Enough is enough, please! Every year there are countless billions of words written about how to lose weight. With 70 million Americans spending over 35 billion dollars yearly on weight loss, it is easy to understand why so much is written. After all, America is the land of gimmicks. I am surprised each year when I don’t see the “pet rock” diet. It’s a natural, right? Rocks are very low in calories and they sure fill you up. C’mon now, writers, let’s cut out the Hollywood and Beverly Hills nonsense and talk sense, once and for all.
Losing body fat is simple conceptually. If you like simplicity, we offer you our PEP approach. It is based on simple proportions. Want the rules?
1. Fat: Forget about it!
That’s right; for the most part, we are going to ignore fat in our foods. OK, OK, OK, I know, for years you have had all sorts of information on low-fat intake shoved at you. And what about those food boxes….low fat printed all over them. Again, forget about it. Sure a gram of fat is calorie-dense; 8.8 grams versus 3.9 for protein and carbs. But if you exercise properly, fat calories are used very fast for fuel to improve your body. Fat is not bad. Too much fat, like too much anything, is bad. For now, forget about watching your fat intake. Keep it simple right?
2. Carbs: Think low carbs NOT no carbs!
Yes, it is in vogue to attack carbs as waistline bombs. Agreed; as a group, people abuse carbs worse than nearly anything. But stopping carbs totally or eating 20-30 grams daily is just too tough to do over time. Plus it doesn’t make great sense. Seriously, you need carbs to burn body fat. Plus, without carbs, strange things often start to happen…like bleeding gums or falling asleep while driving. Who needs that?
So carbs foods like bread, pasta, potatoes, rice, fruit, etc. should be regulated rather than avoided, while crazy high-carb foods like candy and soda should be avoided as they are just too, too carb-rich and in the case of candy and ice cream often have high levels of unnecessary fat. Getting the picture? If you control your carbs, you also take out a large part of the unnecessary dietary fat.
What we are going to do is…….CONTROL our carb intake. The rule will be to eat less carb calories than protein calories each day.
3. Protein: Protein is key!
Protein is the key to both fat loss and lean muscle gain. Keep it simple; eat plenty of protein, at least 1.0 grams of protein per pound of body weight. How much is too much? Not a practical question. Your pet doggie often gets 4 or 5 times the amount per pound that some dietitians whine about as being too much.
This is a good time to talk about the source of proteins. There are plenty of good higher-protein foods. For example, lean meats, fish, egg whites, etc. are good foods full of protein. Often though, it is difficult to get all your protein from normal foods. In these cases don’t be afraid to reach for a good protein powder. Some people think powders are “unnatural.” I get lost in that thinking. Most good powders come from Whey (milk) or Soy. Honestly, they can be considered better than foods for many reasons. They cost less per gram, are easily digested and do not have the spoiling or bacteria contamination problems that meat and eggs do. For more about protein click here For a short comparison of the better protein powders and protein bars.
The rule will be to eat more protein calories than carb calories daily.
Hence the name Proportion Eating. Your goal every day will be to get a higher proportion of protein to carbthanen you have in the past.
If you think you can do this, feel free to move on to the more advanced (yet still very simple) rules.
4. Exercise: Sensible activity helps!
Normally, there are two general types of exercise; aerobic activities such as swimming, biking, jogging, walking, working out on a stepper, cross trainer, climbing, etc. and anaerobic activities like weight training.
Both are fine, alone or in tandem. It all depends on your goals. If you need help planning a program, just write in. We’ll help for free.
If you are going to do aerobic activity though please do it at the right speed for fat loss, in other words, keep your intensity to the level that you would be able to carry on a conversation comfortably while performing the activity. This will keep you within the ideal fat-burning range. If you go too hard, you start to burn carbs rather than fat.
If you decide to weight train as well, that’s great. In general, remember to warm up well, work on flexibility and do not make the mistake of thinking that high rep and low weight lifts result in definition. The definition is more related to diet. Too often people perform these baby lifts for minutes thinking they are doing great things for their muscles. Wrong. Think overload; more weight for less reps. And no, doing this will not make you look like a gorilla. If it was only as easy to get huge muscles as some people (yes, normally women) worry; life would be easier for a lot of us.
5. Non-food fuels: One or two “berries” among the “nuts.”
There are thousands of “fat loss” products out there. The truth is that most are useless. And many of them are just plain stupid. I can count on one hand the number of “natural” nutrient materials that will help you to lose that ab fat Suffice it to say don’t waste your money buying a majority of natural “diet” products from anyone, including us. The following are the “fat oxidative” products that work. In order of importance:
GABA is an amino acid (a natural product) that you take right before bed on an empty stomach. Excellent for nighttime GH release.
Glutamine. Another amino acid that you take daily for GH release during the day.
AM ABS FORMULA from Outlaw. An herbal mix that does not contain stimulants but does help fat loss.
NO BAN from Outlaw. An all-natural plant sterol mix, excellent for everyone exercising.
Sure, other things might help. Ephedra/Caffeine stacks like Xenadrine, Hydroxycuts, or ISPs THE STACK can help. Chromium might work. Alpha Lipoic Acid is another. Chitosan traps and eliminates dietary fat.
Leave a Reply