Lifting, Cardio and Weight Loss

[PeteMac24]

I am a 24 year old male, and ive been doing weight watchers for about a year now. Ive lost just about 50 lbs and feel like im doing a good job. Recently ive been very active in my cardio and as a result ive been losing weight faster.
I weight right now 351 lbs. When i was younger, and much thinner, i enjoyed lifting weights. I want to start training more and harder and feel the need to include weights. Right now I am doing an hour on the tredmill 7 days a week.
I was thinking about doing cardio in the morning and at night to increase my cardio to somewhere between 1 - 2 hours a day. I want to lift like a did and i want to jump right in. I am willing to go to extremes to get what i want to accomplish. I am willing to add weights into my workouts in either the morning or at night or even both. Any advice? Are 2 days with both weights and cardio bad? I enjoy going 7 days a week. Thank You. I think i wanna post some pics too to show how im doing.

[Machdiesel]

I think for your goals a good weight lifting routine would be a Mon-Wed-Fri split and continue doing cardio 7 days a week. Something like cardio every morning on an empty stomach then working out with weights later in the day every monday, wed, friday. As you already know diet is everything but adding weight lifting 3 times a week will really put your body into fat burning mode. I will put a sample beginner routine below and maybe some people can chime in. Also I would recommend putting a 15 minute HIIT cardio "blast" at the end of your weight training days with a 2:1 ration. If you are not familiar I will put a sample below. When I am cutting i put this 15 minute blast at the end of my workouts and it works wonder.

I wouldn't advise starting off tying to lift heavy weights. Just keep the reps relativly high and start to slowly build strength.
. Also I forgot to mention bring a stopwatch and be sure to keep the same resting time between sets. 2 minutes between sets, 3-4 minutes between exercises and 4-5 minutes between muscles.
MOnday
Flat DB press x12 x12 x10 x8
Either incline bench or DB x12 x12 x10 x8
Cable top crossovers 3x12
Cable ez bar Tricep pushdown- 4x10-12
(you may want to add another tricep exercise but for someone who hasn't worked out your Tris will be toast)

Wed
Lat pull down x12 x12 x10 x8
Standing Barbell rows x12 x12 x10 x8
seated rows 3x12
Standing DB curls x12 x12 x10 x8
(same as tris you may wanna add something another bicep exercise)

Friday
Seated DB military press x12 x12 x10 x8
seated lateral raise machine
front raises 3x12
Squat x12 x12 x10 x10 x8
leg extensions 3x12
leg curl 3x12

[PeteMac24]

Do you think thats good enough? Wouldnt it be better to work each muscle a different day?
monday - chest
tuesday - back
etc

[Machdiesel]

As for the HIIT cardio at the end of each workout I am not sure where you are working out and what type of equiptment you have access to so I will give you many options. Basically HIIT training is a 2:1 ratio of cardio to rest. So you do cardio all out for 2 minutes then rest for 1 minute then repeat.

Circuit Cardio ( my favorite)
This can use basically any type of exercise. If you are at home you can do something like mountain climbers, jumping rope and crunches. another great one in doing strictly suicides and rest. Heres a sample one if you were at a gym
2 minutes on punching bag
1 minute rest
2 minutes jumping rope
1 minute rest
2 minutes doing crunches non stop
1 minute rest then repeat
If you just have a treadmill set it to a speed that will really push you for 2 minutes, maybe something like 5.5 mph to start. Just run for 2 minutes then pop ur feet to the sie and rest for a minute and repeat. If this is to difficult start of with 1 minute cardio 1 minute rest and work up to a 2:1 ratio

[Machdiesel]

IMO you would be better of going to the gym and really blasting your body to exhaustion, then taking a day off to rest. This is what has worked for me numerous times when I let myself go alil and need to get back into shape. Im sure other people have diff methods which will work, this is just what has worked for me and many people I have passed it on to.

[crf450x]

sometimes less is more.

[PeteMac24]

thank you so much for your help, im gonna start the weight training on monday. i will let you know how it goes.

[dynomutt22]

Pete MAck...

Diversify your workout... You need to do it all... lift with a good workout split. Do what you don't like also. Write your plan out and stick to it. I wasn't as big as you but I dropped 37 lbs.... 243 down to 206-ish... you can do it. but you are on a steroid site... remember steroids usually always affect your cholesterol. Be careful.

[Machdiesel]

Petemac once you are able to PM shoot me a message

[ranging1]

I think for your goals a good weight lifting routine would be a Mon-Wed-Fri split and continue doing cardio 7 days a week. Something like cardio every morning on an empty stomach then working out with weights later in the day every monday, wed, friday. As you already know diet is everything but adding weight lifting 3 times a week will really put your body into fat burning mode. I will put a sample beginner routine below and maybe some people can chime in. Also I would recommend putting a 15 minute HIIT cardio "blast" at the end of your weight training days with a 2:1 ration. If you are not familiar I will put a sample below. When I am cutting i put this 15 minute blast at the end of my workouts and it works wonder.

I wouldn't advise starting off tying to lift heavy weights. Just keep the reps relativly high and start to slowly build strength.
. Also I forgot to mention bring a stopwatch and be sure to keep the same resting time between sets. 2 minutes between sets, 3-4 minutes between exercises and 4-5 minutes between muscles.
MOnday
Flat DB press x12 x12 x10 x8
Either incline bench or DB x12 x12 x10 x8
Cable top crossovers 3x12
Cable ez bar Tricep pushdown- 4x10-12
(you may want to add another tricep exercise but for someone who hasn't worked out your Tris will be toast)

Wed
Lat pull down x12 x12 x10 x8
Standing Barbell rows x12 x12 x10 x8
seated rows 3x12
Standing DB curls x12 x12 x10 x8
(same as tris you may wanna add something another bicep exercise)

Friday
Seated DB military press x12 x12 x10 x8
seated lateral raise machine
front raises 3x12
Squat x12 x12 x10 x10 x8
leg extensions 3x12
leg curl 3x12

i agree with this routine, its a very good weight lifting program,

i followed a very similar one when i first started trying to loose weight

however for cardio regime i think u can do more,

just becuase from personaly experience i use to be really really fat aswell, and i found more cardio did help the wight come off faster

personaly i just use to run 4kms every day, at the start when i was fat i could only run 200metres before i was wrecked, and then id walk 100metres and then id try run again, and id do this repeatedly for the whole distance

eventually as u get thinner and fitter u can run further and eventually i was running the whole distance without breaks (this took awhile since i was really large)

if your willing to do more cardio i encourage it, i found running did miracles for my weight loss (i also followed a strict diet aswell)

personaly i did cardio every day (4km run) every day, twice a day, im not saying u should do this much, bu what im saying is u can get away with alot more cardio

BEST of luck

[Machdiesel]

I agree with this but didn't wanna kill the kid in the first week. His body is going to be so sore and run down the first 3 weeks of weight training I think the once a day cardio every day should be fine(plus the HIIT). Eventually his body will recover, get stronger, and his workouts will seem easier. He will recover faster and be able to do more cardio without burning out

[PeteMac24]

alright.. im gonna do the weight training like Machdiesel said.. im gonna do the HIIT training afterwards and then walk for a half hour extra.. my weight today is 351 so i will keep everyone posted on my progress.. thank you so much for your input.. any other ideas please dont be shy.

[PeteMac24]

btw, im not planning on doing any steroids.. i just know people on these forums are very knowledgeable.

[bucks_243]

sounds like your making good progress. Persistence is the key in any workout. If everyone that started working out kept with it the world would be full of BB's. Pace yourself. i am not going to pretend to know as much about lifting than most on this Forum (because I'm new like you) but I can say I have seen a lot of people get motivated and get burned out due to high expectations/ lack of results. However, the one thing I do know about is cardio (former Marathoner). If you main goal is losing weight stay with that as top priority, then slowly intergrate lifting into it as you drop weight. Muscle weights a lot more than fat. I know I'm stating the obvious but out of all the high tech ways we track our progress it helps when we look in the mirror and SEE the results after time.

Don't get over motivated. pace yourself. I know I am going to get flamed for saying slow down on the lifting on a lifting forum but it might be better to establish a baseline for your weight and cardio first. A good way to do that and drop weight is a marathon seriously. I think as a society we have been conditioned to think a pill will solve all our ailments but running burns calories faster than any other exercise unless you are a pro/sub pro MMA in training (very intese on both). While I was training marathons I would eat up about 1600 calories during a run. Of course I'm a hard gainer too. But if you dropped it all and started a BB diet after that a guy like you would probably make good gains without having to worry about the weight issue as well. I'm rambling now so I'll shut up. Let the flames begin.

[Machdiesel]

Did you start the workout.... Hows it going....??

[Rickey]

Taking steroids will not help in maintain a good healthy body. A healthy weight loss diet is the perfect solution to your health problem. Vegetables, proper nutrition and regular exercise is the best way to keep your body fit.

[Shawn01]

I think dietless slimming is the only answer to all weight problems, because “all diets” destroy, your Metabolism and make you “more fat” in the long run.

[Twist]

pete: I just want to say congratulations on your weight loss so far. you sound like you have a ton of motivation.

ONE THING: I caution you to take it slow and move at your own pace. Do not try to do too many things because it will result in a burnout. If you are doing one hour a day of cardio and you think you can do more, GREAT> do this one hour cardio at one time, then half hour of weights and half hour of cardio at another time. that should be good. and don't worry about little muscles and all that weird splits and all that. just focus on legs, chest, back, shoulders. don't worry about going heavy. maybe do bodyweight squats

also if you are doing cardio on one of the "easy" machines and you are feeling good, step it up to a stairmaster or treadmill. its waaaaayyyy better.

[Machdiesel]

update??