What is Metabolism and how can you boost it?
Your metabolism consists of a complicated set of cellular activities that take place all the time. The way your body creates and distributes hormones, rests and wakes and burns fuel, are all parts of your metabolism. The virtue of exercise is that it increases or boosts your metabolism by its effect on muscle cells throughout the body. Metabolism is like money: the rich get richer, and the poor stay impoverished. Men generally have a higher metabolism than women: they also have a higher muscle-to-fat ratio. However, there are always exceptions: a man who is out of shape and doesn't get enough aerobic exercise will probably have more body fat and a lower metabolism than a woman who is in shape.
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People with higher muscle to fat ratios tend to have a higher metabolism, which burns fuel more efficiently and prevents excess fat storage. People who have more fat have a lower metabolism that tends to conserve fat. While these facts have been used to justify the argument that weight is largely determined by genetics, the fact that metabolism can be increased by exercise and diet means we do have some control over our bodies method of storing and burning fats and carbohydrates. |
Five Common Metabolism Facts and Fallacies
1. Aging slows down the metabolism.
Technically this is not true. Reduction of lean body mass - specifically muscle - causes the metabolism to slow down. People tend to lose muscle mass as they age for one important reason - they move around less. The more sedentary you are, the higher your fat-to-muscle ratio becomes, and since fat doesn't need that much energy to exist, your metabolism slows. If you keep eating the same amount, your body stores the extra energy (calories) as fat, perpetuating the problem.
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The key to keeping your metabolism from decreasing from decade to decade is to keep exercising, and make sure you include resistance training to keep up your muscle mass. While this is a simple answer, it is admittedly not always easy - you have to make time for exercise, no matter how hectic your life is. The benefit of doing this - in addition to enhanced metabolism - is that exercise gives you more energy and reduces stress, making that hectic life of yours seem more manageable.
left: Gladys and Maree, competing in senior fig 45, are proof you can look super hot at any age. |
2. Exercising in the morning will increase metabolism throughout the day.
The truth is it doesn't make any difference what time of day you choose to exercise - the important thing is that you do it. Thus far, there hasn't been any research proving that exercise at a certain time of day burns more calories than another. So why are people often encouraged to work out in the morning? Research does show that people who work out in the a.m. hours are more likely to stick to their program than those who do their exercise later in the day. Bottom line: the more often you exercise, the more calories you burn, so pick a time of day, and days of the week that work best for you. You want to be as consistent as possible with your workouts so that doing them becomes second nature for you.
3. Eating Within 30 Minutes After Exercise is a Metabolism Booster.
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Sorry, but no. Post exercise meals make no difference in your metabolism. However, that doesn't mean you shouldn't eat something after you exercise. A small post-exercise meal or snack is great for your glycogen levels, and helps your body recover from exercise. So just because something doesn't do wonders for your metabolism, don't dump it - it can still be doing you good in other ways. |
4. Exercising Raises Your Metabolism for the Rest of the Day
While this is true, the amount your metabolism raises is really not all that much. Resistance training increases fat free mass (FFM), which results in an increased metabolism, and studies show aerobic training also raises metabolism even though it does not significantly increase FFM. How much does this amount to? In the case of resistance training, the increased FFM burns maybe 50 more calories a day, and the raised metabolism from aerobic training nets an extra 25 to 30 (this, of course, is not counting the calories burned during the activities themselves).
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Although these numbers may seem disappointing at first, keep in mind that it doesn't take a lot of calories to make a big difference over time. If 17 extra calories a day can add over a pound a year, then 30 to 50 more calories burned will not only use up that extra amount, but also create a deficit that will add up. If you want to lose weight more quickly, however, you need to create a larger energy deficit - burn three to five hundred more calories than you consume daily, either by exercising more, eating less, or both. |
5. I Shouldn't Eat After 8 p.m. If I Want to Lose Weight
Technically, the time of day you eat makes no difference in your weight loss program. The problem comes with what the average person eats after 8 p.m., and how much. If you sit in front of the television, scarfing down chips, before you know it you've consumed several hundred calories - enough Kcals (energy) to power a workout, when all you're going to do is head off to bed (and that's doesn't mean that chips are a recommended workout fuel - you should eat something with nutritional value!).
Actually, depending on how much you had for dinner, a small mid-evening snack may be appropriate. The key word here is small, and that's if your dinner was relatively light. Consider a snack along the lines of lite cottage cheese, unsweetened yoghurt, protein shake or an apple - if you're feeling hungry, that is (if you're just bored or restless, give the snack a pass). Having an evening snack will keep your internal engine stoked just a bit so you won't wake up ravenous.
Source:
aboutaerobics.com
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