The “2
Pounds” Per Week Rule and How to Burn Fat Faster
By Tom Venuto
-Why do you always hear that 2 pounds per week is the maximum amount of
fat you should safely lose? If you train really hard while watching calories
closely shouldn’t you be able to lose more fat without losing muscle or
damaging your health? What if you want to lose fat faster? How do you explain
the fast weight losses on The Biggest Loser?
-These are all good questions that I’ve been asked many times. With the
diet marketplace being flooded every day with rapid weight loss claims, these
questions desperately need and deserve some honest answers. Want to know where
that 2 pounds per week rule comes from and what it really takes to burn more
than 2 pounds of fat per week? Read on.
Why Only 2 Pounds Per Week?
-The truth is, two pounds is not the maximum amount you can safely lose
in a week. That’s only a general recommendation and a good benchmark for
setting weekly goals. It’s also sensible and realistic because it’s based on
average or typical results.
-The actual amount of fat you can lose depends on many factors. For
example, weight losses tend to be relative to body size. The more body fat you
carry, the more likely you’ll be able to safely lose more than two pounds per
week. -Therefore, we could individualize our weekly guideline a bit by
recommending a goal of 1-2 lbs of fat loss per week or up to 1% of your total
weight. If you weighed 300 lbs, that would be 3 lbs per week.
Body Weight Vs Body Composition
-Weight loss is somewhat meaningless unless you also talk about body
composition; the fat to muscle ratio, as well as water weight. Ask any wrestler
about fast weight loss and he’ll tell you things like, “I cut 10 lbs overnight
to make a weight class. It was easy - I just sweated it off.”
-You’ve also probably seen people that went on some extreme induction
program or a lemon juice and water fast for the first week and dropped an
enormous amount of weight. But once again, you can bet that a lot of that
weight was water and lean tissue and in both cases, you can bet that those
people put the weight right back on.
-The main potential advantage of any type of induction period for rapid
weight loss in the first week is that a large drop on the scale is a
motivational boost for many people (even if it is mostly water weight).
-Why do you hear so many diet and fitness professionals insist on 2 lbs
a week max? Where does that number come from? Well, aside from the fact that
it’s a recommendation in government health guidelines and in position
statements of most nutrition and exercise organizations, it’s just math.
-The math is based on what’s practical given the number of calories an
average person burns in a day and how much food someone can reasonably cut in a
day.
How Do You Lose More Than 2 Pounds Per Week?
-Can you lose more than 2 lbs of pure fat in a week? Yes, although it’s
easier in the beginning. It gets harder as your diet progresses. How do you do
it? My rule is, extraordinary results require extraordinary efforts.
-An extraordinary effort means a particularly strict diet, as well as
burning more calories through training because you can only cut your calories
so far from food before you’re starving and suffering from severe hunger.
-Simply put, you need a bigger calorie deficit.
-If you have a 2500 calorie daily maintenance level, and you want to drop
3 lbs of fat per week withe diet alone, you’d need a huge daily deficit of 1500
calories, which would equate to eating 1000 calories per day. You would lose
weight rapidly for as long as you could maintain that deficit (although it
would slow down over time).
-Most people aren’t going to last long on so little food and they often
end with a period of binge eating. It’s not practical (or fun) to cut calories
so much and in some cases it could be unhealthy.
-The other alternative is to train for hours and hours a day, literally.
People ask me all the time, “Tom, how is it possible for the Biggest Loser
contestants to lose so much weight? Well first of all they’re not measuring
body fat, only body weight.
-Then you have the high starting body weights and the large water weight
loss in the beginning. After that, just do the math – they’re training hours a
day so they’re creating a huge calorie deficit.
-But without that team of trainers, dieticians, teammates, a national
audience and all that prize money, do you think they’d be motivated and
accountable enough to do anywhere near that amount and intensity of exercise in
the real world?
- Would it even be possible if they had a job and family? Not likely, is
it? It’s not practical to do that much exercise, and it’s not practical to cut
your calories below a 1000 a day and remain compliant. If you manage to achieve
the latter, it’s very difficult not to rebound and regain the weight afterwards
for a variety of physiological and psychological reasons.
For Fast Fat Loss: Less Food Or Harder Training?
-Trainers are becoming more inventive these days in coming up with high
intensity workouts that burn a large amount of calories and really give the
metabolism a boost. This can help speed up the fat loss within a given amount
of time.
-But as you begin to utilize higher intensity workouts, you have to
start being on guard for overtraining or overuse injuries.That’s why strict
nutrition with an aggressive calorie deficit is going to have to be a major
part of any fast fat loss strategy.
-Unfortunately, very low calorie dieting has its own risks in the way of
lean tissue loss, slower metabolism, extreme hunger, and greater chance of
weight re-gain.
-My approach to long term weight control is to lose weight slowly and patiently
and follow a nutrition plan that is well balanced between lean protein, healthy
fats and natural carbs and doesn’t demonize any entire food group.
-To lose fat, you simply create a caloric deficit by burning more and
eating less (keeping the nutrient density of those calories as high as
possible, of course).
-But to achieve the extraordinary goals such as photo-shoot-ready,
super-low body fat or simply faster than average fat loss, while minimizing the
risks, I often turn to a stricter cyclical low carb diet for brief “peaking”
programs.
-The cyclical aspect of the diet means that after three to six days of
an aggressive calorie deficit and strict diet, you take a high calorie / high
carb day to re-feed the body and re-stimulate the metabolism.
-Essentially, this helps reduce the starvation signals your body is
receiving. It’s also a psychological break from the deprivation which helps
improve compliance and prevent relapse.
-The higher protein intake can help prevent lean tissue loss and curb
the hunger.
-A high protein
diet also helps by ramping up dietary thermogenesis. A high intake of
greens, fibrous vegetables and low calorie fruits can help tip the energy
balance equation in your favor as fibrous veggies are very low in calorie
density and some of the calories in the fiber are not metabolizable.
-Healthy fats are added in adequate quantities, while the calorie-dense
simple sugars and starchy carbs are kept to a minimum except on refeed days and
after (or around) intense workouts.
There’s No Magic, Just Math
-In my experience, a high protein, reduced carb approach in conjunction
with weights and cardio can help maximize fat loss – both in terms of
increasing speed of fat loss and particularly for getting rid of the last of
the stubborn fat. It helps with appetite control too.
-But always bear in mind that the faster fat loss occurs primarily as a
result of the larger calorie deficit (which is easily achieved with sugars and
starches minimized), not some type of “low carb magic.” If your diet were high
in natural carbs but you were able to diligently maintain the same large
calorie deficit, the results would be similar.
-I’m seeing more and more advertisements that not only promise rapid
weight loss, but go so far as saying that you’re doing it wrong if you’re
losing “only” two pounds per week. “Why settle” for slow weight loss, they
insist.
-Well, it’s certainly possible to lose more than two pounds per week,
but it’s critically important to understand that there’s a world of difference
between rapid weight loss and permanent fat loss.
-It’s also vital to know that there’s no magic in faster fat loss, just
math. All the new-fangled dietary manipulations and high intensity training
programs that really do help increase the speed of fat loss all come full
circle to the calorie balance equation in the end, even if they claim their
method works for other reasons and they don’t mention calories burned or
consumed at all.
Beware of The Quick Fix
-Faster Fat Loss IS Possible. My question is, are you willing to tolerate the
hunger, low calories and high intensity exercise for that kind of deficit?
-Do you have the work ethic? Do you have the supreme level of dietary
restraint necessary to stop yourself from bingeing and putting the weight right
back on when that aggressive diet is over?
-Or would you rather do it in a more moderate way where you’re not
killing yourself, but instead are making slow and steady lifestyle changes and
taking off 1-2 lbs of pure fat per week, while keeping all your hard-earned
muscle?
-Remember, 1-2 pounds per week is 50-100 pounds in a year. Is that
really so slow or is that an astounding transformation?
-You don’t gain 50-100 pounds over night, so why should anyone expect to
take it off overnight? Personally, I think short-term thinking and the pursuit
of quick fixes are the worst diseases of our generation.
-If you want to be one of those “results not typical” fat loss
transformations, it can be done and it may be a perfectly appropriate
short-term goal for the savvy and sophisticated fitness enthusiast.
-It’s your call. But when you set your goals, it might be wise to
remember that old fable of the tortoise and the hare, and buyer beware if you
go shopping for a fast weight loss program in today’s shady marketplace.
>>Train Hard And
Expect Success<<
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