1. How to burn fat by intermittent fasting
How to burn fat by intermittent
fasting
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Fasting is not for the faint of heart. It requires a lot of courage and determination to
actually perform a fast. Fasting is only recommended for healthy adults. It can be
used as an effective tool to burn fat and keep it off. Following is an explanation on
what is fasting and how to burn fat by intermittent fasting.
What is Fasting?
First things first, lets define fasting. Fasting is voluntarily abstaining from food for a
specified period of time. Fasting literally means going on a zero calorie diet. This
means nothing is allowed to pass through your lips except water and zero calorie
herbal teas. Consuming protein shakes and juices is technically not a true fast.
What is Intermittent Fasting (IF)?
Intermittent Fasting is fasting anywhere from 18 to 24 hours. If you are able to go
on water only fast for anywhere from 18 to 24 hours, you have done IF and
successfully burnt body fat. If you want to lose fat, you can try IF once or maximum
twice a week. Rest of the days of the week, you should eat as normally as you can.
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2. How to burn fat by intermittent fasting
Eat everything in moderation is allowed on non fasting days. Once you have
achieved your goal weight, you can switch to fasting once every 2 weeks or even
once a month.
What is Long term fasting?
Long term fasting is going on a fast for longer than 24 hours. I have personally never
tried it so cannot comment on it. I have seen amazing results from IF and
recommend it highly though.
Fasting is natural
Before you totally shun the concept of fasting, realize that we all do an overnight fast
pretty much on a daily basis. We fast while we sleep. From the last meal of the day
to your first meal the next morning we are in the fasting mode. For example, if you
ate your dinner at 8 PM and then next morning you ate your breakfast at 8 AM, you
have just fasted for full 12 hours. So fasting is not as unnatural as you might think it
is.
How does our body get energy during
fasting?
While fasting energy sources are not provided through food intake. Hence the body
turns into stored energy to keep going and meet its energy requirements. Our body
stores energy in 3 forms
1. Glycogen –
Glycogen is the polysaccharide form of glucose. Glycogen is stored in liver and
muscles. During intense exercise or during a fast, our body will tap into the glycogen
stores for energy. Your body turns into its glycogen reserves first before it even
touches your fat stores.
2. Amino acids –
Amino Acids are the building blocks of protein. They are stored in the lean muscle.
Your body starts breaking the protein in your muscles into amino acids and then into
glucose that can be used as energy by the body. Gluconeogenesis is the process
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3. How to burn fat by intermittent fasting
by which the liver breaks down the amino acids to create glucose. So protein is
broken down by body to be used a glucose, but the body does that only in case of
emergency.
3. Body Fat
Body fat can be divided into 2 parts essential fat and storage fat. Essential fat is
needed for normal functioning of the body. Storage fat is non essential fat and
makes you look fat and chubby. Your body burns fat by a mechanism called ketosis.
In order to burn fat, you must enter a state of ketosis, either by intense exercise,
cutting calories or by fasting. Fat burning and ketosis go hand in hand. So in order to
burn fat, you must get into ketosis.
Stages of fasting
Our body can be in 2 states. Fed state or Fasted state. Below is some explanation of
these different states.
1. Fed State –
Up to 3 hours since your last meal. During the fed state, the body is digesting the
food consumed in the precious meal, generating energy from all the food ingested,
replenishing its glycogen stores, and then depositing any extra as body fat to be
used later.
2. Pre - Fasting State –
From 3 hours to 12 hours since your last meal. During this state, our body is not
getting external source of energy (food), so it starts looking for stored energy..
During this stage, your body will start to use up the glycogen stored in the liver and
muscle. A 12 hour overnight fast will deplete your liver glycogen store.
3. Early Fasting State –
From 12 hours to 18 hours since your last meal. At this stage the body has used up
all the liver glycogen and some muscle glycogen. At this point, it will get into the fat
burning state. Basically if you can fast up to 18 hours, you have burnt some body
fat.
4. Intermittent fasting State –
From 18 hours to 24 hours. The body is a fat burning machine at this state.
5. Long term fasting –
Fasting beyond 24 hours is long term fasting. Not recommended in this blog.
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4. How to burn fat by intermittent fasting
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Conclusion
IF is a lifestyle change and not a diet. The best part is the flexibility. Pick a day
where you have no social get togethers planned. It can help you change your
relationship with food.
Once youy body has entered the fasting state, it has depeletd its glycogen stores and
started burning off fat. Although there may be some muscle loss during fasting, if
you are strength training 2-3 times a week, you will easily build that muscle back.
Include IF and Strength Training in your lifestyle and watch that fat melting off your
body.
Source: www.fat2fitsteps.com/how-to-burn-fat-by-intermittent-fasting/