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[Minteh]

I've been doing a lot of cardio to shed any unnecessary fat, and I've also been trying to gain a little weight [muscle weight, and eating protein and stuff.]
But my main issue.. I need my stomach to be.. Not muscly or prominent, just toned.
I have a pretty big pudge that I need to get rid of and tone [it's not THAT big, but it feels like it, and it makes me a little uncomfortable] I've just never been able to find a good way to tone it..
I've been doing cardio to cut the fat down everywhere on me, since I'm pretty squishy, but my stomach, I have no idea what to do to tone it, other than sit ups..

Any suggestions? :X

[rndmguy]

The funny thing about the stomach is that yeah, you really need to get your body fat pretty low before you can see it. So keep doing the cardio.

Now, it's really not all that possible for you to put on muscle weight and lose weight at the same time. They're opposite ends of the same scale. If you're new to lifting, which it sounds like you are, then you could maintain and develop nicely. But being in a deficit and doing it? Well, good luck.

As for abs exercises, I don't really like sit ups. I don't know why, I just don't. Right now I'm doing 3 supersets of:

Hanging Leg Raises
Woodchoppers
Planks

But don't focus just on your abs. Workout all of your muscle groups so you're in proportion.

[Minteh]

By losing weight, I meant losing fat. x.x Oops.
But yeah I'm trying to lose my fat, and turn my fat weight into muscle weight? and gain muscle weight.. :X That's what I was trying to say.

And alright, thank you. c:

Also, I've been working on my arms a lot, with lifting small weights [I'm really weak and out of shape.. I'm mostly working on all of this just to keep healthy, and the tummy toning as an extra] and I've been doing lunges with them to help my legs.

[rndmguy]

Losing weight and losing fat are pretty much the same thing. At least when it comes to fitness most people would prefer that the weight they lose be fat, so it's just assumed. It doesn't matter though, they're still opposite ends of the same process.

Your arms are probably the worst place to be focusing your strength training. They are like the smallest muscles you could work on, which means they're not doing much for efficiency. It doesn't matter if you're using small weights so long as you are challenging yourself. A lot of times you'll see someone throwing around big weights but using improper exercise form, which not only messes up their potential gains but puts them at serious risk for injury.

Training your legs hard will stimulate progress in everything else you do. Lunges are good, but look into developing a solid weight lifting schedule where you're really taxing each muscle group.

[Kiro]

I've been looking into this a little, but I basically agree with rndmguy.

Depending on your body fat percentage, it might actually be preferable for you to cut down on cardio and just focus on resistance/strength training. Like rndmguy said, you can't really be at a caloric deficit and build muscle at the same time; many actually see better results when slightly increasing their calorie intake. Building up your muscles also increases your metabolism, so ideally you should be able to continue gaining muscle tone while reducing your body fat percentage.

Again, agreeing with rndmguy, I have heard that working out your legs does more than working out your arms. Apparently, they're some of your largest muscles, so they have probably the most significant impact on your metabolism. Still, strength training any part of the body should help. I believe it was determined that doing low weights - high reps is similarly effective to doing high weights - low reps as long as you're doing it to the point of fatigue.

In the end, you might have to try out a few things and see what works for you, your schedule, and the equipment available to you.

Some motivation someone posted on FB:

[Minteh]

To be honest, I'm working on my arms and legs, ONLY for the fact I am out of shape. My metabolism is already very very high, and I can eat literally anything I want and not gain a single pound, but I have a high body fat percentage, and I'm very weak. I can barely do an arm curl with a 8[maybe 10? haven't been in gym glass so I don't remember.. mine are like 3-4lbs..] pound weight. It makes my arm shake...

:X I guess I'm just trying to do cardio to get a lower body fat percentage, but I plan on eating more protein and calories to turn into muscle..? Are you able to lose body fat, but not lose weight? :X I guess what I'm saying is, I pretty much just want to turn my fat into muscle, not really lose any weight...

[rndmguy]

You can't turn fat into muscle. Fat sits on top of muscle. That's why you can go to the gym and see a bunch of really strong guys but they're still really fat.

There's two ways that you can lower your body fat percentage. The more conventional way, and the way that gets the results most people want, is to be in a caloric deficit to burn the fat. The other way is to increase your lean body mass, or let's just say muscle mass, which would drop you a few percentage points because more of your weight is being added in muscle rather than fat.

Slow or fast metabolism, anybody can eat anything and lose weight because all that matters is that you're in a caloric deficit. What goes in doesn't matter, how much goes in does. I could eat a diet consisting entirely of ice cream and not gain weight.

Doing cardio doesn't lower your body fat percentage. Being in a caloric deficit. If you do cardio every day but still eat more calories than your body burns, you're not going to lose weight. That simple.

Eating more calories and getting the right amount of protein will help you develop muscle, as long as you stimulate the muscle through proper weight training. If you don't stimulate the muscle the extra calories you put in will just be stored as fat.

If you're new to lifting you can eat at your maintenance calories while lifting and see muscle gains while losing fat, but that doesn't last long at all.

In short though. Fat can't turn to muscle and you can't burn fat without losing some kind of weight. Fat takes up space and it weighs something. You can go through a composition change, as detailed earlier in this post, and that would result in a lower BF%.

[Minteh]

Thanks. :X

[epicserendipity]

This was actually very helpful. I started a workout program of 15 min. in the gym doing weight training and sit-ups, and my cardio is covered by riding my bike everywhere (since I don't have a car, and i ride at least 10 miles a day.) Any know how long it'll take to lose a belly at this rate?

[Arbite]

Originally Posted by Kiro

. I believe it was determined that doing low weights - high reps is similarly effective to doing high weights - low reps as long as you're doing it to the point of fatigue.

Not at all. Not only is the energy recruitment different, but there is different muscular recruitment as well as different kinds of growth associated with various weight-rep ranges.

[Kiro]

http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercis...lds-muscle-too

This was the part I was referring to:

In a series of experiments, Burd and colleagues tweaked some resistance-exercise variables to see which had the greatest effect on building muscle mass. More repetitions with lighter weights can build muscle as well as heavier weights -- assuming they are done to the point of exercise-induced fatigue.

What I believe you're referring to are the finer points, which are important if you're training for something specific, but for the scope of this thread, I think it's a bit much. If you think differently, please enlighten us.

[Arti]

Originally Posted by Kiro

http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercis...lds-muscle-too

This was the part I was referring to:



What I believe you're referring to are the finer points, which are important if you're training for something specific, but for the scope of this thread, I think it's a bit much. If you think differently, please enlighten us.

Yes, you can do the latter by doing higher reps with lower weight, but it's not time efficient. If you are capable of doing heavier weight with less reps, as long it's the same amount of work done (10 reps or 5 reps with double weight), then it doesn't matter as much, as long both workouts put enough stress in the body for an anaerobic response.

However, the amount of reps to the fatigue point do have a factor of what type of muscle is recruited. With higher reps, there will be more slow-twitch (or sacroplasmic) than fast-twitch (myofibillar) because the amount of lactic acid produced, and the latter from low, heavy reps due to the increased tension involved from the heavy load. The latter approach is also desirable as it provides more overall power, and simply makes you more efficient in what you do.

[Arbite]

Originally Posted by Kiro

http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercis...lds-muscle-too

This was the part I was referring to:



What I believe you're referring to are the finer points, which are important if you're training for something specific, but for the scope of this thread, I think it's a bit much. If you think differently, please enlighten us.

http://www.defrancostraining.com/art...ted-equal.html

Simply, low rep, high weight is just more functional and time efficient. Especially for a beginner.

For stomach excercizes. Crunches really aren't that useful. Planks and leg raises. Then graduate to hollow body holds and handstands (seriously works the core muscles), and if you're seriously hardcore, flags, dragon flags, and windscreen wipers.

The core muscles are there mainly for stabilization, they do their most effort when preventing you from moving, as opposed to a sit up style motion.

[Kiro]

Ignore this post.

[noogz256]

use weights to train( do not worry women can not become huge unless you take hormones), do HIIT, and just eat a little bit less. that should do it in a general sense