensitive about how I talk to them about their bodies since I know that they're going to get all sorts of ideas from school, tv etc. but since I was overweight myself and lost it all while they watched, and they do watch, I've decided there's no way around the discussion. At our…

It sounds like you've got the weight loss thing handled. The adjustments are only necessary when you need to change something. Either your weight loss has stopped, or you're losing gym progress or something. Protein: While you are losing weight, protein should be higher than when gaining weight. This is for two reasons,…

If it's true, then it's all the more reason to eat the whole bag of chips instead of just a few. After all, if I eat that much fat all at once, my body will just get rid of it. :tongue:

Your problem is that you didn't regularly get on the scale. You've got to OWN that thing. If you only check the scale once per month you are not getting a good understanding of how your weight fluctuates and you are potentially losing out on two months worth of corrective measures. As an example, if you measure at 200 lbs…

2100 to maintain, 2500 to gain (or 3000 if I'm bad) 1600 to cut 40 yrs, 5'6" 140 lbs. Lifting 3x week, 1 cardio per week.

Yes this^ is it. Except ideally I guess you go to zero reps to failure (Failure of "Form" mind you though). The idea is that in general, failure is a really really good way to tell if you are doing more than it takes to overload your muscles and joints, and it also lets you lift heavy or light (which we know both have…

I don't know if what I'm doing is working, but what I've done is taken the 5 lifts from StrongLifts and turned them into a more hypertrophy based program. I still lift 3-4 times per week with the same ABAB structure. I do 5 sets of each with 10-12 reps at 60-75%. I'm careful not to overdo the volume, but I'm going to add…

If it's working for you, then it's all good. I'd also say your protein is a touch low, but not concerning. You can build muscle on that 98 grams. Up around 100-120 would be peachy since you're around 140-145 lbs, but you're fine at 100. You aren't going to mess up your body or anything on your macro split. You will get…

What you're describing here can be attributed to your calorie deficit. You are doing fine on the strength blocks because they typically involve less volume and if you only do them for a week your recovery is good. Then when you get back on the normal program with plenty of volume, you struggle to recover due to the calorie…

Dude! Awesome! I love it. Well done. If that's your son in that picture he's looking at you with proud eyes and at some point he's going to realize that the change you're making is giving him so much.

Perhaps the way I'd written that didn't come through. What I meant to say was It doesn't mean that since our metabolism slows down therefore we need less food while doing the same activity. That still doesn't come out right. What I mean is that a slowing metabolism isn't the problem.

I weight every day, put it in MS Excel and trend that sucker. I've gotten to know my body and what it's doing really well by doing this. It's enabled me to make adjustments within a few days of something not being as fast or as slow as I want.

That is a really well written article. Thanks for sharing.

If you have had a 500 calorie deficit for a year and you haven't lost weight, then you haven't actually had a calorie deficit. Even though you've tightened up your logging, I would look there again with a kitchen scale. While our bodies do slow down as we age, it just means we are less active so we need less food. It…

I'll go with "Super Yay!" ;)