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The 3,500 Calorie Problem

Do you know how many calories there is in a pound of fat? It's a whopping 3,500 calories. To put that into perspective, let's say you are 50 lbs. overweight. Multiply 3,500 to 50 and you get 175,000 calories. That's 175,000 calories of blubbery fat you don't need. Let's look at it with another perspective.

If your caloric expenditure at rest is 1,250 calories (not uncommon for many women), then you could survive on that for 140 days. Now, you could be thinking, "if I just quit eating for 140 days I could drop this 50 lbs." Unfortunately, it's not that simple. I'm just trying to put it into perspective.

So, I'm going to put it into a perspective where proper diet and exercise is incorporated. Hypothetically, let's say as a result of weight training your caloric expenditure has increased to 1,600 (this is achieved by an increase of 7 lbs of lean muscle, an additional 350 calories per day). Then we add approximately 700 calories used due to cardiovascular exercise, weight lifting, and some other activities you could do in a day. This comes to 2,300 calories.

But, we can't forget that we must eat so we don't waste muscle. So, let's say you ingested 1,900 calories, but 20% of those calories were used in digestion alone. That leaves you with 1,520 calories. Subtract 1,520 from 2,300 and you will get 780 calories. Given that you had a sound workout and eating program, that 780 calories would mostly come from fat. During the course of the week, let's say you used 780 calories everyday and it all came from fat. That would add up to 5,460 calories. Divide that number by 3,500 calories (the amount of calories in one pound of fat) and you will get 1.56 pounds. That means you just lost 1.56 pounds of fat in one week. This means you could lose all 50 lbs. (the right way) in eight months.

One of our most dedicated clients, Steve Ashby, truly utilized this concept. From November 19, 2003 to May 20, 2004 he lost 47.4 pounds. That's 1.975 pounds of body fat per week or 47 pounds in 6 months. His body fat percentage dropped from 29.8% to 18% and it is still going down. If he did it through diet alone, he would be at great risk of getting all the weight back. But, as a result of building a body that burns more calories and changing his lifestyle, he isn't at risk. I hope that with this illustration, you truly understand that importance of incorporating proper eating habits, weight lifting, and cardiovascular exercise.

If you are reading this and you're tired of doing things that just aren't working, click on this link contact me. I will call you and we'll set-up a consultation.