Posts Tagged ‘Fat Loss’

Why Is Interval Training More Effective For Fat Loss?

Question:

What is the theory behind interval training? I always do interval training as they say it is the best to lose fat. They say with high intensity interval training you burn fat all day long. If there are carbs in the muscle wouldn’t those burn? I am a little confused about when fat burns and when muscle glycogen is burnt for energy. 

Answer:

The theory behind interval training is as follows:

It is a myth that low intensity cardio training is best for fat loss just because more fat is burned for fuel as a percentage of the total calories burned.

When you exercise, you are always burning a combination of fat and carbohydrates (in the form of glycogen - the stored form of carbohydrates). This ratio varies depending on the type of training you do.

Low Intensity (L.I. for short) burns about 50% fat for fuel while High Intensity (H.I.) burns about 40%. This is not a big difference.

Say, for example, you burn 100 calories in 20 minutes of L.I. work compared to 160 calories in 10 minutes of HI work, you’ve still burned more total fat doing HI.

Low Intensity
100 calories x 50% = 50 calories

High Intensity
160 calories x 40% = 64 calories

High intensity interval training will also boost your metabolism long AFTER the workout is done due to the increased demand on your cardiovascular and muscular system. This doesn’t occur with low intensity cardiovascular training. This is the reason it is said that interval training burns fat all day. Your body will also be burning carbs at the same time, of course, but since your metabolism has been raised, you will be burning more fat too.

The basic idea when you’re trying to lose fat is to create a caloric deficit. The type of training does not matter as much as creating that deficit. High Intensity training just creates the deficit more efficiently than Low Intensity training.

08

06 2010

Fat Burning Furnace

To become a fat burning machine and increase your fat loss, most people know, that you need to increase your metabolism by working out and adding lean muscle mass to your body.  When you live your life in a very healthy way you will enjoy many other benefits.  For this Fat Burning Machine guide we are going to look at how you can use intensity, volume and frequency and progression to lose weight and keep it off forever.

Of all the people I see working at the gym performing weight training or resistance training most are spending too much time with the exercise and not working hard enough.  They will burn very little fat with this low intensity workout.

The key elements to train for lean muscle and strength is the proper application of three vital elements.

The secret I’ve found is that training for lean muscle and strength requires the proper application of three vital elements that are often overlooked by those who try it.  These three elements are:

     1.   Intensity

     2.   Volume & Frequency

     3.   Progression

The intensity is how hard it is to perform for you, given your current physical condition.  The volume and frequency are how much weight you use and how often you perform the exercise. The progression is related to how much the demands increase from workout to workout. You will become a fat burning machine with these 3 key elements.  The Fat Burning Machine system will take you from beginning to lose weight to learning how to keep the weight off permanently.

It is essential that you keep the number of your weekly workouts in check and remember not to workout for too long.

Two entirely different forms of exercise are fat burning aerobic and anaerobic exercise. In fact, they are complete opposites.

The definition of Aerobic exercise is high volume and frequency, low to moderate intensity, and not much progression. Anaerobic exercise, or weight training, must be performed at a high intensity, lower volume and lower frequency, and with progression to be as effective as possible. Only with anaerobic exercise will you become a fat burning machine.

Performing weight training at a low or moderate rate of intensity will not give you significant muscle or strength building beyond a few weeks.

The goal is simply the combination of sufficient intensity, coupled with increasing either the number of repetitions of a weight training exercise or the amount of weight used each and every workout. This will keep your body evolving into the ultimate fat burning machine!

When you are creating an effective and efficient workout routine for maximizing your workout and minimizing the time spent in the gym remember to pay attention to the details.  Why?  Because perhaps even more important that the workout itself is the rest period that follows.When you get adequate rest and enough sleep you will become stronger and increase your muscles.

When you strength train in the proper way you are causing small injuries to your muscles. When you allow your body to restore itself, it will overcompensate and increase the amount of muscle that you have. 

 If you workout again before that process is completed, you’ll experience lackluster results, if any, muscle building or fat burning results. You will also be overworking your muscles to the point where they will not respond to your workout.

So make sure to get proper rest between workouts, which typically means a minimum of 1 to 3 full days of rest between properly executed resistance workouts.

Many women are saying “But I don’t want to get bigger, I want to lose weight” after they hear that you need to add muscle to your body to be sure that you will become a fat burning machine!” 

But this is such a shame, because it’s very unlikely to happen, and countless women are losing out on these fat burning benefits because of it. 

You see, most men and almost all women simply lack the necessary genetic traits required to produce such muscle gains that would cause them to look bulky or overly developed to most people. Among these traits are muscle fiber makeup, testosterone levels, muscle belly length, and other traits.

Those competitive bodybuilders you’ve seen on TV and in the magazines are the genetic cream of the crop for muscle development and they are typically on heavy doses of anabolic steroids, growth hormone, and other bodybuilding drugs. 

 Don’t be fooled by these images, or those that scare you into thinking this way. Do you realize that you will actually be getting smaller because you are replacing the fat on your body with lean muscle and lean muscle is more compact that fat.

Whoever you are, if you want to be in the best position to succeed with you fat loss and also your fitness goals you will perform properly conducted intense resistance training.

But make sure you understand and apply the three critical Fat Burning Machine principles I discussed above.   

Here they are again:  Intensity, Volume and Frequency and Progression.

If you do not apply these three elements your ability to burn fat and get the lean, strong, and healthy body you deserve eventually will leave you unhappy with your results.

 

 

27

05 2010

A Diet To Lose Weight

We could all stand to lose a little weight, couldn’t we? Of course we can. Some people only want to shave off five or ten pounds. Other people have significant weight loss and health goals that involve losing fifty or more pounds. However, no matter how much weight you want to lose, there is a diet out there that will help you to lose it. Watch out for “fashionable” diets and wonder cures. If you want a diet to lose weight you have to know that it is not only a diet, but also a lifestyle.

Have A Peek At This Great Diet

Being on a diet doesn’t mean starving yourself. It just means portion control and making healthy choices. One week start dieting, keep a journal of everything that you eat. Make a note of everything you consume as well as an estimated quantity on your average day.

Highlight all unhealthy foods in one colour and the healthy ones in another at the end of the week. You may be surprised at the results.

Now it’s time to start the diet. Begin with breakfast and make five small meals your daily aim. Try to get protein, vegetables, and fiber in each meal. This means that an egg, two pieces of toast, and a six ounce glass of juice for breakfast is great. You could even make an omelet with some vegetables inside of it.

Then you can have some fruit or trail mix for a mid-morning snack. Have a sandwich on whole grain bread for lunch along with some fresh vegetables, a salad, or your leftover veggies from the night before. In the afternoon, you should stick to fresh produce when snacking. Nuts, fruit and yoghurt for example.

At dinner have moderately sized portions of grilled or baked meat, rice, noodles, or potatoes, and (again) some vegetables. You can even have a small dessert as your reward. Frozen yoghurt and vanilla ice cream in the correct portion sizes will make a guilt free dessert.

This is a just a basic outline of a diet to lose weight. Everyone will have a unique diet plan. You have to account for allergies and eating preferences, but this article gives a good foundation on which to base your new, chosen lifestyle.

You also have to account for your guilty pleasure food. It is okay to treat yourself to unhealthy food every once in a while. You just need to watch the quantity. Have one slice of greasy pizza or one of those mini Hagen Daaz containers. Get a small portion of french fries or a small pack of M&Ms. Also, tell the people you’re close to that you’re trying to lose weight. They’ll often assist you by tending to your needs. Do not forget that you’ll very likely need moral support for your diet.

Have A Look At This Diet Site

22

05 2010

A Major Cause Of Why You’re Fat

There are alot of lessons that we can learn from our ancestors back in Paleolithic times.They had to survive the harsh conditions of the environment, or they would die.Genetically, our bodies have not changed much since those times. We’ve had to evolve mechanisms that would keep us alive during times of famine.

During the times of our hunter/gatherer relatives,we endured periods of famine and starvation.This was much more common than having enough food.To combat this,our bodies have more systems that allow us to gain weight than they do for us tolos e weight.

Through hormonal changes in our body,our ancestors survived by gaining and storing weight to survive periodic famines.This sounds ridiculous because who would ever think that we have a shortage of food, especially in Industrialized nations.

On the contrary, our food supply is completely devoid of nutrients.

Nowadays, our food is calorie rich and nutrient poor. We are literally in a famine amidst plenty.

We have poisoned our systems that help us lose weight by not exercising, mental/emotional stress and eating foods that are not congruent with our genetics such as high fructose corn sugar, processed foods, too much salt, etc. This has turned our bodies into fat storing machines.

Remember: Our ancestors were literally built like Olympic athletes. Not because they wanted to be, but because they had to survive and in the wild, survival of the fittest prevails.

As we evolved, we created systems and behaviors to survive when droughts and bad eyesight made hunting and gathering more successful. In early times, our diets consisted of fruits, nuts, vegetables, tubers, and wild meat. These foods were low in calories BUT high in nutrients.This is why it is important to have a holistic weight loss program. This type of program is designed to give you nutrient dense foods that have a very low calorie value.

During our hunter/gatherer times, our sweets were fruits and honey. They were all natural and not in a concentrated form like the sugar and “fake” honey that we have now.

Nowadays, our stress comes from money problems, relationship problems, and work stress. It isn’t for our survival. The problem lies in the fact that our bodies don’t differentiate between mental and physical stress.

Stress, whether it is physical, mental, emotional or chemical, overcomes our biological drive to lose weight.Mentally, we get discouraged and this causes us to give into temptation.When you add these events together, many of our dietary choices are shifted from biological necessities to psychological reactions.

Dr Charles Livingston is a structure/function doctor who specializes in advanced nutrition, detoxification and weight loss. He is also the author and creator of http://www.greenlifeweightloss.com which teaches healthy “green” principles for shedding weight fast and naturally.

13

06 2009

How will you loose your stomach fat- Simple suggestions

Medicos worldwide say obesity is an epidemic. Actually the fat stored in your stomach rather than the obesity itself is the problem to be focused upon.People seem to be running to the stores in droves to buy the latest stomach flattening device. However they fail to realize that there is no magic way to flatten your stomach. This article will explore how to flatten your stomach.

Flattening your stomach starts with doing exercise which even a child knows. Melting those fat with basic aerobic and cardio exercises is the beginning. Next you should follow interval training. Interval training means you should alternate between intense and moderate level exercise for a period of time. An example of this would be go out for a run and run full speed for 1 minute and the jog for 20 seconds and keep repeating for 20-30 minutes. Interval training speeds up metabolism and burns a lot of calories. Weight training exercises are good options to flatten your stomach. Do them at least twice or thrice a week. Each time you do weight training concentrate on different parts of the body. All such muscles you build by weight training burns your fat even while resting.

You can flatten stomach bulge by doing abdominal exercises. Even though you can’t spot reduce fat you can start toning the muscles under the fat by doing abdominal exercises. There are a lot of abdominal exercises. But I would recommend powerful abdominal exercises like Captain’s chair, the bicycle and crunch on a exercise ball.

Captain’s Chair-This exercise is done by a piece of equipment found in most gyms.

1. Stand on chair and grip handholds to stabilize your upper body.

2. Press your back against the pad and contract the abs to raise the legs and lift knees towards your chest.

1. Lie face up on the floor and lace your fingers behind your head.

3. Straighten the left leg out while simultaneously turning the upper body to the right, bringing the left elbow towards the right knee.

4. Switch sides, bringing the right elbow towards the left knee.

Crunch on an Exercise Ball An excellent exercise done using an exercise ball.

1. Lie face-up with the ball resting under your mid/lower back.

2. Cross your arms over the chest or place them behind your head.

3. Contract your abs to lift your torso off the ball, pulling the bottom of your ribcage down toward your hips.

4.As you curl keep the ball stable.

5. Lower back down, getting a stretch in the belly.

These are only few among the many examples of stomach flattening exercises. Regardless if you start with a couple of these suggestions or go all in it is important to just get started and you will start melting the fat away. As you might suspect exercise alone is not going to flatten your stomach you will need to include a healthy diet plan with your workout to flatten your stomach.

Never before has ab workouts been this quick and easy! Grab all the inside information while there’s still time at flatten stomach

06

06 2009