If you want to loose weight and get or stay fit, it’s really important to know how your body works.
How and why does your body store fat
The there are a number fat cells in your body which is based on the eating habits you had as a child and when you grew up. The number of fat cells you have stays the same during your life, they just compress or expand based on your energy requirements. Your body will not use energy from your fat cells if it still has lots of energy available. This means your body will only start using fat (or burning fat) once it doesn’t have energy available to it.
Humans basically store fat in their cells so they can use this energy, if they can’t find food. This is a historical survival tactic, which is not relevant anymore, since humans can now buy as much food as they want. Your body’s historical programming still causes it to store fat, if you eat to much. This is why you need to diet and exercise to stay healthy and not have too much fat build up in your body.
How does exercise work and help you loose weight
Exercise basically expends energy and burns fat. As humans we used to be physically active. We used to travel vast distances for food. We had to be physically fit and run to escape danger. In modern times, we don’t do this kind of exercise and most people sit at their desks all day and drive back and from work. Humans are gaining weight from the system that was designed to save us from starvation.
The science of weight loss
When we do exercise we have higher energy needs, so the body begins to use up the fuel that is available to it. What we eat combines with oxygen and gets turned into three things: water, carbon dioxide and adenosine triphosphate (referred to as ATP).
After our bodies use ATP, it has access to:
Carbohydrates: This is basically sugar in our blood.
Fat: Stored in your blood, in the muscles and finally in the body as subcutaneous (or body) fat.
Protein : which is muscle tissue.
Water also plays a very important role in weight loss, since it helps those chemical reactions to take place.
Exercise for fat loss
So all exercise works and all exercise helps you loose fat, since when your body needs energy, it uses up what’s available to it and then start burning fat. How much fat you burn will depend on how hard you exercise as well as your age and how fit you are. Varying your training cal also play a role.
Bodyweight / Cardio Training
Anything exercise that you do that increases your heart rate and get’s you out of breath is called a cardio workout. The 7 Minute Workout is definitely a cardio workout, since you are supposed to work as hard as you possibly can. You heart rate should rapidly increase and you should be out of breath.
Doing Bodyweight or Cardio Training will cause your body to burn energy (food) and cause your body to start using it’s reserves, which are basically fat cells. So you will burn fat by doing exercise. This happens during your exercise and it also happens for a while after when you are done with your exercise.
Ideas for a high intensity workout:
High Knee Running on the spot, Jumping Jacks or Star Jumps and Brupees are all exercise that will get your heart racing and after a minute you should start breathing harder. These movements were designed to burn energy/fat
Push-ups and body weight squats can be used for cardio. It’s just important to do them fast enough.
These types of exercise are when done fast enough all call HITT (high intensity interval training) exercises. HITT is basically designed to give you the best possible outcome for the least amount of time, as long as you are working as hard as you can.
It’s important to work as hard as you can on the day when doing a HITT (high intensity interval training) exercise. It’s all about how much energy you can use, which equates to how much fat you are burning.
Cardio / Running
Running is a cheap cardio option that you can do on your own as long as the weather is bearable (or you have the required equipment to deal with the weather). Running burns lots of energy and fat and it can fast track weight loss.
You body takes time to get used to running. It takes time and we suggest that you start with walking and then go into a routine of walking for 2 minutes and then running for 1 minute. It’s important to run at a pace that you can still speak to another person when you get started. Over time it will get easier and you will feel great.
If you are running for weight loss it’s important to mix it up. Doing sprints on a field or down a road for 100m – 400m with a minute rest in-between is a great way to mix it up. People also run hills or stairs for stamina.
Building Strength
Cardio exercises and running is not the only way to loose weight. Doing strength training by using weights or your body weight is another option.
All humans have different amounts of muscles and it’s really funny, since the more muscles you have, the more fat you burn. Having muscles makes your body burn more energy and more fat during the day. It also causes you to burn more fat during a training session than a person with less muscle. The more muscle your body builds, the more fat it burns.
Training intensity
If you want to see results, it’s really important to do more repetitions over time. For example, with the 7 Minute Workout, if you can do more pushups each time, it means you will stay challenged, but you will also burn more fat.
Variety is key
Your body adapts quicker than you think and the worst thing you can do it doing the same exercises over and over. When your body is used to certain exercises, it doesn’t burn as much fat and you will eventually hit a plateau… That is why we mix things up in the 7 Minute Workout
We recommend that you cross train, which means doing HITT Workouts, running, sprinting and doing cardio and bodyweight exercises for the best results. This completely confuses the body, which in turn ensures maximum energy and fat burning.
Let us know if you have any questions in the comments.
