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Old 10-01-2014, 06:24 AM   #101
Mercutio
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Machines are easier, free weights are going to have more of an impact on you (both positively and, if you're an idiot, negatively).
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Old 10-01-2014, 01:01 PM   #102
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Anybody got any tips for weight lifting? I'm doing weights, but there are so many damn options in the Gym, ranging from free weights to machines which resembles Eldritch abominations more than anything else. Before this, I used to use cardio and floorwork (planks, crunches, sit-ups, push-ups, star-jumps, etc) to maintain my health, but I want to start bulking up my muscles, especially in my pectorals and deltoids.
Starting Strength is my new Bible. I look like a total nerd taking my laptop with me over to the squat rack but trust me, it is super worth it.

Barbells are the only truly reliable gym equipment you will ever need to develop basically any and every part of your body, and it is designed for weightlifting beginners. I felt exactly as lost as you feel when I first started, and this book seriously helped me understand what each piece of equipment does, what kinds of exercises I should do, how I should do those exercises, and what those exercises will do for my body.

No need for dumbbells or weight machines, really, unless you have trouble with the bar. Then I would suggest using the dumbbell stopgap so you can build up strength to the point where you are able to use a barbell.

Machines are actually a really bad idea.

Quote:
The reason that isolated body part training on machines doesn’t work is the same reason that barbells work so well, better than any other tools we can use to gain strength. The human body functions as a complete system – it works that way, and it likes to be trained that way. It doesn’t like to be separated into its constituent components and then have those components exercised separately, since the strength obtained from training will not be utilized in this way. The general pattern of strength acquisition must be the same as that in which the strength will be used. The nervous system controls the muscles, and the relationship between them is referred to as “neuromuscular.” When strength is acquired in ways that do not correspond to the patterns in which it is intended to actually be used, the neuromuscular aspects of training have not been considered. Neuromuscular specificity is an unfortunate reality, and exercise programs must respect this principle the same way they respect the Law of Gravity.

Properly performed, full-range-of-
motion barbell exercises are essentially the functional expression of human skeletal and muscular anatomy under a load.
So that's where I am, just running through barbell exercises with a laptop open next to the rack. (I go at 3 am so that people don't judge me.) I tried learning the exercises at home and then applying it in the gym, but the feedback loop was too wide - unless the feedback of practicing the movement and checking my accuracy was immediate, I had trouble understanding what I needed to do and how.
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Old 11-08-2014, 12:29 AM   #103
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I've gotten sick and tired of being fat, so I've decided to embark on a potentially life-threatening diet plan: 1K calories each day, for one month. I'll work out regularly (x3/week) and do some distance runs (x1/week) to supplement that, and keep my muscles from wasting away. The goal is to lose 2 lbs per week, and 16 lbs from now until January.

I'll tell you all: it's horrible. I can't think of anything but food. Days feel like they're stretched over weeks. And it's only god dang Day 2!

I feel like reaffirming what I've consumed. It helps me feel better. Whoo boy.

Spoiler: show

November 06 2014: 2 Burger King Whoppers, -mayo (1100 calories); Workout = -975
November 07 2014: 1 protein shake (500 calories), 1 slice cheese pizza (450 calories) = -1125
November 08 2014: 1 protein shake (500 calories), 3 slice cheese pizza (900 calories) = -675
November 09 2014: 1 protein shake (500 calories), 17.6 mile walk/run (-1900 calories), 1 slice cheese pizza (450 calories) = -2575,
November 10 2014: 1 slice of cheese pizza (225 calories), 1 slice of vegetarian pizza (225 calories), 9 ounces of tomato turkey sauce (???) =
November 11 2014: 1 protein shake
November 12 2014: 1 protein shake
November 13 2014: 3 bowls tomato turkey sauce
November 14 2014: 1 protein shake, tofu, lifting, 2 mile walk/run
November 15 2014: 1 protein shake, tofu
November 16 2014: 1 protein shake, tofu, 14 mile walk/run
November 17 2014: 5.5 slices veggie pizza
November 18 2014: 1 protein shake, lifting
November 19 2014: 3.5 slices veggie pizza, 3 bowls tomato turkey sauce
November 20 2014: 1 protein shake, tofu, lifting
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Last edited by Doppleganger; 11-20-2014 at 08:52 PM.
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Old 11-08-2014, 12:37 AM   #104
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If you have not seen a doctor before doing this and you don't see a doctor each week while doing this you're crazy. But if you are, that's reasonable if you can keep up with it, but the weight might come back if you're going on a crash diet like this.
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Old 11-08-2014, 12:47 AM   #105
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I think you're off by a day. It just became November 8 on the East Coast about half an hour ago, so I think your days should probably say 6, 7, and 8 instead of saying 7, 8, and 9 given that you offer a history of events for November 8 that can't have possibly happened yet. ... Unless you're telling us that you intend to follow the prescribed course for November 8 come November 8. In which case I guess I was just misled by your wording ("I feel like reaffirming what I've consumed").

I can honestly tell you that a lot of it is mind over matter. Your body is sort of like an alarm clock that eventually gives up when it can tell that you refuse to tend to it. You'll probably feel super hungry at certain points, but after about 45-90 minutes of that the feeling will completely go away. For better or for worse, I've had back-to-back days where I only ate one meal (estimated at 1300 calories or less) in the past year, and it's been my experience that the body eventually gets used to this treatment, even if it isn't very happy about it.

That stated, I don't really understand why you're starving yourself if the goal is to lose weight. You of all people ought to understand why placing your body in starvation mode would hinder your efforts to lose weight via exercise. Dieting is something people do to a) lose 5-10 pounds quickly and/or b) stand in for exercise because they can't motivate themselves to exercise. But if you're exercising, then I don't see the benefits to you in consuming so few calories.

The FDA historically recommended 2,000 calories to the average American, averaging both the gender-based differences as well as the lifestyle-based differences. As a man, you burn more calories; and as an exerciser, you burn more calories; so as an exercising man, your caloric intake needs should easily eclipse 2,500. So I'd think anyway. Let's try a calculator.

According to a calculator I just busted out on the Internet, a 27-year old male who gets little to no exercise, currently weighs 175 pounds (just a guess), and currently has a height of 5 feet 7 inches (also just a guess), has an allotted caloric intake of 2075 calories a day. If we bump his exercise up to 3 times a week, it jumps to 2377 calories. If we bump it up still further to 5 times a week, it becomes 2529 calories.

Granted, all of this is for "the average man" still. Maybe your basal metabolic rate is much lower than the average man's, and thus you don't require as many calories as he does to keep running. You know your own body better than I do or some soulless calculator on the Internet does. But I still don't think you should be placing your body in starvation mode. 1,000 calories a day will definitely do that. Even for a non-exercising man, but especially for an exercising man.
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Old 11-08-2014, 12:58 AM   #106
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I've been on 1,500 calories for all of October, and noticed this:

-I continue to make lifting PRs
-I haven't lost any weight whatsoever
-I look physically identical to how I did earlier in the year

It's been written that one cannot gain muscle and lose fat simultaneously: you have to eat big to get big, or cut to lose anything. Consuming less calories while lifting just helps stave off the muscle loss and helps promote visceral fat burn.

Exercise isn't efficient at my ht/wt and I'm already dealing with several injuries I don't want to exacerbate. The real deal-breaker was reading that the 7 mile run for me, at my weight, only burns about 600 calories. That's if I run the whole thing at 6 miles per hour. Running 7 miles at 6 mph non-stop is hard, and all that effort basically erases a slice and a half of pizza's worth in calories.

That sucks. Diet it is. I'm pretty sure pacing how the calories are consumed helps more than the quantity, but it's still really tough right now.

Also Talon, your "average male" ballpark figure practically hit me on the button, haha. I'm 27 years old, 5'6", 180 lbs. But I lift three times a week, run distance once per week, and diet. There's no doubt in my mind I'm healthy, but that isn't enough really.
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Old 11-08-2014, 01:26 AM   #107
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So it occurs to me I've never posted in this thread, despite always kinda being aware my physical fitness sucked.

So I'm 5'7" and about 150 pounds, although I wouldn't be surprised right now if I was around 155 or 160 at this point. Basically, when I was camping out for two weeks, I had lost a bit of weight. I'm really not sure how much I did lose, but apparently I was thinner when I came back from camping then when I left, and considering I've always been scrawny, I imagine my exercise had something to do with it, along with the fact that I wasn't eating as much food as I was before. There were a lot of trails through the woods up in Lightfield, and I would spend probably as much as an hour and a half to two hours hiking them, although it was nothing strenuous. At the time I was doing that to improve my cardiovascular endurance...but I'm pretty sure it got /worse/ over the two months. At the moment, I'm not doing much exercise at all...and I'm pretty sure I've picked up some flabb. Which is dismaying, so I want to start exercising again.

See the thing is I used to walk to school, so when I want to exercise its at ridiculous hours: like 6 or 7 in the morning, and I don't want to wake up that early because its the only time I feel like exercising. In addition to that, remember when I said my cardiovascular endurance was bad? It's awful. My mom smoked for all of my life, I had asthma and have since outgrown it until I'm sick or push myself too hard, and I haven't ruled out something more on that front. So I'm not one for running, because I'll smash myself too early on for it to make a difference. The best mile I ever did was ten minutes...I never managed to finish otherwise, and I'm worse now. So my question is: What kind of exercise can I do to keep myself in shape without blowing too much steam?
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Old 11-08-2014, 04:53 AM   #108
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Quote:
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The real deal-breaker was reading that the 7 mile run for me, at my weight, only burns about 600 calories. That's if I run the whole thing at 6 miles per hour. Running 7 miles at 6 mph non-stop is hard, and all that effort basically erases a slice and a half of pizza's worth in calories.
Yeah straight up running is basically worthless. If you're dead set on doing something cardio based, intervals are the better option. Otherwise in my (admittedly purely personal) experience, twenty minutes of bodyweight exercises was a hell of a lot more effective than an hour of running and far less mind-numbingly tedious.
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Old 11-08-2014, 04:21 PM   #109
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You're probably better using a fastimg diet as opposed to a 1000 calory a day diet. But whatever works for you, good luck!

I was thinking of taking up running because I similarly want to lose weight amd don't really want gym membership. Perhaps investing in some weights is a better call.
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Old 11-08-2014, 04:25 PM   #110
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Kush come play Octopush with me.
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Old 11-12-2014, 12:16 AM   #111
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Haven't checked in here in a while. Weight loss is continuing at a steady pace, approaching 140 lbs total loss (if I can keep on track).

Calorie reduction and daily walking (to/from school) is the way to go.

You are all beautiful the way you are, and I love you all.
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Old 11-12-2014, 07:42 AM   #112
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You da man, MG.

Anyone have any suggestions for exercises that can be done around the house, i.e. not going to the Gym? Should really do more casual working out besides my job.
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Old 11-13-2014, 03:30 AM   #113
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You could come canvassing for me!
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Old 11-17-2014, 12:44 AM   #114
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It would appear to me that I've dropped 4 lbs since I started the diet. I weighed in at 176, which was after rehydrating and downing a protein shake. If these losses are real, that is pretty exciting! I can live with a 4 lb drop every 2 weeks. But I've been down to 170 lbs before, before I was lifting, so I won't be convinced until I start to get into 160-165 territory, which is incidentally my high school weight. I might have to go lower because I've always estimated about 18% body fat, which didn't change when I started lifting: rather, I think I gained 10 lbs of muscle because it was insanely hard to get down from 180-185 lbs.

I've been upping the intensity of the cardio and weight training all the while, so hopefully that antagonizes the predictable "diminishing returns" of the calorie cut.
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Old 11-17-2014, 09:48 AM   #115
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As I think I might have said, it is possible to lose fat and gain muscle mass. However, doing so is generally looked down on in the weightlifting community - "toning" is slow, difficult, and does not give you too much strength. It is far easier to weightlift and eat as much as you can (not too much senseless micromanagement of food) and then do cardio for a few weeks and eat a lot less to burn the fat off and maintain the muscle mass.

Not only is toning slow and difficult, it also requires pinpoint calorie counting. That's a colossal pain. You need to meet protein and fat goals for your height and weight without eating enough calories for your height and weight, which is certainly doable, but I would rather go skinny dipping in a volcano than have to account for every chicken nugget.

My advice is to bulk first. Overweight people get judged less, and strength is going to be more useful than how pretty you look. When that's done, cut off all the fat and start over. Easy as pie.
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Old 11-17-2014, 08:12 PM   #116
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The goal isn't to bulk, it's to lose fat. I'm still pushing for PR during my weight-lifting but the point is maintenance: I don't want to start burning muscle because I'm eating <1K cals.
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Old 11-28-2014, 05:22 AM   #117
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Signed up for personal training. First session today - was humbled by how little I can lift, both due to having not done so in a few months and to being made to improve my form. Arms ache right the way down but I hope it'll be worth it.
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Old 12-01-2014, 08:10 PM   #118
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I weigh 173 lbs now. Slow, steady progress. Visually I don't look much different but my arms do demonstrate some shrink wrap.

Unfortunately, my gym membership is gone, so I have to do cardio overdrive to make up for it.
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Old 12-05-2014, 03:26 AM   #119
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So my trainer wants me to more than triple my protein intake.

I'll play about with diet but can I get thoughts on protein shakes? I've always shied away but given that I've now tricked myself in to taking a multi vitamin pill a day I think I could do it.

Should i do protein shakes? What should be in my shake and when should I have it?
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Old 12-05-2014, 03:33 AM   #120
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I haven't been putting on muscle with it, but the protein shake has been a staple of my diet because it's easy calories on top of being protein rich. Drink 1 scoop powder and like 2 cups whole milk with it, it should come out to 500 calories. The whole milk is necessary to keep the shake tasty, if you gulp it with water it's just awful. Lowfat milk is do be avoided since it's basically nothing more than sugar water: fats are good for satiety, and there's some studies that suggest low fat but high sugar can trigger abnormal insulin spikes in the blood, while excess fat apparently has a dampening effect on that.

I personally dislike chocolate flavoured shakes. Vanilla is generally tastier, but that's just me.
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Old 12-06-2014, 07:13 AM   #121
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When should I take them?
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Old 12-06-2014, 12:47 PM   #122
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You don't need protein shakes, but it's really hard to meet your protein goals without them (think Gaston's egg addiction), at least not for me. I tend to not eat though.

Take them when you can manage them. Protein builds the body up during sleep, not while awake, so don't worry about timing. Obviously don't drink one at night and then work out in the morning, that's dumb, but every other time should be just about fine.
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Old 12-06-2014, 09:54 PM   #123
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Obviously don't drink one at night and then work out in the morning, that's dumb, but every other time should be just about fine.
I actually do exactly this.

It's hard to down the protein shake later in the day. It's extremely rich and after eating something similarly protein rich, one basically has to force drink it and it makes one feel sick. This is usually the case with tofu: my tofu is around 330 calories, give or take about twenty when the teriyaki sauce and oil is taken into account. 330 calories feels filling for the whole day when it comes in the form of 98% protein. I need to make 1,000 calories a day or I'll start to waste, but I have zero motivation to drink the protein shake unless it's right before bed.

At least that way, I can sleep through any discomfort from drinking it, and I'll be full for most of the time I wake up.
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Old 12-12-2014, 10:10 AM   #124
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A bit late here, but I've hit a new milestone: 150 lbs total weight loss since Jan. 2012!
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Old 12-12-2014, 12:51 PM   #125
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Amazing! That's brilliant.
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