Calories, Deficits, Gains & Losses

No matter what your goal is, whether it is to lose weight or fat, to gain weight and muscle, or to prepare for a sporting event you need to know how many calories to consume. ⚖

So what is a calorie? 🤔

A calorie is a unit of energy equivalent to the heat energy required (in this case) to raise 1kg of water by 1°C and is equal to 1000 small calories (or a Kilocalories/Kcals) 🤓

To lose weight or fat (and there is a difference between the two so be careful what you ask for!) you need to be in a calorie deficit.

Simply, if you consume less than the body requires you will lose weight.

BUT this weight loss is most likely in the first instance to come mostly from water and atrophy of muscle - if you only stick to a nutrition plan.

Whereas if you integrate a resistance training program with your nutrition plan you are going to see a significant loss coming from fat stores as standard - along with some weight loss BUT a MASSIVE shift in Body Composition.

Muscle or lean tissue is calorificly expensive. What I mean by this is quite simply that Lean Tissue helps to burn calories more effectively, in other words it’s costing your body a lot more in calories with a leaner, stronger body than it would if your body composition was leaning more towards holding more fat.

Now I’m not a big advocate of calorie counting, I think it’s monotonous and for some can become obsessive. BUT it can help you to reevaluate your relationship with food which is the most important factor and is still a good starting point.

It can set you up in good stead moving forward and if it can keep you away from DIETING then it’s a win win.

My hate of the word DIET is a topic for another time but if you want to know what your calorie consumption needs to be to lose 1-2lb of fat each week OR to put on 1-2lb of muscle per week then GET IN TOUCH and I’ll get back to you 💪