The right diet for fat loss is the one that you can adjust easily according to your body, schedule and goals. It is the one that ensures that you maintain the specific factors required for you to lose fat.
The diet alone can be enough, but there are other things that you can put into place to ensure that you lose fat easier and faster. No one diet is perfect, but there is one that works for you and a list will be presented for you to choose from. First, we need to look at how to lose fat.
The diets that will be looked at are the low-carb diet, plant-based and Intermittent Fasting. These are ones that are well-known and often practiced these days for fat loss.
How Best to Lose Fat
There are three fundamentals that will ensure that you lose fat. These are are a given if you do them consistently and are patient with the results.
1. Eat in a Calorie Deficit
You must eat less calories than you burn consistently for you to lose fat. To identify how many calories you should eat, you can track them through MyFitnessPal and other apps or calculate your calorie goals on your own.
2. Resistance Training
Resistance training is the use of training equipment to provide resistance on your muscles for them to grow. There are many types of equipment that you can use:
- Barbells
- Dumbbells
- Kettlebells
- Resistance bands
- Medicine balls
There are more that you can choose from, but with this equipment in mind, you can perform different types of training that can ensure that you get enough resistance on your muscles:
- Muscular Endurance Training – this is the use of relatively light weights to build endurance in your muscles. The way to train this is through using weights that are between 50-70% of your 1 rep max and doing 2-4 sets of 12-20+ reps to build that muscle endurance. Resting should be minimal here between 30-75 seconds.
- Hypertrophy Training – this is the use of moderate to heavy weights to grow your muscles. You train this through weights that are between 70-80% of your 1 rep max, doing 3-5 sets of 6-12 reps. Resting here should be enough to recover, but not too long for you to lose the potential micro tears you will be making in lifting.
- Strength Training – this is the use of heavy weights to build your strength. The heavy weight should be between 80-100% of your 1 rep max, doing 3-5 sets of 1-5 reps. Your rest should be between 2-5 minutes for you to rest enough to put in your utmost effort on each set in developing strength.
3. Cardio
Cardio is the exercising that you do in developing your heart and lungs through the use of oxygen for energy. These exercises can be of low to high intensity or the interchanging of these intensities.
- High Intensity Interval Training is the training you do in which you alternate between high and low intensity intervals.
- Cycling
- Running on the road or treadmill
- Pilates
- Yoga
- Stepper Machine
There are a lot of options in diet, training and cardio that you can choose from that will ensure that you maximise fat loss. It’s always the one that you consistently do that works out best for you.
The Diets to Try
1. Low-Carb Diet for Fat Loss
A low-carb diet is one in which you focus on keeping your carbs low compared to your fat and protein. You focus on getting most of your carbs from vegetables, fruits and nuts which are low in carbs.
Pros: Weight loss has been studied to be greater than in conventional diets that ensure a calorie deficit.
Cons: Carbs are the main source of energy for your body, so you may feel low in energy when you start, until your body adapts.
Foods to Eat
Carbs: Spinach, broccoli, green beans/peas, cauliflower and other leafy green vegetables.
Protein: Nuts, seafood, eggs, beef, pork, lamb and chicken etc.
Fats: Avocado, cheese, full-fat yoghurt, cream, full-cream milk and sunflower seeds.
The low-carb diet may help your body to use more fat as an energy source when your glycogen stores are depleted. You must ensure that a slight calorie deficit is followed to prevent the loss of overall weight, including muscle being lost.
2. Plant-Based Diet for Fat Loss
A plant-based diet is one in which majority, if not all the nutrition you get is from plant-based products. There are many ways this can help with fat loss because most plant-based products are low in calories per serving. The goal of this diet is to eat mostly whole foods that are naturally sourced for more nutrients for your body.
Pros: Most of the food in this diet undergoes little processing (whole foods), depending on how you follow it. This makes the food have more nutrients, naturally and makes it better for the environment.
Cons: If not planned well, you may not get enough of some nutrients, like protein, vitamins and minerals that you get mostly from animal products. It is also difficult to limit or let go of meat.
Foods to Eat
Carbs: Whole grain bread and pasta, oats, brown rice and all whole grains etc.
Protein: Tofu, chickpeas, lentils, nuts and beans. Chicken breasts and lean beef, if you can’t completely let go of meat like me.
Fat: Avocado, nut butter, olive oil, coconut oil, salmon and sunflower seeds.
The point is to reduce the consumption of highly processed animal products. You will also in turn be doing well for the earth in this manner. You may find yourself losing too much weight (including muscle) when you try this type of eating, especially if your planning and tracking of your nutrition is bad.
3. Intermittent Fasting for Fat Loss
Intermittent fasting is a type of dieting that involves you setting a time period in which you eat and a period in which you fast. The goal is to minimize your calorie intake to lose fat by reducing the amount of time you have to eat.
Pros: There are no food restrictions, besides ensuring majority of the food you eat is nutritious, like any diet, but you can still eat anything.
Cons: Hunger pains and headaches may occur when you start, but they subside shortly over time.
Foods to Eat
All carbs, protein and fat sources are applicable, but with all diets, being able to track your intake is of high importance. Your non-nutritious must be limited for fat loss.
There are no food restrictions with this diet, therefore you can eat anything. You will have to ensure that you eat mostly whole foods for a lot of nutrients. Otherwise, if you want to have non-nutritious meals, limit it to 1 or 2 low-in-nutrients foods.
The Takeaway
The right diet for fat loss is the one that works for you in ensuring a calorie deficit and enough time to train. You must be patient and consistent in achieving your fat loss goals. There is no one diet that ensures fat loss unless you maintain those steps on how best to lose it.
The low-carb diet focuses on reducing your carb intake through eating low carb foods and getting most of your nutrition from fat and protein. This is to make your body rely less on carbs for energy and more on fat. You must ensure you maintain a slight calorie deficit to lose more fat than weight.
The plant-based diet focuses on obtaining most of your nutrients from plant-based products. They are mostly whole foods and low in calories per serving, which can ensure that you maintain in a calorie deficit. Ensure that you get enough protein, vitamins and minerals which are not high or present in plant-based products.
Intermittent fasting is a dieting style that involves alternating between eating and fasting. The idea is by reducing the time you have to eat, you can ensure that you eat in a calorie deficit. You don’t have to have any food restrictions, but you must get most of your nutrition from nutritious whole foods.
Which diet works for you?
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