Question:

Some experts claim fat loss is 80-90% diet and 10-20% exercise, while others say it is 50/50, or even that you can eat anything you want if you are active enough. I know both are important, but where should I put most of my effort if I want to get the best results?

Answer: 

Diet is more important than exercise for fat loss since it has a greater effect on energy balance. You can’t put a percentage on it, though, because the relative proportions of the energy deficit due to restrictions on calorie intake and macronutrient ratios versus increased calorie expenditure from exercise and increases in lean body mass can vary tremendously between individuals. All else being roughly equal the percentage of fat loss due to diet will be much higher for someone who has a lot of fat to lose and is able and willing to restrict calories further than for someone who is only reducing calories slightly. For someone whose average calorie intake is about the same as their average expenditure before exercise the percentage of fat loss due to exercise would be higher (although relying on exercise to create a calorie deficit is very inefficient).

Diet and exercise (strength training) are equally important if your goal is to improve your body composition and not just lose fat. This is because strength training is necessary to maintain your muscle mass while fat is lost on a hypocaloric diet. If you don’t strength train you will lose muscle, which will negatively affect your body shape and tone and reduce your metabolic rate making it harder to lose fat and keep it off.

If your goal is to improve your body composition as much as possible the relative contribution of diet and exercise doesn’t really matter, though, because you should be putting one hundred percent effort into both of them, as well as all of the other factors that aid in muscle growth and fat loss.

Question: What is the best cardio equipment to buy? A treadmill, stationary cycle, versa climber, elliptical machine, or rowing machine?

Answer: The best piece of “cardio” equipment you can buy is a barbell or a pair of adjustable dumbbells.

When used properly a barbell or dumbbells are capable of stimulating greater improvements in cardiovascular conditioning more quickly, efficiently, and safely than any of the equipment you mentioned(1). Unlike the equipment you mentioned these are also safe and effective tools for improving muscular strength and size, bone and connective tissue strength, and flexibility.

The primary function of your cardiovascular system is delivering oxygen and nutrients to and metabolic wastes away from your muscles and other tissues. When you are more physically active your muscles use more energy and create more waste causing your heart to pump more blood more frequently. If a physical activity is demanding enough to cause significant increase in cardiac output for even only a few minutes it will stimulate improvements in cardiovascular fitness(2).

Most people don’t think of barbells and dumbbells as cardiovascular conditioning tools because they use them in a way that is very inefficient for this purpose. Typical strength training methods involve sets that are often too short, with too much rest allowed in between, and performed with too little intensity of effort. However, when exercises are performed with a high intensity of effort, for sufficient duration (40 to 80 seconds or longer) and with little or no rest allowed between it is possible to achieve and maintain average heart rates in excess of 80% of one’s predicted heart rate maximum (220 minus age).

Contrary to what you might expect, it is not necessary to move quickly during exercise to accomplish this, since the demands on the cardiovascular system are proportional to metabolic rather than mechanical work. This kind of heart rate elevation can be achieved with very slow repetitions or even isometric exercise if the effort is high enough. Using a very slow 10/3/10 repetition cadence for as few as 2 to 4 repetitions (approximately 45-90 seconds) I am able to consistently achieve average heart rates between eighty and ninety percent of my predicted maximum during workouts. As a general rule you should move slowly during exercises and quickly between them.

A similar effect can even be achieved with no movement at all, performing static holds using a weight that allows for 60-90 second hold times in the mid-range position.

The ability to perform a high amount of metabolic work with little or no mechanical work makes barbells and dumbbells safer for metabolic and cardiovascular conditioning when used correctly. To achieve this kind of heart rate elevation using most conventional “cardio” equipment mentioned requires moving at faster speeds, increasing acceleration, peak forces, and your risk of overuse and acute injuries.

Venous return and thus cardiac blood flow is also more efficient during properly performed strength training than traditional endurance activities, making it safer for people with heart conditions (3).

If your goal is fat loss, barbells and dumbbells are still a better choice, because the proper role of exercise in a fat loss program is increasing or maintaining lean body mass while fat is lost, not increasing calorie expenditure since no activity burns enough calories to be worth doing for that purpose. None of the equipment you asked about does this effectively, but barbells and dumbbells do.

While selectorized machines are also highly effective for cardiovascular conditioning(4) and make it possible to move between exercises even more quickly, barbells and dumbbells provide a greater variety of exercises and are more cost and space efficient, making them the best choice if you want to equip a home gym with limited space and budget.

References:

1. James Peterson, PhD., Total Conditioning: A Case Study, Athletic Journal Vol. 56 September, 1975
2. Gibala MJ, Little JP, Van essen M, et al. Short-term sprint interval versus traditional endurance training: similar initial adaptations in human skeletal muscle and exercise performance. J Physiol (Lond). 2006;575(Pt 3):901-11.
3. Meyer K, Hajric R, Westbrook S, et al. Hemodynamic responses during leg press exercise in patients with chronic congestive heart failure. Am J Cardiol. 1999;83(11):1537-43.
4. Maisch B, Baum E, Grimm W. Die Auswirkungen dynamischen Krafttrainings nach dem Nautilus-Prinzip auf kardiozirkulatorische Parameter und Ausdauerleistungsfähigkeit (The effects of resistance training according to the Nautilus principles on cardiocirculatory parameters and endurance). Angenommen vom Fachbereich Humanmedizin der Philipps-Universität Marburg am 11. Dezember 2003

If you’re not sure how to perform an exercise correctly go to any large gym during peak hours and watch how most people do it. Pay close attention to how they are positioned and how they move. Pay attention to things like their speed and timing, where and how long they stop to hold or pause, etc. Ask some of the people working out and the personal trainers for tips on doing the exercise and take detailed notes.

Then convert your notes into a list of bullet points on how to perform the exercise. Next to this list write the exact opposite of each of those bullet points. If you use these opposite bullet points as a guideline for performing the exercise you’ll end up with something much closer to the correct method.

“The first sign of maturity for people that train is when they stop caring about how much they lift and start caring about how well they lift.”

– Amir Siddiqui

People often ask me how they can get better at an exercise. In almost every case, they are thinking about it backwards. They want to know how to increase the reps they can perform or the weight they can lift, but that is not what it means to be better at an exercise. They’re confusing getting stronger or being better at demonstrating strength with the real goal of an exercise which is to effectively stimulate increases in strength. Exercise is something you do to your muscles with the weight, not something you do to the weight with your muscles.

The purpose of exercise is to efficiently load and fatigue the targeted muscles, to work them as intensely as possible. Lifting and lowering a weight is just a means to that end. The better you are at an exercise, the better your form, the harder it becomes. To perform more reps or lift more weight in a specific manner you must become stronger, which is an entirely different thing than being better at an exercise.

Understanding the difference between the two is the most important part of learning to exercise properly. Almost all of the things people do wrong during exercise stem from confusing the two. Most people break form because they are focusing on how much weight they can lift or how many reps they can  perform instead of how well they perform them. How you perform each rep of an exercise is far more important than how much weight you lift or how many reps you perform if your goal is to effectively become stronger instead of momentarily appearing stronger.

If you want to get better at an exercise:

Start by thinking about the above every time you work out until you habitually focus on what you are doing to your muscles instead of what you are doing to the weight. When you do an exercise concentrate on intensely contracting the target muscles and producing the correct body movement. To paraphrase Ken Hutchins, “…the correct approach is to internalize… to think and to behave to make the body perform the proper action. The weight is relegated to merely go along for the ride.”

When learning a new exercise instead of trying to determine the heaviest weight you can lift for your target rep range, start with a weight that is only moderately challenging and learn how to use it to make the exercise feel harder. If doing something a particular way makes the exercise feel easier do the opposite.

If you frequently catch yourself focusing more on the number of reps than the quality use a stopwatch to time your exercises instead of counting or have a training partner or trainer silently count your reps for you (and only count the good ones). This will allow you to focus more on how well you perform each rep and worry less about how many you do.

A workout is not a weight lifting competition. Your immediate goal is not to beat your previous weight or reps; it is to perform each exercise safely and effectively to stimulate increases in strength and improvements in the supporting factors of functional ability. Somewhat ironically, if you are overly concerned with making the numbers on your chart go up and cheat to do so your workouts will be less effective and your actual strength will go up more slowly. If you focus on performing each exercise as effectively as possible instead, the numbers might not go up as quickly because better form equals harder exercise, but you will get stronger faster.

If you work out in a public gym ignore everyone else; don’t compare yourself to others and don’t concern yourself with what they think of you. If you become better at cheating on an exercise to lift more weight it might make you appear stronger than you really are to other people in the gym who don’t know any better, but this skill is specific to the exercise and does not transfer to any other activity. On the other hand, if you really become better at an exercise – if you become more skilled at efficiently loading the target muscles – your real strength and conditioning will improve faster and does transfer to everything else you do.

I’ve always liked personal training. I enjoy talking about and teaching exercise and instructing workouts. I love watching people become stronger, healthier, and happier. I hate waking up early, though, and think most people who wanted to work out before six in the morning were out of their minds, especially when most of them sacrificed sleep to do so.

While a lot of factors influence your physical fitness, appearance, and health, the three biggest are exercise, nutrition, and sleep. Think of them as the three legs on your fitness bar stool. If you compromise (shorten) any one of them even a little your stool is going to be wobbly, and if you ignore (remove) any of them entirely the whole thing is going to fall over. Also, you can’t compensate for a lack of one by putting more effort into (lengthening) one or both of the others. If you want to look, feel, and perform your best you need all three.

There is no advantage to working out very early in the morning that is worth the disadvantages of losing sleep. Unless you are willing and able to regularly go to bed early enough to get seven to eight hours of sleep before working out it is not worth it. If you’re tired you won’t put as much effort into your workouts and won’t get as much benefit out of them. You’re also more likely to make mistakes when you’re tired, and during exercise mistakes can cause injuries. In the long run getting too little sleep can interfere with your ability to build muscle and lose fat because it negatively affects many hormones involved in appetite, metabolism, and muscle growth.

When you are sleep deprived your cortisol, ghrelin, and  insulin resistance increase while your testosterone, growth hormone, and leptin decrease. This slows down  your metabolism and increases your appetite making it harder for you to lose fat or keep it off and harder for you to gain or maintain muscle mass. To avoid this (and because I hate waking up early) I discouraged clients from working out too early in the morning unless they were able to consistently get seven to eight hours of sleep first.

If you can work out early in the morning without sacrificing sleep there are benefits. You’re less likely to skip workouts in the morning than if you plan to work out in the afternoon or evening. If you work out at a gym you can avoid the crowds by going in early enough. If you work out at home and have young children early morning may be the only time you can work out uninterrupted. If you work out outside it is often cooler in the mornings, and contrary to popular but uninformed opinion cooler temperatures are better than warmer for working out.

To ensure you’re getting enough sleep on a consistent basis it helps to set a schedule and stick to it, just like your workouts. Also, just like your workouts, the quality of your sleep is as important as the quantity and there are a few things you can do to improve it. If you’re getting enough sleep you’re spending about one third of your time in bed, so it makes sense to get the most comfortable mattress, pillows, and sheets you can reasonably afford. You should also optimize your bedroom for sleep, keeping it dark, cool, and quiet. If noise or light are a problem where you live (or if you like to nap during the day) good quality earplugs and a sleep mask can help. To minimize distractions from sleep reserve your bedroom for sleep and sex, and use other rooms for work, reading, watching television, using the computer or electronic devices, etc.

Today a woman told me her dietitian advised her not to eat a food if it’s label contained ingredients whose names she could not pronounce. This is really bad advice, and I would be surprised and disappointed if it actually came from a registered dietitian. This bit of nonsense is based on the appeal to nature fallacy: the popular but ignorant belief that everything “natural” is good for you and everything “unnatural” is not, and chemophobia, the irrational fear of chemicals and belief they are unnatural and should be avoided. Natural does not always mean good. “Unnatural” or synthetic does not always mean bad. Chemicals can be either natural or synthetic and either good or bad for you, depending on various factors.

A chemical is any substance with a specific molecular composition. Chemicals can be either natural or synthetic, but this does not equate to healthy or unhealthy. Either type can be healthy or harmful. Botulinum toxin is natural, but it only takes a few dozen micrograms to kill a person. HIV is natural, but you probably don’t want it on your salad, either. On the other hand, the synthetic food additive and solvent propylene glycol is perfectly safe for consumption in typical amounts (you could eat over 2,000 mg per pound of bodyweight and still not have any toxic effect).

Which brings me to another bit of nonsense at the root of a lot of bad nutritional advice: the belief that a substance is harmful if it is an ingredient in something that might be harmful. Propylene glycol is an ingredient in anti-freeze and hair products which are harmful to consume, but propylene glycol itself is not harmful in the amounts typically contained in food products. Water is also an ingredient in anti-freeze and hair products and has the dangerous-sounding chemical name dihydrogen monoxide, but nobody is going to stop drinking water because of it.

I should also point out the toxicity of a substance, whether natural or synthetic, also depends on the dose. Even relatively benign substances like water can kill you if you consume enough of it, while relatively toxic chemicals can be consumed without negative effects if the dose is small enough.

Your body is made of chemicals. All of the food you eat, including so-called “organic” stuff , is made of chemicals. Protein? Chemicals. Fats? Chemicals. Carbs? Chemicals. Vitamins? Yes, also chemicals. The only way you can avoid consuming chemicals would be to not eat or drink at all, which is really bad for your health. Going for as little as three days without drinking water, which is the chemical dihidrogen monoxide, will kill you.

Many of the other natural chemicals that make up our food also have names which many people are unfamiliar with and may find difficult to pronounce. For example, nicotinamide riboside, pyridoxamine, and hydroxocobalamin are the chemical names for vitamins B3, B6, and B12. These are healthy to consume regardless of whether you can pronounce their names correctly, and just like the ominous sounding dihidrogen monoxide, there are serious health consequences for not consuming enough of these.

Instead of telling the woman not to eat a food if she can’t pronounce the names of some of it’s ingredients, her dietitian (if the person was, in fact, a dietitian) should have told her that if she doesn’t recognize an ingredient she should put a little time and effort into learning about it using reputable sources of information. That way she can make informed decisions about what she eats and drinks instead of being mislead by popular but ignorant beliefs.

In Basic Guidelines for Fat Loss Part 1 I explained how to eat to lose fat. In this article I explain how to exercise for fat loss.

Increasing Calorie Expenditure – Exercise and Metabolic Rate

As I mentioned in Part 1, exercise or increased activity alone is highly overrated for fat loss. Few activities burn enough calories to be worth performing for that purpose alone, and unless you are restricting your calorie intake it will most likely increase with your activity level due to increased appetite. You should choose your physical recreational activities based on what you enjoy but do not expect them to have a significant effect on fat loss.

The most important benefit exercise can provide to someone trying to lose fat is not the increase in calories burned during workouts, but the maintenance or increase in muscle mass and metabolic rate. This can only effectively be accomplished with resistance training. Most steady-state activities such as aerobics, running, cycling, swimming, etc. do not burn a significant amount of calories per hour, are ineffective for maintaining muscle mass, and can even cause a loss of muscle if performed too long or too often. Additionally, resistance training can provide all of the cardiovascular benefits traditionally associated with these activities (11), so they are unnecessary for any fitness or health related purpose.

The effects of resistance training on muscular strength and hypertrophy are specific to the muscles worked. Performing an exercise for the muscles of the legs will do little to stimulate growth in or maintain the muscles of the arms, and vice versa. Because of this, exercises should be performed for all muscle groups as frequently as individual recovery ability allows to maintain as much muscle mass as possible. For most people, two or three full-body workouts per week is an effective approach. (12, 13) Those with below average exercise tolerance or recovery ability or advanced trainees working at a much higher than average level of intensity may get better results training less frequently or following a split routine to reduce individual workout volume. As trainees become more advanced and train with higher levels of intensity and greater loads, workout volume and frequency may need to be reduced.

General Workout Guidelines

Workouts should include one or two exercises per muscle group, performed in order of largest to smallest muscle groups. While a variety of set and repetition ranges can be effective only one set is necessary if performed intensely enough, and at least a moderate repetition range ensures enough time under tension for all the fibers in the targeted muscles to be thoroughly fatigued and for effective metabolic and cardiovascular conditioning. As a starting point, use a weight for each exercise that allows you to perform at least six but not more than ten good repetitions using a slow and controlled speed of movement, without any bouncing or jerking (lifting in about three to four seconds, holding for a second or two, and lowering in about three to four seconds). When you can perform ten or more repetitions of an exercise in strict form increase the weight slightly the next time you perform the exercise.

The following are examples of basic full-body routines I use as a starting point with most new male and female clients:

Basic Full-Body Free Weight Workout

1. Squat
2. Chin-Up
3. Bench Press
4. Bent-Over Row
5. Standing Press
6. Stiff-Leg Deadlift
7. Weighted Crunch
8. One-Leg Heel Raise
9. Isometric Neck Flexion
10. Isometric Neck Extension

Basic Full-Body Machine Workout

1. Leg Press
2. Pulldown
3. Chest Press
4. Compound Row
5. Shoulder Press
6. Back Extension
7. Abdominal Flexion
8. Calf Raise
9. Isometric Neck Flexion
10. Isometric Neck Extension

For more free weight and machine workout examples and detailed guidelines for performance read High Intensity Workouts.

If you do not have access to free weights or exercise machines an effective full-body routine can be performed with nothing but a doorway pull-up bar or suspension trainer and empty floor space:

Basic Full-Body Bodyweight Workout

1. Squat
2. Chin-up (using doorway pull-up bar or suspension trainer)
3. Push-up
4. Inverted Row (using sturdy table or suspension trainer)
5. Pike Push-up
6. Hip Raise or Prone Trunk Extension
7. Crunch
8. Heel Raise
9. Isometric Neck Flexion
10. Isometric Neck Extension

For more bodyweight workout examples and detailed guidelines for performance read Project Kratos: Bodyweight High Intensity Training,

Keeping Track

Just as it is important to measure and record your daily food intake to ensure you consume an appropriate amount of calories, it is important to record exercise performance to evaluate progress over time. If your workout performance begins to decline and there are no other obvious causes such as inadequate sleep or illness, it may be an indication your calorie intake is too low and needs to be increased slightly.

In a workout journal or on a chart or spreadsheet record the date of each workout and the exercises in order of performance. Record equipment settings for consistency between workouts. Record the amount of weight used and the number of repetitions completed in strict form or the time under load for each exercise. Sloppy or incomplete repetitions should not be recorded. While even a sloppy repetition may provide some exercise benefit, it should not be counted so the resistance used for that exercise is not increased prematurely.

Hard Work + Consistency + Time = Results

Regardless of your current condition, you can significantly reduce your body fat and dramatically improve on your body’s shape and appearance by following these basic guidelines. It will not be easy. It will require discipline at the table, hard work in the gym, and a lot of patience. However, if you persevere and are consistent with your diet and your workouts your results will be worth it.

References:

11. Maisch B, Baum E, Grimm W. Die Auswirkungen dynamischen Krafttrainings nach dem Nautilus-Prinzip auf kardiozirkulatorische Parameter und Ausdauerleistungsfähigkeit (The effects of resistance training according to the Nautilus principles on cardiocirculatory parameters and endurance). Angenommen vom Fachbereich Humanmedizin der Philipps-Universität Marburg am 11. Dezember 2003

12. Carpinelli RN, Otto RM, Winett RA. A Critical Analysis of the ACSM Position Stand on Resistance Training: Insufficient Evidence to Support Recommended Training Protocols. Journal of Exercise Physiology Online 2004;7(3):1-60

13. Smith D, Bruce-Low, S. Strength Training Methods and The Work of Arthur Jones. Journal of Exercise Physiology Online 2004;7(6): 52-68

While numerous factors affect fat gain and loss, by far the most important is energy balance: calorie intake versus calorie expenditure. If you consume more calories than your body burns over a period of time, you will gain fat. If you want to lose fat, you must consume fewer calories than your body burns. There are three basic ways to accomplish this:

1. Reduce the amount of calories you consume.
2. Increase the amount of calories you expend.
3. A combination of the above.

Reducing Calorie Intake – How Low Should You Go?

Many people believe they can effectively lose fat simply by exercising or increasing their activity levels, however this approach is highly overrated. Most activities do not burn enough calories to be worth performing solely for that purpose, and a significant increase in activity levels will increase appetite, resulting in proportionally greater calorie consumption if intake isn’t being measured and restricted. Reducing calorie intake is a far more practical and time efficient means of creating an energy deficit.

Ideally, caloric intake should be reduced enough to cause the maximum possible rate of fat loss without the loss of muscle or other lean tissue. Muscle tissue is highly metabolically active, and responsible for a significant portion of the calories you burn each day. A loss of muscle results in reduced metabolic rate, so everything possible should be done to maintain muscle while fat is lost. This is especially important for competitive bodybuilders, who are judged on their muscle size.

Since there is a limit to the rate at which the body can get energy from fat, if the calorie deficit is too large the body will take energy from other tissues. According to a paper in the Journal of Theoretical Biology (1,2), it is estimated the average, moderately active person’s body can get approximately 30 calories of energy per day per pound of fat. This means the maximum one can reduce their calorie intake below maintenance levels without losing muscle is approximately 30 for every pound of fat on their body.* For example, an active 180 pound man with 15% body fat would have 27 pounds of fat, so he could reduce his daily calorie intake to about 800 below maintenance without losing lean tissue. Assuming a maintenance intake of approximately 2,800 this would mean a daily caloric intake around 2,000 calories.

It is important to note these numbers are based on moderately active people not involved in a regular exercise program and not consuming enough protein. The rate at which the body is able to get energy from fat may increase with training and research shows regular resistance training and adequate protein intake helps maintain lean tissue at low calorie intakes (3,4,5,6). However, to maintain as much muscle as possible a conservative approach is best, so caloric deficit should not significantly exceed 31 per pound of body fat.

As fat is lost the caloric deficit must decrease proportionally to avoid loss of lean tissue. If our 180 pound man from the above example consumes 800 calories below maintenance, he should lose approximately 1.6 pounds of fat the first week (800 calories per day multiplied by 7 days = 5,600 calories, divided by approximately 3,500 calories in a pound of fat = 1.6). He would then have only 25.4 pounds of fat, and would have to decrease his caloric deficit to about 760 below maintenance to avoid muscle loss.

If you’ve been checking the math you’ll notice I’m rounding everything down. In the long run it is better to err a little low on your calorie deficit and lose fat slightly more slowly than to err high and risk losing muscle mass.

Since the maximal caloric deficit must decrease as fat is lost, it is necessary to regularly re-assess body fat and maintenance calorie intake levels and adjust daily calorie intake appropriately. However, since body fat percentage, basal metabolic rate, and calories burned due to daily activity and calories consumed can not be measured with perfect accuracy, and metabolic rate will decrease slightly over time as a result of your body adjusting to the reduced calorie intake, there is little point in re-assessing too frequently. Weekly or bi-weekly assessment and adjustment is adequate under most circumstances.

Calorie Deficit Versus Nutrient Intake For Obese Individuals

Obese individuals may have enough fat to provide close to or even more energy per day than the amount their body requires. However, regardless of the amount of body fat you have, your daily caloric intake should not be reduced below a level necessary for adequate intake of essential macro and micronutrients. The absolute minimum daily calorie intake I would recommend without medical supervision would be approximately half of the estimated daily calorie expenditure.

For example, a 300 pound man with 45% body fat has enough fat to provide over 4,000 calories in a day. Unless he is extremely active this is far more energy than he requires. However, he would still need to eat enough food to provide adequate protein, fat, carbohydrate, and essential vitamins and minerals to function normally.

Some people may have other health conditions with their own nutritional considerations and should consult with a medical doctor before making any significant dietary changes.

Estimating Daily Calorie Expenditure

The average daily calorie expenditure can be roughly estimated for most moderately active people by multiplying their estimated healthy body weight (around 15% body fat if male, 20% if female) by 15. Smaller and/or sedentary people may need to multiply by as little as 12 to 14, while larger and/or very active people may need to multiply by as high as 16 to 18. (7)

A slower but more accurate method of estimating daily calorie expenditure is to measure and record your daily calorie intake and your body weight and body fat percentage every two to four weeks (if you are female you should always weigh and measure at the same time in your menstrual cycle) and calculate your maintenance calorie intake based on any changes in body weight. If you’re gaining weight your daily caloric intake is over maintenance level, if you’re losing weight it’s under. For example, if you are losing half a pound of fat per week on average, your average daily calorie intake is approximately 250 calories below maintenance.

Regardless of your starting estimate it will be necessary to measure and record your daily calorie intake and regularly reassess your weight and body fat levels, and adjust your intake up or down based on how your body responds.

Measuring Body Composition

While there are a variety of methods for determining body fat percentage, the most practical and cost efficient for most people is skinfold measurements. A three-site skinfold test (chest, abdomen and thigh for men, triceps, suprailium and thigh for women) performed by a skilled technician will provide a reasonably accurate measurement of body composition. (8) Most fitness centers and personal training studios offer skinfold testing or another form of body composition testing for a fee.

You can measure your own body fat with the help of a friend and a skinfold caliper, which can be purchased inexpensively online or at most fitness equipment and health food stores.

A slightly more expensive but easier option is to use a scale that uses bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) to estimate body fat percentage. Since these measure impedance to an electrical current which seeks the shortest path through the body, a scale like the Omron that uses both hand and foot contacts will provide a more accurate estimate of overall body composition for most people than BIA devices with only hand or foot contacts.

Calculating Daily Calorie Intake for Fat Loss

Multiply your body fat in pounds by 30 and subtract the result from your daily maintenance calorie intake to determine your minimum daily calorie intake to maintain muscle while losing fat. I do not recommend going below half of your estimated daily maintenance calorie intake without medical supervision.

While the above should provide a reasonably good estimate of the daily calorie intake required for near maximal fat loss while maintaining lean tissue, regardless of what your calculations show, remember that practical results are what count. If you do not lose a measurable amount of fat over a period of several weeks gradually reduce your calories until you do, or if your physical or mental performance declines gradually increase your calories until it improves.

For a detailed guide to calculating calorie intake for maximum fat loss with worksheets read Getting Ripped.

Protein, Carbohydrate, and Fat

Although calorie intake is the most important factor for fat loss, the macronutrients you consume also have an effect. Most importantly, adequate protein intake is necessary to maintain lean tissue while eating below maintenance calorie levels, and there are other benefits to higher protein intake such as increased satiety, and a greater metabolic cost compared to fats and carbohydrates. Protein intake should be around one gram per day per pound of lean body mass, and consist of primarily meat, fish, eggs, poultry, and dairy. The remainder of your calories should come equally from fats and carbohydrates, with most of the fats coming from animal sources or coconut, and most of the carbohydrates coming from vegetables.

Meal Timing

What and how much you eat on average over the course of each day is far more important than when you eat it, so you should divide up your meals in whatever way works best for you. Some people find it easier to eat six to eight smaller meals spread throughout the day, some find it easier to consume only one or two meals within a short time frame and fast the rest of the time, and many find something in between works best for them. Some people eat different numbers of meals on different days depending on their schedule or whether they work out. The best meal frequency for you is the one that is easiest to follow consistently.

Hydration

Drink plenty of fluids over the course of each day. Staying adequately hydrated helps to reduce appetite and enables your kidneys to function optimally. If the kidneys are not functioning well, the liver will take on some of their work, reducing its capacity to metabolize fat for energy. It isn’t necessary to consume a specific amount of water per day, but pay attention to your body and drink something whenever you are thirsty.

Supplements

The majority of fat loss supplements do very little or nothing, and the rare few that are effective won’t make any noticeable difference unless the above dietary guidelines are being followed. Fish oil helps reduce fat and improves other health factors in combination with regular exercise (10), and protein powder or high-protein meal replacements can be helpful if you are having difficulty getting adequate protein from food or finding time to prepare nutritious meals. The ECA stack (20-25 mg ephedrine, 200 mg caffeine, and a baby aspirin one to three times daily) also helps with fat loss, but if you use this you should start with half the typical dose only once per and gradually increase from there.

Keeping Track

The only way to know you are eating the right amount of food each day is to measure and record it in a journal or app. Most people significantly underestimate the amount of calories they consume so guessing or estimating doesn’t work. It may seem inconvenient at first but it only takes a few seconds to weigh or measure and look up the nutritional value of something and record it. Smart phone apps like LoseIt! and MyFitnessPal make this process even easier.

Purchase a digital food scale and several sets of measuring cups and spoons. You will be using them often, and the more you have the less frequently you will need to wash dishes. Having a lot of plastic food storage containers also makes it easier to prepare and package multiple pre-measured meals for the rest of the week.

Continue to Basic Guidelines for Fat Loss Part 2: Exercise

Notes:

* “A limit on the maximum energy transfer rate from the human fat store in hypophagia is deduced from experimental data of underfed subjects maintaining moderate activity levels and is found to have a value of (290 ± 25) kJ/kg d. A dietary restriction which exceeds the limited capability of the fat store to compensate for the energy deficiency results in an immediate decrease in the fat free mass (FFM). In cases of a less severe dietary deficiency, the FFM will not be depleted.” (2)

References:

1. Determining the Maximum Dietary Deficit for Fat Loss. Lyle McDonald. 2006. http://www.mindandmuscle.net/mindandmuscle/magpage.php?artID=35&pageNum=1

2. Alpert SS. A limit on the energy transfer rate from the human fat store in hypophagia. J Theor Biol. 2005 Mar 7;233(1):1-13.

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Question: How can I lose fifty pounds in one month?

Answer: Assuming you mean fifty pounds of fat, you can’t.*

Contrary to the hyperbolic claims of weight-loss supplement advertisements, tabloid magazines, and sketchy health web sites there is no diet or exercise program you can follow, no supplement you can take, and no “weird trick” or “secret” you can do to lose fifty pounds in only one month.

Assuming you want to look and feel better what you really want to lose is fat not just indiscriminate weight, and even at its fastest losing fat is a slow process. One pound of fat contains about 3,500 calories worth of energy, and most people’s bodies only burn about 2,000 to 2,500 calories per day. The approximately 175,000 calories stored in fifty pounds of fat more than enough energy to sustain you for over two months even if you ate nothing and performed a few hours of intense physical activity every day.

Even if it were possible to do this for more than a few days without becoming exhausted and malnourished most of the weight you lose in the first few weeks would come from water and lean body mass instead of fat. And no, you can not and should not even try to lose that much weight from water. Someone with average body composition will start to suffer physically and mentally after losing only around ten percent of their body weight due to dehydration and will die after losing between fifteen and twenty percent. This percentage goes down as body fat goes up, since body fat only contains around ten percent water while most other body tissues contain between seventy and eighty percent.

The reason you will lose lean body mass along with the fat if you do this is your body can only get around thirty calories of energy from each pound of fat per day**. If your energy deficit exceeds the amount of energy your body can take from your fat stores it will get the extra energy elsewhere, mainly from your muscle glycogen stores, muscles, and other organs. This might cause you to lose weight faster initially but reducing your lean body mass will negatively affect your underlying body shape and decrease your metabolic rate. Instead of getting leaner you’ll just become “skinny-fat” and a lower metabolic rate means slower fat loss and a harder time keeping fat off after you lose it.

Even if you have a lot of body fat there are practical limits to how much of a calorie deficit you can create. Most physical activities do not burn as many calories as people would like to believe*** and the calories burned from those activities do not increase proportionally with the time spent doing them, so increasing your daily calorie expenditure is not an effective, efficient, or practical way for most people to increase their calorie deficit.

There is also a limit to how much you can decrease your daily calorie intake without taking in too little food to provide enough protein and other nutrients to maintain lean body mass and avoid nutrient deficiencies. Unless you’re very fat you shouldn’t try to lose more than two pounds of fat per week on average, and the leaner you get the less you should try to lose if you want to avoid losing muscle along with the fat.

Your real goal is to improve your physical appearance, fitness, and health and not just reduce a number on a scale. That means improving your body composition – your ratio of muscle to fat – and not just losing weight. As slow as fat is to lose, muscle is even slower to gain so you do not want to lose any if you can avoid it. It is easier to maintain or even increase your muscle mass if you try to lose fat more slowly, and this will give you a better body in the long run than if you sacrifice muscle for faster short-term fat loss.

With this in mind a more realistic time frame to lose fifty pounds of fat is anywhere from around four months (if you’ve got a lot more than fifty pounds to lose) to one year (if you’ve only got about fifty pounds to lose).

With that out of the way, here is what you need to do to lose those fifty pounds in a more realistic time frame:

Measure everything you eat and drink every day and record the calories and protein. Gradually reduce your daily calorie intake until you are steadily losing an average of one to two pounds per week.

Eat plenty of protein, aiming for at least one gram per pound of lean body mass per day. Choose higher quality sources like meat, fish, and eggs. A higher protein intake will help you maintain muscle while losing fat and will help reduce your appetite.

Eat a lot of vegetables. Vegetables are rich in vitamins and minerals and fiber most are high in volume relative to calories. They let you eat a much larger amount of food while taking in relatively few calories.

Keep portions of very calorie dense foods like nuts, seeds, and oils smaller to avoid consuming too many calories.

Perform two to three full-body high intensity strength training workouts per week on non-consecutive days to maintain your lean body mass and help keep up your metabolic rate while you lose fat. Keep track of your workouts using a chart or journal to make sure you are at least maintaining strength and muscle mass while fat is lost. If not, it might be a sign you need to increase your calories or protein or adjust the volume or frequency of your workouts.

Get plenty of sleep every night. Too little sleep negatively affects hormones that influence your metabolism and appetite and your ability to exercise effectively.

*You can lose this much fat in a short period of time with liposuction surgery, but this is only a temporary fix and if you do not change your diet and stop eating the way that caused you to gain all the fat in the first place you will gain it back in all the fat cells that were not sucked out, causing an unnatural and generally odd looking fat distribution.

**Like most things this number would vary between individuals based on genetics, diet, and other factors and should only be considered a rough guideline.

***Estimates of calories burned during activities usually overstate the benefit by not subtracting the calories that would have been burned during the same amount of time due to resting energy expenditure if the person had done nothing instead. Most people also tend to overestimate their average level of intensity during physical activity.

1. Alpert SS. A limit on the energy transfer rate from the human fat store in hypophagia. J Theor Biol. 2005 Mar 7;233(1):1-13.

2. Pontzer H, Durazo-arvizu R, Dugas LR, et al. Constrained Total Energy Expenditure and Metabolic Adaptation to Physical Activity in Adult Humans. Curr Biol. 2016;26(3):410-7.