GETTING TO THE FAT BURNING ZONE WHEN EXERCISING

GETTING TO THE FAT BURNING ZONE WHEN EXERCISING

Part 3 of 4

So you go to the gym with the thought of burning FAT. Your Fitness App -- Wahoo Fitness, MapMyFitness, RunKeeper -- tells you to exercise aerobically at 60%-70% of your maximum heart rate in order to be in your Fat Burning Zone. MyFitnessPal's blog, which is the Go-to blog for fitness advice for thousands of people blah-blah all the time about going SLOW at 60-70% of MHR in order to get to readers to their FAT BURNING ZONE. Omg! I wish they would STOP giving out what is WRONG INFO for most people...like almost EVERYONE!

MyFitnessPal tells Gym Lovers that for maximum fat-burning results, they should, "Spend 10 minutes on the treadmill, 10 minutes on the rowing machine, and 10 minutes on the elliptical...stick with a moderate intensity level...60% to 70% of your max heart rate." I'm not ragging on just MyFitnessPal, so many gyms tell their members the same advice that's DEAD WRONG 98% of the time. They're right 2% of the time when they're giving their advice to a person who has exhausted their glycogen stores already through fasting or having already exercised off 1,600 calories if you're a woman and on average 2,000 calories if you're a man. 

Exercising and the process of lipolysis or fat burning occurs when the body has high levels of adrenaline, also called epinephrine, (hormone responsible for increasing blood flow to the muscles, cardiac output, and blood sugar which occurs at greater work intensity rather than lower intensities) and low insulin levels (due to a lack of glucose in the blood and glycogen in the muscles and liver.)  

To explain fat burning or lipolysis scientifically I would need to use A LOT of alien terms used Chemistry I and II that most people just aren't familiar with. I really don't have to go into this level of explanation for this blog in order to convey an important exercise principle for maximizing weigh-loss benefits. All that is necessary for me to do in order to convince you to STEP UP your exercise intensity level and turn a DEAF EAR to this bad fitness advice is to REMIND YOU as to how fat is broken down by the body in response to exercise. 

Exercise is physical movement which requires energy. Energy comes from the food we eat. Our body's Go-to source for fuel is glucose or blood sugar. (The body will only breakdown fat and protein for energy when it doesn't have sufficient blood sugar.) When glucose levels are low, the body uses glycogen or STORED sugar to power exercise. Your body utilizes liver glycogen to keep your blood sugar levels up and muscle glycogen during exercise. 

When glycogen levels are EXHAUSTED, the body produces a hormone called Glucagon which increases blood glucose from the breakdown of fat (triglycerides) and protein. Glucagon is proportionately more active on the liver whereas adrenaline has a stronger metabolic action on muscle and fat. WITHOUT Glucagon acting on specific receptors on our cells, the body does not start the chemical cascade necessary to UN-STORE our Triglycerides (stored fat on our hips, thighs, butt, stomach, arms, and back) and then breakdown its chemical components in order to MAKE the blood glucose (ENERGY) Necessary to make us MOVE.  

If our bodies have sufficient blood sugar, we will NOT burn fat when we exercise. If the body has glycogen to use to fuel exercise, we will NOT be burning fat as a fuel source. It is ONLY WHEN our bodies do NOT have glucose and glycogen to use for energy to fuel exercise that our bodies will RELEASE the hormone GLUCAGON which initiates the BREAKDOWN, RELEASE, REPACKAGING, and TRANSPORT of FAT to be used as energy to fuel exercise. 

Working out at 60-70% of ones maximum heart rate is NOT the initiator of fat burning. Aerobic exercise does not hold the key to using fat as our exercise fuel source. A lack of glycogen in our muscles and liver and the need to have an adequate level of blood sugar is what causes fat burning. Get through your glycogen stores as soon as you can and your body WILL GET TO BURNING FAT that much sooner. 

My website DietBella.com will continue this discussion in further detail in order to help everybody who's still a little confused or just wants a workout that will burn their unwanted fat laid out for them.

I've got to get back at work

Thx for reading and giving me a platform to help people in what I absolute LOVE,

-Bell Gia