Critique my fitness plan?

oq4v3ht0u76kf2

Chello ladies and gentlemen,

I have, for want of a better word, ballooned from 217lbs (15st 7lbs) to 281lbs (20st1lb) in less than two years. I know exactly how I did it too, crappy food and no exercise. Go figure. I'm 6' and quite broadly built so at ~215lbs I looked pretty good, I gotta admit. At 281lbs, even with my build I just look fat. Fat. Very fat.

Now, I started actually doing something about it on the 27th of February and in the last month I've gotten down to 267lbs however I've just been exercising "randomly" and watching what I eat. Now I want to get a bit more methodical about things. I'm not in any great rush to lose weight, the sooner the better like but I'm not trying to fit into my Debs tux tomorrow or anything!

So far, I've had a few workouts I've done once or twice...

#1
90 minutes of slow, steady running
Wandering through at about 8 or 9 km/hr, HR hovering about 160 throughout
Don't feel particularly tired after this one, but have heard good things about a relaxed pace/HR being good for weight loss

#2
15 minutes HIIT on the cross trainer
5 minute warmup, 15 minutes HIIT, 5 minutes cool down
Tough, tough workout. I break it down like this:
Minutes 1 - 3: 45 secs LO, 15 secs HI
Minutes 4 - 6: 40 secs LO, 20 secs HI
Minutes 7 - 9: 35 secs LO, 25 secs HI
Minutes 10 - 12: 30 secs LO, 30 secs HI
Minutes 13 - 14: 25 secs LO, 35 secs HI
I feel very tired and almost puking after this one, but feel really refreshed and like I've "done something"

#3
45 minutes general cardio
15 minutes running at a slow to middling pace
15 minutes cross trainer at a medium pace
15 minutes bike at medium to high pace


I've been more or less doing one of these, on average, every three days over the last month. I'm enjoying it but I want some more structure to my workouts so I've decided to come up with a plan of sorts. I've laid it out below, what you guys think?

Monday wrote:

15 minutes high intensity intervals session
20 minutes relaxed swimming

Tuesday wrote:

Weight session
Squat / Deadlift / Bench Press

Wednesday wrote:

Long distance run
60 - 90 minute run, covering about 12km

Thursday wrote:

15 minutes high intensity intervals session
20 minutes swimming at a good pace, no dilly dallying around at the end of lengths

Friday wrote:

Weight session
Squat / Deadlift / Bench Press

Saturday wrote:

Mixed cardio session
15 mins bike / 15 mins cross / 15 mins rowing

Sunday wrote:

Day off

I realise that I'm working six days a week in my plan, but I've been more active than that in the past and I've tried to keep the high impact days spread out amongst the more relaxed days. However, if you really thing six days is too much please let me know. Any thoughts? Cheers guys.

Saabdub

All than running makes me wince:eek: I used to run a lot, then I started to get red, swollen and painful knees. I was afraid it was arthritus but it turned out to be the impact of the weight of my upper body pushing down on the joints as I ran. Now I only do non-impact cardio work (cycling). I have to work a bit harder to get the same calorie burn as running but my knees will probably last me into old age now:D

Saabdub

Al_Fernz

Hi Rob,

Good to hear that you're making the changes and that you have made progress so far. What is your precise goal exactly? Is it just to loose weight? What exactly is your diet like? A relatively clean diet will always aid the pursuit of your goals.

Based on the idea that you want to loose weigh while maintaining/building some muscle I would manke the following changes to your regime:

Monday - I like

Tuesday - Weights (Push) Squat 4x8, DB or BB Bench Press 4x8, DB or BB Military Press 4x8, Tricep Kickbacks (each arm) 3x12

Wednesday - 30 to 60 minute run - about 5km

Thursday - I like

Friday - Weights (Pull) Deadlift 4x8 , Bent over Row 4x8, Pull-up or Chin up (assisted if needs be, if not possible sub in Lat Pull-down) 4x8, Barbell curl 3x12.

Saturday and Sunday - Chill out man. You should have worked hard enough during the week and should need the rest. Two days off will help your body recover so you can train at a high level.

IMO your original training plan is far too ambitious and the shear volume of it would lead to you burning our/getting disinterested very quickly.

rubadub

I don't run at 11.5stone for fear of messing my knees up, at 20 I wouldnt even dream of it!

I would add more wieghts in, good to see you are doing good compound lifts. How about standing military press, dips (if possible), pushups.

Now the weather is getting a little better get some functional cardio in too, walk & cycle everywhere you can.

Diet is vital too, have you calculated your calorie intake?

aye

Al_Fernz wrote: »

Hi Rob,

Good to hear that you're making the changes and that you have made progress so far. What is your precise goal exactly? Is it just to loose weight? What exactly is your diet like? A relatively clean diet will always aid the pursuit of your goals.

Based on the idea that you want to loose weigh while maintaining/building some muscle I would manke the following changes to your regime:

Monday - I like

Tuesday - Weights (Push) Squat 4x8, DB or BB Bench Press 4x8, DB or BB Military Press 4x8, Tricep Kickbacks (each arm) 3x12

Wednesday - 30 to 60 minute run - about 5km

Thursday - I like

Friday - Weights (Pull) Deadlift 4x8 , Bent over Row 4x8, Pull-up or Chin up (assisted if needs be, if not possible sub in Lat Pull-down) 4x8, Barbell curl 3x12.

Saturday and Sunday - Chill out man. You should have worked hard enough during the week and should need the rest. Two days off will help your body recover so you can train at a high level.

IMO your original training plan is far too ambitious and the shear volume of it would lead to you burning our/getting disinterested very quickly.

this is a nice balanced weight lifting plan. i wouldnt be too pushed about a tricep kickback or barbell curl tho, as they are working quite small muscles, and if you want to lose fat i would advise working bigger muscles using compund movements, like the squat, deadlift, etc.
thats not to say that a tricep or bicep exercise is useless, but those muscle will be worked with the push and pull movements, and the aim isnt to build the arms.

is there a reason that in the six days, you do 4 cardio days and 2 weights days and not 3 and 3?

Al_Fernz

aye wrote: »

this is a nice balanced weight lifting plan. i wouldnt be too pushed about a tricep kickback or barbell curl tho, as they are working quite small muscles, and if you want to lose fat i would advise working bigger muscles using compund movements, like the squat, deadlift, etc.

If you look at the routine I suggested the primary lifts in it are compound movements (80%).

I suggest doing arm exercises at the end of a workout because the "pump" can have a great physcological effect. When I first started lifting this is what kept me coming back for more. Of course, a nice corollary of this is for the OP to get a nice bit of muscle growth. Big arms look cool in a T-shirt in case you havn't noticed.:D

aye

i agree with the compound lifts all the way.
and i agree that the pump is great also and big arms look great in a t-shirt

but the OP is near 20 stone or so, and his aim is to losing body fat, and the amount of muscle built from doing bicep and tricep work is very little and wont contribute much to that overall goal.
i'm not disagreeing with doing bicep and tricep work, i am just saying that in this case the time could perhaps be spent on doing more legs stuff, extension and curl say, to build those big leg muscles and fire up his metabolism.
then when the bodyfat starts to lower, which it will, bicep and tricep work would be great for the t-shirts, and the summer!

Al_Fernz

aye wrote: »

i agree with the compound lifts all the way.
and i agree that the pump is great also and big arms look great in a t-shirt

but the OP is near 20 stone or so, and his aim is to losing body fat, and the amount of muscle built from doing bicep and tricep work is very little and wont contribute much to that overall goal.
i'm not disagreeing with doing bicep and tricep work, i am just saying that in this case the time could perhaps be spent on doing more legs stuff, extension and curl say, to build those big leg muscles and fire up his metabolism.
then when the bodyfat starts to lower, which it will, bicep and tricep work would be great for the t-shirts, and the summer!

Hmmmmmmmmmmm, leg extension and curls are isolation exercises too. I can't imagine that the effects of doing them at the end of a hard workout would have a significant effect on the OPs metabolism.

The main reason I was suggesting the arm work was for the physcological effect.

It seems that we think on similar wavelengths and I think we would both agree that disagreeing over what the OP does after all his tough compound lifts is just pedantic nit-pickinking.

aye

Al_Fernz wrote: »

Hmmmmmmmmmmm, leg extension and curls are isolation exercises too. I can't imagine that the effects of doing them at the end of a hard workout would have a significant effect on the OPs metabolism.

The main reason I was suggesting the arm work was for the physcological effect.

It seems that we think on similar wavelengths and I think we would both agree that disagreeing over what the OP does after all his tough compound lifts is just pedantic nit-pickinking.

ha i agree.
OP compound lifts as said, and kieep it balanced.

Hanley

Why not spend some time doing bicep and tricep work NOW at the end of a session so he's not playing catch up 6 months down the road?

oq4v3ht0u76kf2

Cheers for all the input guys, had a tremendously busy couple of days so didn't even remember to check this thread. Okay, I've taken what you've said on board so my new plan is going to look like this:

##

Monday
15 minutes high intensity intervals session
20 minutes relaxed swimming

Tuesday
Squat 4x8
BB Bench 4x8
DB Military Press 4x8

Wednesday
5k training session (see below)

Thursday
15 minutes high intensity intervals session
20 minutes medium-intensity swimming

Friday
Deadlift 4x8
Bent-over Row 4x8
Assisted Pull-up 4x8
BB curl 3x12

##

I've left out the tricep kickbacks on Tuesday for the simple reason that I have no idea what they are, but if anyone can link me to a good resource on them I'd be more than willing to integrate them to things. I tried Googling a couple of things but couldn't find anything with a really good emphasis on form, and I'm very much a "get-the-form-right-and-worry-about-everything-else-later" type of guy.

Secondly, I run 5k in about 38 minutes at the moment so the 5k training session will involve a couple of different things that I'll be trying out to get the time down. My immediate goal would be to get it down to about 34:30 and then look for a sub-30 minute time.

My diet is definitely a weak point for me. I'd imagine I average about 3 takeaways every fortnight and I'm awful fond of a twelve-pack on a Friday night. Basically, I'm a busy / lazy bugger and I've developed an atrocious habit of not eating at home. Everything I eat is either in a restaurant, fast-food joint or a roll / whatever from Spar. I have known this is a ridiculous way to be carrying on for a while now but I finally decided once and for all this evening that it has to stop. I've drawn up the following *rough* meal plan:

Breakfast
Bowl of Oatibix w/ apples and raisins w/ skimmed milk or bowl of porridge with peanut butter and bananas

Morning snack
Couple of pieces of fruit or a smoothie

Lunch
Sandwich or roll, no mayo or butter, mostly going to be either turkey or ham with onion, sweetcorn, tomato and lettuce

Afternoon snack
Bag of popcorn, some mixed nuts and raisins

Dinner
Pretty hard to pin down... I suppose it'll usually be either meat+few veg or lasagne w/ garlic bread

It's a fairly big change from what I'm eating at the moment, but it's really just applying some sensible (I think?) changes to the basic meals I already have. Cutting out lashings of butter and mayo on a roll at lunch, replacing chips at dinner with boiled or mashed potato. Breakfast is going to be tough because (a) I usually skip it, and (b) when I do have it, it's usually a sausage sambo or a damn McMuffin. I do love me some Oatibix though so I'm actually looking forward to that.

So that's where I am so far... do you guys have any more feedback regarding the diet or the training plan? Cheers for all the help so far!

BossArky

I found interval training helped knock my better 5km times from 24 to 22 ish mins.

Google it if you don't know what it is. The general idea would be to cycle between a moderate speed (11kmph?) and then up to something a bit strenous (15kmph?)

Initially try to do the easy speed for 800m, with the hard one for 400m. If you can last 5km with this setup then tweak it a bit next time to maybe both cycles of 600m.

Mix up the speeds a bit each session. It will get your body used to working outside its comfort zone and increase your speed overall.

Al_Fernz

http://www.exrx.net/WeightExercises/Triceps/DBKickback.html

I'm not really an expert on diet but I would recommend 3 things for fat-loss:
1)Fish Oil Tab
2)Green Tea
3)Increasing Protein intake

Your diet probably needs tweaking - but the most important thing is that you have cut out the total junk like sweets, mayo etc. Also, I can't really comment too much on your diet because the portion size is not really listed. Make sure you're getting enough protien in and watch out for excessive carbs. Maybe add a few eggs for breakfast? If you don't eat enough protein you will get-run down very quickly and won't stick to your exercise plan.

All the best!