Is the scale stuck on one number? Has your weight loss stalled? You might have hit a weight loss plateau. According to a study published by the American journal of clinical nutrition most people hit a weight loss plateau at about 6 months into their diet. The reason this happens is because the body has evolved to adapt to whatever you throw at it. When you do the same things over and over again your body becomes more efficient and gets use to the routine. That’s why the best thing you can do when you hit a weight loss plateau and the numbers on the scale are just not moving is to change up your fitness routine. There is 3 different ways you can do this. You can increase the weight or resistance your lifting, increase the intensity of the exercises, or increase the length of time you are working out everyday.
If you add in more workout days and increase the different measurements I mentioned above then the next thing you should consider doing is counting your calories. I know you might think this is unnecessary but it is a critical step to breaking a weight loss plateau. You see without measuring what your eating how are you supposed to know if your on track or not. Remember what gets measured gets done.
A lot of athletes and bodybuilders count calories and you should do it to if you want to keep moving the numbers on the scale. It is easier then ever to do with a calorie counter app on your cell phone or a simple food journal. Once you know how many calories your consuming everyday you can slowly start to decrease them by 200 to 300 calories per day in order to put yourself in a caloric deficit. This should budge the numbers on the scale.
If that doesn’t work and you are still not losing weight after increasing exercise intensity and counting calories then consider cutting carbs. By doing this you will help your body get use to burning fat instead of glucose. This should break your weight loss plateau. To cut carbs simply do not eat foods with sugar, breads, cereals, or pastas. Make sure when you grocery shop to check the nutrition label and see how many carbs the food has in it before you buy it. A good rule of thumb is to stay at 50 net carbs per day or no more than 100 net carbs per day. If you do eat carbs make sure you do not eat them late at night. Sugary food eaten late at night turns right into fat while your sleeping. If your going to eat some carbs for the day for an energy boost do it early in the morning and cut carbs for the rest of the day.
If you are cutting carbs, counting calories and increasing exercise intensity and you still can’t lose weight there is a trick that athletes use to cut weight. Remember this is usually not necessary but some people do have insulin resistance, a slow metabolism, or other problems like leptin resistance that prevents them from losing weight no matter what they do.
The trick athletes use is called the zig zag method. It is very simple instead of eating the same amount of calories every day you zig zag and eat 500 more calories two days per week. For example you eat 2200 calories on Mondays and Thursdays and the rest of the week you eat 1700 calories. This confuses your body so it can’t adapt and go into starvation mode which usually happens if you cut your calories too low for a long period of time. Remember change up your routine if you hit a weight loss plateau, do different exercises, increase the intensity or weight and even try changing up your diet. Don’t let your body adapt. Changing it up is the key to breaking a weight loss plateau.
For more tips and tricks that will help you break a weight loss plateau I recommend you read the fat burning kitchen. It has a lot of great reviews and athletes and bodybuilders swear buy it. It is a helpful book with all kinds of tips and tricks that athletes use to burn fat and get in extremely good shape just by making changes to their diet.
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