The mechanism for losing body fat ultimately comes down to your calorie thresholds, the average food intake over a week or monthly period vs your calorie expenditure.
The calorie threshold is slightly different to daily calorie intake because it is taking a look at food consumed over a prolonged period. When looking at your average intake over a week you find there is direct correlation with the results you are getting. As discussed previously calorie counting has limitations, the main one being no one counts their bad days and are often pretty poor in counting their good days. The point though is not to get an exact magic number to say this is what I must eat but to gauge a picture of what results certain average intake levels produce . From here you can then adjust your intake to get the results you want. This is applicable in fat loss (eating less generally) but also increasing health (eating more generally).
The number of calories expended by your body has three main factors –
1) The calorie burn of the body keeping itself alive and optimising health.
2) The calorie burn from digesting the food you eat.
3) The amount of calories you burn from moving (daily movement / exercise).
The biggest influence is the many processes the body uses to keep itself alive and fully functioning. The body has an ability to change this element a lot. This is why you will often feel cold on a diet as your body has shut down many processes which generate heat. Hence you will feel more susceptible to cooler temperatures. Your energy levels will also reduce. The lower your food intake, the more pronounced the symptoms. Your goal should be to lose fat on the highest number of calories possible.
The way to increase the amount of calories at which you can lose fat is by alternating periods of dieting with periods of optimising metabolism. You can also increase calorie intake and still lose fat by eating “clean” foods that meet your nutritional needs, e.g. less stress on the system through toxins. It is important also to hit your minimum protein, carbohydrate and fat levels with a ratio that works for you. To this you should also do other elements to improve your health, e.g. get enough sleep, stretching etc. This will raise the amount of calories you need also.
Exercise also influences calories needed per day. There is the short term effect, how many calories expended within that day and the longer term influence of how exercise affects your underlying metabolic rate (how many calories you burn without moving). The 6 Exercise types influence both of these factors differently. In general, cardio exercise burns more calories per day (short term) but has less effect on raising metabolic rate longer term. Weight training has a smaller calorie burn that day but a greater influence on raising your metabolic rate long term.
The actual number of calories you need varies between individuals. However, we know at a certain level the following will occur –
Optimal Fat Loss Zone / Starvation Threshold – Your aim is to find the optimal fat loss burning zone when you are dieting. This means you are losing fat, yet you are not suffering from strong hunger or cravings. You will also have the energy to function and move. This means it is sustainable long term. Especially if you have covered the taste and comfort foods issue that any diet should have in place.
When you drift below the optimal fat loss zone you will find that your energy starts to drop, your cravings increase and your willpower is lowered. The result is you end up breaking the diet and normally in spectacular fashion. This is normal and no reason to beat yourself up for doing it. It is a natural result of the body suffering too great a calorie deficit. During this phase the body will also begin to reduce its daily metabolic activities and thus saves calories. Short term this means your fat loss will not be as fast as expected for the effort you put in (though you will still be losing fat) and long term you will be left with a lowered metabolic rate. This can be restored fairly quickly though by eating on the optimal health point.
Fat gaining / Optimal Health Threshold – There is a certain calorie intake level that will begin to produce fat gain. This is your fat gaining threshold. While most people gain fat through excesses you can gain fat also on healthy foods if eat too much and past this threshold.
To strengthen your metabolism you would want to eat just on this point of gaining fat but not past it. Over time the body will then raise your metabolism through the consistent higher food intake. This is accelerated if you eat ‘clean foods’. However, it must be pointed out that with many traditional healthy foods, e.g. vegetables, it is often hard to impossible to eat enough of them to increase your calorie intake up to this threshold point. If you do this, you will optimise your health, sports performance, energy and your metabolism. In the same way the body preserves calories when in a famine if you eat on a higher level consistently you will begin to raise your metabolic rate.
The Fat loss Process
The above thresholds show the general calorie intake levels over a week which will produce results. The actual fat loss process has a few underlying factors but it will always come back to the above formula of food consumed vs movement performed. The type of food will have some effect on the numbers themselves, e.g. whether you should eat 2300 or 2500 calories, as does measurement error and reference tables used affect these numbers.
When the calorie intake numbers are kept constant almost every weight loss trick or secret becomes almost very much a secondary factor e.g. meal timing, food ratios, food sensitivities, fasted vs non fasted exercise etc. They will all have an tiny influence but none will be anywhere as near as important the overall food intake. The difference will show itself in how easy it is to follow the diet and consume your calorie thresholds over the effect it will have on the body. The goal obviously should be to pick the plan that is easiest to follow.
The body is burning food (protein, carbs and fat) all the time to fuel its metabolic processes and movement. Different people will create energy more efficiently from using different proportions of protein, carb to fat. This is why some people respond better to higher protein/fat diets while others higher carbs. How you burn your food will also be affected by activity performed and food consumption itself.
The body has the ability to store protein, carb and fat for later use as energy. Carbs are stored in the muscle and liver while fat is stored in the muscles, around the organs and under the skin. The latter being the fat most people complain about wanting to lose. Protein from muscle can be used for energy also by the body in times of famine.
Fat gain occurs when you continue to eat in excess of your needs once you have filled your body’s stores of food. Fat loss will occur when the food intake is reduced below your needs but often not until the reserve energy stores are emptied a little. This is why you sometimes have to wait a few days of doing a diet before you start seeing changes. Certain people have more friendly metabolisms which mean they burn up their body fat reserves before their carbohydrate reserves so they see results faster, but in any long term long term discussion on diet and fat loss it will come back to the principles of energy in/out against movement.
When in the process of dieting your reserve energy stores are not full which means if you were to overeat you would not gain body fat immediately. This means one or maybe two bad days of eating will not produce fat gain but rather serve to fill up your stores further. This allows you greater freedom on any fat loss diet by having cheat days. Another phenomenon of long term and aggressive diets is that when your return to eating your will continue to lose fat for a couple of days. This is commonly seen in body building circles after the end of a cut phase and personally I have experienced it myself. While this affect lasts only a couple of days or so at best it serves to show you do not need to be 100% on your diet every day and nor should you to get results.
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