Body fat and calories are correlated. Observing diet and workouts will give the body ideal weight resulting in ideal basal metabolic rate and general body health. Embracing a healthy lifestyle entails eating a healthy diet and ensuring there are very little stored calories. This article gives some tips to help you stay a healthy and enjoyable life.
Experts will tell you that what you eat matters in your overall body. The measure of your body fat is a significant sign of your underlying physical capabilities. Bodyweight is something you need to keep in check to ensure you are on the right track. Many people tend to occasionally ask whether calorie intake and calorie output matter in ensuring excellent body health.
Accumulation of fat in your body tends to make someone unhealthy by being overweight. Apart from maintaining a proper diet and nutrition, you’ve to engage in appropriate workouts that burn calories. While this has an ample room for discussion, this article will shed more light to help you make the perfect decision.
What is the Difference between Calories and Fats?
Calories
In its simplest form, a calorie means a measure of energy use and the stored energy in your body. The calories referred to in the diet and calories burnt during an exercise are kilocalories. A calorie is the amount of heat that will raise one kg of water by one degrees Celsius at sea level in some basic scientific terms.Body Fat vs. Weight
Body fat is made up of large cells stored under the skin. You can mostly find it around the organs in the buttocks, belly, thighs, and arms. Excess fat stored in your body can result in some severe health issues. It is an essential macronutrient that is important for your survival—the body stores fat inside fat cells and adipose cells in the form of triglycerides. Fat cells are a bit similar to other cells. They have a nuclear, a cell membrane, and the largest part consists of droplets of stored triglycerides.What Body Fat Percentage is Healthy?
The body's essential fat percentage is roughly 2-5 percent, while the acceptable fat level stands at 18-24 percent. However, the athlete's case is a bit different. Due to the strenuous workouts, an athlete's body fat can range from 6- 13 percent. For fitness, the percentage can be 14 to 17 percent. If it is over 30 percent, there is a high risk of obesity. The body fat to weight ratio also agrees with these numbers. This is true because fat and weight have a significant correlation.Body fat can be measured by adding your hip and waist measurements and deducting the total neck measurement. This brings you the circumference value.
Where is Fat Stored in the Body?
Most of the fats will be stored beneath the skin, while a significant portion will be stored around vital body organs such as the heart and kidneys. Hence, fat serves to cushion these organs and as a strategic fuel source in the low-calorie intake. Observing a low-fat diet alone isn’t the only solution.
Different Foods, Different Calories
Taking one gram as the standard, we can compare different foods to see how much calories they offer. For instance, fat has the highest calories level. One gram of fat has nine calories, alcohol has seven calories, and protein has four calories, while carbohydrates have four calories. Also, fiber offers as low as 1.5 calories because the body doesn't easily digest them.Three Main Ways Our Bodies Lose Calories
Basic Metabolism
Our bodies use most of the energy gotten from food to sustain the essential functions such as heartbeat. Well, this is usually referred to as basal metabolic rate.Digestion
Our bodies use a lot of calories to help in digestion of the foods we intake. The body will use about 15 percent of the calories you eat to run the digestion mechanism. This calories utilization is typically referred to as the thermal effect of food.
Physical Exercises
The remaining calories that you get from the food you eat will be useful in powering the body workouts. These include gym workouts and regular tasks such as walking, farming, washing dishes, and playing.What to Do to Lose and Gain Weight
If you want to slim your body and weight less than average, you have to observe your diet intake. From a biological point of view, you have to burn more calories than you eat.When the body utilizes the calories to satisfy its needs, the remainder of the calories will be stored later. Thus, if you induce calorie deficiency, the body will use the stored fats for energy, and you’ll lose weight effortlessly.
Equally, you'll need to eat more calories and exercise less. Hence, the body will have a surplus. It will store the excess as glycogen and fat. The bigger portion will be stored under the skin or around major internal organs as body fat. And this will consequently make you gain weight.
What’s the Best Way to Cut Body Fat?
The best way to cut your body weight is to engage in workouts and consume fewer calories. Fat reservoirs in your body act as a strategic fuel reserve of your body. Hence, if you aren’t taking enough calories or rather enough food, your body mechanism will shift to breaking down the fat reserves. To do this, it will break the fatty cells to produce free fatty acids. They then get into the bloodstream and find their way into the cells where they are broken down to release energy.Additionally, it would help if you ate low carb diets. But, there is no single option for losing bodyweight that can work alone. It would be best to combine low carb diet, low-calorie intake, intake of water, and routine workouts to keep your body weight in check.
Conclusion
Excess body fat can result in serious health issues. But having the right amount of stored calories enables proper body functioning. Maintaining adequate body fat through diet control is critical. Thus, you need to observe both the quality and quantity of the diet you’re eating. This step will ensure you have the right amount of calories in your body. When you combine the ideal diet with workouts, you’ll maintain the ideal body weight and live a healthy life.Author’s bio: Randolph Ray works as a nutritionist for years and can explain the nutrition contents in food to help you resolve eating disorders. A man who’s dedicated his entire life to studying healthy food habits and other related stuff that has to be definitely incorporated for a healthy living.
