Hi, my name is Travis and i just joined this site. I am overweight and i am trying to "shed" my pounds like everyone else, but for every person i ask how, i get a different response. For starters I am 21 years old, 5' 9", and weighed in at 188 lbs one minute ago. I played football my whole life and never had a problem with physical fitness until i was blessed with college and beer drinking and sitting in a classroom for 6 hours. Now i find myself looking in the mirror and wondering what happened. My legs are not in that bad of shape, meaning compared to the rest of my body, but my gut is way out of line, i have man boobs and a spare tire, and am tired of being fat. i am not going for a body builder physique and trying to get super huge but rather want to build a slight more muscle, but not much. What I am really going for is toning/shaping/cutting my upper body and dropping all my fat. My diet has been really horrible, but over the past two weeks i have made a drastic change. I went from eating 2 huge meals a day to 5 much smaller meals and quit drinking everything but water. I am eating lower fat, low carb meals, except 1 hour before i go to the gym (just started last week), i try to eat some pasta or bread or something of the sort to try and give me some energy. I have had people tell me the best way is to build it up big with higher weight and lower reps (5-7) and i have had people tell me to do a ton of cardio on a treadmill and do as many as 100 reps at a time. I was hoping maybe on this site i would get better (meaning makes sense) advice on how to achieve my goals. I know there isnt one routine that works for everybody, but maybe a general idea as to what is going to help me, and what is going to hurt me. Also, as for my diet, am i on the right track, or if not, what should i change to fit my needs? Any and all help would be greatly appreciated. Sorry its so long, and thanks for reading. Travis.

Hey Travis. Welcome to the crazy world of diet and fitness. Everyone will tell you that they have "the way" that things work and they're all different ... as you've found out.

However, as you do your research and read from valid sources (not just friends and people who want to give advice), you'll find that there are some constants. I've been doing this for over 2 years now - lost 80 lbs, learned to lift weights properly, built muscle, now I'm learning to distance run. It's fun ... but it's taken me that long to wade through the bullshit (if you'll excuse the language) and get to the meat of the matter.

The first thing that I'll get right out there is that there's no such thing as "toning" - not in the sense that most fitness centers and advertisements talk about. There are three things you can do with your muscle: build it, maintain it, or shrink it. Period. "Toning" muscle is a myth that was created by lazy trainers who wanted to pander to their clients who don't want to lift weights or who are afraid of getting "bulky". A real, professional trainer will tell you the same thing.

What most people mean when they say "tone" is to build some muscle (but not bulk up excessively) while cutting fat so that the muscle becomes visible under the skin. That creates that lean, fit, "toned" look that most people talk about.

Doing a gazillion reps of something is not going to build/strengthen the muscle - it's just going to build muscle endurance. There's nothing WRONG with muscle endurance, but it's not really going to have the results that you want. Heavier weights and fewer reps with plenty of recovery time in between workouts is the best way to build and/or maintain lean muscle.

Cardio - there's controversy even on this site about cardio. Cardio isn't a bad thing, but it's not 100% necessary to lose weight. However, most people do some combination of cardio (steady-state, interval, or HIIT) and weight lifting for the maximum effect. I believe and my personal experience has borne out that some form of cardio will help you cut fat faster, if you combined with the proper diet. (There may be people who disagree with me on that - I know Jynus will! )

However, I will say that losing weight and getting in shape (getting that cut/fit/lean look) is going to be 80% diet driven. You can work out all you want, but if you're eating crap, your body is not going to be able to properly benefit from the exertion of the exercise.

So the first thing to do is to really get a handle on your eating. I don't advocate low-anything diets. I believe that eating BALANCED food is more important than low-something food. In order for your workouts to be effective and your body to burn fat, you need to eat fewer calories than you burn and you need to make sure you're getting a combination of lean protein, complex carbs, and healthy fats. Those are also referred to as macro-nutrients (or just macros).

Most of the time you'll see this broken down in a percentage of their overall calories. For example, the percentage I am for on a daily basis is 40/35/25 (40% of my calories come from carbs, 35% of my calories come from protein, and 25% of my calories come from healthy fats). Some people go for 40/30/30, and there are other variations as well. You have to find the one that works for you.

I would say at your current weight, you could probably start off at around 2000 calories a day, trying to keep to a 40/30/30 split and you'd lose weight and see results.

Wow. That was a book. Ok, so I hope some of it was helpful ... I'm sure you'll have questions. Another suggestion for you is that if you post what you actually eat over the course of the day, we can look at it and make suggestions as to how to tweak it. I know it's hard for me to give specific advice until after I've seen where you are ... to know where you should go fro mthere.

You're right, there are a multitude of ways of losing weight. But generally you want to be taking in less calories than you are expending. That means most any exercise will help you burn calories. Its not necessary to eat 5 meals, but you can do so if you like. Maybe calculate the number of calories in your normal meals (pre-dieting) to determine what amount of calories you should cut. Or use one of the numerous formulas to determine your RMR and then cut some calories from that resting metabolic rate. Take a look at the stickies on our forum to get more specifics. Best wishes .