.5lbs a week for every 25lbs

mgonyer123

I've read this a few times here. Is that a good general rule? Why?

jeffpettis

I'm not sure what you mean exactly?

If you have 25 lbs to lose you should have no problem losing a pound a week or so.

IsaackGMOON

Having a relatively aggressive caloric deficit can potentially mean you lose some muscle mass. This isn't something you want, and it's a pretty big regret of mine.

You also want to lift heavy in a caloric deficit, so you preserve as much muscle.

I think that's why

Lasmartchika

Do you mean...

If you have 75+ lbs to lose 2 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 40-75 lbs to lose 1.5 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 25-40 lbs to lose 1 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 15 -25 lbs to lose 0.5 to 1.0 lbs/week is ideal
If you have less than 15 lbs to lose 0.5 lbs/week is ideal

???

DuckReconMajor

I wonder the same thing. I'd always heard 1% of your weight, which is going to be around 1-3 lb for just about everyone. I can get on board with 0.5lb for the last 10 lb to lose, but when you have more than 20 to go I don't see why you couldn't go 1 lb/week

mgonyer123

Lasmartchika wrote: »

Do you mean...

If you have 75+ lbs to lose 2 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 40-75 lbs to lose 1.5 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 25-40 lbs to lose 1 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 15 -25 lbs to lose 0.5 to 1.0 lbs/week is ideal
If you have less than 15 lbs to lose 0.5 lbs/week is ideal

???

Yes that. I've actually read it a few times here so I was curious where that kind of info came from.

galgenstrick

I Don't know where that came from. There is no good reason you have to lose that slow for your last 25 pounds. 1pound a week is perfectly fine, you can go slower if you want but I don't see any reason to...

LiftAllThePizzas

Your fat cells can only release energy at a limited pace and if your deficit is more than that amount, you'll lose other tissue (like muscle) and/or your body will have to find ways to stop using so much energy by shutting down other processes.

elphie754

LiftAllThePizzas wrote: »

Your fat cells can only release energy at a limited pace and if your deficit is more than that amount, you'll lose other tissue (like muscle) and/or your body will have to find ways to stop using so much energy by shutting down other processes.

Source?

lewispwest

I've had to stick to 1.5lbs a week even though I have 20lbs left to lose as if I go any higher on my calories I just don't lose weight.

Sued0nim

They're all just rules of thumb .. and I've never seen any actual science to back it up

What we know is that:

1. Most medics advise 1-2lb per week as a good weight loss
2. Some respected sites talk about 1% of bodyweight being a good target
3. Morbidly obese people who lose at a greater rate than 3.3lbs per week are almost guaranteed to get kidney issues like gallstones (ETA - it was over 70% on the study I saw)
4. Lose weight too quickly and you will rip through your LBM at a greater rate than you need to
5. Don't make it a deprivation diet (well not too much) and you have more chance of not crashing and burning and you'll hit a decent maintenance level more easily

The sliding scale and the 0.5 per 25lbs are both MFP advice that are picked up and repeated ad nauseum .. I have no issue with either .. they're good enough to be going on with though if you bear in mind that it's an average weight loss calculated over 6-8 weeks as weight loss isn't linear to begin with

atypicalsmith

No matter how little you lose per week, it's faster than when you gained it. Most people, when gaining weight, put on five or six pounds a year. In ten years, that's fifty or sixty pounds. If you lose at the rate of even as little as half a pound a week, that's twenty-six pounds a year! Have patience and it will happen. Don't try to rush it or you'll rebel and fall right back into your old habits.

TimothyFish

Lasmartchika wrote: »

Do you mean...

If you have 75+ lbs to lose 2 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 40-75 lbs to lose 1.5 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 25-40 lbs to lose 1 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 15 -25 lbs to lose 0.5 to 1.0 lbs/week is ideal
If you have less than 15 lbs to lose 0.5 lbs/week is ideal

???

Are far as I can tell, this was posted by someone on the Yahoo Answers website and then people started posting it here (over and over again). I have seen nothing to indicate that this is anything but anecdotal on the part of the person who posted it on Yahoo Answers. Their account is no longer active, so we have no way of asking them.

PAV8888

I have seen at least one paper where 0.7% of bodyweight in more LBM preserving than 1.5%. For obese, 1.5% would still be OK.

Rate of loss has to do with amount of free fat available, so BF %, which is too hard to determine, which is why I use BMI obese/overweight/upper end of normal/lower end of normal as proxies.

Some people are at the bottom end of their normal range and do not have much free fat. They are the ones who would benefit the most from slowing down to 0.5lb

But at the same time, for the extreme vast majority of people there is no over-riding need to rush to get to maintenance and 1lb is a great loss goal well within 20% of TDEE, and 0.7% parameters for most people

Slowing down gives people time to develop strategies to cope at maintenance and, with a smaller deficit, they are closer to practising eating like they will in the future.

A large deficit short-circuits this practice effect; but, more importantly, feeds into the mind-set of "I am dieting to reach my goal" / "I am at my goal, my diet is now done"

Smaller deficits also make it easier to persevere and stay on target instead of being hangry and too tired to exercise and give skin as much time as possible to adapt.

Furthermore, if you believe that adaptive thermogenesis exists, a sharper deficit, and/or a deficit that includes eating very little food, are both more likely to trigger a larger adaptation.

Since the cost of avoiding both extra LBM loss and avoiding the sharper deficit that might trigger adaptation is some amount of extra time spent on phase 1 (weight loss) instead of spent on phase 2 (maintenance)... why take the risk?

The only reason would be because Phase 1 is somehow much more onerous that Phase 2.

But, if you lose weight while eating at (or very near) your future maintenance... what does it matter whether your are maintaining or losing weight... you are eating the same ;-)

It only starts to matter when you have the intention of "changing" your diet between phases... which I don't think is the greatest of ideas

[short of sleep, so forgive if any of this doesn't make much sense]

mgonyer123

Interesting. Thank you!

pmm3437

This is the 1st mention ive seen of this suggested rule, and I've been on this site for 6 months, so not sure where you've seen it before.

Generally speaking, slower weight loss rate is more muscle preserving, and the capped healthy rate is usually espoused to be 2lb./week without supervision.

I am currently using a variable loss rate that will be similar to the curve generated by this type of plan. Its caused by eating at a fixed calorie level based on a % of TDEE of my goal weight, so it will naturally slow as I get closer to goal, My BMR etc for my current weight naturally declines as I lose, shrinking the overall deficit.

I didn't make the choice to do it this way based on a recommendation, but simply to get used to following a nutrition plan that will continue thru reaching goal weight. I wont have to change my routine and eating habits after 12 months of structure and routine have been established.

erickirb

TimothyFish wrote: »

Lasmartchika wrote: »

Do you mean...

If you have 75+ lbs to lose 2 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 40-75 lbs to lose 1.5 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 25-40 lbs to lose 1 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 15 -25 lbs to lose 0.5 to 1.0 lbs/week is ideal
If you have less than 15 lbs to lose 0.5 lbs/week is ideal

???

Are far as I can tell, this was posted by someone on the Yahoo Answers website and then people started posting it here (over and over again). I have seen nothing to indicate that this is anything but anecdotal on the part of the person who posted it on Yahoo Answers. Their account is no longer active, so we have no way of asking them.

Actually I developed this one in particular, may be a similar one circulating elsewhere. I based this off of essentially two sources. the main one was talking about BF% and what the deficit you should be in. Lower BF% smaller deficit. Since most people don't know their BF% I made this chart to coincide with your goal weight as the baseline instead of BF%, assuming that the goal weight would put you in a healthy bf% range. The other info used was TDEE calculators that reduce the % cut from TDEE depending on how much you have to lose. This one fits MFP's way of calculating and is easy to follow.

ercarroll311

pmm3437 wrote: »

This is the 1st mention ive seen of this suggested rule, and I've been on this site for 6 months, so not sure where you've seen it before.

I see it on nearly any post where someone asks why they aren't losing weight or how to set their calorie goals... probably at least 10 times in the last month on the forums.

ManiacalLaugh

As someone who has lost 90 lbs, I've actually found this guideline to be generally true. Excluding the variables in the strictness of your diet, the severity of your deficit, whether you're working out or not, etc..., this can be a helpful guide in knowing your approximate target if you're attempting to lose a decent amount of weight in a reasonable amount of time. (I've lost weight too quickly before, so even though I consider myself a turtle loser right now, I still feel better off losing at approximately the rate this scale provides.)

It's a guideline. It's not perfect. But just like your BMI number, your BF%, and your weight on the scale, it's another tool to knowing how it all works.

ETA - I find it "generally true" as I lost about 2 lbs/week in the beginning and am now losing approximately 1 lb/week.

KateSimpson17

I only had 20 lbs to lose to begin with, so far I've been losing about 1.5 a week and haven't had any problems. If I was only going to lose .5 a week it would take like 10 months to lose that, when it's perfectly plausible for me to lose it in less than half that. It seems like an odd rule to me, and maybe it's helpful for some people, but from my research, as long as you're not consistently averaging more than 2 lbs a week it's perfectly healthy.

erickirb

kateyb94 wrote: »

I only had 20 lbs to lose to begin with, so far I've been losing about 1.5 a week and haven't had any problems. If I was only going to lose .5 a week it would take like 10 months to lose that, when it's perfectly plausible for me to lose it in less than half that. It seems like an odd rule to me, and maybe it's helpful for some people, but from my research, as long as you're not consistently averaging more than 2 lbs a week it's perfectly healthy.

depends how much you have to lose. if you try for 2lbs/week when you only have 20 lbs to go a larger % of your loss will come from lean muscle, not the fat you want to lose.

KateSimpson17

erickirb wrote: »

kateyb94 wrote: »

I only had 20 lbs to lose to begin with, so far I've been losing about 1.5 a week and haven't had any problems. If I was only going to lose .5 a week it would take like 10 months to lose that, when it's perfectly plausible for me to lose it in less than half that. It seems like an odd rule to me, and maybe it's helpful for some people, but from my research, as long as you're not consistently averaging more than 2 lbs a week it's perfectly healthy.

depends how much you have to lose. if you try for 2lbs/week when you only have 20 lbs to go a larger % of your loss will come from lean muscle, not the fat you want to lose.

What's the science behind this?

erickirb

kateyb94 wrote: »

erickirb wrote: »

kateyb94 wrote: »

I only had 20 lbs to lose to begin with, so far I've been losing about 1.5 a week and haven't had any problems. If I was only going to lose .5 a week it would take like 10 months to lose that, when it's perfectly plausible for me to lose it in less than half that. It seems like an odd rule to me, and maybe it's helpful for some people, but from my research, as long as you're not consistently averaging more than 2 lbs a week it's perfectly healthy.

depends how much you have to lose. if you try for 2lbs/week when you only have 20 lbs to go a larger % of your loss will come from lean muscle, not the fat you want to lose.

What's the science behind this?

There are studies, the amount of fat you can metabolize is based on how much fat you have, the more fat the easier your body can access fat. It is also a survival mechanism, the body when in a deficit tries to become more efficient at running, which is why with large deficits things like nails, hair, skin, suffer, as your body slows non-life sustaining functions. One of the easiest ways to use less cals is to have less muscle as muscle requires calories.

Look at body builders, they lose massive amounts of muscle when cutting for a show, just to get rid of the last layer of fat.

mgonyer123

So my very last goal I have 63 lbs I want to lose.

I have it set at losing 2 lbs a week. Should I change it to 1.5lbs or does it matter? I'm confused. I don't want to lose muscle. I want to to this in the most healthy sustainable way.

kshama2001

@mgonyer123 - at 63 pounds to lose, if you can lose two pounds per week without feeling exhausted or deprived and likely to fall off the wagon, go for it.

Jruzer

This is the study I've seen referenced most commonly:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15615615

The authors posit the following:

A limit on the maximum energy transfer rate from the human fat store in hypophagia is deduced from experimental data of underfed subjects maintaining moderate activity levels and is found to have a value of (290+/-25) kJ/kgd. A dietary restriction which exceeds the limited capability of the fat store to compensate for the energy deficiency results in an immediate decrease in the fat free mass (FFM). In cases of a less severe dietary deficiency, the FFM will not be depleted.

where the kg refers to kg of fat, not total body weight. This works out to 31 kcal/lb-day. Bear in mind that this is the MAXIMUM possible rate, not one which is always achievable.

Making up a generic female whose goal is 25% body fat, ideal weight is 140 lbs, and who has 50 pounds of fat to lose, we find that she has 85 pounds of fat and can therefore theoretically sustain a loss of 2635 kcal/day, or more than 5 pounds per week! In this case the person would be very hard pressed to maintain this deficit (it's tantamount to fasting), and a 2 lb/week maximum seems reasonable.

To be more specific, in my case I want to knock off those last stubborn 10 pounds. According to the chart I should have a deficit of no more than 0.5 lbs/wk, while by the formula above I can theoretically maintain up to about 1250 kcal/day or more than 2 lb/wk. I stick to 1 lb/wk and this seems to work for me both in the sense of sustainability and in the sense of retaining FFM.

atypicalsmith

Half a pound a week is a lot. If you want to lose more than that, you will eventually give up. Just saying.