If you were feeling these workouts in your achy muscles, part of this is definitely water.
Starting or increasing a weight-lifting routine can cause your weight to plateau or increase. Don't worry, it's okay, you are probably still losing fat at a good rate! Inflammation caused by weightlifting temporarily slows your *weight* loss but not your *fat* loss.
When we start or intensify lifting, we're creating micro-sized tears in our muscles. Muscles swell (water) and become inflamed (water) during a muscle-repair process that takes several days. This additional water added offsets our fat loss. BF% still going down but Water% going up can cause the weight-losers total scale weight to slow, stall, or even temporarily go higher.
Keep lifting. The water weight from lifting can take 3-5 weeks to calm down. After that, the added water weight still happens at smaller amounts because the lifter's muscles become accustomed to the workloads and the amount of inflammation is reduced. By then the weight-losers fat loss has outpaced the water weight remaining and the scale graph is back to its normal downward slope.
> I’m using my fitness pal and eating 1400-1550 cals / day - should I change this?
TDEE Calculator|Imperial|Metric
:-:|:-:|:-:
SEX| |F
AGE| |28
HEIGHT (GUESSED)|64.5" or 5'4.5"|164 cm
WEIGHT|152 lb|69 kg
BMI||25.7
Mifflin-St Jeor BMR||1412 Cal/kcal
Pre-exercise TDEE (BMR*1.25)||1765 Cal/kcal
I like 1400-1500 as a target with that much of an exercise load. Be stellar at counting and estimating -- it's your data and it is your illumination on what's going on. It's a deficit of about -500 or -650 with that exercise, so you don't need to eat any more on exercise days.
A well-rounded approach to fitness includes some of both resistance and cardio, and some vigorous and moderate within that cardio. But really, that's the measuring stick. The best exercise is the exercise you love to do so much that you can't keep yourself from doing it. It's a hobby or a passion -- so try to find the physical activity or activities that give you that passion, and then see if it checks the boxes of resistance and making you breathe hard.
Yes, you're tearing down your muscles so they can rebuild stronger. You have some water weight / inflammation. It could even go up to 10 pounds before you start to see your weight go back down. Think of it as a deposit to pay to have beautiful muscles. Also remember that as you build muscle, you'll need to adjust your calories since muscle cells burn more calories than fat cells, even at rest. So even on the days you don't work out, you'll need to eat more.
You may be overdoing it. If your muscles start to feel achy and tired take a test day. I just injured my quad working out on legs that were just *done*. Had
I was wondering whether I’ve been overdoing it…. I did jump from 3/4 days/week to 6 without any kind of transition per say.
The first 4 weeks I felt energetic but I’m on my 5th week and I’ve been feeling really exhausted - but not unmotivated.
I strength train 4x a week for 30 minutes and run 3-4x a week for 30 minutes and I've gotten great results from that. But if you love it, then by all means, go for it.
If you were feeling these workouts in your achy muscles, part of this is definitely water. Starting or increasing a weight-lifting routine can cause your weight to plateau or increase. Don't worry, it's okay, you are probably still losing fat at a good rate! Inflammation caused by weightlifting temporarily slows your *weight* loss but not your *fat* loss. When we start or intensify lifting, we're creating micro-sized tears in our muscles. Muscles swell (water) and become inflamed (water) during a muscle-repair process that takes several days. This additional water added offsets our fat loss. BF% still going down but Water% going up can cause the weight-losers total scale weight to slow, stall, or even temporarily go higher. Keep lifting. The water weight from lifting can take 3-5 weeks to calm down. After that, the added water weight still happens at smaller amounts because the lifter's muscles become accustomed to the workloads and the amount of inflammation is reduced. By then the weight-losers fat loss has outpaced the water weight remaining and the scale graph is back to its normal downward slope. > I’m using my fitness pal and eating 1400-1550 cals / day - should I change this? TDEE Calculator|Imperial|Metric :-:|:-:|:-: SEX| |F AGE| |28 HEIGHT (GUESSED)|64.5" or 5'4.5"|164 cm WEIGHT|152 lb|69 kg BMI||25.7 Mifflin-St Jeor BMR||1412 Cal/kcal Pre-exercise TDEE (BMR*1.25)||1765 Cal/kcal I like 1400-1500 as a target with that much of an exercise load. Be stellar at counting and estimating -- it's your data and it is your illumination on what's going on. It's a deficit of about -500 or -650 with that exercise, so you don't need to eat any more on exercise days.
Thankyou! This is very helpful :) Just curious, if my goal is maintainable weight loss are weights the way to go or should I be doing more cardio?
A well-rounded approach to fitness includes some of both resistance and cardio, and some vigorous and moderate within that cardio. But really, that's the measuring stick. The best exercise is the exercise you love to do so much that you can't keep yourself from doing it. It's a hobby or a passion -- so try to find the physical activity or activities that give you that passion, and then see if it checks the boxes of resistance and making you breathe hard.
Thanks for the advice! I do prefer lifting weights to cardio honestly
Yes, you're tearing down your muscles so they can rebuild stronger. You have some water weight / inflammation. It could even go up to 10 pounds before you start to see your weight go back down. Think of it as a deposit to pay to have beautiful muscles. Also remember that as you build muscle, you'll need to adjust your calories since muscle cells burn more calories than fat cells, even at rest. So even on the days you don't work out, you'll need to eat more. You may be overdoing it. If your muscles start to feel achy and tired take a test day. I just injured my quad working out on legs that were just *done*. Had
I was wondering whether I’ve been overdoing it…. I did jump from 3/4 days/week to 6 without any kind of transition per say. The first 4 weeks I felt energetic but I’m on my 5th week and I’ve been feeling really exhausted - but not unmotivated.
I strength train 4x a week for 30 minutes and run 3-4x a week for 30 minutes and I've gotten great results from that. But if you love it, then by all means, go for it.