Losing weight
is a battle: And like any good fight, you don’t always come out on top. At
first, you were dominating, dropping weight every time you stepped on the
scale. Then, the numbers began to slow, and now they’re completely stagnant.
You’ve hit the dreaded weight loss plateau.
It’s a bummer when your fat loss slows, but
hitting a weight loss plateau is completely normal.
“The leaner you get, the harder it gets to lose
those last few pounds,” says Tony Gentilcore, C.S.C.S., owner of CORE in
Brookline, Massachusetts.
As you continue losing weight, your metabolism
starts to slow down, so you either need to eat fewer calories or burn more
calories to see continued weight loss. But still, your current weight
doesn’t have to
be your ending weight. You just need to start approaching your fat loss plan a
bit differently if you want to see results. Here, six reasons you’ve stopped
losing weight—and what you can do to get back on track.
WEIGHT LOSS PLATEAU CAUSE: YOU DON’T PORTION OUT
YOUR FOOD
A lot of guys devalue the importance of portion sizes, says
Gentilcore. You might think eyeballing the amount of food you eat isn’t doing
much harm, but it can make a big difference when you’re trying to shed those
last few pounds.
Say, if you add just a couple extra tablespoons of peanut butter to your
daily smoothie, that’s around 120 extra calories, adding up to 840 extra
calories a week.
“As you get a little bit closer to your target weight, you have to be a
bit more meticulous,” says Gentilcore.
If you’ve stopped seeing results, you need to pay attention to portion
control. First, familiarize yourself with what you should actually
be eating. For instance, a serving of beef is 3 ounces (about the size of a
deck of cards) and a serving of ice cream is half a cup (about the size of half
a tennis ball). Then, measure it out, Gentilcore says.
After you get used to what that amount looks like, you can go back to
eyeballing your portions.
WEIGHT LOSS PLATEAU CAUSE: YOU TREAT YOURSELF TOO
OFTEN
What’s the harm of one brownie after a hard workout, right? Well, that
kind of mindset can stunt your weight loss, says John Raglin, Ph.D. an exercise
researcher at Indiana University Bloomington’s School of Public Health.
“You could run an extra five miles, but it’s really easy to reward
yourself with more than 500 calories,” he says. “The reward usually far exceeds
the extra calories you expended.”
These excess calories stack up: If you eat a 500-calorie treat several
times a week, that could be an extra day’s worth of calories each week, or more
than 6,000 calories per month. And that can make a big difference if you can’t
seem to move the scale, says Raglin.
Instead of binging on a sundae because you “earned it,” choose smaller
portions of treats you really love, suggests Raglin, like a really decadent
piece of dark chocolate or one scoop of your favorite, high-quality vanilla ice
cream.
Here’s one rule to go by: Only 10 to 20 percent of your daily calories
should come from junk food, says Men’s Health nutrition
advisor, Alan Aragon. If you feel like you’re not seeing results, try to stick
to the 10 percent range if a craving hits—so if you’re an active guy eating
about 2,800 calories a day, that treat should only be around 280 calories.
WEIGHT LOSS PLATEAU CAUSE: YOU THINK YOU’RE
MORE ACTIVE THAN YOU REALLY ARE
When you start working out more, you might experience something called
“compensatory inactivity,” says Raglin. That means you might be exercising
more, but moving less throughout your day.
Many people fall into this habit of “keeping score.” You bust your butt
during your morning sweat session. Then when you get home, you plop down on the
couch for the rest of the day to binge watch your favorite Netflix show because
you feel like you’ve already done enough for the day.
That’s a mistake: If you’re serious about keeping up with your weight
loss, falling into this habit of not moving after exercising can really hold
you back, says Raglin.
“Don’t miss out on opportunities to walk or be active or take the
stairs,” he says. “It’s a small difference, but you’re keeping your metabolism
up.”
What’s more, incorporating more movement throughout your day can keep
you motivated, says Raglin. Make an effort to be active whenever you can—take
your dog for a walk, kick around a soccer ball with your kids, or give yourself
a daily step count target. The pounds will keep coming off, he says.
WEIGHT LOSS PLATEAU CAUSE: YOU DON’T FUEL UP RIGHT
Sticking to a high-intensity routine boosts your appetite, says Raglin.
You might end up feeling ravenous post-workout, causing you to overeat and gain all of those
calories back instantly.
So play the preventive game: If you’re hungry going into your workout,
chances are good you’ll be starving afterward. In that case, consider having
a pre-workout snack to manage your hunger, says Raglin. You
don’t want something too heavy or rich, which can make you feel uncomfortably
full. Instead, shoot for an apple, which is full of simple carbs to give you
energy, or a handful of almonds, which contain good fats and some protein to
hold your hunger over.
If you work out before work or after leaving the office, you will need
to eat afterwards. Just make sure you’re doing it right: If you have some time
to kill before your usual dinner time, make yourself a protein shake or have a small snack so you’re not tempted
to overeat at dinner, says Raglin.
WEIGHT LOSS PLATEAU CAUSE: YOU’RE NOT CONSISTENT IN
THE GYM
Consistency matters when you’re trying to lose that last bit of weight,
says Gentilcore. In fact, skipping just one workout can increase your odds of
missing another one by 61 percent, according to British research.
And consistency matters in your routine, too. Despite
what you may hear, novelty doesn’t necessarily equal progress, says Gentilcore.
For a fat loss program to work, you have to stick to a routine long enough so
you can really master it.
“The squat, deadlift, and bench press are staples for a reason,” he says. “People
don’t give themselves enough time to learn and master these moves.”
The sooner you become proficient at an exercise, the better you get at
it. That means you can add more weight to it, helping you gain and retain
muscle—which helps you burn more calories throughout the day and fend off fat.
But if boring really bothers you, add new stuff to the last 10 minutes of your
usual routine as a finisher, suggests Gentilcore.
Then, usually after about 4 to 6 weeks, you can think about switching
your exercises up, says Gentilcore. Once you’ve mastered your staples, you can
seek out some more challenging variations, like switching up the classic flat
bench press with the incline or close-grip bench press.
WEIGHT LOSS PLATEAU CAUSE: YOU DON’T RECOVER
PROPERLY
You’re not going to maintain or continue your weight loss if you’re too
sore to keep up with your workout plan out for the rest of the week. Not taking
your recovery period seriously can cause you to plateau, says
Gentilcore. When you pump iron, you’re literally breaking down your body by
causing micro tears in your muscle tissues, so you need give it time to rebuild
that muscle before you get back into it.
“People don’t understand that going home and eating well, going to
sleep, and drinking enough water is going to allow your body to recover so you
can go back to the gym a day later so you can do it again,” he says.
When you’re first starting out, training three days a week seems to be a
happy medium for most guys, says Gentilcore. Or you can do full body workouts
every other day and allow a day of recovery in between.
But if you really want results, Gentilcore says it doesn’t hurt to get
in the gym 6 days a week, just make sure you’re alternating muscle groups, he
says. So if Monday is your chest day, work your legs Tuesday to give your upper
body time to recover.
If you’re constantly feeling too sore to get moving again, try one of
these ways to speed up recovery after a hard workout so you can stay on
track with your exercise routine.
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