Tag diet

When you go online, you’ll probably realize right away that there are millions of websites dedicated to diets. Most diets are about losing weight, others focus on health, and there are even diets for ethical or religious reasons. But if you want to build muscle, you also need the right muscle building diet.

Of course, the “right” diet is open for debate, because many experts have different opinions. What is obvious is that a specific diet needs to be customized to your requirements and circumstances. While a nutritionist can probably help you out, there are some things which you can do yourself when you are looking for the right muscle building diet for you.

A Good Muscle Building Diet Requires Monitoring Your Calories

The first thing you’ll need to do is to figure out how many calories you need per day. For that, you can go online and use a calorie calculator. This calculator estimates the minimum number of calories you need to consume.

If your aim is to lose weight, then you’ll need to eat less than what your body uses up. But if your goal is to pack on more muscle mass, then you may have to consume more calories than what you burn.

You can start by consuming about 20 calories for each pound of body weight if you want to gain weight. After a month or so, you can change this if you’re not gaining weight or if the weight gain is too much.

Now, this means you need to do some research on how many calories each meal will have. Canned and packaged foods have this info on the label and there are also many guides online for calorie content of common food items. Just track the number of calories you consume each day, so you can tweak your muscle building diet accordingly.

Plan on Eating Smaller Meals More Often

Now figure how many calories you need per meal. You should plan on eating 6 small meals a day, instead of three large ones. It’s easy; just take your normal meal and divide it in two, and then eat the other half three hours later. Eating six small meals means you won’t get hungry often because your food intake is spaced out.

Tracking Your “Muscle Building” Protein Intake

Next, track your protein intake. This is just as important as your calorie intake, because protein and amino acids are the building blocks for muscle growth. If your protein intake is insufficient, you won’t be able to grow as much muscle you want.

While some top-level bodybuilding athletes do is gobble up massive amounts of protein, for you it will be different. You can start by taking about a gram of protein for each pound of body weight, although you can go up to 1.5 grams per pound.

Carbs are a Necessary Part of Your Muscle Building Diet

Get enough carbs. Some people forget about carbs and concentrate on protein when building muscle, and then later on they complain why they’re not getting bigger and stronger. What they don’t realize is that carbs should be where most of your calories are coming from.

You can start by consuming about 2 grams per pound of body weight. Some may suggest as much as 3 grams per pound, but it’s a better idea to start low. You can always just increase the carb consumption if when you don’t gain muscle mass after a month.

Generally, you should opt for slow-burning carbs to raise your glycogen levels, which boosts your stored energy. Examples of these include oatmeal and quinoa.

For breakfast and for your post-workout meals, you should switch to starchy simple carbs. These raise your insulin levels, which helps you absorb nutrients more efficiently. You can also choose quick-burning carbs to replace your oatmeal or quinoa if you find it difficult to gain mass.

Fats are an Important Part of Your Muscle Building Diet

Don’t forget fat in your diet. This is also important if you want to build muscle. In fact, the rest of your diet should be fat after protein and carbs.

Fat has 9 calories per gram while protein and carbs have 4 calories per gram. If you weigh 200 pounds, then you may be aiming for 300 grams of protein and 400 grams of carbs, which gives you 2,800 calories. If you are aiming for 4,000 calories a day in your muscle building diet, then the rest of the 1,200 calories comes from about 133 grams of fat.

As you may have noticed, these are not hard and fast rules. Just make sure you track your food intake and monitor your gains. Then tweak your muscle building diet routine when you want to make improvements or if you’re not making any improvement. It’s as simple as that.

Following a rapid weight loss diet is a short term fix for something that needs a long term remedy. It’s like using a band aid when you need stitches. For the most part, many will say that rapid weight loss diet does not look like a “diet” at all.

These diet plans often include some drastic cut down on carbs and calories. This is not a good idea because that will make the body react in an equally drastic manner.

A lot of the times, these diet plans are not designed by proper nutritionists and just basing the design on their personal experience. What worked for them does not necessarily will work for you.

Let’s look at the pros and cons of such crash diets.

Rapid Weight Loss Diet Pros

Produces Results

Rapid weight loss diet does produce weight loss in a very short amount of time. Slashing down on carbohydrates and calories will definitely drop your weight because your body is no longer getting the same amount that it used to have to maintain the weight. Simply put, slashing carbs and calories will make you weigh less.

Short Term Goal

Rapid weight loss diets are great for people who just want to lose weight for a single event. This is definitely the case for the most part and I would not suggest rapid weight loss diets to be used for extended amounts of time. But for short term goals, it is indeed perfect.

Rapid Weight Loss Diet Cons

Rapid Weight Loss is Downright Unhealthy

As mentioned earlier, rapid weight loss diets are suitable for short term use specifically because they are not healthy to be followed for extended amount of time. Slashing carbs and calories from your diet for extended amount of time will cause the body to go to starvation mode and conserve what it can and can even has the opposite effect in the long run. You might very well gain instead of lose weight.

No Studies To Support All Claims

There are simply no substantial studies done on what rapid weight loss diets can do to the body if used on a regular basis. Your body needs calories and carbohydrates to function properly and there are some rapid weight loss diets that includes diminished water intake which is a no-no since our bodies are made up of at least 70% water. Sure you might get thinner but you will hardly look great if you have dry skin and hardly any meat in you.

If you noticed, I hardly had anything to write about the pros because there is simply not that many advantage for rapid weight loss diets. These diets are more like gimmicks than anything else. A proper diet plan should include carbs, calories, protein, fat and fiber and cutting out one of those things can have adverse effect in your health later on.

Being healthy is a long term goal and should not be rushed because not every body reacts the same way. You have to get to know your own body and how it reacts to change before a great nutritional plan can be created. If someone really wants to lose weight, he or she needs to put in the hard work and eat properly to achieve a healthy and sustainable weight loss plan.

Five Tips to Control Portion Sizes While Losing Weight

Diet is an important part of weight loss. Nutrition if about 70% of your overall goal and if you get it properly, you are well on your way to getting that body that you have always wanted. Eating more often with smaller meals is one of the best ways to improve your metabolism and therefore your body size.

Controlling the portion to actually make it a “small” meal is the key. Without properly portioning our smaller meals, we might end up having 6 regular sized meals instead of smaller meals which will takes us to the opposite direction of our goal. Some would just slash down their regular meals and then have some kind of shake between their meals but that might not work so well for some so here are a few easy tips so that we can portion a better and more balanced meal.

Have Some Salad

Having some salad before dinner will curb that appetite and the fibers in the salad will make us fuller. Include some protein in your salad though for additional energy that way you will feel fuller at dinner and not eat a lot. Dinner is an important meal to lessen because you are about to sleep and our bodies tend to not use a lot of energy at this time and therefore if we eat a lot, our bodies will convert the remaining resources to fat.

Buy in Smaller Servings

Buy snacks in smaller servings. Do not buy a gallon of ice cream instead, buy a pint so that you will not be tempted to finish it while in front of the T.V. Smaller sized snacks will of course make you eat less and therefore easier to manage weight. But don’t buy smaller sized snacks but place them all next to you because you will just be tempted to open them and that will just be the same thing.

Eliminate The Possibility Of Seconds

This can be done easier by not serving your meals in large containers. Put your meal on a plate and finish it. Chew longer to make it easier for your body to digest the food and therefore process it better. Slower chewing also will give your body time to let you know that you are actually already full.

Mix and Match Your Meals

We are used to making salads the side dish. This time, make meat your side dish and load up on veggies and healthy grains. This will make you feel fuller faster because of the fiber in the veggies and the meat will just make things taste better. Protein is important in every meal too so make sure that you choose lean meat sources.

Master Kid Servings

If you have a kid and you cook for them, start measuring your meals the same way you measure theirs. This is an easy way to portion your meals better and can be easier on your pocket too. Having smaller meals will be easier this way and if you have a kid that enjoys eating with you, then this can also be a fun way to get into a proper diet plan.

Does Willpower Help With Your Weight Loss Journey?

Willpower is something that all of us have. Some have more of it, some have less but it is something that will certainly be useful when you are trying to achieve a goal. As they say, nothing worth achieving can be done overnight. And that applies to your weight loss journey too.

You cannot expect to lose 5 pounds in two weeks because that cannot be safely and naturally done. It can be done but it often include some medical intervention using some kind of dietary supplement that often have some side-effects that is not included in the fine print.

A weight loss journey often includes some changes in lifestyle and diet. These changes are a big deal and that is why a lot of people fail because they try to take the journey without one essential component of any endeavor and that is willpower. A weak willpower will make you eat that double chocolate cake at night when nobody is watching and make you gain back the weight that you have worked so hard to lose the past week.

A weak will power will make you finish your set at 8 repetitions when you should be doing 15. Willpower oftentimes spells the difference between success and failure. Here are a few things that willpower can do for you.

Better Workout Sessions

Having willpower will allow you to push that last couple of reps in your sets and even a couple more beyond your target. Willpower will often be the one that will get you in the gym in the first place. It allows you to push harder, run longer and improve the quality of your workout every time you come in. That will then allow you to burn more fat and feel better about yourself because you can actually feel the strength that you get from all that pumping and pulling.

This Pushes Us To Improve Your Diet

We all know that it is very hard to replace that chocolate cake with a carrot or chicken breast but an improvement in the diet is necessary if we are to improve our body composition and weight. Willpower will play a great role in pushing through this change in your diet because at the end of the day, you know that what you put in your body is healthy and will benefit you. Willpower will even get you through the change in taste. Something as simple as that can derail people from their diet plan without a strong willpower.

Gives Us The Strength To Commit

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step and willpower will play a big part on this as well. Committing to change a few things in our lives can be very challenging like passing on those weekends spent on bars and parties. You don’t have to say no to all of them but you do have to make sure that you do not go out very often because that’s when you don’t get to sleep properly and end up drinking all night.

All those brews that you downed last night will have to be burned again in the gym and if you are too tired to hit the gym in the first place, then that makes things worst. Willpower will help us say no to some of these things because we know that it will be for our own good.

Don’t Complicate Your Weight Loss Goal Simplify It

Weight loss is actually simpler than most would expect. It is all about having the right nutrition and workout plan. The hard part seems to be following the set plan. Of course, it will involve changes in your routine because not changing it will give you the same result. As someone once said, if you want to keep on getting what you are getting, keep on doing what you are doing. It is very simple and yet very true. So to ignite change in your weight and ultimately physique, there has to be some changes done. Here are some tips on keeping it simple.

Stick To One Diet Plan

A good diet plan should have a good portion of protein, carbohydrates, calories, fiber and even fat. A good nutrition plan will allow someone to keep getting the right amount of energy to workout and actually produce results. When you go on a crash diet, sooner than later, the body will run out of resources and you will lose the energy to workout. Without working out, you will get thin but you will not just be losing fat but muscle as well. Losing both fat and muscle will make you look more like a twig than an hourglass.

Don’t Take Too Many Diet Supplements

A lot of people turn to “diet” supplements that offer outrageous claims of weight lose and using such supplements will not really be healthy. Many do not have appropriate research backing them up and thus is unsafe for continued use. If you hang your hopes of weight loss on supplements, you are fighting a losing battle. Stick to a good quality vitamin and mineral supplement and have a proper diet and you should be good to go.

Keep Up The Hard Work

Working out is an important part of weight lose. Our daily activities often include us being glued to an office chair and minimal physical activities. Our bodies need to be active and sweat regularly to get rid of toxins as well as keep the muscles working. Our ancestors lived a lot longer because they lived active lives and losing weight is not a big deal for them because they more or less are in the ideal weight range to begin with. But for use, just include an hour of physical activity a day and losing weight will be a lot simpler.

Don’t Let Go

This might very well be the key to keep weight loss simple. Don’t let go too early. Oftentimes, people let go and stop the routine before their bodies have reacted to it and produce noticeable results. It’s not as simple as switching a light bulb. Remember that you had years and years in building the weight that you are trying to lose so don’t expect to get rid of it in two months.

These simple pointers will keep weight lose simple and you don’t have to get on the hype of the new age weight lose gimmicks. The formula of weight loss has been around for a long time and it is as simple as the pointers mentioned above. Just keep it up and you will get there in a healthy manner.

A strength training program encompasses everything you do in order to boost your physical strength. It isn’t just about exercises and workouts. It touches on everything, from scheduling the workouts and figuring out the frequency of each one, and also includes a careful look at your diet as well.

It may even include motivational techniques, since there is a very good chance that you’ll eventually give up due to the sheer amount of effort required to succeed.

It is highly recommended that you don’t try to create an entire strength training program on your own, unless you yourself have been highly trained on the subject. It’s too complicated a process, and there’s a very good chance that your efforts will be in vain. You may do all that hard work and still get very little benefit for your trouble. It also puts you at risk of injury.

Here’s a video example of a Kettlebell strength training program that can give you some ideas for creating your own program:
 

If you can’t create your own program, what are your options?

In general, there are two:

1. Get a personal trainer. A personal trainer can help you with just about everything you need. This is especially true if your trainer is also trained as a nutritionist. Before you choose one, take a look at several practical considerations first. Can you afford to hire a PT? A personal trainer may not be exactly cheap. You should also verify their qualifications so that you can be assured that the trainer knows what they’re talking about. Then you have to make sure that you can work with this person, because even the most knowledgeable trainer is useless if your personalities don’t jive.

A trainer will listen to you as you explain your training goals (whether you just want to look good, or you’re training for a particular sport) and then he or she will come up with a schedule that outlines when you should do your workouts, and what exercises you need to include.

There may also be a list of all the equipment you’ll need, although often they can all be found in the gym where your personal trainer works. The trainer can also help you with the right diet plan, including the health supplements you will need to take before, during, and immediately after a workout. And last but not least, a trainer can motivate you not to quit, because there’s always the temptation to give up.

2. Do some research and get a training program online. A training program is like a DIY manual. It gives you all the pertinent information that a personal trainer can provide. The problem with this is that it’s more generic, so it won’t be precisely tailored to your particular needs. Your best bet is to find a program for your profile. For example, a program may be geared towards elderly men, rehabilitating heart patients, football players, overweight individuals, or runners.

A good training program always includes lots of instructional videos, so that you’ll be able to do the recommended exercises properly. If possible, it should also include recommended diet plans as well.

In a recent report based on a study done at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, MA, doctors found that women who walked at a brisk pace three or four hours per week reduced their risk of a heart attack by 30 to 40 percent; those who walked at least five hours per week reduced their risk by 50%.

They went on to state that one-third of coronary events in middle-aged women are due to physical inactivity. Walking can reduce your risk of a heart attack by…

1) Lowering Your Blood Pressure

One of the causes of a heart attack can be high blood pressure – known as hypertension. This “silent killer” causes your heart to work extra hard to pump blood throughout your body. Walking, along with eating properly, losing weight, stopping smoking and restricting your salt intake, has shown to decrease high blood pressure and therefore decrease your risk of a heart attack.

2) Reducing Stress

Walking reduces the amount of stress hormones released in our body. An overabundance of stress hormones elevates your blood pressure. However, by exercising, your mind focuses less on what is causing you stress and more on the repetitiveness of doing the exercise. With less stress hormones in your system, your blood pressure lowers itself.

3) Reducing Cholesterol

The higher your cholesterol level – a ratio of HDL, LDL and triglycerides (another fat in your bloodstream) – the greater chance you’ll have a heart attack. Cholesterol is a fat-like substance that when found in excess, can build-up on the walls of your arteries and cause, at the very least a narrowing, or worse a blockage.

With a narrowing, your heart will not get as much oxygen as it needs and you will get chest pains. If one of your arteries becomes blocked, you suffer a heart attack. By walking, you can naturally raise your good HDL and reduce your bad LDL cholesterol thus lowering your overall cholesterol level.

4) Stabilizing Your Blood Sugar Level

When you eat foods high in sugar, your pancreas releases insulin into your bloodstream to break down the sugar. But in many people, the insulin response is too great, thus processing too much sugar. Your body responds in the form of a craving for sugar so you eat something sweet … and the yo-yo cycle continues.

Why this is bad is that over time, your body becomes what is known as insulin resistant. In other words it takes more insulin than your body is capable of creating to break down sugar. The result – Type 2 diabetes and generally an associated weight gain.

As your body becomes insulin resistant, a thickening of your arteries starts to happen with symptoms and results similar to high cholesterol. Walking takes energy and that energy comes from your blood sugar. With less excessive blood sugar to control, insulin can do its work effectively thus preventing insulin resistance.

A Quick Note on Eating Properly

All the walking in the world will not reduce your risk of a heart attack unless you also eat properly. Many of the above symptoms are linked to not eating right. By eating foods low in salt, sugar and saturated fat, along with regular walking, you can significantly reduce your risk of a heart attack.

If you’d like to get more out of your walking for fitness plan, check out the “Guide to Setting Your Walking Fitness Goals” for more in depth knowledge on the subject of walking for fitness. While you’re there, be sure to sign up for the free MyFitnessNut.com Newsletter to be kept up to date on the latest health and fitness topics.

What to Do If You Blow Your Diet Plan and How to Get Back on Track

If you stay on your healthy eating plan long enough, it will happen to you – guaranteed! You’ll blow your diet plan.

The key is to not let that one event define you and to get right back on your healthy eating diet plan. It is like riding a bike; when you fell off of it the first time, what did you do? You got right back on and learn to ride! It is the same with a diet plan.

Most of the big holiday parties are past us now (for this year), but we still have birthday parties, anniversaries, weddings and vacations to endure during the rest of the year. To help you minimize the “damage” from overeating at one of these events, here are 6 ways to handle occasional overeating:

1) Don’t Beat Yourself Up Over Your Diet Plan

You can’t “undo” what happened, so why dwell on it. Instead, focus your energy again on eating right. A one-time overeating binge may affect your weight loss for that week, but it doesn’t blow your whole dieting plan. If you do gain weight, a good portion of it will be water weight from the additional salt. It will flush out of your system in a couple of days.

2) Think of the Bigger Picture

Many dieters see their diet plan as a daily thing when in fact researchers have found that we typically tend to eat more on the weekends. So if you overate on a weekday, count that as one of your weekend days when you usually eat more calories anyway. Just be sure to make one of your weekend days a regular weekday instead.

3) Eat a Healthy Breakfast on Your Diet Plan

I know, the last thing you want to do when you feel bad about overeating the day before is to eat again now. But eating within 30 minutes of getting out of bed sets the tone of your metabolism for the rest of the day. By eating a healthy breakfast you are burning calories right away.

4) Do An Extra Workout for a Mental Commitment to Your Diet Plan

Granted, one extra workout is not going to totally erase the extra calories you had yesterday; it will do more for your mental state than physical, but it helps you get back in the right frame of mind. A step aerobics class or a light strength training session burns off a few of those extra calories, but its real value is refocusing you toward your goal.

5) Go Back to Your Diet Plan

Get back on track. If you normally eat three light meals per day with a healthy snack in the morning and at night, continue that regimen. There is a common tendency to start skipping meals/snacks as a way to “compensate” for yesterday’s overeating. Don’t succumb to these feelings. What you were doing before was working, so stick to your eating and exercise plan.

One bad day is not life altering. Don’t make more out of it than it is – merely a hiccup in your overall plan.

6) Drink Plenty of Water on Your Diet Plan

Hydrating does a couple of things. First by drinking your 64 ounces of water throughout the day (optimally one ounce of water for every two pounds of body weight), it keeps you full so you have less tendency to overeat again. Second, it helps flush fat and toxins from your system.

Drinking the right amounts of water each day is probably the single most important thing you can do for both weight-loss and your overall health. Read “How to Make Water a More Enticing Beverage” if you’re one of those people who have a hard time getting enough water into your diet plan on a daily basis.

All of us know water is an essential ingredient in our healthy lifestyle, but after a while drinking plain water gets boring. Eventually, you will start drinking less and not end up getting your daily eight 8-ounce glasses. So how do you make plain water more appealing and exciting?

Add Citrus Slices or Cucumber to Your Water

There are several things that are good for you by themselves that also make water better tasting. For example, try adding a slice of citrus fruit, such as lemon, lime or orange to a glass of water or several slices of one fruit to a pitcher of water. To add even more zest to your water, and kick up the visual appeal, crush a sprig or two of fresh rosemary and add it to the pitcher along with the citrus fruit.

For something a little different, try adding slices of cucumber to your pitcher. Not only does it add flavor to your water, but the green rind around the slice creates interesting visual appeal.

Green Tea

So far we have talked about how to make plain water more enjoyable to drink, but brewing it into green tea has certain medical benefits too. Due to the polyphenols in green tea, studies have shown it can help:

• relieve rheumatoid arthritis
• reduce high cholesterol
• prevent infection
• boost an impaired immune system

Hot or cold, green tea is good for you.

Mint Tea

Another tea many people enjoy is mint tea. Just boil some water and add fresh mint leaves. Mint has health benefits too numerous to list. Two of the more popular ones include soothing a stomach upset by stress and weight loss.

Mint tea contains theanine, a natural compound shown to have a calming effect. Green tea helps you lose weight too due to its diuretic effect. Drinking it helps get rid of extra fluid your body does not need and with it extra weight. Because mint tea has a small amount of caffeine, it can increase your endurance and help you work out longer in the gym, thus burning even more calories.

Try Some Fizzy Water

For some “fizzy” water, try drinking Seltzer water or Club Soda. Both come in natural and calorie-free fruit flavors, so you are not adding any additional calories to your healthy diet – just taste. Or you can make your own fizzy water with one of the new consumer soda machines. Add the bubbles, but not the favor mix. Sure, there’s a little controversy on the subject of drinking carbonated water but even more so on not drinking enough water. Try using the “fizzy water” as more of a treat rather than to drink it all of the time.

The old school of thought concentrated on drinking at least 64 ounces of just plain water per day and optimally one ounce for every two pounds of body weight. Now nutritionists mostly agree that some of your daily water requirement can come from other sources, such as coffee, tea, and certain fruits and vegetables. It all adds up and makes life more interesting!

Many slim people don’t know they may have excess belly or visceral fat. However it is true and these people can have the same increased risk for heart disease, cancer and diabetes as an overweight person and not even know it.

Researchers have found 4 main reasons why slim people have excessive belly fat:

Lack of Exercise

If a person tries to stay slim by diet alone, s/he can still pack on pounds of fat deep within the abdominal cavity and not know it. As far as exercising, cardio routines are the best to get your heart rate up and your body into the fat-burning mode. Try to do cardio exercises 20 to 40 minutes per day for at least four days per week. Add in two days of strength training and take the 7th day off.

The Persons Age

As we age, our metabolism slows down, so we do not normally burn as many calories per day as when we were younger. In some people, the extra calories our body does not burn up get stored as belly fat. While aging is a continual process, you can help stave off its effects through proper diet and exercising.

Their Hormones

As we age, hormonal changes occur. Especially in postmenopausal women, fat may move from the hips to the abdominal cavity. So even though the scale has not shown any weight gain, fat may have moved to the belly region. There isn’t much that can be done to prevent it. Eat a healthy diet and get exercise as described above.

Their Genetics

Some people are predisposed to acquire fat in their belly region instead of on their hips or buttocks. Call it “bad genes” if you will. This can be disheartening as you are doing everything right but still gaining belly fat. Try to control it though exercise and avoiding sugary foods or food with trans fat. The body doesn’t know how to process trans fat, so it stores it as fat.

The odd fact about belly fat is that it does not show up on a Body Mass Index (BMI) reading. So even with a BMI of less than 25, dangerous belly fat could be lurking inside your body.

Unfortunately, belly fat is the most dangerous fat there is as it secretes hormones in the body that can create an increased risk for many life-threatening diseases. The only real way to tell if you have excess belly fat is through a Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) or a Computed Tomography (CT) test.

You can find more “Belly Fat Success Tips” in our weight loss category found at http://myfitnessnut.com and while you’re they, be sure to subscribe to our monthly fitness newsletter and be kept up to date on the latest developments in the world of health and fitness.

Have too many years of too many beers transformed your flat and ripped six-pack abs into a fat, round keg? What really causes a beer belly, and how can you lose it? It is true that beer drinkers around the world, especially men, tend to grow what is commonly called a “beer belly” if they drink beer frequently enough and long enough.

But is it really the beer that causes the beach ball stomach? You may know someone who has never had a beer or alcoholic beverage in their life, but is still sporting what is usually called a beer belly. How does this happen in a teetotaler?

And more to the point, how do some serious beer drinkers seem to avoid getting this profound paunch?

The Beer Belly Blame Game

As it turns out, too many calories and a sedentary lifestyle can turn your formerly flat and sexy stomach into a beer belly. It can happen with men and women, regardless the amount of beers you actually consume in your lifetime.

In today’s society, food rich in preservatives, saturated fats and other nutritional bad guys are the norm. This leads to fat which generally collects in the midsection, and if you take in more calories than you burn and get little exercise, you too may be sporting a lot of unhealthy belly fat.

Yes, You Can Blame Beer for Giving You a Beer Belly

The reason why beer and alcohol intake is associated with a bigger waistline is because your liver goes to work burning the poison alcohol in your body when you drink, instead of attacking fat. And with a standard beer sporting 150 to 180 calories, five or six in an evening can single-handedly net you half of the calories you should be taking in for an entire day.

So heavy beer consumption can definitely cause a beer belly, but it is certainly not the only culprit. Doctor Michael Jensen is an obesity researcher for the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, and he says that sugary beverages and over-sized meal portions should get just as much blame for creating beer bellies.

Compound the Beer Belly Problems with the Need to Eat

Of course, since alcohol consumption increases your appetite, you many times have something to eat while you are drinking. And the food offered at many pubs and bars is not the healthiest. Pizza, chicken wings and fattening fried foods often accompany beer drinking, and they are just as responsible for your overhanging belly as are the beers you are washing them down with.

As you age, hormonal and metabolism changes make it harder to burn fat, so the same poor diet your body easily shrugged off when you were young can quickly become the basis for a beer belly now that you are older.

Does above average and consistent alcohol and beer consumption cause a beer belly?

It certainly can, if your overall nutrition and exercise do not compensate for all those extra calories. Because men have less subcutaneous fat than women, they store most of their fat in the midsection. This tends to make the classic beer belly more prevalent among males than females, but women who take in more calories than they burn can also develop this classic beer drinker’s belly.

From type II Diabetes to high blood pressure and multiple heart problems, too much belly fat surrounding your vital organs can be dangerous, and sometimes deadly. Take up a weekly exercise regimen, practice smart nutrition habits, and a few adult beverages after work and on the weekends will have a much smaller chance of cursing you with a beer belly.

You can find more “Belly Fat Success Tips” in our weight loss category found at http://myfitnessnut.com and while you’re they, be sure to subscribe to our monthly fitness newsletter and be kept up to date on the latest developments in the world of health and fitness.

Let’s be honest, losing belly fat (also known as visceral fat) is hard to do, but not impossible. But if it’s so difficult, why would anyone even try to get rid of it?

Because having an excess amount of visceral fat – the type of fat found deep in the abdominal cavity – is unhealthy and can lead to a whole host of diseases – many of which can be life-threatening. If you are a women with a waist measurement in excess of 35 inches, or 40 inches for men, you have an increased risk of getting heart disease, a stroke, sleep apnea, bone density loss, insulin resistance (leading to Type 2 diabetes) and some types of cancer.

How to Lose Belly Fat

So what are the secrets to losing belly fat?

Exercise and eating healthy foods.

Lose Belly Fat Through Exercise

There are many products and methods that tout themselves as being the Holy Grail when it comes to losing belly fat, but the fact of the matter is none of them work. Instead put that money into a gym membership. The only way to lose belly fat is to burn more calories than you eat.

Fortunately when you start to lose fat, belly fat is one of the first to go. But to set the record straight, but there isn’t a program that specifically targets belly fat – the body just doesn’t work that way.

Do high intensity cardio-style workouts four times per week. Add in a couple days of strength training per week (with one day off) and you have half of a recipe for losing belly fat and body fat in general. The other half is healthy food choices.

Lose Belly Fat Through Healthy Food Choices

You can only burn off so many calories per week working out. If you make bad food choices, both in the type and amount you eat, you will not create a calorie deficit and lose belly fat.

One tactic in portion control is eating on a smaller plate. This works by tricking the brain into thinking you ate more than you really did. So when it sees your plate empty, it thinks you are full.

The food you eat should be healthy. Focus on eating foods low in saturated fat and calories, but high in protein and fiber, such as fresh fruits, vegetables, whole grains and lean meats. These foods keep you fuller longer without adding in a ton of calories.

Avoid sugar. At first it gives you a lot of energy, but your body quickly metabolizes it by dumping insulin (usually too much) in your bloodstream. Once the sugar is gone, you “crash” from low blood sugar. So what do you do? Eat more sugar. This yo-yo effect eventually causes insulin resistance leading to Type 2 diabetes.

So as unglamorous as it is, it comes down to a combination of exercise and healthy food choices as the way to belly fat loss. Eating healthy food prevents you from consuming empty calories that have no nutritional value and exercising burns off calories. If you burn off more calories than you take in, you’ll lose belly fat. It really is that simple, but not easy.

You can find more “Belly Fat Success Tips” in our weight loss category found at http://myfitnessnut.com and while you’re they, be sure to subscribe to our monthly fitness newsletter and be kept up to date on the latest developments in the world of health and fitness.