Built,

How much is "a LOT of cardio"? and did you try a split like 80% cardio and 20% upper body resistence training to maintain your upper body musculature while reducing the rest of your mass?

And could you clarify for me exactly what your goals are now? You want to maintain your leg mass but reduce what? exactly?

J

I will answer for myself as I am in the same situation as built and was interested in your answer. There is a layer of fat on my legs that shows up as cellulite, my legs are pretty muscular and I have a nice thigh quad separation, but the fat clings to the front of my quads and around the knees, and the calf area... not so much on the hams. How would you go about getting rid of that fluff without sacrificing muscle mass on top. Do you have to just try and get down to a bodyfat level that makes it acceptabe, and then do a clean bulk to add back on some muscle mass that is lost in that process... or am I just destined to have some fluff as that is where my body wants to keep its fat.

Oh, Hi lowcarbj, thanks for the post. Vanity, if this is too much of a threadjack, say the word and I'll move it out of here and into my journal.

I was doing about 3 bike rides a week (1.5 hours at a time, not steady the whole time - I coast down hills, hammer up them, so it's kinda like informal recreational HIIT), and a few walks.

I had to cut this down to 1 or 2 rides every week or two, and some walking. I was LITERALLY getting nowhere.

And I like to keep as much mass on my upper body as possible. I lift very hard.

edited to add: what are my goals? To have the same % bf on the bottom as the top, while remaining as muscular throughout as humanly possible.

actually she does a lot of weight training on top of dancing and i suspect she juices. actually, a lot of dancers do.

i like dispelling myths.

She does look like she juices.

LiftnLady,

If we are talking about pure tone, and not talking about reducing ones overall mass, it's a different approach.

The older we get, the thicker our fat layer naturally becomes. We also thicken the fat layer around our internal organs. It just comes with age.

You are showing a 20% body fat count and you could probably bring it down to 15%, in good health. And nothing replaces fat with muscle quite like resistence training, especially HIIT training.

Diet, Nutrition, harder workouts of both cardio and resistence training. Resistence training to replace fat with muscle with diet and cardio to burn the fat that your workouts can't get to.

J

Isn't this impossible?


....okay....but for women, as we age, while our testosterone and estrogen levels both decline, our estrogen levels decline FASTER, so our fat distribution changes to a more "male" pattern, which explains the belly fat and internal organ fat, and it also makes it easier to shed "estrogenic" fat as we get older.

yeah 15% would be nice and as Built says, to match the top and the bottom. I do not want to reduce muscle mass, just the fat on top, since any fat shows as the dreaded cellulite (which ismore about the connective tissue, but fat nonetheless). I am just starting NHE and trying to find the groove on proper cals, lifting and cardio at the moment, so we will see I guess. thanks for the feedback.

[QUOTE
i like dispelling myths.[/QUOTE]

party pooper :D

Okay Built,

I'm guessing that you were doing around 100 kilometers (62 miles) a week and minimal walking?

What is your BF% and your dimensions?

J

P.S. Yes, Built, they don't, actually convert, one replaces the other. Boy!, I have to mind my P's and Q's around you! :)

My pix are in my gallery.
Don't know % BF - guessing high teens upper, low 20s lower.
5'8", 137.5 last time I weighed.

These were my measurements at 143, when the pix were snapped:
calf: 15.5
thigh: 24.5
hip (low waist): 32
butt: 39
waist: 26.5
lower chest: 29
bust: 34
bicep: 12.5
My waist is down to 26 right now, haven't measured the rest, but I think the ass is down half an inch as well, thighs maybe a quarter.

No clue on the distances, but the walking was about an hour three times a week at a REASONABLE, but not intense pace.

Built,

On all of my radar screens, you are at perfection, for as far as I go. I show ideal lightest weight for your height as 135 lbs, you're virtually there! Body fat has got to be there! or extremely close! Measurements, there also!

Now...., I don't do athletic training. I don't have an athletic bone in my body, no balance, no coordination. I do help people who are over-weight get to a healthy and fit weight. You've already gone beyond the scope of my work, and some.

The only other thing that I can add is on the cardio. I am a century rider and a lot of my friends are, too. Die hard century riders will routinely log 100-200 miles per week and then do cardio at the gym on top of that. Now that's what I call "A LOT of cardio". And that amount of cardio is going to create a specific kind of body shape.

Great Work, Built.

J

P.S. Sure is easy to spend all day on this message board.

That amount of cardio would make me softer/looser and less muscular. I know this from personal experience.

I know it does NOT do this for all people, but it DOES for many of us. Just too damned much cortisol. I started holding BELLY fat, which had NEVER happened to me.

This is the frustration.

And I've been set up on programmes by well-intentioned trainers who have advised me to lift lighter or less, do less leg work, do more cardio, etc etc, but nothing has done as much for me as dropping down to about a third as much cardio as I was doing and cranking the iron HARD.

Thanks for the complements, and the suggestions. But you won't see me doing MORE low-level cardio. Probably more HIIT though. Not as catabolic, and does more to raise the metabolic rate. Not as boring, either. I bore VERY easily LOL.

Cheers

- Built

Deanna,

One more, final thought, and this has been in the back of my mind since you posted it, but no one was discussing it so I let it go.

For me, if I comsumed 60 grams of sugar and starch, daily, and followed your workout schedule, I would gain weight.

I found 20 gms of carbs per day a really effective guideline for allowing my body to find it's ideal weight. I added exercise and the process happened that much faster.

Now my body is at an ideal range of 164-167 lbs and can run very efficiently on 20 grams a day. I can consume higher amounts than that if I compensate with exercise. Roughly, for every 10 additional grams of carbs, I require 1 hour of exercise.

If I do "reducing" exercises, I can lose weight, down to my ideal weight range. If I do "building" exercises, I will maintain and tone.

I really like my recreational exercises so I no longer restrict my carbs to 20/day. Now I am around 50/day with an average of 3 hours/day of recreational exercise.

Hope that helps.

J.

but i think we're talking bodyfat and not weight... since muscle weighs more than fat.

and why are we talking sugar and starch? who's eating that?