Starting to eat healthier and get in better shape.

[FDF12389]

Well the other day I realized that I really needed to change my lifestyle. I would get 6-7 hours of sleep every night, start off every morning with caffeine, keep the caffeine coming all day until I got home, then drink 2-4 beers. I generally drank about 4-10 sodas per day. I never ate breakfast and always had large lunches.

Now I'm on my second day of trying to be healthier. I'm trying to get at least 8 hours of sleep every night. I'm not drinking any caffeine or soda, strictly water and sometimes orange juice with breakfast, which is usually a hard boiled egg, bowl of kashi cereal, or a grapefruit. I'm packing raw vegetables to snack on all through the day, and then for dinner I'm eating venison, fish or chicken. With some vegetables on the side.


I'm doing 40 push ups and 40 sit ups every night, I use to be able to do more, but that's all I can do right now. What's the healthy way to increase them? Add five more every week, or two weeks? Play it by ear and see what I'm comfortable with every week?


My overall goal is to trim a little fat and tone my muscles more and I want to feel better through the day, no more caffeine up and alcohol down.

As soon as it warms up a bit more I'm going to start running a mile every other day.

Im a male, 5' 11' and I weigh 185.

For vitamins i started taking a men's multi vitamin and fish oil capsules.


Anything else I should be doing?

 

[KoolDrew]

Stop with the countless reps on push-ups and sit-ups. At that point it's strictly an endurance exercise. Go to the gym and get on a good routine consisting of mainly compound movements. Starting Strength by Mark Rippetoe is a good example of a solid routine.

 

[TecHNooB]

First, you gotta cut down on the beers. Maybe once a month or once every two weeks if you must. No more soda. Stick to water or milk. If you want to have orange juice, limit the amount you have to one or two servings a day or make your own orange juice

Second, don't feel like going healthy means you have to eat veggies all day. Eat veggies, but also have plenty of meat.. preferably lean meat.

Third, I love grapefruit, so do munch on those more often if you ever get hungry

Fourth, don't overemphasize pushups and situps. If you can do 40 of each, that's good enough. Incorporate some weights and cardio instead.

Fifth, don't go hungry. You can eat a ton of lean meat and vegetables and not hit your maintenance calories for the day. It's carb dense foods and fats that throw you over the limit. Some foods contain 10 grams of fat.. some contain 120 grams. Avoid the 120 grams, aka fast food. Plenty of fresh food. Fruits, meats, veggies. Eat up and excercise!

 

[dakels]

Someone can write a better response then I so I'll just congratulate you on your change. Keep it up!

BTW large lunch is a lot better then large dinner. You can work off that lunch and help fuel your day. Large dinners as most of us know are unused calories at night.

Be aggressive with the cardio. 1 mile every other day is start but not much. Not that running 1 mile won't help, but you generally want to sustain that high heart rate for longer then 10 minutes per session. Most 1 mile "runs" are well under 10 minutes.

 

[gramboh]

Originally posted by: FDF12389
Well the other day I realized that I really needed to change my lifestyle. I would get 6-7 hours of sleep every night, start off every morning with caffeine, keep the caffeine coming all day until I got home, then drink 2-4 beers. I generally drank about 4-10 sodas per day. I never ate breakfast and always had large lunches.

Now I'm on my second day of trying to be healthier. I'm trying to get at least 8 hours of sleep every night. I'm not drinking any caffeine or soda, strictly water and sometimes orange juice with breakfast, which is usually a hard boiled egg, bowl of kashi cereal, or a grapefruit. I'm packing raw vegetables to snack on all through the day, and then for dinner I'm eating venison, fish or chicken. With some vegetables on the side.


I'm doing 40 push ups and 40 sit ups every night, I use to be able to do more, but that's all I can do right now. What's the healthy way to increase them? Add five more every week, or two weeks? Play it by ear and see what I'm comfortable with every week?


My overall goal is to trim a little fat and tone my muscles more and I want to feel better through the day, no more caffeine up and alcohol down.

As soon as it warms up a bit more I'm going to start running a mile every other day.

Im a male, 5' 11' and I weigh 185.

For vitamins i started taking a men's multi vitamin and fish oil capsules.


Anything else I should be doing?

As Drew said, start a beginner weight lifting program, either Mark Rippetoe's Starting Strength (find the book on Amazon) or Stronglifts.com's 5x5 beginner program (website is having issues today, should be up again soon though). If you haven't lifted weights before it will be hard at first to get into it (it was for me) but after you learn the moves it becomes fun and enjoyable and you will see results fast, the pushups/sitsup on their own doesn't do anything. As for cardio, if you want to run, just run twice a week one short one long, one mile every 2nd day is too short to do anything, you want to be doing at least 30minutes. If you don't care about running, check into HIIT (high intensity interval training), you can get a huge cardio benefit in only 20 minutes of work doing HIIT (sprints, rowing, look up the Tabata that is a good one). For me, I started training in September at 5'10 217lbs, I didn't really get serious until November, I'm 5'10 200 now but have a lot more muscle, I lift 3 times a week (just started stronglifts 5x5), run once or twice a week (one short - ~6km, one long 10-15km, lately only been running once per week) and ski on the weekends.

 

[dakels]

Originally posted by: KoolDrew
Stop with the countless reps on push-ups and sit-ups. At that point it's strictly an endurance exercise. Go to the gym and get on a good routine consisting of mainly compound movements. Starting Strength by Mark Rippetoe is a good example of a solid routine.

Why stop? While I agree that different workout methods would be more beneficial, I don't see why everyone keeps bashing high rep workouts. As long as he is pushing himself hard and not taking 5 minutes to do 40 reps, I don't see the need to stop. Just doing 40 of each is not a big cardio or mass gaining effect but it's still a positive step, especially if you can't get to a gym. Seems to be a big focus for some around here on mass gaining workouts. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but it's not what everyone wants or needs. Maybe I'm wrong.

 

[FDF12389]

Well I was going to start running one mile every other day to get my endurance up, then go from there. Should i just jog for 30 min, and then keep adding distance to that 30 min?

I have stopped drinking beer for the most part, and soda completely.

I don't have time to go to the gym right now, I have a really long commute until my current lease is up. Would it be beneficial to purchase a weight bench? Do the two routines suggested in this thread involde more than just dumbbells and a weight bench?

 

[dakels]

FDF 30 minutes of any high heart rate cardio is much better then a static mile. I would say afford as much time as you can and as much effort as you can during that time. It's generally agreed that pushing to your limit and high heart rates (HRmax -heart rate max) will help you get the most from your cardio work outs.

If this is something pretty new to you (or not) it's a good idea to see your doctor for a check up and tell them the workout and diet plan. Don't be afraid to bring up the most minor/strange details (shortness of breath, unusual heart rates, sleep disorders, abnormal urine/waste color and frequency, etc).

 

[MegaVovaN]

For cardio - time is more important than distance. I began my 3-times-a-week cardio at 20 minutes of jog. Eventually I incremented it by 2-5 minutes, and now, a month or so later, I am at 30 minute jog.
(I don't do HIIT though, since I jog just for maintenance - gaining weight).

The 2 programs require/recommend
-good barbell bar
-plates
-squat rack
-bench


Don't know if good idea to purchase this - it will be somewhat costly since you'll have to buy QUALITY equpment, not cheap $30 bar from walmart for example.
According to "Starting Strength" (book by Rippetoe) a good bar will run you $150-300. (quoting by memory).

Plus it is recommended to have a good base for floor - concrete, plyboard or wood on top of concrete, and rubber flooring on top of wood.

 

[SociallyChallenged]

Originally posted by: dakels

Originally posted by: KoolDrew
Stop with the countless reps on push-ups and sit-ups. At that point it's strictly an endurance exercise. Go to the gym and get on a good routine consisting of mainly compound movements. Starting Strength by Mark Rippetoe is a good example of a solid routine.

Why stop? While I agree that different workout methods would be more beneficial, I don't see why everyone keeps bashing high rep workouts. As long as he is pushing himself hard and not taking 5 minutes to do 40 reps, I don't see the need to stop. Just doing 40 of each is not a big cardio or mass gaining effect but it's still a positive step, especially if you can't get to a gym. Seems to be a big focus for some around here on mass gaining workouts. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but it's not what everyone wants or needs. Maybe I'm wrong.

Actually, you can use Starting Strength while cutting, therefore it's not solely a mass gaining workout. It will allow one to maintain muscle mass and gain strength while losing fat, especially if they incorporate some high intensity cardio into a program. It would be much more beneficial than pushups, unless he was doing x amount of pushups for time in a high intensity cardio workout.

 

[KoolDrew]

What SociallyChallenged said.

Lower reps will generally be better for maintaining LBM anyway.

 

[FDF12389]

Day three.

I miss caffeine, starting to get headaches from not having any I think. Going to see the doctor tomorrow. Just got a gym membership, so I cant starting lifting three times a week, run twice a week, and swim once a week. Still eating healthy.

 

[paulxcook]

Originally posted by: FDF12389
Day three.

I miss caffeine, starting to get headaches from not having any I think. Going to see the doctor tomorrow. Just got a gym membership, so I cant starting lifting three times a week, run twice a week, and swim once a week. Still eating healthy.

Nice! Congrats on choosing to make a positive change in your life. Which gym?

Caffeine headaches suck.