Shredding

Thanks to Charlotte (and the rest of Twitter it would seem. I'm never one to pass by a bandwagon) I ordered me a copy of Jillian Michaels' 30 Day Shred last week.

Now, usually I'm not in to fitness DVDs. I run, cycle, and go to the gym so have never really had a place for them in my life. Plus, as much as it hurts, I like the feeling of pushing myself hard and really getting my sweat on. In my experience, many commercial DVDs don't give you this experience.

...Until I found this one. There are 3 levels and each level consists of 3 circuits; 3 minutes strength, 2 minutes cardio and 1 minute abs. So all in all (not counting the warm up/cool down) it's a workout in under 20 minutes.

Now, 20 minutes may not seem like enough to get results but done right, you can torch as many calories as you would in a longer, slower workout and you'll also get the 'afterburn' effect, where you go on burning calories even after you've stopped.

So, how does it work?

1. Circuit training is one of the most efficient forms of exercise. By combining strength and cardio, with minimal rest, you maintain a higher heart rate throughout the workout, meaning...

2. ...It's intense. High intensity yields a greater calorie expenditure and resulting fat burn.

3.You get a full body workout. By combining upper and lower body exercises, you train your entire body and man, do you feel it the next day.

4. Because it's so fast paced, you're less likely to get bored. You've just about got enough time to think about finishing your star jumps without whacking the dog in the face (just me? Ok, then) and before you know it it's over and you're on to the next thing

5. You can really push hard. Which is the point. Each exercise only lasts about a minute so you can really get your head down and go for it knowing it'll be over soon.

6. You don't need much space. This was a MAJOR selling point for me as our living room is so teeny. No space for grapevines in our house, no siree. No complicated choreography means on the spot jumping around. It's all good.

So, if you're short on time, want to lose a few inches and aren't afraid to work hard, this could be for you.

Have any of you tried it? I'd love to hear your experiences if you have :)

Lift weight to lose weight

Yep, thats right. If you want to lose weight(well, inches/fat but for the sake of this post let’s call it weight loss as we’re all familiar with the term) you need to lift weights. Resistance training is key to a successful, and more importantly sustainable loss.

Lets have a think about metabolism. So your metabolism determines the amount of calories your body uses as fuel. The faster your metabolism, the greater the calorie burn, the slower it is, the smaller the burn. With me so far?

Ok, now your muscles burn more calories than fat so the greater the muscle mass, the greater number of calories your body requires just to function on a daily basis. According to the American Council on Exercise, maintaining 1lb of fat uses 2-3 calories per day. The same findings show that 1lb of muscle burns up to 10 calories a day so you don’t have to be a maths whizz to work out that if you replace fat with muscle* you’ll burn more calories a day.

We all know that cardiovascular exercise increases calorie burn, right? So you go for a 30 minute run, burn about 300 calories, job done, and your metabolism returns to it’s normal rate. Now, how about a weights workout? Granted your calorie expentiture during the session will be less but the magic of resisitance training is that because your body needs extra time to recover (you know that achy feeling you get after weights? That) your metabolism is elevated even after you’ve hit the shower and gone home. Experts estimate this can be up to 39 hours post-workout!

Before you say ‘but I don’t want to bulk up!’…you won’t. Any bodybuilder will tell you it’s not easy to build muscle mass and often means very structured regimes, carefully planned nutrition and alot of discipline. By adding 2 or 3 resisitance training workouts to your week, you can start to replace lost fat with muscle and look forward to a leaner, more defined shape without added bulk.

Thanks to this greater muscle mass, and your new improved (increased) metabolism, you’ll be burning more calories at rest, not just when you exercise. Using more calories as you sleep? Sounds amazing. This makes for a sustainable loss. Carry on with the weights, and as long as your diet remains the same (i.e. not consuming more calories than you burn) you’ll avoid piling the weight back on, a common pitfall of many a dieter.

So what are you wating for? Grab a set of dumbbells, hit the deck for a set of press ups or get squatting to become a lean, mean** calorie burining machine.

* I’m talking losing fat and gaining muscle. Fat doesnt turn to mucle and vice versa, another common myth debunked right there.
** Perhaps not mean, you can still be nice even with muscles

The REAL way to lose weight

I've been going a bit mad with the old exercise mags at the moment. Most of them are great (I'm looking at you, Womens Health and Ultrafit) and promote a sensible diet and give really useful advice on exercise which you can actually follow. They also use fitness models, people who granted, have little body fat but also look strong, defined and well, healthy.

At the train station this weekend I picked up a magazine with 'fitness' in the title, thinking it would be similar to the ones mentioned above. Nu-uh, skinny malinki models with bad form pictured doing the exercises and a feature on detox diets.

So people detox to 'give their body a break'. From what? Eating meat and grains, the very thing our bodies are designed to do? If you eat a healthy, balanced diet you don't need to detox. Want to know why these 'diets' work? Because they involve the consumption of very little calories. When you hardly eat, you lose weight. Who knew?

Our bodies need a minimum amount of calories to function. To keep our heart beating, organs working and brain functioning. If we don't get these calories from food, we go into 'starvation mode'. Because this energy is so important, our bodies actually cling to the fat stores (to keep as an energy reserve as it thinks it's not getting any from food) and instead burn muscle.

Let me tell you about muscle. It is active tissue and acts as a metabolic engine room. It burns calories, even at rest (unlike fat) so the more we have, the more calories we burn throughout the day. Sounds good, yes? Now, imagine what happens if you lose this muscle mass due to extreme calorie deficit? Yep, your metabolism plummets and your body actually uses less calories than before. This here is the very reason why people often put on more weight when they return to normal eating after a fad diet.

So with all these faddy diets, the only reason they work is that you're creating a massive calorie deficit. Nothing more to it I'm afraid. No science, no miracle solution.

The only way to lose fat is to burn more calories than you consume. 1lb of fat equates to 3500 calories. As a rule of thumb, you shouldn't go below 1200 calories a day to avoid 'starvation mode'. Reduce your calorie intake by 500 per day (as long as it doesn't take you below the 1200) and you could lose 1lb a week.

Better still, add in some exercise and your body will burn more calories, resulting in greater fat loss. A steady loss is advisable, no more than 2lbs a week for a sustainable loss.

Even better again is to add strength training to your regime to give your metabolism a boost so even after exercise your calorie burn will be elevated, burining more calories as you work, eat your dinner and sleep. No, you won't bulk up. Any bodybuilder will tell you how hard it is to build muscle mass, these guys work incredibly hard and nutrition plays a huge role.

So pardon my rant but the bottom line is fad diets? Don't do it. Eat sensibly, stay active and be patient and you'll get proper results which stay with you.