Thread: Cutting / weight loss.

Hi guys, I'm new here and wanted to ask a few questions.
Firstly a quick run down on how I got here.
I was around 89kgs for a long time and at only 5ft 8" I though it was about time to get fit. I don't believe in the Infomercial rubbish and I knew that the only way to get fit was plain and simple good food and hard work so I joined a local gym 9 months ago. I am now 71kgs and am in the process of building some muscle. According to my scales I am 19.6% body fat and I would like to get to around 14%. I have lost fat from everywhere in general but am having trouble getting the last bit from around my gut to go away which is really frustrating. The biggest issue I think I'm facing is trying to eat enough to build muscle but trying to lose fat at the same time.
I was thinking of maybe doing a cutting routine to help define the muscles I can actually see.

My routine is basically the following:

Tuesday:
12 / 10 / 8 / 6 reps staggered weight on the following:
Barbell curl
Tricep pushdown
Bench press
Smith machine incline bench press
Seated row
Lat pull down
Standing row
And some others I can't recall the name of

Wednesday:
5 Minute warm up on treadmill
10 Minutes Jogging on treadmill
15 Minutes running on treadmill
10 Minutes on crosstrainer staggered levels
Three sets of twenty leg raises
Three sets of twenty crunches

Thursday:
5 Minute warm up on treadmill
10 Minutes Jogging on treadmill
15 Minutes running on treadmill
10 Minutes on crosstrainer staggered levels
Three sets of twenty Leg raises
Three sets of twenty calf raises
Three sets of twenty leg extensions

Friday:
12 / 10 / 8 / 6 reps staggered weight on the following:
Barbell curl
Tricep pushdown
Bench press
Smith machine incline bench press
Seated row
Lat pull down
Standing row
And some others I can't recall the name of

Any ideas on getting rid of my gut fat? I have been told it's my body type and will be hard to get rid of. I'm not stopping till I can see my abs.
And any ideas on how to build muscle faster?

Cheers.

All comes down to diet mate, post it up and we'll see what we can do. Also, I noticed you don't train legs at all, why is that? Unless you're injured, you really are shortchanging yourself by not training legs.

mate, dont try to bulk and cut at the same time. Believe me, i've tried, it doesn't work.

Concentrate on building muscle while eating big and clean. Once you're happy with your size then do a cut.

Cutting properly is way harder than most people think and alot of muscle can be lost. It requires alot of experience and research IMO.

As the others have said we really need to see exact diet, but generally
speaking to drop fat and maintain muscle it's best too keep protein high,
drop back on carbs escpecially at night and keep fat at a moderate level.

Well done so far though, 89kg down to 71kg is very decent.

Just looking the order of your routine, do you do arms first and progress down? It's generally better to leave the guns till the end, they have to do a lot of work in the bigger muscle group exercises...so leave em last.

Originally Posted by dohes1984

I noticed you don't train legs at all

Man if i could have started all over again i would have smashed them like i do now, they would be 5 times bigger had i done it right in my teens.

Originally Posted by aquafit

Man if i could have started all over again i would have smashed them like i do now, they would be 5 times bigger had i done it right in my teens.

+1 on that Aqua.

Originally Posted by aquafit

Man if i could have started all over again i would have smashed them like i do now, they would be 5 times bigger had i done it right in my teens.

Leg day is one of the most important from a total body perspective.
You engage much more than legs when squatting, leg pressing & deadlifting.
You get an enormous benefit to the cardiovascular system as well when legs are done properly.
I dread leg day going in; but afterwards when you're cooling down - having a shower or bath; you feel a million bucks.

Originally Posted by aquafit

Man if i could have started all over again i would have smashed them like i do now, they would be 5 times bigger had i done it right in my teens.

Oh god how right you are! I was more concerned with endurance training in my teens and used to run ridiculous amounts of km's every week. It's only been the last couple of years i've started to train legs properly. If only we could have our time over hey.......

Originally Posted by dohes1984

Oh god how right you are! I was more concerned with endurance training in my teens and used to run ridiculous amounts of km's every week. It's only been the last couple of years i've started to train legs properly. If only we could have our time over hey.......

when i have kids i will set them on the right path if they choose to weight train.

Thanks for the replies guys. I have been really lame on the legs and only just read recently that training legs can actually help all ove body muscle. I guess I figured that because I was doing running and cross training my legs looked ok and were in proportion to the rest of my body so I was going to wait until my upper body started getting out of proportion to worry about them, that and I think I wanted to use my leg time doing cardio to lose more weight.

My diet is basically:
Breakfast 8am:
1 Bowl of cereal
1-2 Crumpets with honey
1-2 Poached Eggs on wholemeal toast
1 x Protien / Creatine shake with 1 scoop of protien powder and 1 teaspoon of creatine in 1 cup of skim milk

Lunch 12 - 1pm:
1 x Light ham / beetroot / lettuce / tomato wholemeal roll
1 x Bowl of steamed carrots, green beans and 1 potato

Pre gym at 6pm:
4 x rice cakes
1 x red bull (occasionally)
1 x Apple
1 x Protien / Creatine shake with 1 scoop of protien powder and 1 teaspoon of creatine in 1 cup of skim milk

After gym 7:45pm:
1 x Protien / Creatine shake with 2 scoops of protien powder and 1 teaspoon of creatine in 1.5 cups of skim milk

Dinner 8:30pm:
Dinner differs from night to night depening on what I feel like. This is the one meal I like to have a bit of variety with. This is where I think my problem lies.
I tend to have a lot of pasta or rice meals or high card vegies for dinner which at 8:30pm is probably not a great idea.

I was thinking of using those "Fat Blaster" pills but wanted to talk to you guys first.

Skinny most of your protein looks like its coming from protein shakes.

Breaky: Do you really need the crumpets AND the cereal? Also, what sort of cereal. Most of them are jam packed with sugar.

Lunch: IF you can id swap out the ham for something like chicken breast or good old tuna. Sodium content of ham is quite high and its just processed crap anyway.

See if you can have your dinner at lunch time. Some chicken breast, lean steak or whatevre at dinner time would be ideal.

Also pre gym, thats a lot of sugar (IMO). See what they guys say.

Im pretty sure most will say not to bother with fat blaster tabs and just get your diet sorted more. At least at first.

Rusha is spot on, too much hi GI energy pre gym mate,
protein shake with creatine is good but leave the rest out.

Drop the crumpets and rice cakes! Add some chicken breast and tuna,
and the pasta/rice thing at 8pm isn't great for cutting...

Work those legs too!

I'd also be concerned with the time between meals. You have breakfast at 8am then nothing till lunch at 12-1pm, then once again nothing till 6pm (which is just a small pre-workout meal anyway). You need to throw a small meal in between these other meals to keep your metabolism firing on all cylinders. 6-7 small meals a day spaced out every 2-3 hours is generally optimal.

Thanks for the reply guys.
I usually have bugger all energy by the time I get home from work which is why I was having a red bull or an apple before a session.
I might try putting some coffee in with my protien / creatine shake instead of eating before a work out.
I have a hard time getting a chance to eat during the day at work which makes extra meals hard unles its a quick protien bar or something but they are usually full of sugar. By the time I drive from work to home and back I only have about 40 minutes to prepare and eat my lunch which makes it hard to make a big meal at lunch times, sorry to be a pain in the arse. What are most people doing for multiple meals whilst working 8:30 - 5:30. Sometimes my lunch breaks are erratic and I am out on site a lot which also makes it hard. What's turkey breast like instead of ham?