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DEL.ICIO.USThe 3,500 Calorie Problem
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Do you know how many calories there is in a pound of fat? It’s a whopping 3,500 calories. To put that into perspective, let’s say you are 50 lbs. overweight. Multiply 3,500 to 50 and you get 175,000 calories. That’s 175,000 calories of blubbery fat you don’t need. Let’s look at it with another perspective. When you see one of those diets that say you can lose 10 pounds in one week, it is not likely you lost 10 pounds of fat. That would mean that you would have expended 24,500 calories in week and that is not likely even with exercise.
If your caloric expenditure at rest is 1,250 calories (not uncommon for many women), then you could survive on that for 140 days. Now, you could be thinking, “If I just quit eating for 140 days I could drop this 50 lbs.” Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. I’m just trying to put it into perspective.
So, I’m going to put it into a perspective where proper diet and exercise is incorporated. Hypothetically, let’s say as a result of weight training your caloric expenditure has increased to 1,600 (this is achieved by an increase of 7 lbs of lean muscle, an additional 250-350 calories per day). Then we add approximately 700 calories used due to cardiovascular exercise, weight lifting, and some other activities you could do in a day. This comes to 2,300 calories.
But, you can’t forget that you must eat so you don’t waste muscle. So, let’s say you ingested 1,900 calories, but 20% of those calories were used in digestion alone (known as thermic effect of food). That leaves you with 1,520 calories. Subtract 1,520 from 2,300 and you will get 780 calories. Given that you had a sound workout and eating program, that 780 calories would mostly come from fat in the body. During the course of the week, let’s say you used 780 calories everyday and it all came from fat. That would add up to 5,460 calories. Divide that number by 3,500 calories (the amount of calories in one pound of fat) and you will get 1.56 pounds. That means you just lost 1.56 pounds of fat in one week. This means you could lose all 50 lbs. (the right way) in eight months and keep it off.
One of my most dedicated clients, let’s call her Julia, truly utilized this concept. From June 15, 2005 to December 23, 2005 Julia lost 45.85 pounds. That’s 1.91 pounds of body fat per week or approximately 46 pounds in 6 months. Her body fat percentage dropped from 34.8% to 18% (has since December capped off at 16%). If she did it through diet alone, she would be at great risk of getting all the weight back and developing chronic diseases. But, as a result of building a body that burns more calories and changing her lifestyle, she isn’t at risk. I hope that with this illustration, you truly understand that importance of incorporating proper eating habits, weight lifting, and cardiovascular exercise to improve metabolism.
If you have a topic you would like me to cover, don’t hesitate to e-mail me at kelly@kellyhuggins.com.
Comments
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By Troglodyke
August 28, 2006 10:16 AM | Link to this
I’ve always been amused at the “diet crazes” of the last 20-30 years. Every new one that comes along snares more and more obtuse people, and it seems like we just get fatter and fatter.
I’ve known since high-school health class that the only way you are going to lose fat is to eat less and exercise more. Period. Completely eschewing all carbs won’t do it, reducing fat intake to zero won’t do it, counting calories until you are blue won’t do it. You need both parts. I know.
A year ago i was 50 pounds overweight, as was my partner. Our best friends (a very heavy couple) had already started losing weight on WW, and we decided to get off our butts and do something about ours. We didn’t even join WW. We just did the following:
*Stopped eating fast food. *Reduced our eating out in sit-down restaurants to once per week. *Started walking a mile at lunch everyday, and often another mile in the evening (but not every day). *Started paying attention to the empty calories we were consuming, and making better choices.
That’s it. Just those few changes saw us lose 30-35 pounds apiece over a 5-month period. And I refuse to deny myself anything. I like to eat, and I still eat everything I like, but now I eat in moderation.
It works.
By Katie
August 28, 2006 10:47 AM | Link to this
If you really want to lose weight hire a trainer. Three yrs ago I worked with Lydell for about 4 months(I had 100 lbs to lose)… in those 4 months I lost 22 lbs.I then started traveling…BUT I never forgot how to use the equipment, if all that was there was a bike, stairs, outside…to get up and get moving. He also talked about Food with me. He pushed me but never degrated me-even though he was working with alot of beautiful people. My point is, when you need a jump start, get somebody that will help you and if you don’t like the first go to somebody else. I now have lost 85 lbs, go to curves three days a week and feel great..I could now be one of the beautiful people…