Exercise Limits on the HCG Diet

One of the best things about the HCG Diet is that it requires no exercise for successful weight loss! In fact, Dr. Simeons barely mentions exercise in his manuscript. At DIYHCG, we’ve done the diet personally and worked with thousands of dieters over the years. Consequently, our recommendation for exercise during the low-calorie phase of the diet is as follows: if you already have an exercise routine that your body is used to (you’ve been doing it at least 2 months) and you don’t want to give it up, go ahead and continue your routine. However, you don’t want to start a new routine or overdo it since your body is already being taxed during the VLCD from detoxing and losing weight.

If you have not been working out but would like to start an exercise routine, walking 20-30 min. a few times per week is a good plan. We’ve observed that dieters with physical, active jobs like waitressing, lost at an average daily rate that is slightly higher than those who did no physical activity. However, on the flip side, we’ve see dieters who were not used to exercising, go out and chop wood or do some other strenuous activity and, as a result, not lose weight at all or even gain a little bit. Many people feel really energetic on the HCG Diet, feel good about themselves losing weight, and actually feel like exercising! But, for the low-calorie phase of the diet, people who are not used to exercising should avoid muscle-building exercise. Once you’ve completed Phase 2, the low-calorie phase of the diet, feel free to increase your level of exercise. It’ll be a lot easier on your body then, as you will have lost a significant amount of weight.

Once you get to maintenance, remember to start slowly and monitor via morning weigh-ins to see how the exercise is affecting your weight. If you are following the “eating rules” and your weight starts to fluctuate more than 2.1 pounds either way, up or down, from your last HCG date weight, you may want to cut back on your exercise routine until you’ve “locked-in” your new lower weight. When you exercise, your muscles experience micro tears from the workout and will store extra glycogen as they heal, causing more fluid retention and making your weight on the scale increase temporarily.

Exercise is a good habit to get in for health benefits as well as weight maintenance and is referred to by some as a “fountain of youth” since studies show that those who exercise are physically younger. To that I say, “Bottoms up!”