Don't Only Consult The Scale

Many people base their image of their health on weight. Many doctors and health organizations refer to the Body Mass Index to determine level of health. The BMI does offer a good starting point, as American Cancer Society studies have shown that death rates do decline with lower BMIs. A BMI of about 18 – 24.9 kg/(m^2) is considered to be a “healthy” range (see a BMI graph at http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/guidelines/obesity/bmi_tbl.htm).

Many health professionals use the BMI to determine if someone is at a healthy weight. So lets look at two people that have a “healthy” BMI. A 5’7” person weighing 125 pounds has a “healthy” BMI of 20, and another 5’7” person weighing 150 pounds and BMI of 24. Both are in the “healthy” range, but it is clear that there is a big difference in how healthy each person’s weight is. The American Cancer Society recommends that you strive for a BMI of about 18 – 20*. If you currently have a BMI around 23 or 24, it is better to try to reduce that number even more.

But there’s another very important aspect to health: the amount of fat in your body.

As people age, they tend to experience an increase in body fat, while simultaneously losing muscle mass and bone density. Metabolic rate slows as well. These factors can add up to a minor weight gain on the scale, but a major increase in health problems. Increases in body fat (particularly in the abdominal area) are related to the onset of many health conditions such as high cholesterol, stroke, heart disease, high blood pressure, and gallbladder disease.

Consider another person with a healthy BMI. A 6’0” ft tall man weighting 156 lbs has a healthy BMI of 21. As he begins to reduce his physical activity, he loses 10 pounds of muscle mass and 5 pounds of bone mass, and gains 20 pounds of fat. He gained 5 pounds and his BMI only increased by 1 . However, this man’s health has plummeted. Maintaining muscle mass and minimizing fat increase is as equally important as the number on the scale or the BMI chart.

So what’s the best way to stay healthy? Eat healthy (less saturated and trans fats, which are linked to high cholesterol and larger waists) and get to the gym. Burning calories is important for preventing fat gain, and weight training is important for preventing muscle loss.

*Myers, Tim, et. Al. “American Cancer Society Guidelines on Nutrition and Physical Activity for Cancer Prevention: Reducing the Risk of Cancer with Healthy Food Choices and Physical Activity.” ACS Guidelines on Nutrition and Physical Activity for Cancer Prevention Volume 52 • Number 2 • March/April 2002. p. 93-119.

Another Dangerous “Diet”

I recently heard about the KIMKINS diet, which is not only one of the most ridiculous I’ve ever heard of, but is also a total scam.

The diet consisted of eating 500 calories per day, with most of these calories consisting of protein-based foods. Fats and carbohydrates were practically eliminated. The diet forbids most fruits, nuts, and milk-based products.

This diet description is really a recipe for complete malnutrition. Fiber and fat are essential for maintaining good health. Additionally, the diet’s website actually recommends taking a laxative to help lose weight! The body cannot maintain a diet that low in calories.

Some people paid money to join the Kimkins program and lost a lot of weight very quickly. Not surprisingly, most people also had very bad side effects, including fainting, liver damage, hair loss, and missed periods; all effects associated with starvation. Many people tried to get refunded after experiencing these effects, but instead of receiving a refund, they were banned from the program and no longer allowed access to the Kimkins website.

The issue isn’t completely the diet itself, but the person promoting it.

The founder, “Kimmer,” claimed have lost 198 pounds in under a year, meaning about 4 pounds per week (if “Kimmer” ’s story had been true, I’d go on about the fact that this weight loss rate is extremely fast and extremely unhealthy). To join the Kimkins diet, there was an enrollment fee to be a member and to receive diet planning advice. But she banned members who reported bad results. She encouraged what is essentially anorexia, and promoted it under the falsehood that she herself had lost weight and kept it off using this method.

“Kimkim” is actually Heidi Diaz, a morbidly obese woman. She recently confessed that she had not actually lost weight and that she had tricked many people into giving her their money.

There truly is no get-slim-quick method out there. Most diets like this will cause significant damage to your health.

Adjust Weight Training to Match Your Fitness Goals

As mentioned in my article Build Muscle to Lose More Weight (link), it is important to add weight training to your routine. Aging causes a decrease in muscle mass over the years if you are not active. While cardio can help boost your fitness dramatically, challenging the muscles is equally important for weight loss and overall fitness and health.

If you’re just starting to add strength training and weight lifting to your workout, here are a few tips when getting started:

1. Warm-up for a few minutes on a cardio machine prior to lifting weights and cool-down gradually after sessions. Also, don’t forget to stretch.

2. Do exercises properly using the correct techniques regardless of the exercise (cardio, weight machines, etc.). Always read and understand the instructions on the machine and consult a personal trainer when unsure of proper technique.

3. Make sure there is a spotter when lifting free weights. If you try to do squats, bench press, or any exercise where you lift weights over your head, make sure to ask someone to spot you. If something happens and you can’t get the weight back up, you’ll need someone to be there to help you get out from under the weights.

4. Challenge the muscles, but make sure that it's kept safe. While it is usually recommended to do 12 – 15 reps for toning and muscle maintenance goals and 8 – 12 reps for muscle building goals, it is still good to mix up the number of repetitions to keep challenging your muscles and to be sure you do not reach a plateau. Reducing the number of reps and adding weight, and vice versa, can help keep your muscles challenged and in shape as you work out. The same thing goes for the number of sets that you do. Most trainers recommend three sets of each exercise. Sometimes, though, it may be good to decrease the number of sets and mix up the sets/repetition/weight combinations. Challenging your muscles in this way will also help to keep your metabolism high, assisting in weight loss.

Aerobic & Anaerobic Exercise -- Why You Should Do Both

When people talk about aerobic and anaerobic exercise, what exactly are they referring to?

According to the dictionary, aerobic means “pertaining to or caused by the presence of oxygen” and anaerobic means “pertaining to or caused by the absence of oxygen.”

In anerobic exercise, there is not enough oxygen available to support the activity being done. So obviously, this exercise can only be done for a very short amount of time. (30 sec – 2 min).

Examples of these exercises are sprinting, interval training, heavy weight lifting. An example of interval training is sprinting as fast as you can for 30 seconds, followed by 1 minute of walking or slow jogging to “recover”, sprint again for 30 seconds, walk, and so on. Heavy weight lifting involves lifting as much weight as possible for only a couple of repetitions. Understandably, many women would not want to do such heavy lifting, but interval training on the treadmill or elliptical machine will be plenty of anaerobic exercise. This is a strenuous exercise so it may be difficult to do if you are just starting out, and it should absolutely not be done everyday.

An anaerobic exercise will not burn as many calories as an equivalent amount of time of aerobic exercise (i.e., 30 minutes of aerobic exercise vs. 30 minute of anaerobic exercise). However, there are many benefits of anaerobic exercise that support, and can even improve, weight-loss efforts:

*Continuing to burn calories long after you’re done doing the exercise, whereas with aerobic exercise, you stop burning calories shortly after finishing. This means that in the long run, anaerobic exercise can enhance weight-loss.

*Anaerobic exercise causes the body to release lactic acid, which causes the body to release the human growth hormone, which causes the body to release fatty acids into the blood stream, which are then burnt off.

*Resting metabolism will increase, which will allow you to burn more calories throughout the course of the day.