Pilates for Weight Loss After 35: Why You’re Not Getting Toned

0:10 Welcome back to The BODY. Recomposition revolution. This is Robin and today we are discussing. Why your Pilates body? Is not the tone body you thought you were signing up for, which happens to be the thing that my sister and I have been passionately discussing. A lot over the last. Six months or so, and also the thing that I hear from clients all the time. Why Pilates? Orangetheory Fitness. Classes. Running. Why? None of that is making you look. The way the brochure said it would. Today we're going to understand.

0:48 Why? And what you can. Do to actually. Get the toned body you want now first and foremost. I am not. Here to trash Pilates or CrossFit. Or fitness. Classes they. Or running. I run from time to time. I've ran 10K. I usually run 110K a year I think all of those modalities. Have their space, truly. And they have a purpose and a function. But if your goal is. To build muscle and drop fat. And if that's not your goal, then let's let's visit this on a surface level. Women are always saying, oh, I just want to look lean and toned.

1:28 Great. How do you do that? You have to drop fat. And gain muscle now if you have adequate amount of muscle. You just have to drop fat. Adequate is very subjective. So let's say you drop your body fat. Down and you. Still feel like you? Look a little flabby. You don't have any muscle tone. Well, that means you don't have enough muscle to get the toned physique you're aspiring to have, which would mean your ultimate goal is essentially. To. Build muscle and drop. Fat, that is body. Recomposition in a nutshell.

2:00 So here's the problem. Most women don't understand that that. Is their goal their goal? Whether they know the name of it and how to get. There is to drop fat while. Gaining muscle. This creates the toned look they want. So if you are. A woman who has done any sort of fitness related things in the past. Or you are somebody who is. Just now starting on your fitness journey, a lot of times more often than not you automatically choose things like. Pilates or classes or. Running for two reasons. Somebody's telling you what to do and you're comfortable with.

2:40 That. Because you're not comfortable not knowing what to do or researching yourself. And running is easy. It's mindless. It's not if you actually run, but. Those two. Reasons you think somebody's going to be in this dark room telling me exactly what to do and I will just follow instruction and complete this class and sooner or later I will get the body I want or second option you're going to start running and in your mind that will get neither of those modalities are going to. Get you the physique that you are.

3:09 Aspiring to have. If your goal. Is to have a toned body now let's first define the body that a lot of women wants because primarily this. Is the. This is the. The woman that my clients will describe to me the way they want to look, This is their. Goal, OK. If it's not your goal, you can tune out after this. If it doesn't apply to you, you don't need to listen. Most of the women I coach when they say I want to look lean, I want to look toned. What they actually mean is a smaller waistline. They want visible shape in their glutes, in their legs.

3:45 They want shoulders that are toned, they want less flab on their triceps. They want a feminine physique that kind of gives an an illusion of an X. That's what I call with my clients and on my Instagram and what not. I refer to thing the women's body as an X or some people call it an. Hourglass, but it's just a body that looks. Athletic and lean and toned. That's hard for me to even say that word now. Here is the truth. You don't get that look from just calorie burn alone. You don't get that look from Pilates, you don't get that look from Orangetheory, you don't get that look from fitness classes.

4:25 You get that look from structured resistance training is true. That's the only way you can get a toned lean hourglass. Physique is if you are. Weight training Now here's where my sister and I get heated because she'll say things like but I'm. Really sore afterwards. Or the instructor looks. The instructor looks so good and I'm like well. First of all, soreness. Does not equate to muscle growth. Soreness does not equate to muscle growth. I wanted to say that twice so you really understand. Soreness is.

4:59 A. Lack in neuromuscular connections when you're performing a movement, meaning if your muscles haven't performed that movement in that way in the past, very often, yes, you are going to be sore. You're going to be sore. But honestly, and the research will prove. This true? So it does not equate to muscle growth. Or, you know, I'll hear. I was. I was. Shaking through the entire. Class I could barely. Hold this position in bar and that also does not equate to muscle growth. That does not equate to muscle growth when you are shaking.

5:31 So what does Pilates do? Why? Is there such thing as Pilates? Because it has a place, it has a purpose. And if you actually look at the. History of it. It was never meant to increase your muscle, your muscle size. It was never meant. For hypertrophy, the purpose of Pilates is is for posture. It's for core control, it's for your spinal health, it's for mobility, it's for your breathing mechanics. I read that as well. Pilates. Is not for building muscle again. Pilates is for core control. It's for.

6:03 Your mobility, it's for endurance and coordination, but it is not going to give you a toned look. It's not now my the space. That I have for. Pilates in my life might be once a week, once a month, because I think that mobility and coordination, all those things are really important, but it's not going to be anything I. Expect to drive actual visible. Changes in my physique the only reason I would ever and have have and enjoyed going to Pilates. Or bar classes. Is for the mobility. Factor is for the.

6:33 Coordination is because I'm challenged. It's it's something that makes me sweat because my body is not used to moving that way for. It to yoga. Classes, you know, my body is not used to moving that way. So when I go to one of them, I'm sweating. The next day I'm sore. I was challenged throughout the entirety. Of it, but is it? Driving a change in my physique? No, no. That is what's weight. Training is for that's why I will go on the gym floor and lift weights and do. Actual work towards. Building the body.

7:01 I actually want Pilates, not for that. And let's move into. CrossFit because I was a CrossFit. Queen I was a. CrossFit. Queen and embarrassingly only embarrassing because I expected it to deliver something and it didn't and I progressed for way too long. But. CrossFit is if that's. Your jam? Great. If you're not seeing the physique results that you want while being in CrossFit, listen up. This is why CrossFit. And high intensity functional straining training stuff, Orange theory, anything like that.

7:31 That has a. Purpose it can improve. Your VO2 your. Strength. It can improve your performance and there are a lot of. Studies that show body. Composition changes do happen with CrossFit, but ultimately if you ask any CrossFit. Casual goer like? Myself and the other people in the class, they have the same complaints, the same complaints I had, which was I look very. Puffy, I look very. Bulky I my legs haven't gotten any more. Curve Why do I look like a brick? We all have. The same complaints, OK. Those.

8:06 CrossFit movements are not for building your body into a feminine. Physique CrossFit is fatigue. Driven. You're chasing time and rounds. You're chasing intensity, and that is not the same as targeting your glutes. Your. Doubts your lats with. Precision with intention and. Structure that. The intention and the. Structure that a weight. Training program provides that. Provides the hypertrophy. Needed to. Actually. Build muscle. CrossFit. Think brick. OK, think brick. That's what you're going to get.

8:41 And here's the real Here's the real truth. Of the matter when it comes to CrossFit, you are working your. Butt off, you are exhausted. You have been throwing really heavy things around for a long period of time. You're mentally fatigued because you want to beat everybody in the room or at. Least I did afterwards. I ate like a horse, like I ate a lot because. I overestimated the calorie burn that I was having in that class. Was I burning? Calories, yes. Was I working hard? Of course. But after that class I would eat so much and not nearly enough to cover the actual amount of calories burned during CrossFit and here.

9:21 Side note, if you're using a fitness watch or any sort of calorie tracking tool, ignore it. It's wrong. I promise you. I promise you, I'm going to do a whole episode on that. The only thing you should use your. Apple Watch for or your whatever for is to track your steps. Or your sleep. Or. Your body weight or your cycle? Please don't look at the calorie burning means nothing. Now here's what I want to get down to the nitty gritty. And again, please hear me when I say I do not mean to offend anybody.

9:48 Any movement, any class, any type. Of exercise is better. Than nothing. So if you are thinking Pilates is the only thing I want to do or well I'm too nervous to go on the wait floor, I'd rather. Just go to classes. OK, do that. Then do that, but don't expect to have any physical changes, OK, you won't. But if you want to do that, then do that versus sitting on the couch. Now here's. What I actually see women doing here is what I have been guilty of doing myself. So a little bit of everything, right?

10:17 A little bar, a little running, a little hot yoga, a little Pilates. Might go to an Orange theory next month. Or, you know, put on a put a band around my legs and do endless. Whatevers a little bit of. Everything but nothing is tracked, nothing is progressively overloaded and no nutritional support. So primary, utmost driver of any sort of actual changes, you'll see nutrition, 80% of it, OK, So if you're not keyed in on your nutrition, forget anything, any sort of change. Now that extra 20%, that extra 20% that's going to come from aggressively overloading your resistance training, not Pilates.

10:58 That's going to help you be more flexible and more probably neurologically in tune to your. Body. Not orange theory. That not orange theory that's just going to wreck you to be honest, running. Great. Fabulous. If you want to be in zone 2 primarily, and those long runs every once in a while, fabulous. It improves your aerobic endurance. But if you want to shape your body, the primary driver of that is going to be a Nutrition, B consistent, structured, progressively overloaded weight training. So you might be thinking.

11:29 What type of weight? Training. Do you need to do? What does that even mean? Are you going to get bulky? The answer is no to that last part. There's another episode I did on this exact thing. So what type of weight training should you be doing? Where the heck? Do you? Start Women build muscle the exact same way men do. Which is through. Progressive resistance training. That's hard enough, so almost to. Actual failure. OK. And repeated consistently. So here's an acronym because my. Teacher self loves.

12:00 An acronym rack. That's my business. Rack reps. So think of. The Word Reps Rep. S starting with R. R equals. Reps and effort. So the Rep number matters. Way. Less than how? Close you get to. Failure. Hypertrophy. No. Hypertrophy is just actual. Muscle growth When you lift a weight, imagine your muscle fibers kind of tearing and then being rebuilt with the protein you give them to be a little. Bit bigger a little. Bit stronger. That is hypertrophy. We're growing muscles, OK? Hypertrophy can happen across a wide range of loads when the sets are taken close enough.

12:42 To failure. But your version of failure and. Reality is vastly. Different and so is mine. I was just I made a video about this this morning, so I want to briefly go into what failure means. So let's. Pretend I'm on the leg press and I am shooting for, you know, 11:50 reps I'm getting close to failure in my brain. So I stop because. I'm just supposed to get. Close to failure? Well, there was. A study done where all the participants went to. What they perceived. As being muscular failure, whereas in actuality, and I have no idea how they measured this, they had about 9:00.

13:14 Real reps left. In the tank. To actually. Spur muscle growth you. Have to be. Within one to three. Reps of failure, so that's. Pushing yourself way harder than what you. Perceive to be your. Final Rep. So here's a quick test if you're. Doing anything a bicep. Curl a leg, press whatever the whatever the. Movement might be and you think you're. At failure? Really. Hone in mentally and try to perform another Rep pretty fast. If you can lift that weight even a little bit and you're not at failure yet, try again.

13:47 Keep going, I remember, I always say to my clients. Go to failure. Go to failure. In reality, you don't have to. Hit absolute failure every set but. Close enough. close enough. One to three reps in reserve, so one to. Three RIR. There's an acronym you would see in your plans if you worked with me. One to three RIR close enough. Where you'll. Actually experience muscle growth. Because your body. 'S smart. Your body's smart, and the only way that it's going to change it, the only way it's going to build muscle, is if you.

14:15 Ask. It to if you're asking it to lift a load that it can lift without failing. Why would it build muscle if you're asking it to? Lift a load where you are. Failing. You cannot complete the test task that signals to your brain, hey, we need more muscle here, let's build. And it does. Your body is incredibly smart, which going back to. Pilates, that's why. You're not building muscle because you are working in an incredible, incredibly high Rep range in your fitness classes. You are working in an incredibly high Rep range.

14:42 You're not going to absolute failure and your reps. Are like 30. 6090 I don't even know what they are, but they're not in the hypertrophy range and we cover the. R of reps. So now we're moving on to the. E so E. Is exercise selection, so you need to pick. The right tools because. Even hard sets can miss the. Target of if the. Movement doesn't load the muscle. Well, for your body. For example, I have a wonky hip. I have a horrible wonky hip my Nana has. It is my Nana hip. I try to do squats to the best.

15:15 Of my. Ability, but I look. And. Feel horrible. When I do them, am I putting enough effort on the intention or the intended muscle groups? My effort? Yeah. Is my form horrible? Yeah. So am I hitting those groups efficiently? No, I'm not. For me and my body. That I now know. Very well at 30. Seven, I'm not going to push it on a barbell squat often. I will moreover go over to a machine and hit those intended muscle groups through that where I'm stabilized and. Actually able to put. Enough force on on my glutes, on my hamstrings, on my quads, so where I can really experience hypertrophy?

15:55 Whereas of the. Squat. I'm just trying not to die. I'm going to fall over. I'm going to go to the leg press instead. OK. Moving on to. Pee the pee. In reps is for. You guessed it. Protein you can't build with no. Bricks OK, your house. Is going to fall over. That's why my clients are probably so sick of me because they might say like, oh, I'm not, I'm not getting any growth. Here or there are. You hitting your protein goal sometimes. OK, so you don't have enough bricks. To build the house at what?

16:25 What? Are you going to build your butt out of nothing? Air bread. That's going to be flimsy. We need bricks, we need protein, and you need enough bricks. To fill those gaps that are. Happening in your muscles when they're torn. So if you're lifting A heavyweight, you're lifting it with good form, You're tearing your glute muscles. Awesome, that's what we want. What are you going to patch up the holes with again? Bread. You need protein. That's the amino acid that's going to repair those. Tears. Essentially causing the muscle.

16:55 To grow back bigger. And stronger and rounder and lifted, which is what you want for your butt. How much protein do you eat? I always feel like I'm being so redundant because I always repeat these things all day long, which I have no problem with. So if I'm a broken record, I'm sorry, but if you're trying to build muscle and you're a woman, you need to shoot for roughly a gram of protein per pound of. Ideal body. Weight. If you're £250, please don't eat that that much protein, you're never going to drop fat.

17:22 If you are. £250 and you want to be 170. Eat that OK or? Eat 150 grams of protein because. I guess the the. Real frame is .75 grams of protein to 1.5 grams of protein per pound of ideal body weight. But as just an over an overarching stat to keep in your mind or. Fact or whatever. 1g of protein per pound of. Ideal body weight. Of course, there's variances for different situations in. Cases but as. A general rule of thumb 1g of protein per pound of. Ideal body weight. And finally the S in the word.

18:00 Reps structure. Now, what does structure mean? That means progression and enough. Weekly work. So muscle builds from. Repeat exposure. And progression, not random workouts. So if you're bumping around the gym doing some kettlebell overhead farmer carries and then 18 push ups, maybe you'll do some core. None of that's going to do anything. OK, I'm sorry to tell you it's not you. Have to have repeated exposure. And progression, not random good workouts that make you feel like you're dying at the end.

18:36 It's actually not a good. Workout So what? Exactly. Does that mean you need a structured? Workout. Program. Now the general rule of thumb that works for pretty much everybody is you want to hit your muscle groups 2 * a week, not on consecutive days. Great, but here's where. The fun part is if you have really. Specific physique goals for. Example my physique. Goal was to build. My legs, my quads, my hands, especially my glutes. My upper body Beastie. I don't really care about lifting my upper body.

19:07 It can it can calm down for a while. So me specifically. I lift legs 4. Times per week I have them very strategically split up between planes of motion and I put a. Lot of effort. And intensity into my. Lower body lift days. My upper body lift days. They're kind of for fun. I don't really do them as consistently right now. I can do Pilates for my upper. Body workout days. I can do whatever I want for my upper. Body workout days. Because I'm not trying to grow my upper. Body I will. Do some lateral or dumbbell.

19:41 Raises. Really. I will do that to make sure I consistently maintain the X frame, hourglass frame, but I'm not going to be, you know, grabbing the barbell and doing bicep. Curls or. You know, really trying to overload my back anymore. Because as it. Stands. I don't want to and that is what's. So great with. Weightlifting is if you want a specific. Part of your body. To have more shape like for me I wanted my. Legs to OK I. Interjection. I had the best compliment today at the gym. I hadn't seen this person in probably a year and when they first saw me.

20:20 They were like your legs. Look so much bigger and my initial response, or I guess not response but my internal monologue was, you know. Back to the 2. Thousands. When the measure of your attractiveness was based on your Jean size and how tiny you are. I was like. Just a bit. Taken aback. And then I. Realized that's a great. Thing and they were like. Yeah, you've always had such a ripped upper. Body but now wow your. Legs are really. Coming in and they have so much more shape and he was the best compliment.

20:51 Because that's exactly. What I've been focusing on really intentionally for the last year, but kind of. Touch and go for the last two years. So that was a. Huge compliment to me, all of my build and maintenance and cut. Phases. Rotating that throughout the. Year. And having all these. Lower body days. And structuring them where I am putting more emphasis on the areas I want to grow and putting less emphasis on the areas I don't want to grow. All of that is. Now evident to somebody who hasn't seen me in a year, so.

21:23 It was truly. Rewarding. And that it can be you too. I mean, you pick. Which part of your body you want to be? Bigger or smaller, Pick how much body fat you want to have and you can. Build your shape. From the inside out. So. Yes, in a nutshell. The average? Person, you should be working each of your main muscle. Groups twice a week. Not back-to-back with those same muscle groups. Like I'm not going to have an upper body push day and then another. Upper body push day. If I was an average person who was just trying to tone up, I would structure my.

21:54 Day as follows. You know, if maybe I've been lifting for a few. Years so I have. You know, I have some experience behind me. Won't. We're probably going to do a four. Day 5 day split. So we'll do an. Upper body push day. Then we'll do a. Lower body. Maybe quad heavy day and then we'll do maybe, maybe a Pilates class on Wednesday and then and then on Thursday day. Three of our. Lifting day, not day. Four day three of. Lifting. We'll do an upper. Body pull day. Focusing on our backs and all the pulling motions like biceps and then maybe.

22:23 We'll have a rest. Day and then our. Last day will be a big. Leg day where we have a hamstring. Focus a glute focus. What have you. And then if I want to go to the gym one more time, maybe I'll just have an easy peasy pump day, do some high intensity sprints for 20 minutes and then just kind of hit all my muscles together in a. Really relaxed way. Just to make sure that I hit every group. Now that sounds overwhelming to you. If it if it sounds overwhelming to you. Hire a. Coach, buy a plan. Do what you need to do to have the structure you need to have to see the changes you want to see.

22:53 Now I want to go over all of those Herms I just listed off in the acronym. Reps very briefly before I close this out. So our rack reps are. Recomposition check we. Have our reps E exercise. Selection P Protein and. S structure. That is the intentionality you need to place behind the physical. Activity. Portion of your training. So as I said. Previously, your nutrition is going to account for 80% of your physique changes, and then that 20% that's on you to shape. That's where you can have fun. That's where you can choose your modality and what that's going to appear as on your physique.

23:38 If you want to have a tone physique, you need to be lifting weights. If you want to have a less toned physique, be a runner. No, but you can mix the 2. Worlds I actually have. Wonderful clients who mix the 2 worlds and they do it incredibly and they actually motivate me to continue to run at least 110 KA year. And you can mix those two components, but don't get stuck in the running realm without putting enough emphasis on the muscle maintenance or muscle building. Phase of your exercise or your.

24:12 Movement. Or whatever your goal. Is you need to have muscle to build your body, not just. For aesthetic purposes. But for a longevity reasons and for a million other health reasons, especially for women above. The age of 35. You need your lean muscle mass. So in closing. If you love Pilates, do Pilates. If you love bar, do bar. If you love running lease, run. If it's those. Things over not doing anything. Do those things if you. Have Hysique goals. That's. Translate into being more of a toned. Athletic look.

24:50 Athletic look. Integrate weight training into your regimen. Maybe you just want to start with one day on the gym. Floor per week. Where you're getting used to it, where you're building your confidence, where you're building your certainty around those machines and free weights, where you can start doing a plan. OK. Then maybe in a couple. Weeks put 2. Days of strength training into your regimen. You don't have to start big. You don't have to go big or go home. Just start. Just do a little bit. Just build from the ground up.

25:18 Go to your Pilates. Go to your bar. I'll see you there once a week for me because I need that mobility, OK? And then other days you'll just see me on the weight training floor. And if you're going to have one sentence, one take away from this entire episode, I want you to remember. There is a big. Difference between being hard and being? Effective just because a class is hard. Like Orangetheory or what? Have you? Does not mean it's effective for building muscle. Because even as a trainer, I was a trainer in college a million years ago.

25:52 I was a trainer while I was teaching. I have done a few training sessions now, even though I primarily just do virtual coaching. I can make you sweat, I can make you sore. I can give you a workout that is going to make you feel it for the next. Few days, but it's. Not going to have any impact on your hypertrophy, your muscle growth. I can do that. I would throw a bunch of. Burpees at you. I'd make you hold a plank for 1000 minutes. I would do a lot of. Nothing but make you sore. That's not enough.

26:23 Intentional stimulus on the areas that you want to build. It's not. Is it going to make you? Sore yes are. You going to feel like you got a. Good workout. Yes. Are you going to burn calories? Yes. Not as many as you'd if you'd burn if you would do it intentionally, but you are going to have a workout. Now whether? That workout goes towards your goals or takes you. Further away from them, that's up to you, but anybody can program to make you. Sore or tired? Or burn calories. You have to train with intention.

26:53 If you have a. Specific goal in mind. And so. If you are a woman, or a man for that matter, and you are working hard and you're in all those classes and doing all the things, but your body is not changing, don't assume. That your body. Is broken or. That that's just the way it is. Know that your plan is missing one of the. Drivers, be it reps, be it exercise. Selection, be it protein. Be it structure you. Are missing one of those. Drivers if your body. Is not responding to the stimulus that you're giving it, so if you want help matching.

27:30 Your body to your. Goal You can message me on Instagram. My Instagram is. Rack RAC. Fitness under dash? Yeah, that's rack. Fitness under Dash. That's my Instagram you can e-mail me too. I had. Quite a few ladies. Messaging me about getting their customized macro formulations and they have been loving them and I have been loving making them because they inspire these episodes. I actually had a completely different episode on the. Docket for today. I changed it. I changed it. Because I have. Gotten way too many comments, questions about Pilates and like I said, my older sister and I have been passionately discussing this for months.

28:08 I just, you know, my heart was screaming that I needed to share the evidence behind. Why your Pilates body? Ain't happening. So if you have. Your own need to get customized macro formulations. If you want to know what I mean, whatever, you can e-mail me [email protected]. So RAC Fitness MN Lake, [email protected] If you do have interest in joining my RAC Elite ladies, I am at capacity as it stands, but I do have one spot for RAC Concierge, which is a more in depth coaching program and you know if you're brand new.

28:45 That would be what? You would want to do because it's it's a lot of hand holding. We're texting, we're calling, we're talking. RAC Elite is. A group of ladies who've been doing it for a bit and they're a little community in and of themselves and they are incredible. They inspire me every single freaking day. All. Righty. Thank you for listening if you. Have thoughts, ideas. Things you want to know more about? Things you want to hear me rant about politely? At least I try to be. Shoot me a message you usually are representative of most women and I'm finding that most women are in the same state of why is orangetheory networking why is my Pilates body not Pilates bodying why are my bar classes making me.

29:26 Look like a bar. Imagine that. All right, ladies, thanks for listening and you will hear from me soon.