Welcome !

NEW PRODUCT

Set Ascending Direction

2 Item(s)

Even though I’m a dietitian, my clients frequently ask me about exercise as part of their weight loss plan. Since managing weight effectively depends on calorie balance, it makes sense that we talk about not only diet (calories in), but exercise (calories out), too.  Most simply want to know how much…or, sometimes, how little…exercise they need to do in order to lose weight, or to keep off weight that they’ve already lost. So here are some of the key things I tell them about exercise and body weight:

  • Trying to lose weight through increased activity alone is tough to do. To lose a pound in a week’s time – strictly through exercise – you’d need to burn up an extra 500 calories a day, above and beyond your current activity level.  That’s no small task.  You’d need to hike uphill for an hour with a 10-pound backpack or swim laps for 90 minutes – without stopping. Trying to lose weightonly through increased activity – or only by cutting your calories – won’t be nearly as effective as a combination of diet and exercise.
  • Cutting calories may cause your metabolic rate to drop somewhat. Your metabolic rate represents the number of calories your body burns just to keep basic processes going  - and is a big part of your ‘calories out’.  But your metabolic rate can dip a little when you cut back on your eating.  So even though your ‘calories in’ may be lower, your ‘calories out’ can drop, too – and leave you more or less in calorie balance.
  • Strength training can help to increase metabolic rate.  When people think ‘exercise’, they usually think aerobic exercise, like biking, swimming or jogging.  But strength training is important, too – in part because it helps to build lean body mass, which can bump up your metabolic rate and help offset the drop in calorie burn that takes place when you cut your calories.
  • It’s easy to make mistakes when counting calories – both in and out. People tend to overestimate the calorie cost of the exercise they do – and underestimate the number of calories they eat.  Which helps explain the frustration many people feel when they’re sure they’re doing ‘everything right’ – but the scale just won’t budge.
  • You need a lot of exercise to lose weight, but you need even more to prevent it from coming back. Once you’ve lost it, regular activity is critical when it comes to keeping weight off.  But it takes more than a leisurely stroll around the block. Members of the National Weight Loss Registry – people who have lost at least 30 pounds and kept it off for at least a year – burn an average of about 2800 calories a week in exercise.  That’s the equivalent of about 90 minutes of exercise – like a briskfour-mile walk – every day.
  • Exercise is key to good health and anything is better than nothing.  When people hear that they might need an hour or more of exercise a day to keep their weight under control, it can be a little daunting.  But don’t let the numbers discourage you.  Do what you can, do it regularly, and try to go a little farther – or work out a little harder – each time.

Written by Susan Bowerman, MS, RD, CSSD. Susan is a paid consultant for Herbalife.

Tags:

Posted in Nutrition Fitness Tips By Guy Alony

The metabolic rate is directly related to your body composition. Every pound of body fat you have burns only about 2 calories a day. But the rest of you – your lean body mass – burns about 14 calories per pound each day. A big portion of your lean body mass is made up of muscle, so one of the best things you can do to boost your metabolic rate is to build up muscle through strength training. And, make sure to take in adequate protein from the diet, which helps to build and maintain lean muscle, too.

Here are the facts surround five myths about metabolism:

Myth: Aging slows your metabolism.
Truth: People do tend to put on weight as they get older – but it’s typically because they tend to exercise less, or less vigorously, than they used to – and that means fewer calories burned per day. As a result, loss of muscle mass can occur which reduces the body’s lean body mass – which results in a slower metabolic rate. Cardiovascular exercise to burn calories and strength training to preserve or build up muscle are great defenses against age-related weight gain.

Myth: You’re stuck with the metabolism you have and you can’t change it.
Truth: While it may appear that there are people who eat all the time and never seem to gain, chances are they make healthy, relatively low calorie selections naturally. Many of these “lucky” people also burn more calories simply because they move more - they might fidget more, or get up from their desks frequently during the day to stretch, or walk down the hall to talk to a colleague instead of e-mailing. So, once you’ve made the commitment to boost your metabolism by building more muscle, use those muscles more by moving around frequently throughout the day.

Myth: You burn more calories digesting ice-cold foods and beverages than foods that are room temperature or warmer.
Truth: In a laboratory, very slight increases in calorie burn have been measured in people who drink very cold beverages. But the change is too small (amounting to about 10 more calories burned per day) to have any meaningful impact on weight loss.

Myth: If you cut calories, your metabolic rate will slow down, so what’s the point?
Truth: It is true that your metabolic rate can slow a bit when you cut calories – your body’s natural inclination is to try to conserve calories as best it can. But, these decreases are relatively small, and if you become more active as you lose weight, you can offset these small changes. With a combination of diet AND exercise, you can help to preserve the rate at which your body burns calories.

Myth: If you stop eating at night, when your metabolism is slower, you’ll lose more weight.
Truth: When people lose weight because they stop eating after a certain time of day, it’s only because they’ve cut their overall calorie consumption - not because they are eating their calories earlier in the day. Consuming all your calories before the sun goes down won’t speed up your weight loss unless you also eat fewer calories than you need.

Susan Bowerman is a consultant to Herbalife.

Posted in News Health Articles By Guy Alony
Set Ascending Direction

2 Item(s)