Excess calories eaten during meals are converted to triglycerides and stored in fat cells, explains the American Heart Association. Your body releases triglycerides to help you maintain your energy level between meals. You also access this stored energy when you restrict your diet or increase your level of activity.
The Basics
Your diet provides energy to meet your metabolic and activity needs. The number of calories needed to supply your energy needs depends on several factors, including your weight, sex, age and lifestyle. Very active individuals and athletes generally need a substantially higher number of calories than sedentary or less active individuals. Your body converts any excess calories that you consume into fat, saving it as an energy reserve for later.
From Fat to Fuel
When you lose weight as a result of limiting your caloric intake, exercising or a combination of both, you're actually burning off stored energy. To lose one pound, you have to burn 3,500 calories more than you consume. The energy stored as fat actually breaks down into glycerol and fatty acids that your body absorbs into your liver, kidneys and muscle tissues, where your body processes them into energy, according to MayoClinic.com.
Effects
When your body converts fat into accessible energy, the process generates heat that is used to regulate body temperature, according to MayoClinic.com. Once stored fat is converted to energy, your body uses it to fuel activity and metabolic functions in much the same way it uses immediate energy from food. MayoClinic.com notes that waste material produced during the conversion of body fat into energy, specifically water and carbon dioxide, leaves your body through urine, sweat and exhaling.
Considerations
Exercising is an effective way to burn excess fat, as long as you don't eat more calories than your body uses. During the first 15 to 20 minutes of aerobic activity, your body uses energy from carbohydrates, which is more immediately accessible than energy from protein or fat. After your body uses its immediate store of energy, it starts to burn fat for energy. Similarly, when you reduce your caloric intake by a healthy amount, specifically by 250 to 500 calories per day, you limit the amount of immediately accessible energy, causing your body to convert stored fat into the energy you need to fuel everyday functions and activities.
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