This is a training blog post by Grant Lofthouse
Time and time again I get asked what’s the best rep range for fat loss without cardio? And time and time again I repeat the same answer…
But before I go on I want to stipulate that I’m talking about fat loss, not weight loss. There’s a difference.
For average joes, the best rep range for fat loss is 6-8. And even less for raw beginners, more like 5-8.
Don’t get me wrong, high rep training has its place in a fat loss workout. But it should not be predominate. And that’s where people make the biggest mistake when trying to lose fat without cardio.
The reason why we are lead to believe that high rep training workouts work, is because people have been brainwashed into thinking that unless you about to vomit and pass out on the floor, the program isn’t effective. Never judge the effectiveness of a program based on your heart rate.
Read that last point again…
Ok I’m wrapping up the longevity series today. If you have missed any of the other series you can check em out here…
– Longevity Part 4: Grant Lofthouse’s Diet
– Longevity Part 3: Recovery finisher
– Longevity Part 2: Balance Push to Pull
– Longevity
Let’s get straight into it with 34 quick tips to keep you healthy, happy, pain free and embracing longevity.
1. Foam roll your glutes, hammies, calves, ITB, quads, middle and upper back everyday.
2. Jam a tennis ball between you and a wall and roll your lats, tricep, shoulder, chest and middle and upper traps.
Rolling my tricep – will put a future post on how to do the others 3. For optimum lower body health the majority of people benefit from 2:1 hip dominant to knee dominant exercise ratio. E.g. 6 sets of romanian deadlifts to 3 sets of squats.
4. Use body weight exercises as much as possible (they always seem to balance things out).
5. Incline bench is far better on the shoulders.
6. Don’t go lower than 8 reps on dips.
7. Throw out your runners and train either barefoot, in vibram five fingers or some sort of canvas show like converse chuck taylors. Your knees, ankle and lower back will thankyou.
8. It’s easier to say this but keep stress levels as low as possible.
9. Go to be before 11pm and get 8-10 hours of sleep every night.
10. Walk.
11. Don’t weight train any more than 3-4 times a week (ideally 3).
Hey welcome back to cardio haters, by the way I’ve managed to get a hold of a top American female trainer which I will be interviewing next week or so. If you have any questions for her just pop them in the comment section at the bottom of this page and I’ll get her to answer them for you.
Ok longevity part 4 if you have missed any of the pervious posts you can view them here…
- Longevity Part 3: Recovery finisher
- Longevity Part 2: Balance Push to Pull
- Longevity
I was originally going to just give you a list of foods that promote health but the other day this idea just popped into my head. I figured since I already embrace longevity and I always get a few questions a week about my diet, I might as well talk about it in this post.
First off I want to point that in my experience I have found that there’s no ‘one size fits all’ kind of diet. I can also state that EVERY diet works, but the problem with 95% is they are usually too unrealistic and as of a result the retention rate is low. A diet is only as good as how long you can stay on it.
To be fair; you do need to get out of your comfort zone and be prepared to do things you don’t want to do, but if the diet doesn’t have any ‘room to move’ then the success rate aint going to be too good.
The way I see it is that if you can stick with a particular diet for 12 months as opposed to 2. The 12 month diet is going to have a greater long term success.
On the other hand if you’re getting ready for a wedding in 2 weeks and you want to look (but not feel) smoking hot, then you probably need to take the most extreme cautions available. I don’t recommend it, but it’s the truth.
My diet actually follows the complete opposite to most of them out there…
Hey Grant here,
I’m here to tell you about a client that I’ve had the pleasure of teaching and training for the last 4 months.
*I promise you there will still be great training and diet tips in this post*
Funny enough we went to the same school but I graduated a bit earlier than him. Anyways Tom called me one night asking about my personal training services. By the end of the call he was at my facility within the next couple days. I presented him a form to fill out and sign and noticed he immediately circled the 3 times a week option.
I only offer either 2 or 3 times a week simply because people need more than one session a week, and they don’t need any more than 3 because I want them to have a life outside the gym and also to embrace longevity.
I knew straight away that Tom was serious because most clients start off with 2 “to see how it goes” and then they might move onto 3. I understand that money may be the reason why they can’t train 3 times. But those who use the “will see how it goes” excuse clearly aren’t serious about reaching their goals, and they’re only hoping it will happen.
I can personally tell you that you should never “hope” for anything in life. You either go get it yourself or you leave it for someone else. “hope”, “want”, “try”, “see how it goes” are terrible words to use in life.
I have a quote up on my wall at my gym stating… “You’re either in or you’re out, there is no in-between.” Meaning you either do it 100% or don’t do it at all.
Like I said Tom immediately circled 3 times and I just knew he was going to go after it.
I know I have been teasing you with my new Ripped Without Cardio workout for a month or so now. But I’m happy to announce that the program is now live and 100% free. The program has a unique training method known as heavy, light and medium, but I have thrown my little spin on [...]
Hey hope you are fit n’ well,
If you have been following me for a while you would know that I’m obsessed with Seinfeld. Anyway today I watched one of my favourite episodes ‘The Jimmy’.
In one of the scenes Jimmy is mindlessly pumping away on a stair climber. Now whilst I was laughing at Jimmy for always talking as the 3rd person “Jimmy’s got some moves”… something hit me.
Nothing has changed from 20 years ago, people are still looking to the cardio machines (treadmill, bike, cross trainer, stair climber) as their answer to losing body fat and getting ripped.
I have given up on these kinds of people, that’s why I started this blog. So I don’t have to tell any of my readers to stop following Jimmy’s ways. I’m just over it, these people will never change. It’s like trying to convert a power lifter over to bodybuilding and vice versa… it just won’t happen.
Now because this blog is for cardio haters and it’s safe enough to say that Seinfeld is pretty old school. I’m going to combine the two and give you and Old School Finisher that doesn’t involve the treadmill, bike, cross trainer or stair climber…
I decided to give you a totally free report on my thoughts for what I think is going to be big in the year 2011. In this report I’ve included my top 7 predictions that I think marketers and experts will target for diet, training and general heath and fitness…
This is a diet blog post by Grant Lofthouse
Ok so Xmas day is around the corner (this Saturday for us Aussies) and I bet you want to enjoy the day without feeling guilty from stuffing your face with enormous amounts of food and alcohol.
Now for me Xmas day is easily the biggest and funniest day of my year. We (my family) spend time with both sides – my dad and my mums and we usually are flat out from about 11 am all the up to about 1-2am. It’s a big ass long day filled laughter, joy, gifts and food LOTS of food.
I want to take you back 2 Christmases ago in 2008 on Xmas day I was extremely careful with what I ate, I sacrificed a lot all that year to achieve my goals and wasn’t going to let that particular day ruin it for me. The only thing was I didn’t enjoy the day one bit. Now just like anyone else, I loved Christmas day but on that particular day it sucked because everyone else was eating glorious food I was stuck with carrot and celery sticks (not literally…but you get my point).
Now last year I tried to take a more smarter approach, I did the old “eat before you go” because that way I could prepare my own food and I knew exactly what I was eating. The only problem was when you eat at 10 in the morning it doesn’t last you until 1-2 am on boxing day. So come lunch time I was starting to feel it and I didn’t want to experience what I did the year before. So I just gave in and ate everything I found on the table.
I felt like a huge failure; especially when you are known as a personal trainer. Every time I put something ‘bad’ into my mouth it was like I farted in a church. Everyone would just stop and stare.
Now this last week I’ve been thinking of different ways to approach xmas day…
Hey there hope you are doing awesome,
As Frank Costanza would say “I’m back babyyy!” Because I’ve been missing the last 6 days due to chilling and having a great time on the Gold Coast for a holiday. I didn’t have much time to write a blog post up there because…well for one I was on holidays and 2 I was doing touristy things such as…
Riding on a jet boat that does 360′s, dining out nearly every single night (never spent that much money on food before), got a couple massages, went to Dreamworld and White water world, had lunch at this place where you pick your own freash seafood (it was amazing), did an old school gangsta style photoshoot, chilled with my buddi Spongebob and many other things.
I thought this would be an appropriate time to show you how to exercise whilst you are on the road. Now I was just going to use the resorts gym until I looked up on the net before coming to find out that the gym was about as useful as a wet rag.
Ey whats up? Hope you’re doin’ great!
A few months back I hit a pretty big plateau – I stopped seeing results, I was completely unmotivated and lost all my train of thought and didn’t know what to do. It sucked! and it was weird considering I do this for a living but I was literally ‘stuck in a rut’.
It’s actually quite embarrassing to admit considering people where still coming to me for training and diet advice. But I always manage to fix other peoples problems but never my own.
If you are currently experiencing this then I hope this post will fix your problems. You need to go back to the basics, so here is what I would do If I were you…
1.) I’d throw out all my junk food and stock up on fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, meat, poultry and sea food.
2.) I would plan my meals/snacks in advance so I know what I’m going to eat, rather than it coming as a surprise to me.
3.) I would calorie or carb cycle with 3 consecutive days on low calories/carbs and 1 higher calorie/carb day with the high calorie/carb day falling on my hardest training day.
4.) I would fast one day a week for 24 hours but never go a day without eating. Confused? In other words I would fast from 6pm on Monday till 6pm on Tuesday and eat dinner Tuesday night.
5.) I’d supplement with fish oils, green tea and protein powder.
