So far in my articles I have shown you that not changing your exercise and other training variables frequently will stall your fat loss efforts. I have also shown you that being dehydrated and consuming carbohydrates before and during exercise will limit your fat oxidation. Today I’m going to show you how you can increase fat oxidation at rest and during exercise with fish oil.
One of the first studies to show the fat loss effects of fish oil in humans at rest was published back in 1997. In this 12 week study, the objective was to investigate whether the substation of fish oil for visible fats influenced body fat mass and substrate utilization in six healthy adults (5 men, 1 woman).throughout the 12 week study, participants ingested a diet consisting of 52% carbohydrates, 32% fat, and 16% protein, but at week 9 some of the participants were asked to substitute 6 grams from their diet with 6 grams of fish oil for the remaining 3 weeks.
The results: Substituting 6 grams of visible fat by fish oil over three weeks reduced body fat mass and increased basal lipid oxidation. Body weight didn’t reduce much during the study, but body fat did, showing that fish oil can manipulate the partitioning of fat between oxidation and storage (positive calorie partitioning).Resting metabolic rate was approximately 4% higher (burning more calories during the day). Protein and carbohydrate oxidation were also lower in the fish oil group (burning less protein and carbohydrate calories throughout the day and more fat). This last affect will help during your workouts, but I will explain that in a future write up.
Can fish oil help you burn fat during a workout? A study done 6 years ago looked at supplemental fish oil to assess the effects of acute and chronic fish oil supplementation on fat oxidation during exercise during a high fat diet. The study design wont interest you much so I will keep it short and get to the results. The researchers report that 4 grams of fish oil per day for three weeks increased fat oxidation during exercise.
What’s the take home message? Two studies, one high in carbs and no exercise, another high in fat but with exercise, shows that fish oil can help you burn more fat. Both of these diets are not conducive to fat loss, but as you can see, the fish oil acts as a strong positive partitioning agent and I would strongly recommend you take a high quality fish oil supplement for both health and fat loss purposes. I believe so strongly in the power of fish oil that a few years ago, one of my clients was a major owner of one of the world’s biggest fish oil manufacturing companies, and that allowed me to get as much free fish oil as I wanted for all my clients. It didn’t take long for everyone to get hooked on it once they seen the results.
In the future I will discuss the many mechanisms of which fish oil can help burn fat and increase muscle mass. This is what I call one of those best bang for the buck supplements. If you would like to know more about the benefits of fish oil before I present them on this page I recommend you read Omega Rx by Dr Barry sears, the author of The Zone. It’s a bit dated, so see if your library has it. Be warned though, some of Dr. Sears recommendations can be borderline crazy (manipulating prostaglandins), and he does sell fish oil at a price that will make you put a second mortgage on the house. If you’re interested in buying fish oil but confused about which brand and how much it should cost, please send me an email telling me what country you live in and I will do my best to help you.
