5. What not to eat
A team of Canadian researchers report that a high carbohydrate meal immediately after a workout depresses the positive effect that exercise normally has on your metabolic rate - the afterburn.
Their subjects spent an hour on a treadmill, then immediately drank a milk shake. When their post-exercise calorie expenditure was compared to subjects who had not exercised, there was very little difference, either in calories or fat grams burned. The high carbohydrate meal immediately after the workout appeared to completely eliminate the effects of the workout.
In other words, if you want to speed up fat loss, avoid eating carbohydrates straight after you finish training.
This is counter intuitive to what you might normally do to speed up recovery for your next workout - the point is that losing weight is a balancing act. If you still need to eat to be ready to workout the next day, then delay eating for say an hour after your workout. The 'glycogen window' (the optimum time to refuel) is open for about two hours after exercise.
6. Drink green tea
Researchers from the University of Geneva report that green tea can increase the number of fat calories you burn by 35%. Comparing three groups, who had either been given three daily servings of caffeine, a green tea extract or a placebo, they found that the green tea users burned 241 fat calories more than the placebo group -- an increase of 35%.
Control your thermostat
Taken individually, none of the six tips above will necessarily make a critical difference to your weight - but when you combine them, the effects could be profound. By simply exercising with a little more intensity and slightly altering your diet, you can maximize the benefit of your workouts. So crank up that thermostat and watch the weight slip away.
