Is Pilates enough for resistance training?

xxzenabxx

I’m 31 F and 5” 4”. Aiming to lose approx 25-30lbs. My goal is fat loss so I’m focusing more on measurements and less on the scale. I already have a solid amount of muscle mass on me for a woman and I have no desire to lift weights at the moment. Maybe one day in the future but who knows.

I’m planning on doing Pilates 3 times a week for resistance training to *maintain* muscle mass during my fat loss journey as well as adequate protein intake and a small calorie deficit (between 250-500 calories below maintenance). So is Pilates enough to maintain muscle during fat loss phase of a couple of months? Has anyone else tried this too?

AnnPT77

If I recall correctly, there are some studies showing that most any exercise helps somewhat with keeping muscle mass, as contrasted with no exercise at all. Common sense would suggest that anything that challenges the current muscular strength would be ideal, but IME Pilates covers a lot of territory, and I don't know what you're doing or how challenging strength-wise it is for you. On top of that, we vary individually in things like this.

If you're losing slowly, getting good overall nutrition (especially but not exclusively adequate protein) and doing something that challenges current strength, that should be a fairly good scenario, even if not optimal.

I'm skeptical that anyone else's experience is going to shed a lot of light, because there's a lot of individual variability involved in genetics, nutrition, age, loss rate, exercise specifics and more.

Retroguy2000

TBH, I know next to nothing about pilates. However, I'd assume it won't be particularly helpful for your goals. a) I don't know if it's challenging enough for your muscles. b) There probably isn't progressive overload. If you were to lose lean mass while in a deficit, then it's the progressive overload which signals to keep the muscle. If you're losing weight and doing bodyweight exercises, that's the opposite of progressive overload. It's less work, so your muscles don't need their current size.

What does, "I have no desire to lift weights", mean? A lot of women seem to be worried that they'll suddenly look buff and muscular, which is absolutely not going to happen. That takes significant dedicated effort over a long time, especially for women.

The good news is that to maintain muscle, you don't need much volume. About 1/3rd of what it takes to build. Two full body lifting workouts per week, with two hard working sets for each muscle group, may be enough. About 12 sets total per session, not including some warmup sets. Machines are fine, you don't need to touch db's or a barbell if you'd rather not.