Now that the new year is upon us, you may be one the 70%+ that is wanting to exercise more. If you are in this group, let’s make sure you’re not one of the 80% plus that will not only fail, but will do so be the end of February. I feel several fail at this for a number of reasons. One of which is you go too hard too fast. Another is you don’t find the “right” workout routine for your goals. Lastly, several of you won’t change your eating and will just exercise more. While exercise will help you with becoming more fit and for you that may be your goal, but if you’re looking to lose weight and/or body fat there’s more to it then How many of you regularly attend workout classes or belong to a “gym” where the workouts are basically the same for everyone? If you answered “yes”, let me first say “Great job with making exercise a priority”. Second, I’d like to inform you why you may want to change things. I recently read a study from Bangor University in Waffles. In it women exercised at 50-90% VO2 peak for 45-90 minutes per session three times a week and were told not to modify their eating. The researchers found the exercise didn’t produce a weight loss. It found women considered to be lean gained muscle mass and those categorized as overweight and/or obese didn’t lose weight and had an increase in apptetite hormone levels.
Hans-Peter Kurbis, PhD study co-author and senior lecturer at Bangor University’s School of Sport, Health and Exercise Sciences, believes “Our body system is so well regulated that it always finds a way to compensate for a loss in energy after exercise,” this is important because if we have an intense workout, we tend to be hungrier and if we’re not mindful of our caloric intake we can easily eat just as many calories as we burned, if not more. Eating the same would equate to a not weight loss and no weight gain, eating more equals a gain in weight. Keep in mind, we are just discussing weight and not lean mass or a change in body fat. This is why I feel you should not just focus on the scale.
I feel it’s important you’re aware of how your body reacts to an intense workout and you should pay close attention to your nutrition when exercising. This is why I feel it best you workout a facility that will help you with your nutrition and discusses what style of workouts and how many should do as opposed to going to a “gym” that 90% or more of the time focuses on pushing you to your limit and does not take into account recovery, nutrition and specificity.