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Fat Loss for the Summer
I was just reminded what time of the year it was when a friend had asked me to design a program for him. Sometimes in the Seattle area we forget the time of year due to freak weather, Monday is gorgeous with sunshine and highs of 77 degrees and Tuesday is a lovely 41 degrees with torrential rains. His ultimate goal was an improvement in health and energy through a focus in fat loss. So considering that the summer is just a stone's throw away and many of you might be interested in a program to shed some body fat, I know I am! I thought I would share some key concepts behind a fat loss program.
Today at the gym when I went in to do my workout, this guy approx. 6"3 around 255lbs and soggy, approached me in between a set and this is how the conversation in all its awkwardness went.........
(Cristiano cut up playing futbol for Portugal)
Meat Head: (while eating a protein bar in my face) "Hey can I borrow those DB's? I just wanted to work with them before I get out of here?"
Albert: "Uhh, yeah go ahead man."
Meat Head: "Yeah your workout looks pretty intense, maybe I should try something like that, I've been bulking for the last 2 months and now I"m gonna start to cut!"
Albert: (after I saw him lifting heavy low rep chest exercises on machines today) "Hey, good luck with that buddy."
Analysis:
This guy didn't know the first thing about cutting let alone bulking. He said he was cutting but he didn't have a trace of sweat on his body. Everything I did that day was to improve functional strength while conditioning my muscles. It was intense, but not really, just to the untrained eye. He seemed to be following a workout out of a Muscle Magazine, that's great and all because they can have some good information in them, but just remember that you can't write one program that will work for every single reader. Also, for all you out there lifting, don't where a medium t shirt when you really need an XXL and try not to go around talking to people while eating a protein bar because it will kind of make you look like a big idiotic tool.
The shakedown on Fat Loss:
In order to increase fat loss you need to focus on efficiency and adaptation. Not in the posistive sense but the fact that those two things are whats preventing you from being a fat melting machine. The more strain on your body to learn new and unfamiliar exercises the greater turnover of proteins in your muscle fibers. The product of this is an increase in your metabolism. So changing your workouts will keep you from adapting to the exercises. The less you are efficient with the exercises, which we induce by increasing/decreasing reps, we cause your body to experience more stress. Products of stress includes, adrenaline which leads to more blood flow and energy for your muscles to use to burn fat.
(That body looks pretty toned Miss Fox!)
Let's start melting the Fat:
I am going to mention four key points to keep in my mind during a fat loss program, which are metioned in "The New Rules of Lifting" by Alwyn Cosgrove, a fitness mastermind in the industry who is often sought after by many magazines like Men's fitness.
1. Total Body: During a fat loss program you want to focus on total body workouts. The more muscles that are worked in your body the more energy and calories are consumed. Try to focus on larger muscle groups like legs, back, and chest. Think about it, take a second! What's harder doing a bicep curl or squat. Yeah, let it sink in.
2. Superset/Circuits: Don't let the word superset intimidate you, it is nothing more than alternating two exercises. You do one exercise than immediatley after completing it you go into your second exercise and then rest. (That would be 1 set by the way) This is something anyone and everyone can incorporate into their workouts. There's a 75 year lady who supersets body weight squats with lat pulls. Dead serious!
3. Hard work Progress!: You need to constantly improve every week! Huh? you ask. Progressively working harder is going to keep you from becoming efficient and adapting to your workouts. One way to do this is to increase your weight.
4. Slowly decrease rest periods: When you initially begin a program that incoporates ciruit work and alternating sets you will quickly realize how freaking tired you are. It's okay to use 70-80 seconds of rest to catch your breath between sets so you can do quality sets but don't get used to the rest time. Slowly progress to shorter rest periods from 75sec - 60sec - 45 sec. Also if you are doing cardio try doin high intensity sprints than timing how long it takes to catch your breath. Set a goal to decrease rest periods.
Bonus Note:
When planning your alternating exercises for your supersets, try choosing exercises that don't seem to relate to one another such as in the case of a prime mover and it's stabilizing muscles. An example would be going from a squat in to a row. Also don't forget the CARDIO!!!!!!!!!
If you need advice or any help designing a related program, feel free to contact me via email. Good luck.
Albykennethpark@gmail.com
