how to lose stubborn fat for good!
You see, there are very specific reasons why certain areas of your body get leaner faster than others and why some fat just refuses to go away.
If you’re a guy, chances are that your stomach and the lower back region were a pain in the ass for you.
If you’re a woman, it’s probably your thighs, hips, and butt, right?
Well, don’t worry.
- You’re not genetically cursed.
- You don’t need to do special exercises.
- Your hormones are probably fine.
- You’re not eating the “wrong” foods
The Simple Science of Stubborn Fat
When you eat food, your body breaks it down into various substances and releases insulin in the blood to shuttle the nutrients into your cells.
When you’re in this “fed” state, no fat burning occurs, and depending on how much you eat, this can last for several hours.
This mechanism makes simple physiological sense. Why should your body burn fat for energy when it has all it needs from the food just eaten? It has no reason to and holds onto its valuable fat for when food energy runs out.
To that point, as the nutrients eaten are absorbed, insulin levels decline, and the body senses that its post-meal energy is running out. The body then shifts toward burning fat stores to meet its energy needs.
Day after day, it juggles these states of storing nutrients you eat, and burning its stores when the temporary supplies run out. You can see this depicted in the graph in the previous section.
To burn, or “mobilize,” fat, your body produces chemicals known as catecholamines. These molecules travel through your blood and “attach” to receptors on fat cells, which then triggers the release of the energy stored within the cells to be burned for energy.
Now, fat cells have two types of receptors for catecholamines: alpha- and beta-receptors. To keep this simple, beta-receptors speed up fat mobilization, whereas alpha-receptors hinder it.
And here’s the big difference between “regular” and “stubborn” fat:
Fat that is easy to lose has more beta-receptors than alpha-, and fat that is hard to lose has more alpha-receptors than beta.
For most of us guys, this means a steady fat loss in places like our arms, shoulders, chest, face, and legs, and slower fat loss in our stomach area and lower back. For most girls, the stubborn fat is grouped in the hips, thighs, and butt.
So, if that’s the science behind the stubborn fat, what can we do to get rid of it faster?
4 Strategies to Help You Lose Stubborn Fat Faster
How Fasted Training Helps You Lose Stubborn Fat
Your body is in a “fasted” state when insulin is at a low, baseline level and fat stores are the primary source of energy.
The size and composition of a meal as well as various physical factors determine how long it takes for your body to process and absorb the food you eat and enter a fasted state.
There aren’t hard and fast rules but here’s what you should know:
- ~30 grams of whey protein will take 2 to 3 hours to fully process,
- carbs aren’t the only macronutrient that stimulates insulin production–proteinand dietary fat do as well
- dietary fat also slows down the digestion of a mixed meal, causing insulin levels to remain elevated for longer,
The bottom line is the larger the meal, the larger the insulin response and the longer it will take to come back to a fasted state.
This is why most people that train fasted do so first thing in the morning, after at least 8+ hours of time has elapsed since their last meal.
If you can’t do that, then I recommend you eat no more than 30 to 40 grams of protein (whey is particularly good because of how quickly it’s processed) with only trace amounts of carbohydrate and fat (10 grams or less) and wait 3 to 5 hours before exercising.
Now, why bother with fasted training? Because it accelerates fat loss…and especially if combined with a few supplements.
Weight training a fasted state is particularly effective and training first thing in the morning has an added benefit, as fasting for longer than 6 hours increases your body’s ability to burn fat.
Before we dive into the details, I want to make one thing clear: fasted training doesn’t let you somehow “cheat” the laws of energy balance. If you’re not a calorie deficit, no amount of fasted training is going to help you get leaner.
That said, fasted training does “optimize” fat loss in several ways.
Insulin blunts lipolysis (the breakdown of fat cells for energy) and fat oxidation (the burning of the fatty acids resulting from lipolysis), and that’s why the higher your insulin levels are during exercise, the less fat you’ll burn in those workouts.
Furthermore, blood flow in the abdominal region is increased when you’re in a fasted state. This means that catecholamines can reach the stubborn fat easier, resulting in more stubborn fat mobilization.
This is why many fitness competitors swear by the strategies outlined in this article for getting rid of the final bits of stubborn fat that take you from “lean” to “shredded.”
Fasted training helps you lose stubborn fat faster. Here’s how:
Fasted training does have one significant drawback, however: accelerated breakdown of muscle tissue.
This is undesirable because of a calorie deficit, which is necessary for losing fat, puts you at a protein turnover disadvantage. Thus, higher amounts of protein degradation can result in more muscle loss.
Fortunately, you can prevent this with proper supplementation.
HMB and Muscle Preservation
The supplement β-Hydroxy β-Methylbutyrate (also known as HMB) is a substance formed when your body metabolizes the amino acid leucine, which is an amino acid that directly stimulates protein synthesis. it’s an extremely effective anti-catabolic agent. That is, it’s very good at preventing muscle breakdown, which means you will recover faster from your workouts and experience less muscle soreness (and the free acid form shows the most promise in this regard). It also has no effect whatsoever on insulin levels, which means it can’t break your fasted state.
Caffeine Helps Burn Fat (and Stubborn Fat)
Caffeine helps you lose fat by increasing your body’s daily energy expenditure.
Caffeine also improves strength, muscle endurance, and anaerobic performance, and also reverses the “morning weakness” experienced by many weightlifters.Part of maximizing the fat loss benefits of caffeine is preventing your body from building up too much of a tolerance, however. The best way to do this is to limit intake, of course.
Here’s what I recommend:
- Before training, supplement with 3 – 6 mg caffeine per kg of body weight. If you’re not sure of your caffeine sensitivity, start with 3 mg/kg and work up from there.
- Keep your daily. intake at or below 6 mg per kg of body weight. Don’t have 6 mg/kg before training and then drink a couple of coffees throughout the day.
- Do 1 – 2 low-caffeine days per week, and 1 no-caffeine day per week. A low day should be half your normal intake, and a no day means less than 50 mg of caffeine (you can have a cup or two of tea, but no coffee, caffeine pills, etc.).
Yohimbine is a Powerful Stubborn Fat Loss Aid
Yohimbine is made from the Pausinystalia Yohimbe plant, and it helps the body “tap into” fat stores.
Yohimbine accelerates weight loss, but only works if you’re training in a fasted state. Elevated insulin levels negate yohimbine’s effects.
I’ve cut both with and without fasted training and yohimbine and I can say with absolute certainty that with is noticeably faster.
In terms of dosages, research has shown that 0.2 mg/kg of body weight is sufficient for fat loss purposes, and that ingesting it prior to exercise is particularly effective.
Some people get overly jittery from yohimbine, so I recommend you start with .1 mg/kg of body weight to assess tolerance. If you feel fine, then increase to the clinically effective dosage of 0.2 mg/kg.
Furthermore, yohimbine can raise blood pressure. If you have high blood pressure, I don’t recommend you use it.
The Bottom Line on Losing Stubborn Fat
So yes! stubborn fat can be a real pain in the ass.
Depending on your! genetics and circumstances, it can cling to your bones for dear life. Or, if you’re lucky, it can melt away with relative ease.
Either way, rest assured that you CAN get rid of it. Follow the strategies in this article and you’ll get there. Let me know when you do.
What’s your take on losing stubborn fat?
Have anything else to share?
Let me know in the comments below!
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