Over the past couple years iv'e gained around 25-30 lbs and i'm looking to get back in shape. I'm gonna start working out 4-5 times a week and watching what i eat to an extent.

Eating:

For breakfast: Oatmeal, with almonds, cinnamon and milk.

For lunch: A sandwich on Honey wheat bread, light mayo, honey mustard, and deli turkey. Plus a few crackers, only healthy choices though.

For Dinner: 1)Boneless skinless chicken breast plus vegetables.
2)Some kind of fish plus vegetables
3)Spaghetti, whole wheat pasta, ground turkey, healthy type sauce.

Pretty much one of those 3 every night. Not looking forward to that. And maybe 3 to 4 cheat nights a month to eat whatever i want.

Working out:

This is really where I'm asking for help tips. In the past I was more into getting big. I've always heard that, "heavier weights, less reps" is for if your going for the big look...and, "lighter weights. more reps" if you're looking to tone. Before i just went with heavy weights to get the bigger look, but now I'm looking to stay where I'm at and just tone, burn fat, etc.

I figure I'll do various exercises and run about 2 miles a day.

I've searched the net and done some research, but I'm curious to see if anyone has good results for what I'm looking for through personal experience. Thanks for any tips, help, insight from anyone. Thanks

 

My routine is i run 3-5 miles a day -4-5 days a week. it really isn;t very time consuimg...like 30-50 min usually. And then before i bed i do curls with a couple 25lbs dumbbells and use a 8 lbs med ball for ab work outs. As for food i keep it semi healthy but the key i've noticed over the years, my key to maintining my weight is to drink water instead of soda (0 cal vs 120 cal per 12 oz serving) makes a huge differnce.

Good luck

 

Damn , 3 - 5 miles is out of my range i think...maybe after a month of my routine. Yea i forgot to mention the soda..I quite that cold turkey about 2 weeks ago...I used to drink that crap like it was my religion. about 4-5 cans a day...One thing i don't think i can do is giving up drinking alcohol. I have a full time job and go to school and love to have a screwdriver or 2 every night while I'm watching tv to just relax...Prob too much, but it's just something i do. Part of this "diet" is I'm limiting my self to only drink on weekends...I think from working out almost everyday I won't need to drink every night to relax. My job doesn't exactly help the cause much either. I work in computer networking for a hospital so i spend alot of time sitting on my ass. Thanks for the input.

 

I'm not sure if you're like me at all but I hate working out (ADD). I'm not overweight at all but I'd like to tone up a bit more. I get to the gym and start thinking about all the other things I want to accomplish in my day and end up leaving after 30 or so minutes. Can't run worth a crap either. I max out at about a mile at a time. Girlfriend was an All-American runner in college, so she gives me a lot of crap for it.

One thing I've found useful is to maximize the time that you do have during your normal routine. While you're sitting in your car or at the office, tighten up your stomach muscles or constantly tap your foot. Park at the back of the parking lot, etc, etc.

I think your strategy for eating is commendable but typical of someone who is making a new year's resolution. Don't try to confine yourself so much. The most important thing is to break yourself of your addiction to greasy foods. Once you do that and don't crave it anymore, the thought of eating something heavy and fatty will become repulsive.

 

its all in the eating. to tell you the truth, if you just run, lift light weights and more reps, youll get skinny and toned. oh yea, another thing. when running, dont over do it. you notice how cross country runners look BONE skinny right? about 3-5 miles is good enough. i think anything over that and you might be looking a little TOO skinny around the legs and arms.

 

loosing weight and work out are not related.

loosing weight:
-keep you calories <2000/day and you will loose weight, its just that way.
-add up everything you talked about, spaghetti, light mayo, Oatmeal/milk everyone's math is different.
-netrition.com is like the newegg of diet supplement stuff.
-when i try to loose weight my body tries to shut down, i wind up doing the coffee and or diet Mt Dew.
-me wife continues to avoid 4letter words like: diet, work... if you dont have it in the house you will not eat it. hard to resist once its there.
-drinking alcohol is bad, especially while phucking with other things
-you will not become anorexic and die.

work-out
-it is difficult to gain muscle mass while loosing weight.
-usually go to the gym 3 times per week, difficult to do 4 and 2 times is a maintenance level
-i was going with a friend and really made some gains in strength. i mean stuff you can see. also gained fat.
-everyone's is sooo different: i can leg press easy alot of weight like >900 w/o effort but its a struggle to do 225 bench press. the person i was going with was the other way around.
-its noticeably easier to do the day to day stuff. So i would trade this for the hour or so at the gym but the calories spent there are few compared to not eating.

 

the start of each year is the best time to go to the gym All the attractive women come to work our for their new years resolutions.. but make your move quickly.. they'll all be gone come feb

 

My suggestion is to find exercise that you like to do. Or that you can do with a friend so it makes it more fun.

My two best weight loss exercises are raquetball and believe it or not DDR. Totally dorky but it is fun every time and I sweat more and use more energy in an hour of that than anything else. My wife is on a fitness message board and they have a whole section dedicated to it for people who do workouts with it. My brother dropped 20 pounds playing 40 minutes a day before work. You don't have to get that dorky, but something that is fun is key.

My suggestion would be to try to stick to a three day routine and rest on day four.

I do:

day 1 chest, tricep, and leg extension
day 2 bicep, shoulder, ab, squats
day 3 cardio (raquetball, DDR, tennis)
day 4 rest

Try to stick to it but if you find you need an extra day of rest from soreness TAKE IT. Getting an injury from being worn down will set you back farther than taking an extra day of rest as long as you get back on the horse.

Don't eat after dinner, and also, don't cut you calories back too far, it leads to gorging. Recent studies showed that most people started losing wieght with a drop in calories of 100 to 150 a day. It swithced their body from adding weight slowly to burning it off slowly, without causing major hunger issues. In my case all I did was switch from regular soda to diet and still eat whatever I want. Each can of soda is about 160 calories and I was drinking 2 per day. I cut over 300 calories without changing diet. Stuff like less frying, or using olive oil instead of butter, blah, blah, can do a lot without leaving you starving and standing at the fridge door at 9 pm.

 

I ended up losing 30+ lbs when I moved to England from the US, partly becuase I hadn't found the english snack food and only ate at meal times, but mostly becuase I was walking 5+ miles per day, I'd say 3-5 on avg, though for a good month or so it was 5-7.

It took a bit to get used to being hungry, but when I did eat meals I ate more than I usually did, and I also drank a larger volume of alcohol (though didn't get "drunk" as it was 2 or 3 pints here or there as opposed to 5 or 6 in one sitting).

I say start off with the small things, don't limit yourself to only a few foods as you'll only crave the ones you can't have that much more.

I'm joining a gym as soon as I get paid (been meaning to for awhile, just spoke with my friend who is well into UFC/MMA to help "train" me, we're gonna be workout buddies and he's into nutrition like I am) and find healthy foods you enjoy.

For example, I'm a smoothie addict. I also love yoga. I ALSO love mac and cheese, and hummus. I still allow myself the mac n cheese and mashed potatoes and stuff, but try to limit it to once a week/every other week instead of a few times a week, think of it as a treat.

If you hate your diet/exercise plan you'll never stick with it imho. Make sure you enjoy it

 

do 10-15 minutes of cardio before you start lifting each day to get your heart rate up.. then try to keep it up between exercises by taking short breaks or working multiple parts of the body/day so you can go from one to the next with no break.

my work out is typically the following:

day 1: back, bic, abs
day 2: chest, tric, abs
day 3: shoulders, legs, abs
repeat
day 7 off.

each day starts with 10 min cardio and most end with 20-30 min cardio and I through oddballs in there randomly, such as forearms.

I will modify based on how I feel and how strenuous my previous workouts were. I.e. if I go hardcore chest workout, I'm not coming back two days later and beating on it again. If I'm sore I take a break. you can work abs every day unless they're sore.

I find this to be a good way to maintain overall physical shape. I don't get huge, but I am lean, cut, and healthy

In any event, start off slowly. Don't make any dramatic or drastic changes immediately because this is a sure fire way to fail. Start working out 3 times a week and cutting down on bad things from your diet. Don't expect results right away like all these abersize commercials are promising As you start to get in better shape and become more accustomed to your new dieting techniques, you can increase the workout load and start to eat even healthier. Eventually you won't have the slightest craving for bad foods and you will want to excersize ever more.