Weight Loss: Eat MORE fat to Melt off the Bodyfat???
Eat Fat to Melt off the Fat?
There is no question about it; low fat diets work, but are not without problems. While dietary fat intake does have a more direct pathway for storage (.i.e. body fat), all that really matters at the end of the day is how many total calories we have eaten. Fat loss is actually a very simple equation: (energy intake) - (energy expenditure) = (weight loss or gain). While there are many other factors, at the end of the day this is all that matters. Our body fat stores are analogous to a bank account- we are constantly making deposits and withdrawals on a continual basis- deposit more than we withdraw and we gain fat, withdraw more than we deposit and we loose fat. Of course, if it were actually this simple I'm sure a couple of questions come to mind:
1. If all that matters for weight loss from a diet is calorie intake, than why do most diets fail?
2. Where the hell does dietary fat intake come in?
Most weight loss diets fail not because of a lack of adherence to the weight loss diet but from the nature of the diet itself. We have been brain-washed by the "low fat" craze in the media to eat a low fat diet to burn off the extra body fat. This type of weight loss diet is not suited for all people. Many people who have problems losing weight on a weight loss diet fail to do so not because of calorie intake according to the equation above, but from storing those calories in the wrong place (i.e. bodyfat). So we are really dealing with a calorie storage problem, rather than a calorie intake problem. Low fat diets tend to consist of higher proportions of carbohydrates, many of which are typically high glycemic index (GI for short). These high GI carbohydrates tend digest more quickly, raising blood sugar more rapidly and to higher overall levels. This is where insulin comes in.
Insulin's job is as a storage hormone; it is released by the pancreas in response to an increase in blood sugar and acts by transporting the sugar, in the form of glucose, into muscle cells to be stored as glycogen (good!) or fat cells to be converted to triglyceride and stored as body fat (bad!). Under ideal circumstances, the muscle cells will preferentially take up glucose compared to body fat. With a high-carbohydrate diet however, blood sugar tends to rise quickly followed by a massive increase in insulin. Insulin basically desensitizes the muscle cells to the action of insulin; when muscle insulin sensitivity decreases, more and more of that blood glucose gets shuttled into the body fat stores. When people start on a weight loss diet they are typically out of shape and carrying a higher level of body fat; under these conditions muscle-cell insulin sensitivity is down, hence the “storage problem”. Even at a reduced calorie level more energy is being diverted into body fat relative to muscle tissue- the body is basically feeding the body fat and starving the muscles! A high-carbohydrate diet, for this reason, can actually encourage muscle loss in those who choose to follow this type of low fat/high carb diet. These people may even be able to sustain a decent amount of weight loss at first, but the weight loss is not ideal; body fat either increases or stays the same at the expense of hard-earned muscle tissue.
There is a simple solution to this problem- read on to find out how to finally lose the fat and build muscle!
There is no question about it; low fat diets work, but are not without problems. While dietary fat intake does have a more direct pathway for storage (.i.e. body fat), all that really matters at the end of the day is how many total calories we have eaten. Fat loss is actually a very simple equation: (energy intake) - (energy expenditure) = (weight loss or gain). While there are many other factors, at the end of the day this is all that matters. Our body fat stores are analogous to a bank account- we are constantly making deposits and withdrawals on a continual basis- deposit more than we withdraw and we gain fat, withdraw more than we deposit and we loose fat. Of course, if it were actually this simple I'm sure a couple of questions come to mind:
1. If all that matters for weight loss from a diet is calorie intake, than why do most diets fail?
2. Where the hell does dietary fat intake come in?
Most weight loss diets fail not because of a lack of adherence to the weight loss diet but from the nature of the diet itself. We have been brain-washed by the "low fat" craze in the media to eat a low fat diet to burn off the extra body fat. This type of weight loss diet is not suited for all people. Many people who have problems losing weight on a weight loss diet fail to do so not because of calorie intake according to the equation above, but from storing those calories in the wrong place (i.e. bodyfat). So we are really dealing with a calorie storage problem, rather than a calorie intake problem. Low fat diets tend to consist of higher proportions of carbohydrates, many of which are typically high glycemic index (GI for short). These high GI carbohydrates tend digest more quickly, raising blood sugar more rapidly and to higher overall levels. This is where insulin comes in.
Insulin's job is as a storage hormone; it is released by the pancreas in response to an increase in blood sugar and acts by transporting the sugar, in the form of glucose, into muscle cells to be stored as glycogen (good!) or fat cells to be converted to triglyceride and stored as body fat (bad!). Under ideal circumstances, the muscle cells will preferentially take up glucose compared to body fat. With a high-carbohydrate diet however, blood sugar tends to rise quickly followed by a massive increase in insulin. Insulin basically desensitizes the muscle cells to the action of insulin; when muscle insulin sensitivity decreases, more and more of that blood glucose gets shuttled into the body fat stores. When people start on a weight loss diet they are typically out of shape and carrying a higher level of body fat; under these conditions muscle-cell insulin sensitivity is down, hence the “storage problem”. Even at a reduced calorie level more energy is being diverted into body fat relative to muscle tissue- the body is basically feeding the body fat and starving the muscles! A high-carbohydrate diet, for this reason, can actually
There is a simple solution to this problem- read on to find out how to finally lose the fat and build muscle!
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