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If you are one of those people who has a super busy schedule and limited time at the gym, learning how to increase your resting metabolism will be a game changer! In this blog and in our HUB podcast, you will learn how you can lose body fat without majorly restricting your caloric intake and how to naturally burn calories throughout the day with limited exercise.
Maintaining and consuming the proper amount of calories is very important to increase your metabolism. You want to be careful when following a weight loss program to not cut too many calories out of your diet. When you restrict too many calories, your body will enter survival mode causing it to burn muscle mass instead of fat. Your body will slow its metabolism down with a low calorie diet to store as much energy as possible.
You have probably heard the controversy about breakfast being the most important meal of the day or not. Breakfast is definitely the most important meal, if you are trying to increase your resting metabolism. Your body slows down its metabolism at night when you sleep. Eating breakfast literally breaks your night fasting cycle. This kick-starts your metabolism every day. Try eating something with a complex carb and protein for breakfast to replenish your body after its night time fast.
The most important macronutrient to consume to increase your resting metabolism is protein. You should consume 1 gram of protein per kilogram of body weight. Protein replenishes our muscles after resistance training exercises, which requires more energy to be used compared to when we consume carbohydrates and fats.
The second part of increasing your RMR is gaining muscle mass. Adding resistance training to your daily workout routine will help you increase your body fat loss tremendously. Muscle mass is harder for your body to maintain than fat, so your body has to use more energy. When you lift weight, the resistance breaks down muscle fibers and these fibers have to be repaired by protein to cause an increase in muscle mass. While protein repairs these muscle fibers your body will burn calories at rest.
Some of the best weight loss resistance training programs are hypertrophy strength training and high-intensity interval training (HIIT). Hypertrophy training is commonly programmed with heavy weight and lower repetitions helping you increase your RMR. HIIT programming has a mixture of high-intensity cardio to spike your heart rate and strength training to help you burn calories at rest.
With a busy schedule, it can be hard to workout five days a week. If you can do a resistance training workout two-to-three times a week with proper nutrition, you will start to notice your resting metabolism increase. If you are consuming the proper amount of protein and you start getting hungry faster, that is one of the first sign of your metabolism increasing. You do not have to overdo it with cardio in the gym to burn the most calories, resistance training will allow you to burn more body fat with less time.
Chelsey Greenwood
Sports and Fitness Coordinator
