Designing
The Ultimate Fat Loss Strategy
by
Phil Kaplan
Everyone wants it to be quick.
Everyone wants it to be easy. Everyone also wishes it would
rain winning Lotto tickets. The day wishes become reality,
fat loss will become quick and easy. Right now, effort is
involved.
I know what you're thinking. The
fat burner ads, the tummy trimming devices, and the happy
smiling people dancing away fat on videos promise it's easy,
as do the diet centers, the drug companies, and sellers of
cellulite cream. Years ago, a man I very much respect paid
me a compliment I found both accurate and valuable. He said,
"Phil doesn't tell people what they want to hear, he tells
them what they NEED to hear." If you want to lose fat, you
NEED to hear this!
You can! You can! You can!
Oh, wait, there's also part B:
It's up to you to exercise
and eat right.
I know, I know, that sounds so
cliché, but the problem in the past has been, nobody really
told you what exercise and eat right means if fat loss is
the goal. That's about to change. I'm about to share an eight-part
exercise and nutrition scheme that has proven to serve as
the Ultimate Fat Loss strategy.
First I'll list all eight parts
of the fat loss puzzle, then I'll address them one at a time.
- Perform intense resistance
exercise in pre-exhaustive supersets for 30 - 40 minutes
per day, 6 days per week
- Perform staggered intensity
aerobic exercise immediately following resistance 20 -
30 minutes
- Do not exceed 75 minutes
in exercise duration
- Avoid simple sugars, refined
carbs, and avoid adding saturated or hydrogenated fats
to foods
- With a 6-meal per day foundation,
use the caloric stagger or carb manipulation for a four
week period
- Multiply your bodyweight
by .55 to determine the number of ounces of water to be
consumed daily
- Use 100 - 200 mg of caffeine
daily for 3 consecutive days per week for four weeks
- Take 1 tablespoon of flaxseed
oil with the morning meal
I've come to know human nature.
People, still believing a quick fix exists, will read the
8-part list, and pull out one or two parts believing they
now hold the secret. I want to make it clear, these 8-parts
are synergistic and will be limited in their ability to deliver
a result unless all eight are in place! Sure, you can run
to the health food store and buy flaxseed oil and grab some
Vivarin tablets (caffeine) at your local pharmacy, but you'll
likely wind up having trouble sleeping and wondering why your
fat isn't going anywhere.
At this point I'm sure you understand.
Effort is required, a complete strategy is necessary, and
there aren't any shortcuts. If you're still willing to proceed
beyond this point, allow me to warn you. You have much to
lose! Namely, adipose tissue (translation: fat). OK, you're
still reading so here it is . . . the ultimate fat loss strategy
1. Perform intense resistance
exercise in pre-exhaustive supersets for 30 - 40 minutes per
day, 6 days per week
While aerobic exercise does increase
momentary metabolism, it is a mistake to believe that it is
the secret to fat loss. Muscle is metabolically active tissue.
When fat is burned, it actually has to be released into the
bloodstream and shuttled into a muscle cell where it is burned
as fuel. Muscle, therefore, is the fat burning machine. If
you increase muscle mass, even slightly, you increase caloric
burn, not only while you exercise, but while you eat, sleep,
and think. Resistance exercise is a vital key to any fat loss
program, whether it is incorporated to increase muscle or
simply as a method of preserving the size of the fat burning
machine. Allow me to define a "superset." We can break exercise
movements into two types, isolation movements and compound
movements. Isolation movements, as the name implies, work
to isolate a specific muscle or muscle group and usually revolve
around a single joint. An example would be a leg extension
where the thigh is fixed in place and with the knee bent a
resistive force presses against the shin. The act of extending
the knee (straightening the leg) isolates and calls to action
the muscles of the frontal thigh (the quadriceps). A compound
movement would bring in assisting muscle groups and is a multi-joint
exercise. As an example, a squat would have you extending
the knee as you push upward against resistance, but you are
also extending from the hip joint. The quadriceps are still
involved, but the powerful gluteal muscles are called in to
help. A superset pairs two movements performed one after another
without any rest in between. In this type of program the supersets
use a pre-exhaustion technique pairing an isolation movement
with a compound movement. The isolation movement is performed
first selecting a resistance level that will bring you to
a point of momentary muscle failure (where you can't perform
another consecutive rep in strict form) between 12 and 15
repetition. At that point obviously the target muscle is too
fatigued to continue. Because the compound movement brings
in assisting muscle groups to help, you can push the pre-exhuasted
muscle further bringing it to yet a new level of fatigue.
This intense type of training increases caloric expenditure
(as compared to conventional sets and reps training) and quite
efficiently overloads muscle (which is key to muscle development
and improvements in body composition).
2. Perform staggered intensity
aerobic exercise immediately following resistance 20 - 30
minutes
While, as I mentioned, aerobic
exercise is not the single fat loss solution many mistake
it to be, it certainly has its place and must be integrated
into a fat loss program. It's essential if you are going to
optimize fat loss, that you perform your aerobic exercise
AFTER your resistance training. Here's why. When you are in
an aerobic state, which means you're meeting momentary oxygen
demand (as you would if you were to walk, job, or climb stairs)
your body has two options for fuel. It can burn fat and/or
it can burn sugar (glucose, stored in the muscles and the
liver as glycogen). When you perform anaerobic exercise, which
is a short term all out burst of energy (as in each set of
your resistance exercise), your body burns exclusively glucose
(sugar). If you were to do an exhaustive aerobic exercise
workout before weight training, you would burn stored glycogen.
If you deplete glycogen stores, your fuel reserve will be
limited for your weight training session. In order to supply
fuel, your body might opt to break apart muscle to convert
amino acids into glucose, and as you already know, a loss
of muscle is to be avoided at all costs. If you do your aerobic
exercise AFTER your resistance training, you can utilize glycogen
for the weights, and then tap into fat stores to fuel your
cardio. Muscle tissue remains intact. It's also helpful to
stagger the intensity of aerobic sessions while keeping the
intensity in what is referred to as your Target Heart Zone
(THZ). THZ is estimated by subtracting your age from 220 and
multiplying the result first by 65%, then by 85%. The resultant
two numbers would equate to the low and the high ends of your
Target Zone which is measured in heartbeats per minute. When
you are near the lower end of the "zone," you will burn proportionately
more fat, however, when you are nearer to the higher end,
you will burn greater volume of calories. There is virtue,
therefore, in staggering the intensity of the sessions. Day
#1 might be a low intensity longer duration session. Day #2
might be a high intensity shorter duration session. Day #3
might incorporate interval training where you shift the intensity
throughout the session for a moderate duration. Then you return
to Day #1 and the process repeats.
3. Do not exceed 75 minutes in
exercise duration
Overtraining is one of the most
common and most detrimental mistakes exercisers make. Too
much exercise can either lead to a loss of muscle, injury,
undue fatigue, or excessive connective tissue trauma. By limiting
the duration of the entire exercise session to 75 minutes,
assuming your body is properly fueled and hydrated, and assuming
you're getting 7 or more hours of sleep as well as some relaxation
time, you can optimize the benefit of your exercise session
and reduce the risk of overtraining.
4. Avoid simple sugars, refined
carbs, and avoid adding saturated or hydrogenated fats to
foods
Here's the "eat right" part. There
are the notorious nutritional enemies of fat loss better known
as sugars and refined carbohydrates. Simple sugars would be
anything ending in -ose (glucose, sucrose, fructose, etc.)
and most of the foods we would normally consider "sweets."
Fruit juice, sugared cola, and cakes and cookies (even those
labeled "fat free") contain enough sugar to throw pancreatic
hormones completely out of whack severely limiting the potential
for fat release. Sugar intake can also lead to erratic energy
levels, food cravings, and sudden fatigue due to insulin spikes
and residual blood sugar drops. Refined carbs include white
flour and bleached and processed grains. These foods have
very little actual nutritional value and the carbs are rapidly
broken down into glucose which takes us into the simple sugar
challenge. In addition, they are easily converted into triglycerides
and stored as fats. Speaking of fats, the essential fats are
vital (as the name implies) but the fats that are solid at
room temperature, such as the fats in a marbled steak, butter,
or the hydrogenated oils found in butter substitutes have
little place in an effective fat loss program. By developing
an awareness of the sabotage foods, you'll be equipped to
make better nutritional choices keeping fat release at its
peak.
5. With a 6-meal per day foundation,
use the caloric stagger and carb manipulation for a four week
period
It's not only a question of what
to avoid, but even more important, your results depend greatly
upon what you do ingest. For decades bodybuilders, who have
become masters at shedding fat, have relied upon frequent
meals, usually a meal every 3 - 3 ½ hours amounting to six
meals per day (high level bodybuilders often consume up to
8 daily meals). Each meal should contain a mix of lean protein,
starchy carbohydrate, and fibrous carbohydrate. To amplify
fat loss, you can employ a technique I've named the caloric
stagger. To simplify the concept, you alternate a "regular"
day, where you consume lean protein, starch, and fiber every
3 hours, with a lower calorie higher protein day. On the "protein
day" you eliminate the starch and increase the protein size
(in each meal) by approximately 25%. This manipulation of
calories and carbs allows the body to release and access greater
volume of stored fat with reduced likelihood of muscle loss
(the higher protein on the lower calorie days provides ample
amino acids to prevent the body from turning to muscle as
a fuel source). In a 7 day week, Days #1, 3, 5, and 7 might
be "regular days," Days #2, 4, and 6 the "protein days." The
end result is a reduction in weekly caloric intake without
the protective mechanisms that act to slow metabolism in times
of calorie deprivation being activated. Fat loss is amplified,
metabolism stays stoked. This nutritional system works well
for four weeks, but to keep the body from adapting, its best
to return to a more balanced nutrition program immediately
following the fourth week. If additional fat loss is desired,
consider employing this system again after 8 weeks of "supportive
eating" with consistent caloric intake. If you want to do
this by the numbers, you can estimate the number of daily
calories that might be best during this four week fat burning
period by multiplying what you perceive your ideal weight
to be by 15 for men, 12 for women. Divide that number by 6
to determine per-meal calories. You might get 45% of your
calories from protein, 10% from essential fats, and the remaining
45% from an equal mix of starch and fiber (of course on the
protein days the percentage shift to higher protein and near
zero starch).
6. Multiply your bodyweight by
.55 to determine the number of ounces of water to be consumed
daily
Your body is predominantly made
up of water. It doesn't look that way in the mirror, but I
assure you, without water you'd be nothing but a pile of assorted
amino acids, minerals and some fatty acids. If we were to
consider a single human cell, we'd be looking at a molecular
structure that's between 70 and 85% water. Water is the primary
component of blood. Water transports oxygen throughout the
body. Water is an essential nutrient and perhaps the most
neglected nutrient among individuals attempting to figure
out "the best diet." When you perspire you lose water, thus
it becomes even more vital for anyone committed to an intense
exercise program. While the old, but unsubstantiated rule
of 8 glasses per day has held up just fine, multiplying your
weight by the number .55 would provide a pretty good estimate
of the number of ounces of water an exerciser should consume
in a day. If you live in a warm climate and/or you're in a
hot environment all day, be it for outdoor construction or
fueling an indoor furnace, you should make a concerted effort
to increase that number a bit further. If you don't want to
do all this math and measure ounces, I suggest you always
have water with you. A bottle of spring water should be fine.
Sipping it throughout the day, even if you are not experiencing
thirst, can act as a valuable step in helping to mobilize
fat and keep the cells healthy.
7. Use 100 - 200 mg of caffeine
daily for 3 consecutive days per week for four weeks
This is not a "must" but research
indicates that caffeine can have not only a performance enhancing
effect but also a thermogenic fat releasing value. The catch
is, this effect has been noted primarily in individuals who
do not regularly use caffeine. Using caffeine 30 minutes prior
to your workout on alternate days (3-4 days per week for a
4-week period) might allow you to release and burn additional
fat. If you are a regular caffeine user, you might find benefit
by avoiding coffee and caffeinated drinks and products for
3-4 weeks before beginning this fat loss routine. During that
period of time, work out at least 3 days per week with resistance,
at least 4 days per week aerobically, and allow your body's
natural energy systems to restore. You may experience headaches
and fatigue for a few days, but after a week or two you should
find you can function surprisingly well without your coffee
fix. If you don't use caffeine regularly, you might start
out in this four week fat loss period with 75 mg., gradually
increasing up to but not to exceed 200 mg depending on how
you feel (some people get jitters when they use even small
amounts of caffeine). I want to repeat, this is not a "must,"
but because we're discussing the "ultimate," it does merit
mention as a tool for an extra edge. (Leblanc, J. Etal.1985.
Enhanced metabolic response to caffeine in exercise-trained
human subjects. J Appl Physiol. Sep;59(3):p. 832-837)
8. Take 1 tablespoon of flaxseed
oil with the morning meal
The value of essential fatty acids
(EFA's), namely the omega 3 fats (alpha-linolenic acid) and
the omega 6 fats (linoleic acid) warrants a complete article
in itself, or even a series of articles. In order to simplify
the value of these fatty acids, understand simply that the
omega-3 and omega-6 essential fatty acids, which promote performance,
contribute to muscle increase and fat mobilization, and contribute
to cell repair and maintenance, are not produced by the human
body, thus it becomes essential that we consume them. That
doesn't necessarily mean we have to supplement. Essential
fats are found in fresh produce, fish, nuts, and even animal
meats from animals fed a diet high in natural foods rich in
EFA's. Think of flaxseed oil, which is a source of both omega-3's
and omega 6's, as extra support to make certain you are getting
your essential fats. I'd suggest making 1 morning tablespoon
of flaxseed oil (purchase the liquid sold in a dark container
that has not been exposed to heat or light - it should be
refrigerated in the store you purchase it from) a habit, and
on "protein days," consider another tablespoon with one of
the mid-day meals.
There it is. You now have the eight
parts of the Ultimate Fat Loss Strategy. I've used this strategy
with thousands of clients and customers seeking fat loss for
dramatic, sometimes astounding fat loss results. This is incorporated
in some form in all of my programs both for athletes and for
non-athletes seeking positive physical change. By understanding
and employing the eight parts, you should be able to apply
this strategy to your own routine. If you'd like the actual
workout routine that incorporates all eight parts of the strategy,
you can now get my e-book, Ultimate
Fat Loss for only $12 online!
Note: This strategy is incorporated
into all 3 of my primary programs: TRANSFORM!,
the ANSWER!,
and the Best You've Ever
Been
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