First I suggest you revamp your diet. If you're eating any processed foods, drinking soda, eating sugar, eating out basically anywhere then you've found the first problem.

Use this formula to calculate the calories you need to maintain your current weight -- then suctract 3500/week for every 1lb you wish to lose.

1) Calculate BMR

BMR = 655 + ( 4.35 x weight in pounds ) + ( 4.7 x height in inches ) - ( 4.7 x age in years )

2) Calculate TDEE

TDEEsedentary = 1.2 x BMR Sedentary - television of office work

TDEElight = 1.375 X BMR Light – exercise workout or sports 1-3 days per week

TDEE moderate = 1.55 X BMR Moderate – exercise workout or sports 3-5 days per week

TDEEhigh = 1.725 X BMR High – exercise workout or sports 6-7 days per week

TDEEextreme = 1.9 X BMR Extreme – exercise workout or sports twice daily

TDEE is the number of calories you need to maintain your current weight.

There is nothing dramatically different between fat loss routines for men and women. The best way for anyone to burn fat is to eat a clean caloric deficit, lift weights using primarily heavy compound movements, and supplement your lifting routine with HIIT and cario if time is available. Cardio and pilates are poor ways to burn calories. You'll burn off the calories from your morning's bagel in an hour of cardio. You'd be better off just not eating the bagle and saving an hour of your time.

No one, man or woman, is going to gain muscle mass from lifting (regardless of the weight, reps, etc) when eating a caloric deficit. It's virtually impossible. You need to eat a caloric surpluss to build muscles -- which you won't be doing.

Now, if you're naturally muscular, when you cut fat, the muscles are going to show. If you don't want to look very muscular, then you need to get rid of muscle mass too. Doing 20 reps of 5lb weights isn't going to help you here. Doing pilates isn't going to help you here. Trying to get lean and thin muscles.. whatever that means. I don't even know. Your best bet would be to eat little, and do a crap load of cardio so your body burns muscle for the energy it needs. You'd be best served by a total body workout like swimming, elliptical using the arm bars, etc.

 

i lift heavy weights... i hate running. although iv been doing the P90X ab workout. liking what im seeing so far. its a 15 minute ab workout and iv yet to be able to complete the ENTIRE thing, every movement.

 

thanks Vtec9,

I guess simply I want to have lean muscle and a low body fat percentage. I don't mind if my muscle tone shows, I just don't want to have big arms or thunder thighs.. I guess once I lose the extra weight I will just see my muscle instead of muscle+fat. I don't like running at all, I can't concentrate very well and lose focus easily. There are a few times when I feel I could run all day but I don't get that way often. I have been reading a lot about the Abs Diet, you know... from the Women's/Men's Health magazine? Is anyone familiar with that one? Seems like the smartest one I have seen so far. Anyone have any other suggestions?
When I first started, I did count calories and It worked... I eventually got comfortable with learning calories, portions, bla bla..ect..and then I decided to pick up the Abs Diet book. I guess I need to find a cardio exercise that I really like... I love the punching bag but that's not very accessible to me right now since my gym does not have one and I live in an apt.

 

I googled the Abs Diet, and it's nothing special.. it just basically tells you what anyone else that knows anything about nutrition will tell you to eat.

eggs, lean land and sea animals, cottage cheese, low fat dairy
starchy green vegetables, yams, fruits
whole wheat bread & pasta, brown rice, oats
olive oil, fish oil, peanut butter

 

Very true. Its no HUGE secret. Those are the foods you want to stick to. Also stick with NORMAL portions of food. A 1/2 cup of food is a lot less than you think. Get a measuring cup out and fill it up, the put in on your plate. After you do this a couple times, you'll actually know what a certain quantity of food looks like. I think a lot of people think they are eating the serving sizes and what not, but they are consuming a lot more.

 

[QUOTE=vtec9,Jun 2 2008, 12:30 PM]
1) Calculate BMR

BMR = 655 + ( 4.35 x weight in pounds ) + ( 4.7 x height in inches ) - ( 4.7 x age in years )

2) Calculate TDEE

TDEEsedentary = 1.2 x BMR Sedentary - television of office work

TDEElight = 1.375 X BMR Light

 

Thats actually the formula for woman.. I was posting it for S2k_Tiger The formula for men is slightly different

BMR = 66 + ( 6.23 x weight in pounds ) + ( 12.7 x height in inches ) - ( 6.8 x age in year )

use the same formulas for TDEE

 

well I guess I lose weight like a woman then

according to the male formula I need 2935.6 calories a day just to maintain weight....thats nuts.

 

girly man!

 

well I do eat a lot of yogurt and take yoga so that would explain alot