Plateaus still suck.
by codemonkey on Dec.03, 2009, under Dave's Rants, Workout Logs
I slept in this AM after a long night, so, I’ll work out this afternoon sometime. This morning I want to focus my blog on what I can do to break this plateau. I’ve been between 208 and 213 for two and a half to three months now. I joined FastTrackToFatLoss.com (which I love!) about four weeks ago, and, no change. I mean, there have been changes, but, I’m not even losing one pound a week. And, over four weeks, that should not be. I’ll measure later today, and comment on this if my inches have changed noticeably.
So, what I’ve tried / noticed:
- I’ve taken my caloric intake down to 1300, and up to 2000 — no change.
- I’ve kicked diet cokes. no change
- I’ve joined FastTrackToFatLoss, with much “better” workouts than I was doing before. While I’ve noticed and loved the soreness, no change on the scale.
- When I travel, I tend to drop weight, but, it comes right back. I *think* that’s because I do mostly lower carbs when traveling, which dehydrates me. When eating out, it is typically easier to lower carbs than to eat perfectly. Also, when I’m at home, my kids are eating all day, which makes my hungrier.
So — what next? I don’t know if I can last more than another week or to without some results. Before I joined FastTrackToFatLoss, I was toying with the idea of going low carb for a month or two. And, that thought is still on the back of my mind. While I don’t consider it a very good lifestyle choice, it might be a good one to break this plateau. If you take my total weight loss over time, it looks impressive. 50lbs since March. But, honestly, I lost those 50lbs by around September.
I REALLY love strength training. But, maybe I should go to cardio only? I really don’t know. I’d love to be able to show off my muscles, but, they’re sitting cozy under about an inch of fat, hiding from the world.
Looking forward to thoughts from everyone.
-Dave
3 Comments for this entry
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Hiya! I put up this anti-blog(tm) because I wanted somewhere to store files, notes, etc, w/o having to type html all the time. . . So, enjoy the innards of my mind. . .
December 3rd, 2009 on 11:40 am
Just a few standard kinda things…
Are you getting enough water?
Are you writing down everything you eat? This is a big one. I know a lot of people think they can accurately measure the amount of food they are taking in but that the reality is often higher. I’d also make sure you’re weighing everything to make sure you are exact.
I have said it before and I’ll say it again – I know you and Rafe are in the “intense weight lifting is good cardio” club, but I disagree. Unless you are in amazing shape there is no way you’re going to convince me that you can burn more calories in an hour of weight lifting then you can walking or jogging. The whole point of building muscle is to push yourself with heavier weights, and you can’t do that continually for long. I’ve seen Rafe do his “super intense not stopping strength tests” and after 20 minutes or so he’s laid out on the floor. If you want to lose weight I truly believe you need to have some kind of cardio in your routine every workout day.
Also – I still don’t think you’re eating enough. I don’t know your height or age, but assuming 6′ and 35 your base BMR is 2050.94. Assuming moderate exercise 3-5 days a week) you should be taking in 3178 calories a day to maintain, and the very least you should be eating for weight loss is 2178. If you’re working out harder than that you should be eating even more.
December 3rd, 2009 on 11:51 am
I journal my food occasionally over on dailyburn.com. Mostly to just sanity check. I don’t do it every day because it is quite time consuming. So — I know I’m not overeating — but — I could possibly be under eating.
I’m 5’9″, 40, @210lbs.
I had my Resting Metabolic Rate tested in May. At that time, I was at 245lbs. My RMR was 1940, which gave me a BMR of 2522. So, 2000 kcals/day would put me at a deficit of 500 calories a day, or 3500 a week, for 1lb/week of weight loss.
But, at 2000, I did not lose weight, so I tried lowering it — I suppose I could try climbing all the way up to 2500 kcals a day.
Now, to the exercise thing. I’m not as crazy as Rafe (is anyone?). My typical non-cardio workout is:
5 mins of cardio
60 secs of cardio between every set.
5 mins of cardio
I usually get about 30 mins of cardio (6.0 Mph on a treadmill, jogging) along with my strength training. I average 500-600kcals burned for my hour of workout. If I just run for an hour, I burn 500-600kcals.
Right now I’m torn between full body workouts, (which take forever and don’t get me sore) 3 days a week, and pure cardio two days a week — and — split body workouts 4 days a week, which do get me sore, and try to get in two cardio days (but likely only get in one)
December 3rd, 2009 on 5:19 pm
Yeah. I just can’t see how someone who is as active as you are could possibly be getting enough food in at only 2000 calories a day. I’d also strongly suggest you really focus in on writing everything down for a week or two to see if that makes a difference.