We’ve all heard of claims and statements about “tricks of the trade” when it comes to diet and exercise. We’ve also have heard magical and easy ways to six pack abs and ways to add inches to your arms in a flash. It is in our nature as humans to give the least effort for the greatest benefit possible, which is why it is especially easy to get caught in these traps.
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I’m here to show you some common myths and whether or not they hold much water so you can be what every person trying
to be fit should be: informed.
- Spicy Foods Speed Up MetabolismIn an article by Muscle & Body, Julie Upton, MS, RD, states that “it has a very small effect.” She also claims “The amount of chili pepper and powder that you’d have to eat would cause you GI distress before you’d have a metabolic impact.”
- Diet and Exercise : Crunches Will Get Rid of Your Belly Fat.“You can’t pick and choose areas where you’d like to burn fat,” Tyne says. “In order to burn fat, you should create a workout that includes both cardiovascular and strength training elements. This will decrease your overall body fat content.”
- Exercise Turns Fat Into Muscle Fat and muscle tissue are composed of two entirely different types of cells. “While you can lose one and replace it with another, the two never “convert” into different forms,” Tyne says. “So fat will never turn into muscle.”
- Performing Cardio on an Empty Stomach Burns More CaloriesIt’s believed that by not eating before a cardio session, your body will turn to stored fat as an energy source instead of stored carbohydrates. Well, it turns out that this one is actually true. Scientifically, when you don’t eat, your respiratory quotient is lower and you’re burning more fat. The only thing holding this back from being a great thing is that you sacrifice a less than satisfactory workout because you have less “fuel.”
- Eating Late at Night Will Cause You to Gain WeightThere are no “magic hours” when it comes to eating. We associate weight gain with late night eating because we tend to eat not only more calories, but less than healthy calories at night. Think about when you really can’t curb your craving for junk food. Now think about what you want after a few evening cocktails or beers. Also, we tend to eat less than fulfilling meals for breakfast and lunch if we eat breakfast at all. This causes us to not feel satiated (full) and thus lead us to satisfy that hunger . If you simply consume more calories during your breakfast and lunch and the first half of the day, than late night eating isn’t the problem, it’s what you are eating late at night.
- Short, High Intensity Interval Cardio Burns More Fat than Long, Mild Intensity CardioTraining for shorter periods of time, but with higher intensity (ie shorter distance but faster pace) will burn more fat than long and slow training. Australian scientist Alan Boucher claims that this happens because the increase in hormones “catecholamines” (adrenaline is a catecholamine hormone). These increase after intervals, but not after slow cardio. Catecholamines are fat burning hormones.
- Light Weights on Your Legs and Arms Can Boost Your Exercise BenefitSome people carry light (one- or two-pound) handheld weights when they walk or run. Others strap Velcro-fastened weights around their ankles. Don’t bother, says exercise physiologist Ben Hurley. “It slows you down, so you get less benefit from aerobic exercise, and it doesn’t add enough weight to give you the benefits of strength-training,” he explains. To build muscle, you have to use weights that you can lift no more than eight to twelve times in a row. “If you can go beyond the twelfth repetition, the resistance is too light to stress the muscle,” says Hurley. “As your muscles get stronger, you need to add more weight-or other resistance-so you can still do only eight to twelve repetitions.
- Low Fat Foods Help You Lose WeightLow-fat or fat-free doesn’t necessarily mean low calories. Extra sugars and thickeners are added to boost flavor and texture which are bad for you. While eating low-fat or fat-free foods is a healthier option than ones with full amounts of fat, I warn you to be careful of your calorie intake as it is the true measure of weight gain and loss.
- Weight Lifting with Light Weight and High Repetitions will Make My Muscles Tone and RippedLifting lighter weights with many repetitions (20 or more) will merely cause your muscle to become exhausted which is not a inherently negative consequence. However, this method will cause your muscle to become conditioned for endurance, not so much tone and that ripped look you are searching for.
- Cholesterol is Bad For YouCholesterol is a fatty substance made mostly by the liver. It can be bad because it makes deposits that clog our arteries and can lead to heart disease. However, that type of cholesterol is referred to as low density lipoprotein (LDL), found in foods like meat, cheese, butter, and cream. On the other hand, there is high density lipoprotein (HDL) which is a type of cholesterol that is good for you. This type transports cholesterol away from the arteries back to the liver and is found in foods such as olive oil and avocados.
