Need advice

[Joe.Muscle]

Ok so I am helping a buddy of mine lose weight.

He is on a full body routine 3 days a week and does also 20-30 mins of cardio after his full body routine.

He has done well with me for the most part.

He started out losing weight great. We have him at about 500 calories a day below maintenance.

However he will lose weight and progress fine as long as he follows the STRICT diet perfectly. When he does this he loses about 2 pounds a week.

However as soon as he cheats a little bit an veers off the diet...he gains 3 or 4 pounds back within a 5 day period.

Its weird....I have never seen anyone lose weight on and average pace....yet as soon as they deviate the diet just a little bit he gains a lot of weight back.

He promises me that he cheats some..but swears that he doesn't go crazy with the calories and I believe him.

The only thing I can think of is he has never ever lifted weights and he has basically NO muscle so as soon as he eats a surplus he puts it on.

However him being a noobie to lifting you would think this helps him.

Any advice...

 

[imported_electric]

Well, 3 or 4 pounds worth of weight means 3 or 4 pounds worth of calories, so maybe he is cheating more then he is realizing. It is not that uncommon. The other possibility is water retention. Maybe whatever he is eating has too much sodium content?