southpaw121505

No, I was completely unaware that fat burning effects body composition. haha The fact that you are even debating calorie reduction for someone who wants to lose 30+ tells me I'm wasting my time with this. Okay low to no sugar, low to no carbs I got it. Can you guys recommend some foods that are quick and easy to prepare that are low in carbs and sugar? What do you guys eat just a lot of fruit, veggies, and lean meat? Also some name brand snacks and stuff would be helpful too. Thanks I'm going to try and eat better this winter. That's not what I'm advising at all. I'm an advocate of whatever you are comfortable with and will stick to. People make it more complicated than it is. Unless you are trying to get sub 8% body fat you can eat any foods you want and if you consistently hit your macronutrient goals you will progress.

In your very first reply you disagreed with my very basic general advice for losing weight. The fact that you disagreed with calorie reduction for weight loss is enough to make my head explode by itself. But the next gem was when you said cutting sugar out was more important than decreasing calories. You do realize that sugar is a carb and carbs are calories right? Someone who wants to lose 40 plus pounds can and will lose weight by reducing calories, calories from anywhere. The hormonal response to sugar means absolutely nothing when that person is in a hypocaloric state. Can you clarify for me, are you a trainer? Because you said on page one something about sitting at a desk all day, but then later responded that you train people.

jjk, it's hard to give general advice as the devil is in the details, especially with your goal. -Lift as you are, track what you are doing and aim to keep progressing, more weight, more reps, etc. -I'd get 60 mins of cardio in still, can be anything, elliptical, bike, even walking. Anything to increase oxygen uptake. This can be 30 mins twice after lifting or on off days, 20 mins 3x a week, 15 mins 4x a week. Does not matter, get an hour a week in somehow. -If you aren't tracking your calories now I'd shoot for about 2600-2800 calories a day on lift days and a little less on off days. At least 200 grams of protein. -I'd drop the oxyelite. If you really want a fat burner go for an ec stack, I'd recommend going without it though. Xtend can help with recovery and to spare muscle. Can count towards your protein total as well and doesn't taste bad.

"You globo gym guys." I don't work in a franchise gym, I'm independent. I also am "so into fitness." Which should be obvious based on me making a thread about it on brewerfan.net. The reason you guys sound like a cult is just that. Do you seriously believe people can't progress and reach their goals while eating carbs? You honestly believe that someone's main priority to lose weight should be to cut sugar and not calories? If so, there is no point in continuing this discussion. Keto and crossfit works for you and you love it, that's awesome. But acting as if it's the only way is just ignorant. Especially when the subject is a single father with limited equipment and past injuries. He should look into crossfit? Really? Give me a break.

I disagree with almost everything here (except that I agree that drinking water is good). What you eat is just as important as how much. Not all calories are created equal. If you stress just cutting down that calorie number you'll be hungry and misserable. In general, to lose weight (or specifically, to lose fat), the most important things, in order of importance are: -Stop eating sugar. Or at least added sugar. I could get into the science of it if you want, but for the sake of simplicity, I'll just say this: it's all about insulin. When you eat sugar, excess is stored in your liver and muscles as glycogen. When you have too much glucose in your blood stream, your pancrease responds by producing insulin. Insulin's job is to allow glucose to be stored in muscle and liver cells as glycogen. However, if those cells are already full of glycogen (if you have a "normal" American diet and are not VERY active, they're almost always full) the excess glucose is converted to fat. In other words, fat doesn't make you fat, sugar makes you fat. (This is an incredibly simplified account of what happens, but gimme a break, it's a Brewer message board). Also, after like 2 weeks of being sugar free, you barely miss it. -Drastically cut back on carbohydrates, especially those from grains. All carbohydrates are eventually converted to glucose, and your body isn't really designed to handle more than like 100g of carbs a day, maybe. (The average American eats something like 650g a day. I think the USDA reccommends 350g a day, but (a) they're the department of AGRICULTURE, which seems like a conflict of interest to me, and (b) they do keep reducing that number, so even they're starting to come around on that). Southpaw noted that if he cut down his carbs he wouldn't have energy, but I've never met anyone that tried going sub 100g of carbs a day and had any problems with energy. I work out a lot and have plenty of energy. Also, after like 2 weeks of being low carb, you don't even miss high carb foods. -Lift heavy and/or work out at high intensity. Lots of people reccommend biking or running marathons or hopping on the elyptical or whatever (what I like to call "long slow distance, or LSD), but that's a way less efficient use of your exercise time than a 15 minute, high intensity workout, or a heavy lift. Not only will you burn more calories during the workout, you'll also get a much greater "after burn" effect and a hormonal response that causes you to produce more testosterone, which is great for burning fat too. -Vary your exercises. I'm 32 years old and am in better shape than I've ever been. I swam and ran cross country at the college level, but my body fat % is lower now than it was in my late teens/early twenties. I was a pretty good athlete, but I was always the guy that didn't quite look like he could swim a 55 second 100 butterfly or run a 16:30 for 5k since I bought into the "eat carbs for energy" nonsense. Now I kind of do look like I could post those times. And it's functional too. I can still run under 18 for a 5k (and I only run like 10 miles a week), deadlift 415, do about 30 pull-ups, etc. etc. And that's for a guy that sits at a desk all day. Find your nearest CrossFit gym. You'll be amazed at what happens, and you'll start to enjoy working out. You disagree with the law of thermodynamics? That's amazing. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif It's great that you've found an approach that works for you, but as someone who trains people I can tell you that you are in the minority in both your training and diet approach. Low carb is not necessary to lose weight. Crossfit is absolutely not necessary to see results in training. You'll probably disagree and that won't surprise me at all, crossfit borders on being a cult.

For two weeks eat no more than 2.500 calories. Shoot for 200 grams of protein, 250 of carbs, and 70 of fat. The calorie number is more important but having some balance of where those calories come from(macronutrient ratios) is next important. One way to help keep in those limits is to eat meals that are primarily protein + carb or protein + fat. Calories get out of hand quickly when you have fat and carbs in the same meal. Now that doesn't mean a carb meal can't have any fat, but keep it around 10-15 grams tops, same for carbs with a fat meal. Try and limit the amount of sources your fats come from. Ideally they'd come from olive oil, almonds, eggs, a little peanut butter. On top of that do 90 minutes of exercise a week. I don't care what it is. A 15 minute walk can count towards your total, bike ride, walking stairs. Every morning you can do 5 minutes of simple bodyweight exercises to wake you up and get your metabolism going. If you do that everyday you'd have a third of your weeks exercise in right there. Pushups, jumping jacks, burpees, crunches, jog in place, ice skaters. Do 10-20 of each of those as a circuit(non stop) for 2 or 3 circuits and you should have 5 minutes in right there. Besides that, drink A LOT of water. It keeps your body effecient at burning fat, helps your metabolism, and helps you feel full when dieting. If you weigh 280 lbs and eat 2500 calories for two weeks, drink enough water, and do your 90 minutes of exercise and don't lose weight...well you have no choice other than to add more intense exercise. At your current weight you really can't drop calories more than that without risking slowing your metabolism down further. I'd be shocked if you do all of that and don't start to lose weight. You bet. Stick to the plan and be patient. Making any changes to your body can take time. Take some measurements if you can, at least weigh yourself. But if you do, do it at the same time of the day every week, ideally on an empty stomach. It can be hard to notice change by looking in the mirror everyday so having some measurable data to prove it can really help and show you the plan is working.

Roco, I'm sorry if this sounds harsh, but you just don't want it bad enough.. If you wanted to lose weight more than you wanted to eat freely, you'd accept that you can't just eat freely. Same with the working out, you can lose weight without much exercise but to keep you healthy in general you have to find a way to get at least some weekly cardio in, boring or not. If you decide to get serious about it I'd recommend tracking every single calorie that you eat for an entire week. That includes anything you drink, condiments, butter, etc. Just based on the numbers you threw around I'd guess you're off on what you were actually consuming. I weigh a lot less than you and can almost lose fat at 3,000 calories..

That's incredible progress raw, and the good thing is you just made moderate changes to your diet and exercised some. That leaves you some room to change some variables when fat loss stalls. You can up the intensity or frequency of workouts and/or cut a few more calories here and there.

Good call on swimming game, great all around workout. Awesome stuff MacFlash, your training gameplan sounds excellent. Are you on a set lifting routine? As far as diet goes, the key thing I see there is "my energy level is up." That is a perfect example of how no two human bodies function exactly the same and finding what works for you is what's important. I'd have no energy if I ate that low of carbs.

First of all with the injury I'd talk with a doc before doing anything if you haven't already. I assume it is something that is more of a lingering pain at this point and not an injury? For wanting to drop that much weight and wanting to keep those joints safe I'd say do some low intensity cardio, even walking on a treadmil or outside. Ellipitcal is perfect for being easy on the joints but since you are at home that might be practical. Do you have any equipment? Dumbbells? If not you could look into a cheap adjustable set at walmart or target. You can do some circuits that would burn some calories. In general to lose weight the most important things are, in order of importance: -Decrease calories (technically to lose weight this is all that matters, exercise just adds to the caloric deficit) -Drink a lot of water...a lot -Move more -- can be anything, walking around the block, jumping jacks, burpees. If you have 5 minutes here and there those count towards your 30. Six 5 minutes sessions will produce the same exact results for weight loss as one longer session. It wont help performance as much, ie endurance, but for weight loss cals burned are cals burned. -Some resistance training, semi optional. I strongly recommend but in your situation you could lose weight without it.

I haven't seen the pull up thread in a while and was going to bump it but let's use this thread to talk anything exercise related. Any questions, throw them my way. Have any goals, let's hear them. What gyms are good to join, ask, I've been to most of them. Want to vent about the weird guy at the gym, please do. I'll start. My current goal is to add 20 lbs without adding too much fat. Gym goals are squatting 315 and deadlifting 405.

thanks twirly!!

I'm pretty reasonable in relationships but supporting Betancourt would be a deal breaker, for realz.

Smart guy. If you're a single guy into the Brewers enough to post here, it would be pretty darn cool to meet a girl who is into the Brewers enough to post here.

Gamel and Thornburg don't land Mike Adams? hahahah

Unless there is concern over Braun...

I wouldn't be concerned about that. The Mets were not in a position to be trying to create a bidding war. If it got closer to the deadline and other teams balked because of the contract situation then they could have really screwed themselves by trying to hold out for a slightly better package. They probably could have waited and seen if they could get more. I see it more as DM being aggressive saying hey will save you from that contract and them not being able to pass that chance up.

Then why stop holding people accountable for results? How does Betancourt have a job and how long does McGehee hold one? Hardy had a far better track record than those two and more hope to bounce back. Betancourt has never been good and McGehee has had one brief good run. Neither was ever as good as Hardy and Hardy was younger and better defensively.

The computer would explode before allowing Loe to face lefties.

Eh give him the rest of the year, no biggie. /blue

Agreed all around, I just watched it on demand last night too after a recommendation from a co worker. Agreed about FX- Sunny is probably my favorite show and The League and Louie are right up there. Along with Dexter http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif

He can only use Braddock there if there is a cluster of lefties?? %#%? My head just exploded.

It's dumb to think a pitcher will be good because he has been good in the past?

Yeah, he should be ashamed of that sub 1 ERA.He had the most wins, most shut outs, 2nd best ERA, 3rd best opponents batting average. He was dominant.

LOOGY at best? lol