How to Lose Weight and Gain Muscle

There is no “one size fits all” exercise routine for everyone that can guarantee that you will lose weight and gain muscle. There are simply too many factors involved when each person is different, be it in terms of personality, metabolism, drive, patience, appetite, or many of the other things that can affect the decision and ability to lose weight and gain muscle.

Lifting the Load

Generally speaking, the usual workout plan is to do cardiovascular and aerobic exercises to lose weight, and gain muscle afterwards by lifting weights. And this is as sound a plan as any in anyone’s bid for the ideal physique, barring any medical prohibitions against it.

Lifting barbells and dumbbells in order to lose weight and gain muscle is not as simple as strapping on the weight-lifting gloves and going at it. You must realize that if you exercise and lift heavy weights but don’t watch your diet, you can end up as strong and healthy as those Olympic weightlifters - and about as big. You could also end up with strained muscles and hernia (ladies, this means you, too). It goes without saying that not only do you lose weight and gain muscle, you affect your ability to do so as efficiently as you would have liked.

Think Small, Lose Big

An effective program to lose weight and gain muscle would be to use light weights with a lot of repetitions. Depending on your size and overall fitness, it could be anything from half a pound to five pounds. A good way to find out is if you can feel that you are carrying something, but you are not straining to do so when you've got weights in hand.

By “a lot of repetitions”, it can mean from 2 sets of 8 up to 5 sets of 8. Couple this with a brisk walk around the block, and your well on your way to losing weight and gaining muscle. And if you want the lean and wiry look of marathoners, you might just have to run about as far.

If you don’t have any dumbbells or barbells, or are not inclined to use them on your bid for a physique that could rival Stallone's, you can use your own body’s weight and lift it up the way Pilates practitioners do. The best thing about this is all you need is a mat and quite a bit of space. After all, you don’t want to be kicking your coffee table when you do those leg lifts - it’s painful, and the table won’t appreciate it much either.

Go for the Gold

As mentioned earlier, if you don’t watch what you eat even when you're on an exercise program, you will still gain weight. And unless you are planning on a sumo-wrestling career, stick to a healthy diet plan to lose weight and gain muscle. Remember that a diet plan that will help you lose weight and gain muscle should be high in fiber, good protein, and trace nutrients, but moderate to low in fats, sugars, and simple carbohydrates.

Click here to see How To Lose Weight In A Week!