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Why you can lose weight and still not look any better in the mirror... Japanese researchers have shown that you lose fat from different parts of your body, depending on whether you lose weight with exercise or diet. Where does my body store fat? Exercise, on the other hand, has a greater impact on subcutaneous fat. Subcutaneous fat is stored just under your skin, and has the biggest impact on the way you look. The minor effect of dieting on subcutaneous fat could explain why dieters can lose a lot of weight, but remain unhappy with the way they look. The women in this study took part in a 13-week exercise and diet program. One group followed a low calorie diet, combined with 1-2 days per week of exercise. Group two made no change to their diet, but exercised 3-4 days each week. What's the difference between exercising and dieting? The loss of subcutaneous fat was almost 4 times greater in the women who exercised. Visceral fat loss was greater in the women who dieted. When the results of both groups were combined, the researchers found
a link between exercise frequency and the loss of subcutaneous fat. In
other words, the more often you exercise, the more subcutaneous fat you'll
lose. There was no link between exercise frequency and changes in visceral
fat. In short, if you really want to look good naked, dieting alone isn't enough -- you'll have to exercise! Reference |