It can be a challenge to lose weight and especially fat, which is why so many people struggle to get rid of their unwanted pounds. So many people have problems with their weight that various media sources are constantly providing "helpful" suggestions. This is great, except much of this information is dumbed down or oversimplified to the point where the information becomes misleading or even incorrect. One issue that is frequently misrepresented is the relationship between calorie burning and fat loss. People are constantly saying that if you burn an additional X calories per day, then you will lose X amount of weight over the course of a week, month, or year. Unfortunately, things are not quite that simple.
From a theoretical standpoint, these statements are accurate, because one pound of fat contains about 3500 calories. Therefore, if you burn an additional 500 calories per day, then you should lose one pound over the course of a week (500 calories multiplied by 7 days = 3500 calories). This sounds reasonable enough, but if you have ever tried this, chances are your results were not exactly as expected. While the equation is scientifically accurate, it does not take all the relevant factors into account.
The issue of losing fat cannot be simplified to just looking at the number of additional calories you burn during the day and the number of calories in a pound of fat. Many other factors influence your ability to lose fat/weight and this equation ignores two of the most important issues: the number of calories you eat during the day and the number of calories your metabolism burns. Weight loss statements assume these are constants, but they can both have a significant amount of variability.
There is no question that nutrition is a critical element in weight loss, but when people talk about losing fat by increasing activity, they often fail to mention the effects that activity can have on your eating. Most notably, if you increase your daily activity by 500 calories, which is a significant amount, then you are also increasing the amount of energy your body needs to fuel your activity and this can cause you to become hungrier and eat more in response. Naturally, if you increase your caloric intake while increasing your activity level, then you have to factor that into the equation.
Whenever someone increases their activity level, their caloric intake rarely stays exactly the same. This is important, because both activity and calorie intake not only affect your daily calorie totals, but they have an additional impact on the number of calories your metabolism burns as well. People often think of their metabolism as being a constant that burns the same number of calories every day, but this is not the case. Your metabolism won't burn hugely different amounts from one day to the next, but it can significantly change over time.
Your metabolism can increase or decrease based on how you eat, but the thing that typically causes the most problems is not eating enough, especially when increasing activity and dieting. Your body needs a certain number of daily calories to function and it needs energy (calories) to engage in the activities you do to burn extra calories, so this causes your body's daily caloric requirement to increase as well. Ideally your body's need for extra calories would be met by converting your fat cells into energy, thus causing you to lose fat. Unfortunately, this is not always what happens.
Increasing your activity level and decreasing your caloric intake can cause too big of a difference between the number of calories you are consuming and the number of calories your body needs to function throughout the day. If this happens, your body won't convert more fat into energy to meet this demand, but will instead try to decrease the number of calories it expends, which is accomplished by slowing down your metabolism.
If your metabolism slows down, it completely changes things when it comes to statements like, burning 500 additional calories per day for a week results in one pound of fat loss. Unless you are Michael Phelps or another elite athlete who trains for hours every day, your metabolism is responsible for the vast majority of your calorie burning, so any decrease in your metabolism will severely hamper your ability to lose fat. In other words, if metabolic changes are not considered in calorie burning and fat loss equations, they could be far from accurate.
It is also important to note that the burn X number of calories to lose X amount of fat equations have one other major oversight. They assume that every calorie you lose is a calorie of fat, but when you increase your activity level, many of the calories burned are from carbohydrates and some can even be from protein (muscle). The physiological mechanisms behind this are beyond the scope of this article, but this is another example of why burning extra calories does not necessarily translate into fat or weight loss.
On the surface, it seems as though burning a certain number of extra calories should translate into a specific amount of weight loss, but things with the human body are never that simple. This is just one of the many cases where what is true in theory or in a lab does not necessarily transfer to real life situations. Increasing your activity level is certainly a good thing, but it doesn't always result in the fat loss you may expect. It takes the right combination of nutrition, exercise, and recovery to get the lasting results you really desire.
Ross Harrison, CSCS, NSCA-CPT is a certified personal trainer, strength and conditioning specialist, nutritional consultant, and has a BA in psychology from Grinnell College. He takes a holistic approach to health and fitness and teaches people how to lose weight, get in shape, and improve their quality of life with exercise and nutrition. If you want to find out more about his services or contact him for any reason, please visit http://precisionhealth-fitness.com/.
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