Quote:
Originally Posted by Revartr
Need some quick advice. I'm about 5'10", and I weigh around 278lbs. Given, I do have a decent amount of muscle on me (not weak by any means), I'm still pretty damn chubby. I need to get down to 255lbs by December. What's my best course of action?
I had planned on doing roughly 30 minutes of steady, medium cardio every day after work (Mon-Fri) on the elliptical (crossramp on 8, resistance on 13), and I had planned on changing up my diet a bit as well. I rarely eat breakfast (wake up at 9:30, work at 10:00), but switching to just having a low-calorie salad with bits of turkey or grilled chicken for lunch. Not sure what to go for at dinner time (I usually get home around 8:00 in the evening). And maybe having a cheat day on Saturday.
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You decided to make a change and that's an awesome first step. Here's what has worked for me:
1. Nutrition is 80% of body composition. Doing a bit of cardio here and there is not going to make nearly as much difference as changing the foods you eat on a regular basis. This isn't a "diet." You have to change what you eat as a lifestyle choice. But you can have a
cheat meal (not a cheat day) once a week. Having an entire cheat day is a good way to ruin the hard work you put in for the entire week. Every meal, you should have a bunch of protein (e.g. chicken, fish, beef), some vegetables (broccoli, cauliflower, kale, spinach, etc.), and if you need the energy, some clean carbs (brown rice, sweet potatoes, lentils, etc.). I prefer to cut carbs when trying to lose fat, but you don't have to as long as your calorie intake is below your expenditure. Cut out things that are overly processed or prepackaged. Eat whole, natural foods.
2. Get an app like myfitnesspal to figure out many calories you are eating. There are a lot of websites you can look at to figure out how many calories you need to maintain your body weight, such as
http://iifym.com/tdee-calculator/. I recommend a modest 20% calorie deficit. For example, if your total daily expected expenditure is around 3400 calories, then you should eat about 2700 calories a day.
2a. Make sure to eat a ton of protein. As much as a gram per pound of body weight. As for fats and carbs, different people have different feelings on whether to go low carb or low fat, just depends what works for you. Personally, if I'm cutting fat, I try to keep carb intake less than 200g per day, and fill the rest of calories with healthy fats like from avocados.
3. Lift weights three times a week. Since you have a good amount of muscle, the purpose of this is to maintain your muscle mass while the fat falls off your body. If you do not do this, then you will lose some muscle too while in a calorie deficit. If you want, you can lift weights with very little break between sets. Look up HIIT, for sort of a combination of cardio / weight lifting.
4. As for your cardio, when in fat losing stage, I prefer to do mostly low level cardio. Then once a week, do an activity that requires maximum effort like sprinting. Look up "tabata intervals" on google. A good activity to do with this is elliptical or the rowing machine.
I recommend buying a book from Mike Matthews. It will explain a lot to you if you prefer to listen to an expert.