If you’re trying to lose weight, it’s so frustrating to work hard at the gym and in the kitchen and not see the scale budget. So check out these 2 surprising reasons why you might be stalling out
Losing weight is the number 1 fitness-related goal in the world but with all the information out there it can leave you running in circles. Let’s break down two common mistakes made on the training side so you can make sure you’re on the path to success
Short-term gains are not what we are after today- I want to set you up so you can drive sustainable change
Mistake 1: Too much cardio, not enough weights
The first activity people want to turn to when trying to lose weight is more cardio but here’s the deal. When your body is in a calorie deficit it is going to do two things
1) it’s going to look for energy stored in your body
2) conserve energy wherever it can
So this means your body will probably start chewing up some fat but it also means your body is going to burn up some muscle
Focusing on weight training will help us maintain muscle mass and strength, which will give us a two-fold benefit.
1) You will look leaner when you drop the body fat
2) Raising muscle mass will help keep our metabolism high
Recent research continues to suggest that not only does strength training improve lean muscle mass and function, but it’s also ideal for goals like weight loss, improving body composition, and endurance as well. So while we always incorporate mobility, agility, power, and endurance training in our programs we know that improving your strength through the major movement patterns will have the biggest overall impact on your success so we recommend prioritizing it within your training twice a week.
Mistake 2: High-intensity training all the time
High-intensity training is everywhere in the training world from cardio to weight training-it comes in the form of CrossFit, F45, boot camps. There’s no shortage of solutions to your fitness and weight loss problems.
Now there’s nothing wrong with high-intensity training if classes excite you, you have fun and you get some early results I just want you to know there may be some issues long term and some diminishing returns with this type of training, and here’s why
HIT is very stressful on the body. Stress in all forms will lead to an increase in cortisol in the body. Furthermore HIT training typically has Lactic acid build-up associated with it that will dramatically impact your digestion. The way you absorb nutrients. This combination of raised stress, cortisol, and lactic acid will lead over time to get poor sleep, difficulty managing your hunger signals, and feeling low energy
Really stressed-out individuals tend to crave sugars, salts, and foods that are not optimized for their energy balance equation.
The total number of calories you burn in the day is most important. If you go so hard in the gym that you have no energy left to move for the rest of the day the net effect of how much energy you spent might be lower than if you went with a moderate exercise approach that left you feeling the energy to go be active for the rest of the day.
An optimal approach to cardio would be 30 to 60mins of movement at an intensity you can comfortably sustain- for example walking, swimming, cycling, hiking, or whatever activity you enjoy
There you have it two common training mistakes. Remember at the end of the day doing something is always 10 times better than doing nothing so make sure not to over think it- We just prefer a smarter not harder approach to these things
