Tips to lose fat and get lean: Lift weights
Lifting weights builds muscle, I am sure that I don’t need to convince you of this fact. What may be less obvious to you is how muscles are such an important part of long term, successful fat loss.
There are various calculations / estimates concerning how important muscles are to your metabolism. Some will say that 1lb of muscle equates to an extra 20 calories a day onto your metabolism, others will say it is as little as a measly 5 calories. This is one case where I feel that real world experience wins out above all else. I have seen an additional 10lbs of muscle gained literally transform a metabolism and add what would seem like an absolute minimum of 500 calories to the daily metabolic rate (adding up to a whopping 3,500 calories a week!). Others are not so lucky though, and even 20lbs more of lean muscular tissue can barely add even a 100 calories per day.
There are two things to take into consideration here –
1) You don’t know how much better your metabolism will be unless you try to add muscle to your body, and;
2) As nice as adding a little extra muscle might be, even more fundamental to long term fat loss is maintaining your existing muscle mass. Countless studies have proved irrefutably that losing even a few lbs of muscle will send your body crashing into what can simplistically be referred to as “famine mode”, causing thyroid levels to plummet and meaning that your body will inevitably rebound badly once you stop your current state of calorie restriction.
The facts are clear – 98% of all diets fail within 6 months because the dieter regain all (and often more) of the weight lost on the diets themselves. Don’t short change your long term fat loss health goals – be smart and lift weights, even two 30 minute a week sessions will make a huge difference.