Why cutting calories might be making you fatter!

You’ve probably heard the term “metabolic rate” or “metabolism”. Basically, your metabolic rate is how fast your body burns calories.

The faster your metabolism, the more calories you burn.

But did you know that reducing calorie intake (such as in most diets) can actually reduce your metabolic rate?

What does this mean? Basically, that when you first start your calorie restriction diet, you’ll lose weight because your body will be burning more calories than you’re feeding it. Great!

…But your body isn’t stupid. It knows it can’t keep this up for long, so since it thinks food is scarce, it does the only thing it can, it STOPS BURNING SO MANY CALORIES.

(As a side note, a “cheat day” will NOT solve this problem, but I’ll go into that another day)

What happens when you diet to the point that your metabolism slows down to match your calorie intake? …Weight loss stops.

Now most people, having lost some weight from the first wave of calorie restriction immediately assume they need to cut calories even more. Weight loss will start again; and then stop.

How long can you keep this up for? There’ll come a point when you can’t just stop eating.

This is where many people fall off their diet, because the lack of calories slowly shuts their body down. You feel terrible, have no energy, and your body will start to burn muscle tissue instead of fat; after all, muscle requires energy, from food which it’s not getting, so your body ditches the extra muscle to save on energy expenditure and you end up “skinny-fat” (a term used to describe people who are skinny, but with no muscle – think marathon runner)

We all know people, maybe you’re one of them, who seem to eat almost nothing and still don’t lose weight. This is why.

In the end, most of these people either carry on eating almost nothing and make themselves sick, or give up and go back to eating the same junk they were before. Except now your body is burning far fewer calories than it was originally (since you’ve slowed your metabolic rate down), so it can’t do anything with all this extra food except store it, as fat. Enter the yo-yo dieter!

Yes, a slight calorie deficit is necessary to aid weight loss, but if you can also ramp UP your metabolic rate (through exercise, and the right food selection), you’ll now be burning more calories (not less) without starving yourself. Energy levels will be good, your immune system won’t be compromised, and you’ll lose weight.

For help with your diet or exercise plan visit my website www.DartfordBootcamps.com

One-to-One and small group Personal Training, and outdoor fitness classes in Dartford, Kent.

Outdoor Training

Now that the worst of the weather is behind us and it's starting to warm up a bit I'd like to think that most of you are considering moving your training (or at least part of it) outdoors.

Granted if you're used to using the gym machines (which by now I hope I've convinced you not to) you may be at a loose end as to what you can actually DO outside other than running.

Well I'm going to use this post to give you some ideas of what you can do to turbocharge your training and increase fitness levels, and fat loss, faster than you could imagine.


The limits of the gym mean there are a huge number of exercises you can't do, or just don't want to do in a busy gym, that you can easily do in the unconfined space outdoors and without so many spectators making you feel like YOU'RE the one doing things wrong (as if sitting on a bike watching telly's going to get results!).


So, for starters, you can achieve almost any result you want using just bodyweight exercises.

These could include push-ups, squats, lunges, sprints, chin-ups (on a bar/tree/rope), burpees, jumping (lots of variations), crawling and climbing, although there is no limit to the movements you can make up and combine.

Make use of the space - this isn't generally available in gyms, so unless you're willing to train in the rain, you won't be able to perform these exercises for a large part of the year.

Use the space for sprints, bounding, skipping, gymnastic type rolls and cartwheels, try some handstands or even make use of obstacles like benches and fences. Challenge yourself.


And with just a few simple, cheap bits of equipment you can add literally thousands of new exercises to your routine.

Buy a bag of sand from your local DIY store, a bit of rope, resistance bands, an old tyre, heavy medicine balls and some dumbbells and you've got yourself a gym that outshines even the flashiest of gyms.

But remember that training is about having fun and pushing yourself to the limit, don't stick to the same exercises you'd do in the gym, take advantage of your surroundings and make up as many movements as you can, however silly they might look.

If you can see potential in ANYTHING, use it!

Change your exercises to take advantage of the outdoors and train HARD. Find a local Bootcamp and make it a regular training session.

If you're local to Dartford, Kent, visit my website Personal Trainer Dartford for times and locations of my Bootcamp classes.


And just so you know that I put my money where my mouth is, check out this video of a workout I did a couple of weeks ago (I haven't got around to editing the more recent ones yet!). It's a great example of a tough workout that you can do in your back garden, or anywhere!