Quote:
Originally Posted by rowech
I've been doing some reading and have some questions. Here are my numbers from my scale...while not perfect, it surely is in the ballpark.
Now weiging in at 251.4 with 28.4% body fat and right about 50% water.
Prior to starting to lift weights my numbers were 248 with 29.3% body fat, not sure about water.
From what I've read, that water percentage is way too low. Does anyone kno enough to say for certain that's a problem?
From what I've read, it's important to have weight training and cardio part to exercise but I'm wondering if I shouldn't be weight training at all given the fact I still want to lose weight? Can I lose weight if I'm lifting or is that chasing windmills?
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You'll get different views on this on here. You can certainly lose weight while lifting though, so in a "yes/no" world the answer is yes.
All the weight I've lost I've done through cardio to-date (although to be fair I've been increasing resistance on the elliptical to keep building the leg muscles as I go, and monitoring my skeletal muscle %). Someone like Blackadar has lost a ton through lifting weights/other excercise type programs.
I
personally think if you're just lifting weights it's going to be difficult to lose the weight at a pace that's going to keep you motivated precisely because you're going to be building that muscle mass (although you'll be reshaping your body, which is nice).
I think in a perfect world you want to do a good deal of cardio, but also work in some strength training so that you continue to build lean muscle mass. The problem with doing all-cardio is that you can start to burn your muscle rather than your fat, so if you do some strength training you'll keep the skeletal muscle percentage relatively consistent while burning off the fat.
My approach to it, frankly was "I have 80 pounds to lose. That's a ton of weight! I'm going to do straight cardio and try to burn off a ton of the weight and get down close to my goal weight, and then work back in the strength training as I reduce cardio in order to have a long-term exercise program."
I knew that I wanted to keep seeing consistent weight loss on the scale in order to keep myself motivated, and that if I messed around with building muscle mass at the same time it would be too easy to justify overeating, or cheating on my food consumption, or seeing the numbers on the scale going in the wrong direction. I've toyed around with lifting weights at a couple points within the process (and adding more protien back into my diet to assist with building the muscle) and found that at least for me it tended to cause me to plateau. And I wasn't comfortable with even like...temporary plateaus on the way down.
I started right around where you are now. And now I'm maybe...4-8lbs away from working the strength training back in to things and establishing my long-term program. In 10 months. Despite a couple of plateaus (probably a month's worth of plateaus total).
I think the key is really finding a program that works for you personally, that will keep you motivated to do it everyday with 100% effort. For me
personally that's cardio, because once I get on that elliptical and set the program...I commit myself 100% to finishing the program. No stopping early or dialing down the intensity...I power through that shit. Whereas with weights, with
me personally it was too easy before to say "man I can't lift this damn weight another time. So what if I've only done 6 of my 10 reps? I hurt."
Pretty sure that whichever side of the "cardio vs. strength" debate we come down on we can all agree that it's about finding something that you can commit to with 100% enthusiasm on a regular (ideally daily) basis.
Does that help at all? I gotta go to the gym and rip out my cardio now. 21 minutes of high-resistance (14) and lower RPM (130ish), followed after a 5 minute water break by 21 minutes of lower-resistance (10) and higher RPM (170ish).