Fat Loss, Fat Burning

4 Steps for Burning Fat

Diet & Body — Tue, 02 Jan 2007 17:09:00 +0000

By Gary Matthews
eDiets Guest Columnist

Below you will find scientific guidelines for weight loss that have always been around, but are not followed by the majority of weight-loss programs these days.

1. Increasing Your Metabolism

To produce sustained, permanent and long-term weight loss, it's imperative that you boost your metabolism. And the most effective way to raise your metabolism is to have a greater proportion of functional muscle on your body.

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The only way to build this lean muscle is through strength training. There's no other method that works wonders on the metabolism.

By performing strength training, you'll effectively increase the amount of functional lean muscle on your body so that your metabolism will elevate.

After a strength training session your body will undergo a significant increase or spike in metabolism, which will allow you to burn much more fat than you were able to before.

2. It's All About Lean Muscle

The amount of fat the body can burn is directly related to the more lean muscle your body can hold.

If your muscle system can sustain more energy and use this energy significantly when performing strength training, then it will be able to burn off the calories you eat and the excess fat on your body.

In other words, if your muscles become stronger and can hold more energy, then you should be able to release this energy more efficiently to increase your metabolism and to burn off excess calories that you have eaten.

Once we can build more lean muscle our bodies will become more efficient at burning fat.

It's also the amount of lean muscle on your body that makes you look good. Once you burn off the excess fat from your body, the lean muscle underneath your skin will be exposed making you look healthy, energetic and well-toned.

3. Decrease Your Daily Calories

For years we have been told to use low-calorie dieting to rid the excess fat from our bodies. The trouble with this is that the calorie-restricted diet throws the body into starvation mode, with the body holding onto the fat and using precious muscle tissue for energy.

This then lowers the metabolism, causing greater muscle loss. When the diet is broken, the unwanted fat not only returns, but actually increases because of the lowered metabolism.

The way around this is to cut your daily calorie intake by a small amount of calories. This will stop any starvation mechanisms from clicking in.

Decrease daily calorie value by a couple of hundred calories per day and no more. This will generate slow weight loss and the majority will be fat loss only. The daily calories should be consumed during the day with small frequent meals.

4. Fast Walking Burns Fat

All you need to do now is incorporate fast walking into your weight loss program to hasten the burning of excess fat.

Not only is fast walking much easier on the hips, but it also produces a greater percentage of fat loss as opposed to jogging or running.

Here are some of the benefits of fast walking.

Easy to perform
Most conventional
All natural body movement
Doesn't cause injuries
Can be done anywhere
The best minimal effort exercise for fat loss

I can't stress enough how fast walking is necessary in every weight-loss program.

Gary is the author of several ebooks, including Maximum Weight Loss in 10 Weeks -- the complete ebook and time-saving solution for burning away unwanted fat, and Maximum Weight Gain in 10 Weeks" -- easy-to-use and follow techniques that serve as a guide to muscle growth without having to "live in the gym." Visit Gary’s website at www.maximumfitness.com

The fitness pros at eDiets can show you how to combine exercise and nutrition to get the best results. This is what you've been looking for. You will need to make the commitment, but isn’t it time to finally take care of you?

The Paleolithic Diet - Should We Eat Like Our "Cave Man" Ancestors?

Diet & Body — Fri, 29 Dec 2006 13:27:00 +0000

QUESTION: Hi Tom: Your Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle ebook was an eye-opener for me. I am following your advice closely with very good results. I'm a semi professional windsurfer and a mountain biker, and especially for the latter I need to be as lean as possible. Thanks in large part to your program, I'm well into single digit body fat and dropping. Just recently I came across a book called the paleolithic diet and I was wondering if you ever heard about it? What's your opinion on this book? Is it worth reading if I already have your book? Is the program any good?

Mariusz
Poland

ANSWER: The "paleolithic," "stone age," "cave man," or "neanderthal" eating plans have been around for a while and there are quite a few books that have been written on the subject.

In general, with a only few minor constructive criticisms, I think they are right on point, and will benefit your health and definitely your fat loss efforts.

A "Paleo Diet" is actually quite similar to my Burn The Fat program, only with the starches and grains (and dairy products) removed completely.

In fact, a "paleo" or "cave man" diet is very, very similar to the "contest" (bodybuilding or physique) diets I recommend in Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle and this is most definitely a great way get very lean, very fast.

On physique competition diets (bodybuilding, fitness, figure, etc), you leave the lean proteins, lean meats, nuts and seeds, the green veggies (fibrous carbs), and some fruit in the diet, while reducing or removing ALL processed foods and SOME of the grains and starches. (usually the dairy products go too).

When it comes to MAXIMUM FAT LOSS, the removal or reduction of grains and calorie dense starchy carbs in favor of lean protein and veggies will definitely help speed the process - even if that's only because it reduces caloric density of the food intake, although there are other reasons.

Lean protein (fish and meat) + good fats & nuts + lots of green veggies + some fruit = LEAN!

And thats basically what the "paleolithic" diets recommend, because the principle there is to eat like our "stone age" ancestors did - before there was McDonalds, Coca Cola and other junk food.

The premise is that since our genetic code (the human genome) has changed less than 0.02 percent in 40,000 years, this means that our bodies are still expecting to get the same foods and nutrition they were getting 40,000 years ago.

By eating what our "stone age" hunter and gatherer ancestors ate, say the paleo diets, we will rid ourselves of the health problems and the obesity problem that has only recently begun to plague us as a result of modern lifestyle and processed manmade foods.

Forty thousand years ago, you had to eat nature-made food. There was no food in cans, boxes or packages was there? The packaging was peel, a skin or a shell!

There were no TV dinners. There was no drive in fast food. There were no convenience stores.

There was no corn syrup. There was no white sugar. There were no hydrogenated oils. No chemicals. No preservatives. No artificial anything.

There was only what could be hunted and gathered: Meat, fish, nuts, seeds, plants, vegetables, fruits.

My only real constructive criticism is that some of these programs not only recommend removal of all grains and starches (and even dairy), they outright condemn them - sometimes unfairly, I believe.

They say that agriculture arrived on the scence only 10,000 years ago so foods produced as a result of agriculture should also be on the "banned" list and that includes 100% whole grain products and even rice, potatoes and other starches which are not manmade.

The truth is there are some starchy carbohydrates and grains which are very minimally processed or completely unproceseed (the only processing being cooking).

Also, some people can metabolically handle starches and grains just fine, while others cannot. The same can be said for dairy products.

This is known as metabolic individuality. Because this individuality exists from person to person, I don't believe it's necessary to recommend that "EVERYONE" cut out "ALL" the starches and grains "ALL" the time.

I do believe that many people are getting an overdose of refined carbs and sugar and that moderating intake of concentrated carbs almost always accelerates fat loss.

However, the nutrition program you choose should depend on your metabolic/body type, your current body composition and state of health as well as your goals (maximum fat loss vs. muscle growth vs. maintenance, vs. endurance athleticperformance).

I don't believe that "agriculture" and everything that came with it is "evil."

I believe that highly processed and refined and packaged foods are the "nutritional evils" we should be aware of.

To remove brown rice, 100% whole grains, sweet potatoes, oatmeal, legumes and so on for healthy carb tolerant people, especially those who are highly active and or already at a normal body fat level doesnt make a lot of sense to me.

In particular, for athletes with a high energy expenditure, eating the concentrated complex, starchy carbs and grains - from natural sources - can be quite important.

Sure, there are some "renegade' nutritionists who prescribe high fat diets for endurance athletes and claim that will provide high energy and high performance, but that is controversial.

Also, an explanation for athletes successful on such plans may be that they are metabolically suited for more fat and protein to begin with, so that conclusion shouldn't be generalized to everyone.

Thats the trouble with so many programs -- the creators might say, "It worked for me and for some of my clients, so this is the way EVERYONE should do it."

Everyone is different, so the true inquiring minds will inquire about what is best for THEM, not the other guy... In the case of highly active healthy people and athletes, I would lean towards a decent amount of natural carbs forperformance goals (and pull back on starches and grains when goals change to maximum fat loss).

The key word here is NATURAL!

There is a HUGE difference between natural starches and grains and refined starches and grains.

For example, look at old fashioned unsweetened oatmeal versus sugary, white flour cereal grains. How can you throw those together into the same category??? They are no where near the same, but often they get lumped together by those who are adamantly "no-grain" or "no-cereal" allowed.

What about sweet potatoes? why cut something like that out of your diet? They are not processed or man made at all are they?

Aside from that minor quibble I have with some of these programs being too strict with their "Absolutely no grains or starch allowed," there is a lot anyone can learn from the "paleolithic" eating concept.

The questions raised from these programs and books are good ones:

"What were we eating tens of thousands of years ago?"

"What are we genetically and environmentally predisposed to eat?"

"what has gone wrong with the modern day diet that has led to so much disease and obesity which didn't exist thousands of years ago?"

I believe that too many people get caught up in low fats or low carbs or whatever the trend of the month is, but the real source of our problem is neither fat nor carbs, it is an excess of processed, refined man-made food! (combined with a serious shortage of exercise)

If you study and understand the concept of eating according to your personal goals and your unique body/metabolic type first, which I discuss in chapter 5 of my book, Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle, then I believe you will get even more benefit from the further study of the "paleo" eating concept, as you will be informed and flexible enough to adapt it to your personal situation.

Loren Cordain and Ray Audette have written two of the more notable works on the subject (the Paleo diet and Neanderthin). You can get either of these at almost any bookstore or Amazon.com. You can get my Burn The Fat program at www.burnthefat.com

ANY good nutrition program - for health or for fat loss - is going to be focused on natural foods and it will teach you how to get the processed food OUT and the natural food IN

When you analyze ANY diet or nutrition program, keep in mind what ageless Fitness Icon Jack Lalanne has always said,

"If man made it, dont eat it!"

THAT is the essence of eating how we're supposed to eat!

About the Author:

Tom Venuto is a natural bodybuilder and author of the #1 best selling e-book, "Burn the Fat, Feed The Muscle,” which teaches you how to burn fat without drugs or supplements using the little-known secrets of the world's best bodybuilders and fitness models. Learn how to get rid of stubborn fat and turbo-charge your metabolism by visiting: www. burnthefat. com.

Fat Loss With 7-KETO

Diet & Body — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 16:18:00 +0000

7-KETO

Weight Loss Aid & Immune System Support -> click for more information

7-KETO is a natural metabolite of DHEA that has all of the benefits but none of the side effects associated with DHEA. 7-KETO is trademarked by Humanetics Corporation and may help to support energy production, healthy skin, lean muscle, liver function and other body functions. The high-potency 100 mg capsule is an excellent complement to the popular 25 mg dosage.

The American College of Physicians conducted a clinical trial to study the effects of 7-KETO on body fat. Thirty overweight adults were recruited. Half were given 100 mg of 7-KETO twice daily, the other half a placebo. All subjects did aerobic exercises three times per week for 60 minutes. Body composition was tested at the start of the trial and twice more at the 4- and 8-week marks. The 7-KETO group showed a 1.8% reduction in body fat while the control group lost 0.57% body fat. No side effects were reported. Researchers concluded that 7-KETO may reduce body fat at a dosage of 200 mg per person per day.

DHEA is the most plentiful hormone in the human body, but its production declines with age. As the levels of DHEA decrease, so does this important metabolite, 7-KETO. 7-KETO is a powerful antioxidant that aids fat metabolism and supports the production of lean muscle tissue.

During the aging process, the levels of certain hormones participating in the metabolic process decline. For example, the level of the female hormone estrogen, made by the ovarian glands, is dramatically reduced after menopause. The level of melatonin, a hormone made at the pineal gland, also declines steadily after the age of 40. The levels of dehyroepiandrosterone (DHEA) and its numerous derivatives, manufactured in the adrenal glands, begin to decline after the age of 30 with about a 50% decline by the age of 40 and about 85% decline by the age of 70. On the contrary, the levels for cortisol and aldosterone, steroid hormones also manufactured in the adrenal glands, essentially remain constant throughout the entire lifespan or, in cases of excessive stress and anxiety, increase.

Concurrent with the decline of these hormone levels during the aging process, there occurs a series of detrimental physiological and anatomical effects. These include a substantial reduction in protein biosynthesis leading to a net loss in muscle mass, and reduction in bone tissue regeneration leading to a net loss of bone mass (a serious risk factor for the onset of osteoporosis). Other negative effects include the substantial decline in the basal metabolic rate leading to a net increase in fat tissue accumulation, the decline in many immune system functions, and the increased rate of neurodegeneration leading to memory loss.

Given these observations, many reputable scientists attest to a definitive relationship between the age-associated decline in hormones, such as DHEA, and physiologic and anatomic trends observed during the aging process. These same scientists also affirm that the restoration of the levels of these declining hormones could potentially delay the rate of muscle and bone tissue loss, strengthen the immune system, increase the capacity to burn fat, and increase the expression of neuroprotective properties. However, the ingestion of hormones as dietary supplements must reliably demonstrate safety and efficasy in order to eliminate short term and long term side effects.

DHEA is actually an intermediate in the biosynthesis of testosterone and estrogen taking place in the adrenal glands. In addition to this, DHEA exhibits a range of physiological effects that are not related to sex hormones. In in vivo clinical trials on genetically obese and normal animals, DHEA demonstrated anti-obesity (fat reducing) properties. Other controlled experiments in animals resulted in DHEA reducing serum cholesterol, strengthening the immune system and improving memory functions through the improvement of neuroprotective properties.

In order, however, to provide a definitive structure-function claim or a mechanistic rationale as to how these liver mediated metabolic improvements take place, a receptor (either bound to a membrane or existing on an enzyme) for DHEA must be identified. The nature of the receptor would then allow for an explanation as to how these biochemical effects take place. To date, no such DHEA receptor has been found. Therefore, it may be that some metabolite or derivative of DHEA may be responsible for the aforementioned positive physiologic effects. In addition, numerous controlled experiments in both animal and human subjects have demonstrated that the ingestion of DHEA has resulted in the net increase of the sex hormones testosterone and estrogen. Elevated levels of these sex hormones pose an increased risk for a range of undesirable effects.

Based on the seminal work of Professor Henry Lardy, a Villas Professor Emeritus of the University of Wisconsin at Madison, Department of Biochemistry, over 150 derivatives of DHEA were prepared and assayed for safety and efficasy over a period of 10 years. One of the prerequisite criteria in selecting these derivatives for further testing was for them not to convert to any of the sex hormones, such as testosterone and estrogen. Eventually, these carefully executed studies led to the identification of the DHEA analog named 3-acetyl-7-oxo-dehydroepiandrosterone (trademarked 7-KETO), which exhibited the highest biochemical efficacy with no measurable toxicological side effects.

One of the effects from the ingestion of 7-KETO in a double blind, placebo controlled clinical study in humans was the stimulation of liver thermogenic enzymes, which increase heat production using fat as the primary source of energy. Naturally, this resulted to the reduction of adipose fat tissue when combined with systematic exercise. Analogously executed clinical studies in humans resulted in 7-KETO improving immunologic profiles (the various attributes characterizing a healthy immune system) and improving memory-related functions. In all cases, 7-KETO was demonstrated to be substantially more efficacious than DHEA without the unwanted, sex hormone related, side effects.

The safety evaluation of 7-KETO was based on observations from an extensive array of pre-clinical and clinical safety studies in both humans and animal subjects. In all cases, 7-KETO was consistently found to be safe for human consumption as a dietary supplement. -> click here to order

Supplements or Foods?

Diet & Body — Fri, 15 Dec 2006 14:18:00 +0000

Protein Supplements Vs. Protein Foods?
By Tom Venuto, NSCA-CPT, CSCS
Burn the Fat

Are protein supplements really better than protein foods? Before attempting to answer this question, I should first preface it by mentioning that I do not sell supplements, nor am I associated with any supplement company, so you’re getting an honest and unbiased opinion. Don't get me wrong; I am not anti-supplement by any means. It would simply be more accurate to say that I am "pro-food." There are a lot of good supplements on the market, and I've used many of them, including a multi vitamin, creatine and essential fatty acid (EFA) supplements such as Flaxseed oil. Protein powders and meal replacements can also be indispensable if you don't have time to eat every three hours. However, protein supplements are not the master key to your success, real food is!

Did you ever notice how articles about protein in certain bodybuilding magazines are seldom objective? Instead, they all seem to be slanted towards hyping some "revolutionary" new product. Did you ever wonder why? In my opinion, most articles on protein supplements are nothing more than thinly disguised advertisements (some very thinly). Sometimes they give you a very persuasive-sounding argument, replete with dozens of references from scientific studies (mostly done on rodents, of course). They even give you an 800 number at the end of the article to order. (How convenient!)

When protein manufacturers throw around fancy words like cross flow microfiltration, oligopeptides, ion-exchange, protein efficiency ratio, biological value, nitrogen retention and glycomacropeptides, it sure sounds convincing, especially when scores of scientific references are cited. But don't forget that the supplement industry is big business and most magazines are the supplement industry. Lyle McDonald, author of "The Ketogenic Diet," hit the nail on the head when he wrote "Unfortunately, the obsession that bodybuilders have with protein has made them susceptible to all kinds of marketing hype. Like most aspects of bodybuilding (and the supplement industry in general), the issue of protein is driven more by marketing hype than physiological reality and marketing types know how to push a bodybuilder’s button when it comes to protein "

Many nutrition "experts" (read: people who sell supplements), state that there are distinct advantages of protein supplements (powders and amino acid tablets) over whole foods. For example, they argue that whey, a by-product of the cheese-making process, is a higher quality protein than most whole food sources. There are many different methods of determining protein quality, including biological value (BV), protein efficiency ratio (PER), Net Protein Utilization (NPU), chemical score, and protein digestibility corrected amino acid score (PDCAAS). If you have ever seen advertisements for protein powders and supplements, you have undoubtedly heard of one or more of these measures of protein quality.

BV is one of the most commonly used and is arguably, the best measure of a protein's quality. BV is based on how much of the protein consumed is actually absorbed and utilized by the body. The higher the amount of protein (nitrogen) that is actually retained, the greater the BV. If a protein has a BV of 100, it means that all of the protein absorbed has been utilized with none lost. Whole eggs score the highest of all foods with a BV of 100, while beans have a BV of only 49.

Protein quality is certainly an important issue, but it is one that has been enormously overstated and even distorted for marketing purposes. Whey protein is truly an excellent protein with a biological value at or near 100. Many advertisements list whey as having a BV between 104 and 157, but if you look in any nutrition textbook it will tell you that it is impossible to have a BV over 100. In "Advanced Nutrition and Human Metabolism," BV is defined as "a measure of nitrogen retained for growth and/or maintenance that is expressed as a percentage of nitrogen absorbed."

When a protein supplement is listed as having a BV over 100, the company has intentionally manipulated the number for marketing purposes or unintentionally confused BV with another method of rating protein quality. Certain whey proponents claim that whey is "superior to whole egg" so the percentage sign on BV had to be dropped and the scale extended beyond 100. It was noted by bodybuilding writer Jerry Branium in IRONMAN magazine that in a study where the BV of whey was reported to be 157, the author confused BV with chemical score. Chemical score is a comparison of the amino acid pattern in an ideal reference protein to a test protein and therefore the number can exceed 100. 157 was actually the chemical score and not the BV.

Most bodybuilders and strength athletes already consume more than enough protein (an understatement if there ever was one), so the importance of BV to these athletes who are already consuming copious amounts of protein has been overplayed. Even though whey has a higher BV than chicken breast, fish or milk protein, if the total quantity of protein you consume is sufficient, then it is not likely that substituting whey for food proteins will result in any additional muscle growth.

Whether you choose a whole protein food or a protein supplement isn’t as important as some would like you to believe. For the purposes of developing muscle, the only guidelines for protein that you must follow are: (1) consume a source of complete protein with every meal, (2) eat at frequent intervals approximately three hours apart (about six times per day) and (3) consume a minimum of .8 grams to 1 gram per pound of body weight. There are times when it would be beneficial to consume more than one gram per pound of body weight, but that will have to be the subject of another article.

Because whey protein does have a high BV, it probably offers the most benefits when you are dieting on very low calories. When your energy intake and correspondingly, your protein intake, are reduced, whey protein could help you get greater utilzation of the smaller amount of protein that you are taking in. In other words, choosing proteins of the highest quality is more of an issue when you are dieting than when you are focusing on mass gains when total calories and protein are being consumed in abundant amounts. Whey protein also provides a way to get high quality protein without the fat, which is also important when dieting.

It has been suggested that whey may have other advantages besides high protein quality, although they are frequently overstated. These benefits include enhanced immunity, increased antioxidant activity and quick absorption. Several studies in "Clinical and Investigative Science" by Dr. Gerard Bounous of Montreal have shown that whey protein provides anti carcinogenic properties, protection from infections, and other enhanced immune responses. Whey protein was also been shown to raise levels of Glutathione, an important antioxidant that can offer protection from free radical oxidative damage. While such findings are very promising, all these studies, which are frequently quoted in whey protein advertisements, were performed on mice, so it is unclear how well the results extrapolate to humans.

Another acknowledged benefit of whey protein is its fast absorption rate. Although there isn’t any evidence that protein supplements digest more efficiently than whole foods (as is often claimed), they are definitely digested faster. This is most important after a training session when the rates of protein synthesis and glycogen re-synthesis are increased. This is the reason it is often recommended that a liquid meal containing protein and a high glycemic carbohydrate be consumed immediately post-workout and that whey is the ideal protein for this purpose. Even in considering post-workout nutrition, there is still little proof that a liquid protein-carb complex will actually produce better muscular growth than whole foods, as long as complete whole food protein foods and complex carbohydrates are consumed immediately after the training session and every three waking hours for a period of 24 hours thereafter.

Speaking of protein absorption rates, the discussion of fast acting versus slow acting proteins seems to be the latest hot topic these days in bodybuilding circles. The interest was sparked by studies in 1997 and 1998 that examined the differences between the absorption rates of whey versus casein. The researchers concluded that whey was a fast acting protein and was considered to be more "anabolic" while casein was slower acting and was considered to be more "anti-catabolic. " It was further hypothesized that consuming a combination of these two types of proteins could lead to greater muscle growth. These findings have prompted the supplement companies to market an entirely new category of protein supplements; casein and whey mixes. The problem with drawing such conclusions so quickly is that these studies looked at the speed of whey and casein absorption in subjects who had fasted for 10 hours before being fed the protein. Any suppositions drawn from this information are probably irrelevant if you are eating mixed whole food meals every three hours. Obviously, more research is needed.

This recent fascination with various rates of protein absorption could be compared to the interest in the glycemic index. The glycemic index is a scale that measures the rate at which the body converts various carbohydrate foods into blood glucose. The higher the glycemic index, the faster the food is converted to glucose and the larger the insulin response. Therefore it is said that high glycemic foods should be avoided in favor of low glycemic index foods. The error in relying solely on the glycemic index as your only criteria for choosing carbohydrates is that the index is based on consuming a carbohydrate food by itself in a fasted state.

When carbohydrates are consumed in mixed meals that contain protein and a little fat, the glycemic index loses some of its significance because the protein and fat slow the absorption of the carbohydrate. That’s why the glycemic index is really much ado about nothing and the same could probably be said for the casein and whey argument. It's just the latest in a long string of new angles that supplement companies use to promote their protein: free-form vs peptides, concentrate vs isolate, ion exchange vs microfiltration, soy vs whey, casein and whey mix vs pure whey and so on. Every year, you can count on some new twist on the protein story to appear. Certainly there are going to be advances in nutrition science, but all too often these "new discoveries" amount to nothing more than marketing hype.

What about amino acid pills? Amino acids pills are simply predigested protein. Proponents of amino acid supplementation claim that because the amino's are predigested, the body will absorb them better, leading to greater improvements in strength and muscle mass. It sounds logical, but this is a gross underestimation of the body's capacities and actually the reverse is true: The human digestive system was designed to efficiently process whole foods; it was not designed to digest pills and powders all day long. Amino's are absorbed more rapidly in the intestine when they are in the more complex di and tri-peptide molecules.

Your body gets better use of the aminos as protein foods are broken down and the amino's are absorbed at just the right rate for your body's needs. In "Exercise Physiology; Energy Nutrition and Human Performance," authors Katch and McArdle state that "Amino acid supplementation in any form has not been shown by adequate experimental design and methodology to increase muscle mass or significantly improve muscular strength, power, or endurance."

Furthermore, consuming predigested protein when you are seeking fat loss is not necessarily advantageous because it shortchanges you of the thermic effects of real food. Whole foods have a major advantage over protein supplements; they stimulate the metabolism more. This is known as the "thermic effect of food." Protein has the highest thermic effect of any food. Including a whole protein food with every meal can speed up your metabolic rate as much as 30% because of the energy necessary to digest, process, and absorb it. This means that out of 100 calories of a protein food such as chicken breast, the net amount of calories left over after processing it is 70. In this respect, the fact that protein foods digest slower than amino acid tablets is actually an advantage.

A final argument against amino acid supplements is the cost. Amino's are simply not cost effective. If you don’t believe it, pick up a bottle and do the math yourself. One popular brand of "free form and peptide bonded amino acids" contains 150 1000mg. tablets per bottle and costs $19.95. 1000 mg. of amino acids equals 1 gram of protein, so the entire bottle contains 150 grams of protein. $19.95 divided by 150 grams is 13.3 cents per gram. Let's compare that to chicken breast. I can buy chicken breast from my local supermarket for $2.99 a pound. According to Corinne Netzer’s "Complete Book of Food Counts," there are 8.8 grams of protein in each ounce of chicken, so one pound of chicken (16 oz) has about 140 grams of protein. $2.99 divided by 140 grams equals 2.1 cents per gram. The amino acids cost more than six times what the chicken breast does! I don’t know about you, but I’ll stick with the chicken breast.

The biggest advantage of protein supplements is not that they can build more muscle than chicken or egg whites or any other whole food protein, the biggest advantage is convenience. It is easier to drink a protein shake than it is to buy, prepare, cook and eat poultry, fish or egg whites. Consuming small, frequent meals is the optimal way to eat, regardless of whether your goal is fat loss or muscle gain. To keep your body constantly in positive nitrogen balance, you must consume a complete protein every three hours. For many people, eating this often is nearly impossible. That's when a high quality protein supplement is the most helpful.

Aside from convenience, the truth about protein supplements is that they offer few advantages over protein foods. There is no scientific evidence that you can't meet all of your protein needs for muscle growth through food. As long as you eat every three hours and you eat a complete protein such as eggs, lean meat or lowfat dairy products with every meal, it is not necessary to consume any protein supplements to get outstanding results. Whey protein does have some interesting and useful properties and supplementing with a couple scoops each day is not a bad idea, especially if you are on a low calorie diet for fat loss or when you're using a post workout shake instead of a meal. Aside from that, focus on real food and don’t believe the hype.

References

1) Groff, James, et al, Advanced Nutrition and Human Metabolism, West Publishing company, 1995.

2) Fruhbeck, Gema. Slow and fast dietary proteins. Nature, 391: 843-844

3) Boirie, Y. et al. Slow and fast dietary proteins differently modulate postprandial protein accretion. Proc National Acad Sci, 94: 14930-14935, 1997

4) Lemon, Peter, Protein and Exercise: update, Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, Vol 19, No. 5, S179 - S190, 1987

5) Carraro, F., et at, Effect of exercise and recovery on muscle protein synthesis in human subjects. Amer Journal of physiology, 259: E470, 1990

6) Lemon, Peter, Is increased dietary protein necessary or beneficial for individuals with a physically active lifestyle? Nutrition reviews, 54:S 169-175, 1996

7)Bounous, G., et al, The immunoenhancing property of dietary whey protein concentrate. Clinical and Investigational Medicine, 11: 271-278. 1988.

8) Sadler, R., The benefits of dietary whey protein concentrate on the immune response and health. S Afr. J Dairy Sci, 24: No 24, 1992

9) Bounous, G., Dietary whey protein inhibits the development of dimethylhydrazine-induced malignancy. Clinical and Investigational Medicine, 12: 213-217, 1988

10) Bounous, G., et al, The biological activity of undenatured dietary whey protein; role of glutathione. Clinical and Investigational Medicine, 14: 4, 296-309, 1991

11) Netzer, Corinne. The Complete Book of Food Counts. Dell Publishing, 1997

12) Katch, Katch & McArdle, Exercise Physiology; Energy, Nutrition and Human Performance, Wiliams and Wilkins, 1996.

About the Author:

Tom Venuto is a natural bodybuilder and author of the #1 best selling e-book, "Burn the Fat, Feed The Muscle,” which teaches you how to burn fat without drugs or supplements using the little-known secrets of the world's best bodybuilders and fitness models. Learn how to get rid of stubborn fat and turbo-charge your metabolism by visiting: Burn the Fat

Top 7 Cardio Fat Burning Techniques

Diet & Body — Wed, 27 Sep 2006 13:34:00 +0000

By Kelli Calabrese MS, CSCS
2004 Personal Trainer of the Year
For eDiets

If you have tried and failed at exercising more times than you care to count, you are not alone. In fact you are in the grand majority. I don't want you to feel bad or blame yourself. It's not your fault. You are not an exercise expert and the information can be very misleading. Past failures simply teach you more ways not to go about exercising.

The fitness pros at eDietscan show you how to combine exercise and nutrition to get the best results. This is what you’ve been looking for. You will need to make the commitment, but isn't it time to finally take care of you?

If you are left feeling confused, without hope and more desperate than ever, I'm here to share the secrets that work. These secrets are going to not only steer you clear of failing, but leave you in the best shape and health of your adult life -- when combined with one of the eDiets food plans.

The cardiovascular techniques will contribute to changing your shape and allow you to live longer, stronger, vibrant, energetic years. These are secrets that anyone can afford and can be a natural part of your lifestyle. These seven secrets have had proven themselves time and time again with the longest lasting effects.

As a 20-year fitness-industry leader who had transformed the bodies of thousands of people just like you, I can tell you with 100-percent guarantee that there is a way to improve your body. It’s not quick, it’s not easy and it does not work like magic! It takes work, patience, dedication and consistency, but it works every time.

7 Cardiovascular Techniques That Optimize Fat Burning
Variety is not only the spice of life, but the key to Fat Burning when it comes to cardiovascular conditioning. The following methods will help to motivate you to exercise, push you past a plateau and give you the most return for investment of time.

Here are the seven key cardiovascular fat-burning secrets:

1. Interval Training -- Interval training combines brief periods of high-intensity exercise interspersed with periods of lower-intensity exercise in the same workout. Intervals not only increase your cardiovascular efficiency, but burn more calories and fat in the process. Lower-intensity exercise such as walking allows for recovery so that you can work harder during the higher-intensity intervals.

For example, simply start by alternating between walking and running. Walk for five minutes to warm up, and then run one minute, followed by two minutes of walking. Repeat the running and walking sequence for the duration of your workout. As you become more conditioned, decrease the length of low-intensity recovery periods (walking) and increase working intervals (jogging or running). (Caution: If you are a new exerciser, vary your walking speeds for intervals before introducing running).

2. Cross Training -- Cross training combines a group of aerobic activities into one workout at steady or varying intensities. For example, take a 15-minute bicycle ride to the local track; walk or run for 15 minutes on the track; then bicycle home for 15 minutes. If you have access to exercise equipment, you might use the rowing machine for 15 minutes, then the stair climber for 15 minutes, followed by 15 minutes on the elliptical trainer. This is a perfect time to incorporate a new activity you have always wanted to try.

3. Periodization -- One example of periodization is to choose a different activity seasonally. For example, you may primarily swim in the summers, cycle in the fall, participate in a boot camp in the winter and hike in the spring. These don't have to be the only activities you do for the entire season, but it's good for your body to adapt to a new exercise every few months to optimize fat burning.

4. Fartlek Training -- Funny name but great results! Fartlek means "speed play" in Swedish. This training method is similar to interval training (see above) but the intervals are not measured by time or distance -- they are irregular. For example, race-walk until you feel winded, and then walk until you feel recovered. Then when you are feeling refreshed again, sprint to the corner. Walk slowly to catch your breath and break into a jog again. You increase and decrease your speed (intensity) based on how your body is feeling. Accelerate when you are feeling energetic and then cut back the intensity when you are feeling too exhausted.

5. Cycle Training -- Plan your cardio workouts in phases. For example, for the first week exercise at a lower intensity for 45 to 60 minutes. This will allow you to build your base level of fitness. For the next week, exercise at your highest intensity for 20 to 30 minutes. The following weeks exercise at a moderate intensity for 30 to 45 minutes. You can also have a transition week where you perform light amounts of exercise two to three times weekly for 15 to 25 minutes. This system allows you to maintain a high level of fitness, prevent injury and avoid overtraining. Repeat the sequence beginning the next month.

6. Circuit train -- Perform several cardiovascular exercises in a row for several minutes each. For example, perform each of the following exercises one after the other for two to three minutes each. Step up and down on a step, jog in place, jumping jacks, jog around the perimeter of the room, jump rope, high knee kicks, and jump squats. Rest for several minutes and complete a second or third time. Circuit training is lively and less tedious than some other routines, so people tend to stick with it longer. It's also an efficient calorie burner, increases muscular strength and decreases body fat.

7. Double up on your sessions -- Exercising twice in one day gives you two metabolic boosts. You may be thinking you are having a challenging time fitting in one session, however it is possible and can even be enjoyable. For example, in the morning, engage in a 30-minute boot-camp video. Then go for a 20-minute walk after dinner. Or do a sprint workout on your bike in the morning and then take a 20-minute abs class at lunch. You don't always have to be dripping with sweat to get benefits for a workout. If possible, keep your sneakers handy and take up any opportunity to get in an extra session most days of the week.

Give your cardiovascular conditioning your best effort. With each session strive to work a little harder than the last one. Walking is a great exercise, but eventually you must graduate from your starting level. If you keep walking at the same pace, the same course, the same amount of time and in the same heart rate range, the results will be diminishing. In order to change your body, push your physical limits beyond what you are accustomed to now.

Remember these seven techniques only work if you practice at least one of them consistently. When you have done one for a while, incorporate another fat-burning technique. Do not try to incorporate all of them at once. The complete formula includes first making up your mind to exercise and eat healthy, then working on your meals through eDiets proven plans, followed by exercising your muscles, then performing aerobic motions and finally allowing your body to recover. Cardiovascular conditioning is one important piece of the puzzle. Now take your first step.

eDiets offers 23 different health and fitness programs, including Mayo Clinic Plan. Get started today by clicking here and completing a free personal profile.

Kelli Calabrese, MS, CSCS 2004 Personal Trainer of the Year, is the author of "Feminine Firm & Fit" and is a 20-year fitness industry leader. She is the editor of "Personal Fitness Professional Magazine."

Burn the Fat: How To Repair A Damaged Metabolism

Diet & Body — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 11:48:00 +0000

How To Repair A Damaged Metabolism
By Tom Venuto, NSCA-CPT, CSCS
Burn the Fat, Feed The Muscle

If you've caused metabolic damage as a result of following starvation diets or losing weight too rapidly in the past, it can be extremely difficult to achieve any further fat loss at all. The good news is, metabolic damage can be repaired. All it takes is the right combination of metabolism stimulating exercise and metabolism stimulating nutrition (NOT just a diet), all done consistently over time.

The big irony is that most of the diet programs that claim to help you get rid of excess weight, only end up making it harder for you in the long run because they use harsh metabolism-decreasing diets and not enough exercise (almost never any weight training).

It may take a little longer if you have really messed things up with severe starvation dieting in the past, especially if you've lost a lot of lean body mass, but it is never hopeless. Anyone can increase their metabolism.

Most people get an almost immediate boost in metabolic rate when they start the Burn the Fat, Feed The Muscle program. However, the results are not going to be "overnight." Give it a little time...

Within 3 weeks your metabolism will already be more efficient. Within 6-8 weeks, it's burning hot. Give me 12 weeks of consistent diligent effort, sticking with all the metabolism boosting strategies I teach, and your metabolism really will become like a turbo charged engine, and I'm not exaggerating when I say that.

What’s most important for upping your metabolism is CONSISTENCY in applying the Burn the Fat, Feed The Muscle nutrition and training principles every single day.

That includes:

Meal frequency: eat 5-6 small meals per day
Meal timing: eat approximately every 3 hours, with a substantial breakfast and a substantial post workout meal.
Sufficient Caloric Intake: maintain a small calorie deficit and avoid starvation-level diets (suggested safe levels for fat loss: 2100-2500 calories per day for men, 1400-1800 calories per day for women; adjust as needed)
Food choices: Select natural, unprocessed foods with high thermic effect (lean proteins like chicken, turkey, egg whites and fish are highly thermic, as are all green vegetables, salad vegetables and other fibrous carbs)
Cardio training: Push up the intensity a bit if you really want to get a metabolic boost. Walking and low intensity cardio is fine, but higher intensity is more metabolism-stimulating
Weight training: The basic exercises that include the largest muscle groups or even call into play the entire body as a unit (squats, front squats, split squats, deadlifts, stiff legged deadlifts, overhead presses, all kinds of rows and core-activation exercises) will have a much greater metabolism stimulating effect than isolation exercises (concentration curls, calf raises, etc)

The weight training is extremely important in cases of "metabolic damage" because this is the stimulus to keep the muscle you have and begin rebuilding new muscle tissue, which is the engine that drives your metabolism.

The men don't usually have a problem with the weight training, but I still hear women say they don't want to lift weights as part of their fat loss programs. Well, people who wont lift weights can expect a very, very long metabolism "repair process" if they achieve it at all.

Consistency is the key.

Nothing will undermine the "re-building" of your metabolism like inconsistency. If you stop and start, or skip meals and workouts often, you will not even get off the ground.

After your metabolism is back up where it should be, it takes continued "stoking" of the metabolic furnace to keep it there. Once you get your metabolic engine running, you've got to keep feeding it fuel or the fire will die down.

Picture an old fashioned wood burning stove...

Imagine you're in a cabin up in the mountains in the winter. It's cold in there and you want to keep the cabin warm. Can you achieve this by feeding the fire once or twice per day? Nope. Not enough fuel to burn, so not much heat is generated.

What if you just toss an entire pile of wood in the stove all at once? Will that work? Nope. Lots of fuel, but can't all be used at once... it just smothers the fire and the excess just sits there.

How about if you throw some tissue paper or crumpled newspaper in the stove, will that work? Nope - too quickly burning.

You have to keep putting small amounts of wood (the right type of fuel) on the fire at regular intervals or the fire burns out.

It's also difficult to get the fire lit again. In the case of metabolism, it's like going through that initial few weeks of overcoming inertia all over again.

Your goal is to get your metabolism burning hot and keep it burning and this cannot be achieved by missing meals, missing workouts or with sporadic, infrequent training.

I have only seen a handful of cases where all these things were done properly and there was still a longer "repair" process.

For example, one case was former ballet dancer. At 5' 5", she was previously 110 lbs and had increased to about 145 or so. She didn’t want to reach her previous 110, but find a happy medium of about 125 lbs.

I figured with 20 lbs to cut, this would be a simple and predictable process, but she had a challenging time (and I didn't know why at first).

I later found out that she had been anorexic and bulimic for many years. This had caused a lot of damage, and although she did reach her goal, it took about twice as long as we had anticipated.

The good news is, even in this extreme case, the same nutrition and training principles worked! It just took a little longer. And by the way her program included some serious training with free weights and she ate a lot more (clean) food than she had ever eaten before. No "starvation!"

That’s the power of burning the fat and feeding the muscles... Trying to starve the fat with crash diets is what causes the metabolic damage in the first place!

If you’re interested in the healthy, sensible way to take off the fat, while keeping all your muscle and actually increasing your metabolism in the process, then my Burn the Fat, Feed The Muscle program can teach you how. No gimmicks or false promises. Just the truth - you have to work at it and you have to be patient.

About the Author:

The Rapid Fat Loss Handbook

Diet & Body — Thu, 31 Aug 2006 15:11:00 +0000

"Do you need to lose massive amounts of weight in record time?"

Learn the FASTEST, Most EFFECTIVE way to shed both weight and fat in the shortest time possible

The Rapid Fat Loss Handbook

My name is Lyle McDonald. I'm an exercise physiologist and trainer whose advice has helped thousands lose fat and keep it off.

I'm known in the industry for my no-nonsense, no fluff, no BS approach to nutrition and training for fat loss.

I won't tell you what you want to hear...EVER

I believe in telling people the truth, telling them what they need to hear, even if it means cutting into my bottom line.

For years I've sought out dieting solutions that worked. I use a combination of scientific research, personal experience (and experimentation), along with the feedback I've gotten from clients, trainers, and elite fitness professionals.

The Rapid Fat Loss handbook is one of those solutions.

Now, in an ideal world, I think it would be better if people made small changes to their diet and activity patterns and focused on long-term results. But we don't live in an ideal world; in the real world, there are times when you need results yesterday.

Maybe you need to drop weight fast for a special event, like a class reunion or a wedding.

Or you want to look good in a bathing suit and didn't start your diet and exercise program early enough.

Maybe you are a bodybuilder who has to get in shape and is under a time crunch.

Or an athlete who has to make weight without losing muscle or performance.

Maybe you need to kick start a more moderate diet and simply want some quick results to get things moving.

Or you just want to get your diet over as quickly as possible

That's where the Rapid Fat Loss handbook comes in.

"I purchased Lyle McDonald's Rapid Fat Loss Handbook in hopes of losing a few pounds quickly. The diet did not dissapoint, in just 10 days I lost 7.8 lbs!"

- Mary Ellen, South Carolina

I want you to ask yourself a question: How many other diets have I tried that promised quick easy results? Four, five, ten? If they worked, why are you here?

The simple fact is that any diet that promises you quick easy results is lying to you.

So what am I promising? Quick weight loss? Yes.

Easy weight loss? Well....

I'd be lying to you if I told you that the diet described in my Rapid Fat Loss Handbook is easy.

But it works better than anything else you've ever tried and that's all that matters.

The Rapid Fat Loss Handbook is a complete program that includes

How to know if the Rapid Fat Loss diet is right for you
What you must eat and what you must avoid on the diet
How to simply and easily track your results (this is CRITICAL for fast success)
A step by step method for setting up the diet based on your starting weight, bodyfat percentage and activity levels (you won't need expensive supplements, the diet is based around whole food)
The ONE STEP you must make, when designing your exercise program to maximize results
Why metabolic rate slows when you diet and how to prevent it
Much, much more (keep reading)

"I've been lifting weights for 35 years, been in the medical field for 20 years, have been a critical care nurse for 12 years. I've done most every type of diet. I have never had such an easy time losing so much fat with so little muscle loss in such a short period of time (50 pounds in 2 1/2 months) as I have with Lyle's version of the Protein Sparing Modified Fast. After just one month on the diet, markers of health...blood pressure, resting heart rate, cholesterol, triglycerides, among others...all went from really REALLY horrid to just about perfect. Truly amazing."

- David Cohen, Nevada

No filler, no fluff, no pages of full color supplement ads like other products. Even if you don't use the diet, you'll learn things about human physiology and nutrition that you probably didn't know.

So if you are ready to lose weight in the fastest, most-effective way possible, to shed weight and fat rapidly (and learn how to keep it off), the Rapid Fat Loss Handbook is for you.

The book also includes:

How to cheat on your diet to actually IMPROVE your progress
How to keep the weight off when you’re finished (most diets cause you to REBOUND back up afterwards)
Eight eating guidelines that will let you maintain your bodyweight without counting calories
A five step method of setting up a maintenance diet
How to design an optimal moderate diet

"Your PSMF really put me on the right course. I have gone from 305 to 279 in 74 days. Your no nonsense plan is extremely easy to follow and the best part is....... IT WORKS!!!!! "

- Bill Evans, Delaware

Don't wait another second - the sooner you order this book, the sooner you can start losing weight and fat at a rapid rate.