Fitness & Nutrition Tips & Advice

Calories - Are they the real deal?

Is your goal to lose weight, or more specifically to burn body fat? Now whilst a lot of material out there suggests that it is as easy to do so by counting your calorie intake (the calories which you eat) and making sure that you burn more calories than you would eat in your day through exercise. After all a difference between calorie intake and calories burned should show a negative to prove that weight loss can be achieved. (E.g. 1,000 calorie intake - 1,500 calories = -500 calories) Whilst this may be true to a certain extent I’m a firm believer of not worrying too much about calories. The reason being, this is just a number. As an example, you can have 2 very different meals, one much higher in fat than the other yet they can still make up the same amount of calories. A good example can be one meal consisting of a healthy low fat salad, and the other of a high in fat burger. Calories are made up of nutrients such as your fats, proteins and carbohydrates but the amount of calories do not state which nutrients they consist of, after all the term Calorie, is just a measure of energy.  You can have a low calorie meal but if those calories are all fat based then you are likely to struggle when it comes to losing weight. I think rather than calories, it’s far more beneficial to think of what the calories consist of no matter the number, ie.making sure your consumption of proteins and vegetables/fruit are far higher than those of carbohydrates and fats. By doing so you are guaranteed a high metabolic rate, burning fats and not just any energy sources and actually getting results.