A fast moving metabolism is a sign of good health which makes knowing how to improve it extremely valuable. According to the American Council on Exercise, a high metabolism means that your body is better than average at utilizing calories. This results in a healthier weight, more lean muscle and higher amounts of energy throughout the day. If you believe that you may have a disease or condition that is negatively affecting your metabolism, consult your physician immediately.
Resistance Training
According to the American College of Sports Medicine, one of the best and fastest things you can do to boost your metabolism is to do resistance training. Resistance training will help you build lean muscle. The processes that your body uses to build and maintain new muscle mass requires large amounts of energy. As you build more lean mass, your metabolism speeds up in order to keep up with the extra amount energy required to maintain the muscle. Any exercise that works to improve muscle strength will work to help raise your metabolism. In order to maximize your metabolic benefits, it's recommended that you train as many different muscle groups in your body as possible.
Cardiovascular Training
According to the American Council on Exercise, cardiovascular training can help raise your metabolism through respiratory efficiency. As you run or do any other kind of cardiovascular training, your body becomes more efficient at transferring the oxygen from your lungs to your blood cells and then to your other muscles, including your heart. This process requires energy and helps to boost your metabolism. As you continue to train, your heart, muscles and lungs will be able to transfer larger amounts of oxygen, resulting in more energy being used and ultimately a higher metabolism.
Digestion
Digestion will also help speed up your metabolism. According to the National Federation of Professional Trainers, around 10 percent of the calories you burn are just from breaking down food and processing it. This 10 percent can have a big impact on whether or not your metabolism is working as fast as it can. Typically, when you exercise more, you begin to eat more because your body needs extra calories to keep up with energy demands and new muscle you create. Most of these extra calories you eat will go to maintaining your muscle, provided you're eating the right kinds of healthy foods. Eating smaller and more frequent meals spread evenly throughout the day can also help boost your metabolism. The more meals you eat throughout the day, the more often you'll be digesting food and the higher your metabolism will remain.
Sleep
According to the American College of Sports Medicine, getting enough sleep can also help boost your metabolism. Erratic sleep patterns or lack of sleep may lead to sustained periods of high cortisol levels in your body. High levels of cortisol for sustained amounts of time are known to cause an increase in abdominal fat and decrease in muscle tissue. Since muscle tissue is paramount in your metabolic boosting efforts, any hindrance to muscle gain will be counterproductive. Try to sleep at least eight hours a night in order to avoid lasting effects of cortisol in your body.
References
- "Sports Nutrition Manual"; National Federation of Professional Trainers, Mark P. Kelly et al.; 2006
- "ACSM's Resources for the Personal Trainer"; American College of Sports Medicine; 2010
- "American Council on Exercise Personal Trainers Manual"; Cedric X. Bryant; 2003
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