My weight loss plan

cynicalcough

Hi everyone, just looking for some tips and suggestions for my weight loss plan. Have been through a tough time personally and have piled on the weight so need to do something. I have about 3-4 stone to loose.

My typical day at the moment is something like this;

Breakfast: Kale and mixed fruit smoothie (homemade approx 88 cals)
Pulsing Maple and Whey Protein Snack

Lunch: Homemade Soup (Cabbage and Potato today)
Wholegrain Ryvita x 3 with low fat laughing cow cheese x2

Dinner: 4 bean and vegetable chilli (homemade)
2 wholemeal tortilla wraps
Reduced fat cheese (20g)
0% fat natural yogurt

Snacks: Fruit, blueberries and apricot today

I'm combining this with walking about 60 mins daily, swimming 50 25m lengths 3-4 times a week. Trying to get to the gym about 3 times a week too. At the moment I haven't a clue so burning about 500 cals per session on the cardio machines but I have a fitness assessment this week so will hopefully add some strength training. Would appreciate your thoughts and suggestions on what I'm doing at the moment.

generic2012

That's lots of exercise. If by "the gym" you mean heavy(ish) weights, which would be best, I wouldn't bother with the swimming. They will just short change each other. One or the other would be better than a combination and weights, I think, would be more conducive to your goals seeing as your on a relatively low calorie diet.

generic2012

If you can stick to that OP, that's great, but I'd be careful about being too ambitious. Sometimes if you're too enthusiastic at the start you end up making it too hard for yourself. It's a good start, but you haven't said too much about portion size and haven't said whether you're male or female so it's hard to know what advice to give. If you keep good track of what you're eating and how you're feeling, you'll probably tweak your diet over time and find what's right for you yourself. Be careful with the fruit, it's generally good, but if you're eating a lot it's not great as it's sugary and you'll burn it quickly. So it's good to eat fruit for the nutrients, but it's not a good way of feeding your hunger (maybe try low GI snacks).

Try to vary your diet day to day too.

generic2012 wrote: »

That's lots of exercise. If by "the gym" you mean heavy(ish) weights, which would be best, I wouldn't bother with the swimming. They will just short change each other. One or the other would be better than a combination and weights, I think, would be more conducive to your goals seeing as your on a relatively low calorie diet.

I'd agree that it's a lot of exercise, but more so because it seems quite laborious. If the OP is walking for an hour a day, swimming 3-4 times a week and going to the gym 3 times a week, that's quite a lot of time devoted to exercise every single day. Which is great if you have the time but it sounds like an easy way to burn yourself out quickly. Life can get in the way of plans like that, and anyway, rest days can be very important.
But I'd have to wonder how swimming would 'short change' doing weights? (Although the OP stated it's cardio machines he/she's doing anyway). Swimming and cardio workouts are perfectly valid weight-loss aids.

cynicalcough

I'm female, should have said. 5ft 7. I'm watching the portions and weighing everything, coming our about 1200 cals per day according to my fitness pal. Honestly I feel like that's a bit low given how big I am. Should I start higher and gradually reduce calories as it gets harder to loose. Have buckets of motivation at the moment but need to make sure it's sustainable too.

generic2012

true-or-false wrote: »

But I'd have to wonder how swimming would 'short change' doing weights? (Although the OP stated it's cardio machines he/she's doing anyway). Swimming and cardio workouts are perfectly valid weight-loss aids.

The key to exercise is progression. Be it a faster time running/swimming the same distance, going further in the same mount of time, lifting heavier weights for the same reps, lifting the same weight for more reps etc. The faster you progress the faster your results (more muscle/aerobic capacity), you should be doing everything possible to help this progression which means not cutting calories so much as to hinder recovery and sensible use of the bodies limited energy reserves.

Swimming taps into the same energy systems as strength training (and to lesser effect, the same as the aerobic work) does, so it will take longer to recover from strength training and swimming as they both compete with each other which will slow overall progression. But swimming doesn't have the same strength benefits as direct strength training and does have the same aerobic benefits as walking or jogging. So it's not as good as either (when both are being done, if only one could be done it might be all right), and significantly hinders one.

You've talked about the ease of "burning out", I think we're somewhat on the same page.