Are you on a quest to burn fat and build muscle? If so, these are some tips and techniques you can use to further that goal. Use them where applicable, combined with a good general understanding about diet and exercise.
Eat a balanced diet. Believe it or not this is often overlooked. The illusion that you can starve yourself into fitness, or subsist on only salad and Perrier water, is a misconception that is getting less and less credit in the popular mind, but nevertheless is still around to some degree. You need the whole range: protein, fruits and vegetables, carbs, and even fats to maintain a healthy system that will respond well to other sorts of conditioning you do.
Reduce your intake of simple carbohydrates and saturated fats. Animal products have a high saturated fat content. Some feel saturated fats are healthier than others feel they are, but in general there’s no dispute that they are quickly stored as body fat if not metabolized if not metabolized due to a corresponding physical demand (i.e. exercise) Simple carbs are also quickly stored as fats, while complex ones are released more gradually and generally found in foods that are also healthy in other ways.
Make the amount of carbohydrates and fats (which are the main quick energy fuels your body uses) proportional to your energy expenditure. The fact is that when you eat carbohydrates and fats, if they are more than you need for the amount of energy you’re expending they’re more likely to be stored as fats. Kind of hard for the lounge around snacker to really embrace this, but you need to pay attention to this if burning fat is your goal.
When possible eat proteins rather than fats, unsaturated rather than saturated fats, and complex carbs rather than simple ones. Proteins and fats, as noted above, occur in many of the foods we eat in the western world, so it’s easy to get more than you need. Getting them isn’t the problem but rather choosing foods that don’t have too much. Protein is necessary if you want to build muscle. So when possible favor protein over saturated fat (which, as noted above, often becomes body fat). You also need fats, even saturated ones, but again, we usually get too much of this substance. So try to eat poly and monounsaturated fats (which occur in sunflower and nut oils, and so on) rather than too much saturated fat (which occurs in animal products). And when you do eat meat poultry and fish can be used as a substitute for red meats which usually have more saturated fat. As far as carbs go, simple ones (which are simple sugars such as sucrose, lactose, and fructose) get converted more quickly to body fat than complex carbs (found in fruits vegetables and grains) so favor those.
Drink plenty of water. Water is fundamental. It is necessary for good overall functioning of you system in terms of absorption, nutrient transport, digestion, metabolism, waste elimination and so on, all of which are needed during the “burn fat build muscle” process. Around eight glasses a day are recommended.
Eat a decent amount of fiber (roughage). Fiber, which is found in grains, fruits, and vegetables, is important for healthy digestion and also gets rid of cholesterol. The latter helps the liver function better, which in turns helps you burn fat better. And it is a healthy habit to get into generally. So eat leafy salads, whole grain breads and cereals, and fruit a lot if possible. Note that the latter are also full of complex carbs so they are good slow release energy sources for your workouts.
Now, all this nutritional advice has some value on its own, but combining it with the right kind of exercise is what really sets you up to burn fat and build muscle. This is an area that needs to be understood so there is really only one “tip” here that deserves a few paragraphs to really make it clear.
In general what you want to do is place a fairly intense demand on your muscles. This tells your body to burn whatever fats are available to meet the energy demand, and builds the muscles so it’s stronger for future use. Many people consider long aerobic workouts such as jogging to be the main fat burners, but in fact it’s coming to light that this may not be the case. These activities are low intensity and long duration, meaning that they are basically muscular exercises that don’t place as high a demand on your body as they could to metabolize its fat stores. They also take longer and so are not really very efficient.
The usual long jog works out the leg and back muscles, and increases circulation and oxygenation, but a slow weight lift taking much less time and done at intense intervals will place greater muscular demand and thus burn more fat.
Proteins are like the raw construction materials of the body. Fats and sugars are the raw fuels. They are like the gas and electricity for the various machines used in a contraction project, while protein is the lumber concrete, steel, and so on. Just as a construction crew wouldn’t waste fuel they could use in the future to get more building done, your body doesn’t willingly waste its fat and carb fuels but rather stores them. However it’s when a project is underway – muscle building – that most of it gets used Thus you want to get some construction projects underway that will both build a stronger structure and use up all that excess fuel called fat.
Most quick burn fat – build muscle routines thus recommend mostly muscular exercise with some aerobics thrown in, because muscular work that is beyond the normal limitations you’re used to is what really hits up the stored fat reserves. It creates the “supply and demand” cycle that initiates fat burning (usage). You can find a number of these types of routines, and many don’t even require a large amount of time, so give them a try. There are even slow burn methods that have you do slow motion exercises that really tire out your muscles. Using these, with an exercise session of hour a week you burn as much or more fat as by going for daily jogs and so on.
Use common sense in your quest to burn fat and build muscle and try to grasp the basic principles rather than get lost in complicated formulas. Use more specific tips and tricks where applicable, but basically get that muscle construction project going, get healthy raw materials to make a strong structure, and get that fat burning to fuel it.
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