One pound of human body tissue is equivalent to 3,500 calories. Therefore, to lose weight it is essential to maintain a caloric deficit over time via reduced caloric intake and or exercise expenditure. Losing weight in a healthy manner requires equally distributing this caloric cost over the course of an entire week instead of a couple of days. This method is the best way of not compromising metabolic functioning while still shedding pounds.
Calories
Not all food is created equally, therefore eating only one type of food will differentially impact your body's composition. Carbohydrates, fats, proteins, and alcohol are equivalent to different calorie counts per gram of substrate. Carbohydrates and proteins are both equal to four calories per gram, whereas fats are equal to nine calories and alcohol is equal to seven calories.
Tissue Loss
During the course of weight loss, it isn't possible to target fat or fat-free weight loss. The human body is complex in that cutting calories alone won't just burn fat. The caloric expenditure required to lose 1 kilogram of body fat is 7,830 and therefore is reasonable to say a caloric deficit through dieting alone won't efficiently do the job. Typically it is necessary to combine regular physical exercise with dietary modifications to enable the body to burn fat-mass in the greatest proportion. Additionally, it requires specific types of exercise to optimize fat utilization as opposed to carbohydrate during activity.
Daily Needs
Even in the midst of a weight loss program it is still essential to consume enough calories to perform the activities of daily living. A minimum of 1,200 calories per day is essential to keep your metabolism functioning at a healthy rate for an average size adult person. Whereas anything less serves to stunt metabolic rate, signaling your body to start storing energy in the form of fat stores and preventing fat tissue loss. However, this value is variable depending on your body size and fitness. For example, an elite athlete because he has more fat-free mass, he requires more calories to maintain that level of lean tissue and therefore would require more than 1,200 calories per day to perform daily activities while still being able to maintain body composition.
Exercise Alone
Weight loss can occur in the absence of regimented dieting that involves caloric restriction if a proper amount of exercise is performed regularly. Researchers published in the journal "Obesity" in 2009 that without changes in diet, overweight or mildly obese individuals have been shown to maintain or lose body weight with a minimum of 180 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise per week. Furthermore, this exercise resulted in significant losses of total body fat mass and reductions in central obesity which is more significant than a pure weight loss value by itself. Caloric needs in these instances did not need to be modified more than what was required to carry out daily tasks.
Final Thoughts
With regard to weight loss, it is necessary to consume enough daily calories to carry out the activities of daily living without over-consuming, or being sedentary where there results in a caloric surplus. A surplus will result in fat storage, whereas an extreme deficit will also result in fat storage, not weight loss. Thus, caloric needs and weight loss are very individual specific based on body type, activity level, and genetics. However, remember that 1 lb. of body weight equals 3,500 calories and that value should be evenly distributed across an entire week for safe healthy weight loss.
References
- "Kinesiology;" How Effective Is Exercise in Producing Fat Loss?; K.T. Borer.; 2008
- "Obesity;" Exercise, Abdominal Obesity, Skeletal Muscle, and Metabolic Risk: Evidence for a Dose Response; C.A. Slentz et al.; 2009
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