Not losing weight with BeachBody T25?

[arthertbc0702]

Hi all!

Just wondering, is anyone doing the T25 workout by BeachBody?

I am currently entering my 4th week of the Alpha phase. So far, I think I am doing alright and have been rather disciplined.

I've got some issues however. When I started, I was 80.3kg. However, I am now 81.4kg. That is rather strange. Why am I not losing weight? I am using the Aria to keep track of my weight.

On the plus side however, I THINK I am now more lean and tone when I look in the mirror. I can't be too sure. My fat % was 24.7% when I started and it is now 23%.

But why am I still fat?

Any comments are most welcome. Thanks!

[WendyB]

You should be taking your measurements.

But Its more about what you eat than than the exercise. You can exercise all you want but if you are not having a calorie deficit you will not lose.

[Dominique]

Probably a case of totally unrealistic expectations caused by their misleading advertising, for instance this (taken from the T25 link on their website😞

Sorry, but such a body transformation isn’t going to occur in just a few weeks of doing 25 minutes of T25.

As @WendyB already noted, fat loss is primarily driven by nutrition.

And Shaun T didn’t get the body he has by doing solely the exercises he advertises.

[StarEcho · Accepted solution]

There is a good chance two things are going on here.  Frist a pound of muscle is smaller in volume to a pound of fat.  You are losing fat, but replacing it with muscle.  This is why your body fat percent went down while your weight went up.  This is common.  You need to raid the sewing basket for a flexable measuring tape and get your numbers.  The places to measuer differ by gender as men and women store fat differently.  Do your research.

The second thing is the whole calories in verses the calories out.  I came across an artical about how to get your base calories and active calories:

http://www.msn.com/en-us/health/weightloss/how-to-break-a-weight-loss-plateau/ar-BBorOrE . 

The link above should help you and does a good job explaining how it works.  It also has the fourmula you can use to get your numbers.  The key to losing weight is taking in less than you are using.  A blanced diet and excersise program work best together.  Do be aware that you will be setting yourself up for failure if you use food as a reward.  Example:  You did a video so you feel you can have a large order of french fries.  This will only set you back.

I wish you the best of luck.

[Dominique]

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@StarEcho wrote:

Frist a pound of muscle is smaller in volume to a pound of fat.  You are losing fat, but replacing it with muscle.

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This argument is often presented to explain a lack of weight loss, in spite of dieting and exercising like crazy.

However, you need to consider this: gaining muscle is a very slow process, and several conditions must be met for it to happen: 1) you must perform resistance training (in practice, lift weight), 2) you must eat enough protein, 3) you must be in a caloric surplus (eat more than you burn). If I got it right Beachbody T25 is mostly aerobic exercise, not resistance training, so it’s not likely to add much muscle mass.

Now, assuming the body fat % reported by the Aria scale were correct, and that the change in lean mass were muscle gain, here is what would have happened:

Body fat before: 80.3 x 24.7% = 19.8 kg

Body fat after: 81.4 x 0.23% = 18.7 kg

Fat loss (in 4 weeks): 19.8 - 18.7 = 1.1 kg

Lean mass before: 80.3 - 19.8 = 60.5 kg

Lean mass after: 81.4 - 18.7 = 62.7 kg

Muscle gain (in 4 weeks): 62.7 - 60.5 = 2.2 kg

Gaining 2.2 kg of muscle in 4 weeks doing just 25 minutes of mostly aerobic exercise every day would be simply amazing. And gaining 2.2 kg of muscle while losing 1.1 kg of fat at the same time would be even more amazing.

[TheChiefsWife]

Arthertbc0702,

You may not think you are losing weight but you are replacing the fat with mucsle.  Give your self some time for your body to get use to what you are doing and the changes you are making.  

Remember you need to eat a certain amount of calories a day but even though you are burning say 2,000 calories doesn't mean that you can eat that amount + your normal daily calories.   

Watch your sodium intake, drink lots of water that will help flush the fat cells from your body plus it will fill you up between your meals.  Mix up your workouts it cause muscle confusion so your body doesn't get use to it and get into a stuck.  

Example:

1) I like Rockin' Body, walking, weights, and the elliptical (while watching the news) and swimming weather permitting.

2) I try to watch what I eat for 6 days and have a cheat day but moderate cheating.

    I try to cut white flour and sugar and use wheat/or whole grain when ever possible.  Ues raw sugar in smal amounts or honey.  I dropped 50 lbs just doing that alone before a surgery.

3) Move and sweat, move and sweat. and drink LOTS of water.

Don't give up, keep going don't give up.  

 🙂

[Dominique]

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@TheChiefsWife wrote:

You may not think you are losing weight but you are replacing the fat with muscle. 

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As enticing as the idea of shedding fat while adding muscle at the same time may sound, it’s unfortunately highly unlikely to happen, especially in a short period of time. That being said, if you keep consistently doing the right things, you will eventually see results, whether it’s fat loss, muscle gains, or both. You just need to be patient enough.

[MatthewCH]

So this is me! I am that guy in the picture. I lost 40 lb. but I have to say nutrition played a huge role. Part of the program is the diet and I stayed at a 1600 - 2000 calorie a day. That's what I was on. We were part of a program, they helped us with getting the right food and pushed us with the working out. Just doing the work out alone wont get anywhere close to these results especially if you eat a lot or carbs. Honestly, too, 40 lb was too much for me to lose. I put 10 or so back on when the 10 weeks were up and I started eating like a jerk again after the program ended. 

[Dominique]

@MatthewCH: I hope Beachbody paid you some good money for letting them use your before & after photos (my understanding is many supplement companies, fad diet companies etc. will pay people for such body transformations, and they couldn’t care less if the transformation wasn’t achieved with their products). Anyway, how tall are you and what weight were you at on the before photo? I just can’t understand how one can achieve the daily deficit implied by a 40 lb loss in 10 weeks (4 lb per week = 2000 calories per day) with just 25 minutes of exercising, no matter how intense it is. Even if you regained 10 lb after losing 40 and you would still have 75% of what you achieved on the "after" photo, you would still be quite well off, wouldn’t you? 

[MatthewCH]

So it was for an infomercial. They couldn't pay me money because it had to be a testimonial so they paid me in all the videos (alpha, beta, gamma) and food. We followed a 5 meal diet, 3 meals and 2 snacks - almost no grains at all - for 10 weeks. The 1st week was 1600 cal. a day, then jumped up to about 1800 - 2000 from there on out. It was lots of chicken, salads, hard boiled eggs, apples, nuts, almond & cashew butter, and bison, some beef and pork but not a lot. Very lean, very green. We worked out as a group a few times a week and also at home. It was a great experience. I lost the most out of my group. I was, well at weigh in 185 (though I had been closer to 190 leading up to eveything) and dropped to 145 by the end of the 10 weeks (I'm 5'9"). I got to 152 about 5 days before the photo was taken then went on another quick diet to cut any water weight and that dropped me another 8 lbs. So yeah, putting that 10 lbs back on was pretty good for me. It was honestly a structured lifestyle change. I think thats the key to losing weight, well losing fat. 

[MatthewCH]

Oh, and it's intense, it really is 25 minutes of nonstop work out. Even the upper body days have lots of cardio involved. 

[Dominique]

Looks like they taught you all the little tricks used by bodybuilders and fitness models at the very end of their cuts, to peak for their contests or photo shoots .

I’ll try to do the math for your weight loss, using the old-fashioned energy balance. I’ll consider your "real" weight loss was from 185 to 152 (i.e. "only" 33 lbs), as what happened at the very end was just manipulation of water weight (probably by drastically cutting carbs). 33 lbs in 10 weeks is 3.3 per week, which translates into a 3.3 x 3500 / 7 = 1650 average daily deficit. You ate 1600 for 1 week, and 1900 for the remaining 9 weeks, which translates into an average intake of 1870. Your total energy expenditure had therefore to be 1870 + 1650 = 3520. Your calculated BMR (assuming you’re 40-yo) would be 1740. Let’s assume energy expenditure with T25 is 12.5 METs (which is super-high): half an hour of it would burn 1740 / 1440 x 12.5 x 30 =  453 calories. You’d still have to burn 3520 - 1740 - 453 = 1327 calories during the rest of the day, whether it’s via formal activity or NEAT. Even for a guy your size, that’s quite a lot. If you have a job that keeps you on your feet all day (like the proverbial mail delivery guy), that would help a lot. If you have a desk job, you would need to have a lot of extra activity on top of your 25 minutes of T25. And the calculation doesn’t take into account the fact you’re expending less energy as you become lighter. So my point is 25 minutes of T25 alone, even when coupled with optimal nutrition, is not sufficient to achieve the advertised weight loss.

Now, are you still using T25 as your main form of exercise, and what are your current goals in terms of weight management and body composition? And what is your typical energy expenditure (calories burned) according to your Fitbit?

[DavidSchneier]

That was an awesome breakdown.

I work with someone who has distilled weight loss/management down to a very simple math equation, similar to what you did. The equation makes it so much easier to make more informed and effective decisions about calorie consumption and exercise and it's helped me lose 40 pounds since January. He laughs at all of the fad diets and exercise programs because they either work because it increases the gap between calories burned versus consumed, or because it's a short-term effort with temporary results. There is no magic formula or diet, you lose weight because you routinely consume fewer calories than the body needs to run things. Plateau's are a myth, cleanses are a scam and diet programs that fail to reorient how you chose foods fail. It sounds harsh, but it's true.

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@Dominique wrote:

Looks like they taught you all the little tricks used by bodybuilders and fitness models at the very end of their cuts, to peak for their contests or photo shoots .

I’ll try to do the math for your weight loss, using the old-fashioned energy balance. I’ll consider your "real" weight loss was from 185 to 152 (i.e. "only" 33 lbs), as what happened at the very end was just manipulation of water weight (probably by drastically cutting carbs). 33 lbs in 10 weeks is 3.3 per week, which translates into a 3.3 x 3500 / 7 = 1650 average daily deficit. You ate 1600 for 1 week, and 1900 for the remaining 9 weeks, which translates into an average intake of 1870. Your total energy expenditure had therefore to be 1870 + 1650 = 3520. Your calculated BMR (assuming you’re 40-yo) would be 1740. Let’s assume energy expenditure with T25 is 12.5 METs (which is super-high): half an hour of it would burn 1740 / 1440 x 12.5 x 30 =  453 calories. You’d still have to burn 3520 - 1740 - 453 = 1327 calories during the rest of the day, whether it’s via formal activity or NEAT. Even for a guy your size, that’s quite a lot. If you have a job that keeps you on your feet all day (like the proverbial mail delivery guy), that would help a lot. If you have a desk job, you would need to have a lot of extra activity on top of your 25 minutes of T25. And the calculation doesn’t take into account the fact you’re expending less energy as you become lighter. So my point is 25 minutes of T25 alone, even when coupled with optimal nutrition, is not sufficient to achieve the advertised weight loss.

Now, are you still using T25 as your main form of exercise, and what are your current goals in terms of weight management and body composition? And what is your typical energy expenditure (calories burned) according to your Fitbit?

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[Jumanaopal]

Hi, there I have the same problem!  

This is my 4th week on the t25 program.

I stated at 68kg the first week 

Went up to 69 kg on week 2  68 3rd week 

Now am at 67 kg the scale is up and down, I added cycling on my 3rd week to get more results but still no luck! 

Am not sure what am doing wrong!

My food intake is at noon last meal6 pm.

I decided to take protine shake after  working out and One meal at the same time everyday 3 pm 

I want to be at least 60 kg on my birthday 

[MatthewCH]

This picture is me! So it’s true, it happened. I lost 45 lbs with T25 in t j weeks. Here’s how I did it though.

I went from about a 3500 calorie a day diet - eating fast food and junk - to a 1600 calorie diet over night. I was hungry ALL THE TIME, but I ate healthy. I had eggs, and chicken, and LOTS of salads, and almonds, walnut’s, cashews. It was very healthy and almost no carbs, definitely no refined sugar. I was constantly hungry but I had tons of energy and slept amazingly, I was focused and driven. After the 10 weeks I put about 10 lbs back on, which frankly felt better, and I bounced 10 lbs for a while. I stressed about that and I wouldn’t recommend being that stressed about weight based on my experience with all that, just enjoy being and feeling  healthy. Then covid happened and I put a lot of it back on. 

Diet is supper important. Diet is the key. Working will help your metabolism but the diet is what will save your life. The results I got took discipline and encouragement but diet is the key. The results are attainable but refocusing is what will get you there 

[FitbitUser416]

Thanks for the info

[Glenda]

It seems a serious mistake to me for you to have been hungry all the time,  Eating as you did was not sustainable and with or without covid you probably would have put a lot of that weight back on.  Dieters need to make some new lower calorie eating habits.  We all eat mostly the same foods over and over, unless we are  fond of cooking.  All those nuts were probably your favorite part of the diet but they are high calorie.  You could have eaten lots of beets or something instead.  I am very short and must constantly watch calories.  I eat the lowest calorie version of everything all the time.  When I'm hungry I eat something.  Many people snack so much they never feel hungry,  Everyone could analyze what they are eating that has the most calories and substitute something in it's place and after a while I'll bet they would lose weight in a sustainable way.