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#132 - Breaking Through Fat Loss Plateaus, How To Get Into Running & More
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A Q & A episode answer common questions about fitness and health and anything in between. In this episode, you’ll learn:
- How to stay consistent when life gets busy (and drop the guilt when you miss workouts)
- How much training it really takes to maintain your muscle and progress
- The truth about carbs — when they’re helpful, when they’re not, and how much you actually need
- Tips for starting running without burning out or getting injured
- How to balance lifting and cardio while breaking through weight-loss plateaus
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Transcript
Introduction to Fit-ish Project Q&A
00:00:02
Speaker
Welcome back to the Fit-ish Project with your host Lathan Bass, where we make fitness and health simple for regular people like you and I. We have the weekly episode coming at you this week and it is time for another Q&A episode.
Addressing Common Fitness Questions
00:00:18
Speaker
And so I have five questions that I'm going to get into with this episode, questions that I get from clients, questions that I get from listeners of the pod, questions that I get on social media, or just questions that I get from people that I have conversations with in everyday life. And so
00:00:34
Speaker
Five different topics that I'm going to get into today. If you can and have not left a review, if you can do that, continue to get this podcast out to more of the people who need this type of information.
00:00:44
Speaker
I appreciate that. But let's not waste any time and let's get right into it. Question number one.
Balancing Fitness with a Busy Schedule
00:00:50
Speaker
This one is pretty specific, but I think it's one that a lot of people will relate to. So I've been crazy busy lately and struggling to get my workouts in.
00:00:58
Speaker
I know I need to make time, but I'm really struggling to make it happen. Worst part is I feel guilty about not getting them in. I guess I'm just looking for some insight on how you'd handle this.
00:01:09
Speaker
This is so common. i have conversations like this with people all the time. And a lot of this stems from people believing that if they can't be perfect or if they can't do everything that they were once doing, more specifically, like they were getting in all their workouts, they were super dialed with nutrition. Like if they're not able to do all those things perfectly, they feel like they are going backwards and not making progress and maybe even like ruining their progress. And so I think the first thing you need to acknowledge is that's just not true.
00:01:39
Speaker
A lot of different things are going to happen throughout the course of your life that maybe knock you off a little bit or take away some time. You have some added stress. You have some sort in life situation come up. And so you need to realize that life is going to come and go in different phases.
Adapting Workouts to Life Phases
00:01:54
Speaker
And in some of those phases, you're going to have more time. you're going to have more bandwidth. going have less stress. and it's going to be easy to hit your workouts, to stay super dialed and just to be on it or maybe even put in some extra time with your fitness and health goals. so And other times in life, when you do have some of those events, some of those life things that go on, you have a kid, you have some sort of family situation going on, maybe you get sick, maybe you're traveling a bunch, maybe work is stressful, you have some of those things that come up, life is going to look a little bit differently.
00:02:21
Speaker
And so you need to realize that in these times, yes, it might look a little bit different in terms of like what your workouts, and maybe your nutrition looks like a little bit, but also realize that that stuff is still important. I think a lot of people are very quick to throw out their workouts or just let everything go out the window.
00:02:40
Speaker
When in reality, those are the times that you honestly need some of that stuff the most. Again, it may look a little bit different. So you might not be in the gym as many times per week, or maybe quite as dialed with your nutrition. But if you're eating like crap, you're not working out or moving your body, you're not sleeping well, you're super stressed, that's a recipe for things to just continue
Exercise for Stress Relief
00:02:59
Speaker
to get worse. And so using exercise and nutrition just as a mental and physical tool to make sure that you feel better, you're able to handle stress, you're able to still create a little bit of time for yourself is important.
00:03:11
Speaker
And so make sure that you're still able to prioritize some of that time, even if it does look a little bit different. The second thing that I would say is that to realize you didn't make all your progress in one workout, you didn't make all your progress in a single week, you didn't make all your progress, even in a single month, it takes months and months and oftentimes years to make progress. And so you're not going to lose it that quickly, you miss a few workouts, or maybe you're not working out quite as much throughout couple of weeks, or maybe even like a month or two, because whatever situation is going on, you're not going to lose your progress that quickly, especially if you are continuing to do some things, as long as you don't go into that screw mode or that all or nothing mode, you're not going to be digging yourself into this massive hole.
Consistency vs. Perfection in Fitness
00:03:54
Speaker
And I think that's what a lot of people really struggle with is this idea that if they're not
00:03:58
Speaker
continually making like crazy progress or just on it all the time that they're going backwards. And that's just not the case. One thing that I like to remind people of is that maintenance is part of progress.
00:04:11
Speaker
Because when you look at it, the fact is that a lot of people do go into fitness and health with the all or nothing mindset. And so they do either they're on it or they're not on it. And when you're not on it, you can start to slide back pretty quickly. And for a lot of people, that's the cycle that they live in. They're on for a little bit, a few days, few weeks, maybe even a month or two, and then they fall off for a few days, few weeks, a few months. And so they continuously never really make all that much progress and stay feeling stuck because they don't ever get consistent. But when you just focus on maintaining for a period of time, you might be doing a little bit less, but you're still able to
00:04:47
Speaker
hold on to all that progress that you've made over time. And so for example, maybe you're not working out three or four times per week, but you're getting in two solid workouts per week, or you're not getting in your 10 or 12,000 steps a day, but you're still nailing six, seven, 8,000 steps a day, or like you're not tracking your food or maybe hitting your exact protein goals, but you're still getting protein and veggies at most of your meals.
Maintaining Fitness with Minimal Effort
00:05:09
Speaker
The way that this is going to look is just going to be slightly different, just kind of depending on the phase that you're in. To make this practical, to give you some sort of takeaway in this whole situation is to think about what you can do on a weekly or daily basis, no matter what the situation is. And so I call these like weekly or daily disciplines.
00:05:29
Speaker
I've heard other people call these like your BAM, so bare ass minimums. What can you do when you are super stressed, you have a bunch going on, like on your worst day or your worst week, what are the things that you were able to do? So again, this might look like two workouts per week, maybe instead of getting those four workouts in per week or 7,000 steps per day or protein and veggies at most of your meals. And so these are things that you can do no matter what you have going on.
00:05:54
Speaker
And that's going to be your non-negotiable. These are the things that you have to get in And again, it's going to be hard to do these things when you have more things going on, when life is a little bit harder, when life is a little bit stressed. But I do think it's important to hold yourself to a certain standard, even if you do have to figure out what that standard is going to look like in this phase so that you don't go into this all or nothing mode or just screw up mode where nothing matters, because this is going to help you mentally. It's going to help you physically and it's going to help to just maintain all that progress that you've made. And so once you figure out what that looks like for you, you have those examples, then you can make sure that you're sticking to that plan. And another thing that I would say too, is just to understand, especially from a workout standpoint, you can maintain on so much less than it takes to actually like build solid muscle and solid strength and solid fitness.
00:06:42
Speaker
For a lot of people, you're going to get your best results when you're working out three, four times a week to really like build muscle, build strength, build your fitness, all that stuff. But to maintain is actually a lot easier. You can maintain on a really, really hard, intense workout literally one time per week. And a lot of the studies will back this up. So they say roughly around like 50% of what you're doing is what it takes to maintain the progress that you've built. So If you put this in like real world terms, let's say you're working out on average four times per week. Well, to maintain, you only need to get two solid workouts in.
00:07:14
Speaker
And as long as you're keeping the intensity high, you're using heavy to moderate weights, you're really focusing on getting close to muscular failure with your workouts, you can maintain. And so you can cut that volume down. You can cut the amount of time that you're spending in the gym down.
00:07:30
Speaker
And now you can actually continue to maintain all that progress that you built. So you're not going backwards and you don't have to have that voice in the back of your head. Like, man, I'm screwing myself up. I made all this progress and now i'm just wasting it or letting it just go all down the drain. That's not what's actually happening.
00:07:45
Speaker
Figure out what you can do and then stick to that. Even if that is less than what you were doing before, that's going to be much better than just doing nothing at all. Something is always going to be better than nothing.
Understanding Carbohydrates in Fitness
00:07:57
Speaker
Question number two, I hear people saying carbs are bad and unnecessary. And then I hear other people saying that carbs are very necessary, especially if you exercise a lot. And I'm confused. Can you clear this up?
00:08:09
Speaker
The first thing that you should probably understand, well, the first couple of things that you should understand about carbs is that no carbs are not bad. Carbs do not make you fat. Carbs do not do any of those things, even though a lot of people will vilify carbs and say that they're the worst thing and that you don't need them and all these other things.
00:08:25
Speaker
In Part of that is true. Like carb you don't need carbs, but carbs are also not bad. They also don't make you fat. They also don't have all these really terrible health effects. Carbs are not essential, meaning that you don't need them to survive like you need proteins or fats. So you could survive without never eating any more carbs.
00:08:43
Speaker
But that doesn't mean that they don't have a good use. Carbs provide us with energy. And so especially if you are active or you're wanting to build muscle, or you're wanting to improve your cardio, you're wanting to be active and have good energy, then carbs are going to be helpful in doing that. And so the first thing you need to understand is like no carbs are not essential, but yes, they are very helpful, especially for people who are trying to be more active and trying to exercise and have some sort of fitness goals.
00:09:10
Speaker
When it comes to figuring out how many carbs you actually need, first you need to pin down like what's your actual goal because there's a very big difference between the amount of carbs that someone's going to need if they're just trying to get a little bit more fit, maybe lift some weights, build some muscle, look better, feel better.
00:09:25
Speaker
Maybe they do a little bit of cardio versus somebody who is trying to train for, let's say, marathon. The more intense exercise you do and the more that you just exercise in general, the more carbs that you're going to need. And that's a general rule that I like to remind people of is like the more active that you are, the more carbs that you're probably going to feel better on. That's not necessarily for every single person because it will vary from person to person.
00:09:48
Speaker
Some people just really feel good on carbs and like carbs and other people not so much. And so it will vary based on you and your preferences. But for a general rule, the more active you are, the more intense exercise that you're doing, the more benefits that you are going to get from carbs.
00:10:05
Speaker
And so thinking about that and knowing that it's going to be a little bit of a trial and error process and figuring out like where you actually feel best on some things you can start to look out for when you start to have more carbs is this like your workouts feel better, you have better pumps in the gym, you're able to do more, maybe your cardio feels better, your energy levels are better, and you're eating a certain amount of carbs. And that's probably a good sign that like you're in a good spot. But if your workouts are kind of flat,
00:10:31
Speaker
you don't feel like you're recovering real well, maybe like your cardio sessions or like your runs or your workouts, you just don't feel like you have energy, you fatigue sooner, then it could be a time to think about adding in some more carbs.
00:10:43
Speaker
And so it's not like rocket science, like if you're just Feeling a certain way your diet has a ton to do with that and so playing around with how many carbs are getting can be super helpful as a general rule a lot of people will recommend somewhere between like 30 to 40 percent of your total calories to come from carbs and so when you think about this in terms of just your diet so let's say you're somebody who eats around 2000 calories 30 to 40% of that is going to be somewhere around like 600 to 800 calories just from carbs, which is about 150 to 200 grams of carbs, which isn't a whole lot. You could easily get that from having some fruits and vegetables and some whole grains throughout the day, pretty easily hitting 150 to 200 grams
00:11:26
Speaker
If you're eating around 3000 calories, that could be anywhere from like 1000 to 1300 calories from carbs, which is like 250 to 400 grams of carbs, which is definitely a little bit more. And again, this is going to be individualized just based on the amount of activity you have. But as a general rule, 30 to 40% of your calories coming from carbs is a pretty solid thing for most people.
00:11:48
Speaker
If you are training for something that's more intense or you're just very active or you have a very active job, you can go well above that. You could go up to 50%, even 60% if you're somebody who's like very active and you're burning a lot of calories and you're really using all those carbs that you're putting into your body, you can get up there. But I think for most of you guys listening to this podcast and just for the average person of like You lift two, three, maybe four times per week.
00:12:14
Speaker
You're doing a little bit of cardio, maybe like one or two sessions per week. You walk six, eight, 10,000 steps a day. You don't need to get a crazy amount of carbs. So for most people, somewhere in that range of like 150 to 300 grams a day, depending on your size, is going to be a pretty good range to shoot for.
00:12:32
Speaker
Again, this is going to vary a lot based on how big you are what your certain goals are, because if you have goals around like body composition, then maybe you're going to be having a little bit less carbs just to control and manage your calories a little bit better.
00:12:45
Speaker
And if you're on the other end where like you're trying to make specific adaptations about building muscle or improving your cardio and things like that, then you're going to want more
Making Running Enjoyable
00:12:55
Speaker
carbs. So it is very individualized, but just understanding that carbs are not bad. They're not going to make you fat. They're not something to be avoided. And specifically, if you do have goals around building muscle or improving your performance, carbs are only going to help you figure out where you want to kind of be and then play around with what that actually looks like for you.
00:13:15
Speaker
Question number three, I'm wanting to give running a try and I've seen you get into running. So I'm wondering if there's things you wish you would have known when you started that you can pass on to me before starting.
00:13:27
Speaker
This is a great question. So I've actually done a couple of podcasts just strictly on running and specifically when I was like training to run a marathon and just things that I learned and things that I would have done differently and all that kind of stuff that you can check out.
00:13:40
Speaker
But I'm gonna break this down and put this in three different categories and then just give you some practical tips based on each of these three different categories. so The first thing I would say is just to make sure that you set the right expectations.
00:13:52
Speaker
Running is hard, especially when you first start. And I heard somebody say this recently on a podcast, but they said you have to run long enough until you get running competence. And so when you get to this certain level to where running doesn't feel so stressful, it doesn't feel so difficult, it doesn't feel so hard, because when you first start,
00:14:13
Speaker
You go out there and run unless you have a really high level of fitness or it's something that you've done in the past or like you're just really athletic or just have that just natural ability to run or just geared towards endurance type of things.
00:14:26
Speaker
Running is going to feel difficult no matter how slow you're going. It's just going to feel hard because you're not used to it and your body is going to have to adapt to this new stimulus that you're giving it I remember when I first started running, I hated it for the first 10 weeks.
00:14:39
Speaker
I trained for my marathon for 18 weeks. And for the first two and a half months, I absolutely hated it. I just did not enjoy it. And running felt hard every time I went out. I felt like it was super stressful. And I was just like, it just wasn't enjoyable because it always, it just hurt. Like it felt really crappy. And so I think just setting those expectations that running is going to be hard for a while until you get to that certain level.
00:15:01
Speaker
Eventually you'll get to a place where it doesn't feel as difficult. You're still going to have those days where it just sucks. Like the runs don't feel good. You feel super tired. Your legs feel heavy. You're breathing super hard. It just doesn't feel good.
00:15:13
Speaker
But the more and more that you do it and the better level of fitness that you build and just the bigger aerobic base that you build, running becomes much easier. And it even gets to a point where it is enjoyable. I didn't ever understand how people enjoyed running,
00:15:29
Speaker
Now that I've been doing it for multiple years and I've gotten much, much better at it, I do for sure understand the appeal of why people enjoy running and that it does get easier. And so I just want to set that expectation because it is difficult at first and you're probably not going to be great at it at first.
00:15:46
Speaker
But the more and more that you do it and just stick it out, you will start to see those improvements. And it does get to a point where it's actually enjoyable. The second thing I would say is that you don't have to crush yourself on every run.
00:15:58
Speaker
big reason for this is that you're probably not going to like it if you do that. As I just mentioned, running is going to be difficult when you first start. And especially if you're going out every single run, you're trying to run as hard and as fast as you can.
00:16:11
Speaker
It's just not going to be enjoyable. You're not going to like it. And worse than that, you could lead to like some sort of injury. That's a big thing that people run into is having certain injuries when they first get into running because your body's just not adapted to that type of stuff. It's not ready for all that wear and tear.
00:16:27
Speaker
But as you start to build your body up, you become more resilient, you become more durable, and have to worry about things like injury. The other thing that I would say is that if you just go out every single day and you're just trying to like break a PR every single time. Like that's exciting. That's like kind of motivating and stuff, but like that doesn't lead to the place where you want to be. It's more, more than likely if it doesn't end in injury, you're probably going to feel burnt out. You're going start to acquire all this extra fatigue and it's just not going to make this whole process very pleasant from a just general standpoint. Let's say you're going to try to run three times a week. I think that's a pretty good place for people to start two or three times a week.
00:17:08
Speaker
you could run more frequently if you wanted, as long as you're keeping the duration little bit smaller. But I think for a lot of people, like two to three times a week is a pretty good place to be. So if you're running three times per week, let's say one of those runs is going to be kind of hard where you can really push it, push the intensity.
00:17:23
Speaker
Another one of those runs is maybe more of a medium type of run where like, you're not completely going all out or anything like that, but it's also not super easy somewhere like in the middle. And then on The third run, you're just going to try to go nice and easy. Maybe even it's like a walk run type of thing.
00:17:38
Speaker
And so if you do that, if you use that sort of lineup of runs, I think you're going to be able to get a lot of those improvements that you want to see, but you're also not going to have to worry about the injuries or the burnout or just hating your life as you start to get into running.
00:17:53
Speaker
The more and more that you get into it, you'll start to hear people talk about this 80-20 rule. But when you're first starting out, those percentages don't really matter as much. The 80-20 rule just means that 80% of your runs are going to be easy. So like easy miles where you're not really stressing yourself too much. And then 20% is going to be focused on like harder, more intense runs. And the reason that people do this as they start to up their mileage and run more is that if you're always running super, super hard, you're just not going to make as good a progress. 80-20 rule as you start to get more mileage in is something that you can start to learn more about and lean more into. But that simple template of like one hard, one medium,
00:18:31
Speaker
one easier type of run, I think works pretty well for a lot of beginners as they start to get into this. And then the last thing that I would say just about not crushing yourself with the runs is just figuring out how to make progress in different ways. So you don't always have to run a faster pace. I think that's the thing that a lot of people look at is they only look at like, how fast am I running per mile? And that's the only way that they gauge their progress.
00:18:54
Speaker
But again, if you're doing that, You're going to see some progress at the beginning, but eventually if you're just trying to beat that pace every single time and you're never running any of your runs easy, never really giving yourself the proper training, you're going to plateau at a point and you may even go backwards at some points. And so finding other ways to measure your progress with running is super helpful. So that could be not just that you're making faster times on your mile pace, but maybe you have a lower heart rate at a certain running pace, or maybe you're able to run for longer distances, or you're able to run for more time without stopping, or certain styles or certain tempos or certain distances of runs start to become easier over time. All those are signs that you are making progress. And so don't just solely focus on your mile time. There's a lot of ways that you can
00:19:43
Speaker
measure progress and see improvements with your running. And the third thing I would say that goes right along with this, or it's kind of the opposite of that second point that I just made is just to make it enjoyable.
00:19:55
Speaker
First thing I would say is just get yourself some good shoes. That makes a big difference, especially as you're going to start putting some miles in. If your feet are uncomfortable and your body is uncomfortable, your knees and your hips and ankles, all that stuff is just not feeling good, which like going to have some aches pains, especially when you get into running before your body starts to adapt to those things. But your shoes make a pretty big difference. So I went to a running shoe store and got some advice and just got fitted on some proper running shoes. And that made a big difference from just picking some random shoes, which is what I did when I first started.
00:20:24
Speaker
And so I would make sure that you get some good shoes for your body and just for your running style. Go to somebody who knows what they're talking about. And there's a million different options out there. So I think the best bet is just to go to a actual running shoe store and just get some advice from the people who actually know the most about that type of stuff.
00:20:40
Speaker
The second thing I would say is like, With runs, you're going be out there and so find some good stuff that you enjoy listening to so you actually look forward to your runs, whether that's a good music playlist, whether that's a podcast you're looking forward to, whether that's an audio book, but there's ways that you can make running more enjoyable.
00:20:54
Speaker
And since you're going be out there, you might as well listen to something that you're going to enjoy while you're doing it. If you enjoy running with other people or just doing activities with other people, this is a really good time that you can start to add that in. So if you have a running partner or running group or something of those sorts that can just help with making it more enjoyable, but also just helping you with accountability and things like that.
00:21:16
Speaker
I really like running by myself. I like the just solitude of just being out there on a trail or whatever and just kind of just doing my own thing. But it is fun to run with other people too, to push you a little bit and just to just have that more of a camaraderie, more community feel sometimes. So that can be way that you can make it more enjoyable.
00:21:34
Speaker
Another way that you can make it a little bit more enjoyable is to actually sign up for some sort of running event. I mentioned that I signed up for a marathon and that was what got me originally into running. And i honestly don't think that if I would have had that marathon on my calendar and had already signed up for it and paid for it and told my buddy that I was going to run this marathon with him, that I would have stuck it out for those 10 weeks until I actually started to enjoy it. And so having something on the calendar can help to hold you accountable, but also just keep you motivated and give you something to look forward to as you're starting to get into this training. So
00:22:08
Speaker
It could be a 5K, a 10K, a half marathon, a full marathon, whatever. Some sort of type of event that you're looking forward to that you can train for and get excited about can help to just make this a more enjoyable thing as you start to get into.
00:22:22
Speaker
And then one last tip that I would also throw out there is just to be smart about your training in order to avoid that injury and just make better progress overall. It's recommended that you only increase your weekly miles by about 10% per week. And so you don't want to be going from five miles to then 10 miles the next week to then 15 and then 20. Because if you're jumping that much in mileage, your body's probably not going to adapt to that super well. And then again, you're more likely to have injuries. And so increasing slowly over time is going to make it more enjoyable, but also just keep you in the game so that you're actually too able to keep running and keep making progress and keep getting better and all those things. So
00:23:01
Speaker
Hopefully those tips help you a little bit as you get into this adventure. And I hated running my entire life. I really did not like it and I never understood why people did it. But almost three years later, I'm still running and I have actually gotten to a point where I genuinely enjoy running.
00:23:17
Speaker
And it's something that I want to continue to get better at and can you continue to do more of. And so give it it an honest shot. Make sure you're you're approaching this in the right way. And i think it can be something that's really good for a lot of people.
Balancing Cardio and Weight Training
00:23:30
Speaker
Question number four, I think it is having a hard time finding a good balance between cardio and lifting weights. Any tips on this? This is a perfect question to follow up that last question. So I do think it's very smart, even if you are getting into cardio to also do some strength training.
00:23:47
Speaker
And so the first thing that you're probably going to want to look at is think about what's your primary goal here. Are you trying to get really good at cardio or train for some so certain type of like running event? Or are you trying to like get really strong, build a lot of muscle,
00:24:00
Speaker
Or if you're like most people, you just want to look good, you want to feel good, but you also want to improve your overall health. So you're doing both weights and cardio, which is where most people are going to fall.
00:24:12
Speaker
The first thing I would say is to prioritize the thing that you care most about right now. So if you are training for some sort of type of running event, then maybe that is your primary focus. You're going to want to put a little bit more of your effort and energy into your cardio event or whatever event that you have on the calendar.
00:24:29
Speaker
or maybe you're really trying to build a lot of muscle, then it probably makes a little bit more sense to put that priority and that effort towards strength training and building muscle. But for most people, for most of you guys who are listening to this, you're kind of in that middle ground where like you want to just have good health, you want to look better, you want to feel better.
00:24:48
Speaker
And so in that instance, I think you're going to want to prioritize strength training and then think of cardio as more of like a supplement or more of like a secondary goal.
00:24:59
Speaker
Kind of a side note to think about as you're starting to add in both of these things like cardio and weights together, you're obviously going to be increasing your activity if you were only doing one of these things before. Like maybe you were only doing cardio and now you want to add in weights or you were only doing weights and now you want to add in cardio.
00:25:16
Speaker
You're adding in more activity. So with more activity, it becomes more important to make sure that you are recovering well. And so sleep should always be a priority, getting the proper nutrition. So getting enough carbs, as we talked about earlier, getting enough protein, all that stuff so that you can recover well, staying hydrated, all those things are going to help to manage this extra activity and just help you balance these two things better. Because as you add in this activity, you're not recovering well, it's going to be hard to do well at either one of these things. And so you want to make sure that recovery is still a priority.
00:25:49
Speaker
And then the other thing that I would say is just to, there's so many different ways that you can make this fit into a schedule. But the biggest thing is just to figure out a way where you're actually going to be able to get everything done.
00:26:00
Speaker
There's certain rules about like when you should do cardio versus weights and like what might be a little bit more smart as far as like getting the best results or best adaptions from the training.
00:26:13
Speaker
But in the real world, everything's not going to be as clear and cut and dry. And like, in some instances, you just have to make this stuff work for your schedule and for the way that your life is set up. So if you can only do certain things on certain days, then that's just kind of how you have to roll with it. But I'll give you a couple of examples here of how you can balance this, because I think this is a pretty common example. And this is what a lot of clients that I've worked with do, because they do do both of these things, they'll lift and they'll do some cardio as well. And so For the typical person, if you're getting in three lifts per week and you're getting in two cardio sessions per week, that's awesome. Like that's a really good place to be. You're going to get a lot of really good benefits both mentally and physically from doing that.
00:26:52
Speaker
And so you can just simply pick five days and just alternate between cardio and weights on those days and you would be perfectly fine. So maybe you want to do Monday through Friday so that you can keep your weekends open. So Monday you lift, Tuesday you do cardio, Wednesday you lift, Thursday you do cardio, Friday you lift and boom, you're done.
00:27:11
Speaker
you wanted to add in a recovery day in there because you just want a day of rest. Maybe you go Monday, Tuesday, you do lift, then cardio, and then you have a rest day on Wednesday, and then you go lift, cardio lift for Thursday, Friday, Saturday. That could be a way that you set it up.
00:27:27
Speaker
Or maybe you're somebody who doesn't want to do things on five different days. You're just busier and you want to squeeze all this stuff down into three days total. You could lift and do cardio on the same days. Maybe you lift first, you get your 45 minute lift in, and then you do like a 30 minute cardio session right after your lift. That could be an option. Or if you have the luxury or want to split those things up in the day. So you lift in the morning and then maybe at night you do 30 minutes of cardio.
00:27:58
Speaker
That is what I prefer to do. I like to split them up because for me, I just don't want to be doing something for two hours. I don't want to lift for an hour, an hour 15, and then go do cardio for another 45 minutes.
00:28:10
Speaker
I don't want to do that. And so I split those things up. But again, you have to make it work for your schedule and just things that you have going on. It doesn't really matter all that much. As long as you're making sure that you can recover from these things, you can really set these things up the way that you want to do it. And so it's just important to figure out what that's going to look like for you so that it can fit into your lifestyle and so that you can be consistent and so that you can actually show up and get these things done. Because as long as you're able to be consistent with these things, you're gonna get a ton of really good benefits. So the way that you set it up doesn't matter a ton. I wouldn't stress over that too much. Just figure out what works for you and then just be consistent with that.
00:28:51
Speaker
The last question of the day.
Overcoming Weight Loss Plateaus
00:28:53
Speaker
Feel like I've been stuck at the same weight for a while and can't break through this weight loss plateau. I've heard you mention that maintaining is progress too.
00:29:01
Speaker
So that does feel good, but I really want to break through this weight loss plateau eventually. Any tips for me? Again, this is a very common thing. At some point or another, if you have quite a bit of weight to lose, you're going to more than likely run into some sort of plateau where you stop making progress.
00:29:20
Speaker
What you were doing is no longer working in terms of weight loss. And there's a lot of different reasons for this. Some of this is just your body adapting so you no longer can eat the same amount of calories to lose weight because you're now a smaller, more efficient version of yourself. If you think about two people, let's say you take two athletes. let's say you have an athlete that weighs 300 pounds, a big old lineman, and then you have an athlete that weighs 150 pounds who's maybe a defensive back.
00:29:47
Speaker
The big guy, the 300 pounder needs a lot more calories to fuel his body and to do all the things that he needs to do versus that 150 pound guy. So think about yourself the same way as you start to lose weight and drop pounds and just become more fit. You don't need as many calories to fuel your body. And so.
00:30:04
Speaker
the amount of calories that you need to get into a calorie deficit is going to become smaller. You're going to need more calories overall. And so if you're using that same calorie deficit that you started with when you were at a certain weight, but now you've lost 30, 40, 50 pounds, you might need to adjust that slightly in order to get yourself back into a calorie deficit to lose weight.
00:30:24
Speaker
Along with that, if you've been dieting for a long time, your body starts to become pretty good at adapting to this as well. And so if you've been in a calorie deficit for a long time, your body will start to give you the signal to just do less.
00:30:39
Speaker
And what I mean by that is like throughout the day, your body will start to just move less through NEAT, which is non-exercise activity thermogenesis. So you may still be working out and things like that, but your body is just finding ways to rest more so that you're burning less calories. And it does this because you're giving your body less calories over a certain period of time. So it's like,
00:31:01
Speaker
We need to start to learn how to conserve energy. And so then it says, I'm going to make us move less throughout the day. And so a combination of those two things, along with the other thing that a lot of people run into, which is like, if you've been dieting for a long time, a lot of times certain habits will just start to slip.
00:31:18
Speaker
So Maybe you were tracking really diligently at first and now you're not really tracking at all and you're eating more than you realize. Or maybe you are super on point with all your workouts, consistent, hitting four or five workouts a week, doing cardio, getting your steps in, all that stuff. And now maybe you're starting to slip a little bit. So now you're only getting in a couple workouts a week where you're not getting all your steps in. And this combination of your body adapting with slipping on habits a little bit, usually is the culprit of why people fall into plateaus. And so what you can actually do about that, once you realize this, is to first acknowledge, are you actually in a plateau?
00:31:54
Speaker
And I define a plateau as you haven't made any sort of progress in a minimum of two weeks, but I would say closer to three weeks. And when I say any progress, that doesn't just mean that the scale stopped moving. This means that you haven't seen progress in any physical way. So your clothes are not fitting any better. You're not losing inches. You're not seeing any changes in progress picks. If that has stalled for two to three weeks, then it could be time to change something up, add in some activity, lower the calories, whatever the case may be. But you need to actually look at the data. And if you don't have data, so if you don't track calories, if you don't track your steps, if you don't track workouts, this makes it a little bit more difficult to figure out what you should do next, which is why I'm such a big proponent of using data to
00:32:37
Speaker
inform these decisions because if you're just going off feel, if you're just going off vibes, it doesn't give you as clear and cut of a direction. And that's when things can start to get really frustrating with plateaus is when you're just trying to make random guesses. And so track things, have data, then you can use that data to make the best decision. And so you have really three options.
00:32:56
Speaker
When you get to this point, you can up your activity to help you burn some extra calories. You can lower your calories so that you're getting closer to a bigger calorie deficit to lose more fat, or you can take a diet break.
00:33:10
Speaker
There's not really a right or wrong answer. It's just about where you're at in this whole process. And so an easy thing to do for a lot of people is to up their activity. And so upping your step count. So maybe you were getting 8,000 steps a day.
00:33:22
Speaker
You could focus on getting 10 or 12,000 steps a day You could add in a couple of cardio sessions, some low intensity type stuff, or maybe you're doing some 30 minutes of riding a bike or jogging a couple times a week to help you burn some extra calories. Maybe instead of getting three workouts in per week, you add in a fourth day of workouts. If that's something that you have time and want to actually add in, that is always an option to up your activities.
00:33:46
Speaker
you could also lower your calories. So you could lower your calories 200 to 300 calories a day, track that, see if that scale starts to move again, see if you start to make progress in other ways. And so that is an option.
00:33:57
Speaker
You could do a combination of the two. So you could up your steps or up your activity and lower your calories a little bit to help you get into that calorie deficit again. Or the third option, which is probably a more underutilized option is just to take a diet break.
Getting Professional Guidance
00:34:11
Speaker
And so take a diet break. You're not necessarily focused on losing fat for a while. And this is mostly just to give you a mental break so that you're not focused on dieting because it does start to get a little bit fatiguing after a while to just be so locked in mentally and physically and all those things. And so if you give yourself a break.
00:34:30
Speaker
just focus on maintaining your weight for a while and let your body kind of recoup and recover, let your mind recoup and recover. You take a break for four weeks, eight weeks, a couple of months even, and then you come back to it and hit it hard where you get into a more aggressive calorie deficit. You're on point with all your habits and you focus on losing fat again.
00:34:49
Speaker
You come back feeling more refreshed and more revigorated to really attack your goals again and Now you can start to see that progress again and then hit it really hard and bust through that certain plateau that you were at. so These are all viable options and it really just depends on where you're at and how you're just responding both physically and mentally to the diet. And obviously this is where it comes in handy to have a coach or have somebody who can give you some insight about what to do next, because you will likely hit a plateau if you are dieting for a long period of time and what you do next just kind of depends on where you're at. But hopefully there's some nuggets in there that you can start to think about.
00:35:25
Speaker
you have certain questions about this, this is obviously what I do with people with helping them with coaching. And so you have questions or want to have a conversation, you can always reach out about that. But that is the five questions for this week. If you want a question answered in future episodes, you can always shoot me a message on Instagram. If you are interested in coaching, you can always apply to see if you are a good fit. That link is in the show notes as well.
00:35:49
Speaker
I do appreciate you listening and we will see you next week.