Weight Loss
What we are really talking here is fat loss, as when we decide to lose weight whether it be for health reasons or to simply look and feel better its fat we want to lose, we ideally want to keep hold of the muscle we have.
This journey can be a tough one for some as a lot of people are just eager to see the scales go down week after week and this is not always the case, this can lead too an un healthy obsession with the scales. While scales can be used as a guide they are not an exact measurement of how much you have lost, there are many reasons that can affect what the scales say which i will get too in a minute, because of these reasons the scales may go up one week or simply stay the same you may not consistently drop each time you step on.
There are other ways to measure results such as photos, measuring tapes, body fat scales, calipers, how your clothes fit or just simply how you feel.
So reasons why the scales may go up even though you haven't actually gained fat are-
1. Your carb intake
If you have eaten more carbs than you normally would this can cause you to store glycogen in your muscles adding around 3 grams of water per gram.
2. Salt
Consuming more salt than usual can cause you to hold up to 3 lb extra water weight.
3.Stress
Increased cortisol can play with anti diuretic hormone release again causing you to retain water.
4. Progesterone and Estrogen fluctuation
These again cause us to retain more water, especially around our menstrual cycle.
Other reasons could be weighing at a different time, weighing in different clothing, been dehydrated or constipated, most has to do with undigested foods and fluids in your body and water retention.
So with all that been said what is a healthy weight loss rate, i would advise a loss of 1-2 lbs per week, it is not a race or a quick fix it is a lifestyle change that you want to be able to maintain and keep the weight off.
Finally how do we achieve this, its as simple as calories in vs calories out, in most cases, we need to be burning more than we consume, this can be done through diet, exercise or a combination of both, creating a deficit which is what we need to be in to shift that fat.
Do it for you! one workout, one meal, one day at a time.
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Muscle Building
Don't be scared to pick up those weights ladies, building muscle is a great way to shape our bodies how we want them, creating curves where we like, whether you like the hard bodied lean look or the more soft murves (muscles with curves) look, the power to build your body is in your hands.
Unlike weight loss building muscle requires us to be in a calorie surplus, therefore taking in more calories than we burn in doing so we need to ensure we are consuming a sufficient amount of protein to build our muscles and make the rest of our calories up from healthy fats and carbs. Proper nutrition is important to fuel our workouts and help our muscles recover as well as nutrition our muscles also need sleep to recover, aim for 7-9 hours per night, while sleeping we release human growth hormone which facilitates muscle growth.
Now as im sure you know our muscles wont just grow from eating and sleeping unfortunately, we also need to place stress up on the body, we do this by working out, breaking down the muscles, then they rest and recover and grow, but our muscles will adapt to the stress placed on them over time, halting their growth, so we must use progressive overload, this can include changing variables such as increasing weight, volume and intensity and decreasing rest times.
Now what are you waiting for, go get them gainz.
Booty Building
Lets talk glutes!
The glutes are an important muscle to train, not just because they look absolutely great when you do so but because they are essential to athletic performance and having strong glutes can help prevent injuries to the lower back, hamstrings and knees, so why would you not want to train them.
So you may think going into the gym and doing countless squats will cut it, nope! despite popular belief the squat is not the best exercise for that booty, in my opinion it is the hip thrust i believe this is to the booty what bench press is to the chest.
All though this is a great exercise for glutes and will give you some great results you also want to add a variety of other exercises to target the glutes into your routine, i find it great to use a range of reps, weights and hit them from all angles after all the glutes are made of slow and fast twitch muscle fibres and are made up of three different muscles the gluteus maximus, gluteus medius and gluteus minimus.
When training the glutes it is important to activate them, to ensure you use them correctly and other muscles don't take over, especially if you spend most of the day sitting your glutes will most likely be switched off and your hip flexors may be tight, a body weight glute bridge is great for both stretching hip flexors and activating glutes.
Im sure you already have brains and beauty so go chase them gainz and booty!