Hi there everyone!

I'm on a quest to find a happy medium with exercise where I maintain weight but don't spend every spare minute exercising... I reached my maintenance weight with a fitness routine of 45 minutes cardio 6 days per week, 10-30 minutes of yoga, calisthenics, etc as often as I could, typically 3-5 days per week. In the last two weeks, since transitioning to maintenance, I really ramped up the exercise - I added in 50 minutes of strength training 3 days per week, started doing those yoga and calisthenic routines in the evening so I did two to three of the videos 6 nights per week for two weeks, kept the 45 minutes of intense cardio 6 mornings per week. I enjoyed the physical effects of the exercise for the most part, but I know I overdid it a few times. Last Thursday I could barely lift my arms over my head, for example. I could feel myself getting burned out, plus I felt like I was working, eating or exercising all the time, found it harder to get out of bed in the mornings for the cardio because I was so worn out at night. I didn't have a free minute for much of anything else for the last two weeks. There is no way I'll be able to maintain that level for an extended period of time...

I'm trying to figure out how much I really need to exercise to maintain, so I've been doing research. (I know, everyone is different, so research for one doesn't always apply to all... ) I just read the 2005 USDA guidelines that said 60-90 minutes of moderate to intense physical activity most days to maintain weight loss. I also read another article that says "Research suggests that overweight women who exercised at least four hours and 40 minutes per week were able to maintain a weight loss of approximately 29 pounds over one and a half years. More importantly, these individuals did not regain weight. However, individuals who exercised less than three hours and 20 minutes per week showed significant weight regain during the same 18-month period." That is a big difference, from 280 minutes to 360-540!

So, I'm interested to see how much other maintainers are doing. Does your exercise level vary now that you are in maintenance from what you were doing to lose? How much exercise do you do per week and what types?

Thanks!

I'm a very, very new maintainer, so this probably isn't valid - but - I exercise 1 hr per day - 5 days a week and then try to work in some physical activity on the weekend (probalby 1-2 hrs of "lifestyle activity that is physical in nature).

Weekday routine includes .5 hr of either yoga, pilates, weights, fitness ball routine and .5 hr of cardio (walking or dance).

I look forward to the responses of more "experienced" maintainers.

CountingDown, I just went and looked at your pics, you look great!

Thank you Shannon! You are doing FANTASTIC yourself!

I'm really hoping that others respond that "moderate" exercise will work! I think we both have found that mixing it up is a "key" component.

And - at 50+ - I'm really hoping that I have finally found a recipe for success

You might be interested in this thread: http://www.3fatchicks.com/forum/showthread.php?t=140274

And I know we had one about the recommendations that was pretty interesting...I'll keep looking for it.

Heh! Found it! For your reading pleasure:

http://www.3fatchicks.com/forum/showthread.php?t=147573

As for me, I run 3-5 times a week and lift weights 3 times a week. Sometimes it feels like a lot and sometimes it doesn't. Rest days are always helpful and I never regret them...but ya gotta get back on the exercise plan and not let rest days turn into rest months.

Your life needs to be workable though.

Thanks midwife! I knew I had seen those threads earlier in this process, before I was even thinking about maintenance , I just hadn't made my way back to them yet!

I exercise about an hour to an hour and fifteen minutes per day. Sometimes I feel like the gym is a black hole; I go in there and come out two hours later for what should have been only an hour workout. I'm not quite sure where the times goes.

Here's my typical weekly routine:

• Sun: 6 mile run outdoors (takes just under an hour if I don't have some physical problem that slows me down) OR one hour cardio in gym (divided between TM and elliptical and including about 45 min HIIT) and 15 min abs
• Mon: one hour strength training with PT
• Tues: 45-50 min cardio (divided between stepmill and TM with 35 min HIIT), 15 min abs
• Wed: one hour strength training with PT
• Thurs: 35 min on TM (including 20 min HIIT), one hour circuit training class
• Fri: one hour strength training with PT
• Sat: 75-90 min swim (including 20 min intervals)

So it works out to be a little over any hour per day. On the days I'm not working out with my trainer, I'm also stretching for at least 15 min, sometimes more if the exercise gets split into multiple session. On Thursdays for example, that circuit training class is a :censorer: so I try not to do it and the HIIT back to back. I go into the gym in the AM for the HIIT and come back in the evening for the class. But that means 30 min of stretching because I have to stretch after each workout. And when I run outdoors, I have to do a more extensive stretch session, so those days the stretching also works out to 30 min.

I also try to do two to three one-hour yoga, mat pilates, or stretching classes per week, but those don't really elevate my heart rate so I don't count them as exercise. And sometimes I do a spin class instead of my regularly scheduled workout, just to mix things up. The spin classes definitely count as exercise (especially if I can get the instructors I like).

I don't have kids and I work from home, so that frees up some time in my schedule to go to the gym. And, there are a number of other reasons I exercise besides just burning calories and increasing my metabolism:

• Not Eating: If I weren't at the gym, I'd probably be eating, so partly I do all this exercise not for the calories I'm burning but for the calories I'm not consuming. Every minute at the gym is a minute I'm not eating. Plus, I have to stop eating at least an hour to an hour and half before I head over there. So that's several hours out of the day where I'm not eating.
• Me Time: My SO is out of work and literally never leaves the house (seriously, it's like he's agoraphobic). So I'm here all the time and he's here all the time. I'm the sort of person that needs time alone and most days, the only time I spend away from him and focused only on myself is at the gym. It's not a perfect solution because there are other people at the gym, so I'm not truly alone, but I'm sure that accounts for part of why I spend so much time there.
• Work-Life Balance: I have a demanding job and I live in the place where I work, so it can be hard to get away from it. Exercise forces me to spend a few hours every day not working. It's been a really useful tool in achieving some balance in my life.

I'm also trying to maintain a very ambitious goal weight; I'm at the low end of my BMI. If I were willing to accept a less ambitious goal weight, I definitely think I could maintain on less exercise. I'm not even sure all this exercise is necessary to maintain my current weight. My trainer definitely thinks I could cut back some on the cardio, maybe even cut out all of it.

So I guess what I'm trying to say with this ridiculously long post is that I'm not sure the level of exercise I do is necessary to maintain my weight. My current level of exercise is a lifestyle choice based on lots of factors beyond just maintaining my weight.

In maintainance, I'm shooting for a 400-500 calorie burn per day, when averaged out over the week. It's a rare day when I'm NOT engaged in some kind of fairly strenuous activity. My current routine is to run 4 days per week, averaging 20-25 miles per week (longer in marathon training season). The other three days include a combination of strength/core training, interval aerobics, etc. I like to kayak and hike, so I do that too whenever I can.

I'm really short and small, and frankly don't need a lot of calories to live. It sucks, but there you are. Being active gives me wiggle room to eat more. I STILL can't eat everything in sight, but at least I can indulge once in a while.

The other reason I work out so much is, well, I LIKE it!! I enjoy running and racing, and weight training, and yoga and pilates and all of that. I like being strong and fit, it makes the outdoor sports so much more enjoyable and fun. I always feel better after I work out and happier too. So it's not a chore.

Bottom line, the exercise is just part of how I live now. It has intrinsic benefits to me besides the calorie burn. And for me the surest way to start to regain is to stop working out, been there done that before.

I've maintained my weight loss for almost a year now, so I'm fairly new at this maintenance thing, but I don't know if my exercise has changed a whole lot from when I was trying to lose weight. It's kind of like my food journal--not a whole lot of change; I do my food journal religiously each day, several times a day.

I work out at least 5 days a week. On M, I do 45 minutes of cardio in the morning and then teach a pool toning class for an hour in the evening. On Tuesday, I do 45 minutes of cardio and then lift for 20-30 minutes. On Wed, I've changed to swimming for 45 minutes and again teach my hour long pool toning class. I'm definitely not the fastest swimmer in the morning, but it was time for a change, so I did (I used to do the same thing on Wed that I did on Monday). On Thursday, it's back to 45 min. of cardio and 20-30 minutes of lifting. Friday, again, it's either 45 min of swimming or of cardio. On weekends, I tend to get pretty lazy about it. I might work out one day or the other. I don't stress about it. Although I don't love to exercise, I do love the results of it. If I really look at what I used to do, when I was losing, I was probably doing lots of days where I did double cardio--once in a.m. and once in p.m.