The Calorie Myth
You are at the top of your fitness game. Your fitness band takes note of all the calories you burn during those intense workouts. You measure all the calories, macro, and micronutrients in your food via an app.
Life is fine and it seems like a straightforward game, doesn’t it? But wait! There’s a particular “calorie intake myth” going around. Let us help you understand what calories are and what they do in your body. This will help you on your fitness journey and perform better.
A Calorie is a unit defined to measure the amount of energy that is used to heat one kilogram of water one degree Celsius. It was extensively used in engineering and physics before finding its way to food and nutrition via Wilbur Atwater. It started being used to measure the amount of energy any food contains and how your body responds to that energy.
There weren’t too many people around who would know about nutrients and fitness. This leads to the creation of a general belief that said that if you eat foods with too many calories, they will make their way under your skin and be stored up as fat. And if you restrict your calorie intake, you will magically lose weight.
It was simple and sounded logical. Suddenly, all foods had calories in them according to the amount of heat they generated. No difference was made between different food groups, nutrients, food types, and textures.
To everyone’s surprise, this theory was never proven true. This was how a “calorie counting myth” developed. Attaining a fit body was made a game of just measuring the calories you put in and burn out. Food companies benefited from this unproven theory by assigning averages to the ingredients to market their products. So when people started preferring food with zero calories, they thought it would help them lead a fit life.
Different foods are ingested in your body differently and have different satiety levels. Fructose is different from glucose. They provide roughly the same amount of calories but are metabolized differently. Protein makes you fuller and reduces appetite. Low-carb diets are the best, keeping everything in mind. Refined carbohydrates are believed to be bad by all nutritionists and scientists. They are low in fiber and are digested quickly, spiking the blood sugar (High glycemic index).
Eliminating high-calorie foods and fat-based foods is not the right way and will only make you a sick puppy.
Reflect carefully on your food and nutrient choices. Your fitness depends on what you have eaten the whole day and your activity level.
