Diet & Fitness 

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Jumpstart your regular workout

The fact that you have gained weight shouldn’t worry you, and here’s why. Muscle weighs more than fat, so you cannot rely only on the scales to give you the thumbs up or down on your weight loss and fitness success. The scales only tell your weight, not what makes up that weight. Since you're working out, you are developing muscle so you may gain a couple of pounds.

You also mentioned that your clothes are getting tighter, which leads us to believe that you might be a mesomorph body type. Mesomorphs generally have a solid build with hips and shoulders of approximately the same width. Mesomorphs are able to add on lean body mass quickly and also build strength easily. Does this sound like you?

If so, you’ll need to make sure that you include enough cardiovascular activity in your fitness programme to keep your body fat down as you develop some extra, healthy muscle. Mesomorphs do well with 30-60 minutes of aerobic activity four to six times a week. Aerobic activity (like walking, running, cycling or rollerblading) is necessary to burn calories, so that you burn the fat surrounding your growing muscles. This extra calorie burn should solve your clothing dilemma.

By the way, there's great advantage to being a mesomorph. With consistent workouts, this body type tends to sculpt and shape well-defined muscles more easily than those slender, underwear-modelling ectomorphs. Madonna is a famous example of a buffed and muscled mesomorph. So are Linda Hamilton and Gloria Estafan. Angelina Jolie and Jennifer Love Hewitt are examples of fit ectomorphs. There is one more body type, called the endomorph. Endomorphs have wider hips than shoulders and tend to be round and curvy. Cindy Crawford and Sophie Dahl are good examples.

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