How Does Your Body Actually Burn Calories?

How Does your Body Actually Burn Calories?

There are four components that contribute to calorie burn in the human body:

Exercise Activity Thermogenesis (EAT), 5-10%

EAT = any sort of structured workout: group fitness class, pumping iron, going for a run, playing sports.

As you can see, this is the smallest piece of the calorie burn pie, even though most assume it's the largest contributor.

Exercise of all kinds is crucial to a healthy lifestyle. If we wanna talk longevity, it's likely the number 1 factor.

Lifting weights is necessary to maintain and build muscle.

Cardio is extremely important for cardiovascular and mental health.

But neither play a major role in weight management, or calorie burn.

Thermic Effect of Food (TEF), 10%

This is the energy your body expends during the process of ingesting, absorbing, metabolizing, and storing nutrients from food.

In other words, it requires energy for your body to digest the foods you eat.

This accounts for 10% of the calorie burn pie - still relatively small, but it's actually greater than exercise.

However, not all foods are created equal in this regard.

Here's a quick macro comparison for the thermic effect of food:

Fat provides 9 calories per gram. Its TEF is 0-5% Carbohydrate provides 4 calories per gram. Its TEF is 5-15% Protein provides 4 calories per gram. Its TEF is 20-30%

The higher the percentage, the better. So as always, protein is king.

What this actually means is that for every calorie of protein your body consumes, it burns ~25% of it during the digestion process.

So in terms of net calorie intake, when consuming protein, it's actually ~75% of your total calories consumed. Pretty awesome stuff.

Fat, on the other hand, scores the worst here. Almost no calories are burned during the digestion process.

Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis (NEAT), 15%

NEAT is the energy expended during non-exercise, day to day activities like walking, using a standing desk, fidgeting, etc.

This accounts for ~15% of your daily calorie burn, which is greater than exercise and the thermic effect of food.

Walk more. Stand more. Move more. Sit less.

It will do more for your fat loss goals over time than your Barry's Bootcamp Class.

Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR), 60-70%

BMR, or the amount of energy required to keep bodily functions processing at rest, is by far the biggest piece of the calorie burn pie, accounting for 60-70%.

When people talk about their metabolism generally, this is what's being referred to.

So that begs the question, how does one improve their BMR?

The number 1 way is to build muscle mass.

Want to burn calories while you sleep? Then build muscle. Muscle burns calories while at rest.

Strength training also has a post-exercise calorie burning effect known as post-exercise oxygen consumption (EPOC). To summarize it, after intense strength training workouts, the body requires more oxygen to restore its resting state, resulting in additional calories burned post-exercise.

This is a huge reason why you should always prioritize strength training at the gym.

Here are other ways to boost your BMR: - Consume a diet full of nutrient dense foods that are high in protein - Prioritize Sleep - Prioritize Hydration - Minimize Stress

We just broke down the entire calories out part of the equation. The calories in piece, i.e. your nutrition, mostly in terms of total calories and protein consumed, will always play the biggest role in fat loss.

But hopefully this has given you an idea of other levers you can pull.

Stay well this week, Hal the Health Coach