couple lost weight

Finally, we get to the exercise aspects of the lose body fat or lose weight series. It has been a long time in coming.

Okay so let’s look at how exercise works. This will be somewhat simplistic so that even I can understand it:-).

When you start exercising you first burn ATP (adenosine-5-triphosphate).

ATP transports chemical energy within cells for metabolism. This immediate source of energy gets used up within the first few minutes of exercise.

Then the body look for more energy. It gets it from the carbs stored in your muscles. Once that gets too low then it goes looking for carbs stored in your fat.

This happens after about 20 minutes. Thus the you have to do aerobics for at least 20 minutes before you burn fat.

Problem is you really don’t want to burn fat during exercise.

If you do you are signaling the body to store more fat, so that it will be on hand when you exercise the next time.

What we are saying here is that long term, low endurance exercise will actually help your body store more body fat. Not exactly what you are looking for.

The goal then is to do the correct amount and type of exercise.

We touched upon this in other posts before this series.

You want to do high intensity exercise for short periods of time.

For example you would do a sprint, whether running or on a stationary bike, for 10-60 seconds. Then you would walk or pedal slowly for say 30 seconds or until you get your breath back.

Then you do the same thing again. Do that series for 20 minutes. Or at least build up to that.

Remember how you have to introduce diet changes gradually. Well, the same is true of exercise changes.

If you go out and try to sprint and walk for 20 minutes, you probably won’t be able to move for a few days afterwards. That is because your body isn’t used to it.

Maybe you have to start out with a jog and walk. Or a walk and stop and rest. It doesn’t matter. Start somewhere and build up to that level.

Exercising this way will burn way more body fat than long term slow and steady workouts.

The reason this happens is because of the after burn effect, or more scientifically (EPOC – excess postexercise oxygen consumption).

This means that you will burn way more body fat after the exercise stops than you ever could by doing normal exercising.

In effect this high intensity exercise affects your hormones in a positive way. Here is a very -again – simplistic way of following the hormones.

Exercise raises adrenaline and cortisol (remember you do need cortisol in the picture). This builds up lactic acid which in turn triggers the release of testosterone and HGH.

So this hormonal concoction of adrenaline, cortiso, testosterone and HGH puts your body into a fat burning mode – turning on the EPOC effect. This effect can last up to 48 hours after you stop exercising.

Long term medium aerobic exercise does not affect any of these hormones (at least not in the same way), so your fat burning switch does not get turned on.

Okay, so there you have it. A simple way to lose body fat, along with losing weight.

Now you can use this high intensity stuff with running, biking and weight lifting or just about any activity. Again, just build up to it and once you reach your body fat loss goals then keep on the program exactly as it is for another 36 days.

Then you will have the body of your dreams for your lifetime.

couple lost weight

Here is where we start to finally answer the question, lose body fat or lose weight? If you missed any of the previous posts, just check the archives at: http://www.femfigueres.com

Losing weight is pretty simple – at first. You reduce your calories and you will lose weight. You increase your calorie burning activities and you will lose weight.

Problem is most of that – at least at first – is water weight. After that is gone then you start losing fat and muscle with your weight loss.

And as you know eventually the diet you are on stops working. They are supposed to, they are designed that way.

You stop losing weight and if you are like millions of others, you start gaining that weight back, only this time it isn’t muscle. It is all fat.

So you end up in much worse shape then before.

So how do you counter this? First you concentrate on losing body fat and don’t worry about the weight so much.

The first step is to get your hormones primed for fat loss. There are two steps to this. One is your diet and one is your exercise program.

As you have seen in this series, your hormones are in a constant state of checks and balances. When your diet or exercise program throws these checks and balances off, that is when you prime yourself for either fat gain or fat loss.

Let’s see how this works. Ideally you want to have high levels of glucagon, low levels of cortisol, high levels of human growth hormone, low levels of insulin and low levels of leptin.

With this combination your body becomes a fat burner.

If, on the other hand you have high levels of insulin, high levels of cortisol, high levels of leptin and low levels of HGH and glucagon, then your body is primed for storing fat.

Let’s look at an example. You are under a lot of stress at work and like most people you relieve some of that stress with a high carb diet, followed by a nice chocolate desert.

This will increase the insulin surge to take care of that blood sugar and push it into the cells for storage. So your blood sugar drops and coritsol comes to the rescue.

Cortisol gets released and helps raise your blood sugar levels back to normal. This is a back and forth game and if continued for any length of time will lead to metabolic resistance.

The ultimate end game is fat storage. As adrenaline is released the body stays in a sugar burning stage and never taps into the fat storage.

If you could cut way back on the carbs and deserts and eat more healthy protein this will change the way your hormones react.

More protein and less carbs equals more glucagon. This means your body is primed to burn fat. Adrenaline is now signaled to start burning fuel, but with the lower cortisol, and lower insulin levels you will now start burning fat instead of sugar.

Testosterone and HGH also come into play now and signal the body to go into a fat burning mode. Cortisol switches to a fat burning mode when the levels of insulin are down.

Ghrelin, our hunger hormone, is affected by eating more protein, more fiber and exercizing properly.

A high carb diet helps your fat storing hormones. So does a high calorie meal even if a lot of it is protein. That is why I recommend 2 mini cheat meals a week instead of one huge one.

Why attempt to undo a weeks work of eating right by gorging yourself for a few minutes of supposed pleasure?

Increase your protein and eat smaller meals. Try for your 2-3 normal meals a day and add a couple of snacks. Try to eat protein at each of your meals and snacks.

Vegetables and fruits have lots of fiber in them and you will need that if you are going to increase your protein levels. Go heavier on the vegetables.

I know if I eat too many fruits I start to smooth out. So watch out for that.

Okay, this article is getting very long. We’ll get to your exercise program next post.

couple lost weight

This is part 6 of the lose body fat or lose weight series. We have looked at several hormones over this series.

As you have seen the most important role hormones play is keeping your body in balance to help maintain your health.

Today’s hormones are no different.

You have probably heard of these two; estrogen and testosterone, or the female and male hormones.

Everyone has some of each. The most masculine male in the world has some estrogen and the most feminine woman in the world has some testosterone.

And everyone has HGH or human growth hormone. Really tall people have more than really short people.

I point out that obvious fact, because it is one of the few times you can actually see what happens when a hormone gets out of balance.

With the right amount of HGH people fall into an average height for their culture. Too much and that person’s height goes overboard.

People over 7′ tall definitely have too much HGH. Now HGH doesn’t just affect height, but it is an easy one to see.

Testosterone is known as the muscle building hormone and fat burning hormone. More testosterone and the more muscular you are.

As men age their testosterone levels drop, especially if they don’t do any thing to counter this drop.

Their estrogen levels also rise. This has more to do with the food we eat. Eating non grass fed (natural) beef and chicken means you are eating lots and lots of hormones (mostly estrogen).

Do this over a life time and that is why you are seeing pretty big breasts on men (even younger ones) and soft muscles.

Estrogen or the female hormone also plays many roles. But, for our purposes, it helps more with fat storage.

Now, this is more important for women, because of their ability to give birth.

Women on average will burn 6-8% less calories after a meal then men will. This is because of the fat storing effects of estrogen.

This gets especially bad -for women- around premenopause and menopause time. During these times estrogen goes and little wacky and doesn’t want to burn any fat at all.

But, fear not, this only lasts for awhile. As the menopausal symptoms reside so does the wackiness of estrogen and you will find that weight/fat gain will drop off fairly quickly.

Okay, so far we have hit most of the hormones engaged in helping you lose body fat or lose weight.

The next post will will look at how to bring this all together to help you lose as much body fat as you want.

Well, I hope you haven’t overdone your cardio for fitness program here.

If you are one of those people that are used to doing 1-2 hours of the slow to medium cardio a day, then you might have a problem.

I see this all the time for so called fitness gurus also.

They always want to increase the time frame.

I mentioned that you can greatly shorten the amount of cardio time if you alternate fast paced cardio with slow paced cardio.

I also brought up the point about sprinting to really rev up your metabolism.

Woman Sprinting

Yet, I see people saying oh, you need to do the high intensity cardio for 30- 60 minutes a day.  And sprint for 30 minutes.

I really hope you are not one of these people.

Look, you have to ask yourself, what is the point of cardio in the first place.

Is it to burn body fat?  Most people would agree with that.  Although you do get some cardio vascular benefits as well.

But, let’s just talk about the burning fat.

Once you start increasing the intensity, you have to decrease the time.  Otherwise you are going to burn out.

And not only will you burn body fat, but you will really start burning muscle tissue also.

Your body is a fine mechanism.  And since it is your body, you have to learn what works best.

What works best to get you looking and FEELING the best.

Many ignore the feeling part.  They might look great but feel like crap.  They have no energy.  And eventually this will show.

If you increase your intensity and try to increase the time as well, then you will start feeling lethargic and have no energy.

After that your body will start looking – not like a fitness model – like just a skinny person.  A skinny person with no energy.

This is not what you want.

So please.  Do not think about increasing the time when you start doing the higher intensity cardio and the sprinting.

If anything, work on increasing the speed and the intensity.

Yes, you want to vary the times of fast vs slow cardio.  And you will naturally do this as you adapt to the stress.

I mentioned before that the body is very good at adapting.  But, at a certain point it can’t adapt anymore and starts shutting down.

You and your coach have to find that point.

Now there are several strategies that you can use to maintain, to push, to get ready for a fitness show, etc.

And we will go over these in future posts.

In the meantime, use your cardio for fitness program to help you make progress, not to beat up your body.

That’s all for today.

Hi,

Yesterday we talked about how long, low intensity cardio is not really helping you in your quest to become fit. 

Sure, it will help while you are doing the exercise.  But, you have to do it for a really long time to get the fat burning effects. 

And those fat burning effects end immediately when you stop the cardio. 

Okay, so what can you do. 

There are two things.  The first is a modification of interval training. 

You alternate a higher intensity cardio phase with a lower intensity phase.

That is just a fancy way of saying you want to run for so long and then walk for so long. 

For example:  You can use a treadmill, a bike or eliptical machine at the gym.

First you warm up for 1-2 minutes.   Then you run at a fast pace for 20 seconds, walk for 40 seconds.  Continue doing this for 5 minutes. 

If you can’t go hard for 20 secs, start at 5 seconds.  The point is to start at some level and build up. 

As you get better, add a little more time to the fast pace and shorten up the recovery pace. 

Now you might not think you will burn as many calories doing this for 5 minutes versus 2 hours of low intensity cardio.  And you are right.

At least sort of right.  During the time of the exercise session, you will burn many more calories doing the longer cardio session. 

However, remember the burning of calories stops immediately after the session.  The burning of calories after the high intensity cardio can continue for up to 48 hours. 

This after burn will burn more fat in the long run than the the longer cardio sessions. 

If you remember from the previous post, just burning calories will make you smaller every where.  You will burn fat, but you will also burn muscle.

Which is something you don’t want.  Doing the high intensity cardio will help keep your leg muscles stronger.  And as you know a more muscular body burns more calories even in a resting state. 

In part 3 of cardio for fitness, we will take this a step further.