EAT FAT TO LOSE FAT

Researchers from Washington University in St. Louis did a study with genetically engineered mice where they engineered the mice such that their liver lacked a fat producing enzyme. As we all know fat is processed and converted in the liver to form triglecyrides which is then used up as energy in the body. So a healthy liver is a major fat burning organ converting fats into fatty acids in the blood stream for use as energy. But when the liver is malfunctioning it can work in the reverse direction and become a fat storing organ. This is referred to as a fatty liver disease. A healthy liver is red in color but when the liver starts to accumulate fat it starts turning yellow and enlarging in size. A sign of fatty liver disease is a bulging midsection, an increased cholesterol level, stubborn weightloss and constant lethargy. Also remember the liver is capable of producing its own fat from carbohydrates so a zero fat diet can still lead to fatty liver disease. So why this lecture about fatty liver disease? Because the mice in this study were not capable of making any fat in their liver and the only fat they would get is from diet or from the body's own fat reserves. So guess what was the finding of this study? The researchers found that mice that were fed a zero fat diet developed fatty liver disease! So essentially the fat from the body moved into their liver but the liver didn't process that fat, but instead stored it! Mice that ate the normal fare didn't develop a fatty liver. So the researchers concluded that the liver needs new fat in order to metabolize old fat. In other words you have to supply new fat to the liver in order to regulate fat burning in the liver. Or as I say "Eat fat to lose fat!"

So we can see how we can mess up the liver's fat burning ability by eating a low or zero fat diet. So eat healthy fats found in nuts, sea food, flax, avocados and make sure you get 33% of your daily caloric intake in healthy fat. Folks, you need fat in your diet if you want to stay healthy and keep that stubborn fat off!

METABOLIC EFFECTS OF LIFTING HEAVY

I see many women in the gym ‘toning’ their bodies with little pink weights for hundreds of reps accumulated over an hour long workout. I just wonder why don’t they just jump on the tread mill and spend the hour there. I mean why delude yourself that you are weight training when you really are doing aerobic style workouts. Just to make it clear weight training is a weight bearing exercise that requires anaerobic pathways of energy breakdown which happens when you lift heavy for a few reps. Weight training shouldn’t make you go out of breath and panting for air. This is not the mode that builds muscle. For building muscle you need to lift heavy enough to perform the full range of motion for 10-15 reps and no more. If you are able to do a 16^th rep, then you need to increase the weight.  

A concern I hear from women (and many men) is that they don’t want to ‘bulk-up’ by lifting heavy. To address this I would say that women don’t have near as much testosterone as men do, to really bulk up. Testosterone is the hormone that burns fat and builds muscle and is responsible for sex drive in men (and women). This is why men are leaner than women and this is why teenagers (both boys and girls) lose baby fat as they enter puberty. And weight training has shown to boost the production of both, testosterone and human growth hormone (HGH). So even for women a little extra testosterone is a good thing as it burns fat and builds muscle (which burns even more fat). And HGH has been shown to be essential to prevent many age related degenerative diseases. Recently it has also been shown that intense weight training also increases insulin sensitivity that can prevent the onset of type II diabetes. So you see there are benefits beyond the obvious when you weight train. So if you really want to tone your body, weight train with the right amount of weight for 10-15 reps and if possible do compound movements that involve multiple joints (squats, lunges, dead lifts, bench press, lat pull-downs etc). Having one extra pound of muscle will burn 35 extra calories a day which may not sound like much but will add up to 12775 calories in a year or 3.5 lbs of fat burned. So imagine this! If you have 10 extra lbs of muscle, its equivalent to running for half hour (or 3 miles) every day, 365 days a year even when you are just watching TV. So what would you take, and extra 10 lbs of muscle (traded for fat) or running 3 miles everyday all year around? Its a no-brainer, eh! So even though aerobics has certain cardio vascular conditioning advantage it comes nowhere near weight training for permanently boosting your metabolism and building that firm toned body that you always dreamed of.  So dunk those pretty little pink weights and lift real weights instead. And don’t worry you will never look like those anabolic steroid freaks you see on the cover of magazines like muscle and fitness. No woman (or man) can achieve that kind of muscularity and definition without relying on synthetic testosterone derivatives. Also remember muscle is denser than fat so a 110lb woman with 15% body fat will be trimmer and better toned than a 110lb woman with 25% body fat!

GOOD LINK ABOUT FATS

Here is a good link about fats on MSN health:

http://health.msn.com/nutrition/articlepage.aspx?cp-documentid=100256551

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The take home points are:

1) Use vegetable oils sparingly.

2) Don't be afraid of butter. It has anti-oxidants that protect against cancer and hasn't been shown to increase cholesterol. Use it in omelets and baking.

3) Coconut oil is healthy in spite of its high saturated fat content. Use it in Thai cooking.

4) Eat olive oil and fish as they have the best fats that are good for your heart.

The bottom line is that your body need fat and it is an important component of a healthy diet so don't shy away from fat but only make sure its the right kind of fat.

FREE RADICAL GENERATION IN THE BODY

So now that we gathered how important antioxidants are to your body, let see what promotes the production of free radicals in our bodies. While many of the normal cellular processes produce metabolites that are free radicals there are certain foods that increase the production of these toxic metabolites. Eating food deep fried in vegetable oils (ghee is best for deep frying) produces a lot of free radicals as vegetable oils are unstable and breakdown at high temperatures. Hydrogenation of vegetable oils to produce shortening releases many free radicals, that's why any food with trans-fat or hydrogenated fat has a lot of free radicals in it. Eating a lot of processed foods with artificial preservatives and chemicals releases free radicals in the body. So one must avoid deep fried, processed and foods with trans-fat. Also exposure of skin to UV rays from the sun produces free radicals that attack the skin cells and destroy collagen, the essential protein that gives our skin the 'elasticity' needed to stay supple and young.This is what causes the formation of wrinkles in the skin. In the next article I'll discuss how to combat free-radical attack on the skin to prevent the formation of wrinkles. Stay tuned until the next time...

THE ROLE OF ANTIOXIDANTS

So we hear about antioxidants every other day in the media about how they help people lose weight and how it keeps them young. The discovery of Acai berry by main stream media and Oprah’s endorsement of the Acai berry diet and how it has helped her lose weight has everyone interested in this new berry. So what are antioxidants? And what are their benefits?

Antioxidants (AOs) have always existed in nature and in our food all along. Some foods have more AO’s than others, but pretty much any vegetable or fruit or bean or legume has it. So the word antioxidant itself suggests that it is an antagonist to something that is an oxidant and that is exactly what an AO does. During the normal cellular process the cells in your body release many metabolic wastes, some of which are toxic in the sense that they can damage the cell itself. These metabolic wastes or free radicals are unstable molecules that are hungry for electrons. As a result of this any cell it comes in contact with is stripped of electrons, making the cell unstable. This cell then goes on and finds another cell to attack. As a result of this a chain reaction is set in motion where unstable cells are attacking surrounding cells as they scavenge them in order to regain stability. This leads to cell aging as the cells become unstable and in some cases mutates the DNA of these cells to start causing abnormal cell growth, or cancerous tumors. So here in lies the utility of the AO in that it satisfies the free radicals so they don’t attack normal healthy cells. In this sense the AOs are ‘scavengers’ of free radicals that clean up the waste metabolites and help preserve the health of your cells. It’s immediately apparent that a food rich in antioxidants will prevent premature cell aging and help prevent many types of cancers. So now that you are convinced of the benefits of having AOs in your diet the next question is which foods are high in antioxidants?

Any natural food with a deep color is pretty much is high in antioxidant content. Acai berry, blue berries, black berries, red grapes are all high in antioxidant content. And guess which food has the highest AO content of all? No its not Acai berry but cocoa powder which has 40% more anti oxidant content compared to Acai. Other foods rich in AO are kidney beans, pinto beans, black eyed beans. By the way Kidney beans are as rich in AOs as blue berries. Vegetables such as broccoli, spinach, potatoes and cabbage are rich in AOs. In the next article I’ll talk more about AOs and the role exercise plays in anti aging. Stay tuned…

THE ULTIMATE BODY WEIGHT EXERCISE - BURPEE

Sounds like an aftermath of a full meal, eh? Actually burpee is a form of body weight exercise that recruits the most amount of muscle in a single exercise. If you recall from my earlier posts, I am a proponent of full body exercises or compound movements as opposed to isolation movements. An example of a compound movement is the squat. The squat recruits all the muscles of your legs (front and back) and your posterior chain (butt and lower back). Percentage wise it recruits almost 70% of your body’s muscles. On the other hand an isolation movement like the crunches only recruits the abdominal muscles which are about 15% of your body’s total muscles.


So here is a trivia for you: Which exercise do you think will burn more belly fat, the squat or the crunch? If you answered the crunch then you are wrong! Contrary to popular belief there is no spot reduction in the body, meaning no matter which body part you are exercising the body loses fat from the total body fat pool and not just from the part being exercised. So when you are doing crunches the body is losing fat from your arms and legs and other parts. Belly fat is the last place your body will lose fat from (and usually the first to gain). So if you want to burn belly fat stop doing crunches and start squatting! Now, compared to the squat the burpee recruits almost 90% of your body’s muscles, so it will be even more efficient at burning overall body fat (and belly fat). The burpee is a very simple but effective exercise for cardio and strength conditioning. It’s used extensively in the armed forces for building strength and endurance.

The way the burpee is performed is by starting with a standing position. First you drop down to a squat position and then bend forward and fall on your palms and kick your legs back. Then you perform a push up and as soon as the push up is done you bring back your legs under your chest and rise and perform a jumping squat. This one exercise alone will target your legs, butt, abdomen, chest, shoulders, triceps (the back of your arms) and partially your back. Here is a video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYfNA_lmkHM

Start off by performing 20 of these in quick succession and it should take you less than 2-3 minutes to be done with the exercise. Slowly as your strength and endurance increases you will be able to add a few extra burpees every week. Burpees are the staple exercise in a lot of crossfit gyms across the country and the most I have ever seen anyone (myself included) do is 150. It takes about 15 minutes to do 150 of these and by the end you drop into a pool of your own sweat. It is by far more intense than any cardio exercise on the planet, in terms of building strength and endurance. And research has shown that short intense bursts of exercise are as effective as long duration low intensity cardio type exercises (http://www.naturalnews.com/024188_fitness_health_fat_loss.html). Considering the time savings of such an exercise plan, I'd say it’s a no brainer to do the high intensity type exercises. I mean why would you waste 2 hrs everyday on the treadmill when just 10-15 minutes three times a week will give you the same or more benefits?

So the next time you complain that you don’t have time and a gym membership to get in shape, stop making the excuses! All you need is 15 minutes, 3 times a week and a lot of determination and you’ll be in shape in no time. Want a 6 pack? No crunches required, just burpee!

FLAT BELLY DIET - INDIAN VERSION

I AM LOOKING FOR VOLUNTEERS FOR MY WEIGHT LOSS PROGRAM. I AM WORKING ON A BOOK FOR LOSING BELLY FAT AND WOULD LIKE 15-20 PEOPLE THAT WANT TO LOSE WEIGHT. YOUR WEIGHT LOSS EXPERIENCE WILL BE A PART OF THIS BOOK. SO IF YOU ARE INTERESTED PLEASE GET IN TOUCH WITH ME AT yogi4fitness@gmail.com. Now on to the article:

I am sure a lot of readers must have heard about the flat belly diet which promises to help you lose 15 lbs in a month. So what is the flat belly diet? And what can we Indians do to incorporate it in our eating plan so we can realize similar benefits. Well there is nothing secret about the flat belly diet. It’s based on sound eating principles and plain old common sense about what to eat at what times of the day. Here I am attempting to guide the readers on an Indian style flat belly diet that will make you shed belly fat. While I don’t claim that you’ll lose 15 lbs in a month, I can promise you that after the initial 3-4 days of insulin withdrawal symptoms that you will go through especially if you are used to eating high carb meals, your energy levels will sky rocket and depending on your starting weight you could realize up to 4-6 lbs of fat loss in a month.

In this plan I have divided the total meals into a 300 calorie average size portion with more calories consumed in the morning and less and less as the day goes on. A total of around 1600 calories will be consumed in 5 meals. Here is a sample meal plan (pick one of the options provided).

Breakfast:

•  One cup of oatmeal in whole milk topped with

o   Handful walnuts or almonds

o   Handful of blueberries or strawberries for sweetness.

• One toast spread with butter and a two egg omelet with a glass of tomato juice or coffee/tea (lightly sweetened).
• One whole wheat cauliflower or spinach (or any other vegetable except potato) paratha, pan fried in a small amount of butter with a glass of tomato juice or coffee/tea (lightly sweetened) and a handful of almonds or a whey protein drink.
• One cup of Upma with mixed vegetables and peanuts and two boiled eggs.
• Few Dhoklas (besan and semolina cakes) with 2 boiled eggs and coffee/tea (lightly sweetened).

Mid-morning snack:

• A handful of walnuts or almonds or an ounce of (60% or more) dark chocolate and a cup of coffee/tea (lightly sweetened).
• A pear or an apple or any other fruit (except mango, pineapple or cantaloupe) and a 8oz glass of whey protein drink.

Lunch:

• One whole wheat vegetable paratha light fried in butter with a bowl of daal and a serving of fruit.
• Two whole wheat rotis with cooked vegetables or beans (garbanzo, kidney, pinto or black-eyed) cooked in regular olive oil (never cook in virgin or extra virgin olive oil). 
• One cup brown rice with daal and a vegetable cooked in olive oil.

Mid-afternoon snack:

•  Same as the mid-morning snack.

Dinner:

•  A bowl of daal or chickpea soup with salad tossed in virgin olive oil.

•  A bowl of chaat made with:

o   Germinated green mung daal or black gram or a bowl of cooked chick peas lightly fried in olive oil with salt and pepper to taste.

o   Thin sev (made from gram flour not potatoes) sprinkled on top.

o   Finely chopped onions and green pepper.

o   Pudina or tamarind chutney (sweetened with splenda)

•  Plain salad with olive oil vinaigrette and topped with grated almonds or walnuts and boiled egg slices.

As you can see I have incorporated plenty of Mono-unsaturated Fatty Acids (MUFA) in the form of nuts and olive oil. MUFA’s have been shown to aid in belly fat loss and are an easy source of energy for the body to convert. All other ingredients I have chosen based on their GI values. Try to stick with items in green in the table below (click to see) and stay away from the red zone especially after 6 PM because you are most likely to store the carbs from those items as fat.

Eat breakfast within an hour or so of waking up as it’s the most important meal of the day to rev up your metabolism. Skipping breakfast will slow down your metabolism and make your body store fat.  Space out all the meals by 2 hrs or so and never go beyond 3 hrs without eating something healthy. Finish your dinner at least 3 hrs before bed time and if you find yourself hungry at bed time, have a handful of almonds or roasted peanuts. And finally drink plenty of water and keep yourself hydrated.

Please realize that this is only a sample meal plan and it’s possible to create countless combinations of healthy recipes from the table provided above. Although I have nothing against eating meat I have stayed away from any meats in this sample plan just because a lot of Indians are vegetarians. You can always substitute a bowl of daal or roti with a fillet of salmon or chicken breast. Meat has no carbs and so eaten by itself meat cannot promote weight gain. This is why Atkins works for people that want to lose weight fast. Although I have nothing against Atkins, I don’t think it’s a balanced way to eat. We need to have healthy portions of carbs from high quality (low GI) sources like fruits and vegetables to get all our antioxidants and vitamins. By the same token we need about 30-35% of our calorie intake from healthy fats (MUFA) so instead of avoiding carbs or fat it’s best to balance them as I have proposed in this plan. Protein is essential because it helps us preserve muscle mass which in turn keeps our metabolism high. It also helps our body regenerate from the daily wear and tear. Also protein and healthy fat in diet hinder the assimilation of glucose in the blood and slow the glucose to fat conversion mechanism.  Exercise is optional in this plan but will help you shed fat faster if you do choose to exercise.

On a final note, I would love to have volunteers for this diet plan and will work with you and guide you in planning alternative substitutes based on your taste. Please contact me at yogi4fitness@gmail.com if you want to volunteer. If not I would still love to hear comments based on your experience with this diet plan.