For many months, I was doing 70 minutes of cardio on an eliptical trainer 6 days a week. About 4 weeks ago, I change my routine to the following.

Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday - 45min upper body weight training, 35min cardio

Monday, Wednesday, Friday - 70min cardio

My goal right now is strictly fat loss (5'6", currently ~128lbs with 13 - 14%bf). I added the weight training as I had definately lost a lot of strength over the past year.

Since I joined my gym a year ago, I've been slowly increasing the resistance level on the eliptical trainer. I've been using setting 8 (out of 20) and have never seen anyone use a setting higher than 10.

Over the past month or so, my quadriceps have been very stiff during the day. It's getting to the point where my Friday cardio routine can take a decent amount of effort to complete. I'm beginning to think I may be overtraining slightly.

Yesterday, I decided to do my 35min cardio at setting 6 and my legs feel much better. I was just wondering if it would be best to keep the same exercise time with a lower resistance level, or stay at the higher level but exercise for a shorter period of time. If I do drop the resistance, I may still do one day a week at the higher setting.

My legs are already in decent shape, so they probably don't need such a high resistance level. Actually .... now that I'm typing this, I realize my quads are little larger than I'd like them to be. So perhaps staying at the lower resistance level might be the answer. I'm still very interested to get input from this forum.

TIA to all who respond.

If you want your quads to go down, then yes, stay at a lower-resistance longer lasting exercise Quads are fast-twitch so if you do sprint then your quads are going to BALLOON.

However, my question is this, why would you Want smaller quads? To me quads seem like one of the most aesthetically pleasing muscles on the whole body. It's also quite useful too, and can definitely help boost your metabolism. Also quads are stabalizing muscles, everything about them is cool. I personally have huge quads (27" Non-flexed, non pumped) and I really love them.

would you Want smaller quads

While dropping fat, I've discovered I have a very small frame. While my quads 'fit' my current body, they may look slightly disproportioned once I drop my bf% a little more. But I guess it's not a huge deal. I probably would keep most of their size even if I lowered the resistance a bit. Even more so if I kept the higher resistance one or two days a week (instead of all 6 days).

With your stats, I personally think you should be bulking. If you put on some muscle mass, you will also burn more fat daily and it will help you look better since you will become broader. I would also take the cardio down to 45-60 mins, 70 is a bit excessive.

Just my opinion though.

70 is a bit excessive

Not sure if it matters, but the 70 min is two 35 min sets which include a 5min cool down per set.

My thought is that it doesn't hurt to change a routine, especially if the one that you're using is giving you problems. I'd suggest staying at 6 for a couple of weeks and see if the problems disappear and if you still make progress.