Metabolic Rate   

Metabolic rate / metabolism is the process whereby the body converts food into energy (or uses it for bodily repairs) or stores it as fat for future use. In simple terms:

• Faster metabolic rate - burn calories more efficiently and store less fat.

• Slower metabolic rate - burn calories less efficiently and store more calories as fat.

Metabolic Rate and Calorie Usage

The Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) is the amount of energy (in calories) your body needs just to sustain its basic life processes. If you took no exercise at all and lay still, in bed all day, you would still expend this energy. Your BMR is the single biggest component in the amount of calories that you use every day.

If you are an exercise nut, it can be 60 percent of all the calories that you use in a day, but if you are a couch potato, that rises to 80 percent of daily calorie expenditure

Hence the effect the BMR has on your body, slimming advice, weight gain or loss and looks can not be overstated.

What Affects BMR ?

Health & Nutrition - BMR is governed by thousands of separate chemical reactions. To perform this process efficiently, our body needs a constant supply of nutrients. Without these nutrients (like vitamins and minerals, esp. vitamins B2, B3, B5, B6 & vitamin C) BMR can become inefficient and sluggish. The best way to ensure good dietary nutrition is to follow a balanced diet.

Eating Frequency - Our BMR increases during digestion of food, a process known as the Thermal Effect of food. In simple terms, if we go too long without food (5 hours for men; 3 hours for women), our body thinks there is a food shortage and our body tends to slow down.

Muscle - Muscle cells are about 8 times more metabolically demanding than fat cells. So the greater the our proportion of muscle to fat, the faster our rate.

Exercise - and physical work burn calories. However, the effect continues for several hours afterwards during which time we continue to burn energy faster

Age - As we age, our calorie needs decrease. Our BMR drops around 2% every 10 years. 

Genetic makeup - Some people have a naturally faster metabolism.

The weather - Living in a cold environment can increase your RMR. You expend more energy while moving around in cold weather.  It's a lot easier to move around in summer but more of an effort to "get going" in winter.

Conscious State - BMR slows down when you sleep and rises when you wake.

Hormones - Some surveys have found that BMR dips just before ovulation, and at menstruation, then it starts to rise when the body temperature climbs. Menopause causes the BMR to slow down.

More information

How to boost your metabolic rate

Thyroid and Slow Metabolism examples

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