How To Optimize Fat Loss

Do you feel as though you eat healthy, work out regularly, yet still can’t seem to get to a weight that you desire? Here are a few easy ways to get yourself primed to add muscle and support reduced fat body composition.

Drink More Water
Water is naturally satiating and supports healthy metabolism in the fat burning process. It also helps our body retain less water (because we’re actively hydrating it) and making us less puffy.

A 2014 study by the Swiss Department of Medicine showed that drinking water created an immediate increase in energy expenditure, burning between 2 and 3 percent more calories than usual in the 90 minute window that followed.

It’s best to consume 1 oz of water per kg of body weight. To calculate your weight in kg, simply divide your body weight in pounds by 2.2. 

180 pound person / 2.2 kg = 81 kg
81 kg = 81 daily ounces of water

Fix: Buy a measurable water container you can drink from daily.

Get Better Sleep
Studies suggest that people who sleep fewer than 6 hours per night gain almost 2x as much weight over a 6-year period as people who sleep seven to eight hours per night. In fact, bad sleep can decrease caloric burn 5-20% the ENTIRE NEXT DAY.

So many folks start trying to correct their physique with bullshit supplements, crash diets, fads, or hell, even straight to macros. Fix your base level physiology first. Your hydration and your sleep. There’s a reason Coach Ashley makes both a primary focus the first few weeks of her Nutrition+ group coaching.

Fix: Keep a log every night of how long you sleep and hold yourself accountable to getting seven to eight hours. Begin your nightly winding down routine an hour earlier.

Eat More Protein
Most people greatly underestimate how much protein they actually eat, and nearly everyone fails to meet the necessary levels to support fat burning. Protein is the macronutrient that most supports the development and sustainability of your lean body mass, and if you can pick up on a theme from every recent blog post, it’s lean body mass that supports healthy metabolism. The more of it we have, the more calories we burn.

Protein also has the highest Thermic Effect of Eating (TEF). It’s the hardest macro for our body to breakdown, so just the mere act of eating it is a calorie burning endeavor. For this reason, you want to try and stick to whole food proteins as best you can. Shakes are great, but since they are liquid we lose a bit of that TEF. Still, shakes are better than nothing so take what you can get.

Fix: Aim for 1g of protein per pound of bodyweight per day, or if you have start at less than that, aim to get a serving of whole food protein at every major meal: eggs, chicken, lean red meat, fish, seafood, turkey, lean pork, or any other animal protein is ideal. About the size of 1-2 open palms.

Eat Sufficient Carbs
Cutting carbs can be an effective tool for fast fat loss IF one’s metabolism is healthy, but, it rarely lasts and often comes at a severe cost to your body long term in the following areas.

• Decreased thyroid output
• Increased cortisol output
• Decreased testosterone and strength
• Decreased brain function and mood
• Increased muscle breakdown
• Decreased immune function

When our thyroid is lousy and our cortisol is up, we are primed to store fat long term.

From Dr. John Berardi, founder of Precision Nutrition:

“Your metabolism might slow, your stress hormones go up and your muscle-building hormones go down. You feel lousy, spaced-out, sluggish, cranky and maybe even sick. Most vexing of all? You probably don’t even lose that much weight in the long term.”

In other words, you are mortgaging your future metabolism for short term gains that are in fact fraudulent.

Fix: Get a serving of whole food carbohydrates with every meal: all potatoes, rice, oats, beans, fruits, and quinoa are most ideal. Whole grain bread if you are tolerant. About the size of 1-2 cupped hands, in general.

Lift Heavier Weights
Cranking through workouts with light weight at a madman’s pace may shed fat at the initial shock to your body. This is the exact reason why so many become addicted to it, when in reality, any activity for beginners will burn fat at the onset of a program. Eventually, as you become more of a seasoned member your body will adapt and you must continue to challenge it with new stimulus: heavier loads. 

Performing set after set of 24# kettlebell swings is not going to move you forward if you’ve been camped out there for months.  Doing them faster may be good for your conditioning but will not translate into fat burning once your body is adapted to that particular movement at that particular weight.

As we covered in complete detail here, the focus on your personal output and targeting of strengthening and developing muscle tissue will have a noticeable positive effect on body composition. It increases energy expenditure, anabolic hormones and overall work capacity. As opposed to mindlessly performing fast, meaningless sets, filling your body with cortisol, at weight that’s too light to create change.

This is not to say you need to turn yourself into a heavy weightlifting monster. Simply setting a goal of increasing your deadlift or squat ten pounds, belling up one or two levels on your kettlebell work or pushing yourself to a new band on your pull-ups can present enough stimulus to elicit change. Start mixing in lower rep strength options once or twice per week if you are the type to always go for higher rep conditioning choice, and go heavier in every single movement you do if you varied format workouts. Your body and fat loss will appreciate the change of pace.

Fix: For the current cycle, dedicate yourself to the strength option whenever given the choice. Go a bit heavier and slower in all that you do.

De-Emphasize Your Scale
Constant scale watching makes our actions incredibly short-term focused which more often than not leads to long term adherence failure. Scale watching can be incredibly dangerous for people who join the gym for the first time, because the scale will never tell you the truth. You may not see the scale come down but in reality, you are very likely shedding pounds of body fat.

Remember, this isn’t spin or Orange Theory. You are lifting and developing new lean muscle, running on a machine that was built for hard prison labor in the 1800s.  If you want to know what’s happening, I cannot recommend to you strongly enough to get a scan at the Crown Point gym. It will accurately portray your overall weight in terms of muscle, fat, and water weight so you’ll know exactly how your progress is coming along (free once per month on Sundays to all members).

You cannot get fat while working out and eating right, so pass on the crazy, irrational scale watching and please check yourself before you wreck yourself.

Mix It Up
Like Einstein said about insanity, “It’s doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” Remember, creating adaptation in the body is all about giving it the correct stimulus and it may be that your body is just completely adapted to your current routine. You may just need to shake it up.

Get more sleep.
Drink more water.
Eat more protein.
Go for a run a few nights per week.
Stop going to so many MUSCLE classes.
Stop going to so many FIT classes.
Stop going light all the time.
Stop going heavy all the time.

You get the idea.

Dramatically changing your body requires commitment and patience.  It takes time, a few easy adjustments in both training and diet like the ones mentioned today, but adhere long enough and you’ll see major, sustainable change.