Foods we eat make a major impact on our metabolism. So, if you want to build a body that is burning fat and building lean muscle, following a certain macro-nutrient profile, one that is giving our bodies the proper fuel to keep us metabolic, is highly important. On that note, here are four ways you can tweak your diet to rev up the metabolism so that you can make the most of your kickboxing workouts! 1. Protein! Protein! Protein! Did you know that protein takes more effort to burn than any other foods and just eating it increases thermogenesis? In fact, it burns 20-30% of our calories. Protein also delivers all of your essential amino acids to help build and maintain lean muscle. Examples of high quality proteins are chicken, fish, eggs, and whey. Let's not forget that protein is a source of our energizing B vitamins, along with muscle building and repairing aminos like leucine and carnosine. 2. Carb Cycling Being more metabolic requires our bodies to become fat adaptive, and that is exactly what carb cycling does! A fat adaptive state is when your body starts to burn fat instead of using carbohydrates for its main energy source. I won't spend too much time on this as there are several variations of carb cycling. Here are the basics: It takes 3 days for your body to reach a fat adaptive state. Start out with a low carb diet 4 to 6 days. On these days 50% of your calories will be protein, 10-20% carbs, and 30-40% fats. We then follow this with one high carb day. 3. Reduce Inflammatory Foods Fat releases inflammatory hormones that can impair insulin function and block our fat burning receptors. When our body cannot process food correctly, this can result in excess sugar in the blood which increases fat, inflammation, and makes us down right sluggish! One way we can ensure we reduce inflammation is to reduce dietary causes of inflammation by weeding out the foods you're sensitive to such as gluten or dairy, as well as reducing sugar and adding more natural fresh foods including fruits and vegetables which contain natural anti-inflammatory
