I'm hoping someone can offer some advice on what I am doing wrong or at least what is happening.

I am a 31 year old male and currently weigh 280lbs. My goal weight is around 230-235lbs (which is what I weighed a few years back when I was pretty lean.)

For the past 2 months I have been working out at least 4-5 times a week and also sometimes on weekends a bit. During the week I try to get in at least 20 minutes of vigorous cardio (jogging, eliptical, stairmaster, bike, rowing) I try to keep it mixed up. I also try to get in a quick couple of sets of weightlifting (10 min or less) to target some areas I want to improve like shoulders and arms 3-4 days a week. On the weekends I try to stay active with some canoeing, biking, or just walking/hiking.

For the last 2 months I have also changed to a mostly vegetarian diet, I eat about 4-5 meals a day that are smaller than I was used to. So I have been eating a lot of fresh veggies, fruits, some lean meats and fish, and have cut refined sugar and processed foods out of my diet almost entirely. Usually a bowl of oatmeal in the morning. I drink plenty of water everyday and take a multi-vitamin. On the weekends I typically cheat a bit 1 day but still keep it as healthy as possible (a little bacon and mayo on a chicken sandwich, etc) but no junk food or junk snacks. I never eat more than what I can fit in two cupped hands, portion wise.

So my problem is this... I started at 286lbs, the first month and a half I dropped 11lbs which I thought was reasonable progress. I figured it would take about 6+ months to drop the 40+ lbs. Ive been aiming at about 1-2lbs a week.

The past 2 weeks I have started gaining weight. I've gained back 5 lbs total. So now I am back up to 280lbs. I dont understand what I'm doing wrong. Its discouraging.

I know everyone says muscle weighs more than fat and at 230lbs for my pretty lean weight I'm a big guy to begin with, but I know I cant be gaining 2lbs a week+ the 2 lbs I should be losing for a total of 4lbs of muscle a week. Thats crazy. If I add up what I am eating and my workouts, from a calorie standpoint I should be losing weight, not gaining.

Any thoughts? Suggestions? I dont know what to do, but Im feeling like the hard work I am putting in is for nothing. someone suggested I should take measurements and see if they change.

I've been debating whether to start working out twice a day, once in the morning, once around lunchtime. Is this a god idea? I feel like my body is ready for it fitness wise. I really wanted to hold off on the hardcore workouts until I hit a weight loss plateau down the road, but it looks like I might need a change now.

Also I forgot to mention I have been taking creatine tablets (not powder) everyday. Been taking half the recommended dose. I've noticed it helped me be less sore after workouts. Should I quit the creatine?

I would say 99% of the time when someone sees a reverse it's because they're not eating right. Now "not right" could be one of two things: It could mean that even though you're eating healthy, you're eating TOO MUCH (it's possible to eat too much healthy food and gain weight). It could also mean that you're not eating enough for the amount of effort that you're putting out in exercise and your body is rebelling by holding on to every bit of fuel that you give it, preparing to survive a nutritional deficit.

I would suggest that you register with one of the free sites like fitday.com or thedailyplate.com and start logging your food. Even if you just do it for a week, you'll get a much better idea of how many calories a day you're consuming and how your nutrients are breaking down.

I will say that 10 mins of "spot" weight lifting a couple of times a week is not going to build 5 lbs of muscle. Building muscle is a slow process - and nearly impossible if you're in a calorie deficit. Even body builders who are busting ass to build muscle by taking protein supplements and working out hard usually are limited in the amount of muscle they can build - the most I've heard of is around 40 or 50 lbs a YEAR ... and that's pretty hardcore.

The other thing I'd keep in mind if I were you is that your body weight can fluctuate a lot if you eat very salty foods or if you don't drink enough water. Your body retains water and can retain 3-4-5 or more pounds over the course of several days. Take a hard look at what you've eaten and see if you've consumed more sodium than usual and that could be a part of the problem.

Hope that gives you a place to start.

Well, you are probably losing muscle considering there is no weight lifting and meat in your routine.

Go for weight lifting workouts before moving to cardio, go 25 mins max on cardio (full intensity), 35 mins go for weight lifting (free weights), ask the trainer to assign you a free weights and bodyweight schedule.

include meat in your diet.

As for the portions, remember no junk food, no white bread, no rice, no sugar, no pepsi.

What you are doing will make it impossible to keep the weight off.

because muscle naturally keeps weight and you are doing a terrible job of maintaining muscles.

Kara -Thanks for the input. I was keeping a log before when i was doing well, I dropped the habit when I thought I was making good decisions. Well, I started a log just for the last few days I remembered and you are right... I let my calorie intake wander up a bit over my target. I can't believe it was that simple. I realized I started getting back to eating larger dinners like when I didnt eat well all day....

Vinesh - Like I said, I do eat meat, chicken, turkey, venison, and fish, (very little beef and pork) although not every meal and sometimes not everyday. I watch my protein intake very carefully and make sure I am getting complete proteins by combining foods when I don't eat meat. I'm guessing you were stressing importance of protein in diet. And I don't eat junk, hate pepsi.

I don't think I have much to worry about in losing muscle mass. Although I only lift 5-15 minutes a day I am targeting muscles like biceps, triceps, shoulders, etc. I work them very hard (until failure) within a short amount of time and move on. ( and I do work them before cardio) Those muscles are among the smaller ones on the body and don't like to be overworked. I'm making gains in the weight I'm lifting every week, and I've returned my bench press to 300lbs. (Like I said the last time I saw my stomach muscles I weighed 220 -225lbs, so I'm pretty muscled under the fat)

The reason I'm not lifting more is because I dont want to get bigger, I just want to maintain my muscles and lose the fat on top.

Yup. This is what happens to me. I get into a rut, stop logging my food, and let little things creep up on me. It's very easy to eat a couple hundred extra calories a day w/out even realizing it.


Working only your upper body in isolation is not really effective. Read the sticky posts on weight lifting. First of all you cannot "bulk up" while in a calorie deficit - so the idea that doing full body work will make you "big" is a myth. In order to bulk, you have to work at it hard - and eat more calories than you would while on a diet. There's also no need to work to failure every time you lift.

A more effective routine would be to concentrate on full body and compound exercises. Things like squats, lunges, bench presses, military presses, rows, dips, pushups, chinups/pullups, planks, etc. are going to be FAR more effective at maintaining muscle and burning fat than working your biceps, triceps, and shoulders to death.

I think I see what your getting at. I think I'm somewhere in between what your recommending and what it sounded like I was doing. My weight lifting routine has typically been something like this:

Mon: I choose 3 bicep exercises from about 8 or so I rotate each week. When I'm done I really feel it but not "bad" sore the next day. I take a little longer on these exercises and stretch between each set.

Tues: I usually do a quick leg workout or do extra cardio

Wed: I usually do benchpress in some form with dumbells or pull downs - usually 4 really good sets. (I cant do real pull ups anymore... yet)

Thurs: I usually do chair dips, dips, or other tricep type exercises, or extra cardio. 2 or 3 exercises

Fri: I usually do some kind of shoulder workout like military press, lateral/ front raises, upright rows, etc. 2 or 3 exercises

Everyday I do some kind of cardio for like 20-30 min. rotate between bike, jogging, eliptical, stairs, rowing machine

I think the main reason I stay away from working my legs more is that when I do, they are too tired to do the cardio part with any intensity, since most of the cardio I do is leg based. ...I guess I need to start doing rowing on those days, duh.

So, what you're basically saying is, I don't have to worry about bulking up because I'm on a budgeted diet? I can go full out on weight lifting and it should help? My main goal has been to maintain muscle while I lose fat, BUT I really wanted to round out my biceps and the sides of my shoulders a bit more, hence the bit of targeting. Do you think this will be foolish to pursue until I get to a goal weight? I definitely feel stronger in those muscles but haven't noticed any size improvement over what already there.

Thanks so much Kara, you've been a great help. It's tough doing this work alone sometimes without feedback.

I'll tell you ... Steve has explained it better than I ever could. Read this thread:

http://weight-loss.fitness.com/weigh...t-lifting.html

Be sure to scroll down to post #4 and see the progression of routines that he builds.

If you want to maintain muscle you have to WORK muscle. ALL OF THEM. Targeting isolated muscles not only isn't a productive use of time, it can be counter productive. From the post I just linked this is KEY:

And then this from post #4 in that thread:

That entire thread - and the two other sticky threads in that section that deal with weight lifting are packed with information. It might take you two or three readings to absorb all of it, but I highly encourage you to do so. I considered myself fairly educated on the subject before I came here, but even so, the way Steve explains it helped me to further my knowledge.

If you're going to lift weights (and everyone should), all of this is key.

Wow, that's great stuff! I haven't had a chance to look through the forums as much as I'd like so far and this was a huge time saver for me. Just the kind of thing I was looking for and it really does make sense. I thought I had a pretty good knowledge of this stuff too, but Steve is right, we rarely stop to think about the reasoning behind the routines we choose to adopt. I'll be sure to give this a try for a few weeks. Thanks again!

I fell into a similar rut at one point and got very discouraged. What worked for me was a full body workout with compound exercises. One day weight lifting, then the next day cardio. That has helped me to get results again and start losing weight.