When I started some 2.5 years ago, I bought into the notion that 30 minutes 3 times per week would do it. That seemed doable.

Shortly thereafter I got my pedometer and have been doing about an hour of brisk walking about five or six days a week in addition to my 3x per week lifting sessions at the gym. So I'm about right on - or slightly above - the recommendation.

As mentioned above, I'd be discouraged to start out thinking I had to do so much.

I'd be fat forever, me!

When I joined the YMCA way back about 2 years ago, my first trainer told me that exercising 5 or 6 times a week was necessary to support weight loss. This was what I needed to hear, because I had been doing three times a week, maybe, in a haphazard way for a long time. But, I knew better than to put myself into cardio range for an hour right off the bat.

"Physical activity" is a good phrase, I think, because when people hear "exercise" they often flash "Marine Corp" and rush out to kill themselves.

I think I'm always going to have to be aware of food and exercise. I am trying to transcend the "struggle" mentality...

Jay

This is so true! Sometimes, it's not about the exercise at all, it's about not eating. I try to make sure I stop eating at least one to one and a half hours before I work out. Then I work out for at least an hour. Then I sometimes stretch for 15 min and sit in the sauna for 15 min. If I take a yoga class, that's another hour. On the weekends I walk to the gym, so that's 30 min (15 min each way). All in all, it can be up to 5 hours of the day where I'M NOT EATING! If I have to be off plan for lunch, I'll often plan to exercise after lunch because I know having that chunk of exercise in the afternoon can really help put a halt to any off-plan eating--the exercise forces me to stop eating and get things back under control.

My vote would be to lie, lie, lie like a rug! Seriously, if, back in Aug 2005, when I joined my gym, the folks at the gym had told me that I needed to exercise for 60-90 min a day for 5 days a week, I would never have gotten this far. I would have walked back out the door and assumed that being fit and healthy was not an alternative for me. I just didn't think there was any way I could exercise that much. I thought that maybe I could manage 30 min of exercise, two or three days a week.

And, back then, I didn't need to exercise like I do now. I didn't exercise at all, ever. My modest goal of 30 min, two to three times a week was a huge step in the right direction and perfectly sufficient for my originally very modest weight loss goals. I really truly believe that any exercise, no matter how little and how easy, is better than no exercise at all. Food pyramid be . If all you can manage to do is walk on the treadmill, hunched over and holding the side rails for dear life, for 30 min a week, well, that's still got to be better than not doing any exercise at all.

I also don't believe that everyone is going to need to exercise 60 min a day, five days a week to maintain their weight loss. We have some pretty fit people on this forum with pretty ambitious goals in terms of weight maintenance. My level of exercise is commensurate with the ambitiousness of my goal weight and it's definitely not for everyone. I'm at the low end of my BMI--I could be quite reasonably healthy weighing quite possibly up to 20 lbs more and exercising quite a bit less. Not everyone has to be Dara Torres and not everyone has to pick a weight goal that requires 60-90 min of exercise, 5 days a week to maintain. It's about deciding on a goal that you feel good about but that also encompasses the lifestyle (both eating and exercise) that you can manage.

So I think I'd skip the conversation about what you need to do to maintain your goal weight altogether and just talk about what you should do now to start progress towards that goal weight. Let's face it, the goal weight is a ways, possibly years, off. Things are going to change in that time, including how you feel about exercising. When we get to your goal, then we can worry about what you need to do to maintain it.

Hi Meg, thanks for the post, I thought I was the only one that had this problem.

The majority of the post replys here are female & I'm male.. I'm no fitness instructor or personal trainer or any of those so-called professionals.

I use to be one of those, working out 1-2hours a day, 5-6 days a week after I started losing the weight to maintain a couple of years ago, I plateaued for about 4 months didn't lose anymore weight. I had actually gained...so frustrating. Some of my friends I workout with said it was muscle, but I don't know, I didn't see that extra 2-3 pounds of so called muscle anywhere.

Well long story short, I figured out my plateau was due to my body being too used to the same old exercises I was doing. I altered my workouts a bit by changing the exercises from fixed weight machines to free weights vice-versa. I also did sprints & hill sprints (a killer workout) to swap with my morning runs & vice-versa. just exercises I found on the net really. I play a lot of basketball so sprinting was what I researched to help in my sport. Sprinting might not be for everyone but it does give a full body workout on its own.

After a few weeks it started to work, I started to lose a few more pounds again (maybe it was the sprinting I will never know).

But for my female friends I'm no expert but for those who jog & you've been jogging the same route for a while maybe changing it a little. You could try adding a hill depending where you live if you come across one. Add a sprint not full speed just a faster pace (that you can handle) than your jog maybe lamp post to lamp post or count 10 secs (experiment what works best for you).

If you weight train have you been doing the same exercises? change them up try some free weights if you're not using them, they are really good for your stability. Maybe try a new exercise etc.

When you have those different workouts or programs you could then rotate them around every 3-4 weeks, just improving on the performance of the last time you did that particular program.

Maybe you could use the rower or treadmill or some other machine instead of the exercycle. I'm just suggesting that maybe your body has just gotten too used the same routine. It also makes your workouts more fun so you don't get bored.

By trying this your body should feel the need to push a little harder and not feel comfortable where its at (plateau). I guess its like when you first learn to ride a bike you're a little wobbly at first, but after a while you get use to it. Then once your body or muscles are use to that you try riding with no hands or you try ollies you start using other parts of your body. Your body has to work again and agiin... I hope that was a good example hehe

Although there are many parts that help in maintaining the weight loss such as nutrition, sleep etc. I just wanted to share what I tried with maintaining weight loss through exercising & it helped me.

I hope this helps anyone if not I thank you anyways for the post meg :-)

Oh and remember to always consult your doctor or physician before trying anything new

I am so happy to read this! I have been made to feel like a freak for exercising 60-90 min a day, 6-7 days a week. I have been doing this for about 4 years, and in that time, lost 40 pounds, gained back 35 when I reverted to old eating habits, and lost 30 again when I started counting calories again.

I didn't start at that level. After my son was born, I walked the neighborhood every day. I started with one lap (2 mi). I lost some, then plateaued. I added another lap. I lost some, then plateaued. I added weight training. I did couch to 5k and started running two laps. I lost a lot. You get the picture.

Now I go to the gym every day that I can. I make it a priority, so that means most days I make it there. I usually do a class, a barbell class three days a week and a spinning class three days a week. If I have time, I do additional cardio every day. On the week-ends I might do two hours. I enjoy it and it makes me feel good. I like to see how far I can push myself. I like being fitter at 43 that I ever was at 23.

I prefer to be called "dedicated", not "obsessed". This is what works for me.

I love this forum!! Reasoned, intelligent and relevent posts. How refreshing when compared to a lot of forums out there ...

(warning: philosophical rant below)
Isn't it ironic that the modern scientific advances intended to reduce drudgery and improve our lives, have contributed to our society's obesity epidemic? Our grandparents certainly didn't have to worry about reaching a targeted "exercise" quantity ... not after they milked the cows, chopped wood, pumped water, harnessed the horses, plowed the fields, kneaded bread, washed laundry by hand, etc etc. Our bodies were designed to perform physical labor. By and large, we've eliminated that element of physical work from our daily living and now have to artificially replace it through "exercise". Heck, our ancestors didn't have to "exercise", they were just living!

We'd be better off to lose some of the conveniences and physically work more, but how many of us would be willing to do that???
(end: philosophical rant)

Not me! You can wash clothes by hand if you want--I'll go walking in the morning and to the air-conditioned gym for exercise, thanks very much.

Not only that, but my grandparents would have been thrilled to pieces not to have to do that hard physical labor just to get through a day.

Jay

I totally agree. I have no qualms at all about giving up washing clothes, dishes, milking cows, churning butter, etc. by hand in exchange for working out in an air conditioned gym with my personal trainer or my iPod! Go modern science! Frankly, I hate gardening. I hate it as much, if not more, than I hate cleaning. So I can't imagine that a farm life would agree with me. I'd much rather have the desk job I have.

Wow...am I just weird or what? I lost a little over 70 pounds by cutting back on what I ate (still eating the same stuff as always), and working out only 40-45 minutes per day, 5 days a week. Now that I'm at "maintenance," I'm at 30 minutes a day, and still losing a little weight with MORE calories than I ate before.

Should I get something checked here? Because this seems like the total opposite of what everyone else has experienced....

I credit taking up an active hobby, triathlon, for maintenance of my weight loss. I have a very hard time maintaining a very strict eating plan for any length of time and the exercise helps cover the lapses. I think this is a big reason I gained so much weight, around 60 lbs each, during my pregnancies, since complications pretty much kept me on the couch most of the time. Getting back into it now though, and I have a lot of ground to make up.

Everyone is different though. We all have to do what works for each of us, not what works for most people.

Anne

PS. I've done farm work. I'd rather run.

MindiV, thank your lucky stars!

I exercise 1-1/2 hour a day, 5 or 6 days a week. That's all I have time for, but it has been OK.

Jay

JeyEll...thanks! I was thinking I might have a health issue. Maybe it's just GOOD I'm weird. I also know that my body and my maintenance requirements will change over time...

I think what is interesting though, is that they couldn't assign people to the hour a day (they probably would have just dropped out) that rather they found that the people who chose to exercise an hour a day were the ones that were most successful - but what they didn't ask those people is what they had started at. Did any of them start at an hour a day, 6 days a week - or did they build up to that level, and over what length of time.

That's a very different question, and the answer does make a difference. There are people who will read it as "I must exercise an hour every day to lose weight," "I cannot exercise an hour every day," therefore "I cannot lose weight."

There will also be people who read it as "If I exercise an hour a day, I can eat as much as I want."

Now, there will always be people who misinterpret research studies, but I think that the existing research is rather sparse in identifying many of the factors in successful weight loss.

At this point in my life, it's rather immaterial for me. I am finding what works for me, and I am building my endurance so that I'm exercising to my ability, which I am confident will increase. Until the research catches up with the research each and every one of us has been doing on ourselves, we're the best source of information for each other.

The sad fact is that "the research" can't tell us what will work for us, because the research just isn't that good, yet. The studies are poorly controlled (mostly because people drop out), and few of the many involved variables are ever studied.

I think this site has more to offer than most of the published research.

It's important to remember that this study is about exercise for weight loss maintenance, not weight loss. The 275 minute a week recommendation is for the maintenance phase, not the losing phase of weight loss.

The study initially divided the women into four groups based on energy expenditure (1000 vs 2000 calories/week) and level of intensity of exercise (moderate vs vigorous):

Interestingly, there was no difference between any of the four groups in the amount of weight initially lost. The effect of exercise only became apparent when examining maintenance of the loss -- the ones who exercised more maintained twice the weight loss of those who didn't exercise as much:

I don't think we can assume that what works for maintenance will necessarily work for weight loss -- in fact, this study says that exercise intensity and time didn't matter for the initial weight loss. This study isn't saying that people need to do an hour of exercise a day in order to lose weight. All it's saying is that the most successful maintainers in this study exercised for at least 275 minutes a week -- about 55 minutes a day for five days a week. So I'd be cautious about reading too much into this study about weight loss since it's really about about exercise for maintenance.

re-read the abstract mentioned earlier. I guess in other words ex-overweight/obese people need to work a lot harder to maintain the weight loss.

Watching biggest loser and seeing them shed all that weight is truely amazing, then I'd read in a magazine months later and seeing some have gained it back & were struggling to maintain.

I read this in an article online "Unfortunately, those with more weight to lose were those more likely to regain, according to the study now appearing online and in the July issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine." source: medicalnewstoday.com (dated 10th June 2007)

Also from that same article "Weight maintenance following weight loss is doable," said lead author Edward Weiss, a medical epidemiologist with the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Division of Nutrition and Physical Activity. "We're still learning the things that are necessary for weight maintenance in the long run."

Although that article was a year ago, & the study conducted between 1999 & 2003, they are saying they still learning other means of weight maintenance? will there be more studies? We will never know.

Although that study was conducted with overweight & obese woman, some would say females have to work alot harder than us males (don't know if that's true or not, but I don't believe it). I guess my input or say in this post is not relevant, but I just wanted to share my thoughts. thanks