Importance of Resistance - Strength Training vs Diet for Fat Loss
Aiming to shed some body fat? Let’s
share some basic human physiology facts that affects metabolism of fat and body
composition. From the origins of human species, the food was scarce and our
body tend to save it for times of fasting.
There are many reasons for this, and
I won't rehearse them for you now. Diet is arguably also more important for
increasing insulin sensitivity, which is the biggest driver of chronic disease.
Relation of insulin sensitivity to fat loss and gain
Basic thermodynamic applies to human
metabolism too. So if you are active by
either working on aerobic exercises or if you prefer resistance training you’ll
enhance your energy expenditure and on effect start mobilizing fat into burring
process.
How that happens by breaking up fats
into free fatty acids and glycerides which are then taken to muscle
mitochondria and broken down all the way to the water and carbon-dioxide.
In essence, by strength loading your
muscles you’re going to enhance your mitochondria and mobilize fat. But it's a
big mistake not to include resistance training in a health-improving fat-loss
program.
Resistance (strength) training is more effective than endurance training for
fat loss
Resistance (strength) training is
more effective than endurance training at improving body composition (ratio of
muscle to fat tissue) and insulin sensitivity. The higher effectiveness of
resistance training is likely due in large measure because it's simply more
difficult.
In the words of the cited paper, it
produces "a large metabolic stress". Endurance training falls short
on that score.
Frequenting different gyms, I noticed
people do not exercise with enough intensity. Their usual practice is to do a
fixed number of repetitions, and stop, whether they could have done more or
not.
Then they rest a bit, and do another
set. Then repeat.
Free weights: how heavy the weight should be?
Most of the men in the gym also focus
on how heavy the weight is. The point is not to lift weights, the point is to
stress muscles by putting a load on them.
To move those heavy weights around,
they use momentum, and jerk the weights – lots of body English.
That does at least a couple of
things:
It increases the risk of
injury.It fails to load the target
muscles properly.My mantra as always is that
the most important aspect of working out is to remain injury-free.
People perceive resistance training
as too hard – and it is hard if done properly. Most programs for fat loss don't
seem to include resistance training for their members.
You don't get a large metabolic
stress without some work.
But because of the perception of
difficulty, they may be afraid
Resistance training is effective for fat loss
Resistance training is simply
mandatory to get the full benefits of any fat-loss program, and the same
applies to better insulin sensitivity.
Gene expression was remarkably moved
toward that of much younger people, when older adults did resistance training.
To get the results from resistance
training, it simply must be difficult. To get that large metabolic stress, you
can't just do 3 sets of 10 reps with 2 minutes rest in between each set.
However, you can do it in a short
amount of time.
Intensity of workout dictates the volume – number of repetitions
Most people don't even start
resistance training not only because of the level of perceived difficulty, but
because of the perceived time commitment.
The more intense the workouts, the
more you have to cut back on volume. You can get very fit and healthy in one
hour a week of dedicated resistance training. Even 30 minutes, or even less,
can result in significant improvements in health and strength.
What type of exercise suits your needs best?
Many people think you need to do different
types of exercise to get certain results. For example, you need to do aerobics
for cardiovascular fitness, and resistance training to build muscle and
strength.
Or that there's a fundamental
difference between using free weights and resistance training machines. All of
these have something in common, and all starts at the level of the muscle cell.
When someone runs, they are using leg
muscles to move their body. The cardiovascular and respiratory systems ramp up
in order to supply muscle with nutrients and oxygen, and to remove waste
products.
When muscles work, the cardiovascular and respiratory system follow
When resistance training, the muscles,
and heart and lungs, don't know whether they're encountering a free weight or a
machine. Any type of exercise or any type of physical activity involves using
the skeletal muscles to perform work.
Resistance training results in
changes in muscle, making muscle more efficient.
The changes start with molecular
signaling, and this happens with just one bout of exercise. One of the most
important results of this signaling is an increase in the number and size of
mitochondria, the powerhouses of the cell.
Makes perfect sense, since exercise
increases your capacity to do work, and allows you to do the work you perform
more efficiently.
Resistance training is the most effective for gaining muscle mass
Resistance training increases the
molecular signaling that results in more and better mitochondria even more so
than endurance training, or steady-state aerobics.
When people did endurance training,
followed by resistance training, the molecular signaling was enhanced. This is
likely due to the greater intensity of resistance training as compared to
aerobics.
Cycling or jogging simply does not stress
the muscles enough to get the full molecular signal which resistance training
promotes. All of this is a lot of physiology which you may or may not be
interested in, and you certainly don't have to know it to get results from your
exercise.
But the point is, any kind of exercise
starts at the level of the muscle. Then the cardiovascular and respiratory
systems kick in to support the muscle. Resistance training supports
cardiovascular fitness in this way.
Endurance training imposes a breaking down impulse to the muscle
Resistance training also has benefits
in other areas that endurance training doesn't.
Endurance training imposes a
catabolic (breaking down) state on the body, while resistance training does the
opposite. To a great extent, a balance between catabolism and anabolism is
crucial for health.
Resistance training also has the
great advantage that it doesn't need to be done as often or as long. Thirty to
sixty minutes a week, and you can get lean and fit.
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