Hey gang!!

I just finished getting jiggy with my weight stack.

And while I got my workout done I also did some thinking.

I started thinking about some of the processes I had to go through in order to become the dedicated nutrition and fitness buff that I am now.

And one of my tactics that I’d kinda forgotten about came to mind.

It’s kind of an ‘outside of the box’ tactic, and I’m thinking it might help you, too.

So of course, I have to share:

So? What do you think?

Does breaking it down to the “physical” make things any easier?

Or did I just manage to confuse the heck out of you?

I hope it’s the former, cuz it really did work very well for me when I needed it.

Hope it works for you, too.

Have a fit, fun and fantastic day.
Girlwithnoname

ps. if you still haven’t gotten on the “Hot at Home” Early Birds List, get at it before I close it to give my Early Birds and Inner Sanctum members first crack at it for cheaper. Go here:

(… and I ain’t jokin’ here. I’m only doing this SPECIAL pre-release ONCE, especially for my loyal friends and viewers ONLY … after I close the Early Birds sign-up, it’s closed forever. Just sayin’…)

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Saw something today …

… it was something that made my blood boil a little …

… AND it made me really believe that you get what you work for.

And some people get what they deserve.

Whether its the result of lots of work…

… or the result of NO work.

Get to WORK! Get RESULTS.

Don’t do the work … don’t expect results.

Simple as that.

Have a fit, fun and fantastic day.
Girlwithnoname

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Should Anything Other Than Hunger Be A Reason To Eat?

There’s a lot of confusing information out there these days. Especially when it comes to the subject of weight loss, dieting and getting slim.

Many who decide to get themselves on to the path to a better body find themselves snowed under with advice about meal timing, how much to eat, what kinds of foods to eat, when to eat which foods, and how much of each kind of food to eat.

Tell me you haven’t heard one or all of these little gems of advice:

Don’t skip breakfast or your metabolism will be slow all day.

Eat every 3 hours, to keep your metabolism racing.

Don’t eat only two or three meals each day, eat five or six (also in order to keep your metabolism fast).

Don’t eat right before bed or your body can’t process it and it will just turn to fat overnight.

Don’t eat for several hours before bed (for the same reason).

Make sure you eat before you work out so you have energy.

Eat (or drink) carbs after you work out to replace glycogen in your muscles.

Eat protein after you work out to help build muscle.

Don’t bother with food, you can get all the nutrition you need from this one handy shake.

Sigh … Oh Brother! No wonder everyone’s so darned confused, right?

Then add to the mix these special ones that make me absolutely crazy:

Take this magic pill and your metabolism will be so high your fat will just melt right off with no working out and no dieting.

Try this magic contraption where you can just hook up to a bunch of electrodes or sit on our vibrating machine and watch TV while burning fat with NO EFFORT and no special calorie restrictions!!

ALRIGHT, WAIT! STOP!

Isn’t this getting just a little bit ridiculous?

Sure there might be a tiny nugget of truth behind each and every single one of these theories (except the last two, those are outright scams), but the absolute truth is that when trying to lose weight, it comes down to one thing and one thing only:

Your “Calories In” must be lower than your “Calories Out”.

In other words, the calories you consume while eating must be less than your body needs in order to live, breathe, sleep, brush your teeth, work out and all the other things you do during your days.

The truth of the matter is, that it really doesn’t matter when you eat, or what you eat or when you eat what, or what kinds of foods you combine or how many times of the day you eat, or if your meals are large or small.

All that really matters is that your body has less calories to burn on its daily functions than you are giving it. Then it has no choice but to get its energy from your fat stores.

So, if you are eating when you aren’t hungry based on one or more of the advices above, stop immediately.

Only eat when you are hungry.

Why add calories to your daily allotment that you don’t even feel the need for? That’s completely counter-intuitive to the goal, right?

Eat when hungry and not otherwise, and keep your calories consumed lower than your calories burned. End of story.

The best bet is to figure out what the caloric range is for your body type, age, fitness level and weight loss goals are and then eat approximately 300 – 500 calories less than that each day … or 2,100 – 3,500 less than that per week.

As you go forward pursuing your weight loss goals, go ahead and eat what you want, when you want. But remember the magic formula:

Calories In < Calories Out = Weight Loss Success

And btw, a lot more about these statements can be found in Brad Pilon’s book “Eat Stop Eat“.

Do you REALLY think that not eating certain things at certain times will cause massive metabolism crashes and make you fat?

Did you consider these claims might actually just be ‘scare tactics’ designed by health and fitness marketers to get you to buy their product?

Did you know that real truth might actually be the OPPOSITE of that?

Find out the real truths from Brad. This guy KNOWS what he’s talking about and he has the real world experience AND education to back it up.

Hey, this guy used to work for the supplement companies. He knows what’s a scare tactic and what’s the truth. And he’ll tell you, straight up.

And besides all that, the practice of Intermittent Fasting is a GREAT and EFFECTIVE way to keep your “Calories In” lower than your “Calories Out”.

I practice it myself… all the time. And I’ve never experienced one of those evil “Metabolic Slowdowns“.

What it does for ME, is get my calories back in check, especially when real life gets in the way or a special event has tipped my calories up a bit too high for the day.

Brad Pilon dispels the myths surrounding meal timing and other fallacies then outlines the benefits of Intermittent Fasting in his book Eat Stop Eat.

Click here to check it out ==> “Eat Stop Eat” by Brad Pilon

Have a fit, fun and fantastic day.
Girlwithnoname
ps. You really want your metabolism to stay cranked to the max? Work out often and work out hard. Build muscle and commit to being active. Hey, it’s the truth …

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Hey Gang!! I’m having a bit of a hectic week this week, so my good friend and fellow fitness fanatic Vaclav Gregor is gonna help me out today!!

Vaclav has some pretty important stuff to share with you here, so pay attention, ya hear?

Are you one of those people that has lofty goals for fat loss or muscle building and doesn’t mind spending money hand over fist on supplements in your quest for your perfect body?

Are they helping you reach your goals?

Are you sure?

Or is it all in your head (while it empties your wallet) ?

Have a look at what Vaclav has to say, cuz I’m here to tell you he’s BANG ON!

For those that didn’t know all this, it’s valuable info. For those of us who already know, it’s a timely reminder. Thanks Vaclav!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Secrets of Supplement Companies Revealed
written by Vaclav Gregor, Muscle Pyramid

People in the fitness community (and especially guys) are obsessed with supplements.

Pre-workout, post-workout, fat-burner, creatine, BCAA, Gainer, etc etc.

They want to know if whey protein is better than casein protein or amino acids, they also want to know if creatine monohydrate is better than other types of creatine like ethyl ester or whatever.

Once I overheard one young bodybuilder saying that supplements are the most important thing in bodybuilding.

At that time I believed him.

Now I know that I made a mistake, which cost me a few hundred dollars spent on useless supplements.

And now I’m also aware of the fact that in that time the most important thing for this bodybuilder became his little friends called anabolic steroids.

I want you to learn from my mistakes.

Today I’m going to show you which supplements you should take and which not. I will also reveal to you from which three major ingredients 99% of all supplements are primarily made from. And  much more.

So let’s dive in.

How much money do they make by packaging protein?

If you walked into a supplement shop you will see dozens of products which you can choose from.

They will have amino acids, proteins, creatine supplements, N.O. supplements, pre and post workout supplements.

There will be different brands and different types of these supplements and after a while you will get lost among them. At least until the moment until some attractive girl or big guy starts explaining to you what exactly you “need” to get ripped and as a result you will walk away with hands full of supplements that you don’t even know what are they made from or when you should take them.

There was a survey I saw a couple of months ago. About 74% of all questioned guys declared that they spent about 2-3 times more money when they first visited the shop with supplements than they expected or wanted to. I’m not sure where I saw this report, but I think that the results are quite astonishing.

The supplement industry is truly one of the best businesses to be in. You can make a lot of money.

How much do you currently pay for supplements every month?

Is it 100 bucks, 200 bucks, or even more?

What do you get in return?

Do you really get results?

According to Natural Products Foundation the supplement industry contributes to the U.S economy more than 60 Billion dollars. I don’t think that anybody can even imagine how much money that is.

Just think for a while, how much money they make just by packaging protein and other stuff.

If you still think that supplements are magic pills that will give you 30 pounds of muscle, look at that figure again.

No matter what the claims tell you, you just can’t gain 30 pounds of pure muscle. Most natural bodybuilders won’t gain this amount of muscles in their whole life! So it’s really silly to believe that you can gain so much in just a couple of months.

The Three 60-Billion-Dollar Ingredients

If we take away vitamins and crap like fat burners you will be left with wide range of muscle building stimulants. They mostly consist of three key ingredients.

Those ingredients are: Protein, Caffeine and Creatine.

These are the “magic formula” ingredients. Everything else is just marketing hype.

Let me show you what I mean.

Here we have some N.O. supplement. I apologize, but of course I can’t say the name of the brand here.

First what should you expect from it?

Here are the benefits listed on the cover of this product:

• Doesn’t leave you feeling bloated or stuffed; great for several-times-daily use
• Natural energizer
• Multi-Functional A.M.-P.M. Protein Blend: ultra-premium quality proteins + digestive enzymes
• Packed with BCAAs (for nitrogen balance), Glutamine Peptides (recovery, immune system), MCTs (fast energy) and fiber
• Longer & Stronger Workouts
• “Ridiculously delicious” shakes that make dieting easy and enjoyable

So … Look at item #2 … “energizer” right? What do you think that it consists of?

You don’t have to guess here’s the list:

Arginine Alpha-Ketoglutarate, Creatine Monohydrate, Beta Alanine, Caffeine, 1,3-Dimethylamylamine (Geranium [Stem], Shizandrol A), Citric Acid, Natural Lemon-Lime Flavor, Acesulfame-K, Sucralose, Vegetable Stearate, Silicon Dioxide, Chlorophyll (For Coloring).

That’s right …

Creatine Monohydrate and Caffeine.

Do you really think that you get that energy from some Arginine Alpha-Ketoglutarate?

Of course not, you get it from the caffeine.

Wake up!

Supplement companies sell protein, creatine and caffeine.

If you they want to make a product that gives you more energy they just add caffeine into it.

And what about creatine?

This is the ingredient that you will find in every supplement that promotes muscle gain.

Why? Because it’s the only supplement that has ever been proven to work.

That’s right, there’s no scientific proof that protein helps with muscle growth.

That’s because protein is a macronutrient that is used as a building block for your muscle development. But it doesn’t make your muscle bigger by itself! You need to work out to make them bigger.

Once you are working out, the muscles start to develop, because they need to handle that stress next time you hit the gym. And here’s where the protein comes into game. However, this doesn’t mean that by extensive protein intake your muscles will be bigger, got it?

So when they are making supplements that claim to give you muscle growth, they just add creatine monohydrate and that’s it.

99% of supplements are useless.

The only thing you need is creatine monohydrate. 5-10 grams per day, but the rest of the 98% of the work you have to do is in the gym anyway.

If you don’t eat around 80 grams of protein per day you can choose to add in a protein supplement to your diet, but I don’t think that you really need to supplement protein.

Protein is almost in every food. Even broccoli consists of protein.  So, I wouldn’t worry about that one. Creatine should be enough, if you want to be sure, do the math. Just please don’t get tricked into some night proteins and other gimmicks.

Things that supplements and steroids have in common.

There’s something that you should know. That supplements are recommended and even promoted by people who are on drugs. The way it works is that the company hires somebody to promote their product; this could be a fitness model or a bodybuilder. However, there is one little problem with it and this one is crucial.

If you look at the claims you could easily end up thinking that they are promoting some drugs like steroids. Well, they are not; they promote simple things like protein and creatine.

Supplements are marketed like steroids and promoted by spokespeople who are actually on steroids. This is something that you won’t probably find in the bodybuilding & fitness magazines, right?

How the hell they can claim such a thing, when results like this can only be achieved with drugs? Answer is simple: there just is not enough regulation, so they can say whatever they like.

On the cover you will find a big muscular guy saying: “Buy this and you will look like me in 6 weeks”. Sure you will.

Example would be Christian Boeving. He was asked what he thinks about people that buy the supplements he promotes:

I think you get the picture now.

So this would be everything you need to know when you read statements like: “Proven by bodybuilders”.

If this scared you a little bit and now you are worrying if it’s even possible to gain muscles naturally, I can assure you it certainly is.

You just need to do the hard work in the gym and not expect to transform into a fitness model in 6 weeks by taking supplements.

Because there’s simply no magic pill that you can take to get in shape. At least not yet.

I wish you good luck with your fitness goals, work hard and stay consistent.

Vaclav Gregor
Founder, Muscle Pyramid

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Thanks Vaclav!! That was VERY informative, indeed. We appreciate you sharing your viewpoint and your knowledge.

If you liked what Vaclav had to say in this post, feel free to check out his own blog here: The Muscle Pyramid Blog

While You’re Here, Check Out the “Anabolic Cooking For Muscle Gain” Cookbook:

Have a fit, fun and fantastic day.
Girlwithnoname

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I have a pet peeve.

It’s a pretty big one.

Wanna know what it is?

Well, since you asked, I’ll tell you.

It’s people that ask me how to do something (like get as fit and lean as I am, for instance), then respond in the middle of my explanation with “Yah, but … (insert ‘excuse of the day’ here).”

GROWL !!!

“Yah, but …”

Another way of saying “I hear you but I want you to tell me how to do it AND let me have all my bad habits, too …”

LISTEN UP !!

Those of us who CARE about our goals and are COMMITTED to getting them don’t make excuses.

We don’t say “Yah, but …”

Sure, maybe we don’t WANT to work out every day. Maybe we don’t WANT to eat broccoli instead of ice cream …

But we shut up and we DO IT ANYWAY.

We know that “Yah, but…” doesn’t get us ANYWHERE, and certainly doesn’t help us reach our goals.

Alright. Did you recognize yourself in that little diatribe?

Do you find yourself saying “Yah, but…” a lot?

Does it usually sound like this: “Yah, but I don’t know HOW to cook or eat for fat loss and muscle gain” ?!

Well, you’re in luck because I have the EXACT RESOURCE YOU NEED to learn how …

“Anabolic Cooking – The Cookbook” by my friend “The Muscle Cook” Dave Ruel will teach you everything you need to know about cooking for optimum fat loss and muscle building.

Hundreds of Delicious, Nutritious, Healthy, Fat Loss and Muscle Building Recipes.

C’mon! What else do you need in a cookbook anyway?

Grab your copy right now, and get started creating healthy, nutritious and DELICIOUS dishes to help you REACH your goals (not sabotage them).

==> Get “ANABOLIC COOKING” Here

Have a fit, fun and fantastic day.
Girlwithnoname

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In my last post “Healthy Eating: “Busy” Is No Excuse” I quickly mentioned a cool resource that I recently discovered:

The “Anabolic Cooking” Cookbook by Dave Ruel (who is also known as “The Muscle Cook”).

In fact, even though I’d only taken a cursory glance through it and it looked pretty good during that glance, I was SO excited about my new discovery that I wanted to make sure you knew about right away.

Well, since then I’ve taken a more extensive look through the book and the other goodies you get with it and tried a few of the recipes.

So? Is it really as good as I initially thought at first?

What’s the real truth about this cookbook, now that I’ve had a chance to analyze the heck out of it (like I’m known to do with stuff like this)??

What’s good about it?

WHAT’S WRONG WITH IT?

I’m gonna tell you everything you need to know before you head out and grab a copy for yourself …

… but if you need a sneak peek, I’ll tell you this much before you watch the video:

Yes, there’s a couple of things I find frustrating about it. But that shouldn’t stop you from checking it out.

None of it is insurmountable and if Fat Loss or Muscle Gain (or both) is your goal, then this is a “must have” nutrition resource.

Here’s the what you can expect once you’ve got yourself a copy of “Anabolic Cooking – The Cookbook” :

Alright, so now you know everything you need to know. What more is there to ponder?

Hundreds of Delicious, Nutritious, Healthy, Fat Loss and Muscle Building Recipes.

C’mon! What else do you need in a cookbook anyway? Grab your copy right now, and get cooking.

==> Anabolic Cooking – The Cookbook … by “The Muscle Cook” Dave Ruel

Have a fit, fun and fantastic day.
Girlwithnoname

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Wow!! What a way to start the week!!

Are you ready for this? (of course you are, I warned you last week this was coming, but that doesn’t make it any LESS exciting, does it?)

Anyway, I got Brad Pilon, author of the controversial nutrition and weight loss program “Eat Stop Eat” on the phone over the weekend and of course I hit the ‘record’ button as soon as he said hello …

This is an EXTREMELY informative interview and Brad blows the lid off a BUNCH of commonly held myths and misperceptions about metabolism, muscle loss, weight loss in general, and a ton of other stuff.

If you want to simplify your weight loss or weight maintenance program, this really IS a “MUST HEAR” event … and possibly my most controversial interview to date.

So tune in now and find out what’s raising eyebrows:

What did I tell you? Crazy stuff, eh?

Did we just blow every single one of your fondly held beliefs out of the water? Well, good! Cuz this is stuff YOU NEEDED TO KNOW!

Here’s where to grab your copy of Brad Pilon’s Eat Stop Eat to learn ALL the interesting and “RELEVANT-TO-WEIGHT-LOSS” facts about Intermittent Fasting plus learn the strategies of how to do it EFFECTIVELY for yourself:

==> Eat Stop Eat by Brad Pilon

(if you don’t feel like listening all the way thru the video that autoplays on the site, there’s a nifty little “Order Now” link all the way at the bottom of the page you can just click on to skip straight to getting the goods)

Phew!! That was awesome and I’m spent!! I hope you enjoyed that as much as I did!!

So, enjoy reading Eat Stop Eat and finding out how Intermittent Fasting can work for you.

Always a pleasure talking to you Brad, thanks again!

Have a fit, fun and fantastic day!
Girlwithnoname

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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Hi everyone! How’s it going today?

My “3am feedings” got me thinking the other day so I thought I’d share with you my thoughts on fat loss and eating late at night.

Is it really a bad thing?

Meh.

Check it out:

** Don’t forget, if you’re having a hard time keeping those New Years Resolutions, head over to my Online Fitness Coaching page and sign up. **

I’ve been known to beat those New Years Resolutions down and leave them whimpering in the corner. If ya need help, just let me know.

Here’s today’s Workout Song of the Day.

It’s great for cardio.

Just a great fast, weird, fun song! Nothing else. And sometimes that’s all ya need to really grind one out, right?

Enjoy!

Yello – Bostich

Don’t forget, if ya love it Amazon can set you up in the click or two of a mouse. Just click on the Buy button on the player widget and you’ll have it in no time.

Have a fun, fit and fantastic day.
Girlwithnoname

ps. don’t forget I’m starting a new series for anyone who signs up for my Inner Sanctum newsletter. I’m pouring out my heart about who I was before I decided to get super-fit (and trust me, some of it ain’t pretty) … plus how I found my resolve to get in shape. Sign up over at the top of the sidebar if you haven’t yet (and enjoy a free report from Tom Venuto, one of my favourite guys).

]]> http://www.girlwithnoname.com/2010/01/calories-in-vs-calories-out/feed/ 2 http://www.girlwithnoname.com/2009/05/tom-venuto-wisdom/ http://www.girlwithnoname.com/2009/05/tom-venuto-wisdom/#comments Sun, 10 May 2009 19:57:07 +0000 Girlwithnoname http://www.girlwithnoname.com/?p=825

Hey you guys… I found a fantastic article written by Tom Venuto. Give it a read and you’ll see why I’m so hyped up on his fantastic book. He knows what he’s talking about and he speaks the truth!

The 2 Pounds Per Week Rule and How to Burn Fat Faster
By Tom Venuto
www.BurnTheFat.com

Why do you always hear that 2 pounds per week is the maximum amount of fat you should safely lose? If you train really hard while watching calories closely shouldn’t you be able to lose more fat without losing muscle or damaging your health? What if you want to lose fat faster? How do you explain the fast weight losses on The Biggest Loser? These are all good questions that I’ve been asked many times. With the diet marketplace being flooded every day with rapid weight loss claims, these questions desperately need and deserve some honest answers. Want to know where that 2 pounds per week rule comes from and what it really takes to burn more than 2 pounds of fat per week? Read on.

Why Only 2 Pounds Per Week?

The truth is, two pounds is not the maximum amount you can safely lose in a week. That’s only a general recommendation and a good benchmark for setting weekly goals. It’s also sensible and realistic because it’s based on average or typical results.

The actual amount of fat you can lose depends on many factors. For example, weight losses tend to be relative to body size. The more body fat you carry, the more likely you’ll be able to safely lose more than two pounds per week. Therefore, we could individualize our weekly guideline a bit by recommending a goal of 1-2 lbs of fat loss per week or up to 1% of your total weight. If you weighed 300 lbs, that would be 3 lbs per week.

Body Weight Vs Body Composition

Weight loss is somewhat meaningless unless you also talk about body composition; the fat to muscle ratio, as well as water weight. Ask any wrestler about fast weight loss and he’ll tell you things like, “I cut 10 lbs overnight to make a weight class. It was easy – I just sweated it off.”

You’ve also probably seen people that went on some extreme induction program or a lemon juice and water fast for the first week and dropped an enormous amount of weight. But once again, you can bet that a lot of that weight was water and lean tissue and in both cases, you can bet that those people put the weight right back on.

The main potential advantage of any type of induction period for rapid weight loss in the first week is that a large drop on the scale is a motivational boost for many people (even if it is mostly water weight).

Why do you hear so many diet and fitness professionals insist on 2 lbs a week max? Where does that number come from? Well, aside from the fact that it’s a recommendation in government health guidelines and in position statements of most nutrition and exercise organizations, it’s just math. The math is based on what’s practical given the number of calories an average person burns in a day and how much food someone can reasonably cut in a day.

How Do You Lose More Than 2 Pounds Per Week?

Can you lose more than 2 lbs of pure fat in a week? Yes, although it’s easier in the beginning. It gets harder as your diet progresses. How do you do it? My rule is, extraordinary results require extraordinary efforts. An extraordinary effort means a particularly strict diet, as well as burning more calories through training because you can only cut your calories so far from food before you’re starving and suffering from severe hunger.

Simply put, you need a bigger calorie deficit.

If you have a 2500 calorie daily maintenance level, and you want to drop 3 lbs of fat per week withe diet alone, you’d need a huge daily deficit of 1500 calories, which would equate to eating 1000 calories per day. You would lose weight rapidly for as long as you could maintain that deficit (although it would slow down over time). Most people aren’t going to last long on so little food and they often end with a period of binge eating. It’s not practical (or fun) to cut calories so much and in some cases it could be unhealthy.

The other alternative is to train for hours and hours a day, literally. People ask me all the time, “Tom, how is it possible for the Biggest Loser contestants to lose so much weight? Well first of all they’re not measuring body fat, only body weight. Then you have the high starting body weights and the large water weight loss in the beginning. After that, just do the math – they’re training hours a day so they’re creating a huge calorie deficit.

But without that team of trainers, dieticians, teammates, a national audience and all that prize money, do you think they’d be motivated and accountable enough to do anywhere near that amount and intensity of exercise in the real world? Would it even be possible if they had a job and family? Not likely, is it? It’s not practical to do that much exercise, and it’s not practical to cut your calories below a 1000 a day and remain compliant. If you manage to achieve the latter, it’s very difficult not to rebound and regain the weight afterwards for a variety of physiological and psychological reasons.

For Fast Fat Loss: Less Food Or Harder Training?

Trainers are becoming more inventive these days in coming up with high intensity workouts that burn a large amount of calories and really give the metabolism a boost. This can help speed up the fat loss within a given amount of time. But as you begin to utilize higher intensity workouts, you have to start being on guard for overtraining or overuse injuries.That’s why strict nutrition with an aggressive calorie deficit is going to have to be a major part of any fast fat loss strategy. Unfortunately, very low calorie dieting has its own risks in the way of lean tissue loss, slower metabolism, extreme hunger, and greater chance of weight re-gain.

My approach to long term weight control is to lose weight slowly and patiently and follow a nutrition plan that is well balanced between lean protein, healthy fats and natural carbs and doesn’t demonize any entire food group. To lose fat, you simply create a caloric deficit by burning more and eating less (keeping the nutrient density of those calories as high as possible, of course).

But to achieve the extraordinary goals such as photo-shoot-ready, super-low body fat or simply faster than average fat loss, while minimizing the risks, I often turn to a stricter cyclical low carb diet for brief “peaking” programs. I explain this method in chapter 12 of my e-book Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle (it’s my “phase III” or “competition” diet).

The cyclical aspect of the diet means that after three to six days of an aggressive calorie deficit and strict diet, you take a high calorie / high carb day to re-feed the body and re-stimulate the metabolism. Essentially, this helps reduce the starvation signals your body is receiving. It’s also a psychological break from the deprivation which helps improve compliance and prevent relapse.

The higher protein intake can help prevent lean tissue loss and curb the hunger. A high protein diet also helps by ramping up dietary thermogenesis. A high intake of greens, fibrous vegetables and low calorie fruits can help tip the energy balance equation in your favor as fibrous veggies are very low in calorie density and some of the calories in the fiber are not metabolizable. Healthy fats are added in adequate quantities, while the calorie-dense simple sugars and starchy carbs are kept to a minimum except on refeed days and after (or around) intense workouts.

There’s No Magic, Just Math

In my experience, a high protein, reduced carb approach in conjunction with weights and cardio can help maximize fat loss – both in terms of increasing speed of fat loss and particularly for getting rid of the last of the stubborn fat. It helps with appetite control too. But always bear in mind that the faster fat loss occurs primarily as a result of the larger calorie deficit (which is easily achieved with sugars and starches minimized), not some type of “low carb magic.” If your diet were high in natural carbs but you were able to diligently maintain the same large calorie deficit, the results would be similar.

I’m seeing more and more advertisements that not only promise rapid weight loss, but go so far as saying that you’re doing it wrong if you’re losing “only” two pounds per week. “Why settle” for slow weight loss, they insist. Well, it’s certainly possible to lose more than two pounds per week, but it’s critically important to understand that there’s a world of difference between rapid weight loss and permanent fat loss.

It’s also vital to know that there’s no magic in faster fat loss, just math. All the new-fangled dietary manipulations and high intensity training programs that really do help increase the speed of fat loss all come full circle to the calorie balance equation in the end, even if they claim their method works for other reasons and they don’t mention calories burned or consumed at all.

Beware of The Quick Fix

Faster fat loss IS possible. My question is, are you willing to tolerate the hunger, low calories and high intensity exercise for that kind of deficit? Do you have the work ethic? Do you have the supreme level of dietary restraint necessary to stop yourself from bingeing and putting the weight right back on when that aggressive diet is over? Or would you rather do it in a more moderate way where you’re not killing yourself, but instead are making slow and steady lifestyle changes and taking off 1-2 lbs of pure fat per week, while keeping all your hard-earned muscle?

Remember, 1-2 pounds per week is 50-100 pounds in a year. Is that really so slow or is that an astounding transformation? You don’t gain 50-100 pounds over night, so why should anyone expect to take it off overnight? Personally, I think short-term thinking and the pursuit of quick fixes are the worst diseases of our generation.

If you want to be one of those “results not typical” fat loss transformations, it can be done and it may be a perfectly appropriate short-term goal for the savvy and sophisticated fitness enthusiast. It’s your call. But when you set your goals, it might be wise to remember that old fable of the tortoise and the hare, and buyer beware if you go shopping for a fast weight loss program in today’s shady marketplace.

Train hard and expect success,

Tom Venuto
Fat Loss Coach
www.BurnTheFat.com

About the Author:
Tom Venuto is a fat loss expert, lifetime natural (steroid-free) bodybuilder, independent nutrition researcher, freelance writer, and author of the #1 best selling diet e-book, Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle: Fat-Burning Secrets of The World’s Best Bodybuilders & Fitness Models (e-book) which teaches you how to get lean without drugs or supplements using secrets of the world’s best bodybuilders and fitness models. Learn how to get rid of stubborn fat and increase your metabolism by visiting: www.burnthefat.com

Hey everyone!! How’s everyone’s week coming along?? I’m still doing my headless chicken routine, but managed to get some hillsprints in today and that got me thinking more about interval training and Tom Venuto and the awesome advice and principles he talks about in his book “Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle”. Tom is one of those guys that believes in HARD WORK over starving yourself in order to lose fat.

I also share a recipe that I invented. When I first published this recipe on Twitter, I got a few incredulous responses asking if it actually tastes any good. Well, YES, it does and if you don’t believe me, ask one of my converts!! My friend over on www.thefightgeek.org didn’t believe me, tried it anyway and now eats it regularly! Its a super good, nutrient-rich combination for pre or post workout with lots of protein!!

And finally, are brown eggs more nutritious than white eggs?? I answer this question too!

Check it out!!

If you’re interested in getting Tom Venuto’s book “Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle” GET IT HERE!!!