trying to get into shape all advice welcome!
Hey guys I joined the site because I always loved to lift weights and I need some help. I was a football player. I didn't play my junior year of high school and so on I gained weight through college and my current job as a traveling railroader hasn't helped any. I fell hard into fast food. I'm 21 years old, 5ft 5, 275lbs. I know I'm over weight. I haven't lost all of muscle mass I'm still pretty thick. I could probably still bench around 285. ( I was benching 360 my sophomore year at 220) I have never used any supplements, only protein shakes. I was obese as a young kid and lost weight during middle school football. So I guess I was prone to gaining the weight back. I'm not a huge fan of cardio but I know it is one of the best ways to lose weight. I am thinking about going on a low sugar, carb diet. For breakfast drinking protein shake and bar, lunch pouched tuna, dinner green salad and Tyson's grilled packaged chicken (not drowned in dressing). I know organic foods would be the way to go but with my career that is almost impossible. I spend a lot of time living out of hotels. My daily work load is higher than most as a railroader swinging around 16 lbs hammers all day. I know that weight at 5ft5 sounds crazy but I'm not in too bad of shape I can run around, play sports, jog a mile or more and I'm still stout. I can drop and do 300 crunches and 60 push ups. I went to the doctor and got checked normal blood pressure, sugar, and cholesterols I really want to get back into shape and would love all the advice I can get. I believe if I lost around 70lbs I'd be pretty rock solid and would consider pro-hormones with estrogen blockers.
Thanks to all who are willing to help in advance!
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Exercise is necessary along with diet to maintain the health and improve the fitness level. You should do some light exercises such as jogging, walking, sits ups, and pulls ups etc. if you can't do hard exercises.
Go for morning walk and make it your daily routine, it will be the better tool for you to maintain the health and fitness.
great advice from makwa use it...
Thanks so much guys, another question I have is with cardio would i be better set to run as hard as I can let's say in spirts or to jog for an elevated amount of time?
I like HIIT training (high intensity interval training). sprint as fast as you can for a minute then walk for minute and repeat that cycle 10 times. Google HIIT and you will get some good examples.
Again I appreciate all the feed back guys. Totally understand switching to lean meats that makes since. Are peanut butter and packaged turkey okay choices to add to my diet? Also love the idea of beans. That could be easy to do with the traveling. Would canned nbeans be acceptable in my situation?
I love... and I mean LOVE peanut butter, but it can be a little calorie dense when trying to lose weight. Have you heard of the powdered peanut butter? If not do a Google search for PB2. It taste very similar to regular peanut butter but only has 45 calories and 5 grams of carbs per two tablespoon serving.
PB is fine. Make sure it is the kind that doesn't have all that added sugar in it. The prepacked turkey might be ok. You just need to watch out for how much sodium and other fillers are in it. Some of that stuff is hardly even turkey. When you go to buy coldcuts there is a difference between the $8/lb and the $2/lb turkey coldcuts. Get the real meat without all the fillers and sodium. Beans, probably not. Especially if they are like those Bush's Baked Bean. Loaded with high GI sugar which is definitely not good.
Excellent comment. +1 am the way. Another way to check the quality of your cold cuts is simply to check the amount of protein per serving. If you are looking at some cold cut turkey that has 8 grams of protein per 4 Oz serving... you know there is a lot of "something" in that turkey that ain't turkey!
Its usually full of "lips and assholes".
"Lips and assholes"... Sounds like processed meat has become synonymous with politicians ;-)
Yep. My buddy managed a meat processing plant for a large commercial farm so I know more than I would like to about what goes into "budget friendly" meat products
Oh god i forgot those baked beans even existed. I thought he meant Goya beans in a can and stuff, good catch.
Question on the side: just how much better would the cold cuts actually be price wise? I would think buying turkey breasts in several lb. bags/casings (whatever the hell those things they come in are) and then slicing them thin either by hand or on a deli slicer would not only be more nutritous, but also cheaper... (I am aware this greatly varies by location).
The thing to look for with cold cuts is whether they are "processed" or the "whole" version. The processed meats are basically all the scraps with a bunch of fillers and that are formed into a tube and then sliced up. Look for the whole turkey breast or roast beef which are the actual cuts of meats. The whole versions are definitely more expensive but if you can't be slicing them up yourself for some reason, I guess we have to pay for the convienence.
Peanut butter is alright, but if you're trying to lose weight watch the intake (or cut it altogether and get your limited carbs elsewhere). You could also try almond butter instead to if you'd want to switch it up, but be warned it does cost more.
What do you mean packaged turkey? Cold cuts? Or turkey breasts that are packaged (Perdue, Tyson?) I'd be careful with those as I do believe they are loaded with salt (if we are talking about the same thing here) and other shit to preserve it. You could prepackage them yourself really, that way you'd know they are quality breasts and know exactly what is in them. I don't remember what the difference was with canned beans vs. bagged... Somebody else could probably enlighten more here. What I would do is just prepare them in the morning, portion them out, and then reheat when it was time to eat.
You basically have to prepare meals (do several days worth of you would prefer saving time) ahead of time and then heat them and eat. This is probably 100x harder to do out of a hotel, on the road, but you have to make it work for you. Make you diet your bitch. Don't give in to what you hve to eat because of your job, but make your position bend to your needs. It's difficult to get down, but once you do it'll pay off thousand fold.
Good advice here.
PallMallhonestly, i think you're in the wrong place...
most of the guys here have bodybuilder aspirations or show type physique goals... at least the ones who post regularly and all. your best bet dude would be to hire a diet coach..if your on the road a lot and you are 100% serious about getting fit. you may need to join more than 1 big name gym so that there is always a facility accessible to you wherever you go.
You mentioned that you would like to lose about 70lbs. The only way you are going to do that is to put your body in a caloric defecit to first off begin losing weight..there is a whole scientific process involved in weight loss to be real about it. hiw serious are you?
I don't think he's in the wrong place at all. I'd be willing to bet less than 5% of the members are professional competitors, and even if that number is 95%, who cares. Does that somehow invalidate their advice for this guy?
Currently I eat around 6 scrambled eggs for breakfast (hotel pre-made), lunch one pouch of tuna with 6 crackers, and for dinner 10 or 12 boneless chicken wings. I work 12 hours a day and when I get back to the hotel I'm exhausted. I do sit ups and push ups and goto sleep. Breakfast is always my biggest meal. I know the diet sucks but its gotta be better than mcdonalds. Thanks for all of the lnput I'm very gracious. What did you guys think about taking protien shake for breakfast and a protein bar, protein shake and pouche of tuna for lunch, and a leafy salad with Tyson's grilled chicken with a vinegar and olive oil dressing?
My main goal is to loss the body fat then I want to get ripped.
You're not eating enough times throughout the day buddy. You have to eat at a constant rate anywhere from 5 times or more per day to keep your body fueled and not going into starvation mode which ends up converting your intake into fat. You could try incorporating protein shakes as meal replacements once or twice a day (I do that sometimes) and you'd really need to improve what you eat. What are the wings and why wings as opposed to breasts? You want to incorporate more greens to help fill you, think beans, spinach, etc.
You need to be eating a meal or snack containing protein at least every 2.5hrs to help maintain stable insulin levels and stay in a positive nitrogen balance. Protein shakes would work fine for your snacks. Stay away from all simple sugars/high glycemic index carbs and ditch the wings. Stick with lean cuts of meat.
Pro hormones would do more harm than actually help to lose weight, unfortunately lots of cardio is the answer. Try find activities that involve running, perhaps Football. Me personally i play soccer & it helps to stay in shape due to all the damn running involved. Cutting carbs(specially simple cars AKA Sugar) will help big time if you combine it with a good cardio. You are very young, you already on roids naturally!!!
Forget the prohormones man, you don't want to be messing around with those. What is your current diet like? What are you able to achieve with your job diet wise? If you're a railroader you are doing a lot of activity I assume, so adding in cardio in addition to your work would do wonders... I'm assuming your diet is where the problem lies. Post it up here or in the dieting lounge and members will be able to figure something out with you given your limitations.
First off NO prohormones or e blocker. You have to put that cardio in there, I hate it too but I do it anyway. My first suggestion is to read all the stickies on weight loss. there is a ton of info there that should get you well on your way. No sense in repeating it all here. If you still have questions after researching, come back with those questions and we can hopefully get you squared away.
Thank you, Makwa. I will continue to read the forums that are up in weight loss.