Toning up

I have lost 10 pounds. I started at 125 and now i'm 115. I am 5' 2". I am still unsatisfied with how my body looks, especially my bum and upper thighs. I am used to being toned, but within the past 8 months, I have gained fat and lost muscle. Now I want to tone myself up again. I have been eating 1400 calories or a little more so that I might lose. But now that I am at 115 pounds, should I eat at maintenance (1800)? But I still want to lose fat while gaining muscle. I usually go for a fast walk or do a short tae bo or some other workout video during the day.

I have a dvd of a Jillian Michael's workout that has been working my bum and upper thighs. I also like getting on the elliptical at the gym and doing the program "gluteals" that has 2 different levels.

We are just about the same height and weight. I've been working on my diet and exercise for a few months using CC. Do you have some tips for me as far as what to eat and exercise so that I might be able to also lose my 10 extra lbs? How long did it take you to lose that? I currently have an intake of 1200-1300 calories a day. Should I bump my intake to 1400?

So are you saying you're 125 pounds right now? Is 1200 to 1300 the amount you got when you used the Calorie Target? If you can do 1200 to 1300, I don't see any reason why you shouldn't. As long as you're eating at least 1200, you probably should be fine. Do you tend to lose weight easily? I think i tend to lose weight easily, so when I was told by the Calorie Target to eat 1400 calories, I did not want to eat any less. It probably took me 5 weeks to lose that amount. Eating less than 1400 would have been really hard for me because I love food way too much.

Have you ever tried Tae Bo before? Those workouts are high impact cardio (they seriously kick my butt!). I must warn you that they're difficult, so if you're not used to this type of thing, then you'll need to be very careful. If you start out with a basic dvd workout, then you can work your way up to intermediate and then advanced. I even have a dvd which has a shortened workout for days that I'm busy or just doing feel like working out as much as usual.

As far as what to eat, I have been making a tuna salad pretty often. Romaine lettuce with half a can of tuna, a pinch of basil, a pinch of dill, a pinch of pepper, a teaspoon of olive oil, and whatever veggies i want to eat with it. I also put 1/4 of an avocado with it if I have it (which is high in fat, but very nutritious). I did this because I realized I needed more protein.

Other than that, I've been eating fruit for snacks rather than chips or something. I've mostly been eating whatever I wanted but limiting my intake and trying to get a balanced diet.

Yea, I got just above 1200 when I calculated from the Calorie Target and I know it works when you increase your calorie intake as long as you're exercising and continuing to burn the calories. I just have a hard time increasing my intake when it's been calculated for me. Make sense? For a while I was maintaining 125 lbs with some problem areas, and then went on spring break and now my problem areas have increased! AH. So, I have to get back down to what I weighed before and continue onto my goal that I was working toward before, 115-120.

I have not tried Tae Bo before but I have taken exercise classes that are high impact cardio. I might research those though and see if I think they would work for me.

I'm very conscious of my diet plan, it's just a matter of not eating the extra stuff that comes into view. For example, earlier this week we had a birthday celebration for an office member and I had my fair share of treats plus some extra, which has thrown my week off.

So at 115, are you wanting to lose more but just tone up? I would think that you would stay at your calorie intake of 1400 but just do toning exercises to concentrate on the areas you want to improve. If you bumped up your intake, would you begin to lose more weight?

yeah i think i just want to work on toning now. so if the calorie target said 1200, then i think you should do fine at 1200. =) oh and one more thing about eating. i saw that i was eating too much fat and not enough protein and that's where fish and shrimp have come in handy. but beans and brown rice are supposed to be good too.

i know what you mean about just eating whatever's there. my husband is a huge sweet tooth and so i have to say no every day to numerous sweet, chocolatey things. and i'm a huge chocolate lover too so that doesn't help.

i have no idea what would happen if i ate more calories. i keep reading things like if you don't eat more than your usual amount of calories that you won't gain muscle. so i don't know what to do. that's what i'm trying to figure out.

Maybe you could try bumping up your calorie intake for a few weeks, pick up some different toning exercises and see what happens. I'm sorry I can't help you much more, ha. I'm going to keep my intake of 1200-1300 for a few more weeks and watch my results. If nothing happens by my goal date, I think I'm going to increase by a few hundred calories. Thank you for the advice!

Here's a bit of advice: If you're looking to tone up, but not really lose much anymore, you should down the high intensity cardio a bit, and add some other workouts for toning like circuit training, or some workouts with dumbells/free weights that will target the specific area you want to work on. Saying that, I'm not sure what tae bo is like, if it combines cardio and toning exercises you could just as well stick with it.

I just recently started with a personal trainer, and although the workout she wrote for me are short, they really work. As far as toning goes, I've started seeing results within a couple of weeks. The way this works is: I do cardio twice a week, then I do weight training twice a week with some cardio as warm up (about 20-25 mins on the elliptical trainer) and then working with dumbells (the usual stuff, lunges, squats, etc). I used to do the exercises before, but adding the weights really seems to have made a difference. Also, seeing a personal trainer once a week keeps me disciplined with my workout schedules, as if I miss a day I have to tell her (have to fill out the forms with how much I've done everytime I do a workout so she can monitor my progress). I know, personal trainers are definitely not cheap, but it really helps me keep motivated as I feel embarrassed if I don't do as much as I'm supposed to.

Also, you shouldn't just be increasing your calorie intake, you should concentrate on adding a bit more protein into your diet (I know this from a friend of mine who is a professional wrestler who also studied fitness and nutrition in uni and has to keep consuming ridiculous amounts of protein to keep/increase his muscle mass, I know, that is a bit of an extreme, but the same theory applies on our level.)

Hope this helps. :)

I would suggest trying out barbell squats for upper thigh/butt muscle building. Start with a light weight to work on your form. Ask a trainer at the gym if you are unsure how to do these properly. Do 3 sets of 10, (or 5 sets of 5) and add 5 pounds of weight _per week_. 

Your legs/ass will be toned in no time - I have never found any amount of cardio/martial arts workout that will give you an increase in muscle as fast as squats. 10 min stairmaster on very high difficulty was the closest, and the improvement is much slower.