The First fallacies: is all carbs are not equal and further all calories are not equal. Choose carbs wisely, if you’re preparing for a major performance event; do eat a meal high in fast digesting carbs during the hours prior to the event. This type of carbs will convert to fuel quickly and provide the energy for the event. Otherwise eat carbs mostly from fruits and veggies.
We should keep our carbs at no more than 50% of total calorie consumption. If you go over this amount especially from starchy carbs, you risk changing your metabolism. Your metabolism changes from fat burning to a carb burning system. This change doesn’t occur over night, however the body will adapt to a burn more of what it is fueled.
Second Fallacy: All Fats are bad, if you’ve been paying attention on the past oh 30 years we’ve been told to eat less fat. During that time “Lite” or “Low Fat” and “Fat Free” as inundated our grocery store isles with products labels. However, during this same time Americans have now reached the epidemic state of overweightness. How can this be? It’s because most people eat more sugar than they’re aware; these same groceries stores are packed with foods that are JUNK.
Harvard researchers found that men, who ate 20% of their calories from monounsaturated fatty acids (MUFAs), dropped 11 lbs over an 18 month period. Truth about fat, as your body’s physical conditioning improves you become better able to burn fat. Healthy fats do not make you fat. Contrary to a diet high in starchy carbs, which when eaten in excess will store as fat. So choose good fats with all your meals like almonds, avocado and olive oil, and the occasional chocolate dark that is.
Third Fallacy: It’s easier to lose weight if you miss breakfast. Although, less than 1/2 of the population eat breakfast and you can bet a lot smaller percentage actually eat a decent breakfast according to recent studies. Breakfast is probably the # 1 fat burning metabolism starter of all. Without a decent breakfast you quickly descend into energy deficit, which makes you poise for a binge attack later. And reduces your calorie burning metabolism, so when you do consume calories they are more like to store as fat. Research shows that people who skip breakfast are 4 1/2 time more like to be or become overweight.
Because you have your entire day ahead, consume approximately 25% of your total daily calories for this 1st meal. Oh and don’t skip the fiber. Fiber actually helps you burn 2 times as much fat during your workout.
Fourth Fallacy: Age doesn’t matter with respect to calorie consumption. Here is what we need to consider to breakdown this fallacy. Muscle is what powers your metabolism, therefore the more muscle you have the more calories you’ll burn, while relaxing and certainly during exercise. The older we get we lose muscle and gain fat. While weight training and cardio will help reduce these loses, diet can a play bigger role than was previously thought.
As we age our kidney functions changes as well, blood becomes more acidic and we excrete nitrogen (an essential component of muscle anabolism) faster than we take it in. Basically, we begin to pee away our muscles and with this net loss of nitrogen our ability to develop or maintain muscle is drastically diminished.
Therefore we need to reverse these affects by increasing the alkalinity of our blood. We can do this by supplementing our diets with Acid Zappers or by eating foods which increase alkaline. Foods like fruits and veggies. If we consume the majority of our carbs from fruits and veggies we can maintain our muscle mass and boost our metabolism.
When planning what to eat, use this simple example as a measure of both how much to eat and how frequently. Eat only when you’re hungry and eat about every 3 to 4 hours. If you’re not hungry in 3 hours then your previous meal was too big. Reduce the portion size, so that hunger begins at roughly 3 hours past the last meal. With a little trial and error, you’re on way to improving your physical performance and aesthetic appeal.
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