Let’s face it. Everyone wants to get the fat off as quickly as possible - and having that desire is not wrong – it’s simply human nature. However, you must become aware of some serious problems that can occur if you try to force it and lose weight too quickly. The faster you lose weight, the more muscle you will lose with the fat, and that can really mess up your metabolism. An even bigger problem with fast weight loss is that the loss just won’t last. The faster you lose, the more likely you are to gain it back. Think about it: We don’t have a weight loss problem today, we have a “keeping the weight off" problem.

Are there any exceptions to this rule? Is it ever okay to lose more than two pounds per week? The answer is yes. It may be ok to lose slightly more than two pounds per week if you have a lot of weight to lose because the rate of weight loss tends to be relative to your total starting body weight. Generally the rule is that it’s safe to lose up to 1% of your total body weight per week, so if you weigh 300 lbs to start, then 3 lbs a week is a reasonable goal.

What really matters is not how much weight you lose, but how much FAT you lose. Where did your weight loss come from? Did you lose body fat or lean body mass?"Weight" is not the same as "fat.

As an example, let’s take a 260 pound man who has a lot of body fat to lose - let’s call it 32%. With 32% fat, a 260 pounder has 83.2 pounds of body fat and 176.

Weight Loss Scenario 1:

If he loses a half a percent of body fat, here are his body composition results:

Weight Loss Scenario 2:

257 lbs 31.5% body fat 80.9 lbs fat 176.1 lbs lean body massThese results are better. Although he lost less body weight than scenario one, in this instance, 2.3 pounds of fat and only 0.7 lbs of lean mass were lost.

What if he only lost two pounds? Here are the results:

Weight Loss Scenario 4:

So the answer to the question is yes - it’s safe to lose more than two pounds per week… but only if the weight is all fat or at least mostly fat with minimal lean mass losses.

One thing you should know is that water weight losses sometimes distort the numbers, especially when you first begin a new nutrition and training program. It’s very common to lose 4 - 5 pounds in the first week on nearly any diet and exercise program and sometimes even more on low carb diets. Just remember, its NOT all fat - It’s water!The best advice you will EVER get is to focus on losing fat, not losing weight. If you lose three to five pounds per week, and you know it’s all fat, and not lean tissue, then more power to you!Of course the only way to know this is with body composition testing. For home self-testing, I recommend the Accu measure as first choice. I suggest using the bio-electric impedance analysis body fat scale only as second choice behind calipers for home self testing because this device gives some funky readings sometimes.

From literally hundreds of client case studies, I can confirm that it’s rare to lose more than 1.5 - 2.0 lbs of weight per week without losing some muscle along with it. If you exceed 2.0 to 3.0 pound per week, the probability of losing muscle is extremely high. If you lose muscle, you are damaging your metabolism and this will lead to a plateau and ultimately to relapse.

This is one of the toughest lessons that overweight men and women have to learn - and they can be very hard learners. They fight kicking and screaming, insisting that they CAN and they MUST lose it faster.

The rapid weight loss being promoted by the media for the sake of ratings and by the weight loss companies for the sake of profits today makes it even harder for those of us who are legitimate fitness and nutrition professionals because our clients say, “But look at so and so on TV - he lost 26 pounds in a week!"Sure, but 26 pounds of WHAT - and do you have any idea what the long term consequences are?Short term thinking, folks… foolish. There are hundreds of ways to lose weight quickly, but only one way to lose fat and keep it off in the long term.