Basal Metabolic Rate vs. Calories In

Too often I encounter someone who believes eating 500 calories a day will help them lose weight.

It is unfortunate but a lack of truthful information is streaming through the media.

And diet companies are not the only ones to blame.

Every day we are inundated with information contradicting itself that it gets so frustrating, you don't know what to believe.

Honestly, I'm not surprised that we are in the situation we are as a country.

When I deliver information, I make sure it is scientifically proven and from a viable source.

This one is no different.

Basal Metabolic Rate

Your basal metabolic rate is how many calories you will burn at complete rest (calories you burn sitting on the couch all day long). These calories are expended performing functions in your body so you stay alive.

Unfortunately the Basal Metabolic Rate is often taken out of the equation when trying to balance the whole calories in versus calories out equation (I suppose unbalance would be a better word here).

So the mentality is that training for 1-2 hours and burning 1200 calories is going to be the calories out while taking in 1000 calories in a day creates the calorie deficit we are looking for.

Theoretically this is true, but here is why it doesn't work.

Your basal metabolic rate is your metabolism. Your metabolism is dependent upon several factors: body size, activity level, diet, and amount of lean muscle tissue to name a few.

If you were a 40 year old 140 pound female who was 5 feet 6 inches tall, your basal metabolic rate would be 1532.36.

That's 1500 calories doing absolutely nothing!

If you add that the example above has a desk job, so is a pretty sedentary person, her calorie output just working and sitting on the couch would be 1838.832!

And that is without any exercise.

Makes eating 500 calories a day seem a little absurd doesn't it?

The great thing about the basal metabolic rate is that you can increase it so that you burn more calories at rest.

Weight training will do that. Your muscle IS your metabolism

Supportive nutrition will do that. Make the food work for you by burning more calories just to digest it.

Looks like the impossible just became a little more realistic:)