Learn how your metabolism is related to weight loss, and how to increase your metabolic rate to start the new year off with a bang!

Lots of people talk about their metabolism or metabolic rate when they talk about weight loss. But how many people actually know what this is and how to actually maximize it. Your metabolic rate is the rate at which your body burns calories. Here’s some tips on how to maximize your metabolism to start the new year off right!

Water: Dehydration slows down your metabolic rate because the lack of water inhibits the functionality of some vital organs. Water in general will increase your metabolic rate, but cold water will help even more since your body has to heat up the water to reach your internal body temperature. 

Caffeine: caffeine from things like coffee, energy drinks, or tea can temporarily increase your metabolism. The added energy that your body gets from consuming caffeine speeds up all of your body’s natural processes including your metabolism. This spike in metabolic rate is pretty short lived and tend to have an increased affect on leaner individuals.

Spicy: spicy foods, whether you like them or not, can help boost your metabolism when working in tandem with other metabolism boosting foods and drinks. A chemical found in spicy foods, capsaicin, creates temporary boosts in your metabolism similar to caffeine. However, these increases are very small, which is why eating spicy foods helps when working alongside other things that also help boost metabolism.

Consistency: eat consistently throughout the day. Its better for your metabolism to eat a lot of small meals instead of eating fewer large meals throughout the day. Eating constantly means that your body is constantly burning calories rather than trying to do a lot all at once. 

Muscles: simply having more muscle and less fat will increase your metabolic rate, even at rest. Muscles are just more active than fat, and use more energy to maintain themselves in comparison to fat. Pushing yourself to do more high-intensity workouts will push your metabolic rate even higher, and longer after your workout. And while you may think that dieting may help, you are actually hurting your metabolism since you often lose muscle mass by depriving your body of nutrients while dieting.

So if you’re looking to increase your metabolism to make an extra push towards burning those pesky calories to start the new year off right, try out these tips! If you’re trying to take advantage of building muscles in order to increase your metabolism, come by and check us out. One of our trainers would love to help you out! Make 2020 the year of change!