5 Ways to Burn Fat Faster

April 8, 2013 | Anthony Yeung

Everyone who wants to burn fat wants to do it fast. Everyone. But, with so much advice and information floating around, it can be difficult to find an effective way to accomplish this goal.

The key to fat loss is calories. You have to expend more than you consume. There are two ways to do this: burn more calories with exercise and eat fewer calories. (Calculate how many calories you should eat.)

This article focuses on strength and nutrition factors that increase your ability to burn fat faster.

Gain Muscle

Over 60% of the calories you burn are from your body’s resting metabolic rate (RMR), which is the amount of energy it takes to maintain vital functions. Even if you lie in bed all day, you’ll still burn calories.

Your RMR depends on how much muscle you have. The more lean muscle, the more calories your body burns. So, it’s important that you work out to build muscle. You will simultaneously increase your RMR and burn more calories through exercise.

What to do: To build the most muscle and burn the most calories during workouts, perform complex multi-joint exercises like Squats, Deadlifts, Pull-Ups, Rows, Push-Ups and Bench Presses. Do three to four sets of eight to 12 reps, and make sure your last few reps are difficult.

Get the “Afterburn” Effect

How you work out alters the amount of calories you burn after you finish exercising. Oxygen levels remain elevated to bring your body back to its resting state. The phenomenon is called excess post-oxygen consumption (EPOC). Your metabolism is elevated as your body restores oxygen and energy levels and clears waste through circulation.

Intense and intermittent exercise creates a larger EPOC effect than traditional cardio. You can actually burn more calories after your workout if you focus on high-intensity exercise, such as interval training.

What to do: Finish your weight-training workouts with an intense conditioner that targets your anaerobic system. Beginners should start with a 1:2 (or even 1:3) work-to-rest ratio, and eventually progress to a 1:1 ratio. (Try this interval workout.)

Eat More Protein

Protein aids in muscle growth, which helps increase your RMR. It keeps you full longer, which can come in handy when eating a calorie-restricted diet. Protein also has a high thermal effect, meaning that it takes more calories to digest. (Add muscle with the two-hour rule.)

What to do: Eat lean protein with every meal. Shoot for at least one gram of protein for each pound of body weight.

Take Fish Oil

A 2010 study published the Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition found that fish oil supplementation increases lean mass and reduces fat mass. Also, fish oil reduces rates of heart disease, cancer symptoms and joint inflammation.

The exact amount of fish oil is debatable. The highlighted study called for four grams of fish oil per day (400mg EPA and 200mg DHA). However, I’ve seen it as high as one gram of fish oil for each percent of body fat. So, if you have 15 percent body fat, consume 15 grams of fish oil.

What to do: Take at least four grams of fish oil per day.

Consume a Pre-Workout Drink

Most athletes understand the benefits of post-workout nutrition; however, many ignore the importance of pre-workout nutrition. It may seem counterintuitive, because it calls for consuming calories to burn calories, but research supports it.

A study in the journal Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise concluded that “timing protein supplementation before heavy resistance training (HRT) may be a simple and effective strategy to increase energy expenditure by elevating resting energy expenditure (REE) the day after HRT. Increasing REE could facilitate reductions in body fat mass and improve body composition if nutritional intake is stable.” In other words, having some protein before your workout can raise your metabolism after your workout, which helps you burn fat.

What to do: Shortly before your weight-training session, drink (or eat) some whey protein orBCAAs. Or, drink a little of your post-workout shake.

Source: http://www.stack.com/2013/04/08/burn-fat-faster/

7 Fitness Trends to Watch in 2014

 

Fitness tools (like old school dumbbells), ideas and even clothes (ahem, leotards) come and go, but the desire to innovate and train smarter persists. Sometimes a new method evolves into a trend that shapes the way we exercise. Other concepts prove to be mere fads, briefly flaring up in popularity before fading into oblivion.

Each year, the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) polls fitness professionals worldwideto help determine what is likely to be part of the next phase of fitness development—and what’s likely to be phased out. The resulting survey of 20 fitness trends indicates the direction that training is heading around the globe. From their list for 2014, here are seven of the top ideas you can expect to see influence your workout this year, along with an example of each from the STACK archives. It’s everything you need to stay ahead of the athletic curve. All you have to do is provide the sweat equity.

1. High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT)

What It Is: Bursts of intense exercise broken up by brief rest periods form the foundation of HIIT. The method’s main selling point is that it delivers many of the benefits of traditional steady-state cardio in far less time. The ACSM says HIIT routines usually take less than 30 minutes.

The Good:  Get the results you want in less time, so you can get in, get out, and get on with your life.

The Bad: While these workouts won’t actually kill you, they’ll make you feel like you want to die. And all that time you save might be lost if you spend 15 minutes after the session catching your breath and/or vomiting.

More on HIIT>>>

2. Bodyweight Training

What It Is: Exercises like Push-Ups, Pull-Ups and other moves where the only resistance is your own body weight. This style of training is cheap, requires minimal or no equipment and can be done anywhere with a floor (and if you don’t have a floor, exercise is the least of your problems).

The Good: If you’re creative and willing to push yourself, you can save big by not having to pay for a gym membership.

The Bad: It can get boring if you’re used to the gadgets and contraptions of a traditional fitness center. As you struggle to bang out one last rep of Push-Ups or Pull-Ups, onlookers may think you’re having a seizure. And don’t forget about the ever-looming danger of someone filming your fitness fail.

Best Bodyweight Exercises>>>

3. Functional Fitness

What It Is: Defined by ACSM as “using strength training to improve balance, coordination, force, power and endurance to improve someone’s ability to perform activities of daily living.” Functional Fitness focuses on movements like Farmer’s Walks, Bent Rows and Push-Ups, which closely mimic common movements in our everyday lives—like carrying two heavy suitcases, lifting a toddler out of a car seat, or getting up after you fall.

The Good: Reality-based fitness, applicable to your life. You’ll be able to do all the stuff you do outside of the gym even better.

The Bad: Nearly everything you do in the gym has an effect on your life outside of it, and if you’re training like an athlete, you’re already mixing isolation movements (which aren’t “functional”) with compound movements (which are). Unless you’re doing this.

Functional Movements For Football>>>

4. Yoga

What It Is: After stagnating for a few years, yoga—which ACSM defines as all types of yoga, from ultra-hot Bikram to far-more-gentle Kundalini—has been gaining ground in the view of fitness fiends, and it was ranked the 10th most important fitness trend for 2014.

The Good: Yoga’s benefits are well documented: from the obvious (increased flexibility and strength) to the surprising (did you know regular yoga practice can lower bad cholesterol and make you happier?) A 20-minute yoga session could even increase your mental sharpness, according to information out of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champlain.

The Bad: Chanting and “Om”-ing can be a little much. Also: Gents, if you’re going to wear baggy shorts to class, always, always ALWAYS wear boxer-briefs (preferably ones reaching mid-thigh) underneath. When you try your first headstand, you’ll immediately know why.

Arizona Cardinals Cornerback Does Yoga>>>

5. Core Training

What It Is: Increase your core strength with workouts that “typically include exercises of the hips, lower back and abdomen.” Expect to use items like BOSU balls, wobble boards and foam rollers.

The Good: A strong core is a must for every athlete. It’s important for everything from swinging a baseball bat to carving down a mountain on a snowboard. Also: Train hard enough and you’ll be able to do your laundry on your abs.

The Bad: The realization that you spent an hour at the gym wobbling, bouncing and planking while others ran and lifted heavy objects. Most big lifts, like Squats and Deadlifts, engage the core, so you may not have to dedicate an entire training session to it.

BOSU Squat With Med Ball Throws>>>

6. Circuit Training

What It Is: Similar to HIIT but less intense, circuit training involves performing a sequence of exercises (usually six to 10 moves) back-to-back-to-back with little rest in between. It’ll jack your heart rate up higher than the traditional “10-reps-then-rest” scheme.

The Good: Hits every muscle group in your body within a short amount of time. Fast tempo delivers some cardiovascular benefit too.

The Bad: Circuits can require equipment from all over the gym, and nobody likes the dude who shouts “I’M ON THAT!” to somebody attempting to use their squat rack while he’s doing Bicep Curls halfway across the room.

This Circuit Will Make You Run Faster>>>

7. Sport Specific Training

What It Is: Exercises or programs done to improve a player’s ability in his or her sport, but not necessarily to improve overall fitness. An example would be a baseball player who dedicates time in the off-season to increase strength in his core so he can hit with more power. This helps him develop more power in specific movement patterns, which could increase his abilities when he heads into next season.

The Good: Returning from the off-season faster and stronger is sure to catch your coach’s eye, which will hopefully result in more playing time.

The Bad: Focus on only sport specific moves and you’re liable to develop imbalances in your body that can lead to injuries. Y’know, kind of like this dude.

 

Source: http://www.stack.com/2013/12/20/2014-fitness-trends/

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• High-Tech Lives Spur Back-To-Basic Fitness Workouts (nlm.nih.gov)
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How to lose weight

By Smarter Lifestyles | Last Updated December 23, 2013

More than one-third of adults in the United States are obese. In fact, the furor over obesity, which some have termed an “epidemic,” has reached such proportions that one big-city mayor has gone about banning large-sized, sugary soft drinks and the First Lady has been on a crusade to control the dietary offerings in public schools.
Even many adults who do not fit the clinic definition of obese are still overweight, and a large percentage are looking for the best ways to lose weight.

Shedding pounds largely comes down to the two-pronged factors of diet and exercise. Not modifying the first one enough, and not getting enough of the second one, ends up giving the individual a recipe for being overweight.
Conditions related to obesity include heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes, and certain types of cancer, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Counseling someone to eat less and exercise more might be the simplest advice possible, but it’s also, partially, an oversimplification. When it comes to diet, no one needs to starve themselves in order to lose weight. It has more to do with the types of food you eat than how much you eat.

Reduce the amount of red meat in your diet. If you don’t want to eliminate red meat altogether, choose cuts of meat with less fat content. Limit your intake of salt and starches. If you’ve got to have potato chips alongside your sandwich at lunch, opt for the baked potato chips that are less greasy and contain less fat than the deep-fried chips. You might find you’re really not sacrificing that much in terms of taste.

A diet rich in fruits, vegetables, egg whites, skinless poultry, fish and nonfat dairy products will certainly aid in the mission of losing weight. Drink more water and less sugary drinks. If you have to have a soda, a diet soda is a better option, but seltzer is an even better choice than that.

In terms of exercise, it’s important—if not always easy—to make sure you get at least some physical activity each and every day. Cardio and strength training burn lots of calories. If your feet or your stamina level won’t allow for a regular jogging regimen, then make sure you take lots of walks. Next time you need to mail a letter, walk to the mailbox instead of driving. Try to work in a daily walk in your neighborhood. And if you intend on more rigorous, formal exercising at the gym or fitness center, be sure to pace yourself and don’t build up to an overly ambitious workout agenda too quickly.

There are thousands of diet fads among us.  However, sometimes the best advice is common sense.  Work towards a healthy diet and integrate regular exercise.  You would be surprised at the results small changes can make.

Source: http://www.smarterlifestyles.com/2013/07/02/how-to-lose-weight-2/

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