Not all fats are the same. Body fat comes in a few guises, some of which you need to well, stay healthy. An understanding of these fats helps you to understand how you can go about burning off excess flab, aka body fat. Body fat is essential, but the wrong kind of body fat is the body fat that looks just bad. It is the fat that wobbles when you jump up and down, this is called subcutaneous fat, but there is another fat that is located deeper within the body close to the abs called visceral fat.
So how do you burn body fat?
Well there are various techniques, the first one you must look at in more detail, is what are you putting into your body right now? Is your diet ‘fatty’? If a lot of the food you intake is fatty, such as badly deep fried food: think fries that are soggy in fat, chicken mcnuggets etc. You get the picture. Consuming too much fat in your diet would cause excess fat storage.
But fat by itself is not the main problem. Some fats are good don’t forget, trans-fats and saturated fat. Some fats are essentials to things like good skin these are ‘essential fats’.
Some studies show that obese adults in the United States consume over 30% of their daily diets through bad fats. So think about that for a second. Everything you do in terms of burning body fat starts with what you eat. Avoid pre-packaged foods where possible, always try to eat fresh food. Lots of lean proteins and vegetables, nuts, good olive oils for cooking etc.
Once your diet is worked out or getting better, then you need to incorporate an exercise program which features a mix of carido and weight training. If you are starting out then go for brisk walks 3 times a week, then move onto a more vigorous training program by vigorous I mean things like elliptical machines, swimming, jogging etc. until you have established some routine.
Once you have diet and a good training program in place, body fat will start to be reduced. If you are obese chances are that body fat will burn faster than if you are more lean. Both visceral fat and subcutaneous fat will be reduced.
Calorie reduction is important also, a calorie is a unit of energy are all calories the same? Well yes and no. The conversion method remains the same but the way your body goes about burning it isn’t for example, a 1000 calorie meal consisting of Big Mac’s will not be burned off as fast as say 1000 calories of chicken and broccoli. This is because your body deals with different foods differently. Your muscles need protein, so this excess ‘calorie intake’ can build more muscle than the Big Mac.
Anyway enough of the food science, you need a plan of action, which does include the above suggestions.
Start with some cardio that makes you sweat. Do this for 30 minutes a day. After you have worked out take a good protein shake this will help build muscle, which by the way burns fat faster anyway. This will also fill you you a bit. After an hour or so of consuming the protein shake, eat some good lean protein with complex carbs in the form of vegetables. A good meal might be some salmon, potatoes and vegetables. It is important to have a healthy balanced diet. But don’t go to excesses. Common sense is what matters.
Once you have a solid regime of cardio in place and fat loss is occurring move into weight, or body weight training to spark muscle growth. Ideally start this pretty early in the training program. This should consist of light weights initially. What you are looking for is a program which works all major muscles within the body.
Try not to eat to late at night as your body will start to convert the excess stored food back to fat again. Eating smaller potions throughout the day will help in losing body fat.
Also if you are eating more carbs then this is what you need to burn off before your body will burn off the globularity around your waist, bum, thighs, face etc. After that your body will move onto burning off protein, then your muscles, before, well you die. This is why you need protein because otherwise after the fat is gone where does your body get it’s energy left for survival? It will start breaking down your muscles, so you get smaller. You don’t want this, but the goal: how you want to look will matter.
Lets quickly go over how to burn body fat and some tips:
- Caloric reduction
- Eat healthier
- Try to burn off more calories than you take in
- Try to burn off more calories than you take in and exercise = more fat burned faster
- Drink lots of cold water
- Consider supplements such as protein powder, fat burning pills with things like green tea will also work.
- Go in the sauna
Your goal should be at least 1lb of fat per week.
Fad diets are a waste of time also.
Obese levels of fat: 25%+
Athlete levels of fat:6-13%
