Need input on friend's progress - any ideas?

[Gibbee]

A friend of mine has recently started training at home (weights combined with walking) and I gave her Katy Smith's LIft Weights to Lose Weight as a starter video (along with form pointers - which are necessary with that video). She did that for about 01 weeks and was slimming down nicely. She recently acquired Power Hour and has been doing it for about 3 weeks now but has not noticed any further improvements and has actually put back on some of the weight (size) she was previously losing. Realizing that some of it is probably diet, but beyond that, can someone recommend another Cathe vid she might try? I was thinking she ought to stick to Power Hour a couple more weeks and watch her diet and then either rotate back to Lift Weights to Lose Weight and/or see if the new Cathe pyramid video would be a good choice. I thought about Slow & Heavy or Pure Strength, but I'm not sure and thought someone might offer some good input from here with the wealth of knowledge that reads this board! Thanks in advance for the input.

 

[Connie1]

More details please!
Is she doing Power hour once a week? Is she doing any other videos? Is she doing any cardio with or without videos? What is her diet like?

 

[Gibbee]

Diet: not sure but she is trying to get it lower fat and 'cleaner'.

Power Hour: 3x a week. I suggested maybe upping weights where she felt she could do so, but I was surprised in the backslide she's had. With the Kathy Smith workout, she did it 3x a week as well (full body workout, not split).

Cardio: Pretty much does fast walking at breaks at work and at lunch... also walks a bit in her neighborhood and uses a trampoline (weather permitting) with her kids. Has had some knee problems in the past but has been careful on her form with lunges and squats and is doing good - but something like a step workout wouldn't work. Age: 40 and in good health. Just a few pounds over ideal weight.

 

[Connie1]

Hmmmm...

What does she like about Power hour? It's boring to do the same tape over and over. If it were me, I'd want to do Pure Strength, then Slow and Heavy. There's nothing like muscle mass to crowd out fat.

Does she like more intense cardio? Cathe has some great ones, like Interval Max. That was my first Cathe cardio.

 

[Gibbee]

Intense cardio isn't her thing. She used to run a lot but has bad knees. Walking is her past time but it hasn't yielded any results but adding K.Smith has. I'm thinking she needs a different video from Power Hour - which I thought would (as a beginner) give her some endurance and strength results with some change in body shape but it has not. Again, I think diet may have something to do with it but to backslide so much, I'm surprised.

 

[Cruncholi]

Sounds like she may benefit from circuit training to me! Blasts of cardio (can be done low impact for those bad knees) with weight training mixed in.

Also, I agree with Connie that some heavy weight lifting will help blast the fat and get the scale moving.

She may be gaining weight also due to an increase in muscle, which weighs more than fat. Aquajock has an interesting theory on this that your muscles may bulk up at first, but then they pat themselves down as you continue weight training.

Good luck to her.

 

[Connie1]

This is a total assumption- but maybe she is intimidated by Cathe? Power hour, after all, is very tough. It takes a special kind of mental strength just to modify, and it takes skill to know when and how to modify.

If you suspect this, you might mention to her that Cathe's videos are advanced, and it takes *everyone* a long time to work up to them.

I think a person needs superb cardio capacity just to finish Power hour within 60-80 minutes!