How Your Workout Can Mess With Your Metabolism: A Doctor & A Fitness Expert Explain

While you can't exercise your way out of a bad diet, research has consistently shown a strong correlation between living an active lifestyle and maintaining a healthy weight.

But as the boutique fitness scene continues to boom and more classes become available on a daily basis, it can be hard to know which types of workouts are best suited to your weight-loss and weight-maintenance goals.

No, all workouts are not created equal. There are tons of tiny details that go into creating the most beneficial workout for your body, including what time of day you work out. Dr. Metzl suggests working out first thing in the morning. "Sometimes [workouts] are best done 'naked' [without food]," he notes. "I’m a big fan of using intensity [HIIT] to ramp up the metabolic furnace for the day."

Lisa adds that when it comes to a metabolism boost, the weight-training/cardio combination is golden.

If you're exercising more than ever and gaining weight (and we're not talking muscle mass), Dr. Metzl suggests looking at how much you're eating—because again, you will not lose weight if you eat a pint of ice cream after every workout.

Lisa adds that not giving your body adequate time to recover—otherwise known as overtraining—is a recipe for disaster. While it may not seem like you're overdoing it, working out five to seven days per week for over an hour can exhaust the body.

If you're lifting tiny weights and spending long periods of time chatting between reps and sprints, that might explain why you're not seeing results. But if you're working out long and hard on a daily basis and not seeing results or you've hit a plateau that you can't seem to break through, this probably has to do with overtraining.

Other signs of overtraining include insomnia, fatigue, loss of motivation and irritability, persistent muscle soreness, and a decrease in your normal workout performance.