Silly Number One Fat Loss Secret

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by: Dr. Dennis Clark
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Word Count: 770
Date: Tue, 25 May 2010 Time: 6:47 PM
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Activate The Key Enzyme For How To Lose Stomach Fat

When you want to know how to lose stomach fat, your best friend (or maybe your worst enemy) is an enzyme called lipoprotein lipase (LPL). Its role is to cleave fats from lipoproteins (i.e., proteins that have fat attached to them) known as LDL cholesterol and VLDL cholesterol.

One form of LPL works in fat cells and is activated by insulin. Another form of LPL works in muscle cells and is not activated by insulin. What this means is that when you are well-fed (we all are) and sedentary, more fat will go into your fat cells than into your muscle cells because of where your LPL is working (fat cells) and not working (muscle cells). This explains why eating plenty of food and being inactive makes you fat. No surprise there.

The key, then, is to activate LPL in muscle cells. The good news is that you can do this without exercise. Indeed, for most people, exercise will not be as effective as doing one simple thing: stand up more often.

The Missing Fat Loss Secret Is Simply To Stand Up

Yes, muscle building exercise will raise the levels of LPL and enable muscle cells to take in and burn more fat for energy. However, no amount of exercise will overcome the side effects what most people do, that is, sitting down all day. Only standing up more often will overcome the side effects of sitting down too much.

The important point to grasp here is that being inactive does not have the same effect as sitting down all day. Sitting down too long is much worse.

Likewise, exercise does not have the same effect as standing up. Standing up specifically directs the activation of LPL in muscles that we use for supporting our posture when we are standing up. We do not use them while sitting down, and we do not exercise them when we work out.

Some of the research behind this explanation is astounding. For example, when you sit, the activity of LPL drops more than 90 percent in the muscles that help us stand up. Within 2 hours this shows up as a 20 percent decrease in healthy HDL cholesterol.

Surprising Health Benefits Of Standing

Lean people stand up, on average, for about 2 hours longer than their counterparts. The sitting crowd, on the other hand, has more obesity, more hypertension, higher blood triglycerides, lower blood HDL cholesterol, and higher blood pressure. Finally, older people who move around instead of sitting have half the death rate of their sitting peers.

How else can you benefit from standing more often? Is it not enough to be leaner, have lower triglyceride levels, better blood HDL cholesterol levels, lower blood pressure, and a longer life? In the immortal words of every late night infomercial, Wait, there's more!

No more ‘long-distance flight fat ankle' syndrome. If you sit all day and your ankles swell up, you can retain so much fluid that you can gain 4-5 pounds in one day. Seriously. If you see a puzzling weight gain from one all day sit-down to the next, even if your ankles do not swell up, you are retaining too much fluid.

The explanation for this is that you need enough fluid to keep blood flow going. When everything slows down due to too much sitting, any food you eat will just add to the sludge. Your blood flow becomes more like ketchup than freely flowing blood. Your body's only defense is to hang onto water to keep things moving.

Good News, Bad News

After reading all the above, the good news and bad news is that you have to stand more. This is good news because it is easy to do, and theoretically you should not have to buy any special equipment to do so. (Maybe you will need a stand-up desk, like I do.) The bad news is that you really must do something out of your normal daily activities. And it may seem strenuous at first.

Fortunately, humans evolved to be upright. This means that the muscles that you have for standing up are already there for you. All you have to do to get them in order is stand up more. In fact, once you get them working the way they are supposed to, it won't be so difficult to stand up more every day.

Now go do it, and you will be pleasantly surprised how another daily (standing) activity gets better ... i.e., the one where you stand on the bathroom scale. The number will start to go down.

About the Author

Dr. Dennis Clark is a retired university professor and research scientist, specializing in natural products biochemistry and human health. His scientific analysis of belly fat science is full of pleasant and unpleasant surprises for those who want to lose fat naturally. Get his free scientific report (5 Steps to a Slimmer and Healthier You) on the most important ways to get slimmer permanently, at BellyFatScience.com.