Anyone care to talk exercise?

Mayo that'll never happen heh

Exercise! I shall wax eloquent! nksl55 (Phillip) had asked me about it over yonder (the post which began the great exodus from the iron fisted hegemony and gilded cage).

First, a preamble about exercise and weight loss in general. I still believe it is something to do *after* you've lost a substantial amount of weight *if* you are having challenges getting the weight off (because most people that were posting to our thread fit those two categories). Exercise does not help with weight loss 99% of the time but it sure can interfere with weight loss 100% of the time. Heck, even if you aren't having a particularly hard time losing weight it is still worth waiting to begin an exercise regimen. If you stall you will know your way of eating, or lifestyle, needs to be tweaked. But if you add exercise too early you added so many variables just by adding exercise it is hard to figure out what is wrong. It could be just the exercise, or just the woe or, the most likely thing, a combination of the two. Exercise is very easy to do wrong - too much, the wrong type, the wrong way, etc. It also adds an excuse to go off plan, for example, you skip the gym a few times and get into that mentality of 'well I screwed up this much I might as well have this here pizza and beer'. Or you believe the hype about exercise burning the fat off but don't see the weight falling off and throw in the towel on both exercise and the way of eating. Or you eat extra carbs because you think you burned them off with your treadmill skillz. Etcetera etcetera.

And on to the waxing...

Lessee.

Back in late September early October I noticed that my arms looked stick thin. It was perturbing to say the least. You know how some very elderly men have super thin arms? It looked like that to me without the liver spots. So I knew then that I'd have to do something about it but I wanted to get to goal with zero exercise to prove the point about exercise not being an essential component of weight loss. So I continued on my zero exercise weight loss path of glory.

But! Something changed! I watched a McGuff video that wasn't really about his exercise regimen but he gave a very brief description of it and he answered some exercise related questions. Anyway, what he said, and what he co-authored a book about, was a once a week 12 minute strength training regimen. Well well well. That got my gears turning because that approach fit perfectly with what Phinney/Volek had to say about exercising too much and non-strength exercise regimens over 10 hours a week. Another important thing, for me, was sustainability of whatever exercise regimen I adopted. It had to be something I could do on my own and it had to be simple enough that I wouldn't abandon it after the shiny wore off. There was one problem with McGuff's approach and that is that it was predicated on going to the gym. I seriously wasn't interested in embarrassing myself in a gym around a lot of people. And being tied down to a gym was a huge issue with me sticking with it too. That is exactly the sort of situation where something would come up and I'd not go, then something else and before you know it I'd have quit going. I know me.

When I started I was 197 which is about 20 pounds from goal. So starting at that point fit what I'd been recommending over yonder too - close or at goal and a desire for body recomposition. That is worth pointing out since Phillip asked if I was softening my stance on exercise. The answer is no, just following my own advice

What has really, really surprised me about my little venture into the workout arena is that it is exceedingly difficult to stay disciplined enough to keep the amount of exercise down. I mean, wow! No wonder so many people fall off plan when they mix exercise and weight loss. You *want* to do more and see better and faster results. If you aren't real careful about what you are doing you'll do more but you won't do more of the right stuff and you won't see results *and* the problems that exercise can bring to the weight loss table start cropping up. Like a lower resting metabolism, over stressed metabolism, too much of a calorie deficit, etc. And it is very easy to do exercise that is not particularly weight loss friendly because in the mainstream dogma world we live in *any* exercise is considered *good* exercise and that simply is not true. For example, going overboard on cardio is not going to help with weight loss. I think that is a real problem for women because they tend to be big believers in cardio type stuff because they don't want to bulk up. But the fact is, strength training is not going to turn a female into a tom boy hulk unless they really go all in with HGH and very heavy lifting.

Now I shall wax poetic!

Oh cat!
Feline I have trained but refuses to wear a hat!
Please fetch my son Frank,
Whom I accidentally deposited in the overnight slot at the bank!

Thanks Darin!! I enjoyed that laugh! LOL still laughing.

I also appreciate that view on exercise. Great points!
Waiting to exercise has helped me this time around. I tend to get carried away too and want to do more and more and I end up shooting myself in the foot so to say. I am glad you wrote all this out. I did get to briefly read over the post you made to Phillip back at the other place but it got zapped so quick I didn't really get to see it all.

hehe

Actually, I am certain that this post is a much better version of what I was trying to say in the post that was zapped over yonder.

I'm inclined to think that it is dang near impossible not to go overboard on exercise. I mean, goodness gracious, if even *I* get caught by that bug who can possibly be spared???

Over at BodyBuilding.com they have a search feature that lets you search for exercise for specific muscles with short videos showing the proper way to do it. Very cool.

www.bodybuilding.com/exercises/finder/lookup/filter/muscle/id/15/muscle/biceps

Wow, I can really feel the soreness from those wide arm pushups this morning!

Yep you have been bitten by the exercise bug

:DIt is cool cause you sound so excited about it.
Woot woot!

*That* is exactly what Mike Chang is talking about right there. You can do strength training and you will build muscle mass but without losing the body fat it will be hidden and that is very discouraging. Then you have the problem of gaining [heavier] muscle mass while losing [lighter] fat tissue and the loss of fat is eclipsed by the muscle. For a slow loser that'd be frustrating as all get out. Fast losers would never even notice the problem.

Which is why skinny dummies are big proponents of losing weight through exercise. It works for them and the fact that it must not work for a fat person completely flies right past them. Right? Otherwise the fat guy would have just worked out a bit and zapped the weight. Bah.

And you are right, I am jazzed about the workouts heh

KaPow, lol
Sounds like a great workout!

Man that is the best feeling. When it was too hard to finish a few work outs ago. Then KaPOW ya knock it out!
That is how I felt about snaking cobra pose. LOL

Whew!! Today I did my workout before having coffee (which is caffeine and a lot of fat from the CO and HWC) and the workout kicked my butt horribly. I got through the four rounds of max calorie but could only do two rounds of my regular workout. Today I did max calorie, and then my regular routine which was: curls, one arm tricep extensions, horizontal towel pullups, crab dips, alternating knee crunches. I skipped the wide arm pushups, that is how whipped I was. Oh, I was looking around youtube for the tricep extensions and I found several that recommended using the other arm to stabilize the one you are exercising. I did that today and it was much, much better

 @ exercise mafioso, and homer!  LOL

Workout day today! I did my normal routine but changed it up a bit again. Curls (4), one arm tricep extension (4), alternating knee crunches (2), crunches (2), squats (4), wide arm pushup bent knee (2), close grip push up bent knee (2).

[ETA: Oops! I accidentally posted this on the food scale thread.]

Dunno Deb, I don't use one.