I am interested in starting BFL next week (hope to have all my energy back by then...got the flu Christmas Day). However I am a nurse and have a somewhat irregular schedule. I work 2 or 3 12-hour days a week. It will be difficult (but possible) to exercise before work, and impossible to exercise after work. Also I usually teach 3 water aerobics classes a week, 2 of them on the same day. I'm not sure if I should count these as my cardio or do the HIIT training in addition to them. I may try making my classes HIIT, but I'm not sure how that will work. This is my schedule for next week:

Sunday: off
Monday: work (7a-7p)
Tuesday: 8a teach water aerobics
12n Pilates class
Wednesday: work (7a-7p)
Thursday: work (7a-7p)
Friday: 8:30a teach water aerobics
4:30p teach water aerobics
Saturday: 10:15 yoga class

Any suggestions as to how to incorporate the BFL workouts into my schedule are welcome. I can work out on Sunday. Is it ok to do cardio and weights the same day? Has anyone tried the actual BFL diet? I am toying with that, but I really don't miss low-fat products. I would probably have to increase the fat anyway, I was always ravenous on the Zone diet.

Thanks in advance!

Jen

Hi, Jen

Glad to see you still on the board. For at least the first 4 weeks, I am going to do BFL by-the-book foodwise. My body needs a change. As for cardio and weights the same day, I don't know what the book says (they're on the way), but Nat did.

Cheers,

Friday

Hi Caver, How intense are your water aerobic classes? If they are considered moderate then go ahead and do your HIIT cardio in addition to the classes.

I know that there are people who have done BFL and do cardio the same day they do weights. I would recommend though your first challenge to do it as close to the book as possible.

As far as low fat is concerned, I hate low fat foods so my only change to the BFL foods list is to add healthy fats. Since you are familiar with Schwarzbein you could easily use her healthy fats list.

Good Luck!

Piano

Hi Jen, the advice I would give you is to do what you can. If you have to do both cardio and weights on the same day it's better to do weights first and then cardio. In fact the personal trainers at my gym teach people to double up like that.

I follow the eating for life method and I really like it. It's not *low fat* but low in saturated fats and modest amounts of good fats. (I eat about 2 Tbsp of natural peanut butter every day.) It's a lot like Schwarzbein except you can have artificial sugars if you wish and you aren't quite as liberal in adding fats to every meal! It's not quite as healthy and you don't have to be as strict about 100% whole wheat and whole grains. You make wise food decisions but if you add a few graham crackers or something with a bit of white flour (not 100% whole wheat) occasionally it seems to be ok. Also you are creating a calorie deficit but you split it up into 6 meals so you shouldn't be ravenous at all. It works out great for me and my husband.
Good luck!

sheri

I guess I'll just have to see how it goes. Getting up early enough to do a 45min workout before work will really be a challenge, but I guess I can try it by the book at first and modify it if need be. I checked out the BFL website. There wasn't much info about the diet (and that website is so poorly organized!), but I did find a calorie calculator. For my weight and goals it said to have 150g protein, 150g carbs and 33g fat. That's a little more protein and carbs and a LOT less fat than I'm eating now. In fact, I think I can easily eat 33g fat in one meal. So I think to start out I'll try to cut back on fat, especially saturated fat. Splitting 33g of fat over 6 meals gives me nightmares of my old low-fat days! But eating 30g carbs and protein for each meal and 20g carbs and protein for each snack sound pretty close to Schwartzbein. I'm just afraid if I add too much fat that with that level of carbs that I will gain weight.

Jen