Hey all, little question here... After only a few weeks into this passionate love affair with my new bike, I can see that there are lots of lovely muscles sprouting up where there was nothing but jiggly skin before . But when I weighed myself yesterday, I had gained about 3 kilos since I began riding (and light weight training + goofing around on my Swiss ball).

Now everyone says muscle weighs more than fat, so I understand that. But what is the ratio, as in, for each kilo of muscle gained, does that correspond to a certain amount of fat (or # of calories) burned? How do I know I'm not just getting muscles under my fat? I haven't actually had a weight problem, but recently quit smoking and wanted to prevent that possibility (plus I just turned 35 and I figure it's all downhill from here, right?).

Well, if anyone has the time an inclination to respond, I'd be most grateful.

Sara

Hi Sara!

The weight of muscles you gain does not correspond in any way to fat you burned, for example if you lift weights every day for like 30-40 minutes, you'll get big muscles but you will burn hardly any fat, in order to burn fat you have to exercise at least 90 minutes or so at certain heart capacity, I'm 22, and it is 150 beats per minute for me, if you're 40 it could be somewhere around 130 beats per minute, cycling is good aerobic fat burning sport, and if you ride for two-three hours each day at your working heart rate you'll burn fat and gain muscle tissue at the same time.
You won't loose much fat in 2-3 weeks of doing some sport, in order to loose some fat you need to exercise at least 5-6 month, and the most important thing is, if you eat a lot before training and you do the training for just like one hour, your body will first use those things, then the glycogen stored in muscles and at last start to burn fat, so that's why you have to exercise more than one hour to burn fat, glycogen-reserves stored in muscles must be exhausted and that process takes a while.

Thanks for the good answer, so yes, I basically could just be making muscle under the fat layer (yikes!)...

Well, I'm far from 2-3 hour training everyday... this morning it was about 2 ours, but usually I don't have that much time. But I'm also watching what I eat, and I hope that through the sheer force of getting on the bike and moving my tail everyday a great deal more than I ever have before I'll drop the minor accumulations I've made over the years ! and keep my curves in the right places.

What do you think about "gentle revolutions" my young friend? Build the muscle, and they will come? Won't extra muscles in and of themselves burn extra calories for me? Just how scary are additional kils on the scale at this point?

Thanks for your help!

Sara

That is true about the not burning fat bit but women are very unlikely to get "big muscles".

The more muscle you have the higher your metabolism. For every extra kilogram of lean muscle you have you burn 50 calories at rest per day. Therefore you may not be directly burning fat while lifting weights but when you go to sit down to do nothing you will be burning more calories. If you burn enough calories ie more than you consume it will begin using fat as an energy source.

This is why sprint athletes eg Maurice Green, Tim Montgomery are so lean. They don't run 5km a day at 60 - 70%HRM to burn the fat off their body as this would be detrimental to their sprinting.

So u can lose weight by sitting on your ass!

Jonny

"So u can lose weight by sitting on your ass! "

Now see there, that's what I wanted to hear, 'cause I can see them muscles growing, but I don't think I have time to train aerobically for hours everyday. So if I can keep doing what I'm doing, and keep away from the beer and the chips, and eat all my veggies, I ought to be able to make some improvement without too much pain. Atleast I'll have enough muscle to hold the fat up nicely!


Sara

Sara...yetrox is totaly off the track, that persons not even in the same park...take a leaf out of ol Jonny's book he's on the right track!! He's hit the nail on the head. Strength work burns more 'fat' after the work out compared to that of aerobic work, as for the 'fat burning zone' that is a misconseption. Any form of exercise will use energy, the more you do and the harder you go the more used..i guess you could compare it to a car. When you drive the dame thing it will use petrol/fuel. The more you put your foot down on the accelerator the faster you go and the more fuel it burns...

With a good exercise program and right diet It wont be too long till your all taught and there will be very little jiggly bits....even if you are 35!! lol.

__________________
Girl who go camping must beware of evil intent

Thanks for the encouragement there! In any case, I can already see a big difference in the month or so I've been at it, and I actually think there's a little of the jiggle I'd like to keep!

Is it true what they say about people from the Gold Coast?

Sara

Pacesetter is correct. Just the process of rebulding muscle tissue from anaerobic exercise (which is done at rest) burns some amount of fat although not as much as aerobic exercise does. I've been weight training for many years and I was always able to maintain a fairly low body fat level (though not as low as some of these cyclists) without any aerobic exercise at all as long as I maintained a decent diet. When I tighten up my diet a little more and add aerobic exercise I see very visible results within 1 month and I am 40 years old (it should not take 5-6 months to see results as was stated previously). Usually what happens with me is that I see an almost immediate drop in weight since fat burns faster than muscle builds. Over time though the weight starts coming slowly back up as I build muscle however I'm still much leaner.

I pretty new to cycling and "serious" aerobic training so I can't really comment too much on that. I recently started cycling because I have bad knees from my earlier years and cycling doesn't seem to bother them at all. I've cut back my weight training to mostly just upperbody and am concentrating on cycling for my legs, heart and midsection. So far I'm really pleased with the results (especially in the midsection) although I need more time to know if this is going to be a good long term solution for me.

Matt

I only know what happened to me, and I wasn't even trying to lose weight (which is the really weird thing of it all.)

I was heavily into cycling years ago, then got away from it (and got into eating all the wrong stuff). To make a long story short I went from about 125 lbs years ago to 305 lbs until 2001.

I got hooked on stationary recumbent exercise cycling, working up from 5 mins a day (3 years ago) to (now) 90 mins a day 6 days a week. I also switched to a lowerfat diet as a way of controlling some Gastrointestinal problems I have called IBS.

The result? I now weight 135 lbs (5 ft 6 in)...a loss so far of about 170 lbs. Just from stationary cycling, regular cycling (which I returned to a few months ago), and eating right. No diets, nothing. Just permanently changing my life to be more active and healthier. I also incporporate my regular bikes into my daily lifestyle (I use my bikes to run all errands, go to the doctor, etc). I dont know how to drive a car and use my bike instead.

__________________
"He who conquers himself is the mightiest warrior"--Confucius

Seems like you did it the right way? Its a shame its not got any extreme ideas otherwise you could write it up as a book and make a mint. Perhaps if you called it 'the enjoy life, lose weight and control poor health diet' you could convert some of the 'no carb' junkies!

>>>


Yes. I unwisely mentioned on another forum the same thing I just did here, and was DELUGED with emails from ppl begging me to help them lose weight (most had far less to lose than I lost.) I didnt know what to tell them...they evidently were looking for some magic bullet solution, when I could only tell them what I did and they acted like, "Is that it?"

__________________
"He who conquers himself is the mightiest warrior"--Confucius

They should ask themselves how they put their weight on in the first place, probably by doing things oppersite to you. Not exercising and eating poorly; its not hard to see where they went wrong.

Three simple things have to be in place: Diet, cardiovascular exercise, and resistance training (weights).
The dude who lost so much weight did this and had success. THAT IS the magic bullet(s).

Any questions on your particular situation or if anyone else has any questions feel free to email me or check out my website:www.intellifitinc.com

Cheers!