So between the weather and trying to soothe our wounded son I was again restricted to indoor exercise with my trusty old Swiss Ball and some workout DVD’s. As per usual, I still managed to maintain my daily calorie intake around the 1,500 calories per day, however, my weight loss this week was only 0.4 kg (0.9 lbs) – still a good loss for the week, but a little disappointing.

Hopefully next week the weather will be kind to me and my young son will stay out of trouble with his “broken wing”.

So how do we know where we stand with weight versus body fat? With a good Body Fat Monitor – in my case I have a Tanita TBF-531 Body Fat Monitor suitable for families as it can be programmed for up to 4 people. Tanita re to Body Fat Monitors what Polar are to Heart Rate Monitors – simply the best!

How does it work?
The monitor uses a method called Bioelectrical Impedance Analysis, which basically involves passing a very low, safe electrical current through the body. The current meets resistance when it passes through fat tissue, and in this way the monitor can accurately measure the body fat percentage.

In order for the monitor to do this, you need to stand on the scale with clean, dry bare feet.

You will need to programme the monitor first with your height, sex and select Adult or Child settings, but this is very simple and easy to do. When you first turn the monitor on you must wait for a zero to show, then you can stand on the monitor in dry bare feet, placing your heels on the centres of the lower electrodes. The monitor will display your weight first and then your percentage of body fat. When you step off, the monitor resets itself.

Readings may be less accurate when the Body Fat Monitor is used by children, pregnant women, patients on dialysis and people suffering from oedema. Nor is it suitable for use by professional athletes. People with medical devices implanted (e.g. pacemakers) should NOT use the Monitor.

The Monitor runs on 4 AA batteries, which are easy to insert. I would advise keeping your Monitor out of the bathroom, as you should not get it wet.

The Body Fat Monitor comes with some useful booklets on nutrition and exercise. It is a pricey piece of equipment, but extremely accurate and reliable in most cases.

Being restricted to indoor exercise, I dragged out my trusty old Swiss Ball, some light dumbbells and one of my Swiss Ball workout DVD’s. I didn’t have any trouble maintaining or restricting my daily calorie intake to around 1,500 calories so I was still able to achieve a weight (fat) loss of 0.6 kg (1.3 lbs).

I seem to recall reading somewhere previously that up to 70% of weight loss comes from dietary intake and around 30% from exercise routines. This seems to make sense as it is a lot easier to NOT eat say 300 calories than it is to subsequently burn those calories off later through exercise.

Heart rate monitors that come with chest straps are without doubt the most accurate of the heart monitors available. The chest strap is worn around your chest (naturally), just a few centimeters below your breast. It contains an electronic sensor that is able to detect electrical activity of your heart and transmit it to the receiver, or brain of the machine – just like an ECG. The chest transmitter continually senses your heartbeat and constantly transmits that information to a display monitor, which is generally attached to your wrist like a watch.

The watch can be worn as a regular sports watch, and when not connected to the transmitter strap, will still give you time of day, alarms, stopwatch functions, etc.

If you are planning to buy a quality heart rate monitor, one of the more popular manufacturers around is Polar. Polar technology has been around for two decades now and the company has achieved the status of being the industry leader in the heart rate monitors field. They have different series for heart rate monitors, ranging from beginners and intermediates to professional athletes. You can also choose your heart rate monitor from different categories, depending on what your needs are: Cardiac Rehab, Jogging, Cycling, Swimming (this includes a waterproof monitor-watch), Fitness, Weight Management and so forth.

You can of course purchase one of the lower-end models but low quality heart monitors can lead to inaccurate results and that sort of defeats the purpose of buying one – and what price do place on your health.

increase the effectiveness of your exercise and get more out of each workoutBy monitoring your heart rate you can reduce the chance of injury from over training and know you are getting a great workout by staying in the “target zone“, drastically increasing the efficiency and benefits of your workouts.

One of the first things you need to know when using a heart rate monitor is what your maximum heart rate is. The standard formula used is to subtract your age from 220, however, we also provide a more accurate method, the Karvonen formula . You can then calculate at what percentage of maximum you should be exercising at.

When doing cardiovascular training, research says exercising at 60-70% of your maximum heart rate will be best for fat loss and to build endurance, while exercising in the 70-80% of maximum range will increase your fitness.

As I tend to focus primarily on cycling for my cardio/fat burning workouts I purchased a Polar S710 cycling heart rate monitor. I also purchased the speed/distance and cadence sensors that go with this unit and the infra-red serial connector for uploading my exercise information to a computer.

Although it seemed like an expensive purchase at the time, it does provide me with an incredible amount of information (see images below) allowing me to specifically tailor my exercise programs to maximise my fat burning. I have been using this Polar heart rate monitor for the past 8 years, so if I amortize the initial cost over that time frame, then it is quite affordable – working out at less than $100.00 per year.

It certainly pays to shop around for a good deal, especially on the internet. If my memory serves me correctly I purchased my Polar heart rate monitor and cycling sensors through the internet from Scotland of all places.

The first item of must have equipment for me is a good bicycle (not an exercise bike), but a real bicycle for cycling outdoors. While I know that walking is one of the best exercises that you can do, it just doesn’t do it for me – I find it somewhat boring and a bit of a task, whereas with cycling, I love the freedom of being able to travel much greater distances, see more of the world around me and get a significantly better fat burn for the time involved in exercising.

I can also burn around twice as many calories riding than I can walking for the same amount of timePlus when riding a bicycle I can get my heart rate up into the fat burning zone quite easily, even at a moderate pace, whereas with walking, I find it quite difficult to get my heart rate up to that same level without resorting jogging intermittently. I can also burn around twice as many calories riding than I can walking for the same amount of time.

At the moment I have two bicycles, a hybrid bike and a road bike. The hybrid bike I use for my shorter rides (workouts) and the road bike I use for my longer rides (usually an hour or more). I had previously owned a mountain bike, but like more than 75% of mountain bike owners, I rarely used it off road- It was meant for maneuvering rocky areas and hills, not flat concrete bike trails so the suspension forks, nobbly tyres and etc. became a hindrance when riding on the roads – hence the switch to a hybrid or city bike.

Make sure that your bicycle is the right size for you or it can become quite uncomfortable due to your incorrect body positioning, similarly, a good quality comfortable saddle (seat) is also important if you are planning to spend some time riding. You should be able to ride for a couple of hours without any pain or discomfort after. A good pair of cycling shorts (with chamois insert) is also highly recommended to reduce or minimise any discomfort in the crutch area.

At least one water bottle cage or carrier is also a must for your water bottle(s) to ensure you keep yourself well hydrated during your rides – drinking water at least every 20 minutes is recommended. I also have a small Cateye cycling computer attached to both bicycles, so that I can check my speed, average speed, time and distance traveled during and after a ride.

I also use and highly recommend a a heart rate monitor which includes a chest strap and a wrist unit that measures duration of exercise, time in “the zone” (your target heart rate to accomplish fat burning), average and maximum heart rate, and calories burned – but I will cover this item in more detail in a later post.

Bike riding is a fun part of my exercise and weight loss regimen, helping me to burn calories at an accelerated rate – so I suggest checking out a hybrid bike and customizing it to your needs.

The calories consumed for the week were as follows:
Monday: 1377, Tuesday: 1750, Wednesday: 1435, Thrsday: 1558, Friday: 1644, Saturday: 1674, and Sunday: 1452 – plus I was able to fit in a couple of bike rides, some swimming and a swiss ball workout, enough to burn an additional 1436 calories for the week.

All up I managed to have a deficit for the week of 8367 calories which should be equivalent to 1.09 kilograms. I did in fact manage to lose 2 kilograms, but unfortunately some of the 2kg weight loss, 0.6kg was lean body mass and 1.4kg was body fat.

Ordinarily I wouldn’t be too happy about losing lean body mass (as opposed to body fat), but as my projected result allows for some lean body mass loss I can live with it. It also means that I will need to include some strength training into my weekly routines

In the next week I will go into more detail about exactly what I use to record and measure each aspect of my diet and exercise program in order to help me maximise my fat loss

The school holidays, including Christmas and New Year have not been kind to my now advancing middle aged body and I am now at my heaviest weight ever – and feeling it. Time to do something about it.

I have pulled up my old Excel spreadsheet based on Tom Venuto’s "Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle" ebook that I had used previously to drop some 7 kilograms in my now slimmer past. This time the challenge is far greater, as I am looking at losing a minimum of 11 kilograms and hopefully 14 kilograms. As you can see from the spreadsheet image below, it is not a pretty picture by any means and it is going to take some dedication.

In the end that is all that is required – willpower and dedication (or application). I figure that if I could quit smoking "cold turkey" (as I did a few years ago) then I should be able to stick to my diet and exercise program (without relapses) til I reach my goals.

I took it fairly easy for my first day with a 42 minute bicycle ride, which according to my polar heart rate monitor burned 405 calories, with an average heart rate of 126 bpm and a maximum heart rate of 139bpm, pretty well in my fat burning zone – not too paltry for my first day.

I also carefully monitored my meals and snacks today for a total calorie intake of 1,377, which is fairly low – certainly lower than I had anticipated, especially given that now that I am exercising, my adjusted BMR is around 2,543 calories. If I put all the pieces together, then it gives me a calorie deficit for my first day of 1,571 (equivalent to 0.20 kg), again, more than I would have expected – but a good start all the same. If I maintained this sort of rate I could drop approximately 1kg per week, which is about the top end of the recommended weight loss rate.