Space Age Playboy
Banned
I'm looking for a workout program that will improve my muscle tone, not really put on a lot of mass. Any Gaffers have experience with a program that works well?
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Muscle-toning workout
- Thread starter Space Age Playboy
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There a number of things you could do. If you have a gym available to you, mix in a cardio program like running with weight training, but focus more on high rep and low/moderate weight rather than heavy weights. Otherwise, swimming and/or running are great for general toning, alongside a few exercises you could do on the side, like push-ups, pull-ups, crunches, and so on, just to strengthen muscles. Of course, eating healthier, particularly by reducing your saturated fat intake and exercising frequently to help boost your metabolism will be key to bringing the muscle definition out.
Ninja Scooter
Member
whytemyke said:
i can vouch for this. I did light weight workouts more out of neccesity (i only had 100lbs of weights to work with) but after only a couple of weeks i had way more definition in my arms and chest. I basically did weights 3 times a week, and tried to do some type of cardio every day.
Liu Kang Baking A Pie
Member
I'd say do the opposite for your stomach. Do low reps and really push every crunch and ab workout for maximum pull. If you do too many reps on your abs, it'll start to grow out and build the muscle instead of toning it, just like how your biceps and chest muscles get larger.
A defined, low-mass body is 3/4ths diet. Cut down on saturated fats, sugars, carbs, etc. and go for the good fats. You can look that up online to get a good diet for that. Start taking whey protein supplements.
A defined, low-mass body is 3/4ths diet. Cut down on saturated fats, sugars, carbs, etc. and go for the good fats. You can look that up online to get a good diet for that. Start taking whey protein supplements.
Space Age Playboy
Banned
Thanks for the advice so far. One more question, is it OK to work out a muscle group more times per week when toning, or should I still get plenty of rest days before I repeat a specific exercise?
Liu Kang Baking A Pie
Member
Your muscles won't be torn up and need to be repaired and rebuilt from doing heavy lifting, so you should be fine. I'd go two days of hard cardio and workouts (focus on a different body part for each day, but do a general overall cardio workout for your whole body both days) and then rest for a day.Space Age Playboy said:
Your diet is the most important thing, actually. Tons of cardio won't make up for bad eating, but little cardio will be fine with a very specific diet. I don't know your diet right now, but if you're looking to tone, you're going to have to eliminate as much of the fat layer around your body as you can to show off that tone. Lots of cardio and eating well will put your metabolism through the roof and give you results really fast. Don't go on any sort of restrictive diet, just make sure you don't take in too many empty calories and saturated fats and you'll be good. There's lots of info on this around the net if you want to get really specific about what to eat and when to eat it.
FreakyFink
Member
My trainer talked me into strength endurance training. Now I do a lot less machines and more free exercises, weights are down to 40% of my personal maximum, 25-30 reps, same amount of sets (3-5), 3 days a week, 2 muscle groups per trainings day and that 8 weeks. I'm in my fifth week and I gotta say, it's freekin demanding. I've talked to a few people and found out, that a lot people (at my gym that is) quit after 2 weeks. It's kinda interesting how the body reacts to the different training approach, the reps between 25-30 are the hardest, but pushing yourself to do the extra reps while your body screams "NO!!!" is a bit more painful, but more do-able. No DOMS after the training so far, but a heavy, afterglowing tiredness for around 48h. My bodyfat was ~15% (lower body) and ~12% (upper body) before I switched, now it's down to 10-12% after 4-5 weeks. Oh ... and 30-60min cardio on non-weight-lifting days twice a week.
OpinionatedCyborg
Member
Less fat = better tone. Focus on cardio to lose fat and excess weight, then begin building muscles if you want to be buff.
Space Age Playboy said:
Toning your muscles. God that is hilarious. How do you tone your muscles? Toning is just some buzzword gyms invented so that women would not feel intimidated with exercise.
You already have muscles, you can't tone them. You can increase their size, decrease, or maintain them. You can lose the fat around the muscle which would make it look a lot cooler.
So you want weightloss. Just walk an hour everyday and try and get further everytime. Working out will just make you burn sugar and make you hungry.
LOL great advice you are giving him. Running and swimming are going to burn up so much sugar your body is going to be begging for food. Personal trainers want you to do more reps at less weights because it burns more sugar. No sugar = hungry. Hungry = eat food. You probably have shit food or fast food, which means you get fatter.
The only way to burn fat is very low intensity for a long time. Walking is the cheapest way and god help you if you get a fat man jogging.
LOL I love it when clueless GAFers give advice. No wait do the increased reps and running and see what happens. LOL you will get toned.
ChryZ said:
LOL did you know that even the best manual body fat measurements have a +/- of at least 10% points. So ask your pro trainer that next time you go. LOL. Who knows maybe you will have 5% body fat if you pay him enough.
LOL 25-30 reps what a retard trainer you have. That is just going to fuck up your lactic acid levels. If you have lactic acid you can't work out at full capacity. No pain = No gain is so noob. You should ask around for a real trainer, not some noob.
Cauliflower of Love
Banned
OpinionatedCyborg said:
The truth.
Cauliflower of Love
Banned
acidviper said:
Fat has alot to do with tone. You said it yourself a couple posts back.
That's toning. Letting the definition of your muscle show. (To me at least)
About the cardio, I'm not well versed in that.
oh yeah, :lol at the noob in a fitness discussion.
Nice trolling, anyway for the record: the body fat measurement was not manual, lactic acid soreness was never a problem to me, you might wanna read up on the subject ( http://www.cytosport.com/science/lacticacid.html ). All this crap aside, the topic was "Muscle-toning workout" and what I described above worked for me. I lost body fat ... visible, muscles appear more visibly. Bottom line, you can't argue with resultsacidviper said:
acidviper: Just wondering, you said with running your body will burn off your sugars as they are your most readily available energy source, which yeah makes perfect sense. What I don't get is, it seems you're implying walking will burn fats over sugars, and so is better than running. Why would your body, when at low intensity, burn fats over sugars? Seems to me, it wouldn't matter - your body will first burn off sugars and then move on into burning fats/producing ketone bodies/gluconeogenesis/whatever.
The Bookerman
Member
I do drop sets.... A rep is a two step thing with drop sets: 8 reps with full weight, drop by half the weight, do 12 more. 3 sets should do it.
Works great.... I work up a sweat while I didn't do before when I trained.
It'll work on your cardio, TRUST ME.
Aside from that, I dropped the sodas, candy bars. I lost 10 lbs in a month.
Now I'm slowly moving to my target weight.
Works great.... I work up a sweat while I didn't do before when I trained.
It'll work on your cardio, TRUST ME.
Aside from that, I dropped the sodas, candy bars. I lost 10 lbs in a month.
Now I'm slowly moving to my target weight.
Oh lord, so much misinformation in this thread my heads going to explode.
Toning (or making your muscle more visible) is achieved by only one thing. Reducing your body fat level. The more fat you lose, the more visible your muscles will become. How do you lose the fat, high intensity short duration cardio. This kinda cardio not only burns calories, but also increases your metabolic rate, making your body use up calories at a faster rate. And no walking will not do it LOL! hahaha that was a good one btw, had me laughing for a while.
Another big aspect of losing fat and keeping it off is a reasonably calorie restricted diet. If you consume less calories a day than you burn, you will burn fat. Its that simple. Also, it is very important that you eat right after the cardio workout. A meal that can't be skipped, its just as important as eating right after weighting lifting.
Also, about weight lifting in itself and how it can help u get toned, forget the old myth of light weights and high reps. Its pure bullshit. Once you understand the concept of getting "toned" is just to lose the fat, you will start to see why high reps and light weights are a waste of your time. If you are going to be lifting weights to get more tone, just do heavy weights and low reps. The concept behind this is simple, your muscles will get bigger, (not crazy big because to do that, its very hard ask any bodybuilder) but big enough that you can see them easier. You keep doing it until u get to the point where you like the size and tone you have gained. Err...i'm sure i probably missed some stuff but some linked to the other thread, i'm too lazy to write all that over again. Just go read there.
Toning (or making your muscle more visible) is achieved by only one thing. Reducing your body fat level. The more fat you lose, the more visible your muscles will become. How do you lose the fat, high intensity short duration cardio. This kinda cardio not only burns calories, but also increases your metabolic rate, making your body use up calories at a faster rate. And no walking will not do it LOL! hahaha that was a good one btw, had me laughing for a while.
Another big aspect of losing fat and keeping it off is a reasonably calorie restricted diet. If you consume less calories a day than you burn, you will burn fat. Its that simple. Also, it is very important that you eat right after the cardio workout. A meal that can't be skipped, its just as important as eating right after weighting lifting.
Also, about weight lifting in itself and how it can help u get toned, forget the old myth of light weights and high reps. Its pure bullshit. Once you understand the concept of getting "toned" is just to lose the fat, you will start to see why high reps and light weights are a waste of your time. If you are going to be lifting weights to get more tone, just do heavy weights and low reps. The concept behind this is simple, your muscles will get bigger, (not crazy big because to do that, its very hard ask any bodybuilder) but big enough that you can see them easier. You keep doing it until u get to the point where you like the size and tone you have gained. Err...i'm sure i probably missed some stuff but some linked to the other thread, i'm too lazy to write all that over again. Just go read there.
Diet is very important. The timing of the type of carbohydrates that you will make an impact. Try to eat carbs with a low Glycemic Index except for after a workout.
Here is a good article on the subject from GNC's website.
Examining The Rights and Wrongs of Carbohydrates with the Glycemic Index
After you've worked out, take a whey protein shake.
Using a high quality meal replacement powder I think is one of the most practicle things you can do diet wise to help you. Most people aren't going to eat a 3 or more perfect meals in a day. Who has the time to prepare 3 healthy meals every day? A MRP simplifies things a lot imho. And when you aren't consuming a MRP, try to eat smart.
Here is a good article on the subject from GNC's website.
Examining The Rights and Wrongs of Carbohydrates with the Glycemic Index
After you've worked out, take a whey protein shake.
Using a high quality meal replacement powder I think is one of the most practicle things you can do diet wise to help you. Most people aren't going to eat a 3 or more perfect meals in a day. Who has the time to prepare 3 healthy meals every day? A MRP simplifies things a lot imho. And when you aren't consuming a MRP, try to eat smart.
FreakyFink
Member
boutrosinit
Street Fighter IV World Champion
acidviper said:
Acidviper. You talk with much confidence. What is it you do for a living?
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