Cardio Lite

Q: If I could offer you a session of cardio every day wherein you would burn calories but never have to set foot on a piece of "cardio" equipment, would you take my offer?

The thermic effect of food (TEF)- or thermogenic effect - is a term used to describe the energy expended by the body in order to consume (bite, chew and swallow) and process (digest, transport, metabolize and store) food. This is where the popular thought lies with respect to celery. You know the mantra, "it takes more calories to eat celery than are in it."

For the "Average American" this overall sum in general describes about 7-10% of their daily calories consumed, based on the Standard American Diet (SAD)

Upon closer inspection:
Protein foods typically have a TEF of 25 -30%.
Carbohydrate foods require about 5-10%.
Fruits are around 15%
Cruciferous vegetables are around 30%
Fats are somewhere between 0 and 3%.

Can you see where I'm going with this?

If you just exchanged 100 calories of carbs for 100 calories of protein, in effect you would burn off another 20-25 calories.

If you swapped 100 calories of fat for 100 calories of vegetables, you would chew up an extra 27-30 calories.

Try this on for size: imagine you are the typical person eating a highly processed, low fiber, low protein diet. You eat about 2500 calories and burn about 7% of those calories.2500 - (7% of 2500) = 2325 calories absorbed

Due to the revelations of a superior trainer, you are convinced to switch to a higher protein diet, low in refined carbs and very high in whole foods, vegetables and fruits. You could easily increase the thermogenic effect by 2500 - (16% of 2500) = 2100 calories

That would mean you'd burn an extra 225 calories by doing nothing! For most people that's the equivalent of about 20-25 mins on a treadmill!

Small changes add up to big differences in the long term.

God bless,
Steve