4 strategies to increase your metabolism

Incorrect training and nutrition strategies can slow down your metabolism. Here you will find how to change it and put it at full throttle!

We all have that friend who seems to be able to eat whatever food he wants but still maintains a six-pack all year long. They don’t count calories; they do not put limits on their diet. Oh, how we secretly dislike that person!

The rest of us are forced to spend hours in the gym each week just to keep our waists in check. By the time we relax a bit – even for just a few days, fat accumulates in all the wrong places.

Let me start by giving you good news: You can increase your metabolism! Probably not at the same level as your enemy … I say friend, but enough to help you feel less anxious for wanting to eat a cheesecake.

What is metabolism?

Your metabolism (or to make it more precise your resting metabolic rate) refers to the number of calories you burn in a state of rest (while sitting, lying down or sleeping). These calories are expended to carry out essential survival functions such as respiration, blood circulation, and the supply of oxygen and nutrients throughout the body.

Your metabolism accounts for up to 70 percent of the calories you burn per day. The higher your metabolism, the more calories you will burn. This means that you may be able to eat more calories than a person of similar height and maintain your weight better. And when you are dieting this means that you may be able to eat more calories than other people and be able to lose weight, which makes you happier and less hungry. No wonder a “fast” metabolism is so desirable!

Factors that you can and cannot control

Your resting metabolic rate is influenced by several factors that are not modifiable. These include your age, height, gender, and genetics. As you age, your metabolism greatly slows due to a decrease in lean mass. That means as you age your body requires fewer calories to maintain your weight than it did the previous year, everything else is the same. Therefore, if you do not alter your exercise and your eating habits, it is very likely that you will gain weight.

Your body regardless of its muscle mass is another factor that affects your metabolism beyond your control. The larger your body size, the faster your metabolism, since your body needs to expend more energy to carry out essential functions in a larger area. And of course, genetics play a role in everything, so even if you are the same age and size as someone else, your metabolic rates can still differ significantly.

Fortunately, your muscle mass also greatly influences your metabolism. And you can directly influence the amount of muscle mass you have through your eating and exercise habits. Skeletal muscle is an energetically expensive tissue, which essentially means that your body expends a significant amount of energy (calories) to maintain it. If you were to measure the metabolic rates of two people of the same size but with different body compositions, you would likely see different metabolic values. By eating and training to optimize muscle growth, you can speed up your metabolism.

Strategies to accelerate metabolism

1. Train with weights on a regular basis

Resistance training induces muscle damage which is necessary for muscle growth to occur. A study published in “Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise” found that subjects who trained regularly for six months experienced a 7 percent increase in their resting metabolic rate. But you don’t have to wait that long to see a boost in your metabolism – vigorous resistance training can raise your metabolic rate by almost as much as 11-12 percent for two hours after training, and even 9 percent for up to 15 hours afterward. training.

To take full advantage of the benefits of resistance training, make sure your workouts target the major skeletal muscle groups with movements that span multiple muscles and with multiple sets, often approximately 8-12 reps, and even in a range of 12-20 at times.

2. Choose high intensity exercises or HIIT

The style of exercise you choose also has a big impact on your metabolic rate. After completing a high intensity exercise session – think interval or circuit-style resistance training – your oxygen consumption (sometimes referred to as Post Exercise Oxygen Excess or EPOC) rises in an attempt to replace used substrates. during exercise. This increased EPOC raises energy expenditure potentially up to 24-48 hours later, further affecting your metabolic rate long after you’ve finished the training section.

3. Eat enough protein

The consumption of dietary protein directly triggers muscle growth and repair. To maximize the muscle-building response from protein, it’s important that you’re not only eating enough, but that you eat it frequently throughout the day. Remember that the amount of muscle mass you have has an impact on your metabolic rate; To boost your metabolism it makes sense to prioritize protein intake appropriately throughout the day.

In addition to eating enough protein at each meal, it is advantageous to divide protein evenly across multiple meals rather than in just 1-2 large meals and in some protein-poor meals. To maximize muscle growth and protein repair response, you must meet a minimum threshold every few hours, which for most of us is 25 to 35 grams of high-quality protein.

4. Stop dieting all year long

Long-term dieting can negatively affect your metabolism as it causes your body to start conserving energy, which slows down your metabolism. Long-term dieting has been shown to negatively affect your total daily energy expenditure by reducing the number of calories you burn per day. For each week you diet, make it a goal to go at least many weeks without dieting. This will help you provide adequate time for your metabolism to be restored to pre-diet levels and allow enough time to build muscle mass. Ideally, the longer you can spend away from a calorie deficit, the better the impact it will have on muscle mass and ultimately your metabolism.