BURN, BABY, BURN!

Can you actually spot reduce fat?

     When I am talking to people about their goals or what they are wanting to improve on their body I hear a lot of them say, “I want to trim my belly” or “I want to take away some of the fat from my arms”. Or as one woman told me the other day, “I want for when I wave my arms, for my arms to not keep waving back at me.” So we all have an area that we want to work on, right? Well the question then is, if I work out that specific area like crazy will I zap the fat there? In short: no. But keep reading if you want to learn!

     I will start very general and talk about the energy balance that our body is constantly in. Our body needs energy for everything we do and we pay for that by spending calories. So anything as basic as our heart pumping to running a marathon we need energy to complete it. In order for us to get energy we need to eat and give our body the right nutrients to pay the price. As we eat, we take in calories that then get used for energy. This is all well and good if we are staying in an energy balance which means that we are using as many calories as we are taking in.

     The next question is how many calories should I take in? Well our bodies all burn different amounts based on age, weight, and sex. The calories that we burn just being awake (even if we sat on the couch all day) is called our metabolism. To figure out how many calories we burn with our metabolism, you can use these equations: (This is called the Harris-Benedict Formula. Where BMR stands for basal metabolic rate)

BMR Men= 66 + (6.23 x pounds body weight) + (12.7 x height in inches) - (6.76 x years of age)

BMR Women= 655 + (4.35 x pounds body weight) + (4.7 x height in inches) - (4.7 x years of age)

     This is our daily amount burned even if we are sitting on the couch doing nothing. But if we are exercising we can add calories for as much as we exercise. According to bmrcalculator.org we can use this chart to figure out how many calories to take in:

Activity Level	Description	Formula
Low	You get little to no exercise	Calories Burned a Day = BMR x 1.2
Light	You exercise lightly (1-3 days per week)	Calories Burned a Day = BMR x 1.375
Moderate	You exercise moderately (3-5 days per week)	Calories Burned a Day = BMR x 1.55
High	You exercise heavily (6-7 days per week)	Calories Burned a Day = BMR x 1.725
Very High	You exercise very heavily (i.e. 2x per day, extra heavy workouts)	Calories Burned a Day = BMR x 1.9

     The problem comes when we do not use those extra calories that we take in for exercise. When we eat over our recommended intake [BMR x exercise] we take those extra calories and store them as fat for later use. One pound of fat is equal to 3500 calories and so as we put more calories into our bodies that we end up not using for exercise we slowly accumulate fat. Everyone stores fat in different ways and places. Men mostly store their fat in their stomach viscerally (under the muscle and around major organs) and subcutaneously (under the skin). Women usually store it in their hips, arms, and thighs. So the question is now, how do we get rid of that fat?

Jim really knows how to burn as few calories as possible!

     Consistent training of specific muscles can increase muscle tone, which can give a slimming appearance and if hypertrophy (muscles getting bigger) is done a more defined appearance can appear.  However, there is no evidence that shows fat is mobilized preferentially from the adipose cells located near active muscles (1). This means that if you are going out and doing thousands of sit-ups to burn that belly fat, all you are really doing is making those muscles stronger and more defined. A study done by Katch et al. (2) tested 13 men on a 27 day training program that consisted of a total of 5,004 sit-ups. There were no significant changes that occurred in body fat percentage, skinfold, or girth measurements. There was a reduction in adipose (fat) cell size but that difference was the same in the abdominal region as well as the non-exercised gluteal and subscapular regions. This shows that even if you work your muscles like crazy you won’t get those six-pack abs right away.

 (1) (Plowman, Sharon A, and Denise L. Smith. Exercise Physiology for Health, Fitness, and Performance. Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 2010. Print. 

(2) (Frank I. Katch, Priscilla M. Clarkson, Walter Kroll, Thomas McBride, Anthony Wilcox. Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport.Vol. 55, Iss. 3, 1984)

The white areas are fat.

      The reduction of fat is more focused on a whole body increase in burning calories. Fat is mobilized to be used as fuel for the body hormonally and hormones circulate to all parts of the body (1). That means that as you are exercising; your body is taking fat from all different regions of the body to use as fuel. The best way to get rid of fat then is to go into a calorie deficit (burn more than you are taking in). This could be from eating fewer calories than you need, exercising, or a combination of the two. As you burn calories your body will slowly use the fat from the whole body which will slowly reduce the amount of fat in one specific area.

 
  So the real way to fight that excess fat that we have is to watch number of calories that we eat and exercise. Good Luck!

Challenge/Tip of the Day:

     Everyone has a weak spot when it comes to their diet. Mine is cereal. I LOVE me some cereal and I have a hard time stopping myself when it comes to sugary cereals like Lucky Charms and Fruity Pebbles. These calories are called are called empty calories (calories that provide little or no nutritional value). So my challenge for today is to cut out that one weakness you have ONE time this week. So if you come home from work and just have to have a cookie or a beer, replace that one time this week with an apple or a glass of water respectively. I know it isn't easy but I am right there with you. Once you can make this change one a week you can slowly start to make the healthy choice more often than not and you will save yourself an extra few hundred calories each week! As we talked about above, the best way to reduce fat is to cut down on total calories stored (which can come from reducing calories eaten). This is one great way to start!

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