Alright maybe not a lie. Well, maybe not a whole lie. BUT! There are plenty of misconceptions surrounding the ‘fat burn zone’ that every weight loss, fitness, and nutrition plan raves over. I mean you’ve seen the ‘how to work out, eat whatever you want, and lose 100 lbs.’ headlines. Or the ‘drink this to burn 50 lbs. sitting on your couch’ videos. I hate to break it to you, but those are lies. Total non-truths about losing fat and weight.
That’s why I wanted to bring you the real truth about losing weight and what the fat burning zone really is. That way, you can be well equipped to sift through the garbage on social media and seek out true facts about losing weight.
Are you ready to stop believing the lies influencers are spreading, and start practicing true weight loss tactics? Keep reading!
Today’s Topics
- The Science and Misconception of the Fat Burn Zone
- What to Do with That Information
- Magic Sauce to Weight Loss
- Recommendations
Before we get to the good stuff, did you know there are 5 heart rate zones?
Yes, they are very light, light, moderate, hard, and very hard. Very hard is about 90% of your max heart rate – super intense exercise. Light is going to be about 60-70% of your max heart rate – really light exercise.
That 60-70% is the so-called ‘fat burn zone’. There is both science and misconception surrounding this coined name.
The Science: At 60-70% of your max heart rate you are burning fat for energy.
The longer duration at a lower intensity causes your body to utilize fat for energy. The shorter duration and higher intensity-sprinting-makes your body use carbs as a source of energy. So, the difference in the heart rate zones is what your body is utilizing for energy.
The Misconception: All you have to do to lose fat is stay in the ‘fat burn zone’ all the time via walking, the elliptical, etc.
Let’s see an example of the ‘fat burn zone’ in action to show you the truth about it.
Person 1 is doing a 20-minute workout at 60-70% of their max heart rate on the elliptical or walking.
Person 2 is doing a 20-minute workout at 90% of their max heart rate,
The higher intensity workout burns more calories than the lower intensity workout. Even though they are using carbs for energy, person 2 is burning more calories per minute than person 1 in the fat burn zone.
So What?
If you do a very intense, short workout, you will burn more calories per minute than if you did a light treadmill walk for a longer period of time.
The fat burn zone does help you burn fat, but you have to be in it a lot longer to burn more calories than higher heart rate zones over time.
Doing a higher intensity workout should almost always be for a shorter amount of time than walking on the treadmill or the elliptical.
The fat burning zone can work if you are trying to burn extra calories, but don’t mistake it to help you burn more calories over time. It’s all about your duration and intensity.
Magic Sauce to Weight Loss
Please don’t mistake that I am saying the fat burning zone doesn’t exist because it does! I’m saying that it isn’t the ‘magic sauce’ to lose weight.
The ‘magic sauce’ to weight loss is a calorie deficit. It doesn’t matter how much fat burning you are doing if you aren’t in a calorie deficit. If you burn a ton of fat but eat horribly, you are just going to gain all that fat back.
The deficit is what is losing the pounds on the scale, not what heart rate zone you are in.
We preach a calorie deficit at Steel because it is the only way for you to lose the weight and see the results you want to see.
Exercise and a deficit go hand in hand with one another. The main benefits to exercise are changing your body composition and health benefits (diabetes, high blood pressure, obesity) – this should be the #1 prescription your doctor should be giving you if you have any of these.
Weight training specifically changes your body composition, and exercise burns the calories.
While the calorie deficit and the food you eat are the cake, exercise is the icing of weight loss.
My Recommendations
I recommend working out in all the heart rate zones.
It’s good for you to be in higher intensity heart rate zones for some of the week, and it’s good for you to be in lower heart rates zones the other parts of the week.
I feel that if you are training cardio, it is super beneficial to play around with all the heart rate zones. Why? Because your heart is a muscle. You should train it like one!
You want your heart to have the endurance of long distance and be able to handle the short bursts of energy, so training it through all the zones builds it up to do so.
Wrap Up
You can be confident, despite any social media opinions, that a calorie deficit is what is going to make you lose weight.
You can skip over the influencer saying ‘the key to fat loss is this pineapple drink’ because it’s just not true. I hate that it’s not, that would be super easy if it was.
Exercise, food, sleep, and vitamins all add up to fuel your body, but the deficit is the magic wand, the magic sauce, the magic formula to weight loss.
If you don’t exactly know what deficit you need to be in, don’t worry. We have nutrition planning and accountability calls at Steel that allow us to build you a plan and talk through it with you on a regular basis. The best part? We have the strength training to go with it! I said earlier that weight training is what changes your body composition and helps work with the calorie deficit.
