I want to preface my explanation with a thought. Think of it as reprogramming your body to be lean instead of calories in/calories out. Does burning more calories than one takes in (calories in vs. calories out) work for weight loss? Yes...BUT...come on now, you know there was a ''BUT'' coming! It does work for as long as you are able to maintain the caloric deficit, but it does nothing to improve your metabolism. As a matter of fact it actually slows it down. You create the deficit by doing one of two things, overtraining or under-eating. Overtraining leads to pain and injuries. Under-eating leads to malnourishment, lack of energy and most significant, loss of lean muscle tissue. (You'll know why this his a big deal after you read the next few paragraphs). The bottom line is with the calories in/calories out approach will help you lose weight in the short term. Some of the lost lbs are from fat, but a lot is water and muscle tissue. The bottom line is it "works" if you are looking for a temporary short term fix that will ultimately slow your metabolism :-)
So here it is...not my system or idea...just a little thing called science. There is no secret or magic, weight loss, or more accurately fat loss, is a combination of eating right, lifting weights and doing cardio. The more accurately you do all three, the better the results. If you lift and eat fairly well but don't do cardio, you may get some results but probably not what you are looking for. If you do cardio and lift, but don't eat right, its the same. The bottom line if you accurately address all three components you will get the results you are looking for!
Lifting- Muscle burns fat! It is the only tissue in the body that can do that. When you are performing a good resistance training program you are building and activating muscle. The more you do this the bigger, better and stronger you fat burning "engine" becomes. Now that you've got the engine, you need to run it!
Cardio- Cardio is running your engine. It puts you in a state where you have the potential to burn a lot of fat. Fat burns when you are in an aerobic state. Aerobic means "with oxygen". Which means the stronger your metabolism is the more fat you burn all day long! I mean, with are technically using oxygen all day, right? When you increase the intensity and do it over a longer duration at a good intensity, your body needs to expend more fuel. So during good cardio activity, you can burn a lot of fat, if you have fueled right!
Eating- Now in order for the engine to run, you have to fuel it right! This is where proper eating comes into play. This is far more complex than this blog so I am going to give you the nutshell explanation! Fat is burnt in a 2 step process. It is released from a cell and sent through the blood stream to muscle to be burned. (see, you gotta have muscle :-) ) In order for this to happen your blood sugar has to be level. Blood sugar controls everything. To regulate blood sugar you need the right combination of nutrients in the right amounts at the right time. Sounds kinda complicated but it's really not! Your body can regulate blood sugar for 3 to 4 hours, thus you need to eat every 3 to 4 hours. As far as the amount goes, you never want to be hungry after a meal. You want to feel full but not over full or bloated. As far as the content goes, every meal must contain a protein, a little fat, and 2 types of carb (energy carbs and nutrient carbs). Any lack of protein will lead to a rise in blood sugar. Any lack of carbs will cause the body to canabalize protein for fuel, which catabolizes muscle. (we know that is bad now, because muscle is the engine and the last thing we want to do is damage the engine) Everything in the body is built from protein. Fat aids in certain metabolic processes and it helps slow digestion and keeps you feeling full. Energy carbs (grains, wheats, etc) are the preferred source of energy and nutrient carbs (fruits and veggies) give you the vitamins and minerals that keep you healthy. This is the optimal food combination to keep blood sugar level. You fuel like this and you put your body into the correct state to burn fat.
So if you are lifting, performing cardio and eating correctly you have the potential to reprogram your body into a fat burning machine! That means when you stray from the path (for example at a wicked holiday party filled with cookies, cupcakes and Corona ;-)) you don't suffer that much. Your body will burn through the "bad" food quickly with minimal damage. You literally become a fat burning machine! Man, of of a sudden I am really hungry. Going go crush a turkey on whole wheat sandwich loaded with veggies and an apple :-)
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