"How do I increase my metabolism?" is a question I hear a lot from people looking to lose weight.
They want to know all about metabolism boosters, metabolism secrets and a diet to increase metabolism.
But does your metabolism really decrease as you age?
Is this lower metabolism something you'll just have to learn to live with?
The bad news is that you metabolism does decrease as you age. The good news is that it's completely preventable.
You see, starting around age 25 to 30, most people lose 5 to 10 pounds of lean muscle every decade.
And lean muscle is metabolically active.
So all you need to do to boost your metabolism or keep it from slowing down is to focus on a workout program that preserves the lean muscle you have or adds a few pounds of lean muscle to give your metabolism a boost.
Let's take a look at the four components of your metabolism.
- Resting Metabolic Rate (RMR)
Your resting metabolic rate makes up most of your daily calorie expenditure and includes everything your body needs to do to survive, such as thinking, repairing tissue and anything else it needs to do.
- Thermogenesis - the thermic effect of eating.
Your body burns calories when you chew, swallow and digest the food you eat.
- Lucky Thermogenesis - the calories you burn based on your genetic makeup.
- Physical Activity -
these are the calories you burn from physical activity via exercise such as biking, playing tennis, weight training and cardio.
If you want to boost your metabolism you need to focus on these different aspects of metabolism.
Your resting metabolic rate can be increased by adding lean muscle.
Will 5 to 10 pounds of added muscle dramatically increase your resting metabolic rate?
No, but it will increase it and every little bit helps.
In addition, if you add 5 to 10 pounds of muscle, as opposed to lose that much each decade, the difference will be quite dramatic over time.
There's another huge positive metabolism boosting advantage to weight training or high intensity interval training and that's the post-workout metabolism increase.
After an intense weight training session (or high intensity interval training session), your metabolism will stay elevated for up to 39 hours AFTER the workout!
With an intense weight training session you also burn calories during the workout.
You can boost your thermogenesis in a couple of ways.
First, your body burns calories to digest your meals. This increases your metabolism.
Thus, by eating more often you elevate your metabolism more times during the day.
Consider eating 6 small meals a day instead of 2 or 3 big one's.
Another way to boost your metabolism is by increasing your protein intake.
Eating more protein to burn fat was confirmed in a study published in the American Journal of Physiology.
One group was fed a high protein diet (just over one gram per pound of bodyweight per day) while the second group consumed a protein diet near equal to that of the RDA.
The group eating the high protein diet burned more fat than the group consuming protein near equal to the RDA.
One reason for the ability of protein to burn fat could be an increased "thermic" effect.
The thermic effect of the RDA group was elevated 16% after eating.
However, in the high protein group the thermic effect increased 42% after eating, almost 3 times that of the RDA group.
This thermic effect of digesting your food peaks approximately one hour after eating.
Spreading your daily caloric intake over 6 meals a day, eating every 2 to 3 hours, helps to take advantage of the increased metabolic rate that accompanies eating.
In other words, the more often you eat, the higher your metabolic rate, i.e. the number of calories your body burns each day.
In addition, by adding more protein to each meal, you also increase your metabolism.
Your body requires more energy (i.e. calories) to process protein than it does carbohydrates.
Your lifestyle will determine how much exercise you need for the metabolism boost you need to start burning fat.
If you sit at a computer all day you're going to need more exercise than someone who does construction work all day.
That's just the way it is.
Here's a sample metabolism boosting exercise program.
Monday - High Intensity Interval Training
Tuesday - Weight Training Session
Wednesday - Active recovery cardio training
Thursday - Weight Training Session
Friday - High Intensity Interval Training
Saturday - Weight Training Session
Sunday - Rest or Active recovery cardio training
Learn more about high intensity interval training at my blog (listed below).
Active recovery cardio is low intensity longer duration cardio that you see most people do in the gym.
You can also do something simple like taking a long walk outside. This type of session should last 45 - 60 minutes.
Put all these pieces together into a cohesive plan and you'll attack a slowing metabolism from all different angles.
You'll not only prevent your metabolism from decreasing as you get older but you'll increase it, leading to greater fat loss, more muscle and a healthier, sexier, more energetic you.
Gregg Gillies is the founder of fitness tips His fitness articles have appeared in Ironman Magazine. He has written two books and is a regular contributor to Body Talk Magazine. Grab a copy of his free ebook Mass Building Tips! at http://www.massbuildingtips.com and check out his blog at http://tnafitness.com
