Reading one of the weight training forums this morning I came across an article about the Water Diet. Curious I had a look around Google and it seems there are numerous different water diets. Here’s a few.

The cold water diet

• Drink 64 ounces of water each and every day.
• The water has to be cold, ideally 50 degrees Fahrenheit or colder.
• Spread the water our over the day, don’t try to consume it all at once.
• Water must be plain water, not flavoured, sweetened, or carbonated.

The “science” behind this is as follows. It requires 12 kcal to raise the temperature of a pint of water from 50F to normal body temperature. It’s further claimed that carrying all this extra water weight around will burn more calories. It rather seems to assume you don’t end up peeing it all out though.

The drink water on an empty stomach version of the water diet

• When you wake up, before brushing your teeth drink 640ml of water.
• Eat breakfast 45 minutes later.

The claims behind this are that it’s based on Japanese society and cures all sorts, including: headaches, body aches, heart problems, arthritis, fast heart beat, epilepsy, excess fatness, bronchitis asthma, TB, meningitis, kidney and urine; diseases, vomiting, gastritis, diarrhea, piles, diabetes, constipation, all eye diseases, womb, cancer and menstrual disorders, ear nose and throat diseases. If only that were true!

The lemon water diet

This diet involves mixing up the following recipe:

• 2 tbs. fresh squeezed lemon juice
• 2 tbs. organic natural maple syrup
• 1/10 tsp. cayenne pepper
• 10 ounces of water

Then drinking it. The theory is that the lemon and maple syrup provide the vitamins and nutrients you need and the cayenne pepper increases the metabolism.

The lemon water diet is apparently also known as the master cleanse, lemon detox or lemonade diet.

The high water content diet

This involves eating foods with a high water content. So things like soup, fruit and vegetables which have a high water content and low calourific density. The science behind this being based on the fact that eating more bulk, but less calouries leaves you feeling fuller so you’re therefore more likely to eat less and stick to the diet.

The high water content diet makes sense to me – more fruit and vegetables is clearly a good thing. The cold water diet has some science behind it, but the estimated loss is just 1lb per year so it’s nothing to write home about.

In summary, eat lots of fruit, vegetables and lean protein sources, stay properly hydrated and you don’t need to worry about fads like the water diet.

I’ve recently tried some PhD Diet Whey, its a new diet version of a whey protein powder from PhD Nutrition’s Fat Loss range.

So how is it going to help with fat loss? Well it’s a blend of Whey Protein, Micellar Casein, CLA, L-Carnitine and Green Tea Extract. The protein (Whey and Micellar Casein) will help preserve lean body mass whilst on a diet and CLA, L-Carnitine and Green Tea are all supposed to increase the body’s ability to burn fat. I’ll look at the evidence for each in a future post. For the moment I’ll just say that the white chocolate flavour was a lot nice than the whey protein I usually drink!

If you’re interested Cheap PhD Diet Whey then visit the Discount Supplements Guide.

It’s often reported that eating grapefruit, or drinking grapefruit juice will help you lose weight. For example the BBC reported in 2004 on a study at the Scrpps Clinic in San Diego saying:

Ken Fujioka and colleagues at the Scripps Clinic in San Diego California enrolled 100 obese patients with an average weight of 218 pounds in the study.

One group of volunteers ate half a grapefruit before each meal three times a day, while another drank a glass of grapefruit juice before every meal. A third did not include grapefruit in their meals.

After 12 weeks, those eating grapefruit had lost an average of 3.6 pounds, and some shed as much as 10 pounds.

The participants drinking grapefruit juice lost an average of 3.3 pounds. But those in the control group who consumed no grapefruit only lost an average of 0.5 pounds.

So it seems you can lose weight just by adding grapefruit to your diet. Awesome – if you like grapefruit. But there’s a few small problems with the idea that grapefruit will help you lose weight:

1. There doesn’t appear to be any further scientific research that collaborates this finding.
2. Dr. Ken Fujioka is quoted in news reports as saying: “The only dietary change, was the intake of Florida grapefruit and grapefruit juice“. When you consider that the research was funded by the Florida Department of Citrus which markets Florida grapefruit it does seem like the results of the study might have been somewhat skewed by commercial interests.

So does grapefruit help you lose weight?

I can’t say for sure, but I suspect that for many of us eating more grapefruit is a step in the right direction even if it’s only to help us eat the minimum of five portions of fruit and vegetables per day.

Since May I’ve been slowly getting back into running because running is a great way to lose weight. I’ve taken it very easy as I know, being overweight, I’m prone to aching knees and shin splints if I ramp up my running too quickly.

Fortunately all has gone well and last Sunday (30th August 2009) I completed the Foxtrot 5 (a local 5 mile road race) in just over 52 minutes. Not a particularly quick time (the winner ran it in 26.5 minutes) but considerably better than last time, when I ran it in 60 minutes. Most importantly I really enjoyed it and being unsure of my progress I’d started off slowly for the first three miles – chatting to a fellow runner – before picking up the pace for the last two miles, one of which was a nice long gentle downhill.

The Foxtrot 5 not a particularly complex race – there’s no chip timing or any of that – but it’s well organised and has a friendly atmosphere. The course is primarily country lanes (I only recall seeing a single car and one tractor) and bit of bridleway, there’s a few small hills but nothing too strenuous – a great first race for those looking to lose weight and wanting something longer than a 5K.

In fact, I had so much fun that I’m now looking for more races to enter in September and October and I’ve entered a trail running series (Coastal Trail Series 2010 – I’m going to do the 10K races) with a view to completing the The Clif Bar 7×7x7 Challenge – 7 races in 7 months on 7 different courses.

It’s counter intuitive – most of us skip a meal when trying to lose weight – but you will probably lose more weight by eating more meals per day. Over the last year I’ve found that by eating small sortions more frequently I do better with my weight loss.

As a result I now aim for 6 “meals” per day. Each meal varies between a 110Kcal protein shake or a handful of nuts and raisins to a full cooked meal containing around 500kcal. My aim is to average 300 kcal per meal for a daily average of around 1800 to 2000kcal. Although as I get fittern and get more exercise that will probably rise in line with the extra requirements for energy to support the exercise.

So what are the benefits of eating more frequently when it comes to losing weight? Well firstly studies have found that there is a correlation between skipping breakfast and obesity. As the researchers noted skipping breakfast was:

…associated with a lower diet quality and concentrated energy intakes through higher protein intakes at lunch and the consumption of snacks higher in energy and carbohydrate in the afternoon and evening;

Which brings us nicely to the other benefit of eating more frequently. If you’ve planned to have 6 meals a day, then you’re eating a meal every 2 to 3 hours which means your energy intake is more even throughout the day and you’re less likely to snack knowing that your next meal is not far away.

As I mentioned in the post Deciding To Lose Weight – Reflecting On Dietary Habits I’d picked up the habbit of supplementing my healthy lunches with a large amount of crisps. Probably because I like savoury/salty food. However crisps would no longer feature in my new healthy approach to life – they had to go.

It’s not that easy though is it. Lunch just isn’t complete unless you have something else with your drink and sandwhich, so I had to find a replacement for the crisps. The obvious answer, given we’re all continually advised to consume at least 5 portions of fruit and vegetables per day was to substitute either fruit or vegetables for the crisps. So that’s exactly what I did.

It took a while to find something I was happy with. I tried apples, but I seem to have some sort of allergic reaction – annoying as I really like apple. Next I tried raw carrots, but I’m not a big fan of their taste. Bananas are great but I was in danger of eating nothing but bananas (I often had one for breakfast). So finally I settled on grapes. 12 to 20 grapes – depending on whose figures you believe – are a portion, they contain a good range of vitamins and minerals and despite containing a log of sugar aren’t really adding that many calories (around 60kcal per portion).

So that was my next small step on my weight loss journey, eating fruit to lose weight – beats eating crisps anyway!

What is the fat burning zone?

The fat burning zone is the heart rate zone at which you supposedly burn most fat. Typically heart rate zone for fat burning is quoted as being between 60% and 70% of your maximum heart rate. So to work out fat your burning zone you’d calculate you maximum heart rate using the formula: maximum heart rate = 205 – 0.5* your age. The fat burning zone is then between 0.6 * max heart rate and 0.7 * max heart rate. Alternately you can find a few fat burning zone calculators on the web.

The trouble is, fat burning zone is a myth.

Exploring the fat burning zone myth

The concept of the fat burning zone is based on an assumption and some solid science. Firstly the science. It is a fact that at lower intensities our bodies primarily use fat to fuel exercise.  However the fat burning zone makes two assumptions:

1. that the maximum heart rate is the same for everyone of a given age. In reality maximum heart rates vary considerably;
2. that the heart rate measured during exercise can be used to predict the oxygen consumption, which isn’t always true.

So how do we address these assumptions? Well firstly you can actually determine your maximum heart rate on your own using your heart rate monitor.The second assumption doesn’t matter, because the science on which the fat burning zone is based has been misinterpreted.

While it is true that at low intensities your body burns the highest percentage of fat, it does not reflect the best way to burn fat and hence lose weight quickly. Consider this example. Lets assume that you burn 100 kcal per mile  that you run. If you slowly run 4 miles then you’ll burn 400 kcal in theory around 65% of these calories will be fat. Now consider what happens if you doubled you running speed and ran 8 miles in the same time. Now you’ve burned 800 kcal but only 35% of those calories will come from fat. Easy to see why many suggest we focus on low intensity exercise to burn fat.

Lets now consider what that means in terms of calories of fat burnt though. In the first case 65% of 400 kcal is 260 kcal of fat and in the second case 35% of 800 kcal is 280 kcal. So the high intensity exercise burned more calories, more of which came from fat and it has a number of other benefits too (such as even more calories burned as a result of EPOC, but that’s the topic of a future post).

Despite easy access to clean water many of us the live in the west are dehydrated. What we drink does not help either, much of it, for example caffeinated drinks and alcohol has a diuretic effect (dehydrates us and makes us wee more).

Unfortunately our bodies depend on water to function correctly, so when we’re dehydrated our bodies aren’t working as efficiently as they should, which impacts our health and wellbeing. The simple fix is to drink more water and less of the other stuff.

The bonus is that by drinking more water you’re more likely to lose weight – and you’ve not even had to give up your favourite foods to benefit from it!

There are in fact several reasons to drink water to lose weight:

1. our brains often confuse being thirsty with being hungry. So when you feel hungry have a glass of water and wait 20 minutes you might well find you’re no longer hungry.
2. drinking more water (especially cold water) burns additional energy as your body works to maintain it’s internal temperature.
3. water fills up your stomach making you feel fuller.
4. Some scientific studies (for example the one listed below) have shown that drinking around 500ml (two glasses) of water before a meal results in you consuming around 13% less than you otherwise would have.

So how much water should i drink to lose weight? Well it’ll vary from person to person, but you’re almost certainly not drinking enough!

Reference quoted:

Davy BM, Dennis EA, Dengo L, Wilson KL, Davy KP. Water consumption Reduces Energy Intake at a Breakfast Meal in Obese Older Adults. JADA 2008; 108: 1236-1239.

It should be fairly obvious to anyone that eating less food will result in weight loss. It is after all the basis of most weight loss diets.

What’s not obvious is that many of us eat too much simply because we’re given (or take) large portions and not just because we’re greedy but sometimes just because that looks like the right sized portion for the plate we’re eating off. In other words we over serve ourselves when we use larger plates and, according to the experts we tend to eat 92% of what we serve ourselves.

The solution? Use a smaller plate. It almost sounds too simple, but one study claims that 70% of people felt more satisfied with a smaller portion when it was served on a smaller plate. One study found that a reduction in plate size from 12″ to 10″ would reduce calorific intake by 22%. In real terms that translates to around 9Kg per year of weight loss.

You can find more information (and some of the scientific evidence) on the Small Plate Movement website.

On the 3rd November 2008 I decided to lose weight. I’d spent too long focus on business and not enough time taking care of my health. That had to change. So I decided I need to lose weight and to make sure that I was going to stick to any weight loss scheme it had to work quickly.

So I set about exploring ways to lose weight as quickly as possible. As I’ve never believed in fad diets, or in the idea of “dieting” in general so I wasn’t prepared to “go on a diet”. Besides I already ate fairly healthily getting in a good selection of fruit and vegetables every day and as I love cooking most food is freshly prepared at home.

That said I did believe there was room for improvement in my normal diet and I recognised a few bad habits that I’d picked up:

• Using a large plate – my wife and I had been given some very large plates as wedding presents and fell in to the habbit of using them.
• Crisps – although I typically ate relatively healthy lunch (brown bread sandwiches with lots of salad) I’d picked up the habit of eating a large number of crisps with lunch.
• Chocolate – although I’ve never really been a big chocolate person, I’d taken to eating some most evenings when my wife had some (my fault not hers).

The first step towards weight loss was clearly to break these habits.