Not working - going for fat loss - ideas?

[MBasic]

I mean, your 48, all this shit doesn't work as well as when your say 30. Your lifts are OK I guess, age, size, years lifting.

Can't believe on 2000-2500 per day with THAT much conditioning and considering your lifts are still moving up.
Somethings weird/off. Or you are just not going to get the that lean cause of genetics and/or "hormone thing"/body chemistry thing.

I watched a UFC fight re-run last night. 185# Latin kid whooped Nate Marquart's ass....25/year old Latin kid had small spare tire/was soft looking...skinny arms...probably works out hard 6/week for several hours a days. All cardio. Marquart was jacked and lean (35y.o.)...go figure....some people just don't get lean no matter what they do.

[chrisd]

What Melody said.

Hard conditioning 7 days a week ?

The stress/recover/adapt principle applies to all physical activity. Doubling up the sessions won't get a quicker result, just fatigue.

[muntz]

Great stuff here everyone. Thanks.

While I was focused on my programming, y'all got me to focus on my calorie and macro intake. I'm sure I can get that dialed in a lot better.

Regarding HIIT, I think I'm doing it right, but maybe not. I do 5-7 intervals that gets my heart rate up in the 85-90%/max area. Some exercises are more taxing, so i take different rest periods - longer when Im doing the sled, shorter when Im doing ropes.

[Kenny Crox]

I just quit my job and have some free time. I've made tremendous progress in the last 1.25 years of serious training - added a ton of strength and muscle. Recently I’ve been dieting as well. I’ve lost fat and my blood numbers have gone from "Pre-diabetic" to healthy (cholesterol, blood glucose and liver enzymes, to be specific). Now I want to destroy those numbers and get into the "super healthy" range by improving endurance, losing the extra fat I'm carrying and getting LDL below 100. Not going for a six-pack, but I'd like to have a relatively flat belly. Most importantly, I want to get off of Lipitor and from what I read, a 10-14% BF should do that in my situation.

LDL

There a lot of misinformation about cholesterol. Ironically, the majority of misinformation is perpetuated by physicials.

So, you LDL reading isn't the key.

What most important is your HDL and Triglyceride numbers and their ratio.

Weight/Fat Loss

As you know, calories are key. And most importantly finding a diet you can life with.

One of the easiest for me is Intermittent Fasting. There some great research on it.

What I like most is it's "Black and White". You are either in a fasted stated (not eating) or fed state (eating).


After doing SS, I've been running 5/3/1 for 8 cycles. Getting close to having to reset - already missing a rep here and there, but have been hitting the heaviest rep on the "1" week, so I’ve kept advancing, albeit with smaller weight increases. I've also been doing conditioning 2-3x/ week: (sled pulls, sprints, rower, kettlebell swings, ropes, ball slams, jump rope, etc). I've also been walking a decent amount.

Currently I'm leaning towards staying on 5/3/1 and adding Boring But Big in order to preserve or build mass, while keeping weight sessions to ~1hr.

Strength Training

It work initially in increasing muscle mass for beginners.

However, at some point you need to incorporate hypertrophy training into your program for optimal mass gains.

Hypertrophy training also provides a synergistic effect with increasing strength.

I also plan to do metcon/hiit type conditioning 3-4 days/week and adding some and also doing hard conditioning 5-6 (maybe 7) days per week, while only doing ropes the day before leg day.

Interval Training

It a good method for increasing your metabolic rate.

However, performing too much takes something away from your strength training.

[/QUOTE](I considered Crossfit, briefly, but then decided I don't feel like getting injured.) I will continue restricting calories. [/QUOTE]

CrossFit

Basically, it another form of High Intensity Training or Circuit Training.

So, it works well with increasing your metabolic rate and for conditioning.

However, the CrossFit Protocol can has a lot of problems, like injures as you noted.

Kenny Croxdale

[muntz]

You'll know when you get there. The good thing is that you'll have to pass through 17% to get to 15%, etc.




Do you feel like dying around the fourth or fifth interval? If not, you're not doing it right.

After the sled or treadmill I sure as hell do.

[chrisd]

muntz

I've dropped 5lbs the last month and 13lbs the last 2 months.

That's a reasonable rate of weight loss. Any faster and you'd stand a chance of messing yourself up.

90% isn't really high intensity. Sure it's higher than low intensity, but it's supposed to be maximal effort. Intervals are supposed to let you continue at that rate, not recover and start over. It's horrible and gruelling. You let your muscles recover enough to go back and start over, but you need to be at peak effort, so your pulse and breathing don't slow down. Your first couple of intervals get you up to your peak and then you stay there. It gets harder. Once a week of that suff is enough for some. It allows time to forget how horrible it was.

There's nothing wrong with working at a lower rate, or taking longer rests, it just isn't quite the same thing.

If you're hoping to ski well, you might want to look at the requirements there. Typically a few minutes of fairly intense effort followed by active rest. Pretty much all leg work.

[vanslix]

Fat loss is done in the kitchen and given your rate of weight loss, I think that's quite an acceptable rate. Just make minor tweaks to your diet, see what happens over a few weeks, reassess and reiterate.

[Culican]

Male 60yo 5'9". Just posting this as a data point for the OP.

Sept 2014, I weighed 199lb with a waist of 36in. Now I am at 181lb with a waist of 32in. I don't have any bodyfat% measurements to go with this.

I had been slowly gaining weight so I made a few minor changes in my diet. I have been eating ~2600 to 2900Kcal/day the whole time and have slowly lost fat. Protein is ~210 to 240g/day and carbs 150 to 200g/day. (I track my food and use a food scale, so these numbers are fairly accurate.

I run 5/3/1 with some added exercises and do no additional conditioning exercises. I do have a job the keeps me on my feet about 50% of the day (the rest of the time I am driving from stop to stop).

Very happy with the slow weight loss. I have lost no upper body strength (not gained much either) and have improved my squat a little bit and my deadlift a lot more during that time. Don't have the intense hunger I get when I get near this weight on a faster cut.

YMMV

[vanslix]

Male 60yo 5'9". Just posting this as a data point for the OP.

Sept 2014, I weighed 199lb with a waist of 36in. Now I am at 181lb with a waist of 32in. I don't have any bodyfat% measurements to go with this.

I had been slowly gaining weight so I made a few minor changes in my diet. I have been eating ~2600 to 2900Kcal/day the whole time and have slowly lost fat. Protein is ~210 to 240g/day and carbs 150 to 200g/day. (I track my food and use a food scale, so these numbers are fairly accurate.

I run 5/3/1 with some added exercises and do no additional conditioning exercises. I do have a job the keeps me on my feet about 50% of the day (the rest of the time I am driving from stop to stop).

Very happy with the slow weight loss. I have lost no upper body strength (not gained much either) and have improved my squat a little bit and my deadlift a lot more during that time. Don't have the intense hunger I get when I get near this weight on a faster cut.

YMMV

Good on you!

[Bill Quick]

I'm 5'10", 215 at the moment, at age 69. I think I'd be pretty happy with 195, and maintaining the strength goals I've previous achieved (though, due to injuries, I've slipped a bit from my previous PRs in everything but the bench).

180 is about as low as I could realistically ever expect, but that was before I started lifting. It may no longer be possible. If I could achieve the waist I had at that weight, along with my gains in muscle size in chest, arms, and legs, I'd be ecstatic, no matter what weight I was at. Not there yet, though.