Effective Diet Planning to loose weight

One of my friends has consulted me a bout one month back. He told me he is extremely confused with so much diet plan suggestion. Yes, you named it. There are plenty of diet plan out there such as South Beach Diet, Atkins Diet, Glycemic Index Diet, Cookies Diet, Cambridge Diet, Lighter life Diet & so on.... so on.........

Most of them does work in certain way. One may be more risky than the other. Most of the plan has certain consideration or planning in mind. So what is the best way?

In fact, I had tried many different diet plan. (I really research into all area of exercise & diet. I believe, it is no point to be just with theory but no practical experiences) Some of the plan is so low in calories or nutrient that made your body feel so weak. I am not over weight. In fact, far from it. I am 5fts 6 inches and my weight is usually around 130 pounds and seldom exceed 140 pounds. In my late twenties, I weight about 150 pounds with intensive weight training. From mid 30's, I focus much more on long distance jogging which build on my endurance. From then on, I usually maintain at around 130 pounds. So with my lean body weight, it hardly requires much energy to support it. Yet those low calories diet will make you have quiet a lousy feeling. With that, it in facts slow down my body metabolism. Many people only look into the calories, carb or fats.. but they forgot the most important factor...... their body.

Yes! your body is a self regulating machine. It will try to adjust itself based on what is given to you. When you in take less food, it will try to put your body into conservation mode. Of course you can try to push it further by doing more exercise, but it is dangerous and could be harmful to your body. You will started to have a lousy feeling.

So, it is no point to have such a lousy feeling. It will lower your morale and it is bad for your weight loss in long term. My friend, you need to lift up your feeling to battle the long term weight loss plan. If the journey is enjoyable, you will feel motivated and press on in long run.

I would suggest that you should at least have 4 meals in a day. (If you are doing a lot of weight training you might wanted to go for 6 meals in a day). Did you get it wrong? If you are trying to loose weight & loose fat, isn't it you should consume less meals? When your body noticed that you are taking less, it will try to store more fat. Yes, it set provision that you might not have food down the line and started storing. When you break down into 4 meals or more, your mind get the signal that supply is sufficient. So it will continue to burn off the excess and even tap into the reserve. Especially if you breakdown, to smaller meal, the body can absorb the nutrient better and there are less extra for the body to store and it can be burn off properly. ( Yes, you can burn off more fat if your body did not feel starving.

So how should you distribute the 4 meals? I encourage breakfast to be bigger as we are not consuming any food for abt 9~11 hours when we sleep. Most of our proteins has also been used for tissue repair. Lunch should be lighter than breakfast. Dinner & supper should be lightest. ( Especially supper, it should be mainly be protein based so that it can be useful for tissue repair. The carb should be low as your body is not going to need a lot of energy while sleeping.

It is quite complex with the detail planning. So, if you have any question, I will try my best to answer your comments here. So do leave me a note.

My finger has it fair share of exercise today. So do look out for my next post. With you great success in your weight loss. Thank you for reading my effective weight loss program.

Photo : courtesy of stock.xchng

Died of Crappy diet program

Just came across this news over the web. Sad to hear that this women had died with drinking too much water by taking the lighter Life Diet program. She was died of swelling of her brain with too much water cause by saturation of water in her body. The Quote extrated from the news articles on her husband comments.

"Mr Henson, 40, said: ‘I would like to discourage any women from doing this kind of crash diet. Even if you are healthy like my wife was, these diets can still be risky."

In my view, Lighter Life is a crappy diet program. One should NEVER EVER taking part in a drastic plan in loosing weight. Practically Lighter weight advice people not to eat & replace it with meal replacement & drinking water. It is a Very Low Calories Diet (VLCD). In fact, I would encourage people not to take more than 1 meal replacement in a day. Weight loss should be gradual and it should be fun. Although drinking more water does make you feel "full", but nothing is better than a good natural nutritional meal.

As mentioned in my Effective Weight Loss Master Plan, one should always keep a journal and plan the weight loss gradually. A good balance is important. You should not have too much shock to your body. Too drastic changes to your eating pattern is extremely dangerous.

To see the news, you can visit the link below

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1093811/Slimmer-died-tragic-accident-drinking-water-controversial-diet.html

Nutrition - Key to weight Loss

I have many friend asking me. What should I eat to loss weight ? Should I take more,carbo, fat or protein? Even if you do a lots of reading on books or publication, you will see one diet plan try to preech against the other. So what is ready the best way to eat? Seriously, I am also quite quite confuse 20 years ago when I started to research into nutrition & diet planning. It is like hunting into the wild jungle.

Is there really a simple way? Hmm............. Just any how eat lor.......hahaa.....



Wrong !! Luckily, there is a simple guideline. Phiew !!

The basic fundamental is nutrition. Once your diet plan is nutrition enough, it will burn more fat and make you feel less hungry. Basically, our body have requirement for vitamins, minerals, fibre, protein (9 essential amino acids), carbohydrates, oil & fat. So a balance nutrition approach is important. So in order to determine what do take you have to have a basic understanding of the followings:-
Good carbohydrates vs bad carbohydrates
Not all carbohydrates are bad. In fact carbohydrate give us a good source of energy. The challenge is process carbohydrates is very low in fibre & has almost no mineral & vitamins. So as much as possible try to avoid white rice, white bread, french fries & high sugar drink (contain chemical & extremely high sugar content but zero in nutrition). Consume more good carbohydrates like fruits (apple,grapefruit,Kiwi & etc) & vegtables (cucumber, lettuces, pumpkin & etc).

Protein
Protein are general good especially it is the main ingredient to build muscle. If you are very conscious about the quality protein. You might like to go for fishes instead of beef. White meat is considered as a better source of protein. There are really no necessity to avoid egg if you do not consume too much. In fact, the egg yoke is full of nutrient. Fat should be avoided from other source rather than from egg. For most body builder, they usually consume a lot of eggs with only 2 egg yoke to avoid too much fat.



Fat & Oil
Olive oil & Salmon fish oil are healthy source of oil. In fact, both prevent the oxidant of LDL. So it is a good form of cholesterol. Especially for Salmon fish oil which is extremely rich in Omega 3 fatty acid (contain DHA) which is good for the brain. Avocado is also a form of good fat. All these food in fact will regulate the glucose level in our blood stream thus reduce the insulin being produce. It causes our body to have the feeling "full" effects.



Another important fact to consider beside the nutrition facts. One should also avoid food that will cause allergy to them. For example, for those people that are high in uric acid, they should avoid soy protein unless it is specially treated to remove the purine. Beside than, one should consider a wide variety of food to ensure a good spread of nutrient rather than simply based on calories, carbohydrates, proteins or fats.



Remarks : people with medical condition should consult their doctor or nutritionist before planning or executing their diet.



Image source : Courtesy of Public Domain Pictures.net
http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?picture=three-peppers&image=615

Preparation for the North Face 100Km Relay

It is really great to complete the Adidas Sundown Marathon on 30 May with a timing of 5 & 1/2 hrs. Although the timing is not as great as I use to have but I am quite satisfy with this achievement after stop running marathon for more than 10 years.

Now, I am teaming up with my jogging buddy to to run the North Face 100Km relay (50Kmx2) on Oct 2009. This is something I really have not try before. My longest distance ran so far is only marathon (42km).

So I am doing my preparation. For long distant running, you have to ensure that you are taking enough of antioxidant. So today, I am taking salad in this Salad bar. They really have nice dressing that is perfectly healthy. ( Olive Oil, lemon & vinegar. Totally no sugar) The ingredients are really fresh and the lunch was very enjoyable.

Glycemic Index - Essentials criteria to weight Loss

If you are serious about your weight loss, Glycemic Index (GI) is one criteria that you must consider seriously. It is one of the far most important criteria. Most of the diet plan monitor the GI index of the carbohydrate food intake, be it Atkins diet, South Beach Diet, diet for diabetic or etc. So why is Glycemic Index so important? How it work help you to burn more fat?



Firstly, we will look into how GI is measured.

GI is an index ranging from 0 ~ 100 where 100 being the highest reference to glucose. (the most common methods as some method is using white bread as reference) The higher the GI reading, the faster the carbohydrate will breakdown into glucose and release into the blood stream. High Glycemic Index food are generally processed food such as white bread, rice & baked goods. High GI food cause the blood glucose to raiser rapidly. Low GI food are mostly food which is high in fiber and slow in breaking down into glucose in the blood stream. Whole grain & vegetable make up the low GI food category.



How the low GI contribute to your weight loss?

The main grouping of food are carbohydrate, protein & fats which product as the sources of energy. Carbohydrate itself has no nutritional value and mainly is to contribute as an energy source for the body. As the carbohydrate enter into the blood stream as glucose. Insulin is release by our body into the blood stream to balance off the glucose and burn off as fuel. Any glucose that is not consumed will be brought to the liver and converted into fat and stored for futures usage. during this procedure the insulin will drop drastically as the liver converted the glucose into fat and hence causes the insulin drop. Due to the drop in insulin, you will feel a sense of hunger. Therefore high GI food cause you to get hungry faster and intake more calories. whereas low Gi food will keep you full for a longer time and also intake less calories. In fact, while the low GI food is unable to supply glucose to meet your body demand in energy initially, it will triggered your brain to start converting some of your stored fat into carbohydrate and burn of as energy.



So if you are able to use the GI index wisely in your dietary planning, you will be able to eat less & burn more fats. Scientific studies has showed that people that using a low GI diet is having less likely with type 2 diabetic disease & heart disease. So in order to have a more effective weight loss program. Always check the GI chart and plan your meal properly. The glycemic index table is easily available from USDA.



Good luck! Thank you for reading the effective weight loss program and I wish you great success in reducing the extra kilos.