Lose Fat In Two Simple Steps
The Workout Doctor, Part One
A lot of people are fat. My job is to make them un-fat.
The doctor is in.
Problem #1 – Your fat-loss plan isn’t working.
If you’re like most of the world, you think cardiovascular exercise is the best way to lose fat. Research says otherwise:
“The addition of 45 minutes of aerobic exercise at 78% of MHR (maximum heart rate) 5 days per week for 12 weeks had absolutely NO EFFECT on fat loss over dieting alone.â€*
What the hell?
Simply put, the fitness industry (me included) failed you. To combat the obesity epidemic, we started looking for the end result (fat loss) in an activity that wasn’t designed for burning fat in the first place: endurance exercise.
Marathon runners run marathons because it’s their sport. They enjoy it. Fat-loss was simply just a side effect from performing their sport – and it wasn’t a very efficient side effect at that. While they burn a lot of calories during the exercise itself, endurance athletes don’t burn a damn thing after their session is over.
Those of us in the fitness industry hoped that by copying them we could replicate the side effects.
We failed miserably.
But now we’re learning the whole concept is backwards. You don’t need to complete the Tour de France to lose ten pounds of fat.
Here’s how to turn it around and start losing fat at a very rapid pace:
First, a couple of truths:
1.Muscle is your fat burning machinery. The basic concept for any fat loss program is to burn as many calories as possible and maintain or increase lean tissue.
2.It doesn’t really matter how many calories we burn during the session. It’s the other 23 hours of the day we’re concerned about. We need to find a way to enhance the EPOC (excess post-exercise oxygen consumption) effect. *
2 easy steps to turn your body into a raging inferno:
1. Lift Weights – Intelligently.
If muscle is your primary fat-burning machinery and lifting weights builds muscle, this step should be a no-brainer.
However, there are a few caveats and pit-falls that almost everyone falls into.
Firstly, guys, you have to do more than bench press and biceps curls. Train your legs. Hit the ‘non-mirror’ muscles (back, shoulders, gluteals, and hamstrings) and fix your posture.
Also, drop the weight a few pounds and practice on actually lifting with some resemblance of quality form. Now, I’m all for lifting heavy, but you have to make sure you’re doing it properly.
O.K, ladies, stop trying to ‘firm and tone’ with the little dinky pink dumbbells. I gave it to the guys for using too much weight, but nearly every female I’ve seen in the gym isn’t using enough weight.
You’re not going to get bulky like female bodybuilders. You don’t have enough testosterone coursing through your veins to achieve that rather unpleasant appearance.
Lifting weights will definitely tighten you up and give you the sexy, defined look you’re aiming for.
It won’t make you look like an ape with no neck.
2. Eat More Often (with more protein and less refined carbohydrates)
Relate your metabolism to a furnace. If you want to keep the fire going full-steam for the entire day, would you:
1) Feed it at random, irregular times with less-than-quality materials?
Or
2) Ensure it’s crackling all day by adding fresh, quality material at regular intervals every couple of hours?
By feeding your body multiple times throughout the day you keep your metabolism ramped up for maximum fat burning efficiency. Aim for 4-6 feedings per day and make sure to get a quality protein source with every meal.
Losing weight and unlocking the body of your dreams isn’t an easy task—but it is simple.
You just need awareness, the right tools, and the right plan of action to get the ball rolling and fat burning.
***********************************
Check out my latest blurb
that originally ran in Men's Health and is now on the front page of MSN. (# 6)
*Utter AC, Nieman DC, Shannonhouse EM, Butterworth DE, Nieman CN
Influence of diet and/or exercise on body composition and cardio respiratory fitness in obese women
International J Sports Nutrition 1998 September; 8(3): 213-22
*Thanks to Alwyn Cosgrove for leading the way in fat-loss efforts
Comments for This Entry
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Hey. I'm Rob, and I'm a first-time poster on your blog (Terribly sorry about the post's length, though, haha); Which, by the way, I rather like. I have a few questions concerning these statements:
“The addition of 45 minutes of aerobic exercise at 78% of MHR (maximum heart rate) 5 days per week for 12 weeks had absolutely NO EFFECT on fat loss over dieting alone.”
“It doesn't really matter how many calories we burn during the session. It's the other 23 hours of the day we're concerned about. We need to find a way to enhance the EPOC (excess post-exercise oxygen consumption) effect.”
In the former sentence, did you mean to say that, when done independently, both solid state cardio and dieting reaped the same results? Regarding the second sentence, why do you say that the number of calories that are used during a workout are irrelevant? Assuming that your diet is in order, the more calories you burn during a workout, the bigger the end caloric deficit. I agree that there are many intricacies to diet and exercise, however, the calories-in-versus-calories-out principle seems very sound. Tom Venuto talks about this in “The Body Fat Solution,” which I saw in another blog post was a book that you'd liked. I'd assumed you agreed with it's meat-and-potatoes approach to fitness.
MY EXPERIENCE: As a personal anecdote, I added 40 minutes of cardio to my 3 off-days and 30 minutes to my weight-lifting days--which, by the way, incorporated 4 sets of compound movements in the 8-12 rep range in addition to a few isolation exercises—and went from 188 pounds/38-inch waist to 184.4/36.6-inch waist in 4 weeks (I was in the 183.8 range during weeks 2 and 3, but my waist continued to slim, which I assumed meant that I had possible gained some muscle). I then incorporated a 20% caloric deficit in addition to my cardio and continued down to 176.2 pounds/34.75-inch waist by week 11. I then increased my caloric deficit to 30%, lowered my cardio to 20 or 30-minute sessions and went down to 171.6 pounds/34.25-inch waist in my 17th week. I missed about 3 weeks of diet and exercise in total during that time due to medical complications involving minor surgeries in my feet. The 17-week time period includes my 3 weeks of total time off. I'm 5'7” exactly, btw, and down to an estimated 12-13% body fat.
I'm only trying to say that strictly adding cardio to my regime helped me slim down during my first month, and then the caloric deficit took me even further. I have graphs and tables for each week, and after taking a few days completely off, I lost over an inch on my waist in a literal 4-day period, which I'm convinced was partially because I had literally just started my caloric deficit. /EXPERIENCE
I only present the questions in such detail because I'm currently studying for my NASM and want to be the best personal trainer I can be. I bought your book today. I'll let you know how I like it. Oh, and was my progress really slow? Thanks in advance for everything. You're an inspiration.
COMMENT RULES: Critical posts are fine, but if you're rude I'll delete your stuff. Please do not put your URL in the comment text and please use your personal name or initials and not your business name, as the latter comes off like spam. But most of all, have fun and thanks for adding to the conversation! (Thanks to Tim Ferriss for the inspiration.)
Rob 8:39pm Jul 8, 2010