If your body was a car the muscles would be the engine, so to burn fat you want to build the biggest engine possible and race that engine as hard as it can go. I love training myself like this, and I train a lot of my clients like this (photo of Jamie and Betsy above). In this blog I explore "The Fat Burning Zone" and the science of how High Intensity Interval Training turns your body into a fat burning machine.

DURING your workouts your MUSCLES (importance of resistance training) look for fuel from mainly Carbs and Fats in the bloodstream or within the muscle itself. Protein is mainly used for fuel during the depleted state, post workout.

Energy from Bloodstream: Carbs are in the form of Glucose, Fat is released from stores into bloodstream (liposys).

Energy from within the Muscle: Carbs are in the form of Glycogen, Fat in the Muscle is called Triglyceride.

During your workout your MUSCLES use a combo of Fats and Carbs for energy based on the DURATION and INTENSITY of your workout. The "Fat Burning Zone," is based on the science that fats require more oxygen to be used as fuel. Fat Burning Zone theory is low intensity, more oxygen, fat burning...going along with this theory still high intensity, less oxygen, more Carbs used for fuel. The low intensity part is true but the high intensity part is a little deceiving. As intensity increases, more fat is burned just in a lower percentage to the contribution of Carbs being used as fuel. I believe in the science of what the fat burning zone is (fat burning occurs when oxygen is available), but I don't believe that a low intensity workout in the fat burning zone is efficient for optimal fat loss. This is explained in 2 parts:

Part 1:
Low Intensity: Fat in blood stream is primary source of Fuel
Moderate Intensity: Triglyceride (Fat) in the Muscle is primary Fuel source
High Intensity: Glycogen (Carbs) in Muscle is primary Fuel source (more fat is burned at this intensity than at low but Carbs are primary source)

Part 2:
What happens after your workout. After you finish a session of High Intensity Interval Training your body has used up a large amount of stored energy from inside the muscle. Your muscle needs to refill these empty stores so it takes Glucose (Carbs) from the bloodstream and converts it to Glycogen (carbs) in the muscle. While your body is doing this it needs energy to run itself so it takes stored fat in the body and uses that for energy. After your workout you will notice that you are breathing a little harder (EPOC, Excess Post-Exercise Oxygen Consumption), this oxygen rich environment it is optimal for your body to be burning up fat for energy (the science of the fat burning zone that I believe in).

This post workout process of refilling your muscle stores and using fat for energy can take up to 48 hours depending on how much you depleted the stores. This post exercise fat burn would not occur at low intensities because the intramuscular stores would not have been depleted. The duration and intensity of the post exercise process are directly related to the intensity and duration of your workout.

The more and more you do high intensity interval training the more and more your body becomes a fat burning machine. This goes along with my philosophy that when you focus on the work/consistency that's when the results come. Your bodies ability to convert glucose to glycogen (rather than as stored fat) increases, and the amount of stored glycogen in the muscle increases. This allows for more of a depletion during training which increases the amount of fat burn post workout. This means your body becomes more and more efficient at burning fat for fuel.......Fat Burning Machine.

So, if you haven't figured this out by now I am a Resistance Training aficionado, but what you might not know is that I am also a big believer in training at a High Intensity. These two things definitely define my athlete based training style. Let me apply this to trying to get that lean/shredded and toned/athletic look..........combining cardio and resistance training.......High Intensity Interval Training. WHY.......

Imagine your body is a car and your muscles are the engine. The only difference from a real car is that this car has to be fueled up everyday. The food that you eat everyday is the gas that is used to fuel that car. All day long your engine is using fuel, and at the end of the day the unused fuel is stored in your gas tank for later use.....Fat. The more and more you don't use all your daily fuel the larger and larger your gas tank gets.

Say you want to lose Fat........your engine has to burn through the fuel that you take in everyday and then use some of the fuel from what is stored in your gas tank. So to lose all the fat that you don't want and to keep it off.............your car needs to burn through all the fuel in the tank (however big the tank), and then from there on out your engine has to be efficient enough to use all the gas from the daily fuel ups.

Knowing this you want to build the biggest engine possible in your car and race that engine as hard as it can go so it uses up the fuel from it's tank. .....High Intensity Interval Training is a great way to do this. I utilize this training method with some of my clients, helping them to get into that athlete mindset and push themselves to an intense level. So, build up your engine so that you can burn through your fuel tank to rebuild (reshape) your Mini Van into an Aston Martin.

I will get more into how this works in my next blog.

Lost your inner athlete or never found it. I see a big disconnect from the energy of being on a team to the energy of working out on your own. I experienced this when I went from being a gymnast to being a regular gym goer. When I opened Sweat I decided to not train clients one on one, but to group train all my clients to create a team atmosphere. Through our training methods, coaching style, and group training Sweat Clients train with the mentality and challenge of being athletes for life. They take the energy that they get from their training at Sweat to drive their regular gym time so that they can have the mentality and challenge of always being an athlete.

A Team Atmosphere brings many advantages to workouts and personal goals:

1.Camaraderie: All my clients are different (teens-70's, male/female, athletes-never workout) and have different goals, but the one thing that bonds them is that they all work hard under one roof to reach those goals. Training together makes them a Team.

2.Competition: What athlete likes to lose? Train with other people and competition is natural.

3.Atmosphere: People working hard in one gym to achieve goals, that is a strong energy that breeds hard work. On days that you don't wanna workout your coach and your teammates push you through your workouts.

4.Encouragement: We want to win, but we want to see our teammates succeed. Everyone can use some positive yelling, screaming, and pats on the butt.

5. Affordability: To train in a private studio can be expensive (even more if you train with the gym owner). It's not often that you can get more for less money, and in regards to group training it definitely holds true.

6. Motivation: My clients train with me because they like training and they like the time they spend here. I also only want clients who want to work hard and have fun.......NO CONTRACTS.

7. Coaching: Someone to know your goals and the struggles & accomplishments along the way. Your coach does one half of your workout. They make sure you have an effective, continually challenging, and fun workout you just have to do the other half show up and work hard.

Stop Losing and Gaining the Same Weight

Winter is a time for eating lots of food and not working out so much, but Summer is here so it's time to eat healthy and head back to the gym. This is a familiar cycle for for many of us. Nobody wants to lose and gain the same weight every year. Most of us want to look good all the time, and continually improve our body......we just don't know why we don't do it. The question to be answered is how can we workout and eat healthy consistently all year long?

Problem

One part of motivation is Autonomy..........I am working on healthy habits because I chose to. Why did you choose to? It can be a number of things...summer, fitting into your skinny clothes, an event to go to, athletic event, prove a point, because everyone else does, because you should, set an example, fear of aging, etc. The trend that I see in clients is that what initially starts people into healthy habits isn't what always keeps them with healthy habits. So, you start with momentum and excitement then two things happen 1.) you lose motivation and enjoyment as you go 2.) you reach your goal. Normally after either of these most people will go straight back to not working out and eating what they want. A few months later you have another reason to go back to the gym and the same cycle repeats. What is the piece that is missing that makes us not continue consistently & with enjoyment for the long term.

Solution

Autonomy.......I am working on healthy habits because I chose to do this for me, because I want to take care of me on the fundamental level. I want to put healthy food into my body and workout because it's good for me. Yes, the other reasons to be healthy will create short term motivations that will make us work harder at times or add to our motivation. What I have found is what keeps people consistently motivated for the long term is wanting to workout for themselves, because it relieves stress, gets energy out, and makes them personally feel good everyday.

Enjoyment

Workouts should be fun, interesting, dynamic, and effective. Some days you might love it after, you might love it during, and you might not love it at all. The point is if you dread going, hate it while you are there (you almost find yourself convincing yourself that it's good for you while you are there), and every time you leave you are just glad it's over.........you ain't gonna last long term.

Mentality

You have to mentally be in the moment and be into what you are doing. Make your time in the gym about you and having fun. The negative thoughts in your head can spread like cancer.....this is hard, I'm tired, I don't feel like being here, I have other things to do, can't wait till this is over...........you have to get those thoughts out of your head. Positive thoughts....I am strong, I can do this, this is for me, I am improving....these thoughts are going to help push you to have a better workout and help you to enjoy your time in the gym. Try to find something fun or positive about every workout session. For example: the people, variety, the environment, a new exercise, good conversation, a hard workout, the time to relieve stress, an instructor that pushed you, a new class you tried, etc.

Having healthy habits for you and enjoying the actual behavior is what will keep you consistent in the long term. Use the short term motivators to accomplish some goals, and then go back to your consistent healthy habits to maintain your results.