Fitness for Dummies

Day 130 / 366

I will preface this by saying that I am no expert when it comes to fitness. It’s just that for the past 6 months or so I have read and experimented a lot about how I can improve my physical health, and these are just conclusions that make the most sense to me. Maybe a better title for this would be ‘Fitness Explained by a Dummy’.

So we all know that if you want to lose weight, you need to burn more calories than you put in. And if you want to gain weight you need to consume more calories than you burn. Simple right?

Now the biggest misconception is that cardio is the most important way to lose weight. Cardio is important for your stamina and to keep your heart healthy. But our body burns calories throughout the day, not just for the 1 hour that you are out on a walk. You would burn maybe 200 calories by walking for an hour. That’s the amount of calories in half a samosa.

So you need to focus more on the calories burned throughout the day. Do you know which part of our body is amazing at burning calories? Muscles!

This is why weight training is absolutely must if you want to lose weight. Firstly, muscles are more dense than fat. So if you gain a kg of muscle and lose a kg of fat, you will look thinner. Secondly, when you are in a calorie-deficit diet, your body will first try to get rid of your muscles, since it senses a lack of energy and muscles consume a lot of energy. So by doing regular weight training, you signal your brain that you need your muscles right now, and it will then resort to burning fat.

Of course, this is a very basic understanding of whats going on, but I think logically it makes a lot of sense. If you want to lose weight then — Eat less, get more protein in, and do regular weight training.