Burn Fat All Day Long with Excess Post Exercise Oxygen Consumption

When someone says you can lose weight even during you are asleep, they are not bluffing! But do consider it a hoax if they are selling you fat-cutter pills and potions! Experts unanimously agree that sound sleep, for not less than 7 hours, is absolutely a must for losing weight, but there is another way to incinerate calories while you are sleeping – and it’s called the “afterburn effect” or EPOC (excess post-exercise oxygen consumption) where your body continues to burn calories long after you have finished the exercise routine, where it does not matter whether you are resting, watching television, or just fast asleep – it solely depends on what kind of exercise you have performed. So, read on to find out how you can burn fat for up to three days with a single routine of workout.

What is EPOC?

EPOC (excess post-exercise oxygen consumption), also called the “afterburn effect” is a state where your body continues to burn calories long after you have finished exercising, to replenish oxygen in the body, to remove lactic acid buildup, repair muscles, and refill ATP (adenosine triphosphate – that is required to provide energy to the body). When we do an intense activity or exercise, the muscles in the body run out of oxygen and normal breathing is unable to meet the oxygen demand from muscles.

This creates an “oxygen debt” which the body settles over the next few hours and expends energy (in the form of calories) to do so. It is believed that the body takes up an excess of 10 liters of oxygen to make up for this debt and spends a considerable amount of calories while doing so.

During this recovery period, the body also clears up lactic acid and repairs muscles – trying everything to bring back the body to the “pre-exercise” or resting condition and continues burning calories long after the exercise session has finished. Research says, with high-intensity exercises, the body remains in “afterburn” for up to 72 hours, and that’s three days straight!

That’s why, HIIT or high-intensity interval training helps the body to burn more fat by incinerating more calories, with a higher post-exercise oxygen consumption rate. In fact, doing just 15-minute of HIIT can burn more calories than running on the treadmill for an hour. HIIT tends to increase VO2 max, which is the body’s ability to use oxygen for energy.

And you what’s best? You do not need to do high-intensity exercises daily, just three to four times during a week is enough, and our body will do the rest during the recovery period. Cycling, swimming, HIIT, are good to create the “afterburn” effect, improve metabolism, and burn more fat.

Since we tend to burn calories even in the resting period, with high-intensity exercises, we can melt fat even while fast asleep.

But, but! In the end, what matters is what you eat and whether you are eating right because weight loss is all about 80% diet and 20% physical activity, so a weight loss diet like the Rati Beauty diet should be given a bigger priority if you want to shave off extra pounds and get fitter.