We Promise You'll Lose One (1) Pound!
One Pound Equals 3,500 Calories; Here's How To Get There
Tony Cappasso on health for working people and active families
March 26, 2001, 8:53 a.m. EST
With all the dieting hype -- herbs that supposedly cut the appetite, supplements that "absorb" fat so your body can't digest it, diets that eliminate or severely limit one type of food -- it's sometimes tough to remember that dieting is about energy.
Your weight is directly the result of how much energy -- food -- you take in balanced against how much you burn by walking, raking leaves, swimming, etc. Changing that balance causes weight to go up or down. Here's the important number to remember:
3,500
That's how many calories it takes to add a pound of weight, and that's how many you'd have to trim out of your daily diet to lose a pound.
Minus 3,500
Cutting calories is easier said than done, nutrition experts at Mayo Clinic admit, but not as hard as it's made out to be by salesmen hyping quick weight-loss fixes.
Here are some simple ways to shed some calories before they end up on your hips or thighs:
- Get some -- guess what? -- exercise.
Walking about 4 mph for two miles will burn around 150 calories. - Cut the fat when you cook.
One easy way: Don't fry, saute or bread your foods. Instead, choose baking, grilling or broiling. That could cut up to 300 calories daily. - Don't skip meals; eat smaller portions.
Reducing a serving of red meat from 8 ounces to 3 ounces shaves off as many as 300 calories. - Avoid snacks.
Forgoing that candy car in the afternoon, for example, could save you 250 calories.
How many calories are burned by various activities
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