How you look is largely influenced by what you eat.
Lack of muscle mass = baggy bits i.e bingo wings, high body fat, lack of energy at work or at the gym, bad skin, digestive problems…
All of these can be caused by unhealthy nutrition. Eating too much, too little, the wrong foods, not enough nutrients all lead these problems.
Since there’s a lot of confusion about what to eat and why, here are 8 simple nutrition rules that will help you lose fat, tone & get stronger.
You get energy from the first hour and you’ll be less hungry the rest of the day. It also sets the trend: you’ll tend to eat healthier if your day starts with a strong & healthy breakfast.
Your best bet: omelettes, smoothies, cottage cheese, porridge oats. Cereals are out!
Did you know: Special K has the same nutritional value as a Tesco dark chocolate premium ice cream!
The easiest way: breakfast, lunch, dinner, post workout, pre bed and 1 or 2 healthy snacks in between. Benefits:
- Less Hunger. Eating more smaller meals vs. few big meals will decrease your stomach size. You’ll feel full faster and your waist will trim.
- Less Cravings. Not eating for long periods usually causes overeating at the next meal or raiding the biscuit jar.
Eat at fixed times every day and your body will get hungry at those fixed times. Example: 7am, 10am, 1pm, 4pm, 7pm.
You need protein to maintain muscle. Proteins also help fat loss since they have the highest thermic effect. And they satiate: proteins make you full longer than carbs.
How much protein should you eat daily? At least 1g per pound of body-weight. That’s 200g/day if you weigh 200lbs. The easiest way to get this amount is to eat a whole protein source with each meal. Some include:
- Red Meat. Beef, pork, lamb, etc.
- Poultry. Chicken, turkey, etc.
- Fish. Tuna, salmon, sardines, mackerel, etc.
- Eggs. Don’t believe the cholesterol myths. Eat the yolk.
- Dairy. Milk, cheese, cottage cheese, quark, yogurt, etc.
- Whey. Not necessary but great for easy post workout shakes.
Most of them are low calorie: you can eat veggies until your stomach's full without gaining fat or weight. Fruits & veggies are also full of vitamins, minerals, antioxidants and fibre which helps digestion. Go easy on the fruits though, as they're quite high in sugar.
Some of my favorite fruits & veggies are: apples, berries, grapes, carrots, turnip, bananas, spinach, broccoli, tomatoes, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, spinach, peas.
70% of population is carb intolerant: they get fat eating excess carbs. While you need carbs for energy, most people eat more than they need. Limit your starchy carb intake to post workout only.
- Eat Fruits & Veggies with all Meals. These contain little carbs compared to whole grains. Exception: corn, carrots, raisins.
- Starchy Carbs Post Workout Only. This is rice, pasta, bread, potatoes, quinoa, oats, etc. Avoid white carbs and eat whole grain.
- Exception. If you’re a skinny guy who wants to gain weight: eat carbs post workout and post post workout. More if needed.
Healthy fats improve fat loss and health. They also satiate, digest slowly and are cheap. Eat healthy fats with every meal and avoid artificial trans -fats & margarine. Balance your fat intake.
- Saturated Fats. Increase testosterone levels. Dietary cholesterol is not bound to blood cholesterol. Real butter, whole eggs, red meat.
- Monounsaturated Fats. Protect against heart diseases and cancers. Extra virgin olive oil, olives, mixed nuts.
- Polyunsaturated Fats. Increase testosterone levels, promote fat loss, decrease inflammation, … Fish oil, ground flax seeds, mixed nuts.
Fitness training causes water loss through sweating which can impair muscle recovery. Drinking water prevents dehydration but also hunger since an empty stomach can make you think you’re hungry.
- 2-3 litres of water a day. Drink 1 cup of water first thing on waking up, 2 cups with each meal and sip water during your workout.
- Get a Brita Filter. Cheaper than bottled water and tastes better than straight tap water. Try also green tea & water with squeezed lemon.
- Ignore Water Intoxication. Eating healthy as explained in this post will make sure you replenish your electrolytes. Unless you do crazy stuff like drinking 2 litres water in 10mins, you’ll be safe.
To really get the results you want, 90% of your food intake should consist of whole foods.
- Whole Foods. Unprocessed and unrefined (or little refined) foods that come as close as possible to their natural state. Examples: fresh meat, fish, poultry, eggs, veggies, legumes, fruits, rice, oats, quinoa, …
- Processed Foods. Usually contain added sugars, trans-fats, nitrates, corn syrup, sodium and more chemicals. Examples: bagels, fruit bars, cereals, pizza, cookies, sausages, frozen meals, supplements, …
Eat whole foods 90% of the time. Difference in result is insignificant compared to eating 100% healthy. So if you eat 6x/day, you can eat a junk meal per week guilt-free. Same with alcohol: 10% of the time is ok.
Forget about portion size and calories. Just eat your stomach full. You won’t get fat eating healthy foods. Especially not if you exercise and with all the veggies. Example diet using the above 8 nutrition rules:
- Breakfast: spinach omlette, green tea, multi vit
- Snack: mixed nuts, pear
- Lunch: tuna steak/salmon, roman lettuce, olives, olive oil
- Snack: cottage cheese with apple
- Post workout: 1/2 peanut butter sandwich, orange
- Dinner: chicken, spinach, baby carrots, brocolli, califlower, ground flax seeds, fish oil
Nobody has time to cook 6x/day. Prepare your food for the day while making breakfast or dinner. This takes about 1 hour and is key to making this work.
Think ahead and remember...
'Not preparing, is preparing to fail!'
© 2009 ProActiv Fitness (UK) Ltd
Web design by Jon Tarrant Design & Print www.jontarrant.org
A meal that contains a lot of fat or is harder to digest will temporarily decrease your metabolic rate. Imagine your body with a set number of available energy, lets say 100 units. The more units used to break down and store food, the less units are available for other requirements. This is why you feel so zapped of energy after eating a large meal or something hard to digest.
What I have found works best is to eat small frequent meals during the day, beginning as soon as you wake up. While fasting overnight your metabolisms slows, so eating breakfast will get it revved back up. Look at the diet plan in the the Eating Guidelines to the left. It builds in three main meals and three snacks throughout the day.
My favorite part is what a good strength training program can do for your basal metabolic rate (BMR). Did you ever wonder why your metabolism slows down as you get older? A large part of this has been linked to a natural decline in muscle after age 25. As much as one half percent reduction in BMR every year for those who don’t train their muscles effectively. If you stress the muscles with resistance exercises, they will adapt by adding more tissue. A 20 minute routine, three times a week, is a great place to start.
As a fat loss / fitness expert I see throughout the day: the gym fills up with endless numbers of people on treadmills, cross trainers, bikes, moving stairs and any other equipment that they can find. In most cases, it’s the same equipemnt they used the day before - and the day before that!
Most of these people want to lose weight, but they don’t realise that they are missing a serious form of exercise that will get them burning calories when they’re not even in the gym! This form of exercise is resistance training. Just by training for an hour in the gym doesn’t guarantee you will lose fat in the long run.
You need to find ways to burn more calories when you’re not in the gym. How many hours can you exercise compared to how many hours there are in the week? Metabolic resistance training raises your metabolic rate for 36 hours POST exercise!!!
Resistance training is a major component of your fat loss mission. By toning up your muscles you increase the chance of burning extra calories. Muscle is an active tissue and unlike fat, it burns calories. As we move throughout the day we use our muscles and thereby burn calories. The more muscle tissue you have the larger the amount of calories you will burn. But girls - don’t be thinking you’ll get massive! For one, women don’t produce enough testosterone to get massive. And two, muscle size isn’t produced in the weight room (strength is), it’s what goes on in the kitchen that counts.
So what’s the best resistance training program for fat loss? Well, it may not be what you think. It’s not the traditional bodybuilding routine of “back” on one day and then “chest” on another, so don’t be put off by the concept of using weights or your bodyweight for resistance. You’re not a body builder so why should you train like one?
To get the best results from your resistance training you should be using compound exercises, utilising bodyweight exercises, medicine balls and free weights. These are the most beneficial to you; these are exercises that work your muscles over 2 joint movements. Examples are: squats, lunges, med ball swings, press ups, pull ups, etc.
Do not bother with isolation exercises such as lateral raises, bicep curls or one arm tricep extensions. If you have been doing any of these exercises you’re not using your time effectively. You should ONLY perform these exercises if you have some spare time to kill. They are otherwise not good for your fat loss goals.
Once you have increased your muscle size you increase your metabolism and therefore even when you sit at home you burn more fat than previously, in fact you start burning more fat 24/7.
In order to increase your metabolism after your workout you want to hit as many muscle groups as possible during the workout. For this reason, my metabolic resistance training system advises you to perform full body workouts. The best format I have found training my clients is to alternate upper body exercises with lower body exercises.
Another benefit you will receive following this system is that it changes your workouts every four weeks. The exercises will change as will the reps, the sets and the tempos. This is to prevent your body from becoming used to the workouts and to make sure you continue to see results.
Start burning more calories today by following these two easy tips.
This should have your body melting fat away!
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