Last Updated on 18th August 2021 by Charlie Walsh
MYTH NUMBER 1 – I want to lose fat from one area
The first myth and potentially the craziest is that a lot of people think they can lose some fat from certain or particular body parts. Firstly, fat cells are placed in whole your body. For example, you may want to lose some belly fat – remember that you need to focus on losing overall body fat, not just belly fat. So what is the best workout if I want to lose fat? HIIT. In one of our Bathmate articles, we wrote about this kind of intense cardio training. How does it work? Our bodies need to take in oxygen at a higher rate to help it return to its natural resting state. The harder your work out is, the more calories your body burns. BUT it’s not the only training your body will need to burn more calories. Strength training can help you do that too.
MYTH NUMBER 2 – I will train every day
“I want to be fit as soon as it is possible so i am going to work out every single day”. You should not work out every single day. So let’s start from the beginning: what happens with our body while working out? A lot of your muscle fibres are being broken so they can rebuild stronger. So this means that EVERYBODY who works out needs at least one days rest and time to recover. What can we do during our rest days? You can rest actively: go for a walk, stretch a bit, even vacuuming is a nice little bit of cardio training. Please, do not harm yourself and don’t think about working out every day. Over training can put you at risk of serious injury and affect your immune system. What can happen? Weeks away from the gym while your body tries to recover. It’s not only about the injury to your body but also about your mental health. Working out should be a nice thing for you and not another stressful responsibility. You work and will have other responsibilities in your life so do not attempt to work out every day. Rest days are more necessary than you think as part of a balanced, healthy lifestyle.
MYTH NUMBER 3 – How long?
More than 40 minutes of cardio training will give a proper result and great health benefits. It does not matter if you run for 10 or 30 minutes because you have enough time to bolster your cardiovascular health. Nowadays, we can notice that short work outs are even better for us than long ones. Remember, those short work outs that we are talking about, keep your overall health in good shape. Bathmate recommends at least 4 hours of work outs per week – this is more than moderate to make your body slimmer.
MYTH NUMBER 4 – One bite wont matter
We have all heard from some of our friends “oh it doesn’t matter, I can eat that pizza, I will burn it off during tomorrows work out.” No, it does not work like that. We need to realise that
even if you work out a lot, properly, you won’t get good results without a proper healthy balanced diet. Diet is 70% percent of the success. If you choose eating unhealthy foods – in the long run – you will not get proper results and your metabolism will not be faster. But from the other hand, you can ask yourself what kind of food makes you happy. Telling yourself that some of the foods available are bad is not a good way of looking at your diet. Labelling food “bad” or “good” is just not sensible. You can eat in a tasty way without labelling your food. A Healthy diet can definitely be tasty.
MYTH NUMBER 5 – Starve yourself
Eat less, work out more. You probably heard that eating less calories and exercising more will burn your fat quicker. It is all about metabolism. If you give your body less energy your metabolism starts to become slower and slower….even if you exercise more. You can become tired, exhausted both mentally and physically because your brain and body needs calories. Suddenly you notice that you don’t lose weight and you feel tired and frustrated. Why? Because your body does not have enough energy to burn your body fat and keep everything you eat (energy) for later. Your body is very clever and does not want to starve. That is why you may even notice that you gain some weight. It’s kind of a paradox – the less energy you give your body, the less kilos you will lose and your metabolism will be much slower. Remember, your body needs recover, needs food and a sensible work out. Dieting, eating and working out nowadays are the topics that are still full of myths and mysteries. The best way to stay healthy is to be sensible and do not over think it. Eat healthy but your food has to taste appealing for you to want to consume it, work out hard but have days off to recover.
