The 4 Basic Elements For Weight Loss

You probably hear lots of tips here and there about losing weight. What to do, what not to do, etc.

I like to go back to the basics, the basics. Because it is by understanding things at the base that we can better understand the rest.

It's the same for weight loss.   

In the United States, a study of 3,000 adults who lost an average of 60 lbs, but did not resume them for more than 60 months (5 years), revealed that for the majority of these people, there were four recurring factors:

- Decrease in calorie intake;

- Regular practice of physical activity;

- Weekly weighing;

- Ingestion of a breakfast every morning.

A little physiology

The loss of body fat is directly related to metabolism.

People often hear about metabolism, but not many know what it is.

Metabolism is "the set of biochemical reactions catalyzed by appropriate enzymes and resulting in syntheses (anabolism) or degradation (catabolism) of biological molecules" (OQLF, 1990). It is the set of "physical and chemical exchanges in the tissues through which a body is kept alive and its energy regenerated" (OQLF, 1990).

The metabolism is in two parts: the anabolism which is the synthesis, the construction, and the catabolism which is the degradation, the disassimilation.

If we focus on adipose tissue, the one we want to lose, we must understand the phenomenon of its degradation, the catabolism of fatty tissue.

Lipolysis ( lipo- fatty, lysis: loosening) is "the hydrolysis of fat, resulting in a melting of adipose tissue" (QQLF, 1982). This is "the initial stage of lipid catabolism. Under the action of lipases, triglycerides are hydrolyzed to fatty acids, glycerols and partial glycerides "(OQLF, 1987).

So, more simply, lipolysis is degradation, melting, loss of body fat.

This is what interests us.

Decrease in caloric intake

Fats that can be hydrolyzed, degraded, lost, come mainly from three places.

First, they come from food, from caloric intake.

Secondly, they come from the fats that are stored in the adipocytes, the fat cells.

And finally, they come from the stores stored in the muscles. However, these are only very small amounts of fat. These are not the fats we are aiming for.

You surely know it, that's what we eat that gives us energy.

And that's what we eat too much - the energy that's contained in food, but we do not spend - that makes us gain weight.

This is the main reason for excess weight: too much caloric or energy intake.

If we eat less, our organization will draw on our reserves to meet its energy needs.

And it will go among other draws in fat tissue, adipocytes: lipolysis.

So the first thing you can do to lose weight is to reduce your caloric intake (Extenso, 2013).

Regular practice of physical activity

This is the second essential.

No matter what you do as a physical activity - running, swimming, cycling, bodybuilding, walking, etc. - there is an energy expenditure.

Even sleeping or breathing while sitting requires energy expenditure.

When your muscles are stressed, they cause your body to consume energy.

And if you have decreased your calorie intake, your body will have to draw on your fat reserves.

This is how weight loss is optimized. By creating a negative energy balance.

Weekly weighing

For many people, using the scale is an uncomfortable moment.

Many people simply do not weigh themselves because the figure of their body weight becomes a weight itself.

The first use of weighing is to have a quantifiable and measurable data to know its evolution and to be able to note the changes in our body mass.

But it's not just weighing that helps to see changes or fluctuations in weight.

First, there are our clothes. Tightest pants or a hole closer or further down the waist make you realize very quickly that your waistline has changed.

Then there is the tape measure for your waist. Here, as for weighing, there is a measure, a number, a quantity.

And then also, there is the percentage of fat that is calculated by measuring skin folds or with bio-impedance. But these are less accessible techniques.

As a scientist, however, I have to advocate a form of measurement so that you can see your evolution at least by yourself.

Seeing the numbers over time, in a notebook or the spreadsheet software, you will be able to realize where you come to know where you go.

Note, however, that no matter the measure, always take it in the same conditions. For example, weighing would be done every Friday morning on an empty stomach.

That's how you can measure your progress.

Ingestion of a breakfast every morning

The word "lunch" literally means "undo, stop fasting".

In English, the word " breakfast " is also clear: break: break, fast: fast.

The absence of lunch would be related to excess weight. We can not say it beyond all doubt, but there is a lot of research going on right now.

One fact remains: sitting in the morning or at sunrise and "undoing the fast" is part of the adoption of good habits.

And if your schedule does not allow you to get up early and you're up just around lunch time, you can always say that you are "branches" instead of having lunch.

It's a good health compromise because, in English, the word "brunch" is a contraction of " breakfast " " and " lunch ".

Weight loss and its myths

This week's blog discusses two myths that I will immensely delight in denying. Virtually everyone 
who trains or wants to lose weight think these two statements are true, while no: 

Myth {1}: Fat Burns Locally

In other words, it does not because do 300 exercises for the abdominals that we necessarily get a flat stomach or that we define our abdominals. It's also not because you work your triceps (muscle behind the arm) that the fat of "bye-bye" will disappear. 

THE FAT DOES NOT COME LOCALLY!

The best example to illustrate these words comes from one of my colleagues. We were discussing the tendency of clients to ask us for exercises that work the muscles located in the area where they wanted to lose fat. This example will definitely allow you to understand. 

When people lose weight, they also lose a lot of fat in the face. How many customers have I told me that many did not recognize them even more so they had lost fat on their face. But they have never done exercises for the face. At least, I have never seen anyone do facial contraction exercises to lose fat on the face.

You will tell me "Well yes it's obvious!" But why then many still believe that doing sit-ups will give them 6 packs. 

This has nothing to do! 
My reference in the field of scientific research in training, a colleague of mine, however, found a research that claimed that a small amount of fat was nevertheless used locally. However, the results were, according to him, so insignificant in the proportion that they had no visual impact. 

The second myth directly follows the first. 

Myth {2}: Adduction and hip abduction exercises to lose fat in the thighs

Adduction: movement of the thigh and leg inward working the muscles of the groin.
Abduction: movement of the thigh and leg outward working the area that you define as the saddlebags. 
Since almost all women want to lose fat at this level and think that fat goes away locally, it is normal that they want to do these 2 movements and therefore all the exercises that result. Nevertheless, we saw that the fat did not burn locally. 
On the other hand, there is also another reason why these movements are a total waste of time: the solicited muscles are so small in comparison with other exercises of lower as of the upper body, that the energy expenditure which is there connected is totally negligible. In addition, the energy they consume at rest is even more negligible.

I must say, however, that this reasoning is not in itself bad. When you do both of these exercises, the stressed muscles burn heavily which can lead you to believe that it will be effective. On the other hand, let's not forget that these muscles are so small that their impact is negligible. The two reasons these muscles burn a lot are that the muscles that are used are very small and are very well insulated during exercise. 

You will then ask me if the adduction and abduction exercises are better than nothing. 
Honestly, it is better than to take this time for an exercise more relevant to the goal set. 

Here are some examples of ideal exercises for weight loss:

• Squats - Back Squat - Front Squat - Side Squat
• Deadlifts (Romanian Deadlift - Straight Leg Deadlift)
• Lunges (Walking Lunges -Suspended Lunges)
• Vertical Tirades (Chin-Up - Pull-Up - Latpulldown)
• Seated Row - Bent Over Row
• Vertical Pushing (Military Press - Shoulder Press)
• Horizontal thrusts (Bench Press - Dumbell Press - Chest Press)
• Any combination of these movements (Push Press - Shoulder - Shoulder-thrown)

The Important Thing Is Not What You Eat But When You Eat It

Much better than the diet to lose weight, and also more attainable: night fasting.
This is one of the trendy diet practices: fasting, or intermittent fasting. The principle is not to eat over a long enough time. And after decades of studying the type of meal to promote or avoid for weight loss, nutritionists are now interested in the pace of meals and the most favorable schedules.



A recent study showed the benefits of this fasting in mice in terms of weight gain and control of blood sugar level (thus helping to prevent the risk of diabetes). But what about humans? Ruth Patterson, a professor of family medicine and public health at the University of California, is one of the researchers studying the effect of fasting. According to her, CNN reports, refraining from eating between 8 pm and 8 am (a bit like a Ramadan upside down, and for nutritional reasons) would help to lose weight. Following a group of women to verify the effects of the method, she considers that"Night fasting is an achievable way of life while the diet is not."

Calories Burned

The variant of fasting, the technique of consuming the majority of calories before 3 pm, because we are programmed to consume more energy and thus burn more calories at the beginning of the day ...

Illustration of an article published in the journal Cell Metabolism (Volume 20, n ° 6, December 2014) on the effects of the restriction of the feeding period in mice

As a reminder, the researcher Traci Mann, who worked for twenty years on eating habits, said last May in an interview with the Washington Post that diets did not work. According to her, the planners who manage to live under their normal weight would be only 5%. And at what price:

"They spend every minute of their lives keeping that weight. In concrete terms, they spend their entire lives as hungry people fighting against biology and evolution. "