The Performance Food guide to body fat reduction

Forget fad diets and say goodbye to yo-yo dieting- Our action plan can help you to reduce body fat safely and protect against loss of lean muscle mass. The key to long-term weight control is making several small changes that count on a day to day basis.

Setting a realistic fat loss goal

A sensible goal is to reduce body fat by 0.5-1.0 kg per week, which will require a saving of between 3,500 – 7,000 calories. Where possible it is preferable to make these calorie savings from dietary fat. This amounts to eating between 389-778gms less fat per week, or between 55.5 and 111gms less fat per day!

Avoid fad diets and extreme weight loss programmes

Sports performers are advised to avoid crash diets, fad diets, very low calorie diets, diets with a very low carbohydrate level, and approaches, which restrict fluid intake.

This is because such weight loss strategies can result in:-

• Increased loss of lean body mass
• Lower resting metabolic rate
• Low blood sugar levels and impaired cognitive function
• Plasma volume loss and susceptibility to heat illness
• Reduced performance
• Increased food cravings leading to
  • Diet binge syndrome
  • Weight cycling

Performance food fat reduction planner

Keep a food diary and check how much fat you are having from foods and drinks by using the information on food labels and packets. Performance Food members can also visit the virtual supermarket and use the booklet Performance Food booklet: Food facts for athletes and sportspeople.

Click here to download your FREE Record Sheet

Food diary

Click here to download your FREE Food Record Sheet!

Guidelines for filling in the Foods Record Sheets:-

1. Use 1 sheet each day
2. Record foods and drinks consumed in the food choices column
3. Where possible enter the portion/serving size or volume of fluid
4. Using the nutritional information from the food label enter the energy, protein, carbohydrate and fat content of your portion in the appropriate columns (see example below)
5. Add up your daily intake of energy (calories), and fat (gms). Then use the Performance Food Fat Calculator to assess the % of your total energy intake from fat.
   

Example:-

Performance food fat calculator

What % of your calories are you eating as fat?

For example a daily fat intake of 70gms, and an energy intake of 2000 calories means that the % energy eaten as fat is 31.5%.

How low should you go?
Guidelines for healthy eating recommend that total fat intake is 30% or less of the total number of calories consumed.

Athletes and sportspeople aiming to achieve greater reductions in body fat levels should lower total fat intake to 20% of total calories per day.

Setting dietary goals for fat reduction

1. Aim to reduce your daily intake of dietary fat by approximately 50gms. This will result in an energy (calorie) saving of about 450kcals per day, and 3150kcals per week. This should help you to lose about 0.5 kg per week providing you do not increase your energy intake by eating more protein, and/or carbohydrate than you need or by consuming alcohol to excess.
2. Use the personal action plan (below) to help you identify food swaps to reduce fat. Add up your daily fat saving.
3. Try to ensure that you continue to match your carbohydrate requirements at the same time as reducing your fat intake.
   

Personal action plan to reduce daily fat intake

Click here to download your FREE Personal Action Plan to reduce daily fat intake (Download as an Adobe Acrobat PDF file)

For example:-

• By switching from a packet of crisps to a banana you save 12gms fat
• By swapping 2 chocolate digestives for 2 jaffa cakes a saving of 5gms fat can be made
• Replacing carbonarra sauce for tomato based sauce with pasta saves an amazing 27gms fat (based on a 200gm serving of sauce)
• Choosing 2 slices malt loaf instead of a doughnut saves 10gms fat

Food swaps to reduce fat

Swap a pasty for a ham sandwich and save an amazing 37gms of fat.

For more ideas on food swaps to reduce fat intake refer to the following Performance Food booklet and Fact Sheets:

Food facts for athletes and sportspeople

The performance food star-rating guide will enable you to identify more food swaps to save fat at a glance.  Click the images to download...

Food fact sheet 1: Carbohydrate ready reckoner	Food fact sheet 2: How do your snack choices rate?	Food fact sheet 3: How do your cake and biscuit choices rate?
Food fact sheet 4: How do your pizza choices rate?	Food fact sheet 5: How do your salad dressings and ready prepared salads rate?	Food fact sheet 6: How do your sauces rate?
Food fact sheet 7: How do your sandwich choices rate? (ready made & home-made)