5 fat loss mistakes you have no idea you are doing!

Mistake 1

Doing hundreds of crunches every day will not flatten your stomach or give you a six pack. When you perform an exercise such as the crunch, you are only working one isolated area therefore only recruiting a small amount of muscle.

Solution:

Big bang for your buck exercises are the best ways to flatten your stomach. Exercises that involve large amounts of movements, will recruit more muscle, boost your metabolism and burn fat! Stick with squats, lunges, push ups and pull ups.

Mistake 2

Hours of jogging and cardio machines will actually make you fatter! Long periods of steady state cardio will increase the hormone cortisol (know as the stress hormone). When cortisol is released in the body it breaks down muscle and slows your metabolism down.

Solution:

Perform interval training. Interval training is a fantastic way to burn excess body fat. Short intervals of high intensity exercise, allows your body to work both your anaerobic system (without oxygen) and aerobic system (with oxygen). Scientific research has shown this method of training increases your metabolism allowing you to burn calories over a 24 hour period.

Sample program:

Jog for 2 minutes, sprint for 1 minute repeat 5 – 8x 

Mistake 3

Limiting your daily calorie intake will not help you lose weight. In fact it actually has the opposite effect. By limiting your calories, your body will go into starvation mode and hold onto any excess body fat that you have.

Solution:

It is not the calories you need to reduce, it is the type of food that dictates how you are going to look. Eating foods that nourish your body will keep your hormones happy and your body functioning optimally.

An interesting study by Kekwick and Pawan, compared three groups on a semi starvation diet.

Group 1 - 1000 calories of which was 90% fat

Group 2 - 1000 calories of which was 90% Protein

Group 3 – 1000 calories of which was 90% Carbohydrates

Interestingly the group consuming 90% fat lost the most weight 408g (0.9lbs) per day. The Protein group lost 272g (0.6lbs) per day and the Carbohydrate group actually gained 108g (0.24lbs) per day

Mistake 4

Lifting light weights for loads of reps will not tone your body. In order to tone a muscle, you must stimulate type 2 fast twitch muscle fibres. Lifting the pink dumbbells will recruit type 1 slow twitch muscle fibres.

Solution:

Lift heavy weights for 8-10 reps. This recruits type 2 muscle fibres and therefore stimulates and boosts your metabolism. And if you are worried about getting bulky, don’t. Women do not produce enough testosterone to bulk muscles like the boys! The causes of bulky females are 1. bad diet and 2. injections in the bum! 

Mistake 5

Going on a low fat diet will only make you fatter! The body requires fat to fuel your hormones and absorb nutrients from your foods. Do you think Mother Nature is stupid? If we were not meant to eat fat, do you think Mother Nature would seriously combine fat into our every day foods such as yolks in eggs, skin on chicken, or that yummy fat on the side of your steak.

Solution:

Nourish your body and follow Mother Nature by eating your fats! Consume adequate amounts of fat in your diet from sources such as butter, eggs, olive oil, avocados, nuts and seeds.