by James Williams June 4, 2020

Losing weight is hard for all of us, but surprisingly it’s some of the hardest gym-hitters who struggle the most. Finding the balance between losing weight and maintaining strength and muscle mass can be a tricky business and our body’s do a surprising amount of work trying to stop us losing weight, as do we ourselves. 

Here are a few reasons you might not be making the gains you expect.

Dodgy Information

Today, with the internet at our fingertips we have a world of information available to us. No surprise to anyone, some of this is junk (mind blown!). While some of it might be pure misinformation focused on plugging a product or just some instagrammer pushing dated or bad knowledge, getting your weightloss right can be easily clouded by incorrect ideas.

While some products like protein powders and SARMS have research behind them and show plenty of evidence that they work, many ‘cutting pills’ are little more than caffeine or pure placebo! 

Lifestyle Balance 

I get it, we all love pizza. I put myself at the top of the pizza lovers list and more besides we all deserve a treat! Unfortunately when it comes to food, the best things in life are almost certainly the unhealthiest! Whether it’s fried chicken, and pizza or even a few bottles of beer all of these are extremely calorific and packed with poor nutrients. 

That doesn’t mean that you can’t enjoy food, just know that you need to incorporate more exercise into your routine to make up for what you eat. Try to find a balance of weights and cardio, both of which have a significant impact on your metabolism. 

Many PTs recommend tracking your calorie intake as this can give you a better idea of how you might be making life harder for yourself than it needs to be!

Genetics

We get a lot from our parents, from hair colour, height, eye colour and even body composition, much of that comes from the genetic lottery. 

Some of us are born with a skinny gene, no matter how many calories we chuck into our body they just seem to disappear. If your goal is to build muscle mass it can make this really hard! 

On the other hand if you have something of a heavy gene your body will naturally maintain and increase weight, though this can often make it very easy to gain impressive strength! 

That said, your body shape isn’t defined by your genetics and it’s possible; with hard work to change your body’s disposition and genetic body type. 

Improve Your Sleep

Sleep plays a huge role in body composition. Numerous studies show the link between bad sleep and increased weight. This comes from two areas, partly, when we’re tired we often make poor nutritional choices. Whether it’s reaching for the takeaway after work rather than cooking our brains naturally tell us to eat ‘rubbish’ food when we’re tired. 

Secondly, sleep in the key period in which our body metabolises food and processes energy, bad sleep can mess with your hormones and ability to effectively burn calories, which is turn leads to increased weight. 

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