Some advice on new fitness regime

mdwexford

Hello folks.

Im a 28yo male and currently weight about 16 stone.

I recently started back playing 5 a side football and was terribly unfit so have finally decided enough is enough and decided to get back in shape.

I work nights so my sleeping hours are 7am till 3pm kind of thing which isnt optimal as regards eating time etc.

My diet up to last week consisted of a Dominos Pizza once a week, a Goodfellas pizza once a week, chips, chicken nuggets, a ton of Coke and other fizzy drinks, loads of chocolate, sweets, crisps etc, basically just a shocking diet.

Ive read up a lot on here and have attempted to change my diet, here is how its looked for the past week....

Breakfast
Porridge with low fat milk or
2 x Poached or Boiled Eggs with 2 slices of wholemeal toast or 2 slices of McCambridge brown bread.

A cup of tea, no sugar.

Dinner
Stew with mince meat, carrots, onions and potato or
Skinless chicken breast with brocolli, carrots and potato or
Chicken curry with basmati rice

Snacks
Tuna steak sandwich with wholemeal bread or
Cheese sandwich with wholemeal bread or
Baked beans with brown bread.

Also been eating at least 2 of the following pieces of fruit daily
Banana
Apple
Kiwi
Frozen grapes

And 2-3 litres of water and fish oil capsules and multivitamin and mineral tablets.

Is there anything major im missing from my diet or any other advice is welcome.

Ive also joined a gym and am trying to work out a regular program at the moment.

Im thinking some hiit on the rower, some steady state on the bike and arc trainer and then bench, military press, squat and deadlift to get me going??

celtic723

Really respect people like yourself for making the effort to change your diet.

Fair play to you, you'll be rewarded.

I've started a protein rich, low carb diet as well as joining a gym down the road. Started last saturday and have been down for 5 sessions already losing 5 pound. And before you ask 'am i hungry?', nope not one bit. I've been eating healthily before someone comes on and says ''Oh you lost 5 pound in a week, that can't be good for you''. It's not water weight i've lost either as i'm drinking 3-4 litres of water a day.

Having said that i am pushing myself quite hard and am restricting myself from eating rubbish.

One thing i will say to you is Potatoes are a bastard. I got rid of them out of my meals and i don't miss them. It gives me more room for some more broccoli or carrots or something else. For the amount of carbs in a potatoe it really isn't worth it.

I think your diet is good, but would be even better if you started exercising daily.

Good luck.

diddlei

fair play to the 2 of ye!!:D celtic 723 whats your workout like??

mdwexford

Just a quick update on this for some advice.

Im down to 195 pounds now which is a tad under 14 stone so thats over 2 stone lost so far which i am very happy with.

I bought one of those scales which measures weight, body fat, water etc 7 weeks ago and have been recording all my readings.

In that time ive gone from 210lbs to 197lbs but my body fat percentage has only gone from 27.8% to 25.1%. Is that normal or should it be dropping quicker?? If so what could i be doing wrong??

Thanks

heno86

to be honest with you mate i wouldnt pay too much attention to the bodyfat percentage on those machines as they're not really that accurate and a lot of things can throw off the readings ie hydration levels etc. i'd just weigh myself first thing in the morning and maybe take some measurements of waist and abs...

Roger Marbles

mdwexford wrote: »

Just a quick update on this for some advice.

Im down to 195 pounds now which is a tad under 14 stone so thats over 2 stone lost so far which i am very happy with.

I bought one of those scales which measures weight, body fat, water etc 7 weeks ago and have been recording all my readings.

In that time ive gone from 210lbs to 197lbs but my body fat percentage has only gone from 27.8% to 25.1%. Is that normal or should it be dropping quicker?? If so what could i be doing wrong??

Thanks

Lower your carb intake.

Blatter

celtic723 wrote: »

Really respect people like yourself for making the effort to change your diet.

Fair play to you, you'll be rewarded.

I've started a protein rich, low carb diet as well as joining a gym down the road. Started last saturday and have been down for 5 sessions already losing 5 pound. And before you ask 'am i hungry?', nope not one bit. I've been eating healthily before someone comes on and says ''Oh you lost 5 pound in a week, that can't be good for you''. It's not water weight i've lost either as i'm drinking 3-4 litres of water a day.

Having said that i am pushing myself quite hard and am restricting myself from eating rubbish.

One thing i will say to you is Potatoes are a bastard. I got rid of them out of my meals and i don't miss them. It gives me more room for some more broccoli or carrots or something else. For the amount of carbs in a potatoe it really isn't worth it.

I think your diet is good, but would be even better if you started exercising daily.

Good luck.

Doubt it mate, to lose 5 pounds of fat/muscle in one week, essentially you would have to have a 2500 cal/day deficit which isn't feasible without going massively hungry/feeling like sh*te. It would be totally wrong on so many fronts aswell. Just because you were drinking tons of water dosen't mean you still didn't lose water weight.

The fact you started a low carb diet/high protein diet proves that the majority of it was water weight. 5 pounds gone on the scales on the first week of a low carb diet sounds about right.

Mellor

mdwexford wrote: »

In that time ive gone from 210lbs to 197lbs but my body fat percentage has only gone from 27.8% to 25.1%. Is that normal or should it be dropping quicker?? If so what could i be doing wrong??

You are doing nothing wrong. 2 stone in two months is HUGE. 1-2 lb per week would be excellant, you are around 3 lb per week average, this is massive. This is going to slow soon, (as you can see from the last 7 weeks have been 2lb/week or so) its just not sustainable, don't lose faith when it happens.

Keep you diet the same, its obviously working, but bare in mind as you shed bodyfat, your maintenance calories drop, you'll need less foods.

RE: body fat
Those scales give a rough value, but can be off so don't worry too much.

Roger Marbles wrote: »

Lower your carb intake.

Nonsense, he as lost 2 stone in 2 months. That is brilliant progress. And as long as he is on a deficit, carbs won't increase his bf%. Increasing his deficit, by dropping carbs is a bad idea.

Roger Marbles

Mellor wrote: »

Nonsense, he as lost 2 stone in 2 months. That is brilliant progress. And as long as he is on a deficit, carbs won't increase his bf%. Increasing his deficit, by dropping carbs is a bad idea.

Firstly don't misrepresent my point, I never said create a further deficit. He can mantain the same deficit by upping his protein and good fats.

Secondly, if you are going to discuss a point someone else makes, refrain from being impolite and labelling it as "nonsense"

Thirdly a carb restricted diet will show greater benefits in lowering bodyfat and other cardiovascular parameters such as BP, cholesterol etc.

Transform

mdwexford wrote: »

Just a quick update on this for some advice.

Im down to 195 pounds now which is a tad under 14 stone so thats over 2 stone lost so far which i am very happy with.

I bought one of those scales which measures weight, body fat, water etc 7 weeks ago and have been recording all my readings.

In that time ive gone from 210lbs to 197lbs but my body fat percentage has only gone from 27.8% to 25.1%. Is that normal or should it be dropping quicker?? If so what could i be doing wrong??

Thanks

the quick drop in weight you have noticed is just from making simple adjustments to your diet.

Those same changes are now NOT enough to get you to where you want to be so you need to get tighter on the diet (doing this 80-90% of the time will work) and keep hitting the gym sessions.

Start using a proper weights and cardio program and even a simple change of cutting out the bread can create a nice drop in calorie intake.

Roger Marbles

Interesting study in NEJM today regarding high protein, low GI diets compared to others with regard to maintaining weight loss...

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1007137

mdwexford

Thanks for the replies.

I can get tighter on my diet alright Transform, cut out the odd treat here and there, im definitely eating a lot of bread and i am drinking heavily once a week but i will be cutting that out totally after Christmas.

My gym program is decent enough at the moment i think.

paky

Roger Marbles wrote: »

Lower your carb intake.

Dont lower your carb intake, you'll suffer in the gym for it

Fart

paky wrote: »

Dont lower your carb intake, you'll suffer in the gym for it

Why's that?

Mellor

Roger Marbles wrote: »

Firstly don't misrepresent my point, I never said create a further deficit. He can mantain the same deficit by upping his protein and good fats.

Secondly, if you are going to discuss a point someone else makes, refrain from being impolite and labelling it as "nonsense"

Thirdly a carb restricted diet will show greater benefits in lowering bodyfat and other cardiovascular parameters such as BP, cholesterol etc.

Low carb diets, esp keto diets, can result in raise cholesterol levels initially.
The OP's diet isn't really high carb if his portion control is good.

I'm all for reduced carbs, but they are still required. Isocalorific is perfectly healthy, and low carb no more so really.

Fart wrote: »

Why's that?

Carbs are generally a good fast acting energy source.
Some people find energy severly lacking in the gym when they go v.low carb

Transform

there really is no need to get overly complicated for the OP - harder gym sessions and get much stronger on the weights being used combined with a more honest effort on the diet is grand.

I stand by the bread comment again as it would be an easy swap and remember to earn the beers at the weekend

nice_guy80

well done on the weight loss so far

that is brilliant!!

Keep it up!