How often should one work out for maximum weight loss? | Exercise.com Learn: Your Fitness Business Resource

How often should one work out for maximum weight loss?

Tyler Spraul is the director of UX and the head trainer for Exercise.com. He has his Bachelor of Science degree in pre-medicine and is an NSCA-certified strength and conditioning specialist. He is a former All-American soccer player and still coaches soccer today. In his free time, he enjoys reading, learning, and living the dad life. He has been featured in Shape, Healthline, HuffPost, Women's...

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UPDATED: Aug 25, 2020

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  • Cutting calories alone is not the answer to losing weight.
  • Along with consuming a nutritious diet, it‘s important to get regular exercise.
  • If your goal is to lose weight, you should plan to get some exercise every two days.

To lose weight, you will need to burn more calories than you take in.

A combination of eating well and getting regular exercise is the key to reaching this goal, and you should keep this fact in mind when deciding how often to workout for maximum weight loss.

Cutting calories alone is not the answer to losing weight. A dieter who severely restricts his or her eating is unlikely to be able to stick to this kind of plan over the long term.

The individual will become bored or will give up on this type of diet because they get tired of feeling hungry all the time.

Once the person starts eating “normally,” they will likely gain back any weight they have lost.

In the majority of cases, a person who relies on diet alone to lose weight will end up gaining back the weight, and possibly a bit more.

This can turn into a vicious cycle of extreme dieting, gaining the weight back, and then going back to dieting.

To find an exercise routine that will help you lose weight, go PRO today for access to weight-loss workout plans, certified personal trainers, and more.

How Do My Diet and Exercise Impact My Optimal Workout Schedule?

To lose weight and keep it off, an individual should use a two-faceted approach. Along with consuming a nutritious diet, it‘s important to get regular exercise.

The exercise will help to burn fat and increase muscle mass, and good nutrition will provide the new muscles with the food that they need to grow properly.

Why Build Lean Muscle When Trying to Lose Weight?

Muscle burns calories at a higher rate than fat does, even when at rest. Adding more muscle to one‘s frame will make it easier to burn calories and lose weight. The increased muscle mass will continue to burn fat and help the cycle of weight loss to continue going forward.

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If I’m Trying to Lose Pounds Then How Often Should I Work Out?

If your goal is to lose weight, you should plan to get some exercise every two days. To build muscle, you need to make the workout challenging. You won’t be able to increase the amount of muscle in your body unless you work at a level that makes the muscle work harder than it normally does.

Working the muscle is only part of the equation when you want to lose weight. You also need to give it time to build up again after exercising. Weight training exercises should only be done every 48 hours to give the body time to recover after a session.

Cardio exercises and cardio workout routines, which get your heart pumping hard enough to get your body to start burning fat, can be performed on alternate days from the strength training exercises.

Examples of this type of activity include walking, running, dancing, cycling, and swimming. Playing a team sport like hockey, soccer, basketball, or baseball can also help to keep the heart-healthy. Changing up an exercise routine to include different activities will help to guard against boredom and may help you stay motivated over the long term.

If I’m Trying to Lose Inches Then How Often Should I Work Out?

When someone first starts to build muscle and lose fat, they may not see the difference in their body reflected on the scale. The number they see may even go up for a time. This should not be cause for concern because, while one pound of muscle weighs the same as one pound of fat, muscle is more compact and takes up less space than fat. So, while your weight may stay the same, you will be noticeably leaner.

Rather than going by the number displayed on the scale to get an idea of how well a diet and exercise program is working, a better way to measure progress is by looking at changes in how clothing items fit as time goes on.

It may be helpful to use a tape measure to track progress. Taking your measurements at the beginning of the exercise program and again four or six weeks later on is probably a better way to get an idea of how well it’s working. There should be a change in the numbers by that point.

In conclusion, the answer to the question of how often one should work out to lose weight is every 48 hours for weight training exercise. Cardio exercise can be done in between lifting weights to provide variety and help with motivation. It’s a good idea to have one day when no exercise sessions are scheduled to give the body a chance to recover completely from the physical activity.

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