Weight Loss: Where Do You Lose Fat from First?
Many people want to lose weight to do more athletic activities, change how their body looks, or manage diseases. The way fat is stored and lost can depend on a few factors, such as genetics, sex, age, environment, and lifestyle. But where do you lose fat from your body first? Read on to find out.
Where do you lose weight first?
Losing fat from a certain body area is not physiologically possible. It is because the body does not use energy from one particular area when you are exercising. It uses energy from all over. So, for instance, when you are doing ab crunches, this workout will not help much in reducing fat from your belly. However, exercising your abdominals will create new muscle cells and mitochondria, which increases your overall metabolism, leading to weight loss.
While exercising one area of the body may be effective in gaining muscle, it does not necessarily help you lose fat in that area. You will need to work on your overall diet and increase your physical activity levels if you want to reduce the quantity of stored body fat
Some people tend to lose weight from areas like their arms and upper back first. The reason for this may be because the fat is distributed unevenly in the body and people have a low-fat percentage and more muscles in these areas.
The loss of fat in these body parts may reflect first on your appearance. However, it does not mean that you are not losing belly fat or internal fat around these organs.
Also watch: Can I Only Lose Belly Fat?
How does fat loss work?
In order to burn fat, the body starts breaking down stored fat into energy, which causes the fat cells to shrink in size. Body fat cannot be converted to muscles or excreted through the colon.
Fat leaves the body in the form of carbon dioxide (CO2) during exhalations or through urine and sweat. Approximately 84% of fat is exhaled as CO2, while 16% is excreted as water. However, the vast majority of fat lost is emitted into the air through exhalation
The body mainly relies on carbs and fat for fuel. However, it also uses a small proportion of protein during exercise. In general, the ratio of these energies will depend on the type of activity that you are doing.
When doing a high-intensity workout, the body will rely more on carbs for fuel compared to fat. It is because carbs are broken down for energy at a more efficient rate. For long, slow workouts, such as running at a moderate pace, you will use more fat than carbs for energy.
Using carbs or fat for fuel will not make you lose weight any quicker. It is not important what fuel you use for energy when losing weight. What matters is the number of calories you burn in a day.
Also watch: Weight Loss vs Fat Loss | What Is The Difference Between Fat Loss & Weight Loss?
What can you do to promote fat loss?
1. Incorporate compound exercises in your workout regime
Compound exercises are exercises that utilize more than one body part. They can also be called multi-joint exercises because they require more than one joint to work in coordination with the others.
Examples of compound exercises include push-ups, squats, bench presses, and deadlifts. The more muscles you use, the more fat you burn. So, your calorie breakdown will be higher, which means you can lose weight faster.
Also watch: How Many Calories Do You Need to Burn Fat?
2. Be consistent with your exercises
When you work out regularly, your body adapts to the physical demands of the exercises. Gradually, the body becomes more efficient at delivering oxygen to the cells. Moreover, exercising daily improves your blood circulation and creates more mitochondria, which leads to a faster metabolism and fat loss over time.
At the end of the day, if you want to burn fat, you have to work for it. There is no magic workout or diet that can give you instant results. The good news is that with consistency you can get into the fat-burning mode with the right amount of activity every day.
Losing fat from one area is not possible because the body does not work that way. If you are a sedentary person, add some form of exercise to your daily routine, even if it is just a short walk. With time, you can slowly get to the point where you are burning more calories.
References
1. Meerman R, Brown AJ. When somebody loses weight, where does the fat go? BMJ 2014; 349: g7257.
2. Mul JD, Stanford KI, Hrishman F, et al. Exercise and Regulation of Carbohydrate Metabolism. Prog Mol Biol Transl Sci 2015; 135: 17-37.
3. Zemková E, Kyselovičová O, Jelen M, et al. Upper, and Lower Body Muscle Power Increases After 3-Month Resistance Training in Overweight and Obese Men. Am J Men’s Health 2017; 11: 1728-38.
4. Cha S, Kang JH, Lee JH, et al. Impact of Genetic Variants on the Individual Potential for Body Fat Loss. Nutrients 2018; 10: 266.
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