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Fat Loss
So let's start with the basics and keep it simple:
The MOST IMPORTANT thing to understand when dieting to lose weight is the difference between losing weight, and losing fat.
At one point or another we have all fallen victim to the infamous bathroom scale. Every morning we step on the scale and maybe it goes up, or maybe it goes down, and in most cases this will actually have a direct impact on the mood of our day. Stop stepping on the scale everyday! It will drive you mad and take the wind out of your sail in terms of staying focused on your nutrition plan. You need to realize that the number on the scale is not important and it does not weigh your health.
You have seen the pictures in tabloid magazines of movie stars at the beach. You know the pictures, where their bathing suits are falling off of them because they are so thin, and sickly looking. They look like that because they have allowed themselves to become obsessed with the number on the scale and not the most important one...body fat percentage.
Lets create an image to fully understand this; picture a person that weighs 200 lbs. with half of their weight coming from fat and the other half from muscle. That's nearly 50% body fat. Not so good! Lets say this person goes on a diet with a target weight in mind of 150 lbs. Now, if this person takes the wrong approach such as one of these "fad diets," they will lose weight but most of it will come from muscle. So, if and when they reach their target weight of 150 lbs., and most of it was muscle, it will mean that even though their weight on the scale went down, their body fat percentage went up. That's right! They are in worse health than when they started. And now as they gain the weight back - and they will - they will have less muscle to help burn calories, so they will eventually gain fat at a faster rate.
The point here is that if you do not take the time and consideration to treat your body right and diet in the correct manner, you will not only lose fat, but you will lose a great amount of muscle, leaving you looking soft, flabby, and sick! The reason being that muscle cells contain more mitochondria (which are the "calorie burning powerhouses") than any other cell in your body. The rate at which your mitochondria burn calories is called your "metabolism"." If you lose muscle, your metabolism slows and so does your ability to burn calories and fat!
In addition to a good nutrition plan, you will need exercise in your life.
To lose fat you must burn more calories than you eat. To do this, exercise is a neccessity. With regular excerise you are able to both strengthen exisisting and building new muscle. As mentioned above, muscles burn more calories than fat, even while you are resting.
First Thing's First!
Determine your caloric needs:
When starting a new nutrition plan you must first figure out how many calories your body needs just to maintain proper function, also known as your "basal metabolic rate" or "BMR." You can do this by using your favorite online search engine and entering the phrase "BMR Calculator" into the searcxh box. You will find one without any trouble. Next, all you do is plug in your age, gender, height, and weight and it will give you a very accurate assessment. The only factor that is not figured in is bodyfat percentage. You will need to adjust for bodyfat on your own. Those with higher bodyfat percentages will need to decrease the number by anywhere form 100-500 calories, and those with higher amounts of lean muscle will need to increase calories by the same number.
The next step is to create a caloric deficit. If your BMR is 2000 calories, by reducing this number by 500 calories you could lose 1 lb. a week (500cals x 7 days = 3500 calories or 1 lb.). Never reduce your calories by more than 1000 calories per day! While we do not have absolute numbers to follow, science does give us some baselines to follow; women should never go below 1200 calories per day, and men 1800 calories.
Add exercise to this and you will burn more fat. Be careful; if you reduce your daily calories too much, you may stall your metabolism by making your body think it is starving. Keep in mind that your body is in the business of keeping you alive. So when it feels it is not getting enough nutrition it becomes ultra-efficient at using the little bit it receives to run itself, and still finds a way to store fat.
That's right, if you eat too little you will gain weight!
This is why you need to be realistic in the amount of weight you lose to assure you are doing it in a safe manner and sparing as much muscle as possible. Try to reduce your calories a little each day until you reach the level at which you are going to stay instead of reducing them all at once.
With all of the fad diets and "super pills" on the market claiming amazing results, one thing is certain - Uncertainty!
With proper nutrition and exercise, you should expect to lose between 1-2 lbs. a week. Anything more than that is unhealthy and you will pay for it! You CAN NOT beat this! Accept it and you will have tremendous success.
