Nutrition & Exercises - Should You Combine Both
Considering whether to combine nutrition and exercises, lose weight with or without physical activity, you might ask a question, whether it is possible to lose weight without physical activities, but only with balanced nutrition and dieting.
The answer is: "Yes, you can, but ..."
Balanced nutrition or even strict dieting with no physical activity will cause you to lose fat and muscle.
You may be thinking, "That's okay. I do not see any problem losing muscles together with losing fat."
Remember: This is a wrong approach!
Muscles impact metabolism
By losing your muscles, you significantly slow down your metabolism. Anytime you exercise, you do so in order to maintain good health. You also know that you have to eat as well, so your body will have the energy it needs to exercise and maintain for the everyday tasks of life. For making the best of your exercise, what you eat before and after you workout is very important.
Diets are not working
People diet for two primary reasons, to lose weight, or to improve health or both. Many people who diet fail to lose weight or, if they do lose, fail to maintain the lower weight over the long term. How many times have you heard that the only way to lose weight through diet is to eat less? There is one type of diet that lets you eat well and still lose weight - learn how to lose weight through a sensible diet and exercise plan.
The only way to lose weight and keep it off is by eating properly and exercising on a regular basis. By taking full control of your eating habits you will begin to lose weight the best way possible - slowly and steadily. You will lose weight by eating, by being more active or preferably by doing both. Don't skip any meals. Lose weight by eating. To lose weight safely, effectively, and for the long term - you need to truly commit to eating and exercising consistently. Eating more often, not less is the way to lose weight.
Balanced nutrition is important
No matter if you are going to be doing a cardio exercises or strength exercises, you should always eat a balanced mix of protein and carbohydrates. What makes that determining percentage of carbohydrates and protein you consume is whether or not you are doing cardio or strength exercise and the intensity level that you plan to work at.
The ideal time for you to eat your pre workout meal is an hour before you start. If you plan to work at a low intensity level, you should keep your pre workout meal down to 200 calories or so. If you plan to exercise at a high level of intensity, you will probably need your meal to be between 4,000 and 5,000 calories.
Those of you who are doing a cardio session will need to consume a mix of 2/3 carbs and 1/3 protein. Doing so will give you longer sustained energy from the extra carbs with enough protein to keep your muscle from breaking down while you exercise.
For resistance exercise, you'll need to eat a mix of 1/3 carbs and 2/3 protein, as this will help you get plenty of energy from the carbs to perform each set you do and the extra protein will help keep muscle breakdown to a minimum while you exercise.
Eating after exercising session
It is important to eat properly after exercises just as important is pre workout meal. Anytime you exercise, whether its cardio or strength, you deplete energy in the form of glycogen. The brain and central nervous system rely on glycogen as their main source of fuel, so if you don't replace it after you exercise, your body will begin to break down muscle tissue into amino acids, and then convert them into usable fuel for the brain and the central nervous system.
Keep in mind that mostly during strength exercise, you'll break down muscle tissue by creating micro tears. What this means, is that after a workout, your muscles will instantly go into repair mode. Protein is the key here for muscle repair, as you don't want muscle breaking down even further to create fuel instead of lost glycogen.
Once you have finished a cardio session, you'll need to consume mainly carbohydrates, preferably those with high fiber. Rice, oatmeal, whole wheat pasta, and northern fruits are excellent sources. Also, try to consume 30 - 50 grams of there types of carbs after you exercise. After your cardio workout, it is fine to eat within 5 – 10 minutes.
Once you've finished a strength workout, you will need to consume a combination of carbs and protein. Unlike cardio workouts, strength workouts will break down muscle tissue by creating micro tears.
You'll need protein as this happens to build up and repair these tears so that the muscle can increase in size and strength. The carbs will not only replace the lost muscle glycogen, but will also help the protein get into muscle cells so it can synthesize into structural protein, or the muscle itself. After your resistance exercise, you should wait up to 30 minutes before you eat, so that you won't take blood away from your muscles too fast. The blood in your muscles will help the repair process by removing the metabolic waste products.
Conclusion
Yes, you can lose weight with dieting, however this only a short-term solution, which will not improve your metabolism, also this approach will not allow you to keep stable weight, feel healthy and full of energy.
Everyone knows that to lose weight you need to eat less and exercise more. Exercise is essential whether you choose to lose weight or maintain your present weight. Someone that increases the amount they exercise, but maintains the same diet and calorie intake, will almost certainly lose weight. Forget all of the fad diets, the fastest (and easiest) way to lose weight is with a combination of diet and exercise.
Remember, don't exercise to lose weight - exercise because you want to have a healthy body!
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