Can anyone offer me gym advice?

Just Peachy

Slowly But Surely
S: 15st10lb C: 12st13lb G: 11st6lb Loss: 2st11lb(17.73%)
Depends what you want to do! No matter what you do, you should at least do 5 mins cardio to get your heart working and what not. If you just wanna do cardio, you only burn calories the first 20 minutes, you burn fat afterwards. If you're not particularly in shape at the minute, just try to stick to a rate that you can keep for a long time, it's more beneficial that doing it really hard and fast for a short amount of time.

If you wanna do weights, choose a weight that you can lift 15 reps for 3 times with breaks in between. Like, a an arm, then do the other, etc. The cross trainer and rowing machine work specific parts of your bodies whereas the bike and treadmill work the whole thing in general, I'd go for that at first. It's easier to use them for a long time on a low speed.

Hope that's helpful. If anything, the people at the gym might be able to help you too.
Hi I go the gym and have a lot of weight to loose. I tend to use the treadmill, but not jogging. I have a heart rate belt that the treadmill picks up and shows me my exact heart rate for fat burning which is moderate intensity i.e. not short of breath but enough to make it hard to hold a conversation. this is the best fat burning zone or so I have been told. I come away feeling that I have actually done something although I am not on my knees when I leave. I find that in the past I have tried too hard and got bored and found any excuse not to go, but this time I am actually enjoying the gym and find that a mp3 player helps as it really motivates you. Hope this helps, but get some advice from the gym staff they will happily give you a program to follow.
S: 12st2lb C: 12st2lb G: 9st7lb BMI: 28.3 Loss: 0st0lb(0%)
This is good advice from everyone, I would add that you must keep variety else you will get bored. Don't do half hour on treadmill (if you aren't used to exercise I'd also try doing power walking on an incline on the treadmill) - but do 10 mins bike, 15mins treadmill, 10 mins x-trainer, 10 mins treadmill and ta-da- without getting bored you've done more than half an hour!

The other things that helps is intervals ie fast min, slower min, fast min, slower min. Helps keep heart rate up without exhausting you.

Finally - don't skip stretching, esp calves etc...ask the trainers at the gym or another person and they will show you.

All the best x

Blue Butterfly

Gold Member
Hey,how did you get on at the gym?
I weigh alot more than you and I started going to the gym a little while back,my fitness level was at zero!
I just started off doing something on every machine and then the next time I went Id just do a little more.
I now do about 40-60 mins cardio and then I do some weights :)
Claire x