Need to lose 40 lbs

[n8tivva]

I lost 25 lbs then gained it back plus some in the past 2 years. As long as I played tennis/softball and body build (weight trained) I was an ideal weight. But when age catches up, with your back and knees aching along with family responsibilities and work (lets just say life) my metabolism slowed down to nothing. It's not the over eating , but the skipping meals. I'm busy at work skipping meals then before you know it, I getting home late and then I'm eating late. Usually too tired now to fix something healthy so it's whatever I can pick up and eat because I'm so hungry. My issues: skip meals, don't exercise anymore because I'm just too tired, don't eat right (the weekends only when I can find the time to fix food outside of other responsibilities), choose wrong foods when starving. I've been reading about raw food lifestyle for about 2 years now. I've ventured into that but I'm not consistent. I need help. I need motivation and support to help me raech my goals and stick it out!!!!!

I received a rower as a gift about 4 years ago and barely used it. I was exposed to rowing at the Y. That's what started me on my weight loss initially. I started doing other things to stay active (walking 16 miles a week and softball until I bruised my knee). I say all that to say, I never used rowing exclusively and want to seriously get into it. I want to truely enjoy the gift that was given me.

Please Help!!!!

[gregsmith01748]

Hi,

I got into this about a year for the same reason as you, to lose weight. It worked like a champ, I lost fifty pounds. I'd be happy to help you plan out something.

It would be helpful if you could tell me a bit about yourself.

- How old are you?
- How much time per day and days per week are you willing to put into exercise?
- When you were rowing, did you like long and slower rowing or fast and short?
- Are you motivated by competing with others or by self improvement?

There are a bunch of different ways to go, knowing more about your situation will help give you better options.

[n8tivva]

Hi Greg,

Thank you for responding.

I'm 44 at 5' 0". First I must start out by saying that I desire to be healthy and physically fit again. That being said, the weight loss I'm sure will happen.

- I can dedicate 2 hours 5 days a week for now.
- To be clear I haven't used my rower no where near what I should have (maybe 30 times since 1/07 wehn I received it). So it's still pretty new. I rowed prior to at the Y 3 to 4 times a week for 45 minutes to 1 hour. So when I got my own I barely did that. Here are few readings I retrieved from memory:

Time Meter /500m s/m
32:09:1 5000 3:12.9 30
31:39:5 5000 3:09.9 31
30:06:5 4095 3:40.5 27

I'm no where near this now (not that it good ) I would say long and slow (if that's slow...I don't know anything about the rowing nomenclature, different styles etc). The damper setting is at 3 and I would say I just row using the timer 95% of the time.

- I'm motivated by competing with others. That really gets me going especially when I haven't exercised in a long time. I have that " I know I can do that" attitude when I see someone else exercising and it looks easy to me. I find out quickly otherwise. But it pushes me. I'm not a quitter.

I hope I answered your questions. A little wordy I know...

[Citroen]

Try this: http://concept2.co.uk/weightloss/interactive

[Junebug]

Hi Greg,

I was in the same situation 10 months ago. I was 48yo and 5'10" and 217 lbs and competely out of shape. My wife bought me a low end erg and I just started rowing based on the interactive weightloss program at this link:

http://concept2.co.uk/weightloss/interactive

I will tell you that I wore out that cheap erg my wife had bought me in about 4 months and found a used C2 on craigslist and have not looked back. As of today I am at 175lbs, my blood pressure is way down, I am off my colesterol meds and my blood work perfect and I feel terrific with energy that last from 5 am till I go to bed!

I did change my eating habits considerably and did find some interest in a raw food diet for a few months. I still take in a good protion of raw foods but mostly just eat wisely. Chick, fish, whole grains and lots of fruit and raw veggies! Gave up all white flour, most sugar, soda and milk and drink water most of the time.

All this in has been done with no more than one hour of rowing a day 5 days a week and some strengh work. About 5 months into my plan I added three days of strength training. ONe day of only ab and core work, two days of whole body work like pushups, pull ups, medicine ball work, Burpies, etc...and I have now cut back my rowing to 3-4 days a week and added two days of spin bike and increased my core work to two days a week. ( I do my core and ab work on my spin bike days).

I started to increase my strength and core work when I hit the 189lb mark because I was kind of stuck at that weight for a few weeks. Since I increased the strength work I have shed another 14 lbs and am now trying to get the last 5-6 lbs off to get where I really want to be. 170# is my goal.

So what you will see from my plan I have dropped about 1# a week on average for the past 44 weeks or so. I didnt ever starve myself, I just filled up on healthy high fiber foods. Made sure my fat intake was always less than 30% of my daily intake and eat health lean protien. I reduced my portion size more than anything and still to this day drink 12 oz of water before any meal to help fill me up. I dont really deny myself to much, I mean I did give up the use of sugar like in my coffee and in my iced tea but I still will have a slice of apple pie when my wife cooks one, or I will still take the kids out for ice cream on occassion. I still like to have an italian ice after a long bike ride as well. But I just dont do that every day. maybe one day a week or so.

What I found when I started feeling healthier and losing some weight is my energy to do other activities increased as well. I used to take my daughter to swim team practice and watch her swim, now I swim in the open swim pool while she is practicing. Or when I took her to soccer practice I will ride my bike around the park at a fairly high intensity for that hour so that just burns another 4-500 calories that day and keeps me ahead of the curve !!!

Ultimatley it has become FUN to stay in shape and healthy and it pays huge dividends in both my personal and professional life !!!

I wish you all the luck in your journey and will support you in any way I can !! If there is anything I can help you with give me a shout!

Matt

[gregsmith01748]

Hi N8tivva,

As a couple of people pointed out, the UK weight loss plan is a really good option. It is interactive, and can be setup for the number of sessions you want. But, let's take a step back.

First a few housekeeping items.

There are four things to consider when you sit down to row on the erg.
1. Your form. Review the videos online and make sure that you are concentrating on emulating that style. If you are going to ramp up your volume, you will putting a lot of stress on your back and other parts if you have a problem with form.
2. The drag factor. You said that you rowed with the lever on "3". Since the drag of a machine changes (by a fair amount) as the flywheel gathers dust, you'll want to check the drag factor. There are instructions on how to do this for the different kinds of PMs on the website. I tend to do distance work between 115 and 120, but others have different views on this.
3. Stroke rate. When I started I used to row at high SPM (like above 30), then I started following this forum and reading some training plans, and I saw that more experienced folks were rowing at lower rates, but going just as fast. They were pulling a lot harder and going more meters per stroke. When doing long distances, my stroke rates can range from 16 to 24 SPM.
4. Speed. This is usually expressed in 500m split time. This is highly individualized, and I'll bet you see rapid improvements in split times while keeping stroke rates the same, as you build up your meters rowed.

The common theme of all weight loss plans is that you increase the number of calories you burn above what you eat. There are 3500 calories per pound of fat, so between diet an exercise, the difference per week will roughly line up with weightg you lose. There is a good calculator on the concept2 website to calculate how many calories you burn from rowing. A key thing to keep in mind is that the power required increases as the cube of speed, so the faster your splits, the more calories you burn per unit of time.

Another common theme in many programs is the concept of heart rate training bands. It is well explained on the UK site. The important thing is that your body tends to burn fat for energy at below a certain aerobic threshold. That's why most weight loss programs focus on lots of time rowing at 70% to 80% of your maximum heart rate.


Weight loss plan options:
1. The interactive UK weight loss program. Pretty gentle, but includes a nice mix of short and mid length intervals. The UK programs tend to focus on workouts measured in time, some others focus on distance. Which works better is a matter of taste.
2. Rowing for weight control (on the US concept2 website). A general guideline that helps you develop your own program of workouts. Has some very useful background and a good set of workouots to get started. Less ambititous than the UK interactive program
3. Interactive 2K training program. Although this is a program to train for speed, it was what I ended up doing for a few months when I was getting going. The work volume was higher that the weight loss programs and I found training to go faster a big motivator. Again, the workout are mostly focused on time, not distance.
4. RowPro. An software package that allows you to network your erg and race online with folks at your ability level. I've never used it, but there are some very positive advocates for the program on the forum who would be thrilled to describe it and entice you into joining it.
5. Other structured programs (including the Wolverine Plan, Pete Plan, Pete's beginner plan). These are higher volume programs with a more set structure, designed to help you row faster. It's hard tp avoid losing weight using the programs, but I think that you're best off starting with one of the UK interactive programs first, because these programs can be demanding and frustrating enough to really turn you off if you go at it too hard.

Things you might want to do:
1. Do a 2K test. A lot of training plans base the rates at which you row off of your best 2K time. I did this, and after I had improved a little on my own, I started posting it on the online logbook. I really got off on watching my rankings go up as I got faster over the months.

2. Consider buying a heart rate monitor. I did and it was really valuable for the UK plans, which are prescribed as a fraction of maximum heart rate. They also give you a pretty accurate calorie count based on body weight, heart rate and exercise time.

3. Figure out your maximum heart rate. There are age based formulas which are probably close enough. If you are at all worried about cardiac health, or have a family history (like I do), you might consider a stress test. When I did, I discovered that my high blood pressure was poorly controlled during exercise and my doctor adjusted my meds.

4. Start logging your workouts on the concept2 online log book. It might sound ridiculous, but the day I got my 1 million meter tee-shirt, I was absurdly proud of myself. It is also useful to see long term trends and improvement.

Good luck, and keep posting with questions and updates. I bet you'll do great.

[Bob S.]

Hi N8tivva,

As a couple of people pointed out, the UK weight loss plan is a really good option. It is interactive, and can be setup for the number of sessions you want. But, let's take a step back.

3. Stroke rate. When I started I used to row at high SPM (like above 30), then I started following this forum and reading some training plans, and I saw that more experienced folks were rowing at lower rates, but going just as fast. They were pulling a lot harder and going more meters per stroke. When doing long distances, my stroke rates can range from 16 to 24 SPM.
Good luck, and keep posting with questions and updates. I bet you'll do great.

An excellent response Greg, but I would like to point out one thing. N8tivva reported a height of 5'0" and spms of 30, 31, and 27. Now I am an advocate of low rate rowing and do most of my own long distance stuff at 20spm, but I am 5'10 1/2" (shrunk down from 6'1" a few decades ago). For a 5' rower, rating in the high 20s is probably about right. It also depends on limb length, of course. For any particular height, a high ratio of torso length to limb length would suggest a higher rating than the reverse.

Bob S.

[gregsmith01748]

Good point Bob, I hadn't thought through that completely. Actually, I didn't know it was that dependent on height. Thanks for straightening me out.

[n8tivva]

Thank you everyone for your advice. I'm going to start with the UK interactive site and go from there. I do have a questions. Because I am "green" with the rowing terminology, Can someone break down what this should mean to me.

Week 1 2 x 11' UT2

I understand UT2 but what is the rest saying 2 sets of what?

Thanks again for everyones help.

N8TIVVA

[woody350ep]

Week 1 2 x 11' UT2

How I read that is Week 1: - 2 sets of 11 minutes long at UT2 pace

[n8tivva]

Jason,

Thanks for the interpretation!!

n8tivva

[Bob S.]

Good point Bob, I hadn't thought through that completely. Actually, I didn't know it was that dependent on height. Thanks for straightening me out.

It is mainly a matter of stroke length and that is a combination of seat travel from the vertical shin position to straight legs, body - swing assuming normal angles off vertical at the catch and finish, and finally the arm pull - assuming normal technique. These three contributions are, of course, determined by leg length, torso length, and arm length respectively. Another factor is that the shorter person is more likely to weigh less and would have less of a penalty resulting from acceleration and deceleration of the body at high rates.

Height itself is a bit tricky, since it has three components, heel to hip, hip to shoulder, and shoulder to the top of the head. The ratios of these vary quit a bit, especially the leg to torso ratio, which are the components which are involved. I suppose that it would be possible to work out how much each contributes to stroke length for varying ratios and some fixed angle for body swing, but I am too lazy to attempt that. NavHaz could probably do a good job on that. He has the know-how to measure body swing angles from videos and could come up with a good average figure for those (15-20 degrees each way? - that would be my guess). Another complication is shoulder movement, fore and aft. My guess is that it contributes a couple of inches of stroke length.

Bob S.

[Bob S.]

Week 1 2 x 11' UT2

How I read that is Week 1: - 2 sets of 11 minutes long at UT2 pace

The one thing left out of that directive is the amount of time to rest in between. That is probably given in a table somewhere else in the program. One suggestion I have seen was to wait until the heart rate has dropped to double the resting heart rate, but that was for intervals and might not apply to UT2 pieces. For this particular workout, 5-6 minutes is probably plenty of time to allow between the two pieces and far more than enough to have the heart beat drop down to double the resting rate.

I haven't looked at the weight loss interactive program specifically, but I assume that it gives the usual advice about warming up and cooling down.

Bob S.

[gregsmith01748]

I just looked it up in the UK weight loss plan. As you thought, they recommend recovery to 2x resting heart rate between intervals for all workouts in the program.

Another "Oh, by the way" down at the bottom, they recommend between 5 and 20 minutes of warm up and the same for cool down depending on the type of workout, where the warm up is at an intensity to bring your heart rate to that same magic 2x rate. That could add some serious time (and meters) to the workouts. For some of the TR workouts in the plan you'd spend 15 minutes warming up, 16 minutes (plus rest time between intervals) in the core of the workout, and 15 minutes cooling down. I warm up for a long time (20 minutes) before I do intense interval work, and I do a cool down after those workouts, but I don't really see the point for distance work. So, what they recommend seems a bit long to me, but the people who put the plan together know a hell of a lot more about this stuff than I do.

[tom pinckney]

Jobs: yep - we need them to eat. However, many of us work too hard thinking our "employer appreciates it." Do the best you can and give them what they deserve. However, when you're gone, a week later people will already be forgetting your name. A job pays the bills. If you like it - that's fine. However, don't let your job kill you because you have nothing else. It's just not worth it.

Exercise: Why not just keep things simple? Get on the erg on a regular basis and you'll get better and better. I remember going to the gym and wondered: "how come I'm rowing just as hard (or harder) than others and they seem to be going faster (500 split times) then me?" It was a combination of "stroking too fast" and poor form.

I found a rowing coach on this forum, went to him for instructions (he charged me nothing) and am now more efficient at rowing than before.

One of the things I notice others (that don't know how to row) doing is setting the damper setting at its' max. For long rows, this wears out most people. Make sure to set the damper in the 4 1/2 range. This is similar to on-water rowing and much more enjoyable. If you do something enjoyable, you'll continue to do it.

Keep records: write stuff down. Try to do better at your pace and don't compare yourself to others. Compete with yourself. Join an online team and do the challenges. It helps keep up the interest. If you have a time problem, you can always get up 30 minutes early and row before work. It will energize you and make you feel better all day. Tired after work: exercising will stimualte you and make you feel better. You're body will tell you it likes it!! Success breeds success.

Diets don't work: yep - you will lose weight dieting, but over the long haul you need to change your lifestyle so that your eating habits are healthful all of the time. You just can't starve yourself all of the time and you gotta give yourself a break once in a while. Eat healthy and you can succeed. Eat five-six meals (the same amount of food as in three big meals) a day and you'll feel better all of the time. Carry your lunch/snacks with you as much as you can. Controlling your food will result in more healthy eating and (most likely) save you money.

Weight training: have a problem with time: there's a book out - Ten Minute Workouts. You can do these workouts wherever you go with very little (or no) equipment. Many of the exercises are using your own bodyweight. It's a terrific book.

MAKE TIME TO WORK OUT: You can find time to workout - a little here and there is better than nothing at all. As you begin to feel (and look) better, you will begin to enjoy it more and look forward to it. I'd rather work out now than have to find the time later for visits to the doctor. You owe it to yourself and your family to be healthy.

Summary: your lifestyle should be three-fold (actually four): weight training, an aerobic activity & eating properly. The fourth? - get plenty of sleep.