Fat loss, this great desire is lurking around our life more than wewant to admit. The internet and its algorithms are tailoring for our content consumption body standards that make us feel bad and that will drive us, in our secret, to google things like “fat loss hack” or “15 days fat loss challenge” or….even worse “30 day fat loss detox”. Can you think of 6 fat loss myths that are still alive today? I’m sure you know many more.
No worries, I’m not here to judge but I’m here to go around the internet for you, bring out those searches and help understand why they’re a massive pile of smoking BS that you would never ever recommend or suggest to any of your friends or family members BUT you secretly believe in for yourself because, hey, we all want to have a 8 pack in 4 weeks, I mean, 4 weeks?
Hell, where can I sign for it?
# 1: spot fat loss AKA lose fat in specific zones of your body through some specific exercise
I give you 3 seconds to answer…Myth or reality?
MYTH.
Why?
Our body Is programmed to store fat according to our genetics and influenced by our lifestyle in terms of the amount of fat stored. The one and only way to lose fat is through caloric deficit. Being in a consistent calorie deficit would make it so that your body starts using the fat stored around to provide the energy that you need for your daily activities.
There’s no sign anywhere that if you, for example, do 1000 reverse abs crunch a day in calorie deficit, you’ll lose belly fat. You’ll just lose fat overall, wherever. Sure thing training your abs will improve their muscle density and tone them but such thing will not magically burn fat on your belly.
Train and eat right while being in a calorie deficit consistently and that, only that, will allow you, over time to get rid of round cheeks, soft belly, love handles and whatever else you pinch while checking your body naked in front of the mirror. This was just the first of the 6 fat loss myths. Can you imagine the others?
# 2: Fat loss supplements. AKA “LOSE FAT OVERNIGHT WITH THIS XYZ”
Do I need to count to 3 for this?
There is no supplement that can truly aid fat loss and that can literally melt fat away from your body while you’re sitting on the couch binge-watching the next big show on Netflix.
Sorry to break this to you but this is a marketing scam. I can already hear you saying “but there a study that tells that this ingredient works Carlo, what are you talking about?” Fair enough. Let me ask you a few things then:
Did you read the study with your own eyes? Did you read how it was structured, the protocol, the pool of participants, the method they used and read the data?
Shhh, did you do that? Now don’t complain until you have done your research on it. I’m serious! There’s a big buzz around apple cider vinegar as a magic fat loss aid. I’ve been going through the science behind it for you, there are animal models where it shows results to some extent that are not necessarily going to be translated in any result for humans. There is, though a Japanese study with obese patient that did show some result but…if you read through the paper they say their selves
[…]Although the degree of reduction was not very high[…]
this study was conducted over the course of 12 weeks and at the end of it some participants lost around 1 or 2 kg and they went through some sort of calorie restriction protocol such as reduced alcohol consumption per day that, for japan, is a big thing, considering that drinking after work is semi-mandatory.
What does this mean? Well….that if you undergo a protocol that puts you in slight calorie deficit compared to your usual, consistently for an extended period of time you will, guess what, lose fat.
I don’t think I have anything else to add here apart from the fact that supplements such as Fat burners do have a slimming effect, yes, on your wallet.
Save your money, tell your friend that recommended them that he/she is wrong, buy yourself a gym membership with the money you save, work on your nutrition and lose fat while becoming the best version of yourself, strong and satisfied.
# 3: to lose weight you just need cardio
# 4: Carbs make you fat, eating after 8pm makes you fat, fruit makes you fat, eating XYZ makes you fat.
Oh you heard this an awful lot uh? Ahh, you also recommended this too and thought about it for your own diet…right?
Worry not, we’ve all been through the stage where eating after 8 was a forbidden fruit, (no pun intended) eating pasta or carbs was allowed only on Christmas, eating fruit was a risky business and eating fat… would make you fat.
Haven’t we been advocates of a restriction, on one side or the other, haven’t we looked at that piece of cheesecake with guilt?
Well, enough of this. Eating in caloric surplus, on a consistent basis will make you fat as well as eating in a deficit will have you lose fat.
Whether you eat your calories over the course of the day or the night is not that relevant and, to a certain extent the composition of your calories could also be irrelevant but let me tell you more…
# 5: all the calories are the same
Nope, not at all.
First thing first, let me tell you a cocktail fact: A calorie is a measure of the energy that it takes to increase the temperature of a certain amount of water by 1 degree. I find it amusing that our body energy expenditure could be used to warm up water, it makes me imagine that our stomach is a giant oven burning whatever we eat or drink. Cheers.
Getting back to our myth. Yes, on paper 1000 calories are just 1000 calories but what matters to our health and diet in the long term, is the composition in macronutrients of those 1000 calories.
Let’s imagine an extreme experiment: if all the calories are the same and we wanted to lose fat, we could eat, in caloric deficit, a diet composed by M&Ms, chocolate and ice cream and still lose fat.
Our blood works would probably be scarier than ever and we’d be on our way to develop a long list of issues but we’d still be losing fat. There are several situations when these types of diets have been done and still proven that fat loss was possible. The reason is always the same: calorie deficit over a consistent amount of time.
Now please don’t take me literally and start a Häagen-Dazs-only diet: the composition of the calories that we eat matters more.
We need the right composition in macronutrients to allow our body to function properly so when you compare foods, look at the big picture, calories matter, but where are they coming from?
Two Double chocolaty chip Frappuccino blended crème have roughly the same calories as 600 grams of chicken breast. The difference is that chicken would provide you a lot of protein a negligible amount of carbs and sugars and some fats, the Frappuccino would provide you very small protein, lots of fats and a whopping quantity of sugar.
One Km is still one Km but if you cross it on your knees or on a Ferrari it makes a huge difference. There you have it, with our diet and the calories, the concept is the same.
# 6: you need a detox diet and to do a detox cleanse periodically
This myth is among my favorites. Imagine that you were calmly walking along your fav street and hear me whisper from a dark corner:
pss, hey, yes you, I have a drink for you, it will cause you diarrhea, make you feel sluggish, moody, hungry, deprived and eventually help you lose a laughable amount of fat, do you want it? It’s free!”
Guess what, you’ll refuse, right? Now, imagine the same thing but with a premium package, a fitness influencer endorsement and a price on top. Bam. There you are swiping your credit card.
While you would never accept the sketchy offer from the dark corner and you would tell everybody to be careful, you fell right away for the same thing in a polished look. Let me break this very sharply and strictly: we do not need such BS to keep our body functioning.
Our liver, kidneys, lungs, and other organs work around the clock to remove harmful substances and excrete the waste products of metabolism.
When you go through these ridiculous detox plans, more than often you have to:
1. Buy an expensive diarrhea tea or juice
2. Drink exclusively this masked laxative for somewhat around a week (if you’re lucky)
3. Refrain from eating other foods, damn, your body has to detox, can’t eat food, come on!
4. Spend more time on the toilet while scrolling on IG and looking at other influencers selling their BS
5. Tell everybody that this is great “#detox” and post several pictures of it because when you realized that it was a stupid purchase – a waste of money – you couldn’t cope with the idea of being deceived so you convince yourself it had to have had some effects
Whereas, in reality by reducing your intake of the nutrients that your organs need to perform these functions, a detox diet can hinder your body’s natural detoxification process and actually be useless if not harmful.
You might lose some weight, duh, you’re literally s*itting yourself out while on a fasted week, of course you shrink. But this will come back as soon as you come back to the world of the living and eat food.
Once again, if you have the right amount of macro and micro nutrients and a moderate calorie deficit for a consistent amount of time your body will do everything it needs to keep itself clean and still lose fat.
In this case too, save the detox money, buy a gym membership and do yourself a real favor.
Don’t believe me? Then trust a physician and listen to this podcast: