On day 1 you will receive a full consultation (approx. 15 minutes) in which I will discuss with you your medical history, diet and fitness goals.
You will receive a full and comprehensive body composition scan on my state of the art “Inbody 270” machine which measures vital metrics including percentage bodyfat, skeletal muscle mass, visceral fat, basal metabolic rate etc.
This will enable me to design you bespoke training and diet plan (usually given to the client 24 hours after the first session) to help complement our training sessions. We will then have an introductory training session in which I will be undertaking a range of assessments so that we can tailor our training specifically for you.
This is very case dependent but as a general rule of thumb one should aim to do both but do bear in mind that most people who go to the gym simply want to look better -
This means that they are looking to improve their “body composition” which is essentially their “fat to muscle” ratio.
Hence why I would always advocate that one should put slightly more emphasis on weight training over cardio.
Short answer yes!
Long answer yes but it's complicated! Weight loss or fat loss is primarily determined by the laws of thermodynamics otherwise known as calories in vs calories out. If you do lots of cardio without weight training, you will certainly lose fat but you will lose muscle too. So let’s use a practical example:
1. Assume someone starts a 12 week program doing just cardio and no weights.
2. They weight 90kg and they are 20% bodyfat.
3. 12 weeks later, they lose lose 5kg on the scales so they are now 85kg. However, their bodyfat percentage remains the same at 20%.
4. This means that although the above person has lost weight, they have lost an equal amount of fat and muscle.
When you are in a calorie deficit, your body will burn both fat and muscle but what stops your body from burning into muscle is weight training. By lifting heavy weights, you are teaching your body to hold onto that muscle tissue thus creating that “toned” look which is what most people ultimately want.
Anyone who follows me on social media will know that I advocate “measurable cardio” which means that you perform cardio normally on a piece of gym apparatus such as a treadmill or rowing machine.
This will allow you to perform a routine over a set distance in a given time therefore it is measurable and you can try and beat it every single time.
If you follow youtube HIIT workouts or high intensity crossfit type workouts (jumping on boxes, battle roles, burpees etc with no structure) how do you know if you are getting fitter or not?
Definitely not – Strength is strength and cardio is cardio – Don’t combine the two together.
For example, let’s assume you go to the gym and perform a 15 minute vigorous cardio workout prior to a 45 minute weights session.
When you commence the weights session, you are already somewhat depleted so you will lift less weight and thus build less muscle.
If you are looking to improve your body composition (fat to muscle ratio), you simply need to ensure that your diet is spot on and that you lifting weights. I am a strong believer that cardio is merely an additional tool for weight loss and should be done for fitness purposes only as opposed to weight loss purposes.
If you measure yourself only using weight scales, it will only show you one thing – Weight!
When a client is looking to improve their body composition, it is vital that we not only measure the weight but also the amount of muscle mass.
I frequently refer clients to a facility to get their body composition done using an “Inbody Scanner” which will measure vital metrics such as their skeletal muscle mass, visceral fat (fat around the internal organs), fat mass and percentage bodyfat. From a practical standpoint, you will look better if you put on skeletal muscle mass and reduce bodyfat – This is called improving your body composition.