Nutritional Information

Nutritional Information

How can I speed up my metabolism?

It’s not unusual to hear people blame their weight gain on a slow metabolism. They’ve cut down on calories and are taking regular exercise yet they’re still not losing weight. The only other possible diagnosis, they expertly conclude, is a slow metabolism. What is a slow metabolism? How does it affect your weight and can you do anything to speed it up? What is a metabolism?

Metabolism describes all the chemical processes that go on continuously inside the body to keep you all your organs functioning normally, such as breathing, repairing cells and digesting food. These chemical processes require energy. The minimum amount of energy your body requires to carry out these chemical processes is called the basal metabolic rate (BMR). Your BMR accounts for anything between 40% and 70% of your body’s daily energy requirements, depending on your age and lifestyle. A ‘slow metabolism’ is more accurately described as a low BMR.

Do some people have a faster metabolism than others?

Body size, age, gender and genes all play a role in determining your metabolic rate. Muscle cells require more energy to maintain than fat cells do, so people with a higher muscle to fat ratio tend to have a higher BMR. As we get older, we tend to gain fat and lose muscle. This explains why the BMR tends to decrease with age. In general, men tend to have a faster metabolism as they have more muscle mass, heavier bones and less body fat than women, which is why their daily calorie allowance is higher. The calorie allowances an average man needs are around 2,500 kcal a day. For an average woman, that figure is around 2,000 kcal a day. These values can vary, Nutritional Information 111 depending on a person’s age, levels of physical activity and other factors. Your metabolism may be partly determined by your genes, although this is not fully understood yet. Genes definitely play a role in muscle size and your ability to grow muscles, both of which affect your metabolism.

Am I fat because of a slow metabolism?

In fact, the opposite appears true: overweight people may actually have a higher metabolism than their leaner counterparts, reflecting the energy requirements of maintaining a larger body size. When you account for differences in body size and composition, there is a remarkable similarity in energy expenditure between individuals. Research has shown that people tend to eat more than they think they have. When asked to write down everything they’ve consumed in a day, many people reported eating far less than they actually do. More often than not, the reason you’re putting on weight is because you’re eating and drinking more calories than you’re burning. It may be hard to accept, but staying on top of the number of calories is the key to losing weight and keeping it off.

Can losing weight too fast slow down my metabolism?

Crash diets and other calorie-restricted diets can reduce your BMR. For example, your body is forced to break down muscle to use for energy with some diets. The lower your muscle mass, the slower your metabolism. With less muscle and a slower metabolism, it then becomes a lot easier to put body fat back on after coming off the diet. What can I do to speed up my metabolism? It is claimed that certain foods and drinks can boost your metabolism, including green tea, black coffee, spices and energy drinks, but the evidence behind these claims is flimsy and the effect on your metabolism is marginal at best, as each person responds differently to each product. While you don’t have much control over the speed of your metabolism, you can control how many calories you burn through your level of physical activity. The more active you are, the more calories you burn. In fact, some people who are said to have a fast metabolism are probably just more active, and maybe more fidgety, than others.

Here are the three most effective ways of burning calories:

1. Aerobic activity Aerobic exercise is the most efficient way to burn calories. You should aim to do 150 minutes of aerobic activity a week, such as walking, cycling and swimming. You can achieve this target by doing 30 minutes a day, five days a week and breaking down your activity Nutritional Information 113 sessions into chunks of 10 minutes. To lose weight, you are likely to need to do more than 150 minutes a week and make changes to your diet.

2. Strength training Muscle tissue burns more calories than fat tissue, so increasing your muscle mass will help you to lose weight. Don’t worry; you don’t need to turn into Arnold Schwarzenegger! Aim to do muscle-strengthening activities that work all the major muscle groups (legs, hips, back, abdomen, chest, shoulders and arms) two or more days a week. Examples of muscle-strengthening activities include lifting weights and high intensity bouts of exercise. Heavy gardening may also do the job.

3. Being active Being constantly on the move and reducing time spent sitting down will help you to burn more calories. Any extra movement helps. Look for ways to walk and move around a few minutes more each day, as the more you move, the more calories you burn.