Friday, September 22, 2006

How to lower body fat when exercise and diet is not enough? -

I ve been in a weight loss program for over a year. I ve been eating well and exercising at least 4 times a week however my body fat doesn t seem to go down. I know lean muscle helps reduce fat but how can i enhance the current plan that i currently have. I m wondering if any one knows about any good vitamins, shakes or diet pills that are good for you. Thanks

No pills are gonna do it for you. Look hard at your diet. Check for hidden sources of fat or excessive calories. Many processed foods have a lot of added fat to increase flavor. Educate yourself and learn to read package labels. Also tweak your exercise program. You body can adapt to a plan over time. Shake it up a bit and look at increasing the intensity where you can. You are in better shape than you were a year ago. Make more demands of your body.

Dont use diet pills. If ur eating well and excercising regularly, then guess wat ur healthy.

If you are burning more calories than your intake, you should be losing fat. Maybe the net loss is so small as to be undetectable. I think you should increase the intensity and duration of your exercise program as curbing eating is not the fun way to do it.For example I eat at all-you-can eat buffet places 7 days a week, but have a healthy workout regimen at the health club, and I am not fat or obese. People think I weigh around 175 lbs (I m male) but actually I weight 195lbs because muscle weighs more than fat.

Have you taken the time to run the numbers? How many calories do you actually consume? Do your workouts more than offset the calories you are taking in? There really is no magic about weight loss, despite advertising we re bombarded with daily. You don t elaborate on your exercise program, but 4 days a week isn t all that much unless you re doing something aerobically significant for more than a couple hours at a time. Walking is a good start, but it doesn t burn many calories unless you do it for a REALLY long time, several hours. Lifting is insignificant for calorie burning because it doesn t elevate the heart rate. Unless you are spending hours in the gym getting huge, you aren t going to add enough lean muscle to have much of an impact on your calorie requirements. Running is best, cycling a close second.

Well, if you could elaborate a little bit more on your exercise program that would help, because it may be intensity that you are lacking. You don t seem opposed to putting on muscle, which is great for boosting your metabolism, but you won t gain muscle putting in 50% effort (you have to give your muscles a reason to grow). And I m not suggesting you try to lift the whole rack of plates either, as that s an easy way to injure yourself.And diet, it changes with your goal; if you want to gain muscle, calories consumed calories spent. If you want to lose weight calories consumed calories spent; and the biggest tip i can give you about calories is DON T DRINK THEM! Check out the sites below, they are very helpful for your question: