YAET: Losing fat and gaining muscle

[Arkitech]

Yes its another exercise thread, maybe some of you experts can give me a few helpful pointers. This is a message I posted on a bodybuilding site.

About almost 4 weeks ago I started training again. I've been running in the morning before breakfast for about 20 minutes, alternating between walking, jogging and all out running. I've been doing that for approx. 4-5 times per week. I've also been lifting, I started off slowly only lifting once a week. Last week I lifted twice, this week I'll lift probably about 4 times I'll also increase my cardio to 7 days a week (biking and running).

My diet is'nt really complex , basically I stick with protein and veggies with the occasional carb. I would guess that my carbs are anywhere between 20-80 grams for 6 days a week. Then one day out of the week I just eat whatever I want, but I make sure to train a little harder on those days.

***
Ok so I started my training with a body weight of around 283-285, almost 4 weeks later I'm hovering between 279-281. So my question is should I weigh a little less or is this normal for a person with my training schedule?
***

I used to work out a lot in my early 20's (I'm 30 now) will muscle retention still work for me even though I have'nt trained hard in more than 6 years?

I have'nt really been measuring myself but I *think* that I might be losing inches. Also I'm starting to look a bit more toned than I previously was, in fact even though my stomach has a long way to go before being perfectly flat my upper ab muscles are starting to show. The wierd thing is that I have'nt done any ab training for years, does this mean I'm shedding body fat?

If I do hard cardio in the morning, weights/ab training/light cardio in the afternoon and light cardio in the evening will I see faster results in fat loss? Or will this be overtraining? My theory is that if I'm doing 3 phases of activity through-out the day I'll be able to keep my metabolism at peak efficiency

Some of these questions I have posted before but I'm still looking for information on them.

 

[Arkitech]

up

 

[TubStain]

That seems like quite a strict regimen, and you progress seems to be good so far. I would work a little more weight lifting into it though, since muscle does help towards burning more fat when you are resting etc. I have focused most of my efforts for the past months towards weight training and little or no cardio, I now find myself much bigger, but with a nice layer of fat on top, so now I'm focusing more on cardio. Let's see how things go by august.

Good job sticking with your regimen though. I must commend you on that.

 

[Arkitech]

Originally posted by: TubStain
That seems like quite a strict regimen, and you progress seems to be good so far. I would work a little more weight lifting into it though, since muscle does help towards burning more fat when you are resting etc. I have focused most of my efforts for the past months towards weight training and little or no cardio, I now find myself much bigger, but with a nice layer of fat on top, so now I'm focusing more on cardio. Let's see how things go by august.

Good job sticking with your regimen though. I must commend you on that.

Thanks, its getting a little easier everyday. I just thought I would see more weight loss, I'm sure I'm gaining some muscle but I don't think I would gain 5 pounds of a muscle in a month. I wish I could shed more pounds, I was thinking that I would lose around 2 pounds per week which would mean I should weigh somewhere around 275-277. Oh well, maybe in another month or so the pounds will start coming off a little faster.

 

[glaHHg]

Personally, I think your progress is perfect. You've lost 4 pounds in 4 weeks, and since you haven't lifted for a long time, your body's not used to it and you'll have kind of a "beginner effect" of gaining lbm faster. That combined with muscle memory, and I'm sure you've gained at least a couple pounds of lbm so far (so thats a few more pounds of fat lost). Just keep doing what you're doing and time will fly by and you'll keep improving.

How many kcal do you take in per day? Just be careful not to drop it too low, I'd guess at your size you'd want to keep it well above 2000, probably closer to 3000. That's just a random guess on my part but hopefully you've got it figured out for you.