How to exercise scientifically to lose fat more effectively and maintain good health?
Today, we'll share some important points about scientific exercise and weight loss.
Question 1: "Exercise is more effective in summer," "Fat burning is more efficient in winter," when is the most efficient time of year?
Answer: Weather does affect exercise effectiveness. In summer, body temperature is higher, and the nervous, endocrine, and musculoskeletal systems are more active, resulting in a higher energy metabolism level, which is conducive to fat burning. Higher body temperature also reduces the risk of injury during exercise because for every 1 degree Celsius increase in body temperature, muscles and ligaments soften by 10% to 20%, becoming more elastic and less prone to strain. Warming up before exercise also utilizes this principle. A proper warm-up slightly raises body temperature, fully mobilizing the cardiovascular and musculoskeletal systems, leading to higher exercise efficiency and a lower risk of injury.
Summer also offers certain advantages for fat loss through exercise. This is mainly because the body expends extra energy to regulate body temperature in hot or cold weather, which is beneficial for fat loss. In winter, the cold can stimulate appetite, leading people to more actively consume food to provide more energy and maintain body temperature. Muscles and ligaments are also stiffer in cold weather, increasing the risk of injury. Therefore, generally speaking, summer is more suitable for exercise and fat loss.
Question 2: Which type of exercise should I choose for faster fat loss?
Answer: The main factor affecting exercise effectiveness is intensity. During low-intensity exercise, the body primarily uses fat as its energy source, with a small amount of carbohydrates also involved. As exercise intensity increases, the proportion of carbohydrates used for energy increases, while the proportion of fat used for energy decreases rapidly. For example, in high-intensity exercises like the 100-meter sprint, the body mainly uses carbohydrates for energy, with almost no fat involved. In long-distance running like a marathon, the body primarily uses fat for energy.
Therefore, if you want to burn fat more efficiently during exercise, low-intensity exercise is the best choice. For example, brisk walking is an excellent way to lose fat. However, this type of exercise burns fat relatively slowly, with a low rate of fat burning for energy. To achieve a 5 kg weight loss in a short period (e.g., one month), a sufficiently long daily exercise duration, such as 1-1.5 hours, is required.
High-intensity exercise can also effectively burn fat. Since the body cannot sustain high-intensity exercise for extended periods, it is typically performed as interval training, such as the speed sprints used by athletes on a sports field. This type of exercise primarily depletes glycogen stores, and fat burning is not as efficient. However, it can increase our basal metabolic rate, allowing the body to burn fat even at rest. Compared to low-intensity exercise, high-intensity interval training sessions are relatively shorter, approximately 0.5 hours, which is one of its advantages.
In addition, resistance training is also an excellent form of exercise, commonly known as "weightlifting." This type of exercise, by resisting resistance, enhances muscle metabolism, increasing the rate of fat burning even at rest.
Relatively speaking, high-intensity interval training and resistance training are best performed under professional guidance and require a good level of physical fitness.
Question 3: After exercising diligently for a while, my weight hasn't decreased at all. Could it be that I've gained muscle instead of fat?
Answer: Building muscle isn't as easy as many people imagine. We need to consume a significant amount of energy, coupled with a reasonable intensity of exercise, for muscle to grow; both are essential. Our experiments have shown that if you restrict your calorie intake while simultaneously trying to lose fat through exercise, you will experience some muscle loss. Therefore, most people trying to lose fat don't need to worry about gaining muscle first.
When evaluating the effectiveness of fat loss, we shouldn't just focus on whether your weight has decreased. Weight loss may not be due to fat, but rather muscle or water. This type of weight loss is likely to rebound quickly. Many people lose weight by skipping dinner, but in this process, most of the weight loss is likely muscle, with only a small portion being fat. This method of weight loss is a classic case of "killing eight hundred enemies while losing a thousand of your own."
Therefore, during fat loss, we should use a scale with body fat measurement capabilities to monitor whether we are losing fat or muscle. If you notice your muscle mass is decreasing too rapidly, you can adjust your energy and protein intake to protect muscle mass as much as possible during fat loss – this is the scientific way to lose fat.
Fourth Question: What are the benefits of appropriate muscle gain for maintaining health?
Answer: Muscle is the cornerstone of health. As people reach middle age, they lose muscle mass at a certain rate each year. If you don't exercise at all and don't keep your muscles active, by old age you'll only have about 50% of your youthful muscle mass, and the burden on the remaining muscle is considerable. Without sufficient muscle mass, people cannot maintain normal exercise and self-care abilities, normal glucose and lipid metabolism is difficult to maintain, and cardiovascular health cannot be well protected, leading to more health problems.
Currently, there is increasing attention on sarcopenia in the elderly, which is mostly caused by muscle loss due to lack of exercise. There is a common misconception about protecting muscle: that all problems can be solved by diet. In fact, people's protein intake levels today are far higher than decades ago, but the incidence of sarcopenia is increasing year by year, indicating that the solution is not primarily based on diet. On the one hand, older adults experience weakened digestive function, making it difficult for their bodies to process high-protein foods; on the other hand, diet alone cannot fundamentally solve the problem of sarcopenia. Muscle growth and metabolism require physical stimulation, and appropriate exercise is an excellent form of stimulation. It can increase the activity of protein synthesis enzymes, promote muscle fiber thickening, and improve muscle strength.
Muscles are the tissues in the body where most sugars and fats are ultimately oxidized and metabolized, making them crucial for maintaining good health. Ensuring a normal muscle mass is beneficial for maintaining basic health and improving quality of life.
Five Questions: How can I adjust my exercise plan to better maintain a consistent exercise routine when experiencing a period of fatigue?
Answer: After exercising for a period of time, it's inevitable to feel tired and want to rest. This is actually a matter of controlling the amount of exercise. Exercise involves two important attributes: intensity and volume. Together, these are called exercise load, which creates physiological stimulation to the body, leading to fatigue. We need to eliminate fatigue through diet, relaxation and stretching, and sleep.
For example, after completing their daily training, athletes perform many recovery activities to exceed their original performance level; this is called supercompensation. If we can achieve supercompensation after exercise through appropriate means (nutrition, relaxation, sleep, etc.), our bodies will enter a virtuous cycle of improved performance, preventing the accumulation of fatigue and burnout. Burnout occurs when the rate of recovery cannot keep up with the rate of fatigue; excessive exercise without sufficient recovery creates a vicious cycle, leading to increasing fatigue. When burnout accumulates to a certain level, it can also affect the nervous and endocrine systems, negatively impacting the body. For example, it can cause sleep disorders, decreased immunity, and in severe cases, osteoporosis.
If we feel tired or even resistant to exercise beforehand, it's actually our body signaling a need for rest. If we don't recover in time and insist on exercising, it can easily lead to sports injuries or a weakened immune system. Therefore, we discourage exercising when the body resists it; this is not a test of willpower but a mistake that violates natural laws.
The correct approach is to rest for a few days and exercise only when you feel like it. Once you develop an exercise habit, you'll be pleasantly surprised to find that you have a genuine desire to participate in exercise. This also reminds us to listen to our bodies' needs, rationally arrange our exercise load, and proactively learn methods to help our bodies recover, so as to achieve better exercise results.
