Eat more not less!
Plateaus are annoying, especially when you have been working your butt off and eating the correct food. Beyond Fitness Personal Training explains why the body goes into plateau and how to get back on track with your weight loss goals.
Plateaus naturally occur as your body adjusts to the new weight loss, so now this is definitely not the time to give up and fall off track!
All you have to do is either wait it out, or change it up, and if you are impatient (like me) here are 3 ways to change it up and speed up the process:
3 Ways to speed up your plateau
1. Take a week off
Now I know what you may be thinking, “Won’t this make me gain weight?!”
Nope nope nope.
During this week off, your body will be able to properly repair itself and finally get that rest that it needs.
One reason for a plateau could be that you are working yourself too hard and not allowing enough time for your muscles to recover. When you finally do give them this time, they will work in your favour and get those scales moving in the right direction again.
2. Eat more!
When you are on a cut (eating at a deficit) for a long time, your body/metabolism begins to adjust to the amount of calories you are eating now. It may actually begin to use that as your new need for ‘maintenance calories’.
The best way to make sure this doesn’t happen is by having a reset every 4 weeks and eating approximately 500 calories more for about seven days, then continue back at your cut.
The extra energy will reassure the body that it is getting enough calories in. Your body will then trust you and be more willing to lose fat.
3. Change your routine
Your body will become used to your routine if you keep your routine the same for over 6 weeks. The best thing to do is simply change it up.
Examples of how to change your routine
- higher sets
- lower reps
- increase or decrease weights; or
- change every exercise in your routine, though you don’t neccesarily need to to that – just adding a HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) session 1-2 times per week will do the trick.
Just get your body moving in new ways and bust that plateau!
Hopefully at least one of these plateau busting ways will help you.
Just remember there is always a way – don’t ever give up because if you give up you will become just that much further from your goal.
Weight loss takes time and is not as simple as gain weight, maintain, lose weight. There is a lot of fluctuation in between, good days, bad days, hormones playing up, and many more factors.
Just remember that it’s not an overnight process, and rushing will only result in a short period weight loss, which you surely do not want.
So take your time, and let things ride out on their own. We are always here to talk if you want some extra support so don’t hesitate to give us a shout out!