Father in trouble. Help?

[Dave17]

Hey, my Father came back from the Doctor the other day and they told him he needed to lose weight because he was getting into the "You are way too heavy" category.

I want to put him on an excersize routine and diet plan. I think I can do the diet plan by using the 13 weeks to hardcore fat burning etc., but the exercize how should I have him go about this?

Are we looking at 30-45 minutes fat burning cardio a few times a week plus light weight training using the compound movements etc.?

[Venom]

Assuming he is a novice, here is my advice.

Don't mess around and have him do balance exercises like the trainers at the gym do. That is just going to drain his cognitive effort, rather than metabolize calories. He does not need to do many exercises or much volume right now. First, because his body will be shocked with a very small stimulus. And second, you want him to adhere to your program...so don't kill him!

Anyway, you need to optimize the amount of calories you are metabolizing during the workout, since the amount of exercises you are doing is limited. So yes, compound lifts would be a good idea.

You could do full body routines 2-3 times per week right now. The goal initially should be for him to learn several skills in the weight room. Here are some tips

1. Results indicate that you can only retain 5 +-2 bits of information per session. So this would mean that you should have him do 5-9 exercises per routine
2. Randomize the workouts. Don’t do 3 sets of bench, followed by 3 sets of squats, followed by 3 sets of dead lifts. That is what is called blocking practice. Random would be like this: 1 set of bench, 1 set of squats, 1 set of dead lifts, repeat. This will increase learning to a much greater extent.
3. In order to maximize learning the pattern of these movements, you want to keep arousal low to moderate. If it gets to high, it is going to be to difficult for him to focus on the movement, and he will not learn well that way. The best way to manipulate this is have him go light and easy at first.
4. I can’t stress how important the first month or so of training is. It is vital that you make this a pleasant experience for him, or he will just quit. Remember: this is a long term project, not a couple of weeks. It’s a life style change, and this takes time. So start out easy with him. I would just make a few modifications at once. Have him do maybe 2 full body workouts a week to start, and 2-3 cardio sessions. On separate days. And make each session enjoyable.
5. For cardio, have him do things he is comfortable with. It might be something simple such as going on a walk, or playing tennis. It does not matter what the activity is: as long as he enjoys it (at least, more so than other options) and adheres to it.

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I want to put him on an excersize routine and diet plan. I think I can do the diet plan by using the 13 weeks to hardcore fat burning etc., but the exercize how should I have him go about this?


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I would not advise this at first. It is really hard-core.

I would do a diet assessment first. Have him record what he eats for 1-2 weeks, then analyze his deficiencies and such. Then, slowly introduce modifications to his program. For instance, if he is eating 3 meals per day, up that to 6 meals. And don’t just cut out all the junk food at once, if he eats those types of things. Again, slow modifications is the key to consistent results. If you do too many things at once, this wont work.

Hope that helps.

Keep us up to date!

[Dzoni]

Agree with Venom, time is the key. Slowley introduce a new diet to him, workout routine slowly introduce new skills so he can learn and keep developing the encouragement as such.

Cold turkey is very hard for someone with a routine they have been following a long time. Week by week these things wont become "i have to do this to get better" rather "this feels good and i want to do these things".

Good luck and please keep us posted [img]/forum/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]