1. While losing weight, forget about the fat burning heart rate zone. While you burn more fat per calorie burned, you burn LESS calories overall working in this zone. During weight loss, your body doesn’t care where the calories come from it just wants you to burn calories. I suggest each cardio workout should be as tough as you can stand it for that day. Try to average in the 75-85% heart rate range.
2. Many of us don’t have time to workout these days, but if you want to lose fat versus muscle you have to. To burn fat (and lose weight), the ACSM, FDA, and ACE all recommend you exercise for one hour a day six times a week. Does this mean if you can’t work out this much you should forget it? Of course not! But, if you are looking for the best way to lose fat you need to plan an active lifestyle. That a day includes your cardio training, weight training, and flexibility exercises.
Exercise can be broken up into mini-segments throughout your day. 10-15 minutes of walking at the end of lunch, 10-15 minutes of quick body toning work when you wake up (push-ups, dips, squats, lunges, crunches), a stroll with the kids in the evening, and 15-30 minutes of combined cardio and strength intervals in the evening constitutes one full workout. Exercise isn’t that hard to fit in through the day; it takes commitment to doing it.
4. Losing weight is 80% what you put in your mouth and 20% what you do with your two feet. You must eat healthy, not just low calorie. So many people want to add an extra 10 minutes to their exercise so they can enjoy a bowl of ice cream. First, if your bowl is an accurate serving size your extra 10 minutes didn’t even cover the calories. Second, if you truly want to lose weight you must learn how to feed your body the food it NEEDS versus the food you WANT. Indulgences are fine, but they need to be controlled and planned for. A treat every night is not a treat…that’s a habit and one that needs to be broken to burn fat.
5. Losing weight doesn’t mean starving. Let me say this again. Losing weight doesn’t mean starving. To burn fat you must learn to eat the right foods, in the right portions, and often enough throughout your day to fuel your body. When you eat too much food your body produces fat; when you eat too little food your body either burns your muscle and/or stores fat.
6. The last and the most important element to burning fat is finding emotional support. As an online fitness and lifestyle trainer, I see everyday how most people need emotional support and someone to point them in the right direction more than any other thing in the fat burning equation. I give clients a workout plan, I review daily what they are eating, and give tips and pointers on where to improve with these plans. The most important thing I do is encourage them and help them believe in themselves.
During my own weightloss journey I had support from my husband. He never turned me down when it came to exercising, he encouraged me to enter races, and he ate what I ate so that I wouldn’t be tempted by trigger foods in the house. He also verbally said the things to me that my own mind just couldn’t do…you can do this, you are beautiful, and be proud of yourself. Not everyone has this in their life and it is a shame. That’s the one thing I strive to give clients that they sometimes lack or don’t hear enough of…a sense of pride in what they are doing along with the tools to get the job done.
So, what is the formula for burning fat fast? Get moving with a plan, eat healthy, and find support. Those are the real keys to burning fat and they work.