Broke through a plateau! But now . . .

disneyfetishboy

There's a long lead in here, but the background is important before I get to my question . . .

I have been making a serious effort to lose weight and improve my health for the past month or so, and made great progress in the first two weeks (losing 7 lbs. or so). I did this mostly with a controlled diet and 6 days of (30+ minute) high intensity cardio a week.

I plateaued in weeks 3 and 4, even though I kept counting calories and exercising nearly every day. Last week, after getting a bit frustrated, I did some research and decided to vary my exercise routines and monitor my burn with a heart rate monitor (HRM). Now, I have mixed up the cardio with some light weight training (20 minutes or so 2-3 times a week), high-intensity cardio (2 or 3 times a week), and low-intensity cardio the remaining days. It seems to be working well, I have had the luck of losing about a pound a day since then.

Here's are my concerns/questions:

1) Should I be worried that my weight loss is occurring too fast? I am encouraged but understand rapid weight loss is often fools' gold, and fear burning off newly-earned muscle!

2) If my primary objective is to burn fat, and secondarily to gain some muscle mass, should I eliminate my higher-intensity cardio routines to focus solely on weights and low-intensity (fat burning) cardio? My fitness level (stamina, etc.) is not terrible and I will work to improve this AFTER I have lost weight.

Thanks much and best to you all on your journeys . . .