The Less is More Thread

[ergophobe]

A couple of additional thoughts on Tabatas

1. Those are just two exercise options (front squats and thrusters) and there might be better options if you have a bad knee. The original Tabata research was done on stationary bikes and the idea of that type of workout was developed by the Japanese Olympic speed skating team (not sure what they were doing, but pretty sure it wasn't front squats, probably biking or skating).

2. Go HARD. The essence of the Tabata is to go all out, no pacing yourself, during the work periods.

The key is something that will completely max you out, which makes sprinting hard (to hard to stop fast enough) and curls stupid (not enough big muscles) as Dan John says in the second article. If you don't feel like puking, aren't shaking in the legs, and feel ready to run off and hit the showers afterwards, you probably haven't gone hard enough. My wife's legs were shaking for a day and a half after her first try (and she's pretty fit -- e.g. skate skied 11 miles the weekend before). I basically collapsed on the incline bench for five minutes. When I got up and thought I'd just do a couple of ab exercises before leaving, I almost puked.

So far, my wife has tried bodyweight jump squats, a weird "skater" thing (essentially jumping laterally with a crossover). She  was broken for a few days after the skater thing. I've done the thrusters.

3. GO LIGHT!
Dan John says Tabata thrusters with a 35-pound weight is a *hard* workout and he's a guy who chucks a discuss 55m and has a lifetime of Olympic lifting heavy. Very heavy. After my experience with the thrusters - starting with 20 pound dumbbells and having to bump down. By the 10th round, I was on five-pounders (which was too light, but crazy as it seems, 10s were getting to heavy). Take a weight that you would do for a normal 10 reps, say, and divide by three or four for a good Tabata starting weight.

For my first time doing Tabata front squats, I would probably go with just the bar (especially as I don't have a squat rack, so I have to hold it throughout). Doing the thrusters with hardly any weight, my legs were getting flamed from what were pretty much bodyweight squats at the end.

4. Front squats are way safer than back squats and you'll be doing them very light and very fast. So the chance of injury is a lot less than when going heavy.

5. Have FUN in that weird, suffering sort of way. It's only 4-6 minutes and you can put up with a lot of hurt for that long.

[Drastic]

Well I'm finally back to losing again. Things were staying stagnant in the 210-211 range.

Hit 205 this week and dropped a belt hole to boot!

I think the key for me is eating little to no carbs after dinner. I'd gotten into a bad habit of snaking on chips & dip or similar around or after 10pm. With more and smaller meals throughout the day I kept on through the evening.

Now that I've cut that back and mostly eating nuts or dried fruit late evening, the pounds are dropping again.

[Rumbas]

>key for me is eating little to no carbs after dinner. I'd gotten into a bad habit of snaking on chips & dip or similar around or after 10pm

Same here. I have a really nasty habit of eating way too late in the evening - usually right before bed. However staying away from carbs and fat and only doing fruits, wegs, serial etc. does the trick.

Still fighting loosing total weight - mainly due to bad eating habits and heavy lifting.

[Drastic]

Yeah, I have this sugar craving that wants to be satisfied with carbs or sugar itself.

Amy makes this kind of nut crunch stuff which works great. Mixed raw nuts, a few berries, and molasses or maple syrup. Baked in a glass pan for 20-30 mins. Pretty healthy yet makes me happy.

Sad thing is I can remember not that many years ago eating ice cream every night at bed time and not gaining weight.

[littleman]

Temptation is tough man.  I try to avoid situations where food I love but I should not eat is being served.  My seven year old loves watching the "food network" and wanted to have cheese fondue with french bread and chocolate fondue for dessert for her birthday.  That kind of stuff is like crack for me -- very hard to resist.

Dras, you should be happy that you have a metabolism that allowed you to eat that way for so many years. 

[Drastic]

For the first time, just dropped below the target of 200 lbs.

Time to celebrate, I think I'll eat a cake.

[Rumbas]

Wow, congrats Ken! Good work there bro
I'm at 230, going hard for 220 and 200 long term.

[thesaintv12]

Nice one!  Keep at it.

[littleman]

Congrats!  You going to post a before/after?  I can't be the only one...

[Drastic]

Thanks all.

Yeah I thought about the before/after, but the before photo from the beach is pretty bad. Shirt off, pasty white - it's plain ugly.

[littleman]

HBO recently did a documentary series on the American obesity problem and they were good enough to put it online.

http://theweightofthenation.hbo.com/

On Youtube as well:
part one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pEkCbqN4uo
part two http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLv0Vsegmoo
part three http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T24B6T-hp0E
<edit>
part four http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmcZRgWBdwQ
</edit>

[Rumbas]

Been here in the US for about a week and I've seen some of the most obese people ever. On all my visits here, this one has been the worst, however I'm also seeing a lot more of the other extreme; excessive huge pumped guys and girls that seem to have sucked on a steroid pipe for too long.
Question is where are the normal people?

I see why Amercans get soo fat; fast food and calories everywhere all the time. Personally I would probably easily weigh 300 lbs if I lived here.

[littleman]

I think you got it right.  Fat is the new norm, so there really aren't any normal people.  For the most part we have those who are into fitness/muscle building and then there is everyone else.  It isn't just the fast food chains.  When you were in the States did you have a chance to look inside a grocery store?   Most of the space in the stores are filled with  isles of empty calories, candy, chips (crisps), cookies, pastries, salty snacks and sugary drinks -- stuff that taste good, but aren't really food.

My girls tell me about what their friends bring to school and it's unbelievable, almost everything is laden with sugar.  One of the causes is that the US subsidies corn production which means cheap high fructose corn syrup so HFCS or sugar work their way into virtually everything processed.  All the fast food restaurants are now pushing sweet 'coffee' & 'fruit' drinks on their customers, so I'm expecting this to add to the weight burden in the next five years.  Honestly, I think our collective gluttony is a much bigger problem than anyone is wiling to admit.

[2much]

Funny Dras that's exactly how I started eating about a year ago.  I'm down to 135 which is almost perfect for me.  130 would be ideal but almost too skinny.  I just avoid carbs in general, why tempt myself.  I only exercise about 30 min's 4-5 times a week and it's enough.

Talking about less is more.  I'm in the middle of moving to the "barn" which is the small house on the new property we bought.  Looking at the old house - I can't believe how much STUFF we have!  It's insane!

I'm going to be selling/giving away as much stuff as I can, and the new house will be minimalistic as heck, it's terrible to have SO MUCH STUFF.  Less is more is my new motto, starting this week!

[Drastic]

Been here in the US for about a week and I've seen some of the most obese people ever. On all my visits here, this one has been the worst, however I'm also seeing a lot more of the other extreme; excessive huge pumped guys and girls that seem to have sucked on a steroid pipe for too long.
Question is where are the normal people?

I see why Amercans get soo fat; fast food and calories everywhere all the time. Personally I would probably easily weigh 300 lbs if I lived here.

Tell me about it bro, it's the worst in the South. All that butter, oil and grease catch up to us. Trying to eat healthy at local restaurants is quite the challenge, you have to pick where to go carefully.

Funny Dras that's exactly how I started eating about a year ago.  I'm down to 135 which is almost perfect for me.  130 would be ideal but almost too skinny.  I just avoid carbs in general, why tempt myself.  I only exercise about 30 min's 4-5 times a week and it's enough.

Talking about less is more.  I'm in the middle of moving to the "barn" which is the small house on the new property we bought.  Looking at the old house - I can't believe how much STUFF we have!  It's insane!

I'm going to be selling/giving away as much stuff as I can, and the new house will be minimalistic as heck, it's terrible to have SO MUCH STUFF.  Less is more is my new motto, starting this week!

That's great! I've switched over to a mostly vegetarian diet around first of the year, going mostly vegan now. My diet is all about overall health rather than weight loss these days. I hear you on all that "stuff," I recently cleaned out the attic and have a couple closets to go. Put some on ebay and made about $1500, the rest went to charity and still have about a dozen items to sell. I'm loving the extra space in the storage areas. Good luck on the cleanup!