The effectiveness of a weight loss exercise largely depends on the circumstances involved in practicing it. Doing the don’ts can make it ineffective while doing do do’s can make it even more beneficial.

Follow these do’s and don’ts before, while, and after doing a weight loss exercise to see good results sooner.

Do’s:

1. Check if your vital signs allow you to do intense workout.

Ideally, overweight and obese people should check their vital signs first before working out because they are prone to heart and pulmonary problems. You have to constantly check, if not monitor, your blood pressure and pulse rate if you are one of them just to be safe. If you don’t have the proper devices to check them, just feel your pulse and heart if they beat erratically or normally. Likewise, monitor your breathing because you cannot workout heavily if you are constantly catching your breath.

check-if-your-vital-signs

2. Eat good “weight loss exercise” foods and avoid those that are not.

What you eat determines your energy level and resistance during workout. Most importantly, the food you eat right before exercising determines how fast you can burn calories. Thus, the importance of eating the right food before stepping inside the gym cannot be overstated.

vegetables

Carbohydrate is needed for intense cardio workouts while protein is essential for strength training and other muscle-building exercises. However, while eating carbohydrate before stepping on the treadmill does not make any harm (unless you eat to a full stomach), eating protein before having a one-on-one with a barbell, dumbbell, and kettlebell might be counterproductive.

 

Protein takes some time to be digested, so the best time to fill your stomach with protein-rich foods is at least a day before the intense workout. Also, this nutrient draws oxygen to the stomach away from the muscles. This makes the muscles more prone to feeling fatigued.

The same can be said with fat, which is needed to boost metabolism but might be unhelpful right before working out.

Eat oatmeal, banana, and apple at least 30 minutes before working out instead. These foods effectively energize the muscles to help you exercise longer and harder.

3. Perform warm-up and cool down exercises before and after doing a long weight loss exercise, respectively.

Warming up loosens up the muscles to make them limber and improves oxygen supply, allowing them to grow bigger and become more resistant to fatigue.

Here are some warm-up exercises that you can perform anywhere :

perform-warm-up-and-cool-down-exercises

Cooling down, on the other hand, allows the muscles to prepare properly for resting. This reduces pain and discomfort, which is common after a heavy workout session. It also stabilizes heart and pulse rate.

4. Divide your fitness plan into several parts.

Look at a fitness plan as a set of different weight loss exercises with their own targets and goals. This gives a psychological advantage that makes the entire plan easier. You get to see improvements step by step and set different targets that can be attained in a shorter amount of time. You can feel satisfied even if you just see positive results in your upper body and not in your lower body because you have different goals for each muscle group or each exercise.

Looking at a fitness plan on its entirety only makes you realize how long it will take to achieve your goals and how long each session must take to finish all the exercises that comprise the plan.

5. Consult a professional fitness coach or medical expert before starting an intense fitness plan if you are obese or overweight.

There might be some complications that you have not seen or felt before. It is not uncommon for overweight and obese people to experience such heath problems, so you need to know what’s best for your body type and weight. Forcing yourself to do a weight loss exercise that does not match your abilities, resistance, strength, and muscle mass can only put strain on your ligaments and joints.

Don’ts:

1. Wear tight workout clothes.

It is normal for athletes to wear tight clothes, which many fitness enthusiasts emulate in the gym. This is a common mistake that both beginners and advanced fitness buffs commit though.

wear-tight-workout-clothes

Tight clothes do not only hamper movements when working out. They also take you closer to accidents because your muscles cannot focus on what they are tasked to do, such as when you are doing barbell bench press but with your arms partially restricted. They also hamper the oxygen supply to the muscles, making them weaker and more prone to muscle fatigue.

2. Let your sweat dripping.

Many people like the feel of their sweat dripping down their body. It makes them feel strong and successful with their weight loss efforts. This gives most people the illusion that they indeed lose a lot of weight, which motivates them to exercise harder.

Nevertheless, not drying up your skin makes you a little unstable when exercising with exercise equipment. Your slippery skin will not be able to hold traction with the surfaces of exercise equipment. This can lead to accidents.

Also, it is not practical to lose weight but develop pneumonia instead.

3. Over-train your muscles.

It is a common misconception that the longer and harder you do weight training, the larger your muscles become and the faster your metabolism burns calories.

The muscles need at least a full day to recover from an intense weight loss exercise. Otherwise, they will just continue to get “shredded” and never grow bigger after healing. You should at least do an intense and light weight loss exercises interchangeably.

4. Rush the use of exercise equipment to work out using as many as you can.

Exercising to lose weight is about quality, not quantity. What’s important is how well you use each machine for your exercises and not how long you use each of them.

Beginners commonly commit the mistake of trying to use all, if not majority, of the equipment in the gym. What they do not know is that those equipment are more effective when they are able to concentrate on one muscle group at a time.

For overweight and obese people, developing leg and arm muscles might be more beneficial than trying to reduce the belly area right away. This can cause damage to the spinal column since the upper body is already heavier than normal, which is fatal on rare but possible cases.

5. Take this weight loss journey on your own.

The path down this road is a long and nasty one.  Never try to walk this path alone. Otherwise, you are just setting yourself up for a big disappointment, scepticism, indecisiveness, and confusion.

Get a workout buddy and help each other monitor your progress. Working out for long hours is also fun when you have someone to talk with and compete with. You can push each other to work hard when you find the exercises tiring and pointless. Keeping yourself company helps you from veering away from your goals.

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