Weight loss

I want to take up either Kung Fu or Tae Kwon Do so i need to lose my spare tire that i currently have. Whats the best and fastest way of losing it?

Cardiovasular exercise. Any aerobic activity such as running or basketball that makes you wheeze and pant, and try to keep your heart want to rip through your chest for about twenty minutes each day, is sufficient.

1. Cardio workouts - gotta pump that heart! 2. Moderation in meals - especially more vegies and fruits. 3. Start stretching to help with the flexibility that you will need in the martial arts.

Quite true, but you can also consider weight training. More muscle = more fat burning. Weight lifting also increases metabolism for a while. The best, of course is a combination of the two. And I would also think that TKD or Kung Fu, if it's a good class, could actually become a large portion of an aerobic routine. When I took TKD I was outta shape when I started, and even though I didn't like the style it started shaping me up fairly well.

Chris Sanders

A better forum for this question would be misc.fitness.weights.

IBVJ's advice is not very good.

You need to increase the frequency of your meals. Eat 5-6 small meals that are high in protein, moderate in fats and low in crab's

You will need to get into a state of Ketosis. This is where your body starts to use up body fat rather than glucose as it's main energy source.

Read into 'The Atkins Diet'. This diet is very good at keeping muscle on while losing fat in the fastest safest way possible.

this is simple enough on paper anyway times your weight by 10 o1 11 example if you weigh 200 pounds you must eat approx 2,000-2,100 calories a day 6 days a week mostly protein low carbs low fat , divided over 5,6 meals. the day

Well, go do some roadwork Running has allways been a good way to get in shape for me. Add some sit-ups and push-ups after the jog and you'll be fine. It doesn't have to be harder than that. Basic hard work is the way to go, there's no magic

Anyways, if it doesn't work out for ya, you could allways start doing some grappling art where your weight is just an advantage

Cheers Jakob

There is a wealth of info out there on weight loss and training but one of the posters hit the nail on the mark - it's a scientific fact that lean muscle burns fat (even at rest because your basal metabolic rate - BMR - increases with added lean mass). A couple of cardio workouts maintained at around 70% of your theoretical maximum heart rate for at least 20 minutes per workout should help with more fat burning and with endurance.

Calculation of theoretical maximum heart rate is usually achieved by subtracting your age from 220 - take 70% of the result and that's the rate you should be trying to maintain.

Starting weights: Workouts should not be much more than an hour and maybe three times a week to begin with on more repetition and lighter weights for about four weeks until your muscles adjust. Then up the weight used and cut down the reps (about 10 reps X 3) unless you're into serious mass in which case lower reps and heavier weights.

Supplements that MAY help - read up about them first - creatine monophosphate (ONLY beneficial for activities involving short explosive movements - your muscles depend upon the creatine phosphate 'pathway' for the first six seconds of explosive movement such as sprinting, kicking, punching etc - NO benefit for endurance). You need to go on a load phase of around 25-30g/day for 6 days (this saturates stores in the muscles) then onto a maintenance dose of 2g/day.

HMB: Hydroxymethyl butyrate - suppresses muscles breakdown immediately after workouts and has been shown in scientific studies to enhance lean muscle mass and reduce fat even in non-training subjects. Rec dose is 3g/day (1g X3). Drawback: VERY expensive ($1/g here in Oz - probably cheaper in the US).

If you really want an excellent text on sports science/personal traing for ALL martial athletes I'd rec obtaing a copy of Christopher Hess' book 'Total Quality Martial Arts'. It talks about training schedules, volumisation, self assessment of physiological capabilites, nutrition, etc

Hope this helps,

Marco

I would not recommend loading the creatine it is almost a total waste! A friend of mine owns a supplement store and told me most of the creatine gets pissed out etc.? He said you still have more in your system than not loading but it is not even worth it, the stuff is too expensive and the effects outweigh the benefits hence bloated feeling diarhea, and a lighter wallet. I would recommend the creatine but also try something called Xenadrine it is one of those natural thermogenic deals. I found it worked really well for me. But the biggest peice of advice I have is water! Dont drink soda or anything with sugars your body reads the sugar as fat. The other thing is your body will eat sugars before fat this is why I do my cardio after my weight training all the sugar is gone from your system and you are burning strictly fat! I hope this helped!

Creatine needs no loading phase and HMB is a total bunch of bullshit. Only steroids really work...there is some evidence that androstene products may, but the jury is still out on them.

Simply don't take them, your body doesn't need them.

VaKo/