The TrainChange Approach to Fat Loss

“The Sun is the center of the universe and the planets (including the Earth) revolve around it,” wrote Copernicus. Today, could you imagine reading a book that says the earth was the center of the universe and that all of the planets in the solar system rotate around it? The possibility of the Sun as the center of the cosmos, and the Earth being one of the planets going around it was an unthinkable concept in the sixteenth century. Although Copernicus wasn’t the only astronomer to believe in this theory he was the only one bold enough to address it. Out of fear that the idea would get them into trouble with the church, other astronomers refused to question the status quo. Had it not been for Copernicus’ courage to take a stand and question the beliefs of his time, modern Astronomy would not be where it is today.

Similarly, the doctrinaire of today is that fat loss revolves around excess calorie consumption. Blinded by an antithesis toward fat, modern medicine is searching for a solution to the overfat epidemic using the notion that overfat is the result of calorie intake exceeding calorie expenditure. Hence, their answer to the overfat epidemic is to reduce the intake of calorie-laden fat. It goes without saying that this approach is not working.

The overfat epidemic will never be solved by simply reducing calorie intake. That isn’t to say consuming excess calories doesn’t contribute to the overfat problem. It does. But the principal problem is what we are eating, not how much of it we’re eating.

Don't Stop Eating. Start Eating Better
In order for humans to function, to be productive, and most of all to remain happy, we must eat. Eating is a festive event that has remained woven in the tapestry of civilizations throughout history. Whether it’s eating during the holidays, birthdays, reunions, promotions, weddings—and sometimes divorces. Happiness and eating is tied into human nature. Therefore, it’s impossible to believe that we could ever be functional and happy if we spent the rest of our lives trying to walk the narrow plank between calorie intake and calorie expenditure. Rather, the focus on curing overfat should be on identifying the catalyst in our modern diet that has caused the sudden surge of excess calorie storage.

With this in mind, my goal was to find a solution that would allow individuals to maintain a healthy weight, not by counting calories, but by controlling calorie storage. I believed the problem of overfat could be remedied by minimizing the accumulation of excess calories. So my initial task was to research how calories are utilized and stored.

During my research I learned the body has a simple—and yet complex—means of storing calories. On the simple side, it stores calories based on storage capacity. The more storage space your body has for a calorie of a given type, the more calories of that type it can store. For instance, while your body has no capacity to store alcohol, it can store limited amounts of protein and carbs in your muscles and liver—and an unlimited amount of fat throughout your body. Alcohol calories (7 calories per gram) must be metabolized or excreted immediately because there is nowhere to store them. On the other hand, when protein and carbohydrate calories are consumed, your body metabolizes and stores as many of them as it can. Once storages are full and your daily expenditure has been met, excess calories are shipped off to awaiting fat cells. These plump little cells are what we commonly fat cells.

Incidentally, this is the perfect opportunity to clarify another common misconception. The term “fat cell” is misleading because people assume these cells only store fat (further contributing to our fear of fat). Well, that’s not true. The proper name for a fat cell is white adipocyte cell, or adipose tissue. Adipose tissue is the major storage site for fat in the form of triglycerides. Although very little is actually known about these cells, what researchers do know is that they are tiny cells located throughout your body and that genetics and gender determine how they are dispersed. In men, the majority of adipocyte cells are located around the abdominal region, while women have a larger accumulation around their hips, thighs, backs of arms, and buttocks. Women can have as much as 50% more adipose tissue than men due to their hip-thigh depots. Each person has approximately 30 billion adipocytes in their body; each cell having an unlimited storage capacity and the ability to multiply. The important thing to understand is that fat cells store excess calories—even if they come from carbohydrates and protein. Unfortunately, simply calling them fat cells has led people to believe that only fat calories can be stored there. Nope. Adipocyte cells are an equal opportunity storage facility. Bottom line, whether your calories come from carbs, protein, or fat, if you eat more calories than you burn, they all get stored in the fat cell.

Having said that, let’s go back to the main point and discuss the more complex aspects of calorie storage. You’ll need to use your imagination for this. Let’s say you have two checking accounts with $1,000 in each of them; you can spend as much as you like from each account, but when the accounts run out of money you’re broke. Additionally, you have $1,000 in bills that must be paid every day. Based on this information, which account would you pay your bills from? Not much of a choice, huh? Either way you’re going to go broke in two days. But what if one of the accounts is receiving small deposits throughout the day, for a total of $1,000? Which account would you choose then? The obvious choice is the one receiving money on a regular basis—it’s a no-brainer.

When it comes to burning calories your body uses a similar logic. With that information, I had the answer to my first question.

As mentioned, everyones body has a calorie burning preference: free fatty acid (fat) or glycogen (carbohydrate). See One Diet Does Not Fit All. Therefore, when free fatty acid is the primary fuel source for a muscle, it can either be burned as energy or stored locally within that muscle (as intramuscular triglyceride). The outcome is dependent on the muscle’s current storage capacity and your total energy expenditure; excess free fatty acids are either used by other muscles or sent to the dreaded adipocyte cells and stored as triglyceride. Likewise, when glycogen is the primary source, the same logic—in reverse—is applied. In other words, when a muscle receives a steady supply of its preferred energy source, it willingly burns the incoming calories as energy—then performs local calorie storage.

In effect, a person who has body that can efficiently burn glycogen should follow a high-carb/low-fat diet because his or her muscles eagerly convert glycogen into energy and store the limited intake of fat. On the other hand, when they deprive their muscles of carbs, such as with a low-carb/high-fat diet, their muscles attempt to conserve glycogen by relying on fat for energy, and until they receive a steady supply of glycogen, their primary source of fuel will be fat. The direct opposite is true for someone that is more efficent at burning fat. When they don’t receive fat, they aggressively store it and burn carbs for energy. In brief, just as you wouldn’t spend money from a checking account that isn’t receiving a regular deposit, your body doesn’t burn calories (of a particular type) if there isn’t a steady incoming supply.

This article is a revised excerpt from the book
TrainChange: A Unique Step-by-Step Analytical Approach to Fat Loss
By Al Smith, Jr., The Fitness Specialist®